Summer 30-for-30: Days 4-6

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Okay, so I admit it - I spent most of the weekend in pajamas, curtains drawn, avoiding the outside. So there was a bit of a lapse in my 30 outfits posting. BUT! I've re-enacted the few outfits I did manage to pull on: (Photo of Bettie taken from here)

Shirt - Mina's Gallery & Boutique, jeans - Gap, shoes - Guess

(Photo from thebettiepage.com)

Tube top & belt - Doubledutch Boutique, cuff - Fisticuffs Leather, shorts - Target

(Photo from bettiepage.com)

cardigan - Gap, shirt - H&M, belt - Doubledutch, skirt - Express, shoes - Kenneth Cole

So you may have noticed the nice big empty space behind me. Or, rather, the one clean space amid all the clutter with a curious square painted on the wall. That's because this weekend I began Stage 1 of my Project Big Calendar. Stage 1 involved turning an ordinary wall ...

... into a chalk board!

Stay tuned as I see how effective my paint job really was, and how writeable this puppy will be!

 

Summer 30-for-30: Day 3

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Day_3
Day_3

Look out, we're already on to the chair poses! This wasn't the most comfortable thing to do in a desk chair. Plus, it has wheels, which left me rolling away Dr. Evil-style every time the camera timer was about to go off. And look! A glimpse into another filthy corner of my office!

I'm probably going to use a lot of images I found from the Bettie Page Official site, www.bettiepage.com, so I may as well just link them every time.

Shirt - H&M, belt - Doubledutch Boutique, pants - Express, shoes - Kenneth Cole, necklace - Target, leather cuff - Fisticuffs Leather.

Summer 30-for-30: Day 3

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Look out, we're already on to the chair poses! This wasn't the most comfortable thing to do in a desk chair. Plus, it has wheels, which left me rolling away Dr. Evil-style every time the camera timer was about to go off. And look! A glimpse into another filthy corner of my office!

I'm probably going to use a lot of images I found from the Bettie Page Official site, www.bettiepage.com, so I may as well just link them every time.

Shirt - H&M, belt - Doubledutch Boutique, pants - Express, shoes - Kenneth Cole, necklace - Target, leather cuff - Fisticuffs Leather.

Summer 30-for-30: Day 2

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I am not the best poser. I'm already getting a little bored with the few poses I can muster that aren't completely cringeworthy, and I worry about how I'm going to make it through this 30-for-30 without boring everyone (myself included) to tears. So I'm thinking ... why not make it a little more interesting by turning to one of the most famous posers for inspiration every day? That's right, I'm talking about Bettie Page - Queen of the Pin-Up! So each day of my summer 30-for-30, not only will I be remixing outfits like crazy, but I'll attempt (and I do mean attempt) to mimic one of Bettie's famous poses for each day.

(Disclaimer: Please keep your expectations of my mimicry low, since I am not a raven-haired, busty bombshell)

Here we go - Day 2!

Day_2
Day_2

Oy, this is going to take me so much longer each day.

Shirt - H&M, belt - from my mom, skirt - H&M, shoes - Bandolino

Summer 30-for-30: Day 2

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I am not the best poser. I'm already getting a little bored with the few poses I can muster that aren't completely cringeworthy, and I worry about how I'm going to make it through this 30-for-30 without boring everyone (myself included) to tears. So I'm thinking ... why not make it a little more interesting by turning to one of the most famous posers for inspiration every day? That's right, I'm talking about Bettie Page - Queen of the Pin-Up! So each day of my summer 30-for-30, not only will I be remixing outfits like crazy, but I'll attempt (and I do mean attempt) to mimic one of Bettie's famous poses for each day.

(Disclaimer: Please keep your expectations of my mimicry low, since I am not a raven-haired, busty bombshell)

Here we go - Day 2!

 

Oy, this is going to take me so much longer each day.

Shirt - H&M, belt - from my mom, skirt - H&M, shoes - Bandolino

Summer 30-for-30: Day 1

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Here we go again! Now, since today was the first reasonably cool day in a so far ultra sucky summer, I busted out the cardigan and pants. So really, my summer wardrobe doesn't appear to be any different from my winter one ...

(and yes, my office has gotten messier since you last saw it!)

Cardigan - Gap, Shirt - H&M, belt - Doubledutch Boutique, pants - Express, Sandals - Steve Madden

The Stacey to My Claudia - Time For Another 30-for-30!

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I have this great friend at work who's always convincing me to broaden my fashion horizons. To put it into Baby-Sitter's Club parlance, she is Stacey (fashionable, classy, cutting edge) where I am Claudia (wacky, artsy, easily bored with my wardrobe). She was the one who first suggested to me, a year ago, to try a 30-for-30 with her. It was August, we were hot and bored, and the only good things about that time of the year (according to me) were Mad Men and Shark Week. So we timidly stepped into the 30-for-30 arena for the first time, just doing it during the work week and still feeling restricted and self-conscious. Then, this February, we gave it another try (a real try, for 30 days, for reals - you can see my recap here), and it finally clicked and felt something more akin to fun than torture. And soooo, since this fashion blog I read announced it was starting up again, I thought .... 90+ degree weather? Boredom setting in? Summer blues hitting me before summer starts, without Mad Men and sharks to distract me?

I'm totally in.

Here we go peeps, the Summer Edition of 30-for-30! And no fun scarves and layering to experiment with this time, it's gonna be crrrazy!

Comics I'm Chewing On ... #1

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Having been to a few comic conventions this year, I've been able to pick up lots of super new books by some absurdly talented writers and artists. And since I mainly only get to read in bite sizes, during breakfast each morning, it tends to take me a looooong time to finish each book. Lately though, I've been able to get through a few in a timely enough manner that I actually remember what I read, so I thought I'd mention what I thought of them. This'll be the first in a mini-series of reviews of all the good stuff I'm gobbling up lately.

Gingerbread Girl 

by Paul Tobin and Colleen Coover

I knew zilch about this book going in, but wanted it purely based on Colleen's gorgeous, mischeviously sexy art. She has this way of creating characters who are simultaneously fun and inviting while being up to no good, which works perfectly for Annah, the main character of the book.

It begins with Annah's story and the way she tells it, but then branches off in fun and unexpected ways to continue the thread through the eyes of anyone who crosses her path.

Anyone remember that movie Fallen with Denzel Washington in it, where this serial killer keeps jumping around and possessing one person's body after another? (Spoiler Alert: He may or may not also possess a cat by the end of the movie - LOL).

That's kind of what happens here - as Annah bops around in her own little world, her story is suddenly inhaled by each person she passes along her journey and they become compelled to continue where the last bystander left off. The story itself is a little bit mystery, a little bit romance, and a little bit fantasy - Annah's out looking for her missing sister, who has almost become a different version of herself altogether. Along the way she struggles with her own identity, how she comes across to others, and how she intends to be from now on. The reader gets to try to piece everything together along with her and her various narrators.

Clearly the subject matter of duality fascinates me (see random post obsessing about my own duality here) and this book takes you on a wending, swirly, fun path to discovery, and you really don't know what you're going to find at the end of it all. In the meantime, you'll have such a fun, flirty read along the way!

 

 

Comics I'm Chewing On ... #1

/

Having been to a few comic conventions this year, I've been able to pick up lots of super new books by some absurdly talented writers and artists. And since I mainly only get to read in bite sizes, during breakfast each morning, it tends to take me a looooong time to finish each book. Lately though, I've been able to get through a few in a timely enough manner that I actually remember what I read, so I thought I'd mention what I thought of them. This'll be the first in a mini-series of reviews of all the good stuff I'm gobbling up lately.

Gingerbread Girl 

by Paul Tobin and Colleen Coover

I knew zilch about this book going in, but wanted it purely based on Colleen's gorgeous, mischeviously sexy art. She has this way of creating characters who are simultaneously fun and inviting while being up to no good, which works perfectly for Annah, the main character of the book.

It begins with Annah's story and the way she tells it, but then branches off in fun and unexpected ways to continue the thread through the eyes of anyone who crosses her path.

Anyone remember that movie Fallen with Denzel Washington in it, where this serial killer keeps jumping around and possessing one person's body after another? (Spoiler Alert: He may or may not also possess a cat by the end of the movie - LOL).

That's kind of what happens here - as Annah bops around in her own little world, her story is suddenly inhaled by each person she passes along her journey and they become compelled to continue where the last bystander left off. The story itself is a little bit mystery, a little bit romance, and a little bit fantasy - Annah's out looking for her missing sister, who has almost become a different version of herself altogether. Along the way she struggles with her own identity, how she comes across to others, and how she intends to be from now on. The reader gets to try to piece everything together along with her and her various narrators.

Clearly the subject matter of duality fascinates me (see random post obsessing about my own duality here) and this book takes you on a wending, swirly, fun path to discovery, and you really don't know what you're going to find at the end of it all. In the meantime, you'll have such a fun, flirty read along the way!

 

 

Excavating In My Own Home

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Our house was built in 1920. It's a row home with original wood floors, awesome high ceilings on every level, and tons of character. I've lived here for 6 years, and in that time, I'll admit it, I've accrued a lot of junk. However, in the basement cellar, back where the washer and the dryer and the spiders and sprickets live, there's been a bunch of stuff that was there ever since I moved in. Shelving units, cabinets, TONS of paint cans, you name it. Over the years I'll admit I've contributed some closet doors, broken A/C units, a boxspring, ... until it eventually ended up looking like this:

Not much room to really walk, just the bare minimum path to the washer and the dryer. This was the Basement Sitch.

Another problem we had, steadily growing beyond the bounds of what we could accomplish ourselves, was the Backyard Sitch. Once again, old house, previous owners, and upon trying to get the yard to resemble something other than a jungle, the BF found mountains and mountains of bricks, wood, and stone. ALL somehow buried in our teeny little yard.

Yipes. So after months of hemming and hawing, my boyfriend and I finally threw in the towel and called in the professionals. I grouped together everything that had been there for ages and needed to go.

We called in two guys from All Star Waste & Recycling who came to the rescue. I fretted that they'd tell me they couldn't take everything, but one of the workers assured me everything could go. He then calmly told his partner to "bring him the sledgehammer" and within record time .... VOILA!

All the junk was magically taken care of. SUCH a load off. Once things were cleared out, we discovered ... TREASURES!!

Real wood blocks rare, and original to the house (now we just have to think of something cool to do with them):

A door . . .

And hidden on the other side of it, in the lock ... the master skeleton key!

Then the coup de grace ... an old matchbook!

I couldn't find any info on the place - looks like there was a Three Little Bakers Dinner Theatre in Wilmington, Delaware that closed down in 2007. BUT! I did find another matchbook on eBay! LOL. And it looks like this fine lady used to perform there.

Did we discover any dead bodies? No, not yet. But I do like the fact that I've uncovered something besides bricks (god - so many bricks) in this old place ... a li'l bit of history.