I’m a walker.
I’m a stroller pusher (although these days, Lucas would rather run up ahead).
I’m a comfort seeker.
I’m a park goer.
I’m a networker.
I’m a beach comber.
I’m a diva.
I’m a mom.
Linking up with Alicia’s Wordless Wednesdays.
Top 10 Best Things About Going To Disneyland Without Children
1. No diaper bag to pack.
2. No maneuvering a stroller throughout the park.
3. Not having to ride It’s a Small World, Dumbo the Flying Elephant, King Arthur’s Carrousel, Mad Tea Party, or anything else that’s slow and safe and clearly made for people under three feet tall.
4. Not having to stand in ridiculously long lines to meet Mickey, Minnie, Goofy or any other character.
5. No over-priced souvenirs to purchase.
6. No temper tantrums, melt downs or crying fits due to heat, hunger, lack of patience, sweet treats or exhaustion.
7. Staying way after dark.
8. Other moms that have a Disneyland Passport!
9. Feeling 15 again, as I my laugh with glee on Tower of Terror, Space Mountain, California Screamin’ and Indian Jones Adventure.
10. Capturing pictures like this: 
This post was inspired by Stasha’s Monday Listicles, a linky right up my alley!
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My Summer Reading List
Try as I might, I could not get this under four minutes so thank you for watching!
Please let me know if you have questions about my recommendations and definitely share your thoughts too.
In order in which I discussed, my summer reading list includes:
One Amazing Thing – Chitra Divakaruni
Sing You Home – Jodi Picoult
Room – Emma Donoghue
Up From The Blue – Susan Henderson
Incendiary – Chris Cleve
The Writing Circle – Corinne Demas
What are you reading this summer?!
This post is for Vlog Talk. The prompt I chose was #1 Your summer reading list.
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My Latest Obsession
Thanks to my friend, Lisa, whom I had the pleasure of lunching with last week, I have been introduced to one of the most delicious (non alcoholic) drinks I have ever tasted.
And I’m not just being dramatic.
Since the juice cleanse my husband and I did in February (you can read all about it here), I have grown to love tea. I despise coffee, so I’m not one to frequent Starbucks, Coffee Bean, Peet’s or any other coffee chain, but I’ve been six times since last Tuesday. At $3.75 a pop, this could get expensive.
If you haven’t tasted it, run, don’t walk to your favorite local barista and get yourself an Iced Chai Tea Latte (with Vanilla) on the double! You can thank me later.
This post is for Wordful Wednesdays and if you want to link up and see some really beautiful photographs, please visit Project Alicia.
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My Wardrobe Rehab Experience
On a typical day, here’s how you’ll find me dressed:
The unofficial official stay-at-home mom uniform: yoga pants, sports bra, tank top and sneakers. Despite how unglamorous this outfit is, I stand behind it; versatile, functional, comfy.
Last October, I wrote a post called What Not To Wear, where I lamented about the awful state of my closet and my need for an overhaul. In my post I mentioned my friend, Nancy, the best-dressed, most stylish person I know.
Nine months ago, Nancy was contemplating the idea of starting her own personal stylist business. Well, she’s done it and I was lucky enough to be one of her first projects clients!
With a closet full of every size under the sun, clothes that didn’t go with my SAHM lifestyle and client meetings, date nights and blog conferences that I longed to “dress up” for, I needed some major help. In other words, I was in need of some style of my own.
Nancy’s company, Inside Out, Wardrobe Rehab entails a three-phase process: 1) Closet Overhaul, 2) Shopping and 3) Putting It All Together. My experience spanned from March – July and honestly, I’ve never felt or dressed better.
1) Closet Overhaul was my favorite part. I love purging! It was so great having someone there with me as I tried on articles of clothing that have been in my closet for far too long and getting a second set of (honest) eyes to confirm that it was time to let go. I ended up donating nearly 50 items!
2) The Shopping phase was the most difficult for me because I’m not a big fan of clothes shopping in general and it was difficult for me to see what Nancy was seeing with some of the selections, but I trusted her and ended with some fabulous pieces that are timeless and will last forever.
3) Putting It All Together consisted of just that; creating complete outfits with what I already had in my wardrobe paired with my newly purchased items.
Here are a couple of my new looks:
Thank you for helping me bring my inner fashionista out, Nancy!
Among many of the fashion tips and tricks Nancy taught me, my four best take-aways were:
- Find a good tailor! All pockets can be sewn shut or removed completely and pants can (and often times should) be hemmed.
- I look really good in bright colors, something I would have normally avoided.
- A blazer and a necklace can do wonders for any outfit.
- Nancy is awesome! Well, actually I already knew this, but her business, professionalism and fashion sense are amazing and I know, if she can help me, she can help anyone with their own wardrobe rehab.
If you have any questions about the clothes pictured above or my experience, feel free to ask.
Stay tuned for an upcoming post on some of the outfits Nancy has helped me put together for BlogHer ’11… God bless her!
And meanwhile, please check out Inside Out, Wardrobe Rehab’s Website/blog, follow her on Twitter and Facebook for great fashion tips and advice on everything from finding the perfect dress to wear to a wedding, dressing for an interview and packing for your summer vacation.
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In The In Box
I spend a lot of time trying to stay staying up on my e-mail. And by that I mean, what we all do: respond, put off responding, organize into files or finding more satisfaction than is probably allowed by hitting the delete button.
If you’re a mom, a blogger and a Twitter addict, like me, I don’t have to tell you how downright daunting a full In Box can be. What with all the newsletters, blog subscriptions, blog comments and back and forth with family and friends, it’s enough to make your eyes pop right out of your head. And now, Twitter e-mails me responses to my Tweets (anyone know how to cancel that, by the way?) It’s all a bit too much for me some days.
Especially when I’ve neglected it.
I like for there to be less than 18 e-mails in my In Box, that way with the size I have my browser set to I can still see the very last one. It’s the last e-mail my father ever sent me.
Beyond 18 and his gets pushed down too far.
It’s not even a great e-mail.
The subject is sox and addresses but it was sent four days before he and my mother died so I will keep forever.
So strange that I’ll never receive another e-mail from my father, but there he is, in my In Box every day. Right there with Groupon notices, Vlog Talk Weekly Prompts and tips on how to get your toddler to eat more veggies.
Just knowing it’s there comforts me somehow.
Except when I forget about it and then upon discovering it, my brain malfunctions for half a second and leads me to believe it’s a new e-mail from him.
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Noise Level: An Apology
If your house is anything like ours, activity begins early. Typically just right of 6 AM, thanks to a 3 foot tall morning person.
Lucky for me, my husband starts his day then too, allowing me the luxury of sleeping in. And by “sleeping in”, I mean 8:00 most days. I’m spoiled, I know.
Todd wakes up to the sounds of “Daddy!” and repeated beckoning, which leads to forceful demanding pleads to play cars and trains, “eat something”, “Mickey show” and/or “read to me”.
We have a small house with wood floors so noises of all kinds, voices and the sounds of temper tantrums, which inevitably lead to time-outs carry throughout.
I’ve grown accustomed to the daybreak racket and can (for the most part) sleep through it, but I always feel bad when my sister (or any guests for that matter) stay the night.
I’d like to make a public apology here and now to Leah and any and all guests we ever have in our home. If you stay over, I can guarantee you two things: a lovely visit filled with good cheap wine and conversation and in the morning, lots of noise! Consider yourself warned.
We appreciate your understanding. I suppose if we all slept 10+ hours we’d be raring to go with the sun too.
Well, maybe.
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Project Smile – June
Proof that my June was magical.
While celebrating Lucas’ second birthday, my 39th and Father’s Day, welcoming three cichlids into our family and breaking in a new pair of sneakers, enjoying a fun overnight in Palm Springs with my girlfriends, I was gently reminded by my sweet son on a walk around our neighborhood how important it is to stop and smell the roses every once in a while.
I’m also proud to share that we got Lucas completely off of bottles in June.
It was a great month!
To see what had me smiling in May, click here and to link up and share your own month of joy, please visit Kristi of Live and Love out Loud.
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GNO
I have always been blessed to have a lot of friends in my life. Some of whom I would call as close as family ~ wonderful women that I confide in, trust, enjoy spending time with and without whom, I don’t know where or who I’d be.
I have friends from high school, friends from college, single friends, divorced friends, mommy friends, friends I gained through my first marriage, friends that I gained through my second marriage, colleagues that became friends, neighbors that became friends and one very dear friend, Sophie that lives clear across the globe.
I also have a ton of friends that I have never even met (yet), thanks to blogging and Twitter. 🙂
My core group of friends consists of five women I see on a regular basis… for play dates with our children, walks without them, lunch, happy hours, dinners and the occasional overnight escapes get-aways.
My friends and I like to celebrate each others birthdays in big ways, usually involving a trip. My husband always gives me a hard time about it, but if we didn’t, there’s a chance I never would have met him. More on that in a later post…
Anyway, my last girl’s night out was last weekend, on an overnight in Palm Springs! We celebrating Lisa’s birthday, my beautiful underwater friend above. In fact, all the photos used in this post were taken over the weekend.
We did what all good friends do; laughed, drank, ate a lot of mini cupcakes, talked about our kids, our jobs, our families, our spouses, or lack there of and had a great time. I’m already looking forward to our group’s next birthday… mine!
Apart from my friends, I’ve even luckier that my husband understands how important my friendships are.
This post was written for Mama Kat’s Writer’s Workshop, Prompt 1.) Girls Night Out! Describe the last time you got to hang out with your friends. What stops you from doing this more often?
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Vision Board
You know from my vlog, My Three Favorite Magazines that I am a magazine junkie.
In the past, I have subscribed to just about everything on the newsstand and nowadays I collect my magazines from a variety of places (I’ll never reveal my sources!). I devour them from cover to cover, save articles that I want to re-read, share with others or might need some day. My might need someday pile is ridiculous!
Ever since I was in high school, I have used magazines to make collages. I would painstakingly remove the ring from my notebooks and cover the covers in photos I liked (think Guess ads and cute and furry puppies) and then used contact paper to protect them and then put the rings back on. It was quite the process, but it was a lot of fun for me. I covered notebooks for all my friends. And, of course, I saved my favorites:
As a teenager the walls of my bedroom were always plastered in Tiger Beat pull out posters and advertisements from magazines. This was my room circa 1990:
Surprisingly, the one thing I never made was a vision board.
What’s a vision board you ask?
A vision board is typically a poster-size board on which you paste or collage images that you’ve cut out of magazines. Right up my alley…
The idea behind a vision board is that when you surround yourself with images of who you want to become, what you want to have, where you want to live, or where you want to vacation and your life changes to match those images and those desires. Worth a shot, right?
In my women’s group this week, we all sat around a table covered with glue sticks, scissors and heaps of magazines and let our subconscious minds take over.
Here’s what I ended up with:
I still have some blank space but there are lots of inspiring words (calm, breathe, dream), peaceful images (hammock on the beach, cocktails poolside), photos of places I’d like to visit (Greece) or return to someday (Paris and New York) and people I hope to meet (Dave Matthews). What?! It could happen. All of it!
I’ll keep you updated on the progress and hope you’ll consider making one for yourself. Or if you have already created a vision board, maybe it’s time to update it?
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