Blog Spotlight V.1

This is a new feature I'll be doing in the new year, and I thought I would give it a little jump start today!  Every couple of weeks I will be featuring one of my favorite blogs- I'll be telling you about them, what I love about them, and linking you of course, so you can hopefully check them out too!  I follow a LOT of really amazing blogs, both with huge followings and also some that are just starting out.  I think it's super important to kind of "share the love" in the blogging community, and support each others' efforts rather than be negative.  So with that said, I'm excited to promote some of the lovely women I know, not because they're sponsoring me, or vice versa, but because I genuinely love what they create and want to shout it to the rooftops.

 

The very first blog I'm excited to talk about, is the internet home of one of the loveliest women I know via the computer.  We've been friends online for some time now, and she's always been the sweetest thing; kind, caring and passionate about life.  Over the years I've always absolutely loved reading her blog and I always enjoy all of the things she posts about.  This darling lady's name is Megan and you can find her via her Tumblr- http://meganislove.tumblr.com.  I actually featured her on a previous Tattoo Tuesday post too.  If you don't read her blog I definitely suggest you head over her way and say hello!  She posts a lot of inspirational things, from food to family, and a little birdie told me (okay, she posted about it yesterday), that in the new year she will be turning her Tumblr into a fully functioning blog!  Awesome.  So if you're looking for a new blog to read, one that will inspire you to eat healthier, love deeper, and have more fun...one full of beautiful photos capturing the life of a little family and their daily world, then hop, skip, and jump right over and say hello to my friend Megan!

 ...and p.s. Happy last day of 2010!  I'll be back later today or tomorrow with my goals post. xo

A Slice of...Columbia, South Carolina!

Hey y'all!

I’m Camille from Columbia, SC and camilleyanair.blogspot.com and I’m here to try to convince you I’m not a hick! J I’ve lived in Columbia my whole life, and now I live here with my New Jersey transplant boyfriend (once you come here, you never wanna leave J)  and our crazy dog Lola!

When most people hear of Columbia, SC (if they’ve ever heard of it), they think of backwards, slow speaking, hicks who eat fried chicken for every meal. I’m not gonna lie, our fried chicken is TO DIE FOR.

** (especially at Zesto’s, where they cook the chicken and fries in peanut oil!)

My friends from “up north” say my voice sounds like a banjo, but that’s where the stereotypes end. Columbia is about an hour from the beach, and an hour from the mountains, making it the perfect place to live if you love road trips. You can go hiking or surfing, any weekend, as long as you don’t mind a little drive.

Another great thing about Columbia is all the history that surrounds it. Separating Columbia from the western side of the state are a couple of rivers, which are now used to go tubing down during the incredibly hot summers.

However, during the Civil War, these rivers are what separated Sherman and his northern troops from the heart of Columbia and it’s State House(which they were trying to take over/burn down ). To keep the State House from being destroyed, the Southern troops built protective walls out of the trunks of Palmetto trees (which cannon balls bounced off of).  That’s why we’re the “Palmetto State” and why you see Palmetto trees all over everything.

Another awesome thing about Columbia is our size, it’s supposedly a “city” but it’s the smallest city I’ve ever seen. You know someone everywhere you go, it appears waaay bigger than it is. The bridge pictured here is the one going over the river where a big part of the civil war was fought, see the State House dome in the distance? (fun fact: my Dad helped build the two tallest buildings on the skyline)

My absolute favorite thing about Columbia (and something that you’ll never know unless you visit a game or live here) is how football and fashion go hand in hand. Football in the South is right up there with religion, it’s a BIG deal. Every Saturday in the Fall, 85,000 people can be found at Williams-Brice Stadium, watching the USC Gamecocks play football. (To put this in perspective-Columbia’s population is 116,000)

The thing that makes these games so fun is the dresses. It’s a tradition for girls to wear a dress to the game, either garnet or black, no matter what the weather. (It was 29 degrees at the game this weekend, and all the girls wore dresses anyway). I design dresses out of recycled materials and below is a dress from a show I did that would be perfect for a gameday in 100 degree games in September.

 Oh, and Danielle, this if for you!

I know Columbia is a lot different from a lot of the places featured on  “A Slice Of…” but I appreciate Danielle letting me show a place that’s quite different. Ya’ll please lemme know if you wanna come visit!

Peace, Love, & Grits
Camille

Why hello Thursday!

 

Good morning! I wanted to make a quick hello post before I jet offline to conquer my huge to-do list (including finishing up my goals post and publishing my Slice of feature this evening!) but I thought I'd pop in for a little hi and hello!  I've been feeling very under the weather for the past day or two but this morning my congestion has cleared a bit and I'm feeling a pinch better.  Or actually, a few pinches better. It's amazing what four whole hours of sleep will do for you when you're used to two to three.  I am just beyond excited for this New Year's Eve and I'm sure that has something to do with my extra high spirits.  My boys and I (ahh I love saying that) will be enjoying a very quiet evening at home with just us, and our plan is to watch all three Toy Story movies.  Can you believe I've never seen ANY of them?!  When Hank realized this he was appalled and we decided we will be toasting the New Year with our traditional sparkling cider as well as a little movie marathon.  I managed to record 1 and 2 earlier this week and Netflix delivered 3 yesterday.  I'm excited! 

I hope all of you have a wonderful Thursday- I have so many fun things to share in the upcoming weeks and I'm really looking forward to it.  Happy day to all of you!

xoxo

wonderful Tuesday

red lipstick kinda day!

Yesterday was such a wonderful day.  I slept in a little bit with Henry, and then headed downtown to meet up with Amber and Adie for some girl time.  Henry came along too, but he didn't mind the girl talk and chit chat one bit. ;)  We ate lunch at Esoji, and I had sushi for the first time since I became pregnant.  It was absolutely delicious and I forgot how much I enjoy miso soup and a rainbow roll- the perfect lunch in my opinion!  I was so happy because H. didn't make a peep the entire time we were in the restaurant outside of happy little smiles and sighs, and the whole experience was really fantastic.  I still have that new mama anxiety about taking him places (especially restaurants) and having the fear that he'll cry and I'll have to leave.  But he was awesome, and we even went to Starbucks afterward.  All in all it was a lovely day and it feels so good to get back into the swing of things with my friends, and also to just feel "normal," after not going out very much over the past month.  It was so nice to spend time with my darling ladies and I'm so happy Amber is in town for a few more days.

It's hard to believe that 2011 is upon us, and I'm looking forward to making some goals to start the year off on a positive foot.  I actually really enjoy making New Year's Resolutions and I typically stick to them, surprisingly.  I think I just like any excuse to make lists, to be honest! haha.  But I will definitely be sharing my 2011 goals before the week is over, and they include both personal and blog goals.  One goal I can share now is getting back into taking photos more often.  It was easy to fall out of taking my camera everywhere with me while I was pregnant, but I definitely need to get back into the swing of things.  And speaking of getting back into the swing of things, I have one more guest post to share with all of you on Friday (originally it was going to be yesterday but I had other things to post), and then I won't have those posts to rely on anymore.  It is harder to find time to blog with little H. being my priority now, but it's not impossible and because I find blogging to be relaxing and quite the de-stressor, I make it a daily "must do."  It will be nice to return to more day to day posts, and start working on a few longer posts I have rolling around in my head.

Well, sleep is calling so I hope all of you have the best Wednesday.  Enjoy your day! xo

 

 Amber and Adie :)

Christmas week

This past week has been filled with so much wonderful-ness (is that a word? If not, it should be!).  We've had quite a few friends in town, we've been able to spend time with lots of family, and we've pretty much been on a holiday high for the past week.  Plus, Henry has added a whole new level of AWESOME to all things Christmas.  I keep thinking forward to next year when he is 13 months old and how amazing that will be.  It's all just very exciting.  One thing I'm really really looking forward to is getting our house all decked out for the holidays.  We had barely moved in when Henry was born, so we've hardly got to decorate in the first place, but our holiday decor was severely lacking.  Next year I'm looking forward to really doing it up and putting into motion all of the fun holiday ideas I have floating around in my head.  But first things first, we need to finish getting our house in order!  Now that things have calmed down a bit I can't wait to start getting our home just the way I envision it...and it's times like these that I am SO grateful for my Anthro discount. ;)

I think the photos below do a better job of telling the story of our week better than I can at this late hour, so enjoy!  And again, happy holidays!

In the beginning of the week, Lisa and Mary Alice came to visit Henry and brought him the cutest presents!


The Peters family came up and visited for an evening and we had the best time. Here's Henry and his Auntie Erin- he adored her.


H. also decided to really examine Uncle JP!


We enjoyed Hugo's, as usual.


Later that night we had a handful of friends over to enjoy some pie, it was delicious.


cherry pie I made




gift from the Peters :)


I love this photo of Amber so much!


the next night was Christmas Eve, spent with Hank's family...

Henry II, III, and IV - pretty awesome huh!


Henry and his Aunt Brooke


we played Pictionary- the guys won, boo!






Henry's gifts started piling up...




Later that night we headed to my parents' house so we could wake up there Christmas morning!


Mom and Henry's stocking (Henry too!)


how pretty is my sister?!


Aunt Lauren and Uncle Abe


my favorite Christmas present


dessert!


our cousin Tim brought Henry a hat back from Peru (he is a geologist there)- Henry clearly LOVED it! haha.


and finally, we spent Christmas evening with Sar and Andy. So much fun and Henry loved meeting his Uncle Andy.

Tattoo Tuesday V.50

Name/blog name: Hey, I’m Nova. My blog’s name is “Might as Rella” because I thought it kinda sounded like “Might as well”, and my internet fake last name is “Rella”… yeah, I know it’s kind of a stretch. You can find me at novarella.blogspot.com.

Age: 28

Occupation: tattoo shop manager … basically I do the dirty work like sterilizing the equipment, booking appointments and mopping the floors, but it’s a super fun job. Here’s the shop website: www.tattoozoo.net … we are a busy little shop with some of the best clients you can ask for.


Age of first tattoo: 21, and I had no idea what I wanted. I ended up getting like half my back tattooed, and now I think I want to cover it. I kind of wish I had started smaller. All I knew was I wanted to have a lot of tattoos and I wanted it right away, and I didn’t really put much thought into what I was actually getting.


Favorite tattoo: I don’t know…I love them all! Usually my favorite one is my newest one; it changes all the time. Right now I really love all my thigh tattoos like the cat-spider (featured below), a Mexican girl dressed as a Zapatista, and a cute bird and flowers that says “Sei Freundlich” (be friendly) by my German friend Roberto.

Featured tattoo/location: Cat-spider on my thigh.




Artist/shop/location of feature tattoo: This was done at Tattoo Zoo in Victoria B.C. (where I work!) around a year ago by Colin Wiley. It’s on my left thigh, from just above my knee to my… bathing-suit area. ;)

1) Tell us about your featured tattoo-

Basically when I come up with ideas for tattoos I usually just think of something I like and get it. I love kitties and I kind of feel like spiders are underrated and over-hated. What if they were combined into one cute, terrifying animal? This is what would happen.

I got this one during my last semester of a B.A. in Hispanic studies. I usually end up getting large tattoos during stressful periods of my life and let me tell you, writing term-papers in Spanish is not easy!

Sorry for the weird angle and lighting. It turns out it’s hard to take pictures of your own thigh.

I chose to share this particular tattoo because it’s one of my favorites I have and I’m a fairly modest dresser so it rarely sees the light of day. Nobody knows I have it except the people I work and live with.


2) Do you have any other tattoos? If so, what do you have and where?

Yeah I have like a million. Actually, I know that I have twenty one tattoos because clients ask me all the time at work and one day I decided to just count them so I would know. (A lot of people don't get how tough of a question that is to answer sometimes...does a tattoo that took eight sessions count as one? How about two that you got at the same time? What if one of them is unfinished?) I have around a hundred hours-ish..everything from a sleeve of a mummy having a tea party with a my little pony to a collection of black and grey optical illusion tattoos.

I feel a little weird putting them on the internet…but whatever. If you copy my tattoos you are an unimaginative loser. There, I said it. (editor's note: I love you/this. haha!)

Here are a few photos.




3) Do you plan on getting more?

Yes. I want to look like Betty Broadbent eventually.


I want to be COVERED in tattoos. I think it looks so beautiful and interesting and yes, feminine. My big plans for the near future include a chest piece with bees in it somehow, rib panels…stomach, the rest of my thighs, cover my backpiece with something bigger and blacker maybe…everything, haha. I also have a pretty long list of tattooers I want to be tattooed by from all over the world.

I still have a lot of room left...yay!


4) How do your family and friends feel about your tattoo(s)? Have you run into any adversity or negativity because of them? Do you have a significant other? Does he/she have tattoos?

My family doesn’t really seem to care much about my tattoos. At first my mom was kind of shocked, I guess, but now when I go home she shows me off to all her friends. Her and my sister even came to visit me a couple years ago and got foot tattoos at my work!

This summer I went to my grandma’s seventieth birthday party and was worried about my clothing choice because it was really hot out but all my grandma’s friends were going to be there. I ended up just saying “Ah what the heck” and wearing a sleeveless, knee-length dress. I was worried I would embarrass her in front of her friends, but nobody except for my weird uncle even commented negatively on my appearance at all. One lady told me her daughter probably “had me beat” in the number of tattoos I have. It was really cute.


That being said, yes, I experience negativity all the time based on my appearance. It’s usually men or ladies around my parents’ age who say things, either to me or just within earshot so I’m bound to overhear…ladies call me disgusting, ugly, and ask aloud why I would do that to myself.

A man at the bus stop a few months ago literally said to me that it’s fine to look that way now but what about when I want to start a family? As though I would never “catch a man” looking the way I do. ( Just FYI, I am in a forever-type relationship with a lovely man who has two kids…I’m set.) Usually I just try and ignore small-minded idiots, but this guy and I actually ended up shouting at each other in the street.

You can read about it here: http://novarella.blogspot.com/2010/06/buthow-will-i-ever-catch-husband.html. Caution, much swearing and bitterness in this post.

I just cannot believe how rude people are on a regular basis to me, because of the way I look.

Being heavily tattooed is a weird thing. People think they can just come up to you and touch you and talk to you about your skin no matter where you are or what you’re doing. And seriously it is so tiresome in the summer months, wearing shorts and t-shirts and having to talk about your limbs constantly with strangers. Sometimes I just want to read my book, people. I’m a very private, shy person, so I don’t enjoy all the attention. I get tattoos because I like tattoos, not because I like talking to random people in the street. After seven years it gets pretty old.

My boyfriend is also heavily tattooed; arms, legs, feet, chest…


He is in the midst of getting a Japanese back piece of a tiger and dragon. For those of you who don’t know, that means the tattoo goes from the back of his knees to his neck. It’s quite the endeavor.

This is a picture of him like a quarter way through the initial outline. OUCH!


He seems to get a much more positive response with his tattoos. I don’t know if it’s a girl vs. boy thing or if it’s because he’s much more outgoing than I am and has a better outlook on all the attention he gets for being so colorful. He recently took his kids swimming though and said he had an awkward time being stared at in the change room, haha.


5) Any advice for those interested in getting tattooed but haven't gotten one yet?

Yes. So much advice it’s not even funny. I have an entire section on my blog about tattoo shop etiquette and all the FAQs and do’s and don’ts…http://novarella.blogspot.com/p/tattoo-faq.html

Getting your first tattoo is scary, exciting and fun. You don’t know what to expect, and tattoo shops can be intimidating places. I say just do it if you want to. It’s not as big a deal as people make it out to be, and if you’re ready for it then it doesn’t matter what anybody else says. Know what you want, where you want it and have reference to bring along with you so the tattooer can get into your head a little bit. Be flexible with your ideas, be polite and be excited! Getting tattooed is as fun and interesting as it is painful. Good luck!