Escape...

One thing on my bucket list:  to see the northern lights in all its glory.  Another example of how nature has a way of creating the most spectacular and haunting images sometimes...

And more...

to add to my Fall eye candy list. I love how each item on this site is so thoughtfully and carefully selected. 

Throwback to the 80's

Almost every kid who grew up in the 80s had a sticker collection, and if you didn't, you didn't have much to do during recess when pretty hardcore negotiations were taking place at the lunch tables.  When I was in second grade, I had a puffy sticker album (remember those??) that was quickly populated with the 20 something sticker max, so I hid my plastic bag full of the remaining hundreds of stickers I'd collected over the years deep in my grandma's closet.  I had to make sure no one would ever touch this bag.  I had spent years and years... ok, a year, collecting and negotiating hard for the most coveted stickers out there. 

One day, upon coming home, I discovered that this bag was missing so of course I interrogated everyone in my household.  My grandma finally fessed up and admitted that she threw the bag away, thinking it was trash.  Wha...??!!  My world crumbled into ashes in a matter of a few seconds and I stood there- combination of flabbergasted and steaming mad.  I eventually got over it, but there was definitely hell to pay. 

So I discovered this store on etsy which seriously gave me flashbacks of my old sticker collection: 


Remember oily stickers?  These had to be pretty intensely negotiated for.

And the pretty sparkly glitter stickers:

The prismatic stickers were fun to look at:

And of course you had to have a unicorn sticker in your collection! 

Don't forget the good ol' scratch n' sniffs.  I used to love the popcorn ones, even though they smelled vaguely of fart.

Gad, that makes me feel old..

Holy moly

Ok, I lied.  I'm back.

The following totally blows my mind.  Can you imagine sitting there for several months, chipping away at the tip of a pencil??  Can you also imagine how livid you'd be if, after these several months creating a miniature masterpiece, the entire thing cracks and falls apart with the final scratch??  I would surely go mad and I'll be the first to admit... I def do not have the patience (nor talent) for that, let alone spending even like 30 minutes working on something that small. 


He doesn't even use a magnifying glass.

via Odd Stuff Magazine

Until then...

5 days until I'm out of the office for good... Both excited and a little anxious at the same time.  I'm excited to break away from safety and predictability and excited to follow what's in my heart... Let's see what lies ahead.  I'm taking a break from this new blogging thing to wrap things up on this front.  See you guys next week on the other side!   

3. 2. 1.

So the countdown begins.  Exactly one week plus a few hours left before I hang up my attorney hat and move on.  Three random things I'm looking forward to:

1. Taking the nuggets to farmer's markets during the week and browsing the colorful produce and flowers at a leisurely pace.  And tasting samples.
2. Trying my hand at cooking here and there.  I'm definitely no chef.  In fact, I usually stay far away from the kitchen, but sites like this really strike a chord.  All of a sudden, I have delusions of being the next Ida Gardner.  My husband wishes...
3. Resuscitating that creative gene, which is on its last legs.  

Oh, and of course getting to hang with the two coolest and sweetest little people I know to my heart's content. Can't wait to just relax and fully embrace motherhood for a while.  The two months of bedrest prior to their arrival and the four months with them before I started working again are sort of a blur.  I want to get into a slower rhythm and soak it all in.  As my sister said, once their childhood is gone, it's gone forever.

Love baby bed head






And love gummy smiles



And I'll leave you with a few words from something that really gave me the inspiration and confirmation I've needed over the past few days:

"...you can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life."

Hot

Via Buro 24/7

The little sweater that could

There's this one assistant in our office whose cubicle is located as soon as you turn off the elevator banks.  If i had to choose a word to describe her, it would be sort of granola-y and audubon society-ish.  Ok.  I guess those are three words and not really words, but moving on.  In other words, I'm pretty sure she wouldn't be caught dead leafing through an issue of Vogue or scrolling through what the Fall 2011 trends are on Stylecaster.  Totally no knock on her, but just stating the facts.

So every day, she has this routine of hanging her outerwear on the outside of her cubicle and I pretty much can't help seeing what her daily pick is. 

Introducing Exhibit A:





Excuse the blurry image.  This was taken stealthily as I was walking by.

 


This one makes a frequent appearance on the cubicle.  Paired with her mom jeans and sneakers, it's just sort of meh but after I walk by, I always end up thinking to myself, "that's actually a pretty cute sweater, if only it was paired with blah blah blah..."  Does that make me hypercritical?  Stalkerish?  Too much time on my hands?  Weird?  I'll settle for weird.

Anyway, here are a few combos I had in mind:



This.

 or how about this?

or for more of a work appropriate look, this:

or this:

You get the idea.  I can go on, but I have to finish drafting an amendment.  :(

Freaks and geeks

Don't you like it when things just fit?  Like when I'm sitting at my desk, I find myself arranging things such that the note pads and post it notes are right at the corner of my desk and the 90 degree angles match up.  Or I'll set my drinking glass on one of the circle patterns on a table cloth and feel great satisfaction when it fits exactly.  Stuff like that (am I scaring you now?).  This is total eye candy for all my OCD friends and family out there.

and forget about CGI, special effects, what not.  Nature has a way of creating the most spectacular and haunting images sometimes...





via Sandra Critelli



I know what boys like...

I'm totally not a nail girl.  In fact, after 20 something years of being a hard core classical violinist, I still run to get the nail clippers as soon as I see any white above my fingertips.  Oh, and my cuticles are a mess.  But that aside, I still appreciate a good polish every now and then.  Nevermind that on my bitten down short nails, polish often makes me look like I have the hands of a rocker- a male rocker.  But enough self-deprecation. 

One polish that I've been loving all summer and even still is Deborah Lippmann's "I Know What Boys Like."  It's a pretty cool shade of blue-ish purple.  I've always been wary of periwinkle/lavender shades of polish.  At least on me, they make my hands look corpse like or like they got frost bitten.  Not flattering.  But this shade somehow doesn't have the same effect.  Also, it has a really nice shiny finish, doesn't chip easily and is pretty opaque with a few coats.  I will say it's expensive at $20 a pop, but I don't own many polishes so I fret not.

image via Into the Gloss

Floating on air

Some people are just so random and brilliant.  Like the woman who decided to one day start taking self-portraits of herself looking like she's floating mid air with just a tripod and a self-timer.  Pretty magical stuff.

Sort of a side note:  Pretty impressive how relaxed her face is while she's doing these really strenuous jumps!  My brow would be all furrowed and every tendon in my neck would be sticking out.  And, it's even more impressive that she doesn't look athletic at all!  Ok, starting to go off on a tangent so I'll end it here.

(via Honestly WTF)

Chunky sweaters and funny faces

I love me a chunky Fall sweater.  But at a diminutive 5'2" and 95 lbs, I have to be careful with these things lest I end up looking like this:

Don't get me wrong.  I actually totally dig the Olsen twins' style.  And I think it's especially impressive how they can wear things that you'd think would only look good on tall, lean modelesque types, or not look good at all, period, and make it work.  But uh, me no likee the above.  I'll just leave it at that. 

Here are a few sweaters I wouldn't mind owning right now:

#1


Funktional Cozy Long Cardigan, available here

 

 #2


Tim Hamilton Women's Redux Sweater

 
 #3


Tsumori Chisato Knit Pocket Cardigan, available here

  


#4


Y's Long Hooded Zip Cardigan, available here

 


It's pretty iffy as to whether #1 and #4 would work on a frame like mine, but guess you never know unless you try! 

One thing on my Fall "to buy" list.  I know this bag has been around for a while now, but I really appreciate the simplicity of Clare Vivier's designs.  With the exception of a few bags, I'm not really into broadcasting what I'm wearing, whether it be low end, high end, whatever.  Love that her stuff is still affordable and beautifully made and will pretty much go with everything. 

Clare Vivier Tropezienne Tote

On a separate note, feeding the nuggets solids for the first time was pure hilarity.

Bluh

Not so much

Pure disgust

Why mom?  Why??

No more solids, thank you!

:)