Year of the Stache

This is the extent of our costumes this year & even this barely happened. I made it for Forest in about 2 minutes as he was heading out the door. He was supposed to dress up for work & I couldn't let him go without something! Thank you something's hiding in here for the idea. Their way cooler version can be purchased here.

I tried to take a photo with B & the mustache, but this is the best I could get. Next year I will be super mom and make him a really good costume. We're heading out today on a camping adventure, so have fun trick-or-treating, don't eat too much candy & pray it doesn't rain on us!

p.s. I LOVED reading the comments about tailoring. I think we're all in agreement that it's a good thing & maybe a lost art in our time of mass production. I'm inspired!

Know a good tailor?

Some girlfriends and I were talking about our wardrobes and the concept of having fewer high quality pieces vs. a closet full of ill-fitting, cheaply made clothes. This is something I've really tried to start thinking about when I shop. As I've been weeding through my closet I've also noticed how many of my shirts really don't fit me well. I love them, but they are too wide or too short, etc...and I start to miss having my personal tailor around (mom). Even when I was like in 6th grade I remember asking her to make my floral parachute pants from Kmart fit better. No joke. Being good at sewing is a curse if you have a daughter like me.

I bought three shirts from Banana Republic the other day because they all made me feel pretty, but they are also cut too wide at the hips. I consider myself on the curvier side in the hip area, but they still flare out about an inch away from my pants on each side. I started thinking about other BR shirts I have & never wear...it's because they all do that & somehow this minor flaw is ignored in the dressing room.

My new solution is to start tailoring most of my clothes. At this age I don't feel I can walk around with clothes hanging & bagging. I'm a mom now & struggle to feel pretty every day, so I need my clothes to work with me, not against me. I may try to do it myself since I have this dress form above that I bought when we were making my wedding dress, or I may wait until my mom comes to visit in a few weeks (haha).

Do any of you have your clothes tailored? I just feel like I would enjoy my current wardrobe so much more if I loved everything I put on. One more step towards feeling like a grown up, classy lady.

Again

My second & final post at sfgirlbybay is up! I'm continuing my mini-tour of downtown Ventura with a visit to my favorite antique/junk shop & Italian restaurant...hop on over to check it out.

Bedroom Re-do Beginnings

I've started playing around with Domino's My Deco File for our bedroom re-do. It's nice to have a place to accumulate everything, but I have a bunch of images, fabric swatches, paint chips, etc..that are not on the computer so I need to scan them. But here's what I have so far - probably going to do light gray walls & I have this teal Herman Miller shell chair I want to use as inspiration for the accent colors. I"ll have to take a photo & post!

Miss P

Just had to post these...photos I took of our niece on her 1st birthday. Happy birthday P!

Guest Blogger on sfgirlbybay

I'm Guest Blogging today and next Monday over at sfgirlbybay while Victoria is off on a far East adventure! All the guest bloggers she has lined up are wonderful - be sure to check them out!

4 Years

It's our anniversary! In the best way possible it feels like so much longer than 4 years. Here's a photo from the beginnings of our relationship. It all kind of started with bike rides. At the time Forest's work & my school were about 100 yards apart & were also about a block from the beach. At lunch we would ride along the ocean & share Trader Joe's salads & Kettle chips. I would say to my friends, "It's just a bike ride, it's not a date!", but they knew the truth.

A good friend of ours gave us the nicest compliment which I will never forget. He said, "I admire how you don't keep score in your marriage. There's no "I did this for you, so you should do this for me". I think that is really true about us & has made our marriage that much sweeter. If I ever do get into the mode of thinking that Forest owes me something for some reason I remember this & turn my thoughts to all that he does do for me & our family. He drives 45 min. to work each way, or leaves the house at 6am to catch the bus. He cleans our pool each weekend so we can swim during the week. He takes on side jobs so we have extra money. He takes the dog & the baby for an hour or two on Saturdays so I can have the house to myself. Yep, he's amazing. And tonight we get to celebrate with our first night out since B was born. I was in denial that it would take us 8 mos. to do this, but time flies. Sushi here we come!

And I also need to wish my little sis Sarah a very happy birthday (and thanks again for letting us steal your thunder that one year). We love you little!

I'm shooting a wedding this Sunday & will be guest blogging on sfgirlbybay on Monday so will have some fun stuff for you then. Happy Friday to all!

Back to the task at hand

After 8 months of adjusting to motherhood & observing how sharing a home with a little one does direct home design to a degree I'm feeling ready to start decorating again. B is now at an age where I can tell if something will work with him - like, can he knock it down, or can he knock the stuff on top of it down. Oh, how times have changed.

I'm always inspired by the homes in Cookie Magazine because they are real life examples of good design & children living harmoniously in the same space. I'm also pouring over my favorite design books again - I never get sick of them. So the next few posts will be design/decorating related - yay, I miss those. The rooms I'm specifically focusing on right now are the master bedroom (in need of help, big time) & the living room. I just registered over at Domino's My Deco File & will be updating my inspiration board too. Work is slowing down a bit as we go into the Winter season & this feels like a good time to refocus & spend some time on the place we where we spend the most time.

The Costumer

I'm not sure if we're going to dress B up this year as we will be camping with the family & there won't be many people to see him in all his first-costume-glory. On the other hand, I feel like the making of costumes is like a rite of passage in motherhood - my mom made the best costumes. We were like her four little crazy fashion designers & she was the seamstress who was supposed to make our dreams through her sewing machine. Just a few that I remember are lobster, ladybug, tiger, cat, zebra, Sara from the Little Princess, and one that was pretty awesome, but that I was not so grateful for...

The Dairy Queen Ice Cream Cone! She even embroidered the words "Dairy Queen" around the top of the cone. That's how good my mom is. And notice that my head is the cherry on top. Why am I not smiling in this photo & beaming with pride over the talent of my amazing mother? Because when we got to the harvest party at church I was surrounded by cheerleaders to my right, little dutch girls to my left & more cats & princesses than I could count. I felt...not cute & not girly at all. So then of course it was all my mom's fault even though I am sure I said "I want to be a Dairy Queen soft serve cone" & she went to the ends of the earth to make that happen for me.

Anyway, moral of the story is I was not thankful for my mother's talents all the time, but she was/is so talented & I want to be that for my kids too.

I was looking through an old Martha Stewart Baby & saw this blue bird costume. So cute!

Looks pretty easy & he already has a blue hat like that, so we'll see. This may be the only year I get to pick what he dresses up as considering how particular I was about my own costumes as a kid. What was your favorite costume & what was your "bad idea that seemed so good at the time" one? Like my ice cream cone. I would love to hear!

Eva & Edgars' Wedding

It was a very sweet day, just them & two close friends plus the officiant, solo guitarist & me : ) Eva & Edgars came from Latvia to marry in Santa Barbara & just because it was small doesn't mean it was without details: the dress, flowers, music, cake, champagne...all thoughtfully planned with the help of Baiba, Eva's bridesmaid.




They celebrated with a Cloud Climbers jeep tour of Santa Barbara's wineries, a surprise from Baiba and pretty much the perfect way to celebrate anything in Santa Barbara - blue skies, friends, wine & a chauffeur : )

If I were a cooler...

Ok, I know that this post might come off as a little narcissistic & I'm willing to take that risk. I also know I could live another day never bringing this up, but I happened upon something of personal interest in Target today I would like to share.

On my list was a small portable cooler so we can transport B's food when we go to friend's houses, road trips, etc...I saunter over to the Outdoor aisle at Target & amongst all the red,blue & gray is a section of pretty, colorful prints. As a sucker for designy anything I grab one and then read "raya" right there on the label. Weird. Of course, I buy it because personalized products just do not exist for me - as a kid I would always check those mini-license plates at convenience stores in hopes that once, just once, there would be a "Raya" plate. Those hopes were crushed over & over.

And of course I had to do further research to figure out how Thermos decided on Raya for their new product line. I could see if it was like "Kate" or "Naomi", but Raya? So random. Here's what their website says:

"Finally, your beverages can coordinate flawlessly with your new sweater. This may be a bit extreme, of course, but the point it, today's high fashion-conscious consumers use more than two senses to enjoy a cup of coffee."

So true, Thermos! High fashion I'm not so sure about, but after reading that I had to smile. I wonder about the Raya who inspired this product line, 'cause I know it wasn't me & I'm pretty sure we would get along quite nicely. We could share a 6-pack of diet coke & keep it ice cold in our polka dot beverage tote with Iso-tec layered insulation structure. Guess we Rayas are all alike- if we have to look at something all the time we want it to look good. Thermos knows us well.

This is Cool

Moo has a new mosaic frame for moo cards & they used our wedding photos in the samples! Watch the video - that's us! Yay.

Moo presents Mosaic Frame --
by MOO_Crew

Each frame fits 20 cards & you can shuffle them up as often as you like. I think I'm gonna have to get a few of these & finally put those moo cards to good use.

Thanks again to David Jay & Chris Humphreys for our awesome wedding photos.

Stacey Costello

Back in June I got to do something I don't do often - photograph someone else's home! Meet Stacey Costello - interior designer/artist/really creative & stylish woman.

We met through my mom & she asked me to come photograph her home for the relaunch of her website & new blog. Stacey's home is so personal and there were endless little details to shoot, which I love. We also took a few portraits & she used this one as the first entry on her blog - which I think is so appropriate - kind of a "welcome, come on in" photo : )

We spent about four hours moving from room to room & chatting about everything from motherhood to designer dresses. It was a nice change of pace from the crazy wedding days I'm used to & I got to know a wonderful mom who is using her talents in her work. I love my job.

Be sure to check out Stacey's Etsy shop where she sells handmade party hats, gift boxes, coasters & more and hop on over to her beautiful blog to say hi & see some photos from our shoot. Here are a few of my favorites:

Steveyann & Nathan's Wedding