Eric recently added this vintage looking motorcycle to our stable of vehicles. Doesn't he look great on it? I can't wait to learn to ride! 
continues to impress and inspire. Next time, we are going to try it with buckwheat and thin it out even further still. 
Roasted Pumpkin Soup (made with a Kabocha Squash from the backyard garden of my favorite local coffee shop!) served with a dollop of whipped cream and lots of black pepper. Roasting vegetables before putting them in soup does so much to enhance their flavor, and it's a pretty easy step. I learned that little trick from the Contessa. 
Kalamata olive tapenade on crackers with wine for a very elegant (and delightfully salty!) after school snack. The recipe is from this worldly cookbook
.
Less elegant, the silly face contest that breaks out around our table after the food is gone. 
Why is Eric's silly face so much cuter than mine? 
What the Sartorialist does best is men's fashion. Of course, he's passionate about it, and surrounded by fashion industry types, but more than that, he finds men who aren't afraid to express themselves through clothes. I wish more men understood how unbelievable sexy that kind of confidence is. Take this fellow for example. His look is slouchy, casual, even a bit grungy, but it certainly doesn't look accidental or like his girlfriend picked out his clothes for him. He Owns the Look. (That's what personal style boils down to: Confidence. Sheepishness is never cool.) My favorite part is the tiny bow he's pinned to his lapel. (Less favorite, the homeless man beard. But hey, that's his call to make!)
Mary gets up early in the cool, grey morning, makes a pot of hot spice tea, drinks it down in hot burning swallows and pulls on her Rubber Riding Boots. 
and heads into her little patch of green. She digs up weeds and pink wriggling earthworms on her knees until they begin to ache. 
Back into the house, she washes the black earth off her hands in a stream down the porcelain sink and dons her favorite Bandana Blouse.
She wanders down the sidewalks and pops into an antique shop to admire a charming collection of weatherbeaten watering cans.
But she can't resist the charm of this ample Herb Collecting Basket. On the way home, she stops in at her favorite cafe for a steaming cup of roasted tomato soup and a toasted cheese sandwich. 
She peruses the missed connections section of the paper while she savors her warm lunch, and on the way home, visions of ruffled red tulips and papery yellow daffodils fill her head. They'll be blooming any day now. 
The first thing we did was go through her closet. Gwen didn't have a ton of stuff- she is diligent about sending things out the door when they no longer work for her. However, she did have a lot of shirts hiding folded in drawers, and the shoe situation needed to be addressed. If you can't see what you have, you won't wear it. She also tended towards jeans and a tee when she wasn't sure what to put on. 
Then we began experimenting with creating looks. This is the part that I think many people just don't do. They throw something on in five minutes and decide that's as good as it can get. 
Gwen also segregated her clothes into "work" and "play". We discovered that many of the things she thought of as play clothes could go to work and vice versa. Here we put a pair of flamingo printed Vans with a striped polo. I love how the dark green cargos work as a neutral but add a little flare. Don't forget that the secret to mixing pattern is to vary the scale of the pattern. 
This top is a favorite of Gwen's that she didn't wear as much as she wanted to. We paired it with some cropped white trousers and a stacked wedge shoe. I love this look! 
Then we added a pretty printed tank and a brown structured jacket. Flip the cuffs and voila- she's a teacher! Don't forget to be open minded. Gwen said "I never would have put this together, but I never would have thought I could look this good in my own clothes!" Remember, we hadn't even bought one garment yet! These were all great things she already had.
The brown jacket works with almost everything Gwen owns- and adds a dash of professionalism. Here, she added a pretty rhinestone pin that had been hidden in her jewelery box for ages. The dark wash denim is also very grown up.
Here is her closet after day one. We got the shoes sorted into pairs, put her accessories into cubbies she can reach easily and hung her tops all in one place. Swimsuits were put in a bin so they are easy to grab from the top shelf when she needs them. 
I'm always looking for an excuse to bake an elaborate cake because it's one of my favorite ways to spend a Sunday afternoon, a completed cake is a beautiful backdrop for a Love Bird Photo shoot AND I have something delicious to share with Eric over a glass of champagne that evening. 
These little Love Birds in Lemon Yellow looked just right on top of the elaborate rosettes. I also added edible pearls to the centers of the flowers. Best of all? It tasted amazing! 
: Michael Pollan examines what he calls "our national eating disorder" (the Atkins craze, the precipitous rise in obesity) in this remarkably clearheaded book. It's a fascinating journey up and down the food chain, one that might change the way you read the label on a frozen dinner, dig into a steak or decide whether to buy organic eggs. You'll certainly never look at a Chicken McNugget the same way again. Pollan approaches his mission not as an activist but as a naturalist: "The way we eat represents our most profound engagement with the natural world." All food, he points out, originates with plants, animals and fungi.
: What perfect timing for this optimistic, uplifting debut novel (and maiden publication of Amy Einhorn's new imprint) set during the nascent civil rights movement in Jackson, Miss., where black women were trusted to raise white children but not to polish the household silver. Eugenia Skeeter Phelan is just home from college in 1962, and, anxious to become a writer, is advised to hone her chops by writing about what disturbs you. The budding social activist begins to collect the stories of the black women on whom the country club sets relies and mistrusts enlisting the help of Aibileen, a maid who's raised 17 children, and Aibileen's best friend Minny, who's found herself unemployed more than a few times after mouthing off to her white employers. The book Skeeter puts together based on their stories is scathing and shocking, bringing pride and hope to the black community, while giving Skeeter the courage to break down her personal boundaries and pursue her dreams. Assured and layered, full of heart and history, this one has bestseller written all over it. 
:In 1922, F. Scott Fitzgerald announced his decision to write "something new--something extraordinary and beautiful and simple + intricately patterned." That extraordinary, beautiful, intricately patterned, and above all, simple novel became The Great Gatsby, arguably Fitzgerald's finest work and certainly the book for which he is best known. A portrait of the Jazz Age in all of its decadence and excess, Gatsby captured the spirit of the author's generation and earned itself a permanent place in American mythology. Self-made, self-invented millionaire Jay Gatsby embodies some of Fitzgerald's--and his country's--most abiding obsessions: money, ambition, greed, and the promise of new beginnings. "Gatsby believed in the green light, the orgiastic future that year by year recedes before us. It eluded us then, but that's no matter--tomorrow we will run faster, stretch out our arms farther.... And one fine morning--" Gatsby's rise to glory and eventual fall from grace becomes a kind of cautionary tale about the American Dream.It's also a love story, of sorts, the narrative of Gatsby's quixotic passion for Daisy Buchanan. The pair meet five years before the novel begins, when Daisy is a legendary young Louisville beauty and Gatsby an impoverished officer. They fall in love, but while Gatsby serves overseas, Daisy marries the brutal, bullying, but extremely rich Tom Buchanan. After the war, Gatsby devotes himself blindly to the pursuit of wealth by whatever means--and to the pursuit of Daisy, which amounts to the same thing. "Her voice is full of money," Gatsby says admiringly, in one of the novel's more famous descriptions. His millions made, Gatsby buys a mansion across Long Island Sound from Daisy's patrician East Egg address, throws lavish parties, and waits for her to appear. When she does, events unfold with all the tragic inevitability of a Greek drama, with detached, cynical neighbor Nick Carraway acting as chorus throughout. Spare, elegantly plotted, and written in crystalline prose, The Great Gatsby is as perfectly satisfying as the best kind of poem.
:This expansive and engrossing multigenerational saga details the history of Hawaii through the experiences of one family. It begins in the 19th century with the dramatic meeting of a young Yankee sailor and a beautiful Tahitian princess. Their descendants, who live in contemporary Hawaii, are four cousins named Vanya, Ming, Rachel, and Jess who have been brought up by Pono, a kahuna, or seer, who has never talked about her mysterious past to her four granddaughters. Davenport deftly includes much information in the narrative--about politics, leprosy, and the racial melting pot that is Hawaiian society--with a minimum of didacticism. She incorporates folklore, history, and myth in a vivid, lush prose style that only occasionally becomes overwrought. This first novel is much better written than James Michener's Hawaii (1959) and brings Hawaiian history up to the present day.
The colors of this Kilim Duffel Bag make it a bit more wearable than some of the tribal trends I've seen. The pink makes it feel softer somehow. 
I discovered this lovely fat Cat on Chair print via my friend Katy. Not only does she create gorgeous calligraphy, she also has impeccable taste- add her to your Etsy circle at once! 
The same thing goes for my friend Libby. She scours Minneapolis for the most perfectly witty/kistchy things and she writes a lovely blog about it all. I'm crazy about these Souvenier glasses. They'd be the next logical addition to my (now massive) souvenier plate collection. 
I think it's the bruised and battered terra cotta pot that takes this simple Moss Mound from ordinary to quite special.
I'd like to toss this Woven Cotton Scarf around my neck for a day of whale watching here in Kona. It would look right at home against that blue water.
I love the handmade feel of this Embroidered Pendant Necklace and the elegant silver presentation which makes it feel polished too. 
