I just dropped my son off at his dad’s after helping him set out milk and cookies for Santa Claus and then reading “Twas the Night Before Christmas” with him.  I’ll see him again at 3 pm tomorrow, at which point Santa will have filled the living room with toys.  I’m going to stay up a little while longer to see if I can catch Santa in the act (in a Fight Club or Mr. Robot kind of way, of course), and while doing so, I thought I’d reflect a little on holiday traditions.

We all have them, although those of us with children probably make more of an effort to find and maintain them because, let’s be honest, there’s nothing like the magic of Christmas when you’re young.  As they say in A Christmas Story (which itself is a holiday tradition to watch for many people, as evidenced by the 24-hour marathons on TNT or TBS), Christmas is the one day of the year every kid spends the entire 364 other days planning for.  Some holiday traditions … like Elf on a Shelf or the aforementioned milk and cookies … are more widespread than others.  (Frankly, I was a total failure at Elf on a Shelf … I would always forget to move him, so he’s stayed up on a shelf in my closet for the last three years … total respect to those of you who stick with it.)  But others are a little more unique.  For example:

1. Reindeer Bells.  When I was little, my dad would wait until about an hour after I went to bed and then go outside with some sleigh bells and shake them around outside my window.  Knowing Santa was in the neighborhood and that I could forfeit his visit if I was naughty enough to try to see him, I would shut my eyes tighter and try (ineffectually) to sleep.  I now do the same thing with my son, and it’s so awesome to hear him tell me in the morning how he heard Santa stop by the house.
2. Homemade Stockings.  When I was a baby, my mom made me this amazing stocking that I still have to this day, which she was inspired to do by her mom, who made her this amazing stocking that my mom still has to this day.  As a result, even though there a lot of very cute stockings you can buy nowadays (especially from Pottery Barn), when Blake was born it was obvious to me that I had to make him his stocking, which I started to do about two weeks before his first Christmas.  Fast forward 11 months and two weeks later, and I was finished.  I even took two personal days off of work to power through and finish while binge-watching Breaking Bad (talk about the irony).  I’m pretty proud of the end product:

   

   … although I’m kind of relieved I probably won’t be having another kid because I have no idea how I’d find the time to make another stocking.

3. Christmas Eve Movie.  This one I started with my ex-husband.  His family would always go to the movies on Christmas Eve, which I think is a great idea because (a) there’s usually something good premiering (especially in this post-Disney owning Star Wars world) and (b) it helps the day go by more quickly (since Christmas Eve is just a countdown for Christmas).

And so today we hit up the iPic in some comfortable but mildly festive attire.  This olive green Haider Ackermann jacket that I got from MatchesFashion (http://www.matchesfashion.com), which I paired with a white t-shirt and dark blue jeans, felt like the holiday without being too elf-ish.

I know many of you will be enjoying your own holiday traditions as we head into Christmas morning 2016.  I hope all of you have an amazing day.  Merry Christmas to all!  And to all a good night.

Westworld has ended (and there WILL be a final assessment as soon as I can be sure that everyone who cares about wanting to see the show sans-spoiler alerts has been given sufficient time to watch it).  I’m totally bereft, of course, so I’ve been trying to find another show on TV that will take its place, all the while thinking of that Crosby, Stills & Nash lyric, “If you can’t be with the one you love, honey, love the one you’re with.”

So I have to say … I’m kind of loving Scream Queens.  I think it would be a Donald Trump-UUUUGE understatement to say it’s somewhat different than Westworld, but it’s totally fun.  The dialogue just whizzes past you filled with amazing one-liners and pop cultural references.  In some cases, you can hardly keep track.  Throughout this season there have been recurring references to Silence of the Lambs and the possessed hand from Evil Dead II, but the show has also been known to layer on references to the Smurfs, the rose petal bathtub scene from American Beauty, Ivana/Ivanka confusion, and Ryan Lochte hair (among other things) IN A SINGLE EPISODE.  Being mired as I am in pop culture, it’s hard not to shout out some serious respect.

This season is set in a hospital, which also allows for a lot of good-natured ribbing on medical shows that may use questionably scientific dialogue, impossibly rare diseases and a crazy amount of office romance that seems very difficult to sustain when everyone is probably really, really tired.  My favorite actors/characters are:

• Emma Roberts as Chanel, who perfectly delivers an unbelievable amount of dialogue every episode;
• John Stamos as Dr. Brock Holt, who plays up the whole “I went to Harvard” thing like, well, some of the people I know who went to Harvard (and NO, I’m not thinking of you);
• Niecy Nash, as FBI (Special) Agent Denise Hemphill, who cannot do anything that is not funny (including effective use of double negatives);
• Glen Powell as Chad Radwell, who plays dumb in the most intelligent way I’ve ever seen; and last but not least
• THE FASHION!!!!

Everything that the Chanels wear is fun and colorful and over-the-top.  It’s totally risky and not for the faint of heart, but you gotta love it.  And so, when I saw this outfit from Emilio Pucci on sale at Moda Operandi (http://www.modaoperandi.com), I thought I’d pull a page from their book and try it out.  The skirt is a wild metallic print, including a silver lame panel, and the red Lurex sweater and red boots from Gianvito Rossi (which I got from Net-a-Porter (http://www.net-a-porter.com)) tie it together (like the rug in The Big Lebowski), I think.

So if you’re feeling a little down now that Westworld isn’t coming back until 2018, try watching Scream Queens (and perhaps wear an outfit like this) to lift your spirits!

I’m a big fan of trying not to take myself too seriously.  I may not always succeed,  of course … we all get sucked into life’s trials and tribulations … but generally I want to be able to find the humor in a situation and to feel comfortable being a total goofball or laughing at myself.

I think my love of fashion can sometimes mask this facet of my personality.  A lot of fashion is built around imagery that is impossibly cool or chic.  The models are generally not smiling in their pictures (even though I would literally not be able to wipe the grin off my face if I got to wear any of those clothes), and the iconic designers intimidate with their dark sunglasses and haughty expressions.  As a result, there’s sometimes an assumption that people who love fashion are a little (or a lot) self-absorbed and humorless and too cool for school and, at the extreme, can suck the fun out of the room (especially if the room has something like a Star Wars or X-Files marathon going on), albeit in a very stylish way.

But is it all an act?  Are a lot of people in fashion having fun with it, like I am, but playing up the narcissistic/vanity side as part of the joke?

I started thinking about this more when my friend Chris posted a link from GQ on his Facebook page titled “Tom Ford’s Guide to Being More Like Tom Ford”  (https://www.facebook.com/gq/videos/10155482879863098/?pnref=story).  Tom offers three tips, the first of which is pretty benign (carry a bunch of mints in your pocket when you go to a party), but the last two of which are so over-the-top pompous (get a full length mirror “to assess yourself in a kind of architectural way” and know the best side to your face, which “may be the back”) that I can’t help but think he MUST be letting us know he’s in on the joke.

And his clothes ARE totally fun!  Take this black, fringed dress with leather trim that I recently got off The Outnet (http://www.theoutnet.com), for example.  The fringe moves great when I walk, the leather-trimmed belt adds shape, and the keyhole top can be unbuttoned for going out (assuming liberal use of double-sided tape, which I need a break from after this weekend).  I paired the dress with black boots from Burberry that I got from Farfetch (http://www.farfetch.com), which made the dress perfect for day, but with some black stilettos, it could easily work for a night out.

Fashion is about image, obviously, but it always helps to remember that you can’t judge a book by its cover and oftentimes there may be some humor or fun behind the image.  I’ll leave you with what I always come back to when I need to be reminded of this … Prince on Muppets Tonight:

 

It’s holiday party season, and that means everyone has an excuse to get dressed up like they’re going to some Hollywood awards show (maybe not quite as fancy as the Oscars, but definitely on the level of the MTV Movie Awards, which I’ve always thought is so much fun …did you ever see the Mission Impossible parody with Ben Stiller as Tom Crooz(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WjmrMOroCRE) … Ben Stiller and Tom Cruise together at the end, dressed alike, both laughing Tom Cruise’s slightly maniacal laugh, is priceless).

Anyway, it’s always tempting to get a new dress, which I did this year, and what I discovered is that a lot of the options out there required me to adopt some tricks of the trade that the celebrity stylists use.  The trend seemed to be towards very deep V-cuts and high slits, and for an office party, you have to make sure everything stays in place.  So I decided not to limit myself to something way conservative and instead ripped a page out of Jennifer Lopez’s book circa 2000 when she wore that green Versace dress to the MTV Video Music Awards (fun fact, this dress got so many searches on the Internet that it was the motivation for the Google images search feature):

I ended up falling in love with this white pleated dress with accompanying grosgrain belt by Galvan that I got off of Forward by Elyse Walker (http://www.fwrd.com).  It has a deep V-cut and a high slit, so I had to make liberal use of double-sided tape to make sure I remained office appropriate.  My go-to brand is called Matchsticks by Commando, which I get from Shopbop (http://www.shopbop.com) (although it’s available at a number of stores):

Of course, double-sided tape is not easy to get on.  It sticks to almost anything, including itself (making just a messy tape ball), and peeling it off both sides of its backing requires patience.  Make sure to give yourself an extra 20 minutes or so to do it without pressure or frustration, and bring along some extra just in case you get too crazy on the dance floor and need to re-apply.  It’s also good to have a partner in crime who can monitor the situation and give you a signal (mine was the nose touch from the movie The Sting) if you need to check yourself before you wreck yourself.

Commando also makes a lot of other good foundation items, like Low Beams if you can’t wear a bra or seamless thongs if you’re wearing a tight skirt, so if you want to go out with the confidence of JLo in a dress cut down to her navel, you should check them out.

Happy partying!!!!

I always find it fascinating to discover what extracurricular activities people did in high school.  Sometimes I can totally guess that someone was a cheerleader or a basketball player or student council president,  but other times I’m completely surprised that someone was a reporter for the school newspaper or had the lead role in the school play or made extra money being a “Mystery Guest” at Jack in the Box.

My big activity in high school was cross-examination debate, but in high school, kids are encouraged to be like Jason Schwartzman’s character in the movie Rushmore and have tons of extracurriculars, so of course I had other things going on that made me cooler than cool (said ironically), like marching band and math team and science team and … wait for it … typing team.

Yes, in high school there was competitive typing.  And what’s more, I learned to type on an electric typewriter, not a computer.  Correction fluid like Wite-Out or Liquid Paper is super-important when you’re using a typewriter.  Not a lot of people may remember this stuff … in my office today, all I can find is correction tape … but correction fluid was so ubiquitous for awhile that it was the basis for a quick sight gag in the movie Ferris Bueller’s Day Off where Principal Rooney’s assistant is discreetly sniffing it at her desk:

I’ve often wished there was Wite-Out for white cotton blouses (but more effective because, let’s face it, Wite-Out never really lived up to its promise).  Although nothing does a better job of highlighting a beautiful skirt than a crisp, tailored, white cotton blouse, a white blouse can pick up stains and other spills (especially on the cuffs) so easily.  I guess products like the Clorox Bleach Pen come close; however, much like Wite-Out, they don’t seem to cover up everything.  And it’s unfortunate!  For example, this white Theory button-down blouse is so lady-like and does an amazing job of drawing attention to the jacquard and fil coupé skirt from Balenciaga that I got off of Matchesfashion (http://www.matchesfashion.com).

Accordingly, I’ve developed a few white cotton blouse “hacks” over the years:

1. No matter what the cleaning instructions say, don’t dry clean a white cotton blouse.  I chose dry cleaning for such a long time, and my blouses would come back slightly yellowish or dingy from the chemicals.  I now ask for them to be laundered and then pressed, and they stay looking crisp for longer.
2. Give a white cotton blouse a short shelf-life as a standalone piece.  While I will wear the Balenciaga skirt for years, I’ll probably replace the blouse within a year since the stains will start to pile up.  I usually try to get a little more life out of the blouse by wearing it under sweaters (not only does it offer a nice barrier against an itchy sweater, but the collar can really dress a sweater up).
3. Use Friends & Family sales to stock up on white cotton blouses.  Saks Fifth Avenue (http://www.saks.com) and Shopbop (http://www.shopbop.com) usually offer around 25% off on most non-high-end designer merchandise twice a year.  I can always scoop up two or three Theory or Rag and Bone blouses to replace the ones I’m retiring.

Not as great as an incredibly effective sartorial Wite-Out, but it gets the job done …

How many of you watched the TV show “How I Met Your Mother”?  ‎I didn’t watch it regularly, but for awhile it was a standard TV choice on airplanes, so every few months or so, I caught an episode or two. Among other things, I learned there’s this ladies’ man named Barney (played by Doogie Howser (AKA Neil Patrick Harris)) who instructs his bros to “Suit Up!” when they go out for a night on the town. By “Suit Up!”, he literally means put on a suit because … as ZZ Top summed it up best … “every girl’s crazy ’bout a sharp dressed man”.

You know who else also epitomizes this philosophy? The rapper Pitbull (favorite Pitbull song = “Give Me Everything”). Unlike a lot of other musicians who wear ripped or saggy jeans or track suits, he’s always suited up like he’s ready for a corporate meeting to negotiate his next record deal. My sister thinks it’s the hottest thing ever, even in his music videos where he’s dancing all night in the club … which we all know in reality means he can’t take his jacket off even though he wants to because his shirt is SOAKED.

I don’t think women suiting up has the ‎same effect for a night on the town, but it’s something we women have to do from time to time for our day jobs. Personally, I think it’s really hard to find a unique suit that has a flattering cut, so I always have my eye out and may snap up a suit I really love even if I’m not in the market for a new one.  I gravitate toward classic pieces that I think will be in style for quite some time and tend to choose more skirt suits than pantsuits because (1) I don’t have to get them hemmed and (2) they are a little more forgiving of any weight fluctuations I may have from year-to-year.

When I saw this Oscar de la Renta suit on Net-a-Porter (http://www.net-a-porter.com), I just had to splurge on it, even though my company allows business casual attire and I rarely have to wear a suit. The fabric is unique because it’s this amazing blue and green tweed that I think would complement almost anyone’s coloring. And the peplum jacket has a matching belt that I can cinch at the waist to make the shape of the suit a little more feminine. I just feel great every time I wear this suit, which is good because suit days at work are usually important days.

And if Barney told me to “Suit Up!”, this would totally be my go-to … even if everybody would be asking me what meeting I was coming from and why didn’t I go home to change first.

Now that Thanksgiving has come and gone, a lot of us are counting down the shopping days until Christmas. D-Day for me used to be the last day I could select standard shipping online and still get my stuff by Christmas Eve, but now that so many Websites have gotten wise to this and offer upgraded shipping until December 22^nd or 23^rd, there’s really not much downside to waiting until the last minute …

OH, WAIT … now that I have a kid, there IS!

Why, you ask? After all, Amazon has an incredible toy department, and they can sometimes deliver the SAME day (which still kind of seems like magic to me).  But even with the Amazon drone-sponsored drop shipments, there will always be a Christmas that will have that ONE toy that every kid will go absolutely crazy for, and supply will NOT keep up with demand.  You will have to plan ahead and decide if you’re going to get the toy or instead create some cover story for why Santa Claus, who allegedly can fulfill every nice kid’s wish, was not able to deliver this time (which, by the way, is a perfectly legitimate move … I think it’s helpful for kids to learn that good things come to those who wait).

This year, that toy is the Hatchimal. Hatchimals are these super-cute stuffed animals that are combinations of birds and other animals (e.g., owlicorn or bearakeet).  They come in oversized eggs that hatch after a kid plays with them enough.  Once they hatch, a kid can interact with the stuffed animal to take it through three stages of development (for you children of the 1990s, they’re Tamagotchis on steroids):

Hatchimals are now going for 5x MSRP on Amazon. I don’t have to work for an investment manager to figure out that’s a pretty good return.

This Hatchimal craze made me think back to other Christmas toy crazes. The craziest toy craze I remember is the Cabbage Patch Kid Craze of 1983.  Back when there was a Sears catalog, I used to flip through it and circle what I wanted for Christmas, and I remember circling that doll without fully understanding that people were actually fighting each other for them when stores got new stock (the dolls subsequently crashed and burned under various owners, but when they were under Coleco, they were HUGE).  Luckily, my dad just happened to come across a new shipment when he stopped by a Walgreen’s in Downtown Houston during work.  Otherwise, I wouldn’t have gotten one since back then there weren’t the online scalping markets we have now.

A doll that didn’t inspire quite the same craze as the Cabbage Patch Kid but reminded me of the outfit above was Rainbow Brite. She was whimsical with these awesome color-blocked shoes and dress:

I think this Salvatore Ferragamo outfit that I got from Moda Operandi (www.modaoperandi.com) and Farfetch (www.farfetch.com) captures that same whimsy.  The skirt has color-blocked panels with zig-zag trim, and the turtle-neck sweater has oversized buttons that do a great job of tying the black, white and magenta panels together.  And I added a color-blocked Pierre Hardy handbag that I got from Gilt (www.gilt.com) to stay with the theme.

I think it’s a super-fun outfit and totally puts me in the mood for toy buying … even if I have to scour everywhere for the Nintendo or Transformers or Furby of the moment.

As many of you may have guessed by now, I’m totally a child of the 1980s.  It can sometimes take a little time to figure out what defined a decade, but with the 80s, it always seemed kind of obvious.  There were the looks — shoulder pads, perms and hairspray, frosted make-up, acid-washed jeans that were pegged at the ankles.  There were the hobbies — video games, roller rinks, malls, MTV.  And there was the culture — conspicuous consumption, Reaganomics, perestroika and glasnost, Valley guys/girls.  A lot has changed in the last 2 1/2 decades, but I’m still drawing inspiration from a time when everything seemed awesome and over-the-top.

One word that appeared to be everywhere in the 80s (besides obvious ones like “gnarly” or “illin'” or “bogus” or “grody”) was “electric”.  It kind of made sense with all the neon and flash.  If you remember any or all of the following, you may appreciate what this post is getting at:

• The song “Electric Avenue” by Eddy Grant — As in “we’re gonna rock down to”.  This video was on constant replay on MTV in the early days, with Eddy Grant sitting on his couch singing.  I’m a big fan of sitting myself, so any video where someone is just doing his thing on his couch speaks volumes to me.
• The movie Breakin’ 2:  Electric Boogaloo —  I still cannot believe there were TWO movies about breakdancing … Breakin’ and Breakin’ 2 (both released in the same year, which suggests, shockingly, there was just too much to fit into one movie).  Of course breakdancing brought along hip-hop dancing, which brought along Jessica Alba in Honey, and she’s awesome, so I should be thankful.
• The song “Electric Boogie” and the accompanying dance, the Electric Slide — This song was originally released by Marcia Griffiths in 1983 but was rerecorded in 1989 and started a line dancing craze.  It’s always the dance I think of when I hear Coolio’s “Fantastic Voyage” and the chorus “slide, slide, slippity-slide …”, although I have no idea if that’s REALLY the dance he would be doing.
• The album “Electric Youth” by Debbie Gibson — I didn’t listen to Debbie Gibson, but I know a lot of people who did.  I wasn’t in the Tiffany camp either, although I will stop and listen to her cover of “I Think We’re Alone Now” if it’s ever on the 80s on 8 station on Sirius.  But talk about an inspiration for the Britney Spears/Christina Aguilera showdown in the next decade!
• The line “electric word, life” from “Let’s Go Crazy” by Prince — An amazing prelude to an amazing party song.  I should learn how to do the Electric Slide to it.

If there’s any outfit that should be pictured next to the word “electric” in the dictionary, it’s this one.  Electric blue thunderbolts and an electric blue bag.  I’m feeling all kinds of 80s nostalgia when I wear this.  The dress is from Christopher Kane that I got off of The Outnet (http://www.theoutnet.com), and the bag is from Pierre Hardy that I got off of Farfetch (http://www.farfetch.com).  It’s the same fun and flash (literally) that the 80s personified, but with a modern edge.

So now I’m going to drive home for Thanksgiving and jam out to some 80s tunes.  Maybe I’ll even break out the best holiday song ever … “Christmas in Hollis” by Run-DMC.  Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!!!!!

Whenever I hear the word “velvet,” I think of three things:

1. The 1989 song “Black Velvet” by Alannah Myles – It won her a Grammy in 1990 for Best Female Rock Vocalist, but if you don’t remember it, the chorus goes:

   Black velvet and that little boy smile
   Black velvet with that slow southern style
   A new religion that’ll bring you to your knees
   Black velvet if you please

   The song is kind of bluesy rock and has this awesome music video to go with it where Alannah Myles is singing on the porch of a log cabin wearing jeans with black leather chaps. I’ve never understood what “black velvet” refers to, so in writing this post, I looked it up on Wikipedia (which anyone can contribute to, so you know it’s got to be true), and “black velvet” is apparently a reference to Elvis Presley because his image is painted on so many black velvet paintings (perhaps even beating out dogs playing poker).  Fascinating!

2. Velvet Jones – This is a character created by Eddie Murphy on “Saturday Night Live” in the early 1980s. According to Rolling Stone, Velvet is #16 in the 40 best “Saturday Night Live” characters of all time. He was the founder of the Velvet Jones School of Technology, which offered books and educational materials on jobs people don’t usually train for (like being a pimp), and also sold trashy “romance” novels where there wasn’t much romance.

3.  Holiday attire!

This last item is obviously the subject of this post. As we head into the holiday season, I’m starting to put the velvet (and also the lurex … because it’s totally festive to dress like tinsel during the holidays) into heavy rotation. Velvet is a rich, decadent fabric that offers a lot of warmth on chilly evenings, and it makes me think of Santa and his elves. I do think you have to be careful to find a good quality of velvet (otherwise, rather than feeling soft, it feels sort of itchy), and it’s important to make sure the cut isn’t too loose so it doesn’t come off as too loungey (which happened with this emerald velvet suit I had been lusting over; when I put it on, I felt like I belonged at the Playboy Mansion in the 1970s). Also, I think it’s good to stay away from a true Christmas red or green unless you want to role-play as the aforementioned Santa or one of his elves.

One of the alternatives to full velvet that I really loved when I saw it was the velvet-flocked dress I’m wearing above from Adam Lippes, which I got from Matchesfashion (www.matchesfashion.com). I met Adam at one of his trunk shows, and he explained that some of the velvet is scraped off of the fabric by a special machine, which leaves this amazing, distinctive design that is complemented by the gold bursts. Beautiful! I’m wearing mine in this California autumn heat with Christian Louboutin ankle-strap heels that I got from Net-a-Porter (www.net-a-porter.com), but I think it would look just as amazing with stockings and booties.

So haul out the holly, step into the velvet and get your holiday on! Thanksgiving is next week!

Today, November 14th, is World Diabetes Day, and November has been proclaimed National Diabetes Month by President Obama.  As a result, I thought it was fitting to do a post showcasing this amazing Alaia eyelet-embellished tote I recently got off of Net-A-Porter (http://www.net-a-porter.com) with the glucose testing supplies for my son that I have to make sure are in my handbag at all times.  I fished out testing strips, spare lancets, a lancing device and a glucose meter.  There’s also a bunch of candy in my handbag for sugar lows (gummy bears are a favorite, although Skittles offer a lot of sugar bang for your buck), but I thought that kind of ruined the picture.

My son was diagnosed with Type I diabetes when he was a little over 2 1/2 years old.  I’ll be honest … it was NOT easy.  I had an irrational fear of needles, so it took a lot of mental preparation for me just to be able to inject my son.  I practiced on my mom, and the first time I stuck her, I probably had that needle poised and ready to go for 20 minutes, just trying to get past the mental block of piercing her skin.  She at least knew what was going on; Blake didn’t understand why he had to be injected up to six or seven times a day and pricked slightly more often than that.  Thankfully, now that he’s 5, he’s on the pump, which we have to change only every two or three days.  The insulin tube gets inserted like a thumb tack, which I think would hurt a lot (more so than the needles), but Blake’s become a real champ at it.

There are days when it seems to get a little easier, but we always have to be vigilant.  We still wake up twice during the night to test him so he doesn’t accidentally have a low (since we don’t yet have the confidence that he will always wake himself up).  And nothing can go into his mouth that I don’t account for (one time I found an unopened canister of Pringles hidden under his chest of drawers, and it was so clear that he just wanted to know they would be there for when he asked to have them, and not that he would sneak to eat them like a typical kid, that it almost broke my heart).

I think we’d all love to find a cure, but until then, we continue to make strides that make me confident that Blake can have a long, healthy, amazing life with Type I diabetes.  And I know that’s due in large part to the awareness raised by World Diabetes Day and National Diabetes Month and the research and outreach efforts from organizations like the International Diabetes Foundation and the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (focused exclusively on Type I diabetes).  Plus, Blake’s an amazing kid, just like all the Type I kids I’ve met … so adaptable and full of life and never once feeling sorry for themselves.

And my next post, I promise, will be lighthearted …