Happy Weekend! In one of my greater strokes of genius, I recently got a bit adventurous with my blender and threw in the only fruits I had in my fridge:
Quarter of a watermelon
Juice of one lemon
6 oz. blueberries
And so, I found myself sitting at my desk at 12:30 on a Friday, sipping on an organic, all-natural slurpee. The only thing that would have made it better was some Grey Goose.
And now you know MY weekend plans…
I fell in love with her courage, her sincerity, and her flaming self respect. And it’s these things I’d believe in, even if the whole world indulged in wild suspicions that she wasn’t all she should be. I love her and it is the beginning of everything.
~F. Scott Fitzgerald
Right, so – next week, The Great Gatsby comes out in theaters everywhere. Leo, darling Leo, BE STILL MY HEART. And along that vein, I figured: what better way to end this [gorgeous, sunny, breezy] Friday than with a little inspiration from the author himself, a little you-are-beautiful message, and perhaps just the right dose of What-Would-Emily A.-Say (trust me, I play this game way too often, and miss her weekly digests on this blog so much these days). Fitzgerald ‘s words kind of grabbed me this afternoon, and made me want to be the woman he spoke of. Courageous, self-respecting and sincere? Those are a few of the most beautiful things to see in another human soul.
And so – here’s to all you ladies out there. Stay courageous, stay strong, stay beautiful in every way that you are.
And for gosh sake, have a wonderful weekend!
feeling giddy and strong today – visiting the Museum site to see the progress and celebrate the gorgeous weather
Well this circulated my office on two different email chains before 10:00am, and I decided that perhaps I’d just throw it out there for the LiL crowd to reflect upon as well:
It was sent out under the title “I never thought a 1 minute video could punch me in the heart yet here we are”…
Ohhh, coworkers.
So here’s the Friday Challenge to go along with the Favorite – how WOULD the world be different if some of these amazing champions of human and civil rights were still around? What would they say about the current state of things? What would they do to try and help? How would they continue to the change the world?
And what can YOU do to honor their efforts and continue to move us forward as a global society?
“We are the ones we have been waiting for.”
Happy Friday!
Posted in Emily D., Our Favorite Things
Emily
Man it’s been a while, but without a doubt, my favorite thing recently is Seattle. I went out there last weekend (for the first time) to see a dear friend for her (25th!) birthday, and I simply fell in love with that city. Rain? Bring it on. I’ll take that and temperate weather over DC’s humidity and zany meteorological mood swings. We crammed a lot into those four days – from touristy things like the Space Needle and Pike Place Market + the original Starbucks and the flagship Nordstrom, to museums (Chihuly Garden, Frye Art Museum, and Olympic Sculpture Park), to amazing food at Revel, Beecher’s, Local 360, Top Pot, Piroshky Piroshky and Brave Horse Tavern, to a bit of antiquing and wine tasting and spontaneous paddle-boarding in Lake Washington… god, Seattle, you were awesome. And so, you are by far my favorite thing this week. I’ll be back soon.
apparently I blew up a few Instagram feeds with my insane documentation of the weekend…
Denise:
Because it’s been far too long since we’ve been disciplined enough to do a group post (booo, us!), my mental list of random links has piled up to new heights of awesomeness. I feel I have no other choice but to list them off rapid fire. Here goes…
And, I would be remiss not to mention my newest obsession (not that I needed another one)…
Oh my goodness. Words cannot express my love for this show. Thank you, Netflix, for allowing me to watch entire seasons of amazing sitcoms in embarrassingly short periods of time. This show features everything I could possible want in entertainment; the protagonist is an overly idealistic government employee (Can you see why I identify with it now?), the show uses a libertarian as comedic relief, it features adorable NERD LOVE (Ben and Leslie = cutest TV couple), and some of greatest one liners come from the office intern, April – perhaps one of the most realistic media portrayals of an intern…ever.
Posted in Our Favorite Things
by Emily
…but that doesn’t stop me from diagnosing myself via WebMD like a maniac, or picturing Joceline every time I see Tumblr posts about prolapsed uteruses (uteri? uterum?)
In other news, I had froyo three separate times yesterday. According to WebMD me, that means my uterus just happens to run on pure sugar.
And with all these happy thoughts about reproductive organs, I’ll throw in a cat tote…
via Scoutmob
…and a cute ballet video…
…and just call it a day. Happy Friday!
Posted in Emily D., Our Favorite Things
by Emily
My favorite things this week are:
The Invisible Helmet
This video (courtesy of a friend):
…anddd my newly re-discovered Stephen Kellogg and the Sixers CD, “The Bear” – courtesy of my lovely friend Amanda and her amazing music taste. Check out my current favorites: Shady Esperanto and the Young Hearts and Oh, Adeline.
In other news, I successfully completed my 10K run and 45 mile bike ride this past weekend! More on that later but… here are a few sweet pics to tide you over!
getting ready to take off!
my bike shoes, 45 (which actually turned out to be 50) miles later!
post-10K run with my sister
andddd a fun one from the weekend. behold, my running partner. 57-minute 10K, yo!
That’s all, kids. I’m off to sleep under my desk for the rest of the afternoon.*
Denise: OK, so this technically happened last week, but…
I love Ingrid Michaelson. Emily D., Meg, myself, and a few others packed a picnic and enjoyed her concert at Wolf Trap.
Old friends + great music + wine = a perfect summer evening
Her voice is divine, isn’t it? Her songs give me chills.
Emily: one of my favorites this week is this recipe that Denise and I made with some friends on Tuesday night (our adaptation here) while we watched the Olympics. Selfishly, this is a favorite because I got to eat the leftovers for lunch the rest of the week. My other favorite, like the rest of America… and, well, the world – are THE OLYMPICS. duh.
I’m not going to elaborate on any more feelings about the Olympics, because I’m pretty sure we’re all sick of everyone sharing a personal narrative of what we are ALL thinking already (minus Joce’s awesome post yesterday, that is!). I will point you to this, though.
Posted in Our Favorite Things
Joceline: This week I love Vietnamese summer rolls. They’re pretty much a fresh version of fried spring/eggrolls, and thus far I’ve always thought of them as a “mom” food–aka, too fussy to make on my own, better leave it to my mom to assemble all the ingredients at home. But that was until I realized you just chop up some fresh veggies and go at it, family style, at the table! Easy peasy.
You start with dry rice paper–it looks a little like a plastic placemat.
Plop on your veggies and some rice noodles (cook these like normal pasta). Veggies include cucumber, carrots, cilantro, mint, and avocado.
Add some shrimp and roll it up like a little Vietnamese burrito! Dip in soy sauce or an awesome peanut dipping sauce (hoisin sauce + peanut butter + milk to taste). Delicious.
Posted in Our Favorite Things
Joceline: My best friend brought me french macarons! And it took me about 15 minutes to eat all 6.
Also, this weekend is Charlottesville’s Disneyland, aka the Foxfield Races. Sadly I’m on call, but hopefully Emily D. is pumped to descend on the happiest tailgate on Earth…
You can't see the seersucker from here, but it's rampant.
Words. Cannot. Express.
Denise: My favorite thing this week is, without a doubt, Trader Joe’s cookie butter. GET SOME.
A: I’m channeling Joce this week, and my favorite thing is
Oh hi, you're beautiful!
Flowers! I got a beautiful bouquet from the Board of Directors at my org, another from my lovely Pops, and more from my boss and his wonderful wife. They totally cheered me up when I was all post-surgery and cranky : ) Plus, they’re sproutin’ out like crazy around Portland and generally just beautifying the city/my life.
And not to get all schmoop-facey, but serious props this week to The Raddest of Boyfriends. Bonus FF’s are earned by people who make scary things un-scary. Deal with it.
Posted in Our Favorite Things
My favorite thing this Friday – and many other fridays – is a big ole’ plate of huevos rancheros. With lots of cheese, lots of black beans, pico or a salsa that isn’t too runny, soft-medium poached eggs, cilantro to burn, and a giant blob of sour cream. And HOT SAUCE.
and a bloody mary.
mmmmmmmmm, brunch, I salute you.
Posted in Emily A., Our Favorite Things, Uncategorized
My Friday favorite today is this recipe for banana pecan pancakes.
I cut the vinegar, used water instead of soymilk (because I was out and too lazy to get more) and added a heaping quarter cup of dark chocolate chips.
The results were fluffy delightful deliciousness that I ate too quickly to photograph, and a leftover giant batch of batter to eat more throughout the weekend.
Muahahahahahahaaaa
HAPPY WEEKEND!
Posted in Emily A., Our Favorite Things
Joceline: Okay, I have a confession. I hate clicking on other people’s youtube links. Music, fun clips, whatever, I’m just so lazy about clicking them. Unless there is an animal in it.
But the rash of Shit [Some People] Say videos? I’ll watch them all, happily. Especially this one: “Does anyone know how I can make Papyrus my default font?”
.
Denise: The Washington Post gathered up some D.C. themed Valentines Day messages from readers…and they are awesome. Some of my swoon-worthy favorites include:
Will you [bike]share your life with me?
A landmark ruling from the highest court: “Our love overturns all precedents.”
NE, SE, NW, SW…You fill every quadrant of my heart!
My love for you is like track maintenance: never-ending.
You occupy 99 + 1 percent of my heart!
Be my First Lady.
You’ve traveled my beltway at record speed.
Emily D: Last night I was enjoying cupcakes and a glass of wine with my sister at my favorite local bakery/wine bar establishment, when I caught site of this amazing work of art displayed in the shop. I’m pretty sure Gracie thinks I am a freak, but I just couldn’t stop giggling.
Quality local artists, yo.
I also made a batch of my new favorite edamame hummus recipe to share at work today (PS: If you decide to make this, I recommend reducing the salt and olive oil by half). And Denise and I are doing some vegan baking tonight. This is the Friday Food post, right guys? Right?
A:
Coconut water. I don’t even like coconut, and I’m suckin’ this stuff down like the life-giving elixir it is. I love water (this is no surprise) and I love coffee for many reasons, only one of them being that it provides insta-energy. Well coconut water is essentially water that provides energy (!!!!!!!!!!!!!) without involving 9 gazillion grams of sugar in the process. I drink some at work and my need for coffee after 2 disappears. Miracles. They happen.
Posted in Our Favorite Things, Uncategorized
Denise: This is pretty accurate. What say you, Emily D?
Joceline: Learned to make this ingenious and sparkly bit of jewelry this past week–the Wrap Bracelet from Honesty WTF. Now, I know not everyone has rhinestone chain and leather cording lying around, but the concept is simple–use any type of stiff-ish cord or doubled-up yarn for the backing, something shiny for the accent beads (you could string your own beads and wrap them, or chain, or even colored string), and then thread or embroidery floss for the wrap.
Emily D: Besides squealing for joy every… 5 minutes… in regards to my new (old) job that starts in one week back at NMAAHC, my favorite thing is trolling Etsy for fun yarn-related inspiration and pretty things in general. Among my favorites today are these gloves (for serious. I’m making my own version this weekend. Emily A – get your crafty butt in gear and join me!) and anything in the shop 1canoe2… but especially the Virginia print below.
a single girl's smittens.
I recently found myself explaining to a male.. "prospect".. in a bar as to why Virginia is the most superior state. Home to eight presidents, a top wine-producing locale, foundation of the 13 colonies... need I go on?
Posted in Our Favorite Things
Since I just can’t seem to get enough of blogging this week, I decided to blog on behalf of the entire Life in Labels crew today and share what I believe everyone’s current favorites are. I’ll start with me, because I am self centered like that.
Emily D: My favorite thing to look at is new fads in China, including ones where everyone pretends to have a pet panda. My least favorite thing is thinking about the poor animals, so I’ve been trying to be less humane as part of my new year’s resolutions in order to enjoy these photos more.
Chow Chow or.... PANDA???
Joceline’s favorite thing right now is old people. Particularly those featured on itsanoldperson.com
LiL rolls deep.
Denise’s favorite thing this week is Nyquil. As I type this, Denise is probably sitting at her desk downtown, resembling something like a too-old David After the Dentist while watching her cubicle spin madly around her. Don’t worry, America, our government has hired only the most capable of minds to preserve the internets.
THROWBACK!!!!!
Finally, Emily A’s favorite thing right now is Emilies, in case you can’t tell from her post on Tuesday. In fact, Life in Labels’ favorite thing this week also seems to be Emilies, as you can see from our first-week-of-resolutions word cloud (whaddup, technology?) below. Who can blame us – Emilies are a an excellent group, if we do say so ourselves (and we do).
we are SO popular. also, please note that contrary to popular belief around my office, word clouds are not simply text boxes with spaced-out words in them.
Now that I have filled your head with plenty of interesting things for the weekend, including my subliminal messaging about the awesomeness associated with my name, I will leave you with one final self-promotion favorite:
Meet Pipkin, a bunny that I adopted 3 years ago today. We had a wonderful two weeks together before I realized he was a holy terror and returned him. So another one of my favorite things about today is that I do not have a bunny anymore.
Posted in Our Favorite Things
Denise: I have TWO favorite things this week. My first favorite thing is this Sara Bareilles cover of Joni Mitchell’s “River.” Now, I normally don’t appreciate covers of this particular song…you know, because only Joni can sing it. Still, I can’t help but click the replay button.
My second favorite thing (thing…obsession...whatever…) is rather tasty:
Take some of the cherry/grape variety, cut in half, de-seed, sprinkle with garlic, thyme, salt, pepper, and olive oil. Bake at 325 for an hour. You're welcome.
A: Christmas Gretchen. My Grandma has a duck doorstop at her house named Gertrude/”Gertie” and a couple years ago she got me Gretchen, “Gertie’s cousin.” At a little work soiree dealie this week, the VP on our Board of Directors decked me out in some sparkly and otherwise-festive garb (evidently, I am the PlayWrite office elf…), and after the fact it was a no brainer that it would go to Gretchen, who usually sits outside my door with a pink boa. Christmas Gretchen, everybody.
Have a quacktastic Quistmas!
Em D: This week (and every week), I simply cannot get enough of HOLIDAY MUSIC, whether it’s a hip pre-made playlist, or sappy old Christmas songs from my childhood, or the most AMAZING new Christmas album from a favorite artist (She & Him FTW) that maybe I’m listening to on repeat….
Joceline: Eggnog. Yes, it’s pretty much melted vanilla ice cream. I don’t care. I could chug it. Happy Weekend you guys!
Posted in Our Favorite Things
Well, it’s that blessed time again–the weekend! Here’s what we’ve been excited about:
Joceline: Ai Wei-Wei’s installation, “Sunflower Seeds”, at the British art museum the Tate Modern. I don’t usually feel like I “get” most modern art. I think it’s cool to look at, sure, but I have to read the artist’s explanation to really say, “Oooh, I understand that.”
But this? Artist Ai Wei-Wei commissioned craftsmen from a porcelain-making town in China to make 100 MILLION tiny, hand-painted porcelain sunflower seeds. They’re raked out in Turbine Hall for visitors to walk over, pick up, and stand in the middle of 1600 people’s painstaking work. It really hits home the impact made by combining a huge number of tiny, tiny parts of people’s lives into one breathtaking whole.
From the review I read, which puts it better than I could: "Every unique seed is homogenized into a sifting mass. Most contemporary Chinese art is a product made for western consumption, just as willow-pattern plates or porcelain vases were shipped out in huge quantities for the western market."
Denise: My favorite thing? Stephen Colbert dancing ballet! You know what? His form is quite impressive. For the love of Christmas, click on the link and watch the video. You won’t regret it. Words cannot describe…
A: Well I for one have just had a blast watching Rick Perry shoot himself in the foot run for President. His acts of political suicide have simply delighted me to no end, and the resulting memes thrill me to my very toes.
Thanks a mil, Rick.
Voldemort Perry has me giggling
wrote itself...
My personal favorite is Rick Perry’s Unpopular Opinions, featuring such gems as “Cats have no place on the internet.”
Supplying me with endless lols and I didn’t even have to ask…what a patriot.
Posted in Our Favorite Things
