There are three things that I require. All are completely non-optional.
{ Something To Wear }
The first is a new pair of pajamas. I ask for new pjs ever year - oversized and cozy and old man-ish and zero sexy, please and thanks - and every year I try to manipulate the present-opening process so that I can get my hands on the box that I suspect holds said pajamas first. And then I change into them, and wander around in my brand-new pajamas all day long. It is wonderful.
{ Magic. (Follow on Instagram @ramshackleglam) }
Hahahahahaha best desk accessory EVER.
I was just hunting around in my archives in search of a cookies-for-Santa recipe, and went down a wormhole of completely bizarre posts that I put up back in the day. How To Make the Perfect Snowball, anyone? ...Anyone? ...No? Sigh.
This little bug hasn't gotten in a lot of air travel yet - we thought we'd hold off until she reached the iPad-as-sedative age - but all that's about to change! In the coming year, we have lots and lots of plans for family travel, including a trip to New York for my dad's 70th birthday, a trip to Ohio to see Kendrick's family, and hopefully a trip to somewhere involving a lobster roll and a lounge chair and silence.
I've partnered up with Alamo for the second year in a row, so I'm going to be blogging about all our family travel experiences - along with ideas for how to make the whole experience not just "doable," but awesome (really) - over here. If there’s anything in particular relating to family travel that you especially want to see – any questions, suggestions, or just stuff you enjoy and want more of – let me know??
P.S. If you missed my Alamo posts last year, some snippets:
Getting dressed for a holiday party, chez us, is quite the undertaking. First, the TV goes on because life is easier when the TV goes on. If I can get Indy poured into clothing accompanied by the strains of Bubble Guppies the whole process moves far, far more quickly, and when you have four people to get out of the house anything that happens quickly is basically a miracle.
Next up is Goldie, who is generally the most laid-back, sweet-natured child on the planet, but who, when confronted with clothing that she likes, dials up the volume as high as it can possibly go. She does not want to wear those shoes, she wants to wear THESE shoes. And THAT DRESS. <shrieking if dress does not go on body in .5 seconds.> AND I NEED TO WEAR THAT SWEATER AND IF YOU TRY TO DELAY THE PROCESS OF PUTTING IT ON ME, MAMA, I WILL TAKE YOU DOWN. (As a refresher, she is 16 months old.)
So it’s a process. But a fun one, because man are they ever cute in their holiday gear.
Here is Goldie's room. It's almost identical to the nursery we put together for her back in Westchester (minus the leopard carpet, TEAR) - we even painted it the exact same shade of pale green that we chose during the office-to-nursery redo. I kept it super simple because it also functions as a guest room when people come to stay with us (that couch folds down into a queen-size bed), and also because I figure we have plenty of years of pink sparkle explosions ahead of us without getting started now. (It needs a rug. I'll get on that sometime in the next decade.)
But!
Were I starting from scratch with a nursery concept...ooooooh are the ones pictured here ever good. (They're good for kids' rooms, too, so I'm bookmarking 'em for a future redo.)
Me + Purple Pants + Rooftop | December 2011
A few weeks ago, I decided that what I wanted to wear to Kendrick's company holiday party was a pair of loose-fitting purple velvet pants - the ones pictured above, specifically - and a silky white button-down, plus lots of big jewelry. Sort of an aging 1980s socialite look, because that's always fun.
Except I couldn't find the pants; it appears that they were either sacrificed to the moving gods or donated in a moment of terribly poor decision-making that I have since forgotten. Which makes me sad because I like those pants so much, but mostly because they belonged to my Nanny Ruth. But no use crying over spilled milk, et cetera.
I once read a Nigella Lawson cookbook (and I do actually *read* cookbooks, cover to cover, as if they were for-real books with plotlines and such; it's my favorite thing to spend Christmas Day doing) in which she described a pasta dish - I think it was carbonara, but I'm not sure - as the kind of dish you carry to your bed and eat straight from the pot, preferably with someone you think is sexy.
I don't know about you, but anything that gets described that way is a thing that I want to eat. Like yesterday. This pasta dish, which I first wrote about back in 2010 (although the recipe has evolved over time into what you see below) is my personal eat-straight-from-the-pot dish: it's rich and creamy and cheesy and a touch sweet, and is - yes - the perfect thing to eat while laying in bed next to someone you think is sexy.
Or alone, in your pajamas, while watching Love, Actually. And I think we all know that's going to happen at some point during the next week or so, god willing, so here you go:
Everyone has those friends who make you want to just follow them around all day to see how, exactly, it is that they do life so damn well. For me, that's Stephen and Dave. You've been hearing about them for years now, ever since I started blogging - they're Kendrick's best friends from college, so we've known them forever, but we also lived in the same building for a few years and had some epic rooftop adventures. And then they moved to the West Coast and we thought, cool, let's do that too. (Kidding, but only sort of.)
Every time I go to their apartment - an industrial-style loft in San Francisco - I need to photograph it; it's just that well-done. The most interesting thing about it, though, is that every time I visit, I notice that it looks even better than the last time, but not because they've added stuff...it's usually, rather, that they've taken stuff away. Pared it all down.
Oh.
Illustration by Jacqueline Bisset
{ Buy Carrying On: Style, Beauty, Decor (and More) for the Nervous New Mom HERE }
Remember what I said about my second book being released in a couple of weeks? Scratch that. Apparently the date was pushed up and it's presently hanging out in Amazon warehouses right now (with an arrival date as early as December 14, depending on the shipping method you choose). Which means: if you're looking for a holiday gift for the mom-to-be or new mom in your life, you can totally get it into your (and then her) hands well in advance of Christmas Day.
Wren Yellow Gold and Rose Gold Opal Rings | Katie Diamond Opal and Diamond Ring
I recently discovered this jewelry brand through a friend who works with the company, and it's perfection. The goal of Iconery is to make fine jewelry unfussy, the kind of stuff you can wear everyday. My favorite pieces: the opal rings pictured here. Simple enough for stacking but spectacular enough to wear on their own, and priced in a way that allows you to actually buy one, rather than stare at them longingly through a store window.
