Friday Remake: Girls Night Out with Malibu (…& a Visa Gift Card Giveaway!)

I have a fun girl's night planned with one of my besties to celebrate her birthday.  I was out of town for her actual day, so we're doing a little belated sips and snacks evening. I'm working with Malibu Island Spiced for this post, so I wanted an outfit totally vacation-feeling.  So, why not go with a muumuu, right?

I loved the color and the white embroidered detail, but the rest of it was definitely not feeling like a holiday.

There's work to be done to make this GNO-worthy...

...and I'm ready to take on the challenge!

I LOVED the white embroidery at the collar so I wanted to make that the key element.  I decided to cut and remove the area all around the white leaves on the neckline.

I took off the sleeves to make the straps a bit thinner...

...and was left with these glorious leftovers.  I'll find a new use for these down the line!

My new, killer straps were complete!  Doesn't this scream summer/luau-Tiki party?

I took off the weirdly placed pocket from the front of the piece...

...and then cut off about a foot and a half from the bottom to turn this muumuu into a top!

I pinned my new hem...

...stitched everything in place...

...and then rocked my new tropical-feeling top!

I just love how the embroidery pops!

By day I paired the piece with black flats...

...but by night, we were getting the heels out!!

My gal TT headed over to have a little "get ready party" which is always so much fun to do with girlfriends.  We pumped the jams (I may or may not have totally rocked out to the new Daft Punk album) put on our makeup...

...fixed our hair...

...picked our shoes (I went with the black sparkly T-straps)...

...and zipped them up while waiting for our Uber driver to come snag us.

We arrived to the bar...

...grabbed our seats, and ordered our Malibu Island Spiced cocktails.  We both went with the Malibu Spiced and Diet Cola, which is a 1:2 parts combo...

...and sipped away which totally made us feel like we should be on a beach somewhere!  Anyone in for a quick jaunt to the Caribbean?

This new version of Malibu is sweetened with Truvia®, so it's naturally sweetened while also being lower in calories. It's awesome for those wanting sweeter drinks while keeping their eyes on their sugar intake and also awesome for me and TT tonight because...

...we used those saved cals to feast on some gourmet pizzas.  Hello truffle oil and ricotta!

We danced to the DJ spinning hip hop, got other bar-goers to chime in on "Happy Birthday," and even got shots handed to us by shot girls.  We felt like we were in college again!

Such a fun catch up/dance our faces off/cocktail/belated birthday celebration/get blisters on my toes from my heels night with one of my favorite people.

We've already put our next girl's night in the books!

I'm hosting a rad contest if you want to join in on the summery fun! Just tell me in the comments below what you would pair with Malibu Island Spiced for your chance to win a $100 Visa Gift Card!

Disclosure: Compensation was provided by Malibu via BlogHer. The opinions expressed herein are those of the author and are not indicative of the opinions or positions of Malibu.

Sweepstakes Rules: No duplicate comments.

You may receive (2) total entries by selecting from the following entry methods:

Leave a comment in response to the sweepstakes prompt on this post

Tweet (public message) about this promotion; including exactly the following unique term in your tweet message: “#SweepstakesEntry”; and leave the URL to that tweet in a comment on this post

Blog about this promotion, including a disclosure that you are receiving a sweepstakes entry in exchange for writing the blog post, and leave the URL to that post in a comment on this post

For those with no Twitter or blog, read the official rules to learn about an alternate form of entry.

This giveaway is open to US Residents age 18 or older. Winner  will be selected via random draw, and will be notified by e-mail. You have 72 hours to get back to me, otherwise a new winner will be selected.

The Official Rules are available here.

This sweepstakes runs from 6/13/13 – 6/30/13.

Visit Malibu Island Spiced Rum on Facebook to get more drink recipes and join the brighter side of spiced rum!

And be sure to visit the Malibu Island Spiced brand page on BlogHer.com to read other bloggers’ posts!

SIP EASY. ENJOY MALIBU RESPONSIBLY.

MALIBU ® Caribbean Rum with Coconut Liqueur & Natural Spices, with Truvia® Sweetener. 30% Alc./Vol. (60 Proof) ©2013 Imported by Pernod Ricard USA, Purchase, NY

Truvia® and the Truvia®  logo are registered trademarks of the Truvia Company LLC.

PER 1.5 FL. OZ. SERVING. AVERAGE ANALYSIS: CALORIES 70; CARBOHYDRATES less than 1 gram; PROTEIN 0 grams; FAT 0 grams.

*when mixed with your favorite zero calorie mixer. Limes and other garnishes may add calories

Thrift Store Shopping: Housing Works

I didn't think I'd get a chance to get any shopping in during this NY trip, however I fit in a little stop to Housing Works before the Tony's on Sunday.  I've been wanting to head to their Buy the Bag store in Brooklyn for a while, so I suited up with my pals for a quick visit. Housing Works is amazing organization.  They have about a dozen thrift stores across NY and the proceeds from their stores provide funding for New Yorkers directly affected by homelessness and HIV/AIDS.  Their Buy the Bag location is a little different from the rest as you get to sift through bins of clothes and fill up a shopping bag of goodies for $25.

We hopped on the subway and got to digging!

BM found a tweed jacket that she couldn't decide on, so we had an impromptu fashion show in the aisles to see what worked out.

We didn't even cover all the bins that were there, but we got good at pulling and tossing and picking things out for each other.

JM found an awesome shirt, however we ran into a slight problem when he tried it on.

After our sifting adventure, we filled up two shopping bags full of stuff.  Perhaps I even found a t-shirt with a pirate on it.

I'll do a follow up post when I'm back in LA with the all the amazing things I scored - there was definitely an awesome mix of vintage and new.  A handful of things will need to get some upcycling love, but the rest will just be incorporated into my wardrobe!  I'll break down what each piece ended up costing after I count out how many pieces I actually ended up with, but I'm thinking I got each one for less than a buck.  Stay tuned!!

KC's NDAD Donation

Happy Tuesday!  Apologies for the lack of a Monday post...I was out until the sun came up, literally, celebrating the Tony Awards with nominated friends.  I'll have a fun rundown post on that soon but in a nutshell, I became bffs with ScarJo waiting on line for the bathroom and had a moment with Alan Cumming discussing fashion.  It was kind of the best night ever. The piece for today is a total winner - my amazingly crafty pal KC gave me a bag of goodies to work on and I couldn't wait to get started on this!  These colors are my jam.

Hello bright, paisley, fabulousness!

Only issue is that I really can't get away with wearing this anywhere.  The print is supes busy and the length is just too long.

Also, there are tons of these guys under the arms...

I mean tons...

First thing I did was stitch up all my arms!  For the most part, all of the holes fell right on the seams making them quite easy to fix.  I just reinforced all the stitching in these areas to prevent more hole-age (yep, that's my totally fake word that I'm using that suits this issue perfectly) from occurring.

Next I got to cutting!

In my head I wanted to make a summery dress for my NY trip to wear with some wedges.  This was screaming vacation, so I thought a tunic-dress would be perfecto!  I trimmed off a third of the dress and then prepped a new hem to be sewed.

I also wanted to open up the neck a bit so I made some snips along the neckline, pinned them under and sewed them in place to create a bit of a scoop shape.

I sewed all my edges, arms, hems, and seams in place and packed my new dress in my suitcase for the Big Apple.  Unfortch, there was one major issue.  RAIN!!  I couldn't get away with a cute sundress in the city while it was raining cats and dogs, so I improvised.  New-dress-turned-new-top!!

I belted it and did a little waist zhuzhing to make a billowy top that worked like a charm with my dark skinny jeans.  I love the rain but was a bit disappointed that I couldn't rock my new piece exactly how I wanted.

However, this just means that I can wear it again when I get back to LA where rain won't be an issue at all...unless I choose to go to Raging Waters.  (Water slides, anyone??)  My travel umbrella came in handy as I forged through the city streets in my flip flops.  Yep, I didn't bring any closed toed shoes with me.  Genius, right?

I have to say, nothing is better than wearing bright, happy colors on dreary days.  This shirt was my little ray of sunshine today.

This bathtub was also my little ray of sunshine today too...

I did not partake in this tub action, but might have to make it happen next time I'm in NY!!

KC, thank you so much for the bag of goodies!!  I'm totally obsessed with my new piece which will get documented as a dress very, very soon!