When you go to someone's house, do not go empty-handed.  Bring something with you.  The typical choice is a bottle of wine, but depending on the host/hostess they may already have selected a good bottle of wine or if it's a larger party, everyone will bring wine.  Another common option is flowers , but that requires your host/hostess to rush around and find a vase.

If you've got your heart set on flowers, bring them already in a vase or planted.  If you've got your heart set on wine, bring a bottle stopper or a cute reusable bag.  Or, break the mold and try something a little more unique.

The items towards the front of the list are good if you are invited for a party, towards the middle if it's for dinner and towards the end if you are a weekend guest.


Collectible Books - various price points

Chocolates - $5.99

Funny Ice Cube Tray - $9.49
It's kinda awful, but it's kinda funny.

Colorful Playing Cards - $10
You can never have too many decks of cards.  This site also has some great poker chip sets as well if you want to go for a bit higher price point but like the concept.

Wine Cork Trivet - $14.49
Let's them use up those wine corks.

Aioli Collection - $17.50

Whiskey Stones - $19.99
These will keep your drink cool while not watering it down as the ice melts.

Fun Salt and Pepper Shakers - $23 (and less)
Of course, there are more options that sea horses.  Birds, Owls,

An apron - $23

Infused Olive Oil - $25.99
There are a ton of gift sets online, or just go pick up one from your local grocery or specialty store.  Also, an infused vinegar would be great as well.

Chalk Board Cheese Plate - $29
I love serving cheese, but it's hard to know what cheese is what and easily communicate that to your guests.  With a chalk board cheese plate, that's taken care of.

Decanter - $49

Artisan Salt Box - $49.99

Paella Kit - $60.95

Margarita Gift Basket - $64.99

Drink Dispenser - $59 Plus Stand - $23

Picnic Tote - $94.95

Do you have any favorite go-to hostess gifts?  What's the best hostess gift you've recieved?

I'm much more likely to chew than I am to do my nails, but with all these easy DIY nail ideas, maybe I'll try to mix it up a bit.

Ombre Nails

source: desireandinspire.com

Ombre is a huge trend this season and not just for nails.  The word Ombre means one color shading into another one.



Water color nails

source: rebeccalikesnails.blogspot.com

These look very springy and are pretty easy to do.  You just need a few pastels and a sponge.


Galaxy Nails

source: joannagoddard.blogspot.com

These are a little darker than the water color nails, but look sophisticated enough that I wouldn't hesitate to wear them to work.


Half Moon Nails

source: the-coveted.com

I never realized how easy these were.  This tutorial breaks it down.

As a kid, Pork Tenderloin was one of my favorite meals.  I suggest serving with cauliflower puree, which is a great lower-calorie substitute for mashed potatoes.  This meal is a little more complex than a standard weeknight dinner, but if you get home a little early, it's totally do-able.

Serves: 4
Time: 45 minutes



Ingredients:
Pork Tenderloin (packaged, marinated)
3 Granny Smith Apples
4 T butter, divided (plus more if needed)
2 T olive oil
1 head cauliflower, stem and stalks trimmed, florets roughly chopped (or a bag of frozen cauliflower)
1 onion
4 T Nuefchatel Cheese (or Cream Cheese)
2 T minced garlic
1 t pumpkin pie spice (can substitute a combination of nutmeg and cinnamon)
1 T lime juice (can substitute lemon juice)

Tools:
Medium-large pot
Medium-large skillet
Cookie Sheet
Casserole Dish or Roasting Pan
Blender (hand submersible or standard)
Cutting board
Veggie peeler
Dicing knife

Directions:
1) Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.

2) Cut the onion into long strips and saute in 2T of the butter in a medium-large pot (the cauliflower will be going in here).  Add in the garlic.  You'll want this to saute at least 10 minutes, but the longer, the better.  You might need to add a little more butter if it gets too dry.

3) Toss cauliflower in olive oil, place on the cookie sheet and put in the oven for 20 minutes.

4) Using a skillet, Sear the Pork Tenderlion on all sides (about 10 minutes total).  Set in a casserole dish.

5) Peel the apples and cut into wedges.  Toss in the lime juice to prevent oxidation.

6) When the cauliflower is ready to come out of the oven, put the tenderloin in.

6) Cook the tenderloin in the oven until a meat thermometer reads 145 (medium) to 150 (medium well).  This will take about 10 minutes.  Reserve the skillet and the dripping for the apples.   When the meat is done,  wrap in aluminum foil and place on the cookie sheet.  Reserve these drippings too.

6) While the meat is cooking, puree the cauliflower with a blender (I use my submersible hand blender, but the standard variety works well too).  Add the pureed cauliflower and the 4T Nuefchatel cheese to the onions.

7) Saute the apples with the remaining 2T of butter in the skillet that the tenderloin had been seared.

8) Remove the apples.  Pour in the dripping from the tenderloin into the skillet and simmer until it has condensed into a gravy.

9) Thinly slice the tenderloin.  Pour the gravy over top and place a few apples on top of the pork.

I recommend microwaving frozen broccoli or mixed veggies and serving it along-side.

Recommend Paring:
I'd go with something "jammy" like a Beaujolais or Zinfandel. Beaujolais is fun because it's easy to drink but not too many people have heard of it unless they are really into wine.

I'm going to say something a little controversial.  Frozen vegetables are not the enemy.  Actually, due to their price, convenience and healthfulness, they can be down right friendly.

Don't get me wrong, I'm a big fan of the farm-to-table craze.  You are more likely to be supporting small, independent farms.  Farmers Markets are awesome and your own garden is even better.  All else being equal, if given the choice between fresh and frozen, it's not a tough thought process.  I'm definitely not dissing fresh food.  But the produce aisle can be a ton more expensive than the canned or frozen aisle.   And the benefits don't add up to the added cost.

Let's go with three simple facts:

• We all need to be eating more fruits and vegetables.
• The less processing is healthier than more processing.  
• The fresher food, the more nutrients it contains.

But this isn't necessarily a win for fresh foods.  It can take days or even weeks for the produce in the produce aisle to reach your local supermarket.  But, foods are canned or frozen almost immediately after harvest.  Spinach can lose all of its vitamin C within four days.  Green peas can lose more than half of its Vitamin C within a couple days according to Joy Rickman in the 2007 "Journal of the Science of Food and Agriculture."

Some things to keep in mind when considering swapping in frozen veggies to your next recipe:

1) Some freeze better than others.  

Most of the fruits and veggies below have MORE nutrients frozen than "fresh" due to being frozen at their freshness peak.  But, still eat them as quickly as possible.  Freezing slows the process of nutrient loss.  It does not stop the process.

Veggies that freeze well:

• Broccoli
• Spinach
• Peas
• Peppers
• Green Beans
• Cauliflower
• Kale
• Collard greens
• Corn
• Onions

Fruits that freeze well:

• Blueberries
• Raspberries
• Strawberries
• Mango
• Peaches

2) Watch the salt

If you go canned, try to pick low-sodium versions.  If you don't have a low sodium canned option available  rinse the produce before preparing it.

3) Added sugar is not our friend

Make sure that your fruits and veggies are canned in their own juice.  Reject fruits canned in sugary syrup.

3) If you are going to cook it anyways... 

Cooking is processing.  Nutrients will be harmed and lost during this process.  That's life.  Fresh food eaten raw makes a ton of sense.  Fresh food intended to be cooked anyways, less so.  Regardless of if your food is fresh or frozen, do not boil, instead steam, bake, stir fry or microwave your produce to minimize the loss of vitamins.   

Bottom line

We all need to be eating more fruits and vegetables.  Fresh is great, but don't overlook the other ways to get in your family's needed nutrients.  Canned and frozen foods just might surprise you, your taste buds and your wallet.

Image: Wikimedia Commons

Resources:

USDA's guide to Buying Canned and Frozen Vegetables

Livestrong Article on the best frozen veggies

So, I ate this too fast and forgot to take a picture.  There were some leftovers as this will make enough for four.  I'll try to remember to upload a picture later.

Time: 30 minutes
Serves: 4

Ingredients:

• 1 onion, cut in strips.  I used white, but red would be nice too.
• 6 T butter (divided)
• 2 T minced garlic
• 4 bratwurst-style Italian sausages
• 2 bunches brocolinni
• 1/2 cup Pecorino Romano
• 3 T balsamic vinegar
• Pasta of choice.  I used fettuccine, but cavatelli would be nice.  Or use what you have on hand.

Directions:

1. In a large skillet, saute the onions in 3 T of the butter.  After about 7 minutes, add the balsamic vinegar and the garlic.
2. Start the water boiling.
3. Add in the Italian sausages and brown them on all sides.
4. Remove the sausages and cut them into coin shaped slices.  
5. Put the sausages and the rest of the butter in with the onions.  Stir carefully so as not to crumble the sausages.
6. When the water starts to boil, add the pasta to the water.
7. Add the brocollini to the onion/sausage mixture (after it looks like the sausage is cooked through).  
8. Cover the brocollini/sausage/onion mixture, stirring occasionally.
9. When the pasta is done and the brocolini has been simmering at least 5 minutes, add in the cheese. Toss to coat.
10. Put the sauce on top of the pasta and enjoy.

I don't wear a lot of makeup.  Usually nothing more than a three minute routine of base, blush and mascara.  Often not even that. 

Your makeup organization solution has a few goals.  You don't want to smear bacteria laden stuff across your face.  Eew.  So, let's get rid of the stuff that is bad and make sure the good stuff stays good as long as possible.

Get Prepped

1. Get rid of makeup that has expired.
• Mascara and Liquid Eyeliners - 3 months
• Liquid Base and Foundation - 6 months
• Nail polish - 1-2 years
• Powdered Base and Foundation - 2 years
• Lipsticks - 2 years
• Eye Shadows - 2 years
• Eyeliner pencils - 2+ years (if they can be sharpened)
2. Get rid of bad makeup.  If the makeup smells bad or is seperating, toss it.  If you used a lip applicator on your mouth while you were sick, toss it.  If you used an eye product on your eye while you had an infection, toss it. 
3. Keep dry.  I know that the bathroom is the most logical place to store makeup, but that's not the driest place in the house.  Humidity breeds bacteria. 
4. Keep away from heat and light.
5. Toss stuff you don't use.  It's Organization 101.  If there is less stuff, it's easier to organize.
6. Sort into categories.  Put all your lipsticks, eye products, brushes, etc into their own sections.  Below I have some ideas on how to keep the sorted stuff sorted.

Storage Solutions

Freestyle Pallets.  Eye shadows junkies know that all those individual eye shadows take up a ton of space.  You can get freestyle pallets that can hold a bunch of colors. from companies like Yaby Cosmetics or Z Palettes.You basically pull out the eye shadow compartments from the eye shadow containers, slap a little magnetic sticker on the bottom and put into the pallet.

IKEA Magnet board.  What doesn't IKEA make?  This great site explains how to set up this little gem.

Think outside the makeup box.  Anything marked "makeup" is marked up more than it needs to be.  Target and IKEA sell small sliding drawers. 

Go specialized.  Container store is always a fun option.  They've got tons of very specialized products that aren't too much more than those sliding drawers.

What did I do?

 

I wanted an actual place to do my makeup.  So I decided to get a vanity with a storage drawer.  I have it in the mudroom which is right off our primary bathroom.

The drawer came with three divisions.  I put three boxes that I got from the Container Store in the largest division to make five.

1. Furthest to the left is my face and hand cremes
2. Next is my bases, powders and concealers
3. The middle has my blushes towards the mirror and my lip colors towards the seat.
4. The fourth container has my eye products.  Eye shadows towards the mirror and the liners and mascaras are towards the seat.
5. The right most compartment is cut off a little bit, but it has hair ties and hair rollers.

The seat has storage too.  This is where I keep my hair products and strightener/curler/blow dryer.

This set up has worked really well for me.  It's easier to find my makeup when I want to experiment or have a special occasion.  Unfortunately, the actual vanity that I purchased at target is no longer available, but there are several similar ones on the market. 


The next one is not mine, but I think it's amazing.

I thought about making one.  Info on how to make that can be found at that link.


Sources:

• http://hopelesslydevotedtomakeup.blogspot.com/2011/04/how-long-is-makeup-good-for.html
• http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/22/organize-makeup_n_1372362.html#s804073&title=Condense_ 

I hope everyone had a great Christmas and a Happy New Year.  The end of 2012 saw my hubby and I in good ole New Orleans.  December 30th was our 6th anniversary so a long weekend trip down to the Big Easy was our present to each other.

They still had some Christmas stuff up.  That santa was in our hotel lobby and looked kinda creepy.

We toured a rum distillery and learned about how they flavor run.

We enjoyed some beignets

We scoped out Cafe du Monde.  This was on our anniversary.  Aren't we cute?

We toasted to the six great years of marriage that we've thus far enjoyed.

Rode on a riverboat

Heard some live jazz on Frenchman Street (much better than Burbon Street)

Braved the crowds

Saw

some

old

buildings

Had more beignets.  They are like little pillows of amazing.  Nam Nam Nam.