Tysons on Thursday

Yesterday I went to Banana Republic's 30th Anniversary Sale. For a few hours everything was 30% off. You had to show them your credit card to get in the door, which was a little funny. And they served champagne and little pastries. It was a mad house.

There were tons of people. I spent half an hour in line for the fitting room. And then another half hour in line at the check out.

It was like social hour. Girls were there with their friends loading up on clothes and drinking champagne. Having a good time. A lot of guys were there for the sale too, but my favorites were the ones who just stood there with womens clothes draped over their arms, drinking champagne.

I know this isn't unusual among fashion retailers, but I haven't gone before.
I'm a little surprised that I wasn't put off by it. I didn't bring any friends with me, and I don't drink champagne, but isn't shopping fun? (Well, sometimes it depends on the sales associates ... and I'm not crazy about the before Christmas madness ...) Oh, and the 30% off is fun too!

Plants

It's been so long since I've posted anything I'm having a hard time deciding what to share.

I guess I'll show you my cucumbers from my garden. Haha, it's so funny that I keep blogging about this.

Here they are!

And here is a little watermelon plant that I planted too late. I'm hopeful that a watermelon will start to grow before it gets to cold, but I've been advised that it will get too cold for a watermelon plant before I have a normal sized watermelon. I guess it is September already.

Yesterday at the Arboretum I saw these pomegranate plants. I wish I could grow yummy pomegranates but my dad said I would have to move somewhere like Arizona for the right climate, so there goes that idea.

Look at these pretty flowers from the US National Arboretum.

And these darling sisters with a rock penjing.

And these wackos blocking the bonsai.

Now Playing

I swear I’m not some sort of X-Files freak, I just enjoy watching it. Thank you Costco, for allowing me to complete my collection for an affordable price. [And Iggy, for starting it :)] Anyway, due to circumstances beyond my control, I’m not going to get to see the movie for another week :(

My First Harvest - Ever!

After writing that last post I decided I wanted to eat some of my beans! So I went out and picked some and then cooked 'um up! Yummy!

I Spy Vegetables!

Guess what I found in my garden yesterday! Beans!

I’ve been out of town a lot lately. I’ve been checking on my plants, but mostly just to make sure they’re not drying out. Then yesterday I went out to take a look and found beans!

Here are the flowering bean plants and some of the vegetables themselves. Almost ready to eat!

These are some flowers from the cucumber plants, no signs of cucumbers yet.

A couple weeks ago I finally planted some watermelon seeds. Hopefully I didn’t wait too long. And hopefully they’re getting enough sun. Here’s what’s come of them, so far. Do they look healthy to you? I’m not sure they’re going to work, but I didn’t have a sunnier place to put them.

I don’t dare to post a picture of the flowers I planted. Nothing’s bloomed yet. As far as I know they’re actually 100% weeds. Seriously, I don’t know what’s flowers and what’s weeds. How can you tell?

Really Chocolate Chocolate Cake

Yesterday I made my first layered cake! It actually went pretty well, I think. I worried that it would fall apart before it was ... assembled, but my biggest issue ended up being the frosting.

I realized only a moment too late that I probably should have stuck to one style. Frosting it smooth around the sides but not smooth on the top made it look like someone’s hair that’s been shaved only around the sides/back but not off the top. Maybe I should have had it the same all over. I don't know. What do you think?

Also, I think I should have put more frosting between the layers. It could have used a little more. It worked at least. Overall I was pretty pleased with this first attempt. It was edible :)

It must have been someone’s birthday!

Let's Go Swimming!

Wahoo! I found a swimsuit! It’s amazing. Some of you may not appreciate how amazing this is. I’m not in the habit of complaining about my body, but I’ll easily complain that designers don’t exactly make clothes to fit it. When it comes to swimsuits it’s the worst. Being super skinny and [ahem] flat-ish makes 2 separate characteristics that no one makes a swimsuit for.

Last year I found this halter-style suit which turned out okay after I had it altered, but this year I was pleasantly surprised by a suit I found in Urban Outfitter’s retro swim collection. This suit arrived today and seems to fit just fine! I picked the one that's adjustable because I thought that feature was promising.

I’m not used to having the suit to want to ask this - anyone wanna go swimming?