The Joy of Cooking...

I know I give myself a hard time about my lack of cooking skills but I really do love being in the kitchen...when I have the time, and as long as I'm not completely ruining something.. (as I may potentially be doing right now..crap.) However, I find that the only time I have the patience or the motivation to get in there and try my hand at a new recipe or even a a tried and true one, is during school breaks, and it just so happens that I have found myself to be on an indefinite break right now;) So, instead of re-capping a million Christmas photos of the standard gifts and decorations I thought I would share our Christmas in a food lovers photo montage. We did quite a bit of cooking and eating for that matter and I think I love taking photos of my food as much as I like eating it, obsessed much ? So with that said, here is our Christmas in food...

Christmas Eve Lunch... Paninis made by yours truly! I thought the colors were festive!

Italian Feast!

Fluffy White Snow Flake Biscuits

Mr. Jones making Grandpa's famous meatballs for Christmas Eve Dinner

Our Christmas Eve table set with care...

The Joneses for Christmas morning brunch! Full English Breakfast made with love by none other than Mr. & Mr. Jones.


And then just a few hours, several sausage rolls and quite a few cups of tea later... Christmas Dinner was served thanks to the wonderful chef Mum Jones!

The cooking has not stopped, we hosted my dad and brother for dinner the day after Christmas, (my dad flew out to help my brother finally make the move east, as I type, my dad and him are doing the cross country drive) and we were still working on leftovers until today when I whipped up my sisters famous enchilada's for dinner! (This post was written pre and post dinner). So there you have it, given the time and opportunity I just might turn into a little kitchen queen after all.



Bon Appetit! - Miss V

Meet your new favorite BLOG!

No.. not mine although I did give myself a little face lift! I know it's not quite the New Year yet, but I did want to change up my background and title. I love Christmas but all that red, green and festive swirly twirl's were getting to be a bit overwhelming so.. I went with something fresh, clean, and tranquil. I want to start the new year off on a fresh start, new degree, new job (hopefully) and even though the idea of hunting for jobs and a new career are not relaxing ideas, I want my blog to be a place where I can share my life and thoughts in a reflective and peaceful manner. So, with that said I went with one of my new favorite photos and a rustic clean look. So there ya go.

On to your new favorite blog though!! I know the suspense is killing you! You've heard me talk about my roomie, bff, Meredith before... here and here... well... drumroll please..... she has ventured into the world of blogging!

I am beyond excited to see what she has in store for her blog. Please check her out and follow if you need some new reading material! Her blog will without a doubt be infintiely cooler than mine so I'm sure you'll instantly be hooked ;) I love her to pieces and I know you will too... now stop reading my blog and see what she's up to! Go! Now! What are you waiting for? ;)

Mere & Mark

http://daygeeknightchic.blogspot.com/

XOXO- Miss V

These are a few of my favorite things...

This will most likely be my last post until after Christmas so I wanted to first wish all of you a very Merry Christmas and a HUGE thank you to all of my readers, friends, family and other blogging followers for all of the love and support this year and for actually reading this little blog of mine! I have loved every second of blogging and am hopefully going to compile my posts from 2010 into a book so that I have a bound hard copy for my bookshelf for years to come.

I also wanted to share a few photos from my 28th birthday...I felt kind of weird about "showing off" my gifts but then again I am soo thankful to my family and Mr. Jones for making me feel special and I really am IN LOVE with everything I received...so without further ado... here are a few of my favorite things ;)

Beautiful Birthday Bouquet

My parents sent me the most gorgeous flower arrangement. I am in love with them and they make the view from my kitchen sink even better than it already was!

I really wanted to start collecting ornaments this year and I think the Christopher Radko ornaments are beautiful. I had hinted to my mom about one as a birthday present while we were in NYC and well Bonnie is a "go big or go home" type of a lady, so of course she outdid herself and sent me three!

My 2010 Santa! Look at that twinkle in his eye ;)

I really only asked for a dated one, I thought it would be nice to start a collection of one nice dated ornament for each year, but Bonnie picked out two other cuties for me to hang from my tree and I love them!

A Cable Car for my lovely city by the bay!

And of course a Big Apple for their new city!

I love that my birthday is so close to Christmas and one of my favorite ways to celebrate is to see the decorations downtown and enjoy all of the holiday festivities! Ever since my family moved to CA about 16 years ago I have always headed downtown for window shopping and to enjoy the holiday sights!

In front of the 80 ft LIVE tree in Macy's Union Square!

This amazing tree is a towering 80ft tall and comes from Mt. Shasta CA!

I may be a bit biased but I think that this tree is prettier than the one in Rockefeller! It towers over our very own tiny ice rink and is surrounded by decorated and lit up Palm Trees!

The incredible view of Macy's across the street.

We headed inside to check out the "North Pole" on the 7th floor. I really wanted to get a picture with Santa, Mr. Jones however was less than thrilled with this idea when we saw the line full of little ones running all over the place and he reminded me that I was turning 28 not 8 hahahah. Bahumbug! (Such a Scrooge)

The "North Pole" ...or Macy's way of displaying the most amazing xmas decor ever and making you feel like you cannot possibly live without any of it ...

Since Scrooge, I mean Mr. Jones, decided that waiting in line with the families and small children to take a picture with Santa would be slighly damaging to his ego... we had a little fun with a few Santa Dolls that we found...

So... Santa sat on my lap instead

Having waayyyy too much fun

After shopping and acting like total dorks inside of Macy's we headed out to birthday dinner at Hillstone! Our new Birthday tradition, we went to their sister restaurant for Mr. Jones' 30th.



And last but not least I received this lovely Stella & Dot necklace that I had been drooling over, from Mr. Jones

Perfect!

And a new Vera to add to my collection from my grandmother!!

Love these colors!!

It was a perfect birthday and I'm sad that it's over! Up next Christmas! Off to finish some last minute shopping today and to enjoy the sunshine that has been hiding from us here in CA for about a week now!

Wishing you all a Happy Christmas!

XOXO- Miss V

28 and Feeling GREAT!

Hahah sorry I "came up" with that catchy slogan last night in anticipation for my 28th birthday which is today! So cheesy but it makes me laugh. Especially since my friends and I have this thing with saying the word GREAT in a really obnoxious way... (inside joke.. I know .. not fair) I am having a perfect birthday so far but will post about it later, because today I wanted to share photos from my 14th annual Girls Holiday Dinner. And yes, now that you know my age you can do the math and realize that my girlfriends and I have held this party since we were 14 years old, or our Freshman year in High school.

I hate to get all sentimental and cheesy, but then again those who know me in real life know me as the sentimental cheesy friend, so I just wanted to say that my girlfriends are the greatest gift I could have this birthday. I love the toast that our hostess Missy gave at this years dinner, she toasted to "the success story that is our friendship" and I couldn't agree more.

This years crew.. we were sadly missing a few friends who were out of town ;(

While the group has grown over the years adding in college friends here and there, family members and work friends the bond betweeen us all is truly a suceess story in friendship. I love all of the amazing women in my life and this post is a toast to all of them whether they were at this years dinner or not! This includes all of you blogging friends! I have been so blessed this year to meet and get "to know" so many more amzing women through blogging and I am just feeling so full with friendship and love as I enter into my 28th birthday.

Our Hostess with the Mostesest!

Missy and her husband Mike were the first of the group to buy a home in the suburbs, so we thought it only appropriate that she host! In an effort to keep things easier we opted out of our usual pot luck and decided instead to have dinner catered. Much easier and everyone was able to just relax and enjoy their dinner!

Loved her table setting

I'm totally stealing this look, so simple, yet so festive!

Christmas music, roaring fire, tree decorated and glowing...

We enjoyed a few appetizers and drinks in the living room, catching up before dinner...

Love these ladies!

Beautiful Brunettes

The first preggo of the group!

Of course everyone wanted a shot with the baby bump!

Friends since middle school... love her.

Cuties!

We also almost always celebrate my birthday at this dinner as well, since it falls at a funny time right around xmas it just makes sense to incorporate it into the evening... Missy's husband Mikey was on cake patrol and look what he picked out!

Beautiful Belle! What a perfect cake!!

We spent the evening laughing, reminiscing, catching up and playing taboo!! It was another successful Holiday Dinner and I am so proud to call all of these women friends for life.

Serious competition happening here...

Hope you all can take the time to appreciate all of the friendships you have this holiday season! Off to enjoy the rest of my relaxing birthday!

XOXO- Miss V

Celebrate!

I did it... well almost I'm still technically one test and one course away from becoming a certified teacher, but my program held its graduation ceremony on Thursday and what a great feeling it is to be one step closer to my goal! I loved our ceremony it was very intimate and casual, you were able to sit with your guests and you were presented on stage with your graduating cohort, there were speeches from our professors and we the graduates performed songs, poems and evenone group had a drag queen who performed "The Children are our Future" oh San Francisco, how I love you! Hahah. After the ceremony we jetted off to the VJones Salon for their Holiday party hosted by Elle Magazine! It was a great night of celebrations! Now off to finding a job!

We did it!!

That cute lady holding up her certificate is Nicole from the blog LaMiaVita I am so thankful for all of the friendships that I have made throughout the program and befriending Nicole and sharing our love for teaching and blogging has been so much fun! I am crossing my fingers that we both get lucky with a job next semester!

Pretty much as soon as I walked off the stage we headed straight to Mr. Jones' parents hair salon where they along with ELLE Magazine were hosting a holiday party!

All decked out for the event!

The party was so much fun, the stylists were doing hair and make up, while food and drinks were being served and a DJ was spinning, there was a vendor there who made the most amazing headbands, according to Mum Jones in England they are called Fascinators, and you see them worn at Weddings and other formal events. We toasted the holidays, my graduation and the salon in style and enjoyed a fun night with family and friends.

Teachers!

Here I am with the lovely Mrs. Jones (not mum Jones) and Mrs. Scott, (friends of Mr. Jones' parents) they are such special women to me and have been a part of the Jones "family" for a long time, they were both teachers Mrs. Jones in Scottland and Mrs. Scott in England and have been a great support system throughout my program! And don't they look lovely in their "fascinators! "

Everyone getting party perfect!

Mr. Jones and I toasting to the night!

Mr. Jones' brother Alex and his lovely girlfriend Gina celebrating with us!

What a great night! Please keep your fingers crossed for a job! Until that happens I am working on my resume and will begin the substitute process in January. Besides the graduation and the salon the rest of the weekend was filled with celebrating the holidays with my girlfriends at our annual Holiday party and an early toast to my 28th Birthday which is tomorrow... yikes! Lots to celebrate right now and so happy that I can share it all with you!

XOXO- Miss V

Winter Wonderland...

Well we're back from NYC, happy to be home but of course missing my family. We had a wonderful trip and I am already excited for the next one! As always there was not enough time to do everything I wanted but we did spend a lot of really good quality time with family and friends either tucked into cozy corners at restaurants or snuggled on the couch in front of Christmas movies. I'll share a few snapshots of our trip, hope you enjoy!

Rockefeller!

Of course my number one mission this trip was to see the tree at Rockefeller center! We spent one very long and very full day running all over Manhattan taking in the Christmas sights! We were really lucky as this was one of the warmer days and free from snow or rain! So we took full advantage! The family that took this photo is actually from the town where the tree was cut down! We watched the tree lighting on tv so it was really exciting to see it in person!

How cute is Mr. Jones in his Winter Gear!

Jazz hands felt necessary for some reason ;)

Macys all decked for the holidays!

I really wanted to see the NY Macys Santa but we were starving from walking all over town at this point and decided to grab lunch and then come back to snap a photo, little did I know that we would end up walking clear across town for lunch ha! Needless to say by the time we sat down at about 3:30 for lunch it started to snow so I will have to save Santa for another time ;(

I thought all of that walking and the chilly air called for a large glass of wine and a cute and cozy restaurant in SoHo.

As much as I loved reveling in all of the sights my favorite part of this trip was all of the family and friend time that we had! The weather was a great help in this and we spent most nights gathered over a meal tucked inside a restaurant or at home.

Sissy, her Brit and one of her NYC besties.

Daddy and Sissy's Brit, enjoying a drink at a Brooklyn Pub.

Mommy and Mr. Jones being cuties.

Mom&Dad, Sissys and their Brits, what a perfect dinner group!

The family getting ready for dinner

We were also able to head to NJ this time as well and visit with the Samples family and the Maneris! I took Mr. Jones to my old hometown to show him the sights!

We met up with the Samples to walk around town, however apparently in this particular borough all of the shops are closed on Sundays! I had no idea! So we strolled around town and were lucky to find a bookstore open, and of all things Mike the "Situation" from Jersey Shore was there selling his book and signing autographs! HAhahah we were dying laughing, of all places to be open and of all people to be there in this quaint little town? So random, of course you had to buy a book in order to get a signature and he was NOT taking pictures... such a drama queen? We did not buy his book but we had a good laugh.

Dinner with the Samples!

Terrible picture quality, sorry, the black and white kind of made it look better. And of course after dinner we stopped by Whitney's parents house, the Maneri's to catch up and to pick up this little munchkin to bring him home!

I love this little face!

Their little boy is so sweet and I love that I have been able to see their family twice this year! They also have another one coming in the Spring and I cannot wait to meet her!!

And what would a NYC post be without Bonnie's cute apt all decorated for Christmas!

St. Nicholas book and bowl full of ornaments!

Little bits of Holly hiding in the book case

Love it!

And a shot of the remains of the snow storm.. haha.. Ok well for a California girl this was a big deal!

Another amazing trip East! We've only been back for two days and I've managed to attend graduation for my teaching program, go to the Holiday Soiree at the Joneses Hair Salon, make a terrible version of Chicken and Dumplings, watch White Christmas, and completely avoid looking for a job! All of these topics to be covered later of course ;) Off to recover from last nights celebrations and bake cookies for my annual ladies holiday party tomorrow!

XOXO- Miss V