1. Movies: Shut up crime!
2. Ads-Must.Learn.French.Immediately.
3. Cakes: For Debi’s Birthday last week, I made this cake. Then Lisa proclaimed me “The one who makes the cakes!” I always wanted to be the one who makes X, so I’m pretty happy about this. So what if my cakes always look terrible and fall apart like volcanos when cut, they taste divine.
Peanutbutter Chocolate Cake with Chocolate Buttercream and Maldon Sea Salt, recipe from Baked Bree
4. Blog Love-Over at Raising Colombian Kids, Mr Colombian Daddy is doing a bang-up job writing a weekly music column. Latinophiles who want to learn more about the best songs can check it out here.
5. Stuff-I’ve been trying to phase parabens and other nasty chemichals out of our “beauty” products for awhile. I’m especially dilligent about the stuff we use on Elian but reading Estelle’s article reminded me that I hadn’t quite gotten around to finding some good face products yet. Specfically I need some “Holy crap, we’re in our 30s face cream.” On impulse I bought some “Yes to Blueberries” at Target and I have to say I’m pretty pleased. The company is privately held and based in San Francisco, which is bonus for a California girl who likes to support local companies when possible. Also the container is biodegradable and dispenses exactly the right amount for you face. I can’t stress how important this is to me. I want to punch someone in the face at Oil of Olay, their containers break, you can’t get the product out and they dispense way too much. Because punching people in the face is impractical/wrong instead I’m just going to swtich brands. Anyways, I recommend the stuff. It works good and is reasonably priced for civil servants on a budget. Let me know what you think.
Estelle has me wanting to make changes too. And age has me wanting better face products. This is one line I’ve looked at for body, but hadn’t seen this face line. I’ll check it out.
I want to make this cake, but I have no baking accoutrements in Boston!!! Maybe I will make it for my birthday and share it with the house and the lab… :o)
If you do make it, add less sugar then requested into the buttercream. I used 2 cups and it was still two sweet for my taste. I prefer buttercream to be far more creamy then sweet.
Okay… never mind my comment on Danielle’s blog. Thought I read that it was your birthday last week!
I’m also looking for new products. I’m interested in Boots @ Target, but I need to do more research before I go further.
The Yes To line is actually an Israeli company… an SF based company invested a lot of money in them to distribute in the U.S. which may be how they can claim to be local. I go to beautipedia.com for a lot of my info on beauty products (http://www.beautypedia.com/Brand/Yes-To/315.aspx). They seem to be pretty unbiased and base their conclusions on published science which appeals to me for obvious reasons. They have their own line of Paula’s Choice beauty products but also recommend tons of other products as well. I’ve really liked both the products I’ve bought from her and the recommendations. It’s an incredibly useful source… though if you like something, you like it :)
I checked it out, good resource except that for Yes to Carrots the overall review was out of date with the current product offerings. She kind of bashed the company and then reccomended two of the products? Still, a nice simple explanation. I liked the EWG Skin Deep database, it gives ratings based on the ingredients and their known safety.
I think it goes without saying that I watched Vivez La Langue over and over again. And that I without a doubt love that cake and only wish that Sacramento was closer.