Review: Kings and Queens Cinnamon Bodymilk

Vlado is a bossy little dude. So instead of allowing me to buy some expensive oil and salts last night, he said, "You have enough lotions and crap you never use at the house. Use those first" -

Uhm. Right. From last winter. Unopened. How unappealing.. But regardless, Saskatchewan weather does not care for my whininess and actually sided with Mr. Love. This morning, after my bath, my skin was dry and cracked and just gross.

It always gets this way during our long 6 month Winter. Itchy, dry, nasty crap. So instinctively, I just put 1/2 a tablespoon of scented oil every other day in my bathtub. On my days I don't do this, I wash my hair.

I'm awful at forgetting to use lotion so I keep it by my bedstand, just in case. Today, I needed something to start this regular habit so I grabbed an old tube and opened it, squishing it onto my arms. 

..AND OUT CAME HEAVEN. It made me stop midway just to SEE what the hell I was using.

Kings & Queens: Queen Isabella Cinnamon Orange Body Milk.

Finish up and run to my laptop, quickly type in: http://forkingsandqueens.com and have an adorable time clicking through each window and reading it. It finally clicks to mine and it says:

Queen Isabella of Spain was very fond of cinnamons mild taste and exquisite aromas but not of its price. So she financed Columbus' search for a new route to Ceylons cinnamon and thus set the wheels in motion for his accidental discovery of the New World.  

The website also boasts: 

11 shower gels

5 bodybutters

3 shimmering bodymilks

4 scrubs

3 eau de toilettes

4 deo spray

4 roll on

4 soaps

2 candles

My experience: Amazing scent. Absolutely Heaven. My skin feels softer and honestly? After a year of being un-used in my closet? The lotion stayed firm and didn't get all liquidy. Thats impressive. The smell makes me want to search out the candles.... The website was awesome in keeping me amused but not the greatest at keeping me informed. I went on there wanting to find out what made it so amazing, what oils were used, WHY it was better then others - instead, I walked away pleasantly happy because it kept me busy looking at little stories and pictures for 5 minutes. Not that is a bad thing.

Many drugstores sell this. I bought mine at Shoppers Drug Mart. 

I got a new jacket...

Vlado bought me a new amazing jacket from Garage. It looks nothing like the photos they have online. Its even better.. It looks an off-shade of grey in the photos but its pure black and very form fitting. It appears (to me) to look kind of "blah, hang off your body, frumpy" in the photographs but it is BEAUTIFUL, and shows your curves, and keeps you adorable warm.

Not only that but it is quite heavy and warm on you, the hood ensures you never have to mess up your hair from a toque (I'm from Canada, eh?) , and it can be worn with a simple skinny jeans plus a t-shirt OR a dressed up version of a Friday night out.

.....The best part? Under 100$. :) Check it out. Heavyweight Twill Parka (This brings you to the garage link)

Beautiful indian girl boots

AKA Mukluks (probably spelt that wrong..) They are on my Christmas List this year, thats for sure!

Mukluks are an aboriginal trendsetting boot that you can wear out and about. I'm going to buy mine from a Saskatchewan dealer but if you are interested, you can find some at http://www.authenticcanadianmukluks.com. 

200-300$ .. These are one of those fashion pieces that you can't cheap out on. Go big or go home.

Sent from my BlackBerry device on the Rogers Wireless Network

Lydia Love

Hand in hand, we walked in Lydias. It is a hipster bar. Local top 40's are banished, as with any sense of color co-ordination. Piercings, excessive unshaven faces, and tight pants on men are a must to walk in.

Vlado was wearing his Bench jacket. Instant suicide mission.
I was wearing jeans, black boots, and a white off-the-shoulder t-shirt with a necklace. Plus, I had make up on. We felt out of place. The musician at the front croned off pitch as if she was making love to the microphone. Beers were in the air helping the patrons to realize what a hot mess she really was.

Vlado and I became more obnoxious the more we stood there, awkwardly. We had the courage of liquid fire to face our crowd of Wheres Waldo. Within moments, we were jumping up and down dancing, laughing, whistling at the end of the song. Vlado pushed it to the limit by screaming out, "THANK GOD ITS OVER!" while I ducked into the sea of braids on men to hide, leaving him to fend for himself.

As the liquid fell into our tummies, we began connecting more to the bar and the people. We were enjoying ourselves, the music was on mute in our brains. The people were like angelic artistics and I never wanted to shave my armpits again.
...K. Not that far.

But they definately became wall-flowers and my friends were the only ones I could see. We laughed against the drama, danced together, and just blended into a fun group of friendship.
Then, this musician came, similar to Ben Harpers sexual seduction that is known as, "Forever", and Vlado and I were emo and madly in love on the dance floor. God, I love alcohol.

The night ended after we met for a late snack of dry ribs, followed by an outrageous cab driver who speeded through the community zones at 100 miles per hour. Safely tucked into our bed at four am, It began. The Audrey drunk talk. Its unstoppable. I just talk and talk and talk. I laugh, giggle, play. After an hour, Vlado is PLEADING with me to just shut up and go to bed.

Good game, my Sir, good game.

timestamp:

Date: October 15th, 2011
Time: 9:06am
Wearing: Vlados' oversized work shirt. Our condo gets too hot in the middle of the night.
Doing: Just finished making my nails look nice .. now going to jump in the shower.
Plans for the Day: I'm going to meet my girlfriend for coffee at 2pm and this evening my sister and I are heading to the club.
Loving: The fact our city got a sephora.. Just found out about it!
Hating: Haven't heard from possible job interview.

cohabiting with clothes.

My boyfriend and I love clothes.
Especially me.

Growing up, my family didn't put much emphasis onto designer labels. Since becoming an adult, I've made up for that.

When Vlado and I moved in, he was shocked at the amount of clothes I had and asked for me to donate "a little bit" - 2 garbage bags later, and my amount of clothes was still ridiculous.

Eventually, he had to come to terms that his regular shirts were now work shirts, and often, he would find new clothes of his own in the closets.

I had to come to terms with sharing closet space.
Which was hard. Very hard.
Heres how we organize our clothes.
We fought long and hard to make this system work for us.

1. Our closet. From left to right - We put our hoodies together but only the expensive ones (100$ and up) then we have my tanktops/camisoles - designer t-shirts, fancy short sleeves, regular longsleeve, fancy longsleeve, sweaters.
Then it goes into Vlados' designer t-shirts, longsleeve, sweaters, jeans.

Then, in the left drawer, is Vlados boxers, socks, etc. On the right are my personals. 

Above our respected areas are my pajama collection. I'm an addict for pajama pants...  

Behind my pajama collection are my 3-4 jeans that are size 2 and too big. Eventually, I will fit them and they were expensive so I can't part with them. 

Then Vlados jeans.. this boy has over 20 pairs of JEANS. WHAT?!?!

Vlados workshirts on the top. These are plain, have stains, cheap, etc., ( more)Vlados jeans and laze-around-the-house pants.

On one side are my jeans and skirts, and summer clothes. Then my lululemon pants below alongside my leggings, my sweatpants, etc.

This is our spareroom closet and it has our expensive shirts and dresses for nights out.. I think alot of my dresses are at my moms right now, or the drycleaners.. 

This is Vlados' workclothes. As soon as he walks in, his workpants, jacket, t-shirts, socks go in the basket. Well, the dirty clothes go on the floor and the clean things go in the basket. Its filled to the top with his hoodies, socks, etc.

Finally, our jackets. My snowboarding jacket, our leather jackets, my wool and jean jacket, our bench jackets. Those go in here. In the little blue box is my snowboarding gear and his baseball hats, my toques, mittens, etc.

Laundry

We decided that I do the actual laundry while he has to carry it up and down the stairs for me. We do laundry when we need something (ie all out of underwear or work shirts, or we need socks, or we are out of hoodies. By the time we get to do laundry, we usually have 2-4 loads to do at once)

Once laundry is done, we dump it on the couch and do it together while watching T.V. First, we make two piles of laundry
1. Clothes to be hung up.
2.Clothes that need to be folded.

One person is in charge of the pile for folding. They fold, put it away, put socks together, etc. I like this job more.

The other is in charge of putting hangers on and going to the various closets and hanging them up in the appropriate area.

So there ya' have it. Hope it helps in the adventures of co-habiting!
xo

Thanksgiving 2011

Another Turkey gone.

October 9th, Vlado and I woke up around 8 am and just lazed around, drinking coffee. It was his one day off a week which is a special day for skype with his Mom. Anxiously, we waited for his brother to log in before we decided to call them on my cell phone. For some reason, his brothers surprised reaction is still making me laugh.. We spent 1-2 hours on Skype, chatting. I absolutely adore his family...

Around 12, Vlado and I went to his extended family that live down the road. They mainly spoke Serbian and I sat and drank coffee, but, the conversation that I did have with his beautiful Aunt and Uncle was so gracious and helpful. His Aunt really made me comprehend the Serbian/Bosnian War ... Just simplified it for me.

We then went to visit my family at my moms house. It was crazy, fun, silly, exhausting, delicious, and the best part was I was with my biggest support system and wine was there.

We dined on Turkey, cranberry sauce, stuffing, mashed potatoes, two different salads, bread, wine, squash, apple pie & pumpkin pie with sides of whipped cream and icecream.

Then, in the evening, we went to my sister with a 12 pack of beer.
Whoops.

I got into bed at 3am with beer stains on my shoes, giggling uncontrollably and whispering loudly, leather jacket forgotten on my sisters couch, my hair smelt like cigarettes and old perfume, but I was over the moon for the fact I was holding the hand of the guy I love. We fell asleep after an hour of me talking non-stop and him laughing, begging me to shut my eyes, and fall asleep.

xo.

More photos here.

jobs

Recently, I gave up my fulltime job. I work with at-risk teenagers in a group home but the only problem is: They stuck me on fulltime (40 hours/week) of nightshifts.

My biggest problems with this decision are:
1. I don't even get to see the youth. Ever.
2. It affects my health and my relationship with my boyfriend at home who I never see either.

After careful consideration, I said I would work my shifts until the end of October and then go back to the casual list. (They call me to fill in shifts that the fulltime workers don't want to take)

I had an interview at another agency for casual support and have been accepted. I'm a little nervous as it does restraints (physically takes down youth when they get angry and abusive to staff) but I've done them before and know I can handle them.

paperwork!

Tonight, during my nightshift, I'm completing the paperwork, and bookwork/training I need to do by Friday. Kind of cool to be getting paid while doing work for another agency.. Shhh!!

Today, I had an amazing interview at this agency that is smaller, less known, but starting to climb the ladder. It has so many programs that help street people, prostitutes, homeless kids and I am DYING to get accepted there.
If I do, Vlado and I need to have a serious little chitchat about it as he works from 7am-6pm and I would work 4pm-midnight. We wouldn't see each other *at all* for 5 days..

Lots to think about.

xox,
a
Listening to: Sonny came Home by Shawn Colvin

It reminds me of my role @ my job...

cafe & creme

I am back at work for one nightshift and once 8am hits, I'm in my car driving home to relax for the next 3 days! Thanksgiving is coming up and its making me question what I'm thankful for..

While I meander that, this was my Wednesday & Thursday. I didn't work..

Laid in bed. Alot. Played on the computer in bed, dozed, read the paper, drank coffee. Slept in, texted friends, called friends, basically- I lived in my bed.

Drank large amounts of coffee with the perfect ratio of cream & sugar. I absolutely adore and would do anything for my morning cup of love.

Outfit of the Day: Dawg shoes, skinny jeans, black t-shirt, scarf I stole from my moms closet, and my green furry jacket.

Do you love the jacket or hate it? Vlado hates it. I love it.

Working?

I am sending this blogpost from my cell phone. I'm hoping it works.

Attached a photo of my outfit, hope it works too! xox
Sent from my BlackBerry device on the Rogers Wireless Network

timestamp

Date: October 5th, 2011
Outfit of the Day: black boots * leggings * longsleeve charcoal sweater dress * belt *
Drinking||Eating: weak coffee
Reading: Columbine by Dave forget the last name..
Plans: Tonight is date night with Vlado. We're gonna go to the mall food court and share some french fries and then a movie.
What I did today: Slept in... can't go wrong with that!