1960s meet the 2010s!

Isn't it the best when you see a line of clothing that you know you could live, love, eat, dance, shop, chat in?

I stumbled up Lesley Ever's website and instantly wanted each and every dress, skirt and tunic in each and every gorgeous, gummy-yummy fabric!  The styling is classic - A line shifts and skirts, wrap dresses, box pleat skirts, tunics - but the details to the paid to the construction and the fabric selection make it thoroughly modern and perfect for la dolce vita.

If I had pick of the litter is would be this little kitten:

Her name is Audrey and the fabric - Love Birds! (It makes me think of my friend from gradeschool who had a Parakeet, appropriately named, I believe, 'Keet.)

Another lovely thing about the website is that every dress is viewable in each fabric offered and there are accompanying front, back, 3/4 shots as well.  AND as an added courtesy, the Lesley Evers ladies show you different ways to wear the clothes. 

Good luck, ladies, I love finding clothing lines that are well thought out and whimsical!

  

Have you joined the bandwagon?

When I was young, my parents were adamant that I not partake in certain trends.  Pierced ears, Benetton sweaters, my own car, the Banana Republic paratrooper bag (this was back when Banana Republic smelled like dung because it was a "travel store" and offered vests with 8 mesh pockets).  I think they were trying to teach me that I didn't need something simply because other people were signaling that I did.  It was fine to get what i what but I had to really want it AND know why I wanted it.  Simply "needing it" because others "wanted it" wasn't good enough.

I keenly felt "deprived" at the time, but with the passage of time (wise tutor that you are) I love what they did.  It was a great lesson for me and I feel as if I now often, make a conscious choice not to do something, read something, go somewhere just because others have deemed it worthy.

So, with that stated, I can't say I "hate" the following things, rather, I haven't joined the bandwagon....

American Idol

Dancing with the Stars - D list celebs trying to scrap their way up to C list notoriety

Glee 

Any kind of musical (see above)

Lost

Survivor 

Any kind of competitive reality show*

Girl with the Dragon Tattoo series

Why is it that when a thing that is presumably perfectly wonderful or enjoyable loses its shine once the crowds come flocking to it?  

* Yes, I admit in the greatness of ironies, I LOVE the Real Housewives franchise.  I cannot look away - I love each and every one of these ladies who willingly subject their lives and families to such (spot-on) examination.....  It takes a "lady" with a certain kind of hubris (or chutzpa) to sign on.  Ick on me!

Daphne, my love

Is there any one couture client more devoted to fashion that Daphne Guinness?

The hair (so Meryl Streep in "The Devil Wears Prada"); the shoes (Alexander McQueen Lobster shoes); the lithe frame (so Duchess of Windsor in its dedication to slimness)....

And her lovely dedication to fashion devotée Isabella Blow? Buying Blow's entire wardrobe before it went up for auction?  The article Daphne wrote recently in the Financial Times explaining her purchase was so touching, so reverential, so based in friendship that for me, it revealed another (unexpected) side of a woman largely known for just her fashion sense.

May we all know someone with such depth of taste and respect for others!

What is joyful?

Food related:
1) Hearing the pop of a perfectly chilled Diet-Coke
2) Getting the perfect bite of pasta - enough pasta, enough sauce, enough cheese
3) The cracking first bite of an apple or a pear
4) The smell of cookies baking (as well as the taste of cookie dough)

Family related:
1) Seeing my older brother after a long gap and seeing his shy smile
2) Hearing my young brother giggle
3) Having my parents roll out the red carpet for an ordinary visit back to my childhood home

Book related:
1) Knowing from the first paragraph that it's going to be an "experience"
2) Remembering that experience and excitedly relaying it to someone else
3) Picking up a book and remembering where you were in your life when you read it.
4) Knowing there is a Sequel!

Child related:
1) Hearing my baby gasp when she realizes I am coming to pick her up!
2) Watching her laugh when her father zooms her around and "lands" her in my arms.
3) Seeing my parents (and in particular, my reserved father) dance around with the baby!

Travel related:
1) Waking up in a new place and stepping out of the hotel with nothing but a map
2) Playing with new money
3) Feeling as if a new town has adopted you, even for a short time.

What I would really like

Wish lists are interesting.  For myself, I find there's a balance to them - material items squaring off with hopes for happiness, health, pureness of mind and soul.

To wit, here is what I'd like/love/swoon over:

1) A set of monogrammed Goyard luggage! (start big!)
2) Recovering my ability to speak, write, read French (it was there only 15 years ago!)
3) The perfect pair of Tod's driving mocs (in the bestest crocodile that never wears out)
4) An arm load of Hermes bangles
5) To get a full night's sleep in a huge, cosseted bed (no husband snoring, no baby waking up in the middle of the night)
6) A chance to have a conversation with Jacqueline Kennedy, Princess Diana and Daphne Guinness
7) Improved relationships with several family members
8) Laundry that places itself in the appropriate drawers and hangers, perfectly folded and ironed
9) Absolute happiness and health for my daughter and husband
10) A day without thinking a mean thought about someone else.

I can hardly believe it when people say they don't need or want for anything.  Everybody needs something, right?  Assuredly, not everyone may want an Hermes bangle or belt, but isn't there some item lurking on the peripheries of one's consciousness that would just strike you flat if received?  I think it's good to keep an updated wish list - you never know when you're going to be asked for a gift idea and it never hurts to think highly of yourself.  Finding that perfect gift for someone else is just dandy, but nudging yourself into the spotlight every now and then never hurts either!

To-Do who??? Not the Honey Melon!

I love to-do lists.  I do.  I love taking pen to paper and then methodically spewing out what needs to be accomplished.  There are few feelings better than crossing stuff out once accomplished and putting it in your rearview mirror. And yet, to make a to-do list of any note, one has to remember what needs to be done.  For me, since having my child, my memory is shot.  (I know studies say that mommy brain isn't true... but I can't remember anything as of late or anything for any length of time.)

It's got to be due to the amazing amount of focus and attention a baby requires.  Yes, she is asleep for about 16 hours total each day, but those  remaining hours are intense.  To wit: "Bring me here!" "Change me...." "Feed me!" "Hold me!"  "Hold me." "Hold me." "Hold me more." "Feed me." "Ahhhhhhhh." "I must take your finger and chew on it for the next 4 minutes." "The croaking frog has rolled away from me and I NEED IT now."*

When I have a moment of quiet, I first sit dazedly and wonder what it was that was so pressing just 30 minutes ago.  Then I reach for the old stand-by: Facebook.  Because nothing buoys me more than learning what you're making for dinner or how you felt about the Miss America contest. More often than not, I find my energy or ambition to do the things I need to do is low, low, low.  Maybe it's because I want to relish the down-time and simply relax, but feel constrained by the fact that she will wake up in less than an hour and that means I have to work fast to accomplish anything fun or on my to-do list.  (As a result I'm jumping here and there - swallowing a bite to eat, only glancing at a Times article IfeelasifImustreadorIllregretitatthenextcocktaiparty, trying to remember one of my many passwords or searching for a pair of skinny jeans.

If I was smart, I'd do the following:  do something fun for one nap, do some work during the next nap.
Maybe I should go back to my old habit and start to make a to-do list each night.  It would help me plan my day, I could see what needed to be accomplished, etc. And of course, it's license to get several fun new sets of to-do lists.  (Not those silly pads with "Honey Do" written at the top. Wants to be associated in any way with the actual Honeydew melon.  It's a bit meek, isn't it?

*My daughter doesn't speak - rather, she emits high-pitched screams, jolly squeals of delight, guffaws and general exclamations

Telly shows to swoon over

1) Gilmore Girls - the banter, the light touch, the charming, yet crazy town of Stars Hollow.  The last boyfriend of Rory's... Fancypants McThatGuy

2) Designing Women - the bravado, the clothes, that staircase... the NIGHT ... THE .... LIGHTS... WENT....OUT.... IN... GEORGIA!

3) Love Boat
4) The Ghost Whisperer (yes, I watched it for close to 3 seasons. I was single and having a rough go of it.)
5) The Muppets Show
6) Anne of Green Gables - with Meagan somebody, Colleen Dewhurst.  Anne and Gilbert - 19th century flames!
7) Magnum P.I. (I watched it with my brothers and never understood what was going on.  Neither did they. Luckily, nor did my parents. They were mercenaries, right?)
8)Ab Fab - simply the best comedy to hop the pond.  I'm chanting as we speak....
9) Golden Girls.  There isn't a single episode that isn't laugh out loud funny.  There's not.  Don't try to think of one as a challenge.  I mean, the cheesecake, the wicker furniture, Stan Zbornak!

10) Facts of Life.  This show made me want to go to boarding school.

Other goodies:
Dynasty, The Colbys, Dallas, Small Wonder (you read correctly)! Family Ties

A feeling or two

Oftentimes I find that holding my baby is the best feeling in the world. We were just in the park and I was giving her an airplane ride (me reclining on the lawn and hoisting her up on my legs while holding her arms). She looked radiantly happy and when her smile courses through her, it takes all I have not to shout to everyone to look and join me in adoring her. C'mon park-goers.... isn't she a wonder?!

Another good feeling: having a tired baby snuggle into you. It's all there - her warmth, her slackness, her need to be cared for, and her trust in me.

Motherhood is exhausting, but just so very (surprisingly) rewarding.

My Wishlist

Ha-ha! This is going to be fun. (I should tell my husband to consult this list when it comes upon birthday, anniversary, mothersday, holiday.)  Here are my first two

Want #1 - The fantastic Amanda Hobo by Tory Burch

Want # 2   American Woman book, by the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum or Art

Both have fun, fashionable and well-worth it additions to the home!

The LOOOOOONNGGGG and Short of It

It being Motherhood. Specifically, how the hours vary in perception in any given day.

Unsurprisingly, some hours zoom by - typically those when we are doing errands or rushing to get home to get the little bug in bed for a nap. But, other hours, oh my gosh, do they feel drawn out. How cliched that each minute feels like an eternity. But when an infants attention span is short and they have a preference to be held (incessantly), one looks desperately for things to do and a small apartment can hold only so diversions.

What are your longest hours with your children? Mine is from 4:30 to 6 pm? Once the clock rings six bells, this baby is bathed, changed, nursed and then nite, nite termite!

Sometimes you stumble upon something that makes you laugh out loud

And this is it! Thanks QBS!

Favorite movies - By Director

It's tough picking a favorite movie. You would be better off asking me what was my favorite black and white movie; favorite animated film; favorite movie by a particular director; foreign film; etc. Because movies, as with real life, are made up of lots of different experiences, textures and memories.

Here's an incomplete listing:
Favorite Hitchcock: Rebecca, Strangers on a Train
Favorite Scorsese: Age of Innocence, The Departed, Raging Bull
Favorite Coppola: Apocalypse Now
Favorite Wilder: Some Like it Hot
Favorite Hughes: 16 Candles
Favorite Malick: Days of Heaven
Favorite Spielberg: Minority Report (weird that it's not Schindler's or Saving Private Ryan.  Can't help it!)
Favorite Eastwood:  Gran Torino
Favorite Capra: It Happened One Night

Abrupt halt....I've done it.  I want to make a ton of sublists and spend the next few days watching nothing but movies.  Lists are swirling through my head:  My favorite Clark Gable, my favorite costume designs, my favorite foreign, best soundtracks..... Gosh, not easy to plunge into, but this just might be a fun weekly feature!

Ahoy! Long time no see!

Well, here I am ! Back after a hiatus of 9 months and with a bouncing baby girl to boot! Our little owl was born in early November and she is simply fantastic. I could wax poetic about her, motherhood and the daily delights of caring for someone so small, drooly and cute, but I would also have to temper it with thoughts about insane sleep deprivation, the monotony of nursing and how vastly life changes once baby arrives.

But, all in all it's good stuff!

But, now, we're through the pregnancy, labor, initial difficult months - I find myself wondering what do I want to do? What can I do that won't take me away from my little one for an entire work day? What will be challenging (enough), flexible (enough), creative enough and fun enough to allow me to feel as if I still can work with the big kids while being the best mother I can be?

Quandries, quandries!

what is in a name?

Well, my first child arrived in early November and I am so, so, so thrilled to report that "The Bean" as we called him or her throughout the pregnancy is a girl. I had a feeling all along the baby was a girl. Some may say the odds were 50 / 50 and they are completely right (and thoroughly unfun). But from the start, I strongly felt it was a girl. I thought of the baby as a girl and while not attracted to only things pink and frilly, I did find myself looking more intently at girl items; books, clothes and the likes.

Which brings me to one of my favorite topics - names! I place a lot of importance on names and as soon as I hear a new one, I run through the nickname possibilities, its pairing with the last name, the initials (for monogramming purposes), the people I know who share the name. Name mad? No, I just think that names tend to arrive before the person does and set up expectations. They speak to the parent's education, culture, values and familiar relationships. Hence, their importance is great and the amount of information a name reveals is often large.

Here are the names we (meaning I) batted around:

Vivianne
This is a classic, elegant name and the nickname "Vivy" is so sweet. It's a rarer name and for me, was a nice nod to Vivien Leigh, one of my favorite actress. Leigh and my daughter happen to share the same birthday. I also love that it is French.

Charlotte
Another English classic. There is something regal about Charlotte and the nickname possibilities are numerous: Char, Cha Cha ("sha sha") Charlie, Chach ("Shash"), Lotte, Arlotte. The Charlottes I have known tend to be quite smart and beautifully behaved.

Honor
My husband thought this was a joke of a suggestion, but I really liked it. Again, it's simple, but there is a lovely splendor to it too.

Eleanor
Simple, unassuming, but kindhearted. My husband vetoed this one off the bat, along with Agnes and Martha. I adore them!

 These are the names that I liked. I can't really remember what names my husband proposed, except for Coral..... crickets chirping, right? And as everyone knows, final naming rights lay with the mother.

What did we utimately pick? Genevieve. As the patron saint of Paris, Genevieve plays an important role in Parisian and French history. (Its a perfect reason to go to Paris when she is older.) And seeing how I loved all things French, and the nickname possibilities are high, it seemed a lovely choice. Many people have been so kind as to say how much they love her name.

And funnily enough, it fits her perfectly!  She is a Genevieve of blue eyes, ebullient laughs, gorgeous milky skin and long, long legs!