Monday, September 30, 2013

Monday Mix Up #6

Its baaaack. Or is it? This week's Monday Mix Up is a small list of videos that I currently love.

*Hashtag with Jimmy Fallon and Justin Timberlake. I love these guys. Love.

*Kid Ink ft Chris Brown- Show Me. This is an audio only video. I like this song. And I like Chris Brown as a performer. Sorry.


*Miley Cyrus- Wrecking Ball. Say what you will about her as a person, but I like the song. And, maybe shes acting out because her relationship ended?

*Childish Gambino- Freaks and Geeks. This video is a few years old, but this song right here is the reason why I love him as a rapper. I like to say that he is a rapper for intelligent people. The references in his songs are amazing.

*Eminem- Berzerk. He became big when I was in high school, and this song reminds of his stuff from back then. I've been a fan of pretty much all his stuff though. He has a lot of talent.

*The best pick up line from Raphael De La Ghetto aka Jazz on the Fresh Prince of Bel Air. This is kind of a running joke in my house (and I couldn't have all my videos be music videos lol).

I hope you like my video picks and goodbye September!!

Saturday, September 28, 2013

Raid Snacks- Battle of the Pumpkin Spice Lattes


Its that time of year again! Everything pumpkin. I love pumpkin, so I think it's great. Its still around the mid to high 80's weather-wise here, so hot drinks aren't ideal right now, but I broke down and drank two today to do this taste comparison for you guys :)

So I chose to compare the Starbucks PSL and the McDonald's McCafe PSL. I chose the smallest size of each on the menu (small at McDonalds and tall at Starbucks). The picture above shows a side by side comparison of the two, and while the Starbucks cup appears taller, both are 12oz. Both were made with no modifications or changes in order to meet the nutritional information you can find online. The McDonald's PSL is 200 calories and cost $2.39. The Starbucks PSL is 300 calories and cost $3.95.

I tried the McDonald's one first, and I thought it was pretty good. The pumpkin spice taste was very muted, and there is no whipped cream, which I thought I was weird (whipped cream and pumpkin go hand in hand in my mind). The Starbucks one however, had whipped cream and the pumpkin spice taste is way more pronounced. It was delicious. If I could, I would probably buy the Starbucks one more (I am also on a mission to get the Gold Starbucks card this year as well), but realistically, I go to McDonald's more, so I see more McCafe PSLs in my future. 

*Price winner- McDonald's
*Taste winner- Starbucks

Friday, September 27, 2013

Poppin' Off- 3.1 Phillip Lim for Target

I love when Target collaborates with designers, I really do. There used to be a time in my life when I would buy a piece from every collab that they did. While that has certainly changed, I had a serious countdown going for this 3.1 Phillip Lim collaboration, and I knew some pieces were coming home with me.




I think in the nerd world, everyone was obsessing about the top two items (plus the navy blue Boom sweater dress, but I found that to be hideous), just because of their comic book look. And of course, I love them for that reason, but they also appear to be really well made, which is unusual for Target clothes these days (sorry Target). There are other pieces to love in collection though. Like the Sparkle Sweater above and the dual color trench coats (love!!!).Here in town, all of our Target stores (we have four), have really limited numbers of everything in this collection. I saw the Sparkle Sweater the day the collection was released, went back the next day to get it and it was gone. I had to go down a size in the Boom sweatshirt for that same reason (I ended up buying my actual size. For sweatshirts I like to buy at least a size up for extra coziness). You can't sleep on this collection, that's for sure. If you want it, and its in your size, buy it! 

Friday, September 20, 2013

Poppin' Off- Espionage Cosmetics Nailed It

Eternally late to the party, I am finally able to write about the awesome Kickstarter that Espionage Cosmetics had for their new nail wraps.

I had read about them on so many blogs (Geeky Glamorous, The Nerdy Girlie, and Geek Pinata to name a few). And pictures of them kept popping up on my Instagram feed. I kept visiting the Kickstarter page, wanting to make a pledge, but something was holding me back. My horribly bitten nails. I bite them like crazy, and I doubted that these awesome wraps would look great on stubby nails. But on the last day the Kickstarter was open I decided to pledge $25. I think these nail wraps are incredible, and there's certainly a market for it. Espionage Cosmetics received 1,185 backers and raised $71,999 for this project (they had set their goal at $20,000). I'm also using the nail wraps I get for pledging (I chose Zombie Killer, Make It So and Turtles) as motivation to finally stop biting my nails. 

Even though the nail wraps aren't available right now, if nerdy makeup is your thing, you should definitely check out the Espionage Cosmetics website and pick up some of their other stuff.

Wednesday, September 18, 2013

WoW Wednesday- Tis the Season(s)

Its no secret that the holidays in World of Warcraft are my favorite thing about the game. The summer months are sad as far as the game are concerned because the only holiday is the Midsummer Festival and that sucks. But Brewfest starts on Friday and I am so excited. Not only is Brewfest a super cool holiday (racing rams, Wolpertingers, and lots of beer), but it kicks off all the other awesome holidays. Halloween is my favorite WoW holiday, and is usually the time of year when you'll see me playing Horde (Halloween in Brill/Undercity- doesn't make much sense to do it anywhere else). Christmas, Valentine's Day, and Noblegarden round out my top holiday picks.

Holidays in the game give the chance to earn cute pets, new gear, and rare mounts. Also, if you're an achievement whore like I am, holidays have tons of achieves to earn. And, if you do them all, you can earn the big achievement What A Long, Strange Trip Its Been (which I have). The bonus to that one is the violet proto-drake and super fast flying. Its time consuming, but you don't have to do it all in a year. It took me a few years to get it, but its worth it.

What are your favorite WoW holidays? Do you enjoy them or think they're a waste of time? Let me know in the comments :)

Friday, September 13, 2013

Personally...Soccer Snacks

This is my son's third year playing soccer. Snacks come with the territory. The first year he played, his coach put a emphasis on healthy snacks. I brought reduced sugar fruit snacks on my first turn and got laughed at. It didn't phase me though. We didn't have a lot of money at the time to spend on extra snacks; especially the organic, free of everything snacks the other parents were bringing. Last season, his team pretty much all brought packaged snacks and things like doughnuts. I felt better about my own snack choices (Goldfish and Teddy Grahams). This season we have switched regions, and while the parents seem less competitive in terms of how the boys play, they certainly aren't any less competitive when it comes to snacks. Why am I even writing about this, you ask? Well, two reasons. The first is, today is my first turn at snack. So far this season, the snacks have been lots of fruit during the half, and then some sort of sweet snack at the end (and lots of juice boxes and sports drinks). I've decided to bring a mix of green and purple grapes plus baby carrots for the half and then some cinnamon organic popcorn for the end. I have juice boxes and Powerades, I just don't know when to give which beverage. I'll be honest, I've been stressing over this snack a little bit. I'm worried about being judged. The story below might help explain it a little better.

The past two seasons, I've been lucky enough to have the game before Halloween. I love Halloween. I thought when I became a parent that I would get to do all sorts of stuff for class parties: makes crafts, bring snacks, etc. When I was younger, I had a party at school for every holiday. Well, the school district my son is in doesn't do that. They only allow two parties a year (Christmas and Valentine's Day), and you can't even celebrate your birthday there. Its very Scrooge-like, but apparently it has something to do with Michelle Obama's war on childhood obesity and parties just encourage bad eating, etc (but thats a post for another time, because I disagree). Anyway, to make up for his lack of party at school, I like to add a little extra to his soccer snacks. I don't go crazy with candy or anything. Just one fun size candy bar, whatever the regular soccer snack is, maybe a pencil or some vampire teeth- all wrapped up in a festive treat bag. Well, his last game this year falls on the Friday before Halloween, and the Team Mom asked if there was a volunteer for snacks for that game. I jumped at the chance, and I told her that I really love doing the snacks at the games before Halloween. And she just came back with "Great. That means candy." I've been told that I have a tendency to take things personally, but I felt like that was really rude. I'm not the most fit parent, I'll admit it. But I don't just shovel junk food down my kids' throats. So it hurt my feelings, and I'm kinda using tonight's snack as a way to (hopefully) show her that I can do healthy and that my Halloween snack isn't going to be all junk. Does that sound crazy?