Monday, May 31, 2021

Cured Meats and Other Treats: Mmmm, Memorial Day

Skirt: Amazon

Socks: Zulily

Tee: So, Kohl's

Bag: LC Lauren Conrad, Kohl's

Hat: Sea Star, Brigantine


Dress: LC Lauren Conrad, Kohl's

Red White and Blue I Love You Barrette Brooch

Bag: Betsey Johnson, Modcloth

Cherry necklace: Candie's, Kohl's; Other necklace: Wet Seal

Dress: Zulily


Skirt: Vylette, Kohl's

Bag: Circus by Sam Edelman, Kohl's

Top: Candie's, Kohl's

Shoes clockwise: Ami Clubwear; Christian Siriano for Payless; (last two) Chase & Chloe. Zulily

A hot dog is the most delicious disgusting thing you can eat (unless you're into escargot, which I'm not), and Memorial Day marks the first of three times each summer that I indulge in the mystery meat (the other times are Fourth of July and Labor Day).  Yesterday was no exception when the husband and I went to my parents' for a BBQ.  This was especially exciting after last year's porch party in the thick of the quarantine.  We ate inside because of the rain, but it was still a fun, festive time.  We're all big TV fans and talked about season finales and which shows got canceled or picked up for next season.  I even made a pudding poke cake from my JELL-O Celebrating 100 Years cookbook.    


Full disclosure, the poke in my cake didn't quite take, which meant that it was just a chocolate cake topped with pudding -- and lots of maraschino cherries.  Because whenever I botch a recipe, I like to make it extra pretty.  Anyway, the rain reminded me of the washout Memorial Day when I was five and my parents took my sister and me to see Honey, I Shrunk the Kids.  My mom was so disappointed that the storm squelched our beach plans, but I was secretly happy that we got to go to the movies instead.  Speaking of Mom, here she is:  


We're the same height, but I appear taller because I'm wearing heels.  We had the best time going through her closet and then looking at old pictures.  As they say, it's the little things. 

I hope your Memorial Day was happy too and that you got to spend time with your nearest and dearest and enjoy your favorite foods.   

Even the slimy ones. :)

Saturday, May 29, 2021

Fantabulous Fantasia: Cinderella in Sequins

Top: Candies, Kohl's; Skirt: LC Lauren Conrad, Kohl's; Shoes: Katy Perry, Amazon; Bag: Amazon; Socks: Amazon; Sunglasses: Betsey Johnson, Zulily; Mint bangle: Decree, JCPenney; Black bangle: Mixit, JCPenney; Coral bangle: Silver Linings, Ocean City; Pink and purple bangles: Don't Ask, Zulily

Top: TJ Maxx; Skirt: LC Lauren Conrad, Kohl's; Shoes: Jessica Simpson, DSW; Bag: Betsey Johnson, Boscov's; Belt: New York & Company; Pearl necklace: Target; Yellow bangles: B Fabulous; Rest of bracelets and rings: Mixit, JCPenney

Sequins?  Check.  Pastel florals?  Check.  Unicorn?  Check.  It's official, Disney disco, these looks are for you!  Not, as far as I know, that there was ever a unicorn prancing around the Magic Kingdom or Studio 54.  But there should be.  Princesses and party people, you're welcome.

When you think about it, sequins are pretty amazing.  They're basically shiny pieces of trash, yet the easiest way to elevate any outfit to New Year's Eve or happily-ever-after.  Speaking of which, I was lucky enough to snag both of these out-on-the-town tinsely minis on clearance. 

As any shopper worth her change purse knows, glitzy getups go out the window with the last Christmas candle. In other words, post holiday is prime time to stock up on dress-up duds.  That's when I got the silver skirt.  I didn't get the rose one until a few weeks ago, when it was only $7.50.  Mama mia, that's a bargain for a Dancing Queen on a commoner's budget!

Next up, '70s Cinderella in -- polyurethane not glass, because why risk a bloody ankle? -- platforms.  

I can already hear the ABBA/Bibbidi-bobbidi-boo mashup hypnotizing cosplay-clad hipsters.

Thursday, May 27, 2021

Ruby Room Rendezvous: A Romance for the Pages

I recently read The Forgotten Room, a jewel of a novel by Karen White, Lauren Willig, and our old pal Beatriz Williams, and the first thing that comes to mind is this: So. Many. Tears.  (The second is: So glad women no longer wear corsets.)  A tale of historical fiction wrapped in romantic suspense, The Forgotten Room is a tearjerker for sure and follows three generations of women as they try to untangle a secret surrounding a necklace.  You've heard of blood diamonds.  Well, this necklace has a blood ruby, and not just because of the color.  It's seen a lot of heartbreak -- and also a little bloodshed.  

The Forgotten Room takes us on a journey through the 1890s, 1920s, and 1940s to meet Olive, Lucy, and Kate, a trio of very different women.  Cruel circumstances cast Olive as a servant, determination drives Lucy to secretarial school (which sounds weak tea but was quite the coup in the Roaring Twenties), and good old grit and her father's death compel Kate to become a nearly Doogie-young doctor.  The plot keeps you guessing as love blooms across decades and class divides.  It even has a villain named Prunella, which made me think of prune juice (ew!).  As the kids say these days, it's a lot.

The Forgotten Room is filled with moving passages, and my favorite is this one about the passage of time.  It's New Year's Eve, 1893, and Olive is waxing reflective:

"All her life, Olive wanted to stay up until midnight on New Year's Eve and experience the exact instant when the old year turned to the new.  When the familiar date passed into history, never to be seen or known or smelled or touched again -- like death, she supposed -- and those bright exotic numbers that had once belonged to some impossibly distant future -- 1893, imagine that! --became your present reality." (294)

I think we've all felt like that at least once.  Because the passing of time, both in life and in this book, is tinged with a haunting beauty.  White, Willig, and Williams's words capture that mysterious magic, a theme that runs through Room and readers' love affair with everything retro and vintage.    

It was so hard to get this story out of my head that I ransacked my craft supply stash for a red rhinestone something.  My efforts were rewarded with the last red and white rhinestone slider bead from an old broken bracelet, itself its own kind of vintage, and I lost no time stringing it with black and red beads.  The resulting necklace -- which I like to call the Half Blood Chintz-y -- is much more modest than the kind I usually create, but I think that makes it strangely -- to borrow an old-fashioned term -- fetching. 

Half Blood Chintz-y Necklace

So, there you have it: jewelry, intrigue, and bittersweet love.  

Forgotten Room, I'll never forget you.  

Tuesday, May 25, 2021

Might of the Iguana: Think Pink

Top: Bongo, Sears

Belt: B Fabulous; Bag: Sleepyville Critters, Amazon; Black and white bracelet: Mixit, JCPenney; Bow: Carole, JCPenny; Blue bracelet: Cloud Nine, Ocean City; Ring: Mixit, JCPenney

Dress: Everly, Modcloth

Tights: Zulily

Belt: Belt is Cool, Amazon; Flower barrette: Cappelli, ULTA; Pink bracelets: So, Kohl's; Pink pendant: H&M; Light pink bangle: Don't Ask, Zulily; Sparkly bangle: Target; Mermaid keychain: Ella & Elly, Zuily; Dragon bangles: Simply Vera, Kohl's; Heart ring: Candie's, Kohl's; Flower bracelet: Belk's 

Top and skirt: LC Lauren Conrad, Kohl's

Tights: Hue, Amazon

Blue bangle: Mixit, JCPenney; Yellow and striped bangles: B Fabulous; Red ring: Making Waves, Ocean City; Bag: T-Shirt & Jeans, Kohl's; Blue ring: Michaels; Boots: 2 Lips Too, JCPenney

Dress: Lily Rose, Kohl's

I don't know much about the might of the iguana because I've never had to wrangle it -- or any other reptile -- unless you count trying to get through Tennessee Williams's "Night of the Iguana" in college.  But in that classic, albeit creepy play, the scaly rapscallion in question isn't so much a pest as a symbol of freedom.  And as such, its likeness in this colorful (Sleepyville!) critter clutch makes fashion freedom worth fighting for.  Take that, school uniforms!

Bag: Sleepyville Critters, Amazon

Now, I didn't go to private school, which means that I was free to wear stretch pants and vests far longer than I should have.  But clothes were always important to me, and I felt sorry for anyone forced to wear a standard-issue, identity-stripping skirt and polo.  Even in the lawless halls of pubic school, I wasn't allowed to wear my hat -- a red and white flower-adorned, floral-print cloche that would've been the envy of Blossom -- on picture day.  I still remember the shame of 1) being called out for trying to break the rules and 2) lacking the nerve to go through with the rebellion.  If only I could've tossed my hat high in the air post picture like Mary Tyler Moore (apparently, my idea of badassery looks like a beloved '70s sitcom).  So private school prisoners and hat fans everywhere, this declaration of outfit independence is for you.  

That said, think pink for now but stand by for flag flair, because Memorial Day's right around the corner.  

Iguana, I love when you become a chameleon.

Saturday, May 22, 2021

Mall Crawl Before You Can Catwalk

After a year and two months of buying stuff only online, last weekend I busted out and went shopping IRL.  Three weeks had passed since my second Pfizer shot, and I had a dentist appointment in a few days.  So I thought it was time to mingle with the masses -- and see if I remembered how to drive.  I chose my outfit carefully, settling on a navy sweater with a rainbow stripe in the middle, ripped jeans, navy crushed velvet flats with yellow socks, a quilted red and black shoulder bag, and a side pony tied with a red and white polka dot ribbon.  It turned out to be way too warm -- I was sweating even before I crossed the parking lot! -- but I liked the look, so no regrets.  

My first stop was Macy's.  It was a Sunday, so it was crowded.  I threaded through the racks, careful to avoid fellow shoppers even though they were masked.  I visited my usual haunts, namely juniors, shoes, and costume jewelry, and was disheartened to come up empty.  Everything was picked over, and what was there was lackluster.  So I hotfooted it up to Macy's Backstage, which is the Marshalls clone section.  Fashion-wise, it too was a wasteland, but I did find a cute picture frame, some pastel gnome salt and pepper shakers, and a pink potted faux succulent for my office.  When it was my turn to pay, I slid my finds through the opening in the Plexiglass that separated the clerk and me.  "I like your outfit," the clerk said, "It's very mall girl."  "I'll take it," I answered.  But that's where the good vibes ended.  Because next he asked what brought me to Macy's, and I explained that it was my first outing in a year after getting vaccinated.  "And you chose Macy's?" he asked, incredulous.  "There are far better places!"  I bit back the urge to retort, "I don't think Mr. Macy would agree," and instead gamely uttered, "Don't worry, I'll hit them all," meaning other stores.  But that turned out to be the wrong tack to take.  "You don't have to spend money! You can do anything!" he counseled, wrapping my $20 worth of baubles with the authority of a financial advisor trying to talk his client out of buying a Bentley.  "Now go out and do something fun," he decreed, thrusting the bag at me as if it held dog poo.  Oddly enough, this wasn't the first time I'd been shopping shamed by a clerk.  But it was certainly the most dramatic.  Nothing like dipping your toe back in the pool only to be tossed into the deep end!  

My next and last stop was Kohl's.  I was disappointed that there weren't any exciting clothes there either.  However, I did score two rainbow rhinestone Simply Vera brooches and a faux wicker pineapple picnic server that I now use to store/display beads.  This time the clerk was much kinder, so much so that she erred on the side of anxious.  I felt for her.  I wouldn't want to work in a store during a pandemic, wondering if each and every customer was carrying COVID.   

So, was the expedition a success?  Even before the quarantine, department stores were definitely on the decline.  But being away from them for a year and then seeing them with fresh eyes made me realize that maybe they weren't so great in the first place.  Online, you can find anything in any size, style, or color without having to settle for something just because you could reach out and touch it.  Brick and mortar stores are always there for you, but they don't always have what you want.  They're like that boring banker boyfriend who's punctual and remembers your birthday but whose stories about his coworker stealing his PB&J make you wish you were with a guy who doesn't wear a watch or have let alone manage a bank account.  That said, the best part of the day was, shocker of shockers, the driving -- or, rather, rediscovering the radio (apparently, I like Machine Gun Kelly).  There's just something about being out there on the road with no responsibilities, singing at the top of your lungs.  Another surprise was the, ahem, pedestrian one of walking.  Despite (sort of ) keeping up with my exercises, running in place in my living room just isn't the same as getting out of the house.  Carrie Bradshaw once famously said "shopping is my cardio."  But it wasn't until I became housebound that I realized it was mine too.  That said, some shopping trips may not deliver the goods in terms of actual, well, goods.  But they give you more than you bargained for in other (good!) ways.

So, yeah.  It's nice to know I can still take on the world, snarky clerks and all.  But that I don't have to if I don't want to.

Which means that next time I'll hit up Macy's online instead of heading Backstage.

Tuesday, May 18, 2021

Shrill Quill, Will Thrill: What Happens When Easton Meets West


Last weekend, I binged the third and final season of the Hulu original comedy Shrill.  Based on journalist Lindy West's memoir of the same name, Shrill follows Annie Easton's (Aidy Bryant) journey as a fat twentysomething journalist jousting for justice.  Now, as I said when I blogged about Big Summer, I'm not and have never been fat and don't pretend to know how fat women feel.  But I am a woman and writer who knows all too well what it's like to be weird.  So, I was on team Annie from go.

When we first meet Annie, she's meek on the outside and enraged on the inside.  Although she's a staff writer at Portland's The Weekly Thorn, she's relegated to writing calendar entries, a gig that stifles her creativity.  She's sleeping with a guy who makes her use the back door so his roommates won't see her.  And everyone from strangers to her own mother urges her to lose weight while feigning concern for her health.  Usually, she shrugs it all off.  But one day she stops being quiet and starts questioning everything (indeed, an early chapter in West's book is called "How to Stop Being Shy in Eighteen Easy Steps").  The angrier Annie gets, the more powerful her writing becomes, earning her a reputation as a voice for the voiceless.  This isn't to say that she doesn't make a boatload of bad and hilarious decisions involving but not limited to vandalism, light stalking, and awkward social encounters.  Still, Bryant brings a kind of I-got-this calm to the crazy, reminding us that Annie's not only smart, sensitive, and talented, but worthy of our respect.  This is just one of the reasons why her many wrecked romances rankle.  I had to remind myself that Shrill isn't a rom com, however much I might want it to be, and that Lindy West's own story didn't exactly wrap with her and some dude riding off into the sunset.  But that's okay.  Because Shrill is about something more important, namely accepting yourself even when -- especially when -- no one else does.  

Along for the Shrill ride are Annie's no-nonsense, Nigerian, gay best friend Fran (Lolly Adefope), on-again-off-again bad news boyfriend Ryan (Luka Jones), narcissistic drama queen boss Gabe (John Cameron Mitchell), laidback but put-upon office husband Amadi (Ian Owens), and kooky coworker Maureen (Joe Firestone), whose Carol Kane energy all but levitates from her manic persona and wild curls.  

Some other stuff to watch for: 

1) Annie's dad, who's played by Daniel Stern, the non-Joe Pesci burglar in Home Alone.  (I knew he looked familiar!) 

2) Portlandia's Fred Armisen and Carrie Brownstein (Season 3).  Armisen cameos as Gabe's long-lost bandmate, and Brownstein directs three episodes.

And that brings us to that tired old thing that people do when they start speeches.  Dictionary.com defines shrill as "betraying some strong emotion or attitude in an exaggerated amount, as antagonism or defensiveness."  And to that I say, betray away. Because emotions aren't meant to be hidden.    

After all, the (quill) pen is mightier than the sword, that early and admittedly questionable line about "jousting for justice" notwithstanding.  

Maybe I should've started with the dictionary bit after all.

Sunday, May 16, 2021

House of Holland: Tulips Take Two, Don't Mind if I Do

Bag: Nordstrom

Polka Dot Posies Barrette Brooch

Dress: Trixxi, Kohl's

Rings: Making Waves, Ocean City; Bow: Carole, JCPenney; Pompom: Target; Scarf: Echo, Macy's; Pink and orange bangles: Mixit, JCPenney; Red bangle: B Fabulous; Yellow bangle: Silver linings, Ocean City

Skirt: LC Lauren Conrad, Kohl's

Shoes: Nine West, Zulily

Daisy Chain Game Necklace

Top: Derek Heart, Macy's

Bag: LC Lauren Conrad, Kohl's

Bag: Betsey Johnson, Amazon

Tropical Blooms Barrette Brooch

Skirt: LC Lauren Conrad, Kohl's

Top: Forever 21

Boots: Apt. 9, Kohl's

Bag: Amazon

Skirt: Joe Benbasset, Kohl's

Ring: Cloud Nine, Ocean City; Headband: Colors, JCPenney; Tropical bangle: Zulily; Folksy bangle: JCPenney

Top: Flying Tomato, Marshalls

April showers bring May flowers.  Except when they bring more April flowers (I see you, tulips and lone daffodil) or spring ahead with a hint of summer (that's you, tiki hut hibiscus).  Not too long ago, in my ongoing ode to the Netherlands, I made a tulip barrette so disappointing that it had me metaphorically reaching for the weed killer instead of a watering can.  In case you forgot, here's what it looks like:   

So I tried again and lucked out with this:


It's exactly the zigzag-topped-tulip triumph I'd pictured!  Hurray for persistent crafting.  

Anyway, it's not just The Tote Trove that's busting out all over.  My yard is abloom with azaleas, rhododendrons, and some unknown flowering tree (despite having lived here for almost four years, this is the first time I noticed it!).  Like spring itself, they won't last long, so I'm happy I had the chance to enjoy them.

Next up, a meditation on crabgrass.