Chicago's Secret Garden

A New Leaf

This is a three story floral shop in the heart of Old Town Chicago that boast an inspiring array of Springtime flowers smack in the middle of the winter.  The exposed brick that blankets the surface of the entire interior of the building added to the ambiance as I found myself delightfully drawn around each corner and up each surprising new level that revealed itself.  Hidden amongst palm fronds and beautifully crafted over sized wreaths I found handmade candle displays, two small greenhouses and enough refinished wood furniture to make the display team at Anthropologie proud.  An hour wandering around this shop with a coffee in hand easily chased away the winter blues and made me nostalgic for what I love and miss so much about California.  Flowers, flowers, and more flowers.... to last the whole year round.

Baby Its Cold Outside

My recent visit to New York and its unprecedented snowstorm in October  inspired me to spend my evening editing this song into a visual wish list if you will. 

Natures Emotional Antiseptic

Home Is Where Your Creative Heart Is

To Curl or Not to Curl....

That is the Question?

My SoCal/San Diego rant

Ok so this one has been brewing a long time I just have not had the time to put finger to keyboard on the subject.  It's been a bug under my skin for the past year even before I made my personal move from Cali to the Midwest.  And here it is:  People who leave Socal/San Diego and say that the only thing they miss is the weather.  If that is the case than you obviously did not use your time there wisely.  Whenever I hear someone say anything along those lines I actually find it to be one of the saddest attempts at prestaged social disconnection I have ever heard. 

We all know those people.  The ones who try to make themselves greater by always managing to find a way to put everything and everyone down ever so slightly.  Those folks are useless.  So what your telling me is  you lived 4 hours from Vegas, 2 from LA, and maybe a half hour from PB, MB. OC or the gaslamp and you really couldn't find anything to love or miss about SoCal?  If you were smart you bar hopped via bicycle, you spent long hours in a sun that wouldn't quit, you wore cute dresses, shorts and open toe shoes all year round, you had the option to surf, rock climb, hike or snowboard all within the same day and the best you can come up with are witty little quips about how you only miss the weather?  Yawn............... your coolness bores me. 

Le Ballon Rouge

The Little Black Dress

 SIMPLE,  TIMELESS,  ELEGANT

Bride Psychology: Less is More

BRIDE PSYCHOLOGY

Alice

Hosts:  Heather Broderick & Briana Adams
Photo's: Courtesy of Briana Adams & Mary Fasanello

Venue:  Home of Sean & Heather Broderick


A special thanks goes out to all of my friends who helped to make this such a lovely event.

Spring in Manhattan

This is just because I love Bill Cunningham (quirky as he is) and because I remember what Spring means on the island of Manhattan:  Crocuses burried under dead leaves or pushing through melting patches of snow, the AM flower district, designer store window watching and good old fashioned people watching.

Mentally and emotionally Spring has always represented the rebirth of hope and possibility, and no city does this season better than New York.



http://video.nytimes.com/video/2011/03/25/fashion/100000000744592/onthestreet.html

Etsy Bitsy

For those of you who are not already hard on the Etsy bandwagon .... let me take this opportunity to put you in the know!  Hip as I think I am (and as you all know I do think myself to be quite hip) I only just learned about this website.  So I have to acknowlege a huge shopping fail on my part.  However pushing past that, I would strongly recommend that you think of this site as an arts and crafts fair, meets a garage sale, meets a thrift store, all stationed online. 
The selection is just as wide as the price ranges. 

• The blue wedding dress below is $2200.00
• The beautifully intricate blue gem stoned necklace is a mere $40.00 bucks. 
• The hand crouched foot lace shown below for your beach apparel runs at $10.00
• Paper Pom Poms for your home, party or otherwise are about 4.00 each
• The never ending array of clutches can run as low as 22.00 or reach heights of 200.00
• Rockabilly dress 45.00
• Paris Candles 11.00

There is something on here for everyone!  I'm chalking this up as one of the major wins that I stumbled across while working my way through the tedious nonsensical hoopla, that crazy people lovingly refer to as wedding planning.  I'm thanking Real Simple Weddings for putting me onto this one stop shopping gem. 

http://www.etsy.com/?ref=si_home

What Gaga's missing

Red wine in hand, cool ocean breeze blowing & that feeling.  Its only right..... Respect.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E4rG4GRTVB4

A Few Good Men

http://www.mrporter.com/styledirectory/icons

"Let's hear it for the boys!" said in my very best Denise Williams Footloose voice.   An old friend of mine recommended the above site to me knowing as everyone does of my undying interest in fashion for the sake of ...... fashion.  I stumbled across the Style Icon link and was instantly riveted for the next half hour, as I realized that I had been remiss in showing the honor that is due to our most esteemed fashion counterpart, Men . 

This site has an inspired list of this past centuries most influential male trail blazers.  It takes the time to list them with iconic photos,  and provide a brief recap of how these gentleman happened to fall into such good company. My top two faves?

Gianni Agnelli & The Emperor of Ethiopia, Haile Selassie.  When it comes to Agnelli how can you hate on a man who had mastered the art of wearing his thousand dollar watches over the sleeve of his fine tailored dress shirts?  While Selassie.... you simply have to give it up to a man who's official title was: His Imperial Majesty Haile Selassie I, King of Kings, Lord of Lords, Conquering Lion of the Tribe of Judah, and Elect of God.  Need I say more?

BHLDN

BHLDN promised to give you a fresh take on weddings. In that area they delivered. However be advised that fresh take is gonna cost you about  1400.00 - 4000.00 per wedding dress.  And to me that sounds like the  same old, same old.

Aside from the fact that I refuse to crack open my wallet for these prices, these divinely inspired looks cannot be ignored.

Fashion Week Fall 2011

• M. Patmos: Your runway models could not have looked more matronly.  Recruit a new hair stylist and try again next year.

• Jason Wu: You did so many things right! #1 Fav
• Click Here for Wu Fall 2011

• Diane Von Furstenberg:  I.Want.This.Bag!

• Tommy Hilfiger: Pass, Fail, Pass. 
• Pass on almost every one of your sweaters
• "Uber Fail" (as Mchl Strch would say) on all of those 1970's mobster business suits you were trying to push on us ladies.  
• Pass again on the felt brown fedora that kept showing up in between pieces.

• Rebecca Minkoff:  Thank you for showing women that if you have to wear leggings, there is a right and a wrong way to do it!

• Thakoon: Loud & Juvenile

• Nicole Miller: Sorry I was simply not able to look past your very loud digitalized & psychadelic prints

• Wes Gordon: so fun!
• Click here for Wes Gordon Fall 2011

• Victoria Beckham:  Touche'. You were my 2nd fav
• Click here for Victoria Beckham Fall 2011

A Real Decision Is Not Like A Preference...

This is for all of my people (and there are allot of you out there) who want different lives, who want change.  It's for everyone who is struggling with how to get from who they are to who they want to be.  The formula is as old as time.  It's really the same bible based truth we learn at every Kingdom Hall meeting.  However sometimes when the same old point is said differently from someone else..... for some reason it finally clicks.  I get motivated when I hear this.  I hope you do to.  Happy Living!

Kush

Vladimir Kush

Just sitting at home viewing one of my favorite artists web sites when I decided that I should share. So lets see.... basically if you were to take Salvador Dali and leave him stranded on a desert island with Lewis Carroll and Walt Disney you would get Vladimir Kush.  If you enjoy surrealism, you cant deny the genius of this Russian born artist.  Kush leaves nothing to chance, you know exactly where he wants his viewers eye to be drawn because he lays his subjects out on canvas with a surgeons precision.  No single stroke of his paintbrush is wasted, no image left unfinished. 

I first discovered this artist on my fourth trip to Vegas back in 2006.  I was trolling the (then) Alladin Casino mall when I chanced upon  an inconspicuous art gallery in the middle of the mall passage.  As I passed I did a double take and quickly found myself mesmerized.  I spent about an hour pouring over the 10 peices that the gallery housed and found myself back again the next day, and every  year since.   My favorite has always been "Red Purse".  Which one will be yours?

Adore Being A Girl?

This Old Thing? Actually Its New!

I was so excited when I stumbled across this NY times article.  Finally!  At least from a fashion standpoint women everywhere seem to be starting to grasp the concept that femininity ...... is a blessing.  With the increased popularity of vintage inspired clothing lines like:  Stop Staring!, Modcloth, and even mass produced Anthropologie, the softer side of being a girl appears to be on the glorious up rise.

I'm not talking hard pressed, fashion forward Sex in the City style femininity (which has its place, don't get me wrong.  Long live Carrie Bradshaw).  I'm talking about old fashioned soft curved femininity, along the lines of Audrey Hepburn, Marilyn Monroe, and Grace Kelly.  Back when women actually understood that there was artistry involved in dressing.  And many trade secrets were passed on from mother to daughter, sister to sister, or between two giggling girlfriends who drew black lines down each other bare legs to mimic the nylons they couldn't afford.

I don't know about you guys but I am so over slouchy shirts, lazy leggings, and the ratty brown leather shoulder bags draped across the chest.  My fashion intelligence is always insulted by the ones who by throwing on a hat are trying to tell me that they have just accessorized.  Sorry honey your lazy and uncreative, plain and simple.  I get it, sometimes you just gotta go.  But when that becomes your uniform of choice, as opposed to your choice for the moment, something has got to give.  And whoever you decide to give it to.... leave it there.  Because it's time for an upgrade.


  

Chris Rock said it best...

Chris Rock said it best.  "All good relationships are boring ". I can concur, as someone who spent an hour and a half in heated debate with her fiance discussing the differences in meaning between the two sentences:  "That person may have a bad heart condition." vs "That person has a bad heart condition."  On that point, no I don't want to expound any further.

What I will say is that I noticed this phenomenon early into my relationship and I had a hard time understanding it.  I mean c'mon! Debates over word placement in sentences, or viewpoints on whether mothers with newborn children should travel....  I mean really?  Is this the best we can come up with? Whatever happened to fights that stem from finding another girls panties in your bed?  Those are real fights!

And then it dawned on me. In a good relationship you don't fight about the fundamentals.  You don't have monumental difference's of opinion that weaken the very fabric of what your trying to piece together.  In good relationships, sometimes you fight for the sheer joy of fighting.  Simply put, to flex your fight muscles.  You fight about the psychological or social impact that certain behaviors have on society.  You fight about how to properly apply bible principles, you fight about how to understand scriptures correctly.  And frankly, I use the word fight loosely.  Trust me when I say that these are not even real fights.  While it might be a big deal to you, the Richter scale for fights refuses to even acknowledge these encounters.  These are extreme differences of opinion between two people who respect each other and ultimately are going to find a way to get on the same page. I mean could this be any more sickening? 

I'm telling you now if you've spent years lovingly nurturing your cynical side and creating an entire self deprecating sense of humor whose timing hinges on that cynicism.... a good relationship is going to destroy all of that work very quickly.  But after the smoke clears from the fall of that cynical wall, you find you are left with the only thing that really matters.  A partner whom you really trust.  Someone who puts you before themselves and who tries to see you in the same light that your maker sees you.  Someone you would cross the country, the ocean or the world for without hesitation.  And after all isn't that security the relationship golden fleece that most us claim we have been looking for?

2010 FB Status Likes......

I'm a facebook troller, there I said it.  Many of us are, most are ashamed to admit it.  As with most things in life I dont suffer from allot of shame.  So whether you call it the modern day "Peeping Tom" or the "Virtual Voyuer" the fact remains.... folks is nosey!   By way of proof I challenge you to count off the number of times you started a sentence with the words: Did you hear; Did you see; or So have you heard? within the past week and maybe we can all begin to embrace ourselves a little more honestly.


So with that said, my nosey tail keeps tabs on the facebook posts that I get a kick out of.  As well as the ones I absolutely hate.  That list will be revealed at a later date.  So below are my 2010 likes for most creative posts IMO.  Of course this list is tainted because it's all from my point of view, but this is my blog so if you don't like it you know what you can do.  Names have been withheld to protect the innocent......   namely myself.   

• dun flexed my presentation skeelz at a board meeting. socks was knocked off. that'll go down in history. and by "history" I mean "official minutes"...
   

• seeing tangled with my parents...THUG LIFE!!!

• Friend on Facebook posted an update saying how "pumped" he is listening to Nickleback and 3 Days Grace while getting ready to go to the gym... Promptly de-friended

• I have decided that its a proven fact: The ratio of brand new shiny white sneakers in a room is in direct proportion to the number of black people there are in said room.

• It warms my heart to know there are people in this world that would , at a stop sign on the top of the 30th street hill, roll down their car window and with the most genuine sincerity and concern ask a complete stranger - who is doubled-over legs shaking grasping for air - if she is "all right"........

• What does it mean when you tell a bartender to surprise you and she gives you glass of water

• I woke up with an unwrapped cupcake in my hand...the question here is not who or how...its just simply thank you

• Women always compliment me on my "restroom eyes".

• cutting my own bangs while watching the garbage pail kids.... i dont want to talk about it

• I'm a 6'4" guy laying on a 4 foot long couch. But by all means, keep complaining about "your" problems.

• just had a gas spill at the gas station, and it killed a cricket...I feel like BP right now

• When I see people that skinny....I wonder what their organs look like.

• I'm preparing to cheat at bible pictionary...

Italy 101

In my opinion Roman women have the lock on monochromatic dressing.

Someone needs to teach Italians how to clean their beaches.  Come on people, the Amalfi coast is one of your biggest money makers.  Would it be too much to send someone out nightly with a trash bag and a litter stick?

Speaking of cleaning...... Naples..... Really?

Italian men are like peacocks on a runway.  You cant help but feel privileged to be watching the free show from your cafe seat.

There is no such thing as speaking softly in Italian

Gelato..... yeah, not so much.  I know I won't be popular for that one but what can I say? *shrugs shoulders*

If you wait long enough at any Roman monument a fashion photo shoot will inevitably take place.

Wandering the streets of Florence with your Ipod playing Paolo Nutini...... Highly recommended.

When Italians recommend their table wine, they know what they are talking about.

You do nothing all day and feel like you conquered the world.  That might be for Europe as a whole but..... whatever.