An Afternoon at the Museum

My surviving winter strategy includes making sure that I plan lots of little outings.  Being out and about keeps the whining about cabin fever and the grayness of winter at bay... a little bit anyways.

Museums are an excellent way to spend an mid-winter afternoon and to find a bit of inspiration.  Lucky for those in the Chicago area, many of the museums have additional free admission days during January and February (my favorites to visit). 

Plans for Saturday? Now you do.

For your Chicago Saturday, there a few events going on that you must consider adding into your plans. 

First start the day with a stop by the Green City Market (indoor version until May) in Lincoln Park to load up on seasonal treats for the week.

The Logan Square Kitchen Pastry Market.  Seriously, this is not to be missed.  Take a beautiful space, add amazing local pastry chefs' confections (Macaron Chicago, Tinycakes, Nice Cream, Flour Cake and Pastry), fun neighborhood type atmosphere and it is certainly somewhere you want to be.  RSVP here.  (And I will be there bright and early so hi if you see me!)  I am giddy just thinking about all of the goodies!

Once you are all hopped up on sugar... time to head to the West Loop.  The Chicago Independent Radio Project is holding its annual record fair.  While vinyl is clearly what the cool kids will be stocking up, there will also be cds, dvds, and all kinds of vintage music goodness. 

Then head up to Evanston for the Chicago Jazz Ensemble for some smooth, live music.  Finally, stop by Volo for a wine and cheese flight before heading home to crash.

 Enjoy your weekend!

Weddings 101 at a Discount!

There are just a few seats left for the January session of Weddings 101... and I have a sweet little discount to offer my dear Chicago bridal readers of $50 off!  The Weddings 101 class is essentially a wedding planning bootcamp for brides-to-be led by seasoned wedding planners Magnificent Milestones.  All you have to do to get the discount is to mention this blog when you sign up. 

Here are the details:

CS Brides presents

Wedding 101

With Magnificent Milestones

January Sessions

Offered Tuesdays & Thursdays

12 PM - 1 PM

Magnificent Milestones | 1041 W. Madison St.

Join us for our January session of Wedding 101, offered Tuesdays and Thursdays from 12 PM to 1 PM. The classes cover budget, guest lists, timetables, vendors and venues. All "graduates" leave with a bridal swag bag full of over $1,000 worth of discounts and incentives, a customized budget and a list of our favorite vendors.

For more information please visit
www.magnificentmilestones.com

Cost is $200 for four, one hour sessions.
Lunch and swag bag included.

Lovely Package Exchange

Way back when there was daylight well past 4:30pm and one didn't even think about wearing a coat let alone a scarf, I signed up for the Lovely Package Exchange.  Then burst out laughing to see that my partner was my friend Tina of With This Ring I Thee Obsess; what a funny coincidence that out of hundreds of participates we were paired up... I think that world wide web really wants to make sure that we are friends!  So then we both became buried with the business of life and decided that we would slowly work on our packages and be rebels with the due date.  But it was worth the wait, my friends, Tina sent me the loveliest of packages!

I ripped open the pretty box to dig into a package that included one of my favorite party decoration elements, tissue flowers... 

She included sweet gifts with the packages all set to a theme; Bake, Relax, Make, Give, and Live.

She included such cute things that were just the type of thing that make me do little girly squeals, such as cute little owls, silve cake tester, and pretty handmade cupcake flags...

I am trying to not over-use the word lovely in this post but seriously, it was really such a bunch of lovely to receive in the mail! 

For the package that I sent to Tina, it was an evolution as it kept changing a little bit as time went on and the due date was further away.

For the gifts, I went with two different "themes" that I know Tina enjoys; Tea and Paper.  I got her a tea towel from Elizabeth Bentz and a tea book from Elite Elishi for the tea items.  For the paper I got her pretty labels, letterpress tags, and sweet cards from Postal Press.

The package was then all wrapped up with kraft paper, fall colored flowers, glassine bags, bakers twine, a little tag garland, quotes associated with the item inside, and stitched together with a red zigzag stitch.  A little hint if you do a stitch for a packaging detail, you can use a needle to get the thread to all be on one side and then tie a little knot before cutting so it doesn't unravel.  I captured a few photos of the inprogress state...

Tina has posted some pictures into the flickr group that includes more detail of each of the packages I received (I was way to excited as I ripped into each of them to get proper pictures!) and posted about her package here.

An Event Not To Be Missed: Ask the Experts

Being a bride to be comes with a whole bunch of questions- such as What should I look for in a photographer?   What should we wear to the engagement session? Lucky for you Chicago brides to be a there is a meet and greet at the fabulous Smitten Boutique this Thursday with amazing experts there to answer your questions.

Chat up the amazing Olivia Leigh or lovely Renee Price of Kehoe Designs while nibbling a Foiled cupcake and sipping champagne. And continue the multi-tasking with picking up a few of these wedding planning essentials at Smitten.  Don't forget to pick up a discount certificate for working with either Renee for decor planning or Olivia for your wedding day or boudoir photo shoot! 

Sounds like a pretty fantastic start to the evening to me!  Details below or click here for the pdf event invite. 

Ask the Experts

Thursday, December 3rd
from 5:30pm to 6:30pm

At Smitten Boutique
1041 W Madison