Snow and Icing

I'm going back home to my parents again this weekend.  My sister in law is having a baby shower for her third boy in three and a half years and I'm providing chocolate cupcakes with raspberry filling frosted with 'ice' coloured icing.  The above chart hasn't failed me yet.  My dad and I are rolling out of town early early tomorrow morning and I'm looking forward to snuggling with my sister (who I just saw on Tuesday) and eating my mother's delicious food and cuddling up on the couch with Lucy and Mal the dogs who are good couch cuddlers.  Probably the best.  Especially when our city is blanketed in snow and bitterly cold.  It's going to be a good weekend.

frosting via

Flowers In Your Pocket

 The best thing about my hometown (I use that term broadly, the town I lived in for highschool, the town I lived in alone after college, the town my parents moved back to after I got married) other than the gorgeous mountains, the beautiful farm, food fresh from farmers I know and my family is the Goodwill.  Maybe it's that no one else in the area is interested in beautiful vintage or maybe it's that there are so many old people getting rid of so many beautiful things.  Either way there are some wonderfully luminous things every time I go.  Over the weekend I was home getting a great haircut and  seeing my best friend from high school and my brother and sister and I swung by the Goodwill.  I found these handkerchiefs for 59¢.  I found five that I couldn't live without.

I'm torn between framing them on my wall and using them for the purpose for which they were intended.  Something about having one of these gorgeous flowery fabric squares in my pocket sounds so warming during this cold snap.

Inauguration

 

We didn’t make it to the mall. We didn’t manage to stand in the throngs of people who waved flags and screamed. We did bundle up and head down the side of the Capital and walked miles and miles and tried to get into the mall in several spots but each one was closed as we approached so we ended up walking along with thousands of people talking and cheering Obama and we saw so many full length fur coats we could barely stand it. Sister and I want BIG fur coats. We ended up getting coffees and sitting on the floor in a hotel lobby with other people who couldn’t get into the mall and we hooped and laughed and clapped and lots of people cried when the president spoke of equal pay for equal work, of the rights of immigrants and of climate change, when he spoke about the journey “through Seneca Falls and Selma and Stonewall”.

We were carried home in a sea of people and stopped for a lunch surrounded by other button wearing, flag waving people.  It was an exciting day to be in Washington.
Photo by moi

Merry Friday

This weekend my baby sister and I are going to see the Inauguration. It’s supposed to be freezing cold and there are suppose be a bazillion people there. We don’t have tickets and I actually don’t have a winter coat (hmmm, that sucks) so we are going to bundle up as best we can and throw ourselves into the fray. I’m also sheering off more of my hair than I’m comfortable with and my best friend from high school and her boyfriend and a pizza are meeting me at the salon (she’s getting a pixie, be impressed with her bravery) and spending a blessed night at my parents’ house and giving my baby brother a big hug before he goes back to Philadelphia for school.

What are you up to?

Clothes, Work

After two weeks I am settling into the rhythm of work. Of getting up in dark and taking the metro through the chilly city and of sorting out my desk chair and I’ve almost mastered the right number of layers to wear to be prepared for my chilly office. My boss’ is nice, there is a good happy hour near by and an indian lunch buffet across the street. Here’s the problem: after a year in an athletics department, a year as a nanny and six months of unemployment I have nothing like appropriate work clothes. SO! Time to get cracking. I’ve bought a couple of the tradition J. Crew Number 2 Pencil Skirts but I find myself wishing (generally around 7:30 am when I’m standing in front of my closet feeling very grumpy and cold and sleepy) that I had a lookbook for my particular closet and my particular job. I've been wearing the same basic thing every day.  Maybe it's time to renew my subscriptions to some fashion magazines.

My Work Uniform

J.Crew v neck top / J.Crew merino wool sweater / J.Crew j crew / Old Navy / J.Crew cotton pencil skirt / Wolford black opaque tight / A|X Armani Exchange opaque stocking / Michael Kors tortoise jewelry / Pearl Earrings / Justine Brooks charm pendant (my pinecone isn't this one but I love it so much)

New Years

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from us and ours to you and yours.  Resolutions are being made, new jobs starting.  I like Gretchen Rubin's idea of a one word theme for the year,  what are your resolutions this year?

Home.  On Christmas Eve. In the snow.