Do any of these strike your fancy?
Well they are all going to lucky winners next week. To enter visit:
As Good As Cake Giveaways and Reviews
and
Style Key West
Aaaand…go!
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ELSEWHERE:
On DC Metro Moms…
My dread of repeating Kindergarten, etc.
Did you know it was my birthday?
I’ve been more or less offline for a couple of days – but I did post a GREAT giveaway on the Style Key West blog today. And I have another on Wishing True. AND I’ll have ANOTHER tomorrow on As Good As Cake.
I’ll be back tomorrow with details – I’m off to a party!
…and first grade…and second grade…and high school…
Today, I visited the school that my five year old will be attending in the Fall when he starts Kindergarten. And as I observed the excitement of the children with their little can’t-be-still -for-more-than-five seconds bodies, their colorful art projects adorning the walls and the competent teacher running the show, I was struck by one very powerful memory. I really hated school.
Okay – hate is a strong word. And I did enjoy certain aspects of school…but the tedious work of studying, memorizing and sitting for hours on end? I was never a fan. And while I suppose Kindergarten was kind of a cake walk, looking back, I can see how it foreshadowed the pressure and responsibility of the higher grades and higher education.
To this day, my math skills are pathetic. All of those hours with the algebra tutor? Wasted! I can barely remember how to multiply fractions. And while I always loved reading and plowed through far more of the Summer reading list than was actually required, I dreaded writing the reports. Memorizing definitions for tests? Pure torture.
So while I sat there listening to a story about Frog and Toad and their garden and then watched the kids puzzle out the answers to various questions regarding plot, their bright shiny faces began to blur. While they were jumping out of their seats to scream “seeds!” “soil!” and “water!” – I was thinking “blood!” “sweat!” and “tears!“
School for me was a grind. It was a necessary evil and at best, an excellent way to meet friends and learn how to French braid hair. I got good grades in the subjects I liked and mediocre grades in the ones I didn’t, and I lived for the Summer when my time was finally my own again.
As much as I am thrilled that my kids will be starting school and beginning to learn how to navigate the world outside of our cul de sac, I’m also dreading all of that homework to be monitored. I didn’t enjoy doing my own. I seriously doubt that I’ll like doing my children’s science fair projects for them.
But then there is another part of me that thinks a Social Studies text book is just what I need. After forgetting about 80% of what I learned in school, it might be a good idea to have some refreshers on world explorers (what did Ponce de Leon do again?), North American Indian tribes, and the states’ capitals (I’m always stumped by Bismark). It might improve my cocktail party small talk – you’d be surprised how often cuneiform comes up as a topic. Seriously though – I’m often shocked by the things that I really should know, but just don’t remember. So quizzing my children on the difference between a genus and a species may not be such a bad thing.
But all of those years… I look at the Kindergartners and think, “this is just the beginning…armed felons get shorter prison sentences…” So no, I don’t have any desire to go back. I really didn’t hate school – but man, I’m SO glad it’s over.
You often hear people talk about children keeping us young. That we relive our own youth in watching theirs. And that works for me as far as the tree climbing and tea parties go – but I’ll happily skip the P.E. class indignities thank you very much.
Next up: sitting around watching little league games! Damn kids, with their contagious youth.
No matter how my style and design tastes evolve, I will ALWAYS love me some blue and white girly beds!
Here is my coordinating outfit.
And now I want to climb in and sleep for a year. Close the blinds please.
Images from Cologne & Cotton.
My friend and fabulous designer, Kathlin Argiro just forwarded me information on an amazing new fashion program for teens! It gives them a peek behind the runway as well as an opportunity to meet and be mentored by industry leaders.
Fashionista Prep offers “hands on” fashion experience through programs and classes taught by fashion experts, including nationally known designers and P.R. gurus. The program is offered to junior high through college-aged students, “leaving no Fashionista behind.”
With unforgettable experiences – only made possible by industry insiders – students will learn things that they never imagined possible and emerge with the edge they need to make it in uber-competitive world of Fashion.
Here is a look at some first hand experience (SO cute!)
Fashionista Prep Goes to Fashion Week from Kathlin Argiro.
For more information visit the Fashionista Prep site or e-mail info@FashionistaPrep.com. (For a quick view of upcoming class dates and details AND a chance to win a free class, click HERE)
I came across this linens shop website recently (sadly I can’t remember where I saw it…) and I wish it was in DC instead of Kansas City.
Shayn Blond, has a wonderful eye. Her selection ranges from traditional to whimsical, but never strays from her obvious good taste. Apparently she is a bit of an expert on fine china, crystal and silver (these are a few of my FAVorite things…la-la-la-la…). Which is clear to me from the styling of her website images.
Love these. (See the Imari plate in the first one? That was almost my china pattern!)
View more HERE.
I love these images from UK interior stylist, Katie Sellers:
Discovered on Brabourne Farm (of course).
I haven’t been writing that much lately. And it’s largely due to the fact that I’m so fully immersed in life and plans and worries and even kind of enjoying myself right now – that when I do have a free moment at the computer, I feel like I have nothing to say.
And how is this possible? Oliver is starting Kindergarten next year and I’m looking down the barrel of a new IEP. AND I’ve done the unthinkable and taken responsibility for initiating sports activities for him. (This, from the girl who would willingly be the first one out in dodge ball just so she didn’t have to play.) Even if I didn’t think he’d spend the entire time rolling in dirt, it would be a bitter pill to swallow.
The emotional roller coaster involved in everything having to do with that little boy could give me a book’s worth of material – both funny and sad. Yet when I start to write about any of it, my head flops down in exhaustion at the idea of actually hitting keys and making this more real than it already is. I’m a realist by necessity but an escapist at heart.
So I don’t want to write about that. Nor do I have the desire to journal every funny story from my life at home with the kids. There are many – and I do sometimes share, but the truth is, I assume that it’s all been said before.
You know how when you start reading blogs, you die laughing over hilarious potty training stories and you send links to non-blogging friends beseeching them to drink the Kool Aid? Then after some time passes, you start to notice that you’re reading the same stories over and over – just from different people. Not that this makes you any less of a fan – in fact it makes you feel even more connected to people all going though the same things. But… When it comes time to write your own blog post, you start to feel rather unoriginal. Personally, don’t find that very motivating.
And I wonder if this is where people who once had so much passion for their writing start to feel a little lost. It’s a bit of a crossroads – a mid-life crisis. What next? Do I continue with my Little Engine that Could enthusiasm for stats? Or should I just write whenever I feel like it?
It’s a boring, dowdy phase, this blogging plateau. Mom jeans to the new-blogger mini skirt. Which is actually an apt metaphor for me since I went through years of preferring skirts and dresses to pants.
There was even a summer in my twenties when I wore nothing but short sundresses. Everyone in my beach house (Dewey Beach – holla!) seemed to have this preference as well, and a guy we knew began calling us The Sundress Brigade. And it sounds ridiculous really, but I kind of miss that. Being known for my feminine fashion choices. Being seen as someone who wears cute dresses and not practical workout clothes, you know – since I’ll be going to the Y later anyway. Someone who makes some effort with her hair in the morning – even if it’s just a low ponytail – instead of forgetting to brush it before leaving the house.
I miss not being a mom.
And that sounds terrible. Because I wouldn’t change anything about my life right now. Well – maybe some slip covers for threadbare couches that the children are slowly and systematically destroying…but nothing about being their mother.
It’s not an actual “crisis,” this thing paralleling my mid-blog life. Just nostalgia mixed with the ever present question of, “but then what?” The one many of us consider when we realize that in just a few years, they’ll be off doing their own thing, “and then who will I be?” Add one cup of sleep deprivation, a sprinkling of Target runs, and a heaping teaspoon of triple action eye cream…voila! You have a busy mom coming up for air. Breaking the surface to gasp for breath and notice a new beach looming on the horizon. Another one without any kids…but not much of anything else either. Just miles of sand where you can build any castle you want. But I’m not sure what I’d want that to be. And where’s the snack bar? Maybe I should bring a book…
So that may be part of this writing malaise. I’m rethinking who I am, who I want to be and how the hell I’m going to get there. Here is nice. But it’s temporary. And since looking forward always makes me want to climb into bed and pull the covers over my head (and Oliver’s head and Eleanor’s head and George’s head since they like nothing better than messing up my nicely made bed), I find myself looking back.
I’d like to feel that sun again. The sun of my youth that was a benevolent provider of tanned legs and the cure all for acne – not the harbinger of skin cancer and the spotlight for crows feet. I miss thinking I had a million things to worry over but easily forgetting them long enough to meet friends for cocktails.
The recent warm Spring weather inspired me to chop off my hair, which was sorely in need of a cut. I felt the need for less. And possibly for some incentive to pull out a brush every once in a while. The first time I had this style was the second summer of sundresses. I had rocked a shag and gone super long, but this flapper inspired bob was something entirely new. I pull it out now and again when I need a change and it never fails me. Just like a dress, it instantly grabs attention and makes me more aware of myself and of my identity as a girl. Not a young and cute girl now…but still that feminine, girly girl who likes to feel the swish of her skirt in the breeze.
My three year old daughter shows flashes of this to me – her future of dresses and tan legs and infinite time. She spins and laughs and reminds me of how it felt to only worry about myself. And to have minor concerns at that.
It will be at least ten years before she becomes the girl that I remember from my own youth. Right now, her preference for dresses is simply based on a love of twirling. She calls them her “ballerinas” and refuses to wear anything else. “Ballerinas don’t wear pants.“
As much as I’d love to join her in this conscientious objection to practicality, I really can’t wear a dress every day. Or even most days. My legs aren’t that great anymore. And I don’t have quite as much time for twirling.
But I will wear a ruffly top, put on some lip gloss and opt for a flirty haircut. This makes me no less of a mother, but it nods the girl that I will always be no matter what. And when I walk into Oliver’s IEP meeting, walk the aisles of Target and run in circles on the track at the Y, I’ll feel the swish of breeze in my hair and I’ll know that deep down I’m still the same girl.
I may have more responsibility and less freedom to stroll on beaches, but I can always find time to dance with my daughter. And remember.
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ELSEWHERE:
On Wishing True…
Mothers Day giveaway from Fifi Flowers!
Tiny lovelies from Handmade by Christine
Rosie Campbell belts
On Style Key West…
Winner: Congratulations Heather!
It’s time to start thinking about gifts for the important mothers in our lives. Our moms, aunts, friends…even ourselves. Everyone has someone to celebrate Mothers Day.
In honor of this Hallmark holiday (I know – first I scoff at Valentines day and now the most holy of the greeting card occasions…I’m such a cynic) I will be giving away this lovely little painting from Fifi Flowers…
…AND a book of Coco Chanel (a matriarch of fashion) quotes with Fifi Flowers illustrations.
Want to win this for one of the important mothers in your life? Or just for yourself…it’s a giveaway in honor of mothers, not necessarily FOR mothers. Either way, here’s how to enter:
Visit Fifi Flowers’s Etsy shop OR the painting gallery (see tab at top of the Fifi Flowers site) and comment here about your favorite item(s).
For additional entries you can:
1. Tweet, Facebook, e-mail to friends… Just let me know and I’ll give you another entry for each.
2. Follow Wishing True (and yes you still get another entry if you are an existing follower)
3. Follow The Big Piece of Cake (see above)
4. Follow Style Key West (see above)
5. AND if you post something on your own site, I’ll give you FIVE more entries
(Don’t forget to give me your e-mail address if your comment doesn’t link back to a website where I can contact you if you win.)
I’ll stop taking entries two weeks from today, Wednesday, May 5 at midnight EST and will select the winner via random.org.
Good luck!
How cute are these?
Discovered through a comment on one of Friday’s posts, Rosie Campbell immediately caught my eye with those bright colors and whimsical animal designs. If you ever asked me if I wanted a blue belt with a big pink buckle sporting a seahorse I would have laughed. But these are just too adorable. I want one of each!
