Where to Find The Cheaping Girls

We have had so much fun writing this blog, but we seem to have lost our steam in the last few months, no? Life has been and continues to be crazy so we're going off to do our own thing(s) for now. If you want to see what we're up to, check out Natalie's new blog, at www.natnote.com. She'll have Cheaping Girls updates along with tales from her own life.

XOXO,

The Cheaping Girls

29 Looks from Emily's Closet

Our friend Emily recently became a Certified Specialist of Wine (CSW) and just started a new job with a local wine distributor here in Salt Lake. She has been working as a bartender/sommelier at a FAH-BULOUS Italian restaurant here in Salt Lake called Lugano and has worn a uniform to work for years. She asked us for some advice on what to wear to her final job interview, so we raided her closet and came up with a few options. After she got the job she asked us to raid her closet again and come up with some new work looks for her.

Her new sales job involves all kinds of fun and fabulous activities including meeting with proprietors of Salt Lake Clubs, hosting tasting events and dining out at lots of yummy restaurants. She needs looks that are professional and fun and casual at the same time.

Emily's closet is full of so-great-I-want-to-steal-them jeans and boots along with great staples from Ann Taylor, Zara, and Banana Republic. She told us that her style inspiration is Jennifer Aniston. With that in mind we put together these looks:

Print skirt with black top and pumps. Perfect for meetings or a lunch appointment.

Khaki skirt with military jacket and ruched top with black boots. These black boots were a favorite of ours.

The first of many many pairs of fantastic skinny jeans. We loved this motorcycle jacket. With a sparkly little top underneath and some fun heels, this is great for a night out.

This was my favorite outfit. I wanted to steal it. Seriously. Dark skinny jeans, drapey top with cardigan and wicked high heels.

Loved grey with grey with a pop of color.

This is a great outfit and super simple - LBD and animal print ruffle kitten heel. Yum.

This is great for an afternoon of wine tasting, no?

We loved this great dress and tried to find a way to make it work for fall. Pair with skinny black jeans and voila!

This is a great basic work outfit - khaki pencil skirt, black sweater and heels.

Oh! I loved this grey trench coat and great patent leather heels. I may be in a bit of a grey period right now. ANYWAY, we paired it with a print top and dark jeans.

MMMMMMmmmm. Love these boots. Pair with skinny jeans and military jacket.

We say don't be afraid of horizontal strips - on top and on bottom! We loved this combo.

Gray v-neck sweater with distressed jeans and ankle boots.

Same sweater with khaki pencil skirt and silver heels dresses it up a bit.

Striped skirt with black sweater, opaque tights and those yummy black boots.

Emily has lots of great jackets. Very Jennifer Aniston!

Another great jacket. Paired with a black pencil skirt and our favorite black boots.

Yes, it's those boots again! This time with a long grey skirt and black top.

These boots were another favorite of ours.

Skinny black jeans and a fun top with a black cardigan and THE boots.

Drapey grey top, skinny jeans and the fab patent leather pumps.

Chanel-y jacket with striped top and jeans with silver pumps.

Another great pair of jeans, great pair of boots with my coveted cardigan and paisley top.

This is pretty much what I wear to work every day. Simple black dress and black heels. So easy to pull together in the morning.

Another great pair of boots. Paired with a bomber jacket and button up top.

Long drapey sweater vest with skinny jeans and a great heel.

The same great pieces - grey top, military jacket, black boots, pencil skirt - used in a new combination.

Another combination of pieces - striped skirt, black cardigan, black heels. Totally new outfit!

The fun part of this was that we pulled this together with just the pieces that were in her closet. Try it! It's like shopping with stuff that you already have!

Whew!!

We've all breathed a sigh of relief. Jodi from A Yummy Life did it again. If the sneak peek is any indication, our family pictures not only turned out OK, they actually turned out to be quite YUMMY. Why did we have doubts you ask??

1. Alek and I (well, mostly me because we were already there and I LUURRRVE to try and get one more thing done if I can squeeze it in) had decided to clean out the chicken coop and were running late. Or rather, were running on Natalie standard time.
2. The Weavers were also running late. Which provided great air cover for my own lateness. Of course, they have a child to get ready, what was my excuse? Hey, those shoes DID take a long time to buckle up.
3. It was hot. And I mean hot. Each layer of our carefully crafted "Fall" outfits suddenly seemed like a bad idea. I had a SIGG and kept forgetting it as we moved from location to location. Every time I would turn around to go back for it Eliza would have it in her little hands. I would thank her for remembering it and she would say "It's OK Auntie, I was REALLY thirsty anyway."
4. The Kewpie Doll was grumpy. And we couldn't really blame her. A 7 month old in black tights, a black long sleeved leotard with a leopard sweater over the top and sequined shoes? Really? Hey, who knew it would be 90 Degrees on October 2nd??
5. G doesn't like bows in her hair. G doesn't like to be held. Or stand still. Or stop eating. Or stop running. Or stop playing. Or stop eating rocks or digging in the dirt. Ever. And she'll give you the biggest smiles in the world as long as you're not trying to keep a bow in her hair and hold her and keep her still and clean. (Damn, I love that kid.)

In the end you'd never know we harried and hot and absolutely desperate for more dogs to wander by to charm the babies. Jodi, you are AMAZING. http://www.ayummylife.blogspot.com/

P.S. We've been asked for a wardrobe breakdown and here's what I know:

• I am wearing a ruffly lime green sweater and red bow tie belt from Mom's closet (both were scored at Ross). Dress is Merona brand from Tar-jay (I bought it last fall for my Betty Draper Halloween Costume). The shoes are a really really really cheap knock off of Christian Louboutin Dillian Flower Pumps. I am morally against knock-offs of brand name products but totally in favor of BANANAS red shoes for the family picture and, well, there you have it. You reap what you sow because the heel is already starting to break off. But they look great in the picture and that was the point!


• Janaan is wearing the rose print sheath dress from White House Black Market. Her fabulous blue pumps are the Glo Women's Jayden Pump in Royal Blue from, drum roll please...KMart!


• Mom's necklace is made from vintage jewelry and was bought on Etsy. The store is Raquel Castillo. There are similar styles at Forever 21.


• Eliza is wearing a leopard print cardigan from Forever 21. And Alexis a leopard skirt from Wal-Mart and all three babies are wearing red sequined Mary Jane's, also from tha Wal-Marts.

Being Yippies Pays Off: Egg Recall

When we went to pick up the first delivery of meat from our CSA Janaan said that everyone in the parking lot was a Yuppie (Porsche, Range Rover) or a Hippie (Subaru, 4Runner). We decided that we were a hybrid because while I drive a Subaru and Janaan drives a 4Runner, we really both want to be driving Range Rovers. So we started calling ourselves Hyuppies. Then my friend Lisa said that Yippie had a better ring to it, and we agreed. So, we are now proud Yippies. Sidebar: we were at a family reunion this summer and I was so intent on recycling as much as possible that my aunt told me she was going to buy me a green swastika. That was possibly my proudest moment as a yippie, and for the record we took home THREE 55 gallon bags of recyclables from the reunion.

This summer we joined a meat CSA (more on that in another post), we have been going to the farmer's market almost weekly, Janaan has a garden, Mom and Dad are growing herbs and tomatoes and Mom and Janaan are currently canning like mad women (more on that too in another post). But perhaps our biggest commitment to yippiehood to date has been our chickens. (The whole process has been so epic and we've been blathering on so much about it that our sister Christina has told us that she does not want to hear another word about chickens at Sunday dinner. So, yeah, OK, we've been pretty obsessed.)

Janaan started doing research on urban chickens after we watched Food Inc. earlier this year. Then our Uncle Perry came to town and got us all jazzed up. He lives in Los Angeles and he has had backyard chickens for almost 20 years. So we formed a coop co-op (get it: coop co-op, heh heh heh) consisting of Janaan and Ed, me and Alek and our friends Barrett and Danielle. More or less, the deal was Barrett and Danielle would keep the chickens in their HUGE yard, Alek and I would build the coop and Ed and Janaan would raise the chicks. Then all of us would split the costs for feed and take turns cleaning the coop and we would feast on farm fresh eggs for 20 years! MWAHAHAHAHA!!!

So, Janaan did a bunch of research and found out which chickens laid the best eggs, were winter hearty and were easy on the eyes. We ordered them from Murray McMurray and they arrived on a Sunday in June. You have to order them in batches of 24 and you get a "surprise" 25th chicken for free. Somehow we ended up with 27 healthy happy baby chicks which Janaan and Ed raised with lots of love until they were ready for transport to the coop. (We've since had two casualties due to a backyard predator of some sort and one is M.I.A. and presumed dead.)

Now I'm not going to lie, this chicken thing has been a total pain in the ass. Yes, that's right, I just wrote ass. Coordinating the six of us to decide to go ahead with this (love you sister!), figuring out which breeds to buy (thanks Uncle Perry!), building the coop on the coldest, rainiest day of summer - the ONLY day that we had time to build it (thanks Dad for all of your help and your tools!), the drama of getting the chicks on Sunday (a special thank you to the USPS agent at the downtown SLC office for making a special delivery that day!), keeping the chicks alive (thanks farmer Ed!), transporting the chicks to the coop, making sure they are fed and have fresh water every day (thanks Barrett and Danielle!), and rebuilding the coop so that varmints (yes, that's right, I just wrote varmints) can't get in and kill them has been quite an endeavor.

And after all this the chickens won't produce eggs for a while, maybe not until next spring if they really don't lay in the winter. But after today's recall of 500 million eggs (yes, 500 MILLION!!) all of the effort is TOTALLY WORTH IT.

If you're as excited about backyard chicken keeping as we are, be sure to check out the Martha Stewart Chicken Show, we know it really put us over the top with our chicken mania.