I Love It When the Seasons Change

The greatest thing about being a forgetful person is that I can reread books and rewatch movies with great pleasure, not just pulling new things from it, but being surprised yet again when the plot twists.

The second greatest thing is the seasons. I forget, when it is winter, what the spring madness and the blooming of the flowers feels like. I forget during spring how heavy and wet the heat presses down in summer. I forget in summer the cool, clean feeling of fall wind. And right now, I can't remember winter clearly enough to write anything except that it's cold.

Fall has come here, a little early, and I am enjoying it so much. The wind and the chill make me feel energetic. I love it when the apples ripen, when it is time to make stew again, when the long pants come out of the garage. I love thinking about Halloween approaching, going to Stone Mountain when it's cool, and watching the leaves begin to turn on the trees. It's not time for fires yet, but I have started to think about them, about reading aloud beside a fire with Aaron and Livy.

The fall makes me want to go out and get a few adventures.

The Things I've Had Enough Wine to Say

I've had more than one glass of wine tonight (I will leave the reader to guess how many more), and in the great and glorious tradition of drunk dialing, I think I will tell everyone the gushy wonderful things about the people I love that I ordinarily don't say, but should.

First, Livy. At the ripe old age of 6, that child has more spunk and strength of will than most people will have at 80. It's hard to be the mom and official limit setter to such a willful person, but I am daily amazed at how in touch she is with exactly what she wants and how she intends to get it. Plus, she is just so cute!

Next Aaron. Aaron is the person in a group who always says the thing that other people are thinking but don't have the guts to say out loud. He is so grounded, so sure of who he is, and so loving. He is one of those amazing people who can address exactly what you said without holding it against you that you said it badly. And he's so interesting! Always learning something new, never stagnant. He inspires me to be virtuous and hardworking and forgiving.

And Jenn. Jenn takes care of me. She helps me with insurance forms and helps me be patient and reasonable when I am on a rampage. She is so funny that no conversation with her is ever average. She is passionately devoted to her career, and when we talk about parenting, she always makes me feel refreshed and ready to reenter the fray. I don't have siblings, but I would choose her to be a sister, tied by blood and memory and unbreakable links.

And Brendan. Brendan is such an affectionate person. I always feel thoroughly cared about whenever I spend time with him. In general, I don't like to be teased because I take things so seriously, but his teasing feels like a warm smile or a hug. Rarely does anyone make me feel as well-liked as he does.

These are the people I love best. Amen.

Livy and Egypt

I'm so excited because Livy has her first really specific learning interest. Before now, she has liked hearing me read books about nearly anything, and her choices were mostly random. But lately, she has take a real interest in Ancient Egypt. It started with a book I picked out at the library, just a general kids book on the Egyptians. She was fascinated. Since then, we have looked at some pictures on the internet, read every general book on Egypt in the children's department of our library, read a book on Hatshepsut (specifically requested by Livy, cause she was a girl who glued a beard on her face for ceremonies), watched the IMAX movie on Egypt, and we have several more books lined up (one of pyramids she got for her birthday, and one on archaeology (borrowed from Rational Jenn) cause it has pictures of mummies. I think we will also make a trip to the Carlos Museum at Emory University, which apparently has one of the best collections of Egyptian artifacts in America and MUMMIES! It really is too bad that she wasn't so interested in Egypt when we saw the King Tut exhibit traveling through Atlanta. She liked it, but now she would LOVE it. I'm sure it will make the rounds again some time.

Anyway, I think it is so cool to see her really interested in delving into a subject (and it's cool that it is a subject I think is really neat-o like history). I know the excitement of finding a new passion and exploring it until I'm sated, and I love seeing my child experience this for the first time. I also got her a book on the Ancient Romans, and I am thinking that reading about Cleopatra and Romanized Egypt might get her interested in other historical periods. We'll see. Whatever she is interested in next will be exciting, I'm sure.

Shoe Trends for Spring/Summer 2009

Shoes Trends for Spring/Summer 2009



shoe trends for the Spring/Summer 2009 season. From fetish-inspired to fringed, there's plenty to be excited about when it comes to this year's shoes.



An extension of one of the major Winter 2009 shoe trends, which saw folk-inspired fringing make its mark via the likes of Gucci and Balmain. The Spring/Summer version of the fringed shoe is lighter; more open; and has a more Western feel.Fringing will continue to be hugely popular through 2009 in both flat sandals and high-heeled styles. Stick to genuine suede in colours like camels, tans, browns and black.

Fetish Shoe Trend



From bold pyramid studs at Balmain to a more subtle, casual studded take at Anna Sui, to patent studded booties at Alexander Wang. Kenzo's shoes and boots also sported studded straps; and Rodarte's heels rebellious chain details. see all detail review for spring/summer trends shoes 2009 at fashionising

Too Many Projects!!!

Do you ever feel like that? There are just too many interesting things in the world to read and to learn about, and, though I read constantly, my list just keeps growing. Here are the things I am working on now:

1. My classes: later 18th century Brit lit (currently Elizabeth Carter and William Cowper) and Historical Foundations of Rhetoric (currently dialogues by Plato)
2. Matilda by Roald Dahl
3. Ancient History lectures from Scott Powell
4. reviewing my ancient Greek
5. working on French and Spanish
6. The Dark is Rising Series by Susan Cooper
7. Anne of Green Gables series by L.M. Montgomery
8. Some Charlaine Harris fan fic
9. Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver
10. A group of poems about Sewanee by Richard Tillinghast
11. all the parenting, nutrition, and Objectivist blogs I keep up with
12. working a parenting writing project

Holy crap! I think I am in over my head. But I like it. Who says I have to do one thing at once until I am finished. I'll never be finished, and I'll do a million things at once!

Reepicheep Costume

Here is a picture of me dressed as Reepicheep for Dragon Con this year. Thought it was appropriate for my blog. When you look at it, think of this quote from the mouse himself:

"While I can, I sail east in the Dawn Treader. When she fails me, I paddle east in my coracle. When she sinks, I shall swim east with my four paws. And when I can swim no longer, if I have not reached Aslan's country, or shot over the edge of the world in some vast cataract, I shall sink with my nose to the sunrise and Peepiceek will be head of the talking mice in Narnia." -- Reepicheep, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader by C.S. Lewis

Continuing to Think about Happiness

So, if you read my post about Rasselas, you know that I am contemplating happiness lately. So here is a question I have been thinking about.

I am a generally happy person, and barring one specific time in my life, I always have been. I am wondering if I am happy because I have all the things I need and most of the things I want or if I am happy because I am the kind of person who is pretty content with what I have. Let me explain more.

Here are the circumstances of my life that I think make me happy. My biggest values are all things I have. I love literature, reading, and teaching, and I am working on a grad degree in English. I love smart, passionate, quiet, and rational men, and I get to live with one all the time. I love my daughter, and I get to have her home with me. I have great friends who share my values and make me laugh. I get to live a double life, like a secret agent. 3.5 days of the week, I am a grad student and live a kind of young, childless life full of reading and Joss Whedon. 3.5 days of the week, I get to be a part of a very familyish circle, hanging with my daughter and going to the zoo. I don't have to choose between these two lives, and I think that is very cool. My partner makes 99.5% of the money for our family, so I am able to go to school and be at home with my daughter and have a lot of leisure time to read and do hobbies I like. So basically, of course I am happy because I am living out all my highest values every day.

But, I was also happy at other times in my life when I was working at a job that was less perfect for me, not in stable relationships, and having less time to do as I please. There are plenty of people who could look at my life this way: I am in school and probably will not complete it and get to work in my field for about 10 years. After a divorce, I had to find a way to divide my daughter's time between me and her father, and it is often difficult to work out how to do that and how to resolve any disputes we have about her. During half the week, I scramble to get all my homework and working done, so that I can spend the other half with my daughter. I see very little of my partner during this first half, as he works long hours to support us. During the second half of the week, I have to figure out a way to balance time with Livy and time with Aaron, since I didn't see either of them during the first half of the week. It would be possible for my life to be described that way too, and put like that, it sounds difficult.

So my question: Am I happy because I work through the problems I encounter and find ways to pursue my values? Or am I happy because I have the kind of disposition that makes me feel pretty content with whatever life I am living (within reason) and because I am a "look on the bright side" kind of person?

Just for more background info, I am pretty laid back. I have goals, but they aren't terribly lofty. They are fairly easily achievable with steady work, and they leave plenty of time for other pursuits. When one goal or plan doesn't work out, it's easy for me to let it go and find another that suits me just as well. Am I able to be happy more easily than another might be because I am laid back like this? Is happiness harder for more ambitious, more goal oriented, more planny people? Would a person with a different kind of personality be as happy as I am under similar circumstances?

Alexa Chung & Taylor Momsen do Fashion Week

in an adorable cropped jacket and toting a classic/classy Mulberry bag Alexa Chung, was definitely the fashionista winner here. Perhaps that's why a hooker-chic Taylor Momsen looks so glum?

here the picture about sexy model Taylor Momsen

Lindsay Lohan as "Artistic Adviser" by Emanuel Ungaro Hires

It's been a busy pre-Fashion Week at Chez Emanuel Ungaro, where the house has brought on a new Chief Designer, Estrella Archs, and an "Artistic Adviser"...Lindsay Lohan(?). Mounir Moufarrige, Ungaro’s chief executive officer, disclosed the appointments exclusively to WWD and is already relishing the prospect of that image running in newspapers and on Web sites around the world. "I think the noise level around Lindsay will be very, very big," anticipates Mounir Moufarrige, Ungaro's CEO, about a hoped-for Lindsanity-generated media circus surrounding the news. "Odds are it could work. Everything we’re going to get is going to be a plus.” Asked to describe her role in the creative process, Lohan said she “kind of oversees everything [Archs] does, while still working with her. "Different generations have different ideas. I’ve always played a big part in what I wear, the costumes. Clothing is something that’s so expressive in so many ways." Lohan, whose first fur coat was an Ungaro, also told WWD she hopes to take Ungaro to a “younger place” with a harder fashion edge, and then acknowledged the real reason her appointment is considered press-worthy: "I'm in a position where I’m working with a fashion house in Paris sets it apart from every other celebrity brand.”

The first Archs-Lohan collection for Ungaro will be presented in Paris on October 4, after which they will likely make a joint runway bow.



actress Lindsay Lohan attend the Charlotte Ronson Spring 2009 fashion show during Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week at The Promenade in Bryant Park.

Top Colour For Spring Fashion

TRANSPARENCY & WHAT LIES BENEATH


From left to right: Naoki Takizawa, Erin Fetherston, Threeasfour, VPL


Jill Stuart, Doo.Ri, Anna Sui, Reem Acra, Marc Jacobs

FANTASY ISLAND ESCAPISM


left to right: Charles Nolan, Snoopy in Fashion, Mooka Kinney (Gen Art Fresh Faces in Fashion), Marc by Marc Jacobs, Kyung Min Kim (Academy of Art University)

HOLLYWOOD HEYDAY GLAMOUR


left to right: Rodarte, Badgley Mischka, Temperley, Jovovich-Hawk, Proenza Schouler (photos: MBUSA.com, style,com, nymag.com)

FASHIONTRIBES : Most Interesting Trends from the New York Shows

Talented designers function like a canary in the mine: they act as a translator of the collective unconscious. When Marc Jacobs staged his most recent Spring 2008 collection in reverse - opening with his final bow, followed by the final look (#56) & then the rest of the run-of-show in descending order - he sent out look after look with underthings peeking out through transparent layers. Consciously or not, he was tapping into a major theme of our time: what lies beneath the surface of things.

Every epoch has a dominant science," prominent futurist Watts Wacker once told Fashiontribes in a pop culture article appearing in the Fashiontribes Downtown Doll e-zine. "In the industrial age it was chemistry, the dominant science in the information age was physics and the dominant science in the post-information age will be biology.” While the 19th century focused on chemistry via mass-scale production, & the 20th century saw space travel & a man walk on the moon for the first time during the age of physics - the new millenium welcomed the decoding of the human genome and continues to explore the inner space that falls within the realm of biology as the dominant organizing principle of society today.

Escapism also translated to an ongoing vein of nostalgia with retro trend of old-school Hollywood glamour including high-waisted pin-up girl shorts & looks, shimmery sequin-covered garments for day, disco ball shiny silver dresses, full length gowns from the glam pre-war Art Deco period, and the continuation of the ankle/floor length day dress (unfortunately also known as the "patio", "hostess" & worst of all, the "maxi" dress & desperately in need of a much cooler moniker). While black is always the new black, what's interesting is how much of it was being shown for spring. Less interesting was the amount of white (this being the warm weather collection, after all), however the predominance of black & white mixtures and prints proved an interesting offshoot. Naturally, spring Easter Egg pastels made a strong showing, as well as Skittles-bright primary colors and exuberantly loud & cheery color mixes of vibrant reds, blinding yellows, and blues of any & every shade. [source]

Amazing Life-Learning Blog Post

The entire post can be found at Renegade Parent.

Here's a quote from this wonderful post:

"When I listen to my child's speech developing daily, or when I watch my partner programming in a new language he has learnt, or when I read about new ideas and work them through to a satisfactory conclusion in debate, then I understand the nature of real learning - tested time and again not by a teacher but against the rigorous standards of reality. Can my child make herself understood? Will customers buy the software? Does my logic stand up to public scrutiny?"

Victoria Beckham Can't Spray Her New Perfume

Former Spice Girl Victoria Beckham has been invited by Whoopi Goldberg to appear on The View to discuss her latest fragrance Signature Story, but as it turns out, Whoopi's allergic to perfume. Now Victoria has agreed not to spray the scent within a nine-meter radius of Whoopi, while the audience members, who will get a goody bag containing a bottle of the fragrance, will have to sign an agreement not to open the fragrance in the studio. A source told Britain’s Daily Mirror.

Whoopi was desperate to get Victoria on The View as she’s got an incredible profile in the US right now. Victoria is launching her perfume so the timing was perfect and she agreed straight away.

Sadly, Whoopi didn’t really think things through – and it was only once her guest was confirmed that she informed producers she was allergic to perfume. If she smells it, her eyes well up and start streaming, and her lips even swell.

Studio bosses have had to write up contracts for the audience and Victoria making sure they don’t spray the scent. It’s not the ideal way to promote a perfume, but Victoria saw the funny side.

Shakira And Pink in the Same Dress at VMA Awards

Shakira and Pink Showing up to the VMA awards wearing the same unique crystal-studded leather Balmain minidresses.Fortunately both Pink and Shakira had a sense of humor about it. Though it must have been a special moment when each of them realized they weren't the only one with awesome taste in crystal-studded leather Balmain minidresses. [zimbio]

Moschino's Spring 2009 collection

Moschino's Spring 2009 collection most The bright colors, crazy sunglasses, feminine dresses and platform shoes

Victoria’s Secret Fall Fashion 2009

Victoria's Secret Angel Marissa Miller walks the runaway wearing Fantasy Bra designed by Martin Katz during Victoria's Secret Fashion Show at the Fontainebleau in Miami Beach, Florida.
Marisa Miller showing off her curves for Victoria’s Secret Fall Fashion 2009 volume 2 catalogue. One thing is sure, her lingerie pics never dissapoint!