A Gamble on Glam and a Line in the Sand: Painting the Desert Pink

Blouse: Amazon

Flirt on My Boots Necklace

Bag: Amazon

Headband: Macy's

Shoes: First Love by Penny Loves Kenny, JCPenney

Jacket: bebe, Macy's Backstage

Bag: Nine West, Kohl's

Hair clip: Wild Fable, Target

Poker chips: Michaels

Big necklace: H&M; Other necklace: Nine West, Kohl's

Top: Kingston Grey, Macy's; Ace of hearts pillow: Michaels

Saguaro Squared Necklace

Sweater: Mudd, Kohl's

Quartz of the Cactus Necklace

Skirt: Candie's, Kohl's

Bow: Art Class, Target

Bags: First two: Arizona Jeans, JCPenney; Last one: T-Shirt & Jeans, Kohl's

Winsome Dove Necklace

Just kidding.  Glam is never a gamble, and I'll never draw a line in the sand when it comes to a desert motif.

So in the tradition of the laconic cowboy (and Forrest Gump), that's all I have to say about that.

Mixed Media Madness and Serpent Time Sadness

Shoes: Nine West, Kohl's

Dress: Betsey Johnson, Macy's

Duster: New York & Company

Rhyolite Delight Necklace

Flower barrettes: Capelli, ULTA

Bag: Current Mood, Dolls Kill

Shoes: LC Lauren Conrad, Kohl's

Bag: LC Lauren Conrad, Kohl's

Eye of the Tiger Eye Necklace

Dress: LC Lauren Conrad, Kohl's

Shoes: Chase & Chloe, Zulily

Bag: Circus by Sam Edelman, Kohl's; Charm: Staples

Top: Worthington, JCPenney

Jasper Rapture Necklace

Sparkly and skinny bangles: Target; Wavy bangle: Mixit, JCPenney; Stretch bracelet: Amrita Singh, Zulily

Headband: Candie's, Kohl's

When I found a bunch of semi-precious gem beads on sale at Michaels (jasper and rhyolite and tiger's eye, oh my!), I instantly knew that I wanted to embellish their mined-from-the-earth natural beauty with a rainbow of manmade kawaii cabochons.   

And I'm so glad I did, because it was tons of fun!  I love the contrast of the bright plastic against the muted stones and am already planning new designs.  What's more, I sold the fruit one (Rhyolite Delight) just hours after listing it!

Now for the not-so-sweet part of our program.  Over the weekend, the husband informed me that he saw "a creature with no legs" in our backyard, then in our front yard wrapped around the small Christmas tree shrub on our walkway.  Yes, friends, it was a snake!  A big black one.  Now, I probably don't have to tell you that I abhor these slithering reptiles.  I can kill a spider no problem, but anything sans limbs gives me the willies.  I even refused to look at the pictures the husband took, not wanting to risk nightmares.  The husband, on the other hand, is, ahem, charmed by serpents.  To my horror, he stood observing this one from the dining room window while snacking on dates, insisting that it "had a cute nose."  (I was facing the opposite wall.)  He even went as far as to name it Lieutenant Dan, on account of the whole no legs thing.  

Needless to say, that's why two of these three outfit pics were taken inside.  (You may recall that the mini Christmas tree is one of my favorite photo op spots.)  I haven't even gotten the mail since the sighting and have been super careful getting into the car (which is thankfully parked in the backyard) the few times I've left the house.  For his part, the husband has been keeping tabs on Lieutenant Dan and recently reported that he saw it in the tree two days in a row but not since.   

Until now.  Just minutes ago, the husband announced that the suspect has shed its skin in front of that fateful tree.  Which means that it's probably taken up residence under the black plastic mulch tarp behind it in the hedge -- and is, gulp, growing.

I've never needed a reason to stay indoors, but this just may push me over the edge into true shut-in status.  Summertime sadness indeed! 

It's a good thing I got those craft supplies . . .

Exchange Rate Fate, Fresh Clean Slate: The Price of Peace of Kind

When the movie version of Pay It Forward came out in 2000, it looked like something serious I didn't want to see.  The other thing I remember is that it starred the kid from Forrest Gump and The Sixth Sense (Haley Joel Osment).  I didn't even know that it started out as a book until earlier this year, when I read Love & Other Words.  The two kids in it had bonded over Catherine Ryan Hyde's heartbreaking novel.  Which made me curious, as I sometimes enjoy having my heart broken too.  So when I started to read it, I thought, okay, I get it. It's about a sweet, naïve kid who thinks people are good, but life keeps proving him wrong.  

Twelve-year-old Trevor McKinney hasn't had it easy.  He has no idea where his dad is, and his mom is a recovering alcoholic.  Yet despite this, he believes that people can change.  So when his closed-off yet kind social studies teacher, Mr. St. Clair, assigns the class an extra credit project posing the question: How would you change the world?, Trevor comes up with this: What if one person helped three people, and then each of those people helped three more people, and so on?  Soon everyone would be helping one another, and bad things would stop happening.  Trever calls it Pay It Forward -- and all of his classmates laugh.  But Trevor remains undeterred, giving one hundred dollars of his paper route money to a homeless man.  As Trevor's project progresses, there are ups and downs -- mostly downs.  Especially because one of his goals is to help Mr. St. Clair, an erudite Black Vietnam vet missing an eye, and his mom, a beautiful woman insecure about her lack of education, fall in love and get married.  (Here I must pause to interject my reaction to the movie, which I watched after finishing the book: How could Trevor's teacher be a white guy with two eyes?  And how could that guy be Kevin Spacey?!)  At first, the story is a little hard to follow because it's interspersed with interview excerpts from the future.  Yet eventually I realized that they're there to show how the Pay It Forward project -- or movement, as it came to be called -- gained traction.  I sensed that if I stuck it out, then it would, ahem, pay off in the end.  And it turned out that I was right.

Poignant and stirring, Pay It Forward shows that we're all vulnerable to the whims of the world, and that our only defense against it is decency.  It also shows that we're all connected, and that even the smallest kindnesses can add up to make a big difference.  That it does so by making the ultimate sacrifice to help humankind is unsettling.  But this is the way that it has to be to deliver the book's moving message.

On that note, my copy of the book is the fifteenth anniversary edition and includes a new introduction by Hyde.  In it she explains how she got the idea for the book.  One night when she was in her twenties, she was driving through her not-great neighborhood when her car began to smoke.  So she pulled over.  This was before cell phones, so she couldn't call anyone.  That's when she saw two men approaching her car.  This is it, she thought.  This is how I die.  But to her surprise, they popped the hood and helped her.  By the time the fire truck arrived (because where there's smoke, there's fire), they had gone without a word.  Hyde felt bad about that.  If they had exchanged contact information, then she could've thanked them properly, even sent them Christmas cards every year.  But her inability to do that, coupled with these Good Samaritans' anonymity, made her wonder, what if?  What if a stranger did something nice for you, and you had no way to thank him except for doing something nice for someone else?

It makes you wonder.  And just maybe believe in the miracle of the human spirit.

Except when it comes to Kevin Spacey.

Be Mine to the Nines: One Enchanted Eating

A frilly, heart-shaped box of chocolates is like a girl gussied up for the prom.  So in other words, a bundle of nerves and expectations wrapped in ribbons.  (Did I mention that this particular prom takes place in the '50s?)  Will the quarterback ask Susie Q. to dance?  Or is she doomed to have her satin pumps stomped on by the hall monitor?  It's a gamble, and that box of chocolates, as Forrest so wisely told us, is no different.  Sometimes you score a strawberry center; other times you get stuck with a maple.

That said, here's my collection of Valentine's candy boxes.  I've shown off most of them over the years but thought it'd be fun to photograph them together.  They store accessories and serve as décor in my closet.  Which means that whenever I reach for a ring or brooch, I think of happy times and sweet treats.  Both of which are tastier than quarterbacks.

But never running backs named Forrest.

Wardrobe Woes and Close Call Clothes: Yarns That Pull at the Heartstrings

We all know that clothes tell a story.  And that there are pieces we always hold on to.  So I was intrigued when I found Emily Spivack's Worn Stories during a routine Zulily browse.  From the very first page, I knew that it was no rose-colored, mall-montage reminiscence.  Although, I should have figured that out from its dark pun title and hole-scarred sweater cover.  The garments of the real-life people in Spivack's anthology tell tales of hard-won survival.  There's the man who kept the blood-stained shirt he was wearing when he got shot, the woman who survived the Holocaust and then had a suit made from the last bolt of tweed from her parents' shop, and the woman who couldn't part with the Harvard Medical sweatshirt that an otherwise terse doc gave her to keep warm when her mother was dying.  

These clothes aren't cute or glamorous; some of them are downright ugly.  But I get what's going on here, and it makes me think of the way I still have my brown corduroy coat and how, subconsciously or otherwise, I brought it with me when I got my first COVID shot.  It also makes me think about (albeit more attractive) clothes that marked other challenging times.  Like the polka dot Express skirt I wore on my first day of college when I fainted while reading The Bell Jar.  A female janitor rushed over (I was having breakfast in the student center) to see if I was okay.  I said that I was fine, that sometimes I passed out when I read about blood.  I don't have that skirt anymore, though.  It didn't seem like something I should hold on to.  

Writing is so weird.  When I sat down to blog about this book, I had no idea that that would come out.  But it makes sense.  Because however unpleasant it is to read others' "worn stories," I can't deny that they help me process my own.  

That said, this book also has a sprinkling of lighthearted anecdotes.  Like this one about a guy scoring a pink squirrel sweater:

"When I found this sweater at a junk shop in England, I was drawn to it, not just because I was an outcast kid growing up in Colorado who had squirrels as friends but, more importantly, because the brand was Avocado.  See, in my youth I was a peddler of avocados.  My grandfather was in the produce business in downtown Los Angeles, and in the summers of my younger teenage years, I'd work for him." 89

This storyteller (yeller?) is Dustin Yellin, a "Brooklyn-based artist and the founder of Pioneer Works, Center for Art and Innovation."  Not that I've heard of him, but he sounds cool and, anyway, maybe you have.

That said, may all of your ragged old tees and jeans empower and/or comfort you as much as this motley mix of apparel has empowered and/or comforted the souls in Worn Stories.  Which is to say, when you catch a stranger staring at the Florida-shaped stain on your poncho, laugh and go full Forrest Gump-slash-American Pie and say, "This one time when I was in Tampa . . ."

They'll either listen or they won't.  But either way you'll have a new story.  

And maybe a new stain on your poncho.

V is for Vendetta . . . and Also Valentine's Day

Hopefully, you're not in a vendetta with your special someone.  Hopefully, you're headed out for a night on the town or, if that's not your thing, then cozying up for a quiet night in.  Even if you're not coupled up, I wish you no Hatfield vs. McCoy-style feuds whatsoever.  Because V-Day should come with all the peace of devouring chocolate on a cloud of pink couch or comforter.  (Not that your couch or bed can't be blue or green or gray.  But I'm trying to paint a picture here.)  That said, I had to kiss a real frog of a chore before tearing into my own treats today.  This afternoon, the husband and I went to the dermatologist for our annual skin scans.  Because nothing says romance like disrobing in front of strangers.  Not that we have any real epidermis issues; we go because it's always good to be one step ahead of Mad Man Melanoma.

Thankfully, our Valentine's Day isn't all lab coats and copays (partly because we don't have a copay, but rather a deductible).  We're going out to dinner later this weekend, which is a long one courtesy of those wig heads Washington and Lincoln.  (Yes, I know only Washington had a wig.  But Lincoln had that beard, which was pretty gnarly and has to count for something.)  Afterwards, I'm looking forward to a choice chocolate chaser.  Because Valentine's Day is the candy holiday.  Wait, what's that you say?  The candy holiday is Halloween?  Or, on a good year, even Easter?  Well . . . maybe.  If you're into Baby Ruths and bipedal bunnies.  But only V-Day has pink and red foil wrappers and cherry and strawberry filling and heart-shaped Russell Stover boxes full of Forrest Gump flavors.

Because that's life in a (hazel) nutshell: diving in without checking the cheat sheet.  Or the nutrition facts.  Nutrition facts are the worst, the Flag Day of facts.  Nothing against flags.  But they don't give you gifts or sugar or a day off.

So, have a happy un-Flag Day.  May you do -- and eat -- all the things that you heart.  And all the things that heart you.

A (Different Kind of) Christmas Story

 Fabulous Felt Christmas Pudding Barrette

Turtleneck: Wild Fable, Target

Sweater: Arizona Jeans, JCPenney

Skirt: Kohl's

Shoes: Ami Clubwear

Bag: Macy's

Belt: Apt. 9, Kohl's

 Fabulous Felt Christmas Gelatin Mold Barrette

Dress: Xhilaration, Target

Shoes: Delicious, Zulily

Bag: Macy's

Belt: Belt is Cool, Amazon

Bangles: B Fabulous

Ring: Making Waves

Lime stretch bracelet: Cloud Nine

Kelly stretch bracelet: Parade of Shoes

This post doesn't have a tongue stuck to a pole, a bunny suit, or a fishnet-clad leg lamp.  But it does have Christmas desserts made of felt (full of fiber and hands down the healthiest part of your holiday meal!) and a strange ornament from Christmas past.  

I made this ornament back in grade school.  I think it was for the tree in the school lobby or something.  Anyway, my mom found it in her ornament box while decorating her tree and told me I should have it.  (Okay, she plucked it off the back of her tree from land-of-misfit-toy-territory and said, "Take this.")  I had mixed feelings.  Although it was nice to see Greta again (she didn't have a name back then, but I think she's earned it now), I was also saddened by her bedraggled appearance.  Clearly, the attic had not been kind; the Greta I remembered was a bright-eyed kid full of holiday hope and wonder.  Now she looked like an old refuge who'd taken a tumble off a Douglas fir.  I had to do something.  So I brought her to makeover central, a.k.a. the craft room.  First, I cut off her weird, noose-like wire ornament hanger.  'Cause if that's not a metaphor for lost causes, then I don't know what is.  Greta could stand proudly on one of my shelves or tables; no more hanging from Douglas firs (or prelit faux pine Home Depot floor models that tip slightly forward) for her.  I didn't have any kelly green ribbon to replace the faded and fraying bows securing her braids, so I made do with some moss-colored satin.  I glued on fresh cotton balls to upgrade her to marvelous marshmallow status, then added rhinestones, sequins, and miniature pompoms for that homespun, church bazaar feel.  Is she perfect?  Hail no.  She looks like a reject from the Trans-Siberian Orchestra or maybe a Russian majorette.  (Not that there's anything wrong with Russian majorettes; they're just not very Christmassy.)  But she's my majorette, and I'm happy to have her home for the holidays where she belongs.          

It just goes to show that a box of ornaments is like a box of chocolates -- you never know what you're going to get.  I hope that you too are reliving happy memories and making new ones with the people -- and creepy keepsakes -- you love.

Merry Christmas!

I Had Walked Nearly Five Miles (Or Something Like That)

And I could not walk just one more!  That was the song (or at least it was a version of that Proclaimers song popularized by Benny and Joon) playing in my head the day I took these pictures.  You see, the day before Christmas Eve I decided to take a walk on the beach.  The sun was bright and the air was less cold than one would expect on December 23, and I though it was a good time to do some thinking and sneak in some exercise.  So, when I reached my usual quitting point I kept going.  I passed a man with a kite and some people with dogs, and it being Brigantine, some people in trucks passed me.  I saw the Emerald City of casinos glinting in the distance and couldn't help but wonder how long it would take to reach them.  Not unlike our friend Forrest, I figured that I'd walked this far, so why not walk some more?
 

An hour or so later I slid onto the cool, smooth seat of the jetty that borders the water barricading the Revel.  It was strange seeing that (to me) unexplored stretch of beach up close and personal, and I spent a  few minutes taking some pictures and taking it all in.

And then it was time to turn back.

I took my time on the return journey, stopping to collect seashells, both in celebration and in deference to my protesting legs.

Then, once back on concrete land, I came upon this less picturesque but nonetheless much-loved Brigantine landmark:

Naturally, once back at home base I made a necklace from the seashells I'd gathered.

I call it the Mermaid Magic Necklace, and Tammy, minx that she is, models it here in her Venus swimsuit.  "That's one must-have mollusk," the fiance said as he was passing through.

I can only hope he was talking about the necklace.