A Squared: Recent Happenings

Thursday, July 2, 2015

Recent Happenings

Let's take a break from our regularly scheduled blog programming and talk about some fun happenings today! A lot has been going on in my little corner of the blog world lately. Posting aside, summer is a big time for events, festivals, and other great opportunities for blogging gals like myself. I try to only commit to one of these events per week (for my own sanity), but that can be so tough in the summer with so many cool things happening every day. Here's a quick snapshot of some of the fun things I have been up to lately:



My friend Kit from The Kittchen hosted Petunia Palooza with Wave Petunias at the Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum. Wave gave us a fun (and hands on!) lesson in planting and caring for petunias. They had arranged a huge spread of planters of different shapes and sizes, a variety of the signature gorgeous petunias, and several other flowers, plants, and herbs for us to create our own planter arrangement that represented us, or styles, and our blogs.


I love decorating with gray, so I snagged a minimalist gray planter and planted a variety of vibrant fuschia, purple, and silver/lavendar petunias in it. To compliment them, I added a delicate soft green climbing leaf and lavendar because it color coordinated, smells amazing, and what would a food blogger's planter be without an herb?

Fun fact that I learned here: The spacing recommendations printed on the plant tags when you buy them really only apply when you are planting in the ground. When planting in the ground, roots have the ability to stretch low and far. In a planter, they can only grow as far as the bottom so you can create fuller arrangements as spacing the roots is not an issue. The more you know.


The Windy City Blogger Collective hosted a happy hour at Seasons 52 in River North recently as well. I'm heading back there in a few weeks and will give you a full rundown of my full meal then, but in the meantime I wanted to mention that their flatbreads are the perfect happy hour snack. They come in a variety of flavor combinations like artichoke & goat cheese and grilled garlic pesto chicken, which are two of my favorites. They're low in calories (and even lower when you share with a girlfriend over a glass of not-so-low calorie wine), full of flavor, and feature an addictive crispy crust.


After a drink and a few several pieces of flatbread at Seasons 52, I headed down the street to Room & Board with Erin for a fun event all about Living With Color. An impressive panel of ladies featuring interior designer Alexandra Kaehler who used to write Things That Sparkle (one of the first blogs I ever read!), Valspar Color Strategist Sue Kim, executive editor of Apartment Therapy Janel Laban, and Cheryl Woolley who manages the visuals for Room & Board. The discussion was moderated by the hilarious editor-in-chief of House Beautiful Sophie Donelson. These ladies had amazing insights about how to (realistically) incorporate color into your living space. The bottom line: Don't be afraid of color and incorporate it into your wall color-- it's one of the cheapest and easiest things to change and can change the look of an entire space.


I'm a huge fan of Room & Board's furniture: their cozy modern aesthetic is right up my alley. After the panel discussion ended Erin and I window shopped for a bit and I fell in love with this display of chevron pillows and blankets in gray tones. I have just upgraded a an IKEA chair in my living room to a great new "grown up" one from West Elm and now I am itching to redecorate the entire room. I'll take one of each of these pillows, please!


And I know I have told you about Rocksbox before, but I had to share again because the most recent box is my most favorite yet! I'm obsessed with this gold and teal Aztec-inspired bangle from House of Harlow (Nicole Richie's line) and decided I was going to purchase it as soon as I opened the box for the first time. My stylist also picked this delicate and understated gold gorjana studs, which are a nice compliment to the two statement pieces in this box. I'm also loving this statement necklace-- it's lighter and a bit more delicate than most necklaces like it (including one that I own), so I am also considering purchasing this one to have as a more "everyday" statement necklace. Thank goodness Rocksbox offers such a great member rate on purchasing these pieces!


I'm still having so much fun with Rocksbox! As a reminder, Rocksbox will send you a box of 3 pieces of jewelry (with picks based on your profile, likes, and dislikes), you can wear them for as long as you want, purchase any of the pieces as you like (at a discounted rate), and when you're done, you send it back, and then your next personally curated Rocksbox is on its way to you. Want to try it out? Use code AASQUAREDXOXO at checkout and get your first month FREE!


Have a safe and happy Fourth of July weekend! Check back in on Monday for more great recipes, food stories, and more!


Editor's Note: Products and services were provided to me at no cost in order to facilitate this post. The opinions expressed herein are my own.

1 comment:

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