Fall Shopping with the Caribbean Shopping Channel

If you've been reading me for awhile, you know I love to brag about being born beautiful Caribbean island of Barbados. Mount Gay, Rhianna and me - the Island's best exports. ;-) (JUST KIDDING) So imagine my excitement when I found the Caribbean Shopping Channel, a televised and online curated shopping network.  They have some amazing stuff which they ship to the US (woohoo!), Canada and the Caribbean. 

Now that it’s fall I love to go out and scour fall trends, and if you’re anything like me I can go nuts buying a whole new wardrobe, so I find tactics on how to restrain myself. 

My best trick is finding that season’s color palette and sticking to items that revolve around that palette – that way I know the various pieces I purchase will go together well, and also compliment the season. Not to mention that living in San Diego, I still do need to "fake" a good sun kissed glow all year round. 

Check out my favorite fashion finds from the Caribbean Shopping Channel all based on a fall palette:      

 

Clockwise from top left:  Avon Glow Bronzing Pearls, Dome Ring, Mark Gimme Boots in Latte, Gold Filigree Bangle Bracelet  

I also use this same technique when feeding my other obsession, home décor.  I found a more subtle fall color palette which I’ve used to base my home picks from the site: 

From left:  30 oz Belmont Blue Pitcher, Blue Victoria Candlestick Set, Essentials Canister, Essentials Orange Wall Mirror  

While that's not the shade of blue I 'normally' go for in home decor, I'm kinda obsessed with it for clothes at the moment. In fact, blue, gray and army greens are ruling my closet at the moment. 

And just as an FYI, the holidays are coming and you know what that means... RUM PUNCH :)

Ingredient:
3oz. MOUNT GAY Dark Rum (the website lists another rum. IMO there is NO OTHER RUM other than Mount Gay!)
1oz. fresh lime juice
4oz. water
2 oz. Tortuga plain syrup or simple syrup
Dash of bitters
Grated nutmeg

Directions:
Combine all ingredients except nutmeg in a shaker with cracked ice. Shake well & serve immediately. Sprinkle fresh grated nutmeg over the top of each glass & garnish with fresh pineapple, mango or lime wedge.

 

I LOVE Halloween...Decor.

I wasn't going to go crazy this year. I'm not having anyone over and I don't even have my kids 2 weekends this month. I was just going to be chill about Halloween decor... maybe put out a few bowls of candy corn and a spider web or two? 

HAHAHAHA. Who was I kidding? 

Seriously. I LOVE Halloween and nothing makes me happier than decorating. And a total bonus? This year since Lucas and Zoe are a little older, I can finally move away from "cutesie" decor and into a more macabre theme.

Vanilla Moose got creepy this year as I went for more spiders, bats and skulls inside the house. 

One of my favorite parts of decorating is pulling out the boxes from the garage and re-discovering all the goodies I have! I had forgotten about my headless horseman and sparkly pumpkin from last year, and pulling them out actually physically, made me happy. 

Then there is the outside...

My inspiration this year? Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds. 

I had been obsessing about birds for a few weeks. So imagine my delight when I walked into Michaels and they were 60% off! I think I bought them out of birds. Sorry Encinitas/Carlsbad - you can not steal my idea because there are NO MORE BIRDS TO BE HAD. And if there were, I may have bought those as well. 

{Almost} Wordless Wednesday: Disneyland at Halloween 2009 - 2013

This past weekend we were thrilled to be able to visit Disneyland for one of our favorite times of the year... Halloween. Visiting Disneyland in the fall has become a bit of a tradition, as we've been doing it now every year since 2009. 

Obviously I'm going to capture many of the same moments... and this year I was feeling a bit nostalgic and wanted to compare just much my almost 6 year old has grown. 

*believe it or not, those are the exact same pair of ears. We've managed to keep them in good shape for 5 years!

*disclosure: Disneyland provided me with 4 park hopper tickets to experience #Halloweentime at Disneyland 2013, opinions are my own. 

Fall Fashion Find: Merona Mackenzie Suede Wedge Pumps

It seems that every time Target launches a new high-end collection these, I go running in expecting greatness... and leaving with things NOT part of the celebrity collaborations. Such was the case a few weeks ago when I went to my local Target in search of the Philip Lim collection. Red card and additional 5% pharmacy savings coupon in hand, I was gonna' buy me a sweater. 

But there was a mistake and my local store never even ended up getting the collection. 

All was not lost! As I walked around searching, I happened upon the shoe area where I found these suede wedges from the standard Target Merona brand that looked like just the shoe I had been looking for. 

I will admit, being the label whore that I am, I was suspect. But I also had been *NEEDING* new shoes and for $30 threw the army green ones into my cart... and didn't take them out last minute like I normally do with non-essentials when my bills climbs past a "certain number." 

And? I love these shoes. LOVE. 

They are high enough to give me a good lift, but not too high that I'm teetering around. They are comfortable too - the wedge isn't too steep and the insides not too hard. They did pinch around my toes the first day I wore them, but by day 2 were broken in. And the best part? They don't look like $30 shoes. 

I think I may need them in black too....

{not so} Wordless Wednesday: Me Time

Last month I bought Lavender scented bath salts at Target with the intent of soaking in the bath before bed when I have some extra time. I finally opened them last night. 

Me time is something I don't have a lot of these days. I also haven't had a lot of time to fully bond with my new GalaxyNX Smart Camera from Samsung. So I combined the two thing that I haven't had time for.

And rocked out to some of my favorite songs from the late 80's. 

It was a good night. 

*disclosure: Samsung gave me the new GalaxyNX smart camera to participate in the #imagelogger program.