tying up loose ends.

the 30/30 challenge is over.

it has been.

i've just been a jerk that made you look at 27 pairs of shoes

and then left you hanging.

by a shoestring.

i'm happy to say that i succeeded.

no repeats!

i even continued it a few days afterwards to make sure all of the shoes got their fair wear.

it also pointed out the couple pairs that really needed be given away.

but honestly, there are only so many shoe pics the world can take.

so here's the final stretch...

one more black pair on thursday.

new MaxStudio strappy heels.

a punch of pink on friday.

these are on their way out the door,

just need to find a replacement pair!

and finally,

drum roll please....

the neatest shoes i own.

custom painted by a little old lady in a london market.

present from the sis last year!

    

big ben, city hall, and my age floating in the london eye.  too cool!

30/30: Day 25, 26, & 27

with the 30 days of shoes winding down, 

i thought i was running out of black shoes to wear.

guess i wrong...

Charles Davids on Monday, Steve Madden Luxe on Tuesday 

and the only pair of Nike's i own today.

i saw the maddens in the window of dsw last summer and had to have them!  

they make me smile.

so worth the impulse buy, 

just enough glitz

and they come with a built in calf work-out!  

and they've been known to withstand an entire afternoon of walking

...well almost...

my feet might not love 4 inch heels as much as the rest of me.

besides for shoe obsessions, 

i also get a little OCD about things at times.

today on my way out the door i shoved an REI gift card

and SOMEHOW managed to jam the corner of the paper into the snap of my purse.

really?! 

what.are.the.odds?!

oh and it was stuck beyond belief.

had to break out the needle-nose pliers AND tweezers.

i'm sure most people wouldn't even notice.

or care.

but not me...

delayed my departure a good 20 minutes

sheesh!

and while we're on the topic of purses,

i have quite the multitude of those as well.

but this is my current 'it' bag.

got it for christmas this year.

my first big girl bag

yay, it holds more than just my phone and keys!

aaah, sometimes it IS okay to enjoy material things.

30/30: Day 24 + Weekend Projects

this weekend was all about doing nothing.  

trying to relax and spend some time doing things i wanted to do.  

there's been way too much running around and scheduled tasks going on in my life lately so i needed a major breather.

well i almost managed to do nothing.  

thanks to the rain i even slept in until 8:45 today.

huge accomplishment in my world!  

but my overactive brain seemed to get the best of me at times.  

i made a new home for some of my shoes while i was putting away all of the winter clothes.  

still trying to figure out how i'm going to get to them every morning...time to invest in stilts?

 

i barely had any need to wear shoes today, so i wore flops even though it was a little chilly for them.

bought them in martha's vineyard many years ago, good memories of warmer days :).

and yea i wore sweats most of the day.  

i don't joke around when i'm trying to be lazy!

___________________

besides for reorganizing my closet and watching too much tv, i made some phenomenal bread.

i am obsessed with anything carb related.

basically i follow the anti-atkins diet

my mom sent me this recipe from the King Arthur website.

there are so many great blogs i could follow.

but why bother when she does it for me and filters it for just the stuff i might like?!

chunks of cheese plus bread...'nuff said!

final result...crusty, cheesy, baguettes.  the house smells AMAZING!

if you're going to try it out, use the blog/picture version, much more thorough.

Can it be Sunday again tomorrow? please?!

30/30: Day 23 + OneforOne

Rocked my TOMS shoes today.

My sister got them for me for my birthday!

The yellow color just screams summer!

That hot TOMS guy came to her school to talk about the TOMS mission to bring shoes to children in need.

Hot guys selling things usually works...

add in some pictures of sad children and 

WHAM

...marketing genius!

but seriously, they're superbly comfy shoes that are way better for your feet than regular flats.  

and it's an awesome cause.

and i really want to participate in the 'one day without shoes' next year.

TOMS sends you stickers and a funny little flag so you can take a picture of you and your shoes to send to them.  

Normally i wouldn't do this but the pair Kara got for me are called "Bridgeport Yellow"

...uhm perfect, i live in bridgeport.

documentation required!

well it's her birthday too!

not only was it my brother's girlfriend's birthday, but it was my friend Linda's 30th birthday on Friday!

her family organized a surprise party for her.  

i honestly can't remember the last time i've been to a surprise party, so exciting.  

and they pulled it off, she had no idea!

in my mind all things that are brightly colored match.

so i wore a bright pink dressed paired with kelly green sandals.

obvi.

they make even little ol' me seem tall!

this cute little guy was at the party...

guarantee that he's going to be setting world records for staring contests in the near future.

30/30: Day 21 + a misty moisty morning...

...when cloudy was the weather.  

it was foggy this morning on the drive in to work.  not a very common occurrence here in PA.

i love fog.

and watching it rise through the spring trees while the sun starts shining is just pure magic.

makes me want to walk through the woods and take a whole lotta pictures.

i miss the fog horn.

being woken up at 2am by numerous freight trains speeding through my town just isn't the same.

wearing my new sperry's made it almost okay that there's not an ocean within walking distance.

second best thing about sperry's, other than the fact that they're awesome, is that right now they're being sold in a shoebox with pictures from newport on it!  

Whaaat?!?! so cool!  

thank goodness i actually loved these crazy shoes because the newport shoebox probably would've forced me to purchase it regardless.

turn that frown upside down + 30/30: Day 20

today was less than wonderful so i needed to work hard to keep up the positive energy...

otherwise my computer was going to get smashed to smithereens!  

work computer of course.  

just using the word smithereens makes me start to smile...

anywho....frowny face remedies...

painted the toes my fave color nail polish

essie bermuda shorts.

dreamt of being in bermuda.

wore a comfy tee with the eiffel tower on it.

dreamt of being back in paris.

wore my chef jacket to cook up some pulled pork.

my mom bought it for me.  

it's the best.

invest in one for yourself!

wondered if my job would be more fun if i just wore my chef jacket to the office once in a while.

listened to pandora.

music always makes me feel better...or at least calms me down.

and pandora is just magically fascinating.

and when all else failed...

watched these two silly videos which always crack me up.

i can't imagine there's anyone left in the world that hasn't seen them,

but have a good laugh and watch them again anyway!

aah! aaahh! aaaahhhh!!!!   is this gonna be forever!?!

no, it's not gonna be forever...tomorrow will be better...fingers crossed!

confession: sometimes i also scream in my car, similar to this vid, when the day is pure suck :). 

Half-Baked Plan + 30/30: Day 19

daily dose of embarrassment:

today i was trying to be productive and i think i must've tried too hard.

because i failed!

big time.

i decided to go to the gym right near work so i could leave something running on my laptop.

with the intention of swinging by the office on my way back home to get it.

had a good little work out.

narrowly avoided being spotted by the few people at the gym that work in my office.

because boy would that be embarrassing.

since i sweat.

a lot.

no glistening here folks, just good ol' pure sweat.

it's awkward enough to see coworkers outside of their natural habitat...

but when i'm sweaty it's just not okay!

success! got out of there without so much as a glance in my direction.

walk through the parking lot and....BAM!

PANIC!!

'i'm COVERED in sweat!

I HAVE TO GO BACK TO THE OFFICE!!

and it's only 5:45...people are still WORKING!!!

STUPID PLAN!!!!

AAAAHHH!!!!!!

luckily i had another shirt in my gym bag so i could hide some of the sweat.

but there's nothing like stopping people dead.in.their.tracks when then saw me walking down the halls in gym outfit with my hair pulled back and those fab little sweat ringlets forming at the nape of my neck.

probably smelled fantastic too.

and why is it that when you're trying to be in ninja-stealth-mode you run into EVERYONE?!?

so glad i'm working from home tomorrow.

give some of the unlucky coworkers a chance to erase that burned image from their brain!

___________________

as for shoes, i settled for one of my brown pairs today.

does anyone else think it's impossible to find brown shoes? 

i only own 2 pair  (flops excluded).

30/30: Day 18...woof!

happy marathon monday!

congrats to all of those courageous enough to participate in the boston marathon.  

i just don't know how they do it!  

hopefully they avoided all of those crazy BC students ;-).

you may notice that i'm a day behind in the 30/30 challenge

...but it's NOT because i messed up...

it's because i didn't have a need to wear shoes yesterday, ha oops.

gotta love a lazy sunday.

i'll extend it an extra day, no worries, wouldn't want to fail at my own made-up challenge!

wore these rocketdogs today...barefoot would've been way more fun.

confession:

when i was little i would have dreams ALL. THE. TIME. that i got on the school bus without shoes.  

don't know why, but i remember it was very upsetting.

maybe it means i'm destined to embarrass myself in public, sounds likely.

30/30: Day 17 + Gear!

let's get real here people.

there are a lot of reasons why i decided to signup for a triathlon...

the pride.

the challenge.

a reason to get back in shape.

the adrenaline rush.

but put that all aside and you get down to one highly overlooked reason...

THE GEAR!!

hey at least i'll be the most coordinated person they've pulled out of the schuylkill river in a long time!

hold up, qualifier...most COLOR coordinated person...physical coordination has never been very high on my list.

some of this fab gear came from www.triathletesports.com.

 they send ya little magnets and stickers.

nice surprise...it's the little things that make me smile.

oooh yea...and how can i forget my new custom oakleys?!

SWEET!!!

hopefully my excitement for the new gear will help me overcome the nerves that are starting to build already.

maybe i can just intimidate the competition out of my way with these fierce duds.

the fact that i called my stuff 'duds' just lowered their coolness by a million.  i'm aware :).

30/30: Day 16

longest week ever.  uggghhhhh.  


being a worker-bee is for the birds...anyone want to employe me to do something fun?! please?!?


wore my Charlotte NYC black flats today that make me happy...but clearly accentuate the wideness of my piggies, yikes!

the weather today was rather fickle...but made for a fantastic drive home!!  awesome light that made the colors of spring glow and then as i was driving through my town a gigantic rainbow appeared so i parked my car, literally sprinted through the house and then ran up the hill with Cam just as the thunder was starting...made up for a lackluster week!

30/30: Day 15

this week has been pure suck.  as a result, i felt the need to glitz up the feet a bit with strappy, bejeweled (so much more adult than bedazzled!) BCBG heels...

and since my allergies....which apparently i just acquired in the past 12 seconds since i've NEVER had allergy issues before...have made my eyes super itchy and red this week, i've been eye-makeup-less and therefore am omitting the pic where i look like i've been crying for days!

30/30: Day 14 + Cam

who doesn't love to hide behind the camera?!  i know i do!  it's one thing to be kooky and crazy but it's another to have your awkwardness documented, so today i'm hiding a little.  but you can kinda see my teal old navy flops in there...bonus!

although this is not a fantastic picture, you get to see my camera!  her name is Cam (yes, OBVIOUSLY i name random inanimate objects from time to time, duh), she's a Nikon D90 and gets the job done just fine.  might upgrade one day...but shhh, don't let her hear that!  

i currently have her accessorized with a PhatStraps wrist strap which i think is seriously the greatest idea ever!

i purchased a funky neck strap from them as well, but i've yet to use it because i just can't bring myself to go back to the old way of camera carrying! 

for the record i also have a little Canon digital elph, clearly his name is Elphus and he tends to only make appearances at parties & concerts.  

30/30: Day 13 + tSwift

oh. my. goodness!  did you see what she was wearing today!? 

yea...those shoes were laaaame!  

purely function over fashion purchase...no need to let that happen again!

oh wait, the shoes are near a taylor swift cd

...and tSwizzle makes everything a little more sparkly...

so maybe all is okay in the world after-all.

ahhahaaa.....yea, i might know all the taylor swift songs.  

and may have attended her concert for my bday this year.  

go ahead, laugh it up.  

but seriously, you know she's awesome.

and a little bit gangsta...

makes me laugh. every single time.

30/30: Day 12

back to work.  barf.

looking like a nerd since i got caught eating candy...chocolate helps erase workday misery.

wore my BCBGirls 'roach killers' as my current boss refers to them...or my 'f-me pumps' as my previous boss called them.  classy.


not a very good day so not much to say....sorry for ya!

30/30: Day 11

oh look, just what you were hoping for....another pair of ratty flops that i refuse to part with.


the rationale goes a little something like this...

me: they're old, get rid of them.

also me: but they're the only brown pair i have.

back to first me: false. you just bought a new pair.  give them away.

now back to whiny me: but these have really awesome arches...

...and nice soles that make my feet feel happy after a long day of walking around in flops.

me: fiiiine.  once the others get broken in though these are out the door.

Yay! I win! :)

i mentioned that i might be a little crazy at times, right?!

30/30: Day 10 + Fogo!

Happy Birthday Kev!

Aaaah he's gonna kill me...I've never met anyone so against celebrating their own birthday (or have his picture taken)!  

Tough, we forced it on him anyway. 

 

Fogo de Chao SEEMED like a good idea.

but i think all of us agreed that it was one of those 'gotta try it once, but once is enough' deals.  

And i was incredibly pleased i didn't wear pants!

i wore a dress silly...get your mind outta the gutter!  

not sure if i was freezing or holding my stomach due to extreme stuffing...probably both.  

seychelles makes these same exact shoes (no joke, check 'em out here) but i got mine at Target, hecks yea!

30/30: Day 9 + My Mom Rocks!

Quick...jump in your internet time machine....


okay so remember easter? well i woke up to a fantastic easter basket placed outside my bedroom door!  yep, i might be 28 but E.Bunny still knows where to find me.  in the basket were these cool kicks...

i wore these today with a very cute matching hair ribbon...

but the picture that included my face looked like i was cranky enough to eat someone

...Rrrrooooarrrr!

uhm wait, so it wasn't this exact pair in my basket, but a pair very similar....which i then exchanged in my mom's room which looked a little more like an LLBean warehouse.  i kid you not when i say that my mom bought these shoes in 5 different colors/patterns and in at least 5 different sizes!  the amount of boxes that came pouring out of the multiple closets would've made a palatial fort for any small child...or tiny 28 year old, don't tempt me!  


Why would one person buyout the entire store? well because they were on sale silly!  AND because she gets free shipping...AND because she got gift cards for spending a certain amount...AND because she would hate to have her girls go home empty handed (take 2 pairs she said!)...AND because she's a rockstar.  obvi!

isn't she the best?! xo!

30/30: Day 8

confession: oops, i wore ugly shoes today! 


don't know why i bought these, never really liked them all that much, yet they seem to be stuck in my closet for the rest of eternity...

oh and in case you're wondering why i don't always take pics of my shoes on my feet...it's because no one's awake to take a pic of me when i leave for work and because i typically go to the gym after work, i look like this when i get home (avert your eyes!):

hot stuff huh?! haha.  AWKWARD! :)

30/30: Day 7

It's WEDNESDAY!!! :)  


Most of you probably don't get as excited for Wednesday as I do....BUT...I work from home on Wednesdays!!! woo-hoo!!  Dance party!


Most weeks I don't leave the house until late afternoon and so shoes are LOW on the priority list.  As crappy as they may be, I didn't want to skip a day in the '30/30 Challenge' so here ya go....

I think i wore shoes for a total of 10 minutes today, old blue Reefs with 'custom' paint spots, haha...see, told ya i can't get enough of blue.  My shoes are most commonly found hiding under the table!