Alright, so I had planned to do a whole gift guide of suggestions for him, her, either, both, whatever...and then I remembered that Valentine's Day is kind of ridiculous. But you know what's not?
Galentine's Day.
So instead of spending $300 on a prix fixe dinner on the 14th, my recommendation is to celebrate on the 13th by throwing a little something special at the true love of you life: your BFF. Girls rule, boys drool. Am I right?
The other day, my daughter pointed to one of the jagged lines criss-crossing her palm. What are those cracks?, she wanted to know. So I pulled up a sort of Palmistry 101 website, and we sat there, labeling each one. Alright, so that one's your life line, I told her. That spot where it divides in two - that's when something big changes, like maybe you get a really cool new job.
After we'd covered the major lines - Life, Head, Heart, Fate - we twisted our hands from side to side, looking for the smaller cracks, then scrolling through the website to find out what they meant. Those little lines in between the index finger and the middle finger represent your kids, and I showed her how I have two. That's you and your brother, I said.
10AM and ready for a nap (oh my god, getting them out of the house, oh my god).
I spent the last three days in a house populated by four children, all of whom are equal parts lovely and awful, depending on the hour of the day and whether everyone can agree on the rules for playing "Hungry, Hungry Hippos" (spoiler: nobody can agree on the rules for playing "Hungry, Hungry Hippos," despite the fact that you'd think the game would be rather self-explanatory).
My friend Erin came down to visit from San Jose with her kids - who are my kids' best friends, and also, from time to time, their mortal enemies, as is par for the course for these kinds of almost sibling-like relationships - and it was...
Vince sweater (via TJ Maxx); Hozen bag; Zara sparkle pants (similar).
The point of this post is to answer a reader question that is very close to my heart, because it is about sweaters. But the secondary point of this post is to answer another reader's question, about Rent the Runway Unlimited.
Just so you have a sense of what you're getting into here.
...So that I don't kill my father before we've even begun our 4,000 hour transcontinental flight. ...Please?
Because he is currently doing the Dad Thing where he sends me article after article after article on Ten Things To Do In X Location!, and for whatever reason this is making me react like a bratty 16-year-old (UGH DAAAAAAAD), and I literally cannot make myself read the articles, but he will not stop sending them to me. (I'm also super conflicted about the trip full-stop, which doesn't help.)
Current favorite food: Sugarfish. Current favorite place to eat it: In bed. Current favorite thing to wear while eating it: these legging-pants and this sweater.
Shockingly, all I could think when I read this article was, "Oooooooh." Apparently I'm a displaced Park Slope mom. (The New Mom Uniform of Park Slope, via NYTimes.)
Current obsession: Laura Ashley pillows (and sheets, and throws). Allllll the pretty, feminine florals.
When I was a teenager, I more or less lived at the Salvation Army on West 46th Street. (As an aside, if you've never been, you MUST go if you ever find yourself in the city; it's four entire floors of some of the best thrifting anywhere on the planet - furniture included). In more recent years, I've pretty much put my love of thrift stores on ice, largely because one thing thrifting does require is time...and that just so happens to be a thing that small children aren't hugely interested in letting you have when you are doing something like shopping for things that aren't toys.
But here's a fun little factoid about thrift stores: If you find one in a fancy area, you GO. Because fancy people do things like give their old Gucci purses to Goodwill, because they can't be bothered to list them on TheRealReal (even though they should). So when a friend told me how spectacular the thrifting is over in Thousand Oaks - about twenty minutes away from me in the direction of the water, a.k.a. in the direction of much, much more expensive housing prices per square foot - I suddenly found myself Marie Kondo-ing my kids' rooms.
You know, because once I had all my bags filled with stuff to donate, I'd have to make my way over to the Thousand Oaks Goodwill. It's really the only responsible thing to do. And once I was there, I had to just pop in, just for a minute. (And just saying: Goodwill is a great organization that does tons and tons to support local communities; they're worth both your donations and your shopping dollars.)
Me at yesterday's Noritake shoot (I ate my props after taking this pic).
I learned about three things over the past twenty-four hours, and you should know about all of them. (Two of them I learned about from Francesca; #creditwhereitsdue.)
OK, so yesterday at about 4PM I had just wrapped the shoot above, and was happily ensconced in my office (my bed), wearing a chic little outfit (ancient pajamas) and eating a heart-healthy snack (leftover Buttercrunch Christmas Popcorn), when Francesca called and told me that I needed to come over. I protested that I was busy (watching Netflix). And besides, it was RAINING. People who live in Los Angeles do not drive to friends' places when it rains; they barricade themselves in their houses and panic.
Kind of insane just-us-three camping trip, Summer 2018
So here's an odd little post-divorce conundrum that hadn't occurred to me until just recently: How does one best go about having a "family vacation"? See, the kids have Spring Break coming up in April, and since they've gone on two trips with Kendrick recently I'd really like to take them somewhere special for the week (I know, that sounds competitive - and it is, a tiny bit, but also I'm finding myself craving that kind of magical time with them that seems to come with being out of your element).
But...what does one do, exactly? How do you vacation with kids when it's just you and them, without...I don't know...feeling like you're just spending the whole time herding cats? Or without feeling weird, being in a place that's very literally set up for the kind of family that you no longer technically are?
This is the Rolf-Benz 3100. It is very expensive. More options to come.
My friend Erin wants a recliner. Or, according to Erin, her husband wants a recliner...but let's be honest: We all kind of want a recliner, even though we know that recliners are the furniture equivalent of minivans.
Erin wants a recliner.
