To Mexico We Go

What are your vacation essentials? 

I'm going to Mexico next week (I'M SO EXCITED!!) and in true form, I've already begun to plan my packing list and will likely start packing some time in the next couple days. Too early? Nahh.

These are some of my beach necessities.

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1. A cute, comfortable, well fitting swimsuit is my key to being happy on the beach. (Well, that and the sun...)

2. Cascade Cool, a fun new color by Essie that I'm excited to try.

3. A great sun hat to keep the rays off my face. Wrinkles? No thank you.

4. A good sun block is a no-brainer.

5. A cover up for walking to/from the beach, around town, out to lunch...

6. Last but not least...A great book to pass the time on the beach. I love witty, humorous writing, and Mindy Kaling's musings are next up on my list.

Spoon Flower

I've been working on a final project (yay school's almost over!) for which I have to design an entire apartment. Literally, the ENTIRE thing. I was given a blank floor plan and had to create a kitchen, living room, bedroom, bathroom, etc. After hand drafting the floor and furniture plans for this apartment, I had to choose fabric and textiles to create an inspiration board representing the "style" of the apartment. (Have I lost you yet? That's fine. Just scroll down and look at the pictures.)

For my inspiration, I primarily used the website Spoon Flower. Yeah, random name, I agree. But it's a website full of amazing fabrics.

This first one has an early 1990's vibe to it. This makes me extremely happy. I may not end up using it for my project, but I love it none the less.

The rest of these will likely make it to the inspiration board, along with a slew of others.

That is all.

Cambridge Satchel

Latest obsession: the Cambridge Satchel Company. Based in the UK, they make awesome leather bags that British kids apparently use for school. They come in a huge range of colors, from classic brown and metallic silver to fluorescent pink and bright white.

These are from the Fluro line. (fluro= fluorescent. Nifty, eh?). When I went to buy mine, I wanted one of these. But let me tell you, it is NOT easy to find these babies in New York, and ordering one online would mean massive shipping costs. Maybe. (I don't really know, I didn't look too much into ordering online, I'm more of an instant-gratification type of person.)

When I went to one of the only stores in Manhattan that carries Cambridge Satchels, I saw this one:

And now I own it. MUAHAHA. 

Here are some more of their color options, because they're pretty and you should like them.

You can monogram your bag, which is pretty awesome:

Ok bye.

Starbuck's spells my name wrong

For your amusement.

3 different occasions, 3 different locations. Things that make you go HMM...

D&D

The Decoration and Design Building, across the street from Bloomingdales in New York City, is the mecca of design showrooms. The building is 18 stories high, and houses some of the most important companies' showrooms.

I've always known about the D&D building, but had never been inside. Until today. The elevator banks are unique on each floor, which was a fun surprise.
This was one of my favorites:

The walls are entirely paneled in wood, like a lodge. The only thing missing was a deer head adorning the wall. 

I think I liked it so much because of how unexpected it was.

Most of the upholstery showrooms had student samples (A.K.A. discontinued fabrics that they no longer needed) in big plastic containers. Myself and two friends from school must have gone through at least a dozen of these containers. We started on the 18th floor and worked our way down, so we could explore every floor (none of us had been here prior) and get as many samples as possible. It was a great way to spend the morning, and I think it energized all of us about our impending project.

Another perk of going to the D&D building:

My new pencil collection.

WHAT?! THEY WERE FREE OK!

New Bedding

What's a girl to do after a mild emotional-breakdown due to over-exhaustion from working and going to school and working and doing homework and working?

Buy new bedding, obviously.

These are my new Kate Spade sheets that I splurged on.

I loved the grey, white, and pink geometric pattern the moment I saw it.

The grey polka-dot pillow cases are Royal Velvet.
I couldn't find any coordinating Kate Spade pillow cases, so I searched the store and came up with the dots. Not too shabby, eh?

The duvet cover is one I've had for quite some time. I knew that this sheet set would work well with it, which was one of the driving factors in me purchasing these babies. (Ok fine that's a blatant lie. I would have bought them anyway.)

So a bummy day turned out to be not so bad.

Shopping makes things better. Always. That is a rule of life. You should probably start practicing it...

Bedroom Redo: Update

         
           As you know, I've been in the process of purging my childhood bedroom of all the junk that has taken it over, with the goal of giving it a new life. I've stripped the room of all the built up clutter (mostly), and my design ideas have been morphing constantly.

Last time I wrote, I was consumed with this fantastic removable wallpaper. I still love the concept, but I've moved away from the idea of having it in my room. In fact, my whole vision has been re-imagined. Hopefully (since I've already spent a nice chunk of money) my current vision will hold steady.

My walls are going to be Dove Gray, which has a warm tone and is light in color. I originally wanted a BRIGHT accent wall, but I've given up on that, instead deciding on some other choice pieces, like these:

Marrakech curtains from Anthropologie. They captured my attention the first time I saw them, months ago, and I still adore them.



















I also chose these new knobs for the two closets in my bedroom (also from Anthropologie):

As for my bed, I've chosen this studded headboard from West Elm:

Against the pale grey that will be on the walls, I think the velvet fabric and pewter hardware will look spectacular.
















In addition to these items, I'm planning to have an armchair in a bold pattern as the real piece-de-resistance.
My bedroom is at the end of a straight hallway leading from the living room and front door area back to the rest of the apartment. This means that when my bedroom door is open, you have a clear view into it when you enter the apartment, etc.
I'm taking this into account with choosing the perfect chair, which is why you're not seeing a picture of it yet. It needs to be bold, size appropriate, and unfortunately, under a certain price point. (Oh how sweet it would be to have a $2,000 chair perched under my window...) So for now, no chair to speak of.

I've been taking pictures of my bedroom throughout all its stages of disaster, and at some point you'll get to see the culmination of all my work in a picture-rich before-and-after post. Hopefully it will be sooner rather than later. I do start school again next week though, so I guess we'll have to see how it all plays out. Wish me luck!

Gifted

Let me just start by saying that today is the coldest day we've had in close to a year. 27 degrees. BRRRR!!! It's strange to have made it this far into winter without being legitimately cold even once. And now...after new years eve (which is usually bone chillingly cold since obviously I don't dress weather-appropriatly) it's cold? Well all right. I suppose I know where my long-johns are.

Ok. Let's get on with it, now that my ranting about the weather is done.

Happy New Year! Happy Chanukah! Merry Christmas!

Did you get any good gifts this year? Give any good gifts? I sure did.

BF, being the fantastic BF that he is, reads my blog regularly (by choice, generally) and read my post about Christmas gifts. (As a side-note, I may add, I considered deleting that post because it felt so self indulgent. Boy am I glad I didn't!) So, what did he get me, you ask? Well, this:

The Michael Kors watch I've been coveting for as long as it's existed! (Don't mind the stuff in the background, that's my bedroom, still in the makeover process. Which I should be documenting, I suppose...) I was so happy and surprised and excited when I opened this gift. BF did good. BF did really good.

In addition to this watch, I got something else that I've been adoring from afar for as long as it's existed:

The most beautiful Marc Jacobs bag that ever did exist. I am in love with it. Mom did good too. REALLY good.





Now, as for the things I gave:

BF got these sneakers (and not a moment too soon...his old ones were so so bad) along with some other assorted goodies.


And for my Mom, my Dad and I split this fantastic Barbour coat. She had one years ago and loved it, but along the road of life it got lost in the shuffle. She is notoriously difficult to buy gifts for, (she never likes anything) so this one was excitingly perfect. There was no way she wouldn't like it.
And mostly that proved true, although she was a bit bothered by how much money we spent.

But alas, she loves it. Overall, the holiday's were good to us all this year.

As I part with you today, I'll leave you with this: Our jewy little Christmas tree:

Going Home Again

After much deliberation and many indecisive moments, I have decided to move back in with my parents. This was not an easy decision, and I am extremely apprehensive about it, but as of right now, logically speaking...it seems to be my best option.

I have not lived with my parents steadily since high school. Sure, there were a couple of years after high school when I was going to college and living at home, but I was always spending time elsewhere. There were summer vacations spent here, there were intermittent periods of unloading all my belongings just to pack up again and leave.

Comings-and-goings of that nature, I have found, amount in an excess of...stuff. Years and years worth of junk. I would post some pictures of the clutter...but it looks like a hoarder has been living there. My bedroom was demoted to a storage closet about two years ago, amassing not just my junk, but my family's junk as well.

My mission for the past couple weeks, which will span into as many weeks as necessary, is to get rid of EVERYTHING that hasn't been touched in over a year. So far I've parted with three garbage bags full of clothes (2 closets and 2 dressers, and I still can't fit everything I own? Give me a break.) One bag of shoes, three bags of things stuff for the trash, one bag of books...And I'm maybe halfway through the trenches.

BUT!! There is a light at the end of the tunnel, and it is this:

Tempaper is a company that makes removable wallpaper. It's similar to a contact paper, made of vinyl, and goes on as a decal.










The wall behind my bed is flanked by 2 closets, making it a perfect candidate for some snazzing-up. I've chosen the Honey Jade Marrakesh pattern, and am yet to choose a wall color to go with it.

I want to avoid a Moroccan theme, so I plan to keep the rest of the room pretty neutral (Orange? Purple? No thanks.) I'll update as the project progresses. Heres hoping it goes well!

Holiday Gift Buying

Well, it's about that time again. Thanksgiving is a few days away (delicious) and then come the other holidays. The present giving holidays. The ones where you bestow beautiful gifts on the people you love, all in the hopes of putting a smile on their face and giving them something new and wonderful to use/wear/play with/love.

What could be better, you ask? Well, apparently when you're me, going shopping for yourself is better than shopping for other people.
Now hold on before you go getting all judgy on me.

Every November, (ie: the beginning of the cold season, ie: no more summer clothes, ie: WHAT AM I GOING TO WEAR?!) All the stores go into holiday mode with ridiculous sales. 30% off my entire purchase? Yes, I will be buying that sweater, a pair of pants, scarf, and ohh look at those necklaces!

November feels far too early to do any holiday gift shopping. Perhaps that's the procrastinator in me, but until December rolls around, I can't seem to equate shopping with buying gifts for people. So I end up going into stores, lured in by their sales (you tricky marketing people, you!), rationalizing (as I mentioned before) that I need new winter clothes, and spending money. On myself. Am I the only one who falls into this trap? I can't possibly be. Or maybe I just suck at not shopping. hmm...

Now, don't get me wrong, I certainly do love buying gifts for people, especially when I think it's the PERFECT gift and know they'll adore it. But...until December rolls around...

So with that in mind, here are some things I've been coveting:

This fabulous Jcrew sweater with pink sequins. Practical? No. Affordable? No. Beautiful and fun and perfect and I want to own it? Yes.

Really now. A sweater that sparkles.






Can you ever really have enough plaid shirts? I mean, if I'm going to potentially possibly maybe ever live on a farm, I need to stock up. 8 is not enough. I need 9. actually, theres a blue one similar to this that I probably need also, if we're being realistic...

This watch. Now, I already have a really awesome Marc Jacobs watch, so I'm having a rough time figuring out a justification for this one, but boy is she perty. 

Confetti Ornaments. I LOVE CONFETTI! wait a minute...perhaps this could be a gift to give someone else! Aha! 

Anyway, I suppose my point in all of this is...well, i'm not sure I have a point. But shopping has been on my mind, and I've felt (mildly) selfish for only wanting to shop for myself...so I figured...I should probably write about it.

In other news, (AKA: why I haven't been blogging very often) I've been getting A's on all my school assignments. woo-hoo!

30 by 30

30 by 30. A list of 30 things to accomplish by the age of 30. I have 5 years to go.

In no particular order, I present my list:

1. Leave New York

2. Graduate College

3. Earn a Masters Degree

4. Run a half marathon

5. Go to Asia

6. Go to Australia

7. Buy a car

8. Ride an elephant

9. Drive cross-country

10. Cut my hair short

11. Go to Mardi Gras

12. Own a bicycle and ride it often

13. Start my career in interior design and NEVER WORK IN A RESTAURANT AGAIN

14. Be a vegetarian for 3 months

15. Get Married

16. Support myself financially

17. Live in a house

18. Keep up with friendships

19. Buy a Louis Vuitton bag

20. See the pyramids in Egypt

21. Visit Berlin

22. Settle into a home I love

23. Pay off all my credit card bills and achieve good credit!

24. Save $5,000

25. Enjoy yoga

26. Learn how to use a camera. properly.

27. Be proud of myself

28. Be a good daughter

29. Spend all the time with my family that I can

30. Be happy with who I am

So there you have it. Some of them are more important to me than others, but all of them are things that I want (or wanted and achieved). Perhaps my list will change as time goes by, perhaps not. But as it stands right now, this is my list. And if you happen to have the means to help me achieve any of these...DO IT! TAKE ME TO GERMANY! TEACH ME TO USE A CAMERA! ENLIGHTEN ME ON THE ART OF YOGA!!! 

The State of Things

This is my drafting table. That is a floor plan and reflected ceiling plan of my classroom. 

This is my desk. Those are watercolors and a color-matching project.

These (and my crap job) are the reasons why my blogging has become so intermittent. But it's a means to an end. And...pretty enjoyable, for the most part, so I really have no complaints. That is, aside from the lack of free time. And sleep. But those come with the territory.

Sometime soon I'll write about my whacked-out professor who doesn't actually teach us how to do anything, just sort of explains what each project is in the most confusing way possible. It's as if he sits at home contemplating how he can make as little sense as possible. He also sort of resembles a hobo. I'll try to snap a pic of him tomorrow tonight. It will enhance everything else I write about him.

Till then...

Inspired By:

I find inspiration for my style from almost everything I come in contact with. The most tangible and easily accessible way for me to reinterpret this inspiration is through clothing. It would be fantastic if I were also able to apply my ideas to the space I live in, but unfortunately it's just not feasible. (ie: furniture etc. is expensive, thrift store finds risk beg-bugs in NYC, I'm not the only one living here, and there's the small issue of the 5 story walk-up.)

So for the time being, I stick to clothes.

I just attended an awesome Housing Works event called Buy the Bag, to which I was invited by NLP (one of my friends and old Managers from The Palm). Housing Works, apparently, has a warehouse full of donated clothing that never has a chance to make it to one of their brick and mortar locations. So, for this aptly named event, you go into the warehouse, rifle though thousands of items of clothing in what is similar to a sample sale on crack, fill up as many of the provided paper bags as you wish, and then buy the bags. Each bag cost $25, and I walked with two of them, stuffed to the brim with label and non-label clothing.

My favorite item, albeit slightly difficult to find a wearable purpose for, is this amazing sweater:

Sure, it's a little juvenile/ christmas-esque/ welcome to the 80's, but I love everything about it. From the sparkly bows, to the princess shoulders, it is perfect. Actually, I almost put this gem back because of it's impracticality, but NLP encouraged me to take it. Good call, NLP, good call.

Another great find were a pair of flared Citizens of Humanity jeans that I also have on in that sweater photo, although you can't see very much of them. I love the jeans, but I've been having a hard time figuring out how to wear them in a casual outfit. I haven't purchased a pair of bell bottom jeans since...let's see...my first year of college, seven years ago. I think it's safe to say that my style aesthetic has evolved since then, as has fashion itself (Skinny jeans?). So, not wanting to look like a high school version of myself, I needed a little inspiration on how to wear these. But where to find it? 

I was perusing What I Wore this morning, and came across this fantastically wearable outfit:

YAHOO! I'm not intimidated by these jeans anymore! And I'm also not in high school! I can totally reproduce this outfit in a way that is my own, and I am muy excited about it. I don't love every little thing about the look, but it feels accessible and, overall, looks good. Mission accomplished.

Now I just need to figure out a way to wear that sweater...

Project I

Last week I began my classes at Fashion Institute of Technology, a.k.a FIT. I'm taking three classes: Drafting, Survey of Interior Design, and Presentation Techniques.

In drafting class, we're learning about what life was like before the invention of a lovely little thing called autoCAD, which is a computer program that assists in creating floor plans, layouts and such. In other words, I am learning how to hand-draft.

Here's my almost finished first project:

To create this, I used vellum, a drafting board, architectural scale, T-square, circular template, lead holder, drafting tape, a steady hand and a LOT of patience.
No idea what any of those things are? Yeah, neither did I until last week.
I still have a couple of squares left to finish, but so far so good.


In other news, it's been raining for three days straight, and the subways are still in service. Maybe...if we give this week of rain a name...Bloomberg will shut everything down again. After Irene we'd be on J, so let's go with...Joan. HEY BLOOMBERG, JOAN IS HERE! LET'S SHUT DOWN THE CITY SO NO ONE GETS WET!

Chocolate Chip Cookies

As you may or not not know, and as I may or may not have previously mentioned, I detest chocolate. For my entire life, (my mother can attest to this, as can many other people) I have been entirely grossed out by all things chocolate. Sugar cookies that shared the same box as chocolate chip cookies? Sorry, not eating them. The flavor and smell of the chocolate rubs off onto anything it touches. A smudge of chocolate frosting on my vanilla-vanilla cupcake? You must be kidding.

My point in telling you all of that is this: today, for the first time in my life, I baked chocolate chip cookies. That's right. I BAKED CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIES and hell did not frozen over. Woah.

Before he left for work today, I told BF I wanted to bake cookies and asked him what kind he wanted. He countered that I wouldn't want to make the cookies he wanted, I assured him I would. So he left to go to work, and two grocery stores later, (the first one was out of flour.) I had my ingredients to make chewy chocolate chip cookies. I followed the recipe exactly, braving the chocolate-ness of the whole thing, and here are the the resulting cookies:

I must say, it was not the worst experience. And if I liked chocolate chip cookies, I'd think these look pretty damn good. Of course, I don't know how they taste, but I'm clearly assuming they're delicious.
Here is the recipe I used.

BF isn't home from work yet, but when he tastes them, I'll add an update on what my first chocolate chip cookies taste like.

Are YOU Pinterested?

Happy Summer.

Here's a list of things that have happened since I last wrote. They are in no specific order aside from the order in which they pop into my head:

1. I cut my hair. For the past 13ish years, I've had long hair down to the middle of my back. I've had different versions of bangs and layers, but the length was always, for the most part, the same. Last week, i went into a hair salon and had it chopped off. It now sits right above my shoulders and grazes the bottom of my neck. I also got it highlighted, but that's less of a drastic change than the haircut.

2. I turned 25. I'm not going to get into this one, because to do that would lead to a diatribe of the pro's and con's of being old. (I know, I'm not old. But in my defense, this is oldest I've ever been, so CUT ME SOME SLACK.)

3. I sprained my ankle. I have absolutely no clue how it happened, but if you've ever injured an ankle/foot/leg and you are an athlete/athletic/enjoy running, you feel my pain on this one, literally and figuratively. I haven't gone running in over 3 weeks and it is not fun to be so stagnant. It makes me feel gross.

4. The last Harry Potter movie came out. I laughed, I cried, Voldemort died. Let's leave it at that.

5. BF and I celebrated our 6 month anniversary. We went out for an impromptu dinner (we didn't realize until half way through the day that it was our anniversary) and the hostess took the WORST photo of us and put it in a little paper frame. It was actually a very sweet gesture, aside from us looking sweaty and, honestly, pretty shitty. The food was great though!

6. It is summer and I am tan. Mission accomplished.

7. Ah yes, getting to the title of this post. MM (my friend who lives in L.A. because she's too cool for the rest of us) introduced me to the website Pinterest. It is a virtual pin board "that let's you organize and share all the beautiful things you find on the web." See something, pin it, choose which of your categorized boards you want it in, give it a title, and boom. you've pinned something you love to your virtual pinboard. I am OBSESSED with this website, so much so that I was excited to get home from work yesterday to pin things. You can also "re-pin" other members' pins. See something of theirs you like, re-pin it onto your board. It's really a genius idea.

Check out my Pinterest page. If you like it, make your own, and we can be pinnies. (That's the name I made up for my pinterest friends. I only have one friend right now...maybe it's because people sense that I want to refer to them as pinnies...)

This deliciously glittery cupcake is one of the pictures I have pinned in my 'food is food' category.

I've also got a 'Randoms' category. This little pink and gold pony came from that one.

He sort of looks like a pink eraser dipped in gold paint, no?

The more time I spend looking around on Pinterest, the more awesome websites and blogs I stumble upon. It really is worth checking out.


8. Um...I think I'll wrap it up for now. Until next time...

What happens in the Hampton's...

...is this:

and this.

That is a man holding a cat on the beach, followed by a giant beaver chillin at the bar we were at. No big deal, just an average day in the life of LUNATICS.