Have you heard?! Westervin is 2 years old. That’s quite a feat, if we may say so! What’s that? You don’t have a present? Well, that’s ok. Turns out you can wish us well by completing a little reader survey. It’ll help us get a better idea of what you like about Westervin, so we can be even better friends this year. Read the rest of this entry »
Every year you can count on getting at least one pair of socks for Christmas, and every year you are probably pretty happy that you have a new pair of socks. After all, socks are important, and you’re pretty lucky to have a brand new pair. But did you know that you don’t have to wear white Hanes socks all the time? There is a better way. A whole world of exciting sockwear, and we’re here to share it with you. The Shopping Sherpa presents: SOCKS…for your feet!
This is exciting! I get to share one of my favorite things that came out of our wedding: the guest book. There are so many ways to handle a guest book, and we sure thought about a bunch of different ones, but ultimately Sarah had the idea of using postcards.
We already established postcards as a theme element with our embroidered save-the-dates and table numbers. After the collection phase, we realized we had quite a few surplus postcards that were really cool but that wouldn’t work for embroidering purposes. So we decided to put those extra postcards to use! We put stamps on all of them, addressed them to ourselves (using our custom address stamp), and displayed them in a rotating postcard tree on our “Welcome Wagon” table. Our guests were then instructed to pick their favorite, write us a little note, and mail it back to us when they got home or arrived at some other glamorous destination!
These are just a few of the ones we’ve received so far, and they’re still trickling in. Getting postcards is so much fun!
P.S. If you were one of our beloved wedding guests, but didn’t see or forgot to grab a postcard, please let us know! We’d love to send you one… perhaps with the Thank You card that we are late to mail to you…
Last weekend we stopped in St. Louis for a few days on our way to and from our wedding shower in Columbia, Missouri. St. Louis is pretty great for a number of reasons, but one of them is that my sister lives there, and she always has some good ideas for things to do. I’d say one of my least favorite things about visiting a city is trying to figure out what to do….turns out I’m a pretty anxious person. In any event, St. Louis is always friendly, welcoming, and fun.
First up we went to the Stable in Benton Park, which is, well, a former stable attached to the former Lemp Brewery complex (by the way, if you’re looking to buy a really old brewery, we found one). The food was a bit hit and miss, but they had a great beer selection and great prices, at least compared to Chicago. Sarah loved her black currant hard cider, and marveled at the majestic chandelier of her dreams.
Next day we were walking around my sister’s neighborhood of Carondelet, which has the oldest bakery in St. Louis (sadly it’s closed on Sundays).
Now that we’ve got some provisions for our crafting expedition, it’s time to line up the presets. You just can’t take a trip without your favorite radio stations! For this particular project, we recommend the White Stripes… and for a few reasons. 1) They just announced they’re officially breaking up. Awww! Boo hoo. We didn’t see it coming. (JK). 2) But seriously, they’re a good f’ing band. You can’t go wrong with the White Stripes. I don’t care who you are or what you’re doing. Do it while listening to the White Stripes. 3) One could say that the craft we’re about to be craftering is a little too old school. Like, granny old. But to those naysayers, I say nay! We are bringing it back and in friggin’ style. Cuz we’ll be listening to the bloody White Stripes! Does your granny listen to the White Stripes? No. Now get away from me. (But come back in a few hours for our final installment!)
We’ve got some new fun for you friends of our, inspired by the crafternoon movement. Crafting is all about havin’ a good ol’ time, if you ask the Westervins, so why not make a day of it (probably not a weekday) with some fresh tunes and even fresher attitudes (by getting liquored up)! We wanna share some of our favorite craft projects and hobbies with you, and to make it even more enjoyable, we’ve paired each craft with a special cocktail concoction and some musical suggestions. So come along. Take a ride with us to a DIY paradise. But we’ll need to fill up the tank first!
We think the Shopping Sherpa did a pretty good job of coming up with gift ideas for everyone else, but we didn’t need any help with finding our own gifts to wish for. Between an Etsy addiction (Sarah’s, obv) and daily scouring of the interwebs (Brian), we’ve collected plenty a pretty present idea over the months. Sure, we’re a little late for all of you to buy us Christmas presents, but maybe, someone, somewhere will get us something from out list during the new year. Here’s hoping!
There’s still some time until Christmas, which means there is still time for more holiday gift guides! Today we have homey treasures for the kind-hearted couple who will invite you to their cozy Kansas cottage for a family style cook-out, offering homemade vegan cupcakes and grilled vegetables fresh from their budding garden. Whether it’s gardening, entertaining, or just watching their favorite movie with a few glasses of wine, the Shopping Sherpa knows how to thank these generous and ingenious pals.
It’s time for another Holiday Gift Guide from the Shopping Sherpa! This one’s for everyone’s favorite Fun Foodie Nerdster. He loves hopping about town, sampling fine and not so fine cuisine, as well as cooking up something special at home. But when this epicure isn’t indulging (or making others smile with his silly sense of humor), he’s likely working on some electronic scraps, creating some eerie dance music or an army of not-so-evil robots for world domination! Ya never know…
The Westervin blog is one year old! Can you believe it? We gave birth to this little idea of a silly blog around this time last year, and my how our little creation has grown in 12 months! My how our lives have changed in 12 months! An engagement, a new job, a new apartment, and our crazy kitty child, Fitzgerald. Happy as clams, we are.
How will we celebrate? Chocolate cake, of course! Lots of chocolate cake. And a little trip to see our bestest best friends in the whole universe. And probably some champagne, if I have anything to say about it. But don’t worry–we haven’t forgotten about you, our faithful reader. We probably wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for you, all of you, with your sweet comments and encouraging feedback. We’ve even got a little present for you. You’ll have to wait until Monday, though. But I’ll give you a hint… it rhymes with Clog Piveaway.
