Christmas nails and Candy Cane toes

So I got inspired by a Pinterest post (check out my Nail Addiction board) and a post on Chloe's Nails blog. I know I didn't do as well as a job as Chloe on my toes however I still had fun and love this design for something fun.

I recommend cutting your strips of tape skinnier than what you think. If you really think about it, your toes are a smaller canvas than what you use tape for normally or even your fingernails (except your big toe of course). The China Glaze little bottle is Ruby pumps. I got it at Sally's Beauty Supply for $1.99. I forgot to mention that when you are applying your top coat, make your strokes in the direction of your stripes. Luckily this only affected a smaller toe by smudging the polish when I tried brushing the top coat on just like normal nails.

Also I used two light coats of the Sephora OPI Good Tidings We Bling on the tips on my nails.

Merry Christmas!!🎄🎅

~Valerie Ram Rattan~

Simple organizational help - labeling cans

Don't know why I didn't think of this before?! I mainly have drawers in my kitchen instead of a pantry, so I'm mainly looking down and seeing the tops of my cans and then pulling each one up to see what the label is on the side.
So one day, I thought about writing with a sharpie what the can was on top so I could see what I had in my "cupboard" at a cupboard....don't know why I didn't think of his before...?

Vegan rice pudding

This was so easy to make!! I had about 2-3cups of left over rice and dodnt know what to do with and was getting pretty bored with some rice dishes. So I decided to change it up and make dessert.



So here is what I did (btw, nothing was measured and I just went for it):

• 2-3 c of cooked rice
• Sweeten Silk soy milk
• Trader Joe's soy creamer
• a palmfull of brown sugar
• 2 cardamon pods
• 1 clove
• sprinkling of cinnamon
• a dash of nutmeg
• a light dusting of egg replacer (center of pan)
• a dusting of Arrowroot

I used a 2" high saucepan and put my stove to 5-medium, bringing the micture to a boil stirring continously. Within out 5 minutes, I could see that the contents were thickening and starting to stick a little = keep stirring. After about 10mins I turned off the stove and left the mixture covered until we were ready for dessert (aprox. 20mins).

*Also, you can take out the clove and cardamon pod before serving. They were pretty easy to find while stirring (when the mixture was hot - FYI).

ENJOY!!

Halloween Nails

One of my favorite blogs is Chloe's Nails. On her site, she creates great French manicures with using scotch tape. She pleasing the tape to the palm of her hand about 5 times to remove the stickiness. And then one by one does each nail.

I thought I would try something a little different, inspired by a picture on Pinterest for Halloween.
I make little sleevers of tape hat I cute and put that down on my orange nails before painting them black. I must admit, Chloe does each nail one by one and I should have followed this as some of my orange pulled up a bit when I finally finished all my nails. I touched them up but in the future would do this extra step than wait.

I thought a red under color and then black on top would look really neat! Also I saw this design done with pinstriping tape which I haven't ordered mine yet from Amazon but that will be another post. :-)
Cheers

Gibson Tuck - easy, fast updo for busy days

Some days that extra 30 mins of sleeping in COUNTS!! however I don't want to go to work looking like I slept-in. My hair is curly hence some of the frizz however the Gibson Tuck is a REALLY easy updo that you can do in less than 5 mins.

I've accessorized the tuck with flowers, sparkling bobby pins or (as shown below) a pic-like hairpin stuck in the tuck. I found this YouTube video online and hope you can benefit from it also:

Less than 5 mins for work (by the way, I didn't wear a sweatshirt to work.....this is when I came home):

Bridal Shower Fun

My friend Sara came up with some wonderful ideas for my bridal shower and I just had to share. I was thinking that these ideas could be used for Baby Shower or just other party planning in general. I was blown away while walking through the door, and even though I did post everything she did I hope you can get the gist of it. :-)

 

My friend Sara, greeted guests at the door and then served red and white wine along with iced tea, bottled water and a variety of sodas.

 She also set up a table near the door with the party favors, a Wishing Jar (for words of wisdom for the bride) and little potpourri sachets she made.

 This was such a cute way of dressing up the favors. Yellow and Gray M&M's with some scrap book flowers hot glued to our colors of the wedding ribbon along with Thank You stickers. I'm thinking about doing this for a baby shower soon also.

And yes, it was a vegetarian delight bridal shower. The only thing I didn't eat was quiche however ever thing else she made vegan for me. I LOVED IT!!! and so did the guests!

 This was my favorite part of the food. She made sandwiches and then used a heart cookie cutter to cute them out. It was the little touches like this for the bridal shower that blew everyone away. And she did all of this by herself the morning of! WOW!

 And when you first walked in the door, you see all the balloons on the ceiling and couldn't help but smile and get in the spirit of celebration.

 And to top it off, she brought in a massage therapist for all the guests to relax, let go of their day and BE HERE for me. This so over the top, I couldn't believe it!! I am so fortunate to have someone like her in my life and to have such a big heart to do something like for me. Especially during our school year, this was like a mini vacation to remember what is important and bring us all back down to our hearts and out of our heads.

Thank you Sara!!! <3

Baggage and Your Life

As much as i would love to expland on this quote, Yogi Bhajan sums up "your baggage" pretty sweetly:

You have baggage; it has wheels and handle. WHen the handle breaks, that bag becomes a load. That's life, When you lost the handle of your own life and it is nor under your grip and control, you can't run it."  Yogi Bhajan    6/27/93

Another quote that I heard the other day while watching Yogi Bhajan's Lifecycles and Lifestyles DVD was (along the lines because I forget exactly how it goes):

We hesitate to meditate. Don't hesitate to meditate.

Meditation is getting you mind/life back under control. It's best to do it first thingin the morning. IT's the mental shower of spiritual cup of joe to start your day grounded. I personally find that when I meditate, I'm less nit picky on aspects of my day. I work in a very analytical job which can spill ouver my 9-5 work day. With Meditation, I find that I bring the calm, neutral, pleasant self to work......and a lot more focused. I find that my monkey mind doesn't wonder as much or be resentful about long hours if needed to get my job done. And it's basically because I have taken care of me before anyone, anything else = I was not forgotten.

Sat Nam