Sunday, May 30, 2010

vera vauge jewelry give-a-way

Happy Memorial Day folks!  I hope that you are all enjoying the long weekend as much as Benjamin and I are.  We have been quite the social butterflies this weekend, breaking out of our hermit shells!

Currently, there is a movement in which artisans are taking things of old that may have out lived their original purpose to create something new out of them.  They are giving these items a new life, a re-purposed existence.

A few weeks ago I came across  Jewelry by Vera Vauge, a shop comprised of repurposed jewelry designed in a creative way.  Vera Vauge creates one of kind pieces from materials that others may discard without giving it a second thought.

It's no secret that I love jewelry.  Benjamin loves everything technology.  Vera Vauge creates jewelry out of recycled circuit boards.  The combination of the two are a perfect pairing in my world!

Vera Vauge has graciously sent me this fabulous pair of earrings for one of you, dear readers, to take home as your own!  Aren't they wonderful?!


This pair of earrings are make from circuit board and chain with sterling silver ear hooks.  They are 2" from top of hook to the bottom of the chain.  And as Vera describes them, "they're lightweight, completely one of a kind and so hip it almost hurts..."  I agree with Vera!



To enter, tell me if you could make one old thing new again, what would it be?  

To get extra entries:
1 entry - visit Vera Vauge's story & tell me what else tickles your fancy
1 entry - become a follower of Crazy Cozad's
1 entry - post a link to this give-a-way on your blog or facebook page!

Be sure to come back and leave a comment for each action so that you get multiple entries. Please leave a valid email for winning notification purposes.

Give-a-way will end on Friday at midnight CST.



photos provided by Vera Vauge

Thursday, May 27, 2010

Vapiano means Delicious!

On Tuesday evening Benjamin and I went down to Mockingbird Station to meet Jonathan and Kim for dinner.  They are going on the Bolivia mission trip with Benjamin in a week.  We wanted to meet for dinner before they all left on their journey.  Benjamin found Vapiano for us to eat at. And I am glad that he did.

Upon entering the restaurant, we were handed a Vapiano's card.  This card kept track of the food that we ordered.  When ordering there, you walk up to the counter of the type of food you would like to eat - salad, pizza, or pasta.  The chef is behind the counter waiting for your selection.  He types it into the computer, you swipe your card and he sets out on making your dish. 

Benjamin chose the a dish made of Alfredo sauce, chicken and his choice of pasta.  I chose a dish with pasta, Sicilian sausage and craisins.

Yes, you read that correctly.  Craisins.

It was fantastically surprising!  The presentation of the food was very well done and the taste was spectacular!  Jonathan and Kim both enjoyed their selections as well.

When you are done eating for the evening, you take your card to the front and pay for your selections.  

I definitely recommend going and giving it a whirl.  It has now found a place on our "Favorite Places to Eat" list!
 

Fuzzy's Tacos

On Sunday a group of friends joined Benjamin and I for lunch at Fuzzy's Taco Shop in Richardson.  The majority of us had never been and we all were up for the culinary adventure!  Fuzzy's just opened a new location on Campbell around UTD.  When walking into Fuzzy's, you are greeted by brightly painted walls, festive tables and crazy fish.  Known for their Baja style tacos, Fuzzy's also serves up a mean fish taco which I know nothing about because the idea of fish tacos is very unsettling to me.

I ordered ground beef hard tacos.  They had ground beef, lettuce, tomatoes, feta cheese and a garlic sauce on it.  While the taste left my taste buds confused as to what I was eating, the food itself did not sit well for the rest of the afternoon....

We also ordered the chips and queso.  It was fantastic!  Probably some of the best queso that I have eaten in a while.

In conclusion, eat at Fuzzy's at least once - try out the Baja style Tacos, go back for a breakfast taco and make sure to take along some good company.  Good Company makes every experience better!

Saturday, May 22, 2010

RuMe bag give-a-way winner!

Thanks to Random.org for picking today's RuMe bag give-a-way winner!

Lucky number 9!


Congratulations to Amy Ratliff!

I will be contacting you soon with details about how to receive your super cute RuMe bag!

We have another fun give-a-way coming up in a few weeks, so keep checking back!  Thank you to everyone who entered.

Sara 

Monday, May 17, 2010

RuMe Bag Give-a-way!

In an effort to cut down on plastic bags retailers are jumping on the reuseable bag bandwagon. Ikea charges you 5 cents for every bag you use and at Target you can save 5 cents for every reuseable bag that you bring with you when you shop! Every little bit helps!

Because it's good to stand out and have something a little different from everyone else, I am giving away the Macro bag from RuMe.



This bag is awesome! It can hold up to 50 pounds. It's water resistant and machine washable. It has 12" long handles and and it rolls up into a small tube that is easy to carry around in your purse!

To enter, simple leave a comment saying "I want this! Give it to me!"

To get extra entries:
1 entry - become a follower of Crazy Cozad's
1 entry - post a link to this give-a-way on your blog!

Be sure to come back and leave a comment for each entry. Please leave a valid email for winning notification purposes.

Give-a-way will end on Friday at midnight CST.

This give-a-way is sponsored by the crazy Cozads.  RuMe does not know we exist.  We just thought it was cool and someone needed to have one for free!  :)

Cross Off: Wildflower!

Amidst studying for finals, driving to and from Waco, and avoiding bad weather, we made it out to Sunday's festivities at the Wildflower! Festival in Richardson.

We rode the DART to Galatyn Park where upon exiting the train we were greeted by the sounds of Swan Song - a Led Zepplin tribute band.  During our time at the festival we watched a Michael Jackson Tribute Laser show, watched street dancers wow the crowd with awesome acrobatics, ate some Freebirds and meandered through the marketplace.  We purchased some really neato rings crafted from Amazon seeds as well as a gift for my Dad.  Before catching the train back home, we watched Queens for a Day, the Queen cover band.  They had an awesome guitar player and "Freddie" was pretty convincing!

All in all, a fantastic way to spend a Sunday afternoon!



Richardson Wildflower! Festival has been crossed off the Dallas Bucket List!

Friday, May 14, 2010

Urban Crust


Today I was hungry for pizza or salad, I couldn't quite decide.  Andrew suggested Urban Crust, a local pizza place in old downtown Plano.  Benjamin was able to come and along with James and Kamran, the five of us went on a culinary adventure.

Located on 15th Street, Urban Crust is in one of the old brick buildings which gives the restaurant character.  We were seated upstairs in one of their booths - it was all cowboy themed.  The benches of the booth were so plush and comfy that I sank into it and didn't ever want to move!

The menu offered a variety of dishes, including the Urban Chop which was my selection for lunch.  It was fantastic - like a party of flavors for my taste buds!  To drink I had peach mango ice tea - I downed at least 4 glasses.  The boys all got pizza which looked and smelled heavenly!  By the end of the meal, no crumb of anything was found!

The strawberry-rhubarb pie caught my eye while we were looking at the menu, so of course I had to order one for dessert.  Kamran ordered their chocolate cake.  The pie was a perfect combination of sweet and tart that hit the spot.  The chocolate cake must've been good because none remained by the time we left!

The prices were reasonable and the food was delicious!  I highly recommend this place for lunch or a nice date night dinner.

One side note:  If you are a lover of ranch with your pizza....this might not be the place for you.  They don't have ranch.... what?!

Thursday, May 13, 2010

Small Things...

This post is not necessarily about small things - but about James G. Smith and the small things he does to make The Pit a better place!

James is the sender of the daily "On This Day in History" email full of happy thoughts from the past.  When in conversation with James it's not rare for him to start talking in a Russian or Gay Cowboy accent.  He often sings to his supervisor....it's called his "Best Friend Jeff."

He's my best friend, Jeff
And you're always there
and your really fun....

James also has somewhat of an addiction.  A coffee addiction.  When asked if he would choose to save his fiance or coffee....his response was that would have to seriously think about it.  A week or so a go James purchased a coffee Thermos online.  He paid an extra $2 to get the larger Thermos.

Flash to Monday.

I am sitting in our conference room with my client for product training and this pops into my email.


On Wednesday James informed us that it takes 3 coffee pots to fill his Thermos.  That day he had filled it 3/4 of the way up and by the afternoon had consumed it all.

I really think it's time for an intervention....

Wednesday, May 12, 2010

High Flying Act

My mom has wanted to go skydiving for as long as I can remember.  It's one of those things that has been on her bucket list and is on mine too.  Noah came up with the brilliant idea for the three of us kids to take Mom skydiving for Mother's Day!  He found a place to jump, made reservations and then went off shore for three weeks.  This left the task of telling Mom to keep her Saturday open to me.

Me.

Me who gets so excited about surprises that she almost can hardly keep herself together.

Me who gets giddy at the thought of how excited the other person is going to be with the gift she has purchased for them that she almost begs them to ask for hints.

Me.

I kept it together and was able to side-step comments from Mom like "We're all going?  So, I guess it's not skydiving because your Dad would never do that."  Me:  "Right.  We are all going."  Her:  "How far is it?"  Me:  "We'll have to take a car."

Benjamin and I decided that she needed something little to open on the Friday night before.  We headed off to Dollar General in search of one of those little men with the parachutes attached.  We hit the jackpot and wrapped it up.

Friday night we were all sitting in the living room and Mom opened her gift.  ".....Parachute Jumper...."  At that moment Noah starts running around the room yelling "We're going skydiving!!" The look on her face was awesome and we sat talking about the next day's events.

Saturday Morning.

We are up.  We are at 'em.  We are at the place at 10am.  We sign our life away.  Literally.  The last page contained the word WARNING! in about a size 72 font with scary words like dangerous, risks, seriously injured or even killed.  We all signed them anyway.  And took a picture to prove it.

{note Mom and Noah:  they are happy and glad they signed their lives away}
{note Benjamin and I: we realize the gravity of what could go down}

We turned in our forms, paid, watched an intro movie and waited.  And waited.
And waited.

And then the clouds moved in.  And stayed.

After 3 hours or so of waiting and jumps being on hold because of the clouds, Benjamin and Noah got the scoop - We would probably be waiting another 3-4 hours because of the cloud cover.

We got a rain check.  Or a cloud-check as my Mom called it.

After a day of getting psyched up to do this thang, we had to reschedule.  August 6th is the day and we are all looking forward to flying high and marking this activity off of our bucket lists!

Happy Mother's Day Mom!  

Mother's Day Weekend

Last weekend Benjamin and I headed down to Houston to spend time with our Moms.  Thanks to you both for raising such awesome kids!  :)




Tuesday, May 11, 2010

Wildflower! Festival 2010

This weekend the Wildflower! Festival takes over Galatyn Park with great music from past and present.  Benjamin and I haven't been able to attend since we have moved up here.  Mel suggested this as one of the things we needed to do in Dallas for our bucket list.  We are looking forward to going this year!  Since parking will more than likely be a little crazy, we are planning on taking the DART.

Acts that we are looking forward to seeing:

Frontiers - The Journey Tribute Band
Toad the Wet Sprocket
Le Freak
The B-52s
Carolina Liar
.38 Special
Queen for a Day

Are you going?  Who is on your line-up?

Sunday, May 9, 2010

itsy bisty paper give-a-way winner!

Thanks to Random.org for picking our winner for the itsy bitsy paper give-a-way!  Entry number 5 is the winner...so....

Congratulations to Kristie!

I will be in contact with you to set you up with your 15 card set of personalized note cards or thank yous!  

Keep checking back because a new give-a-way will go up within the next few weeks!  Thank you to everyone who entered.

Thursday, May 6, 2010

Are you a Warrior?

On Sunday, my husband, along with thousands of others became Warriors as they braved the elements at The Warrior Dash in Forney!  I, unfortunately, was not able to go because of the kidney stones that have taken up residence in my body.  They are evil.  But that's another story for another day.

Benjamin was able to meet up with some of our church staff and ran the obstacle course with them - having a fun time the whole way through.  The great thing about our church staff is that they are our type of wild and crazy!

We had purchased a water proof camera to take with us to document this adventure.  Benjamin was faithful to take photos at every obstacle for me to see!  You can view the other photos here.

The best part of all of this - Benjamin does not like to get dirty - never has.  The last picture in this sequence made my day!  

I am so proud of you my Warrior!


{everyone nice and clean}


{not the case here!}


{love of my life}

If you're wondering about the Fuzzy Helmet.... We both got one!!  :)

Wednesday, May 5, 2010

Dexter

We had a blast photographing Dexter and his people this weekend!






Monday, May 3, 2010

itsy bitsy paper + giveaway

A few weeks ago Benjamin needed some thank you cards to give to some folks at school.  When I looked around, all I had were very floral, very bright, girly thank you cards.  I decided I needed to find some that both of us could use whenever the occasion called for it.  

That's when I found itsy bitsy paper.  The owner's name is Lindy and she is absolutely delightful!  I ordered these adorable cards which arrived in my mailbox over the weekend.  They arrived packaged beautifully, wrapped up with a thank you for the purchase.  The cards are made of heavy stock and look awesome.  They are super cute and I can't wait to use them!



I love paper products, pens, stickers, stamps - anything that goes into helping make a note personal and fun.   Through conversations, I learned that Lindy and I had that in common:

"I have been in love with paper since I was old enough to hold a pen and feel the weight of a good piece of paper in my hands! I have been a lover of Etsy for a long time and figured since I sit at my computer creating at all hours of the day and night I may as well put some of my creations out there to share with others!"

Lindy has graciously offered a give-a-way for you, my dear readers!  She is offering to give away 1 set of thank you notes or personalized stationary!  Normally her sets come in sets of 10, but for us, she is doing a set of 15!  She has really cute personalized stationary  - ones with little crocodiles, one with the state of your choice, and ornate thank you cards.

To enter, please visit itsy bitsy paper, come back and comment on your favorite item.
To get extra entries:
1 entry - become a follower of Crazy Cozad's
1 entry - become a follower of itsy bitsy paper's blog
1 entry - post a link to this give-a-way on your blog!

Be sure to come back and leave a comment for each entry.  Please leave a valid email also for winning notification purposes.

This give-a-way will end Friday at 11:30 pm.

Saturday, May 1, 2010

Gold Class all the way

Thursday was quite a whirlwind day for Benjamin and I.  It started out with an appointment for me to have some testing done because I had another bout of pain last Sunday.  We grabbed a bite to eat, went about our days - Benjamin to school and I to work.  Benjamin brought me a snack at work and then headed to The Container Store for his fourth visit since we discovered that the one at Plano Pkwy was relocating.  I joined him so that we could load the car down with the purchases and hurry home to feed Lu and pop out the door again.

We were going on a date.

A free one!

We went to Gold Class Cinemas at the Village at Fairview on Stacy and 75 where we had free movie going experience!  Gold Class Cinemas hosted an open house this week in order to prepare for their Grand Opening this week.  Benjamin had called ahead and reserved us seats for Shutter Island.

Once on the main floor,  we were greeted by a lounge and concierge desk that looks like it should belong in a boutique hotel.  We checked in at the desk, were given our tickets and a hostess gave us menus and led us to our theatre.  In the theatre, we sat in our oversized orange chairs with a little table positioned between us.  The chair's arm lift open to reveal a hollow space for purse storage - how handy!  We were each treated to one item off of the food menu - and it was a hard decision.  There was everything from salads, mixed fruit, beignets, homemade brownies, and gourmet sandwiches.  Benjamin had one of their sandwiches and I had the chicken satay.  Both dishes were very tasty!

The chairs were fantastic!  We could move them from sitting upright to almost laying completely flat.  The chairs were uber comfortable and upon request, the server provided us with blankets which made the experience a comfortable one.

Shutter Island was pleasantly not what I had in mind.  The movie held my attention the whole way through.  It kept Benjamin and I talking about it all the way home!

Overall, we decided that it was an impressive experience.  It is not your average movie theatre, no, it is much more.  We will go again when we are feeling up for a fancy night out to the movies!

A tip:  Make sure to get their membership card - it's free and it reduces the movie ticket price from $30 to $17.50!

{benjamin enjoying the experience}
Back to Top