Category: lemon

Easy, Breezy, Beautiful, Summer Maxi Dresses: Ten of My Favorites for Every Occasion

Post author By Jess Ross Creative
Post date June 14, 2015
No Comments on Easy, Breezy, Beautiful, Summer Maxi Dresses: Ten of My Favorites for Every Occasion

It’s finally summer (hooray!) But of course, I can’t just enjoy the weather I’ve been waiting for all year long and instead I have to find something to stress over.

The summer weather poses a few problems for me:

1) Blindingly white, pastey legs.

2) Lots of uncomfortable sweating in areas best left unacknowledged.

3) And Shaving, lots of shaving…hours and hours of shaving…

Solution to this very first world problem:

Maxi dresses!

1) Complete coverage of said sunless legs.

2) Comfortable breeze to sweating nether regions.

3) Coverage of lazily shaved legs.

The above maxi dress is from Forever 21 although it looks like it’s not available anymore I found a similar dress also from Forever21 that I think I like even more than the one I purchased:

love21 white lace paneled dress — Love 21 Lace-Paneled Maxi Dress, $34.90

My Sandals are Enzo Angiolini Women’s Jeat Sandal, $84.80 available on Amazon:

Now in no particular order ten of my favorite maxi dresses that I day dreaming of buying to cover up my pastey legs with this summer:

1. In a Dream Maxi Dress from Free People ($350.00):

2. Serilida Maxi Dress from Anthropologie, $198.00

3. Maybe Lady Dress from Free People, $118.00:

4. Motel Wrap Front Maxi Dress with Thigh Split in Floral Print from ASOS, $95.00:

5. Chloe Silk Full Length Draped Dress, for *cough* *cough*, $3,660.74 from Far Fetched:

6. All Tied Down Maxi Dress from NastyGal, $68.00

7. Lisbon Dress from Need Supply Co., $98.00

8. Tribal Print Maxi Dress from Forever 21, $27.90:

9. Faded Floral Flutter Sleeve Maxi Dress from ASOS, $98.00:

10. Summer Solid Lady Maxi Dress from Free People, $148.00:

and one more that doesn’t do much to cover up the pastey leg problem but I am day-dreaming of none the less…..

11. For Love and Lemons Marina Maxi Dress available at Free People, $202.00:

Any “must have” maxis for this summer that you think I missed??

blog cheese chicken easy fresh garlic healthy herbs ingredients lemon organic pasta pesto quick recipe simple spicy summer

presto, pesto!

Yes! My first ever recipe! Yay for me! If you know me, you probably know that I am not the greatest cook. It isn’t that I don’t like cooking, I just get overwhelmed at the organization process that comes along with cooking and the clean up afterwards. Also, it gets expensive buying ingredients when you are only cooking for one…but someone once told me the only way to get better is to keep trying (and clean as you go). I was inspired by the picture on the cover of a recent Bon Appetit magazine of a delicious and fresh looking pesto pasta:

oOoOoooooh…my mouth was watering just glancing at the cover. I figured pesto pasta could be a good one for me to try because pasta reheats well, I’m a pasta girl and it’s relatively healthy (hence the green color!). What I really liked was that Bon Appetit’s pesto recipe used cilantro (which I LOVE) instead of basil or spinach (which is a little on the bland side for my taste buds) and almonds instead of pine nuts. So, needless to say, I was sold. I ended up tweaking the recipe quite a bit and served it to a group of 15 friends who loved it. One of my pesto pasta tasters, Shana Draugelis, who runs the AMAZING and inspiring blog Ain’t No Mom Jeans, suggested I put the recipe on my blog as a place to share it with friends. So here it is…if you try it let me know what you think, if you changed it or tweaked it or send me pics @ sunlightistheirfashionblog@hotmail.com!

Serves 6

Ingredients:

-1 lb spaghetti or linguini noodles

-1 lb chicken (chopped into cubes)

-2 cups chopped fresh cilantro

-2 cups chopped fresh flat leaved parsley leaves

-3/4 cup chopped fresh chives

– 3/4 cup unsalted, roasted almonds

– 1 cup extra virgin olive oil

-1/2 cup finely grated parmesan

– 1 lemon

– kosher salt

– freshly ground pepper

– 2 tablespoon crushed red pepper flakes (if you like a bit of extra spice!)

– 4 or 5 large garlic cloves (or less if you don’t care for as much garlic)

– optional and for the daring…sriracha hot sauce goes amazingly on top of the finished product.

Directions: (This is the way I have gone about doing it that works best for me and is the fastest)

1. Heat a large pot of water until boiling and in a large skillet heat 1 tablespoon of olive oil and 1 or 2 chopped garlic cloves on med to high heat.

2. Once the skillet is heated, add the chopped chicken cubes. While the chicken is cooking, squeeze 1/2 of the lemon over the chicken and add salt and pepper. (I also added 1 tablespoon of crushed red pepper).

3. The water should be boiling by now, so add the pasta and boil on med heat for appx. 6-8 minutes. Once cooked, drain the pasta and set to the side.

4. In a food processor or blender (food processor works much better at blending!) add the cilantro, parsley, chives, almonds, olive oil, 3-4 garlic cloves, the juice from the other half of the lemon and salt and pepper and blend until the pesto consistency somewhat smooth and paste-like.

5. In a large bowl serving bowl mix the cooked pasta, the chicken and the pesto together. Top with fresh parmesan cheese and a little sriracha for a kick!

You will most likely have left over pesto sauce which freezes well and goes great on top of toast,with sliced avacado and fried egg (another idea I stole from Shana!) or throw some on a chicken or turkey sandwich.

Pesto for days and days! I hope you enjoy, let me know what you think if you tried it and any suggestions for improvement! Hope everyone is having a splendid summer!