My girl, and "our" girls

Last night I put one of Hazel's swimsuits on her for the first time, squeezing her broad thighs and roly poly almost-six-month body into the stretchy fabric. We're ten days away from vacation - time to make sure her suits are good to go. They are.

I get these moments now and then of being utterly overwhelmed with happiness that I have a little girl. Seeing her in her very first swimsuit last night very nearly broke me. There she was smiling at me in an old-fashioned print with a sweet little skirt and a high neck and all that skin. It was too much. She has an entire life ahead of her to explore her relationship with swimwear (and if I have any power at all, I hope that relationship will be happier than many girls'), but this first chapter is ours together.

I feel that way about so many firsts she's having these days. I rub her feet - perfectly smooth and un-calloused, since she's never actually walked on them, and I wonder where they'll take her. I see her light up with a grin at someone and think about all the people who'll inspire that smile in her lifetime, and all the smiles she'll inspire in turn. I see her brain whirling and hear her sounds coming, and wonder how many grand ideas will come out of that mouth, how many people will turn to listen to what she has to say.

Because she's my girl, I predict she'll have lots of opinions and quite a lot to say. I want her to be whatever she wants to be, but to be it proudly, and I know she'll have every opportunity in the world to live out that motto. Other girls aren't so lucky. And maybe because just the sight of my little one in a swimsuit makes me teary, maybe because I'm filled with every bit of hope in the world for my little girl right now, the horror of 300 kidnapped girls in Nigeria is especially appalling.

There must have been so much hope in their eyes, sitting in their classrooms and learning about the world. Their families knew that going to school was the best way to channel their hopes into a better life, the best way to rise to the challenge presented by their dreams. If you believe, like I do, that making the women of this world happy is the key to achieving peace anywhere and everywhere, then you know it all begins in a classroom. Of course the classroom is the battleground.

As Uzodinma Iweala wrote in the Washington Post this morning: "The kidnapping of these girls is the crudest attempt to destabilize our country. It is a cowardly act by lazy minds who lack the ability or desire to address a pluralistic nation as the democratic process demands, through the spoken or written word." Kidnapping, he explains, is the worst kind of tool in a young democracy where hope is the currency: "[Kidnapping] turns this hope into a liability that can paralyze."

Paralyzing the future and extinguishing the light in the eyes of 300 girls will have a ricochet effect within Nigeria that I can't even begin to comprehend. The horror of it is both why a "hashtag movement" is so easily prompted, and also why it could never be enough. I know it's not enough, but I say #BringBackOurGirls anyway. I see Hazel's sparkling eyes and her smile and those sweet rolls exposed by her new swimsuit, and I think about little girls everywhere. I know it's not enough, but I say it again, and again, and again: #BringBackOurGirls.

Friday I'm in Love

Thanks for your interesting comments on de-stressing this week, everyone - I loved reading how you turn off your brains and unwind. As a big first step, I did something crazy and new on Wednesday and Thursday of this week: I took a real lunch break! It turns out that eating anywhere but my office desk does great things for my brain, especially if that anywhere is a park bench next to a water feature. This is rocket science, I know. At any rate, we might be up to something fun and exciting this weekend - I'll 'fess up next week. In the meantime, some little tidbits from my world on the Web (outside of near-constant Todd Akin outrage, of course)... Have a wonderful weekend!

Time-Travel Photography

I'm obsessed with this photography project by Sergey Larenkov. Superimposing historical scenes (wartime action... wow) over today's images produces something eery and wondrous, all at once.

Hal Grades Your Bike-Locking

I just love this guy. Via Streetfilms comes this 2003 classic, Hal Grades Your Bike Locking. Hal rocks. There are sequels, too.

21 Jump Street

I love a good foreign film or depressing melodrama as much as the next film snob. You know what I also love, though? Well-cast comedy that's a lot smarter than you expect it to be. Enter 21 Jump Street, the couch with my guy, a big bowl of homemade popcorn, and the most enjoyable Friday night in recent history. Nope, not even kidding - this movie made me giggle. A lot.

Tick tock, North Carolina

Before yesterday, North Carolina was the last Southern state without a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage. Before today, I also believed North Carolina was the last Southern state to secede from the Union. I just google-checked my memory and discovered that Tennessee actually seceded a week after my home state did. There goes a youthful assurance, a little piece of why I've always loved home. (Google: killing dreams since 1998.)

The truth of the matter, though, is that what matters more than when. North Carolina did secede from the Union. North Carolina now does have a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage. Last night was a deja vu moment for me. I saw myself driving my high school car (a hand-me down from my grandmother), with its "Jesse Helms Doesn't Speak For Me" bumper sticker on the back. I'd found it at a little bookstore in Chapel Hill that offered a discount if you could name a historical event that happened on the year they pulled out of a hat. Any nerd like me knows that the French Revolution began in 1789, so my bumper sticker cost me practically nothing. It wasn't the only lefty bumper sticker in my high school parking lot, either. We were in the Triangle of Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill after all, a dynamic region for research, universities, and industry. (The marriage amendment lost 4-to-1 in the Triangle last night, for perspective.) But back then in the 1990s, gun racks still outnumbered peace sign decals. We liked to show our stripes.

Those stripes are everywhere, if you're looking for them. The problem with making assumptions about any "red" state is that it ignores not only the pockets of blue, but the legions of people working hard to change the tide in their surroundings. There's a particular kind of state pride among those who love their state despite their state, who have a seasoned respect that's deeper and more honest than sheer boosterism. Making blanket statements about regions does so at the expense of the folks working hard there to make a difference, and it's something I take personally. Change is slow, and it starts small. Bumper stickers matter. But more than that, so do conversations on front porches, at the neighborhood park, in churches, in the checkout line. This small, steady change is happening all over the South. It's why some of my favorite people are progressive women from Texas. It's why North Carolina voted for Obama in 2008. It's why my teenage cousin half my age just went to her junior prom in NC with her girlfriend, and no one raised an eyebrow.

That same cousin's Facebook status yesterday was "And we keep fighting... and we keep going," said with all the assurance of a seasoned community organizer. She knows that time is on her side. We all do. While headlines are made about irrational amendments being passed, my family and friends at home, some of whom are gay, are trying to go about their lives just as they did yesterday. They're talking with their neighbors, raising families, and adding value to their communities. Their hearts are hurting, but they know the clock is ticking. The bravery in their hearts is the best thing I know. The second-best is the dedication of those on the ground already trying to peel this thing back, already laying the groundwork for how progress will reassert itself.

Tick tock, North Carolina. The march of progress has never left you behind completely, and it won't now, either. You're too beautiful to be shadowed by hate, too smart to be labeled something you're not. Time will tell.

Color peeks

Is anyone else using their one spare minute of the day to hungrily gulp down all the seedy details of the bastard IMF chief rape charge like it's an episode of Law and Order: SVU?

No? Just me?

Anyway... it's been hard for me to break away and blog. Work has been nuts, so when I'm not working I'm in a sort of frenzied rush to make up for lost time around the house. I wonder if I'd feel this way as strongly if I didn't work from home. Because I'm here all day, the evidence of omgsomuchlefttodo is all around me. I can't escape it. My brain's on overdrive, with visions of brush strokes appearing as soon as I close my eyes. My arms are phantom painting, even when they're still. And yet, there is truly so much left to do. At some point late last week we realized that by continuing to work on our big projects we were letting the little things like organization and clothes-unpacking fall by the wayside, so we spent a half-day on Saturday and Sunday focusing on organization. This helped tremendously, but I still can't find 9/10 of my warm-weather clothes. A friend commented to me that I'm making great time getting this house in order, and my jaw dropped. Me, making great time? I feel like the slowest settler-in-er on the planet. See also: me being my toughest critic.

At any rate, I have a charged camera and a somewhat charged computer back in my possession, but since I'm lacking the time to do detailed posts, how about some sneak peeks instead? More coming soon, I promise.

You know my favorite thing about sneak peek pictures, by the way? They're just tiny little slivers of a space that help you imagine a room that's not full of boxes and randomness. Maybe you can even believe something's hanging on the wall or some such madness. With that, let your imaginations run wild:

Our living room/entryway/stairs are now a color called "Chestertown Buff" by Benjamin Moore. We've called it every possible incarnation of this name on accident or accidentally on purpose, including "Charlestown Tough," who we like to think of as a Townie, or "Provincetown Ruff," the perfect name for a P-town gay bar.

The dining room is a light olive green from Benjamin Moore called Olive Branch - the perfect backdrop to these peonies. Olive Branch is not, by the way, the same color as Olive Tree, a color I mistakenly bought a quart of over the weekend. Oh yes, my paint follies continue!

Lo and behold, I finally selected a color for the kitchen! This is huge, folks. I'll get more into my deep thoughts about it later, but for now, here's a dash of BM's Azores on the kitchen wall, featuring small punches of red and orange to represent my red dishes and flame Le Creuset. I'm pretty pumped about it.

And last but not least, some major bathroom progress!

Exciting times over here. We are all paint, all the time.

Friday I'm in Love

Whew! Busy, busy, busy week. Let's get right to it, then.

Giddy Planner Alert

I do work for communities all over the country, but the work that means the most to me is when I get the chance to make a difference where I live. This week, I rolled up my sleeves and begin working with a DC community, as we kicked off a planning process for a project that's intriguing on a number of levels. Even though I'm far away in the news photo above, you can easily see that I have a big 'ol grin on my face, due largely to the totally delightful group that I was facilitating. Getting to know communities and helping them forge plans that best capture their vision is what I do best, and having the opportunity to do that in my new city makes my heart smile. (Nerdy community planner group hug!)

Rescued Baby Bats

I feel terrible for the flooding that's ravaging Australia, but how do I feel upon discovering the extreme cuteness that is rescued baby bats wrapped in blankets? Fantastic!

Healing after Tucson

The president, telling the crowd that Gabby Giffords had just opened her eyes. The crowd, cheering on the brave men and women who helped at the scene. The message, about how words matter, and about why love is stronger than hate. The good people we lost last weekend. The little girl inspired by democracy, with her entire life ahead of her. "She saw all this through the eyes of a child, undimmed by the cynicism, vitriol that we adults all too often just take for granted. I want to live up to her expectations. I want our democracy to be as good as Christina imagined it." All this, on my mind all week long.

Friday I'm in Love

Weekend! I personally feel like every weekend in the summer should be three days, don't you? We're off to Connecticut to hang out with T's family for the weekend, but before I go, three picks for the week:

Arrested Development: The Action Movie

Lest you think I'm a film snob who hates summer action flicks, please check out this re-imagining of Arrested Development... as an action film. Amazing! I love anything Bluth. (And fine, all I really want to see this summer is "The Kids Are All Right" and "I Am Love.")


Tovicorri iPad Case

I've decided that an iPad would be the perfect complement to my kitchen. I know, I know, this is kind of ridiculous. And I need this food processor first. BUT. Cooking with my laptop, where many of my recipes are, is a huge pain, not to mention not very good for my laptop. I worry about it and have to move it a lot and it gets in the way, or I have to keep stopping what I'm doing to walk to it in its safe place far from heat and splatters, etc. So I have it all figured out: a sleek iPad with every cooking link and app my heart desires, lightweight and limber and propped up on a cheap knockoff of this minimalist stand so that I can read easily. But outside of the kitchen, say on the train to Connecticut or hanging out at my local lunch spot, I will carry it in this Tovicorri iPad Case, which looks like me and is the opposite of the minimalist kitchen stand. And then all will be well in my consumer world. (After the additional acquisitions of the food processor, new patio furniture cushions, new living room chair, and new bedding, of course!)


The Crisis of Capitalism, in cartoons


In a natural segue from the egregious consumerism shown in my last entry... The Crisis of Capitalism! Whether or not you agree with this economist (or if you're not sure), this video is fascinating to watch for the rapid-fire cartoon interpretations of the lecturer's words. It's kind of like that UPS guy and his whiteboard, only ten times cooler. This video makes me feel rather skill-less, so be prepared for that if you also lack any sort of artistic talent. If you're feeling contentious or want more sides to his presentation, there are great debates about capitalism and Marxism in the comments of both the YouTube video and the blog post. Like my newfound appreciation for Van Gogh Espresso Vodka, this link is brought to you by my childhood pal Allie, who is a community banking rockstar when she's not pressuring me to consume mysterious liquor.

Happy, happy weekends, everyone!

Gulf oil and seafood and YOU

What do I mean when I talk about eating what I preach? Shrimp is a good example.

More often than not, I walk into a market with a craving for shrimp and turn away disappointed. I'm committed to buying US wild-caught shrimp for a slew of reasons, most importantly because doing so supports an industry and a culture that I care about strongly. Foreign shrimp, much of it farm-raised, has been flooding the US market at an alarming rate for years. Besides simply not tasting as good, spending my dollars on foreign shrimp hurts shrimpers in North Carolina and the Gulf, folks whose livelihood is always dangling by a thread. Spending my dollars on US wild-caught shrimp is just like voting, and I get to do so with every purchase.  

I'm talking about shrimp today because of the oil spill in the Gulf. What's happening is horrendous, and I know many of us feel absolutely trapped by our inability to do a thing to help the situation.

Here, then, is my little PSA for the Gulf and the folks directly affected by the oil spill: GO EAT GULF SEAFOOD. Save for flying down there to get on a cleanup and/or rescue team, it's the best thing you can do today to help out.

Worried about the safety of Gulf seafood? Don't be. There are a slew of agencies and organizations - local, federal, and multi-state groups, overseen by the Food and Drug Administration - diligently testing every bit of water that's supporting seafood based on wind and current shifts and the current path of the oil. This multi-layered protection simply isn't allowing tainted seafood to reach the marketplace, something that consumers aren't as confident about as they should be. Eating Gulf seafood right now is the right thing to do, particularly since we don't know what lies ahead.

Longtime fishing and oyster families in the Gulf - families whose work spans generations, families who've managed to hang on through Katrina and survive despite the flood of international competition in the marketplace - need your help. Eating their seafood for your dinner helps fill their dinner tables, too. That kind of consumer choice is awe-inspiring and humbling all at once.

Fishing is hard work, and making a living from it is a daunting challenge. The parallels to family farming are clear. In both situations, the marketplace and our own choices as consumers have pushed these hardworking folks into ever more desperate circumstances to support their families, to hang on to their land or their boat, and to make it to tomorrow. In that context, here's a song by Drew Landry, singing about the impossible situation of a family fisherman working the oil rigs to pay the bills.

How might things be different if we all made a commitment to support family fisheries and family farmers with our food dollars? What if the playing field was leveled again and family fishing and farm work could support a family the way it used to? What if dangerous and destructive oil work wasn't the best choice to support a family? These are things I spend a lot of time thinking about.

While you're eating your FDA-approved safe Gulf seafood, send out your thoughts/prayers/karma/whatever-you-believe that this thing is over sooner rather than later. It could be a very long summer:

6/4/10 Update: A great piece from the NYT on New Orleans chefs going out into the water to check on the local seafood supply. Eat it while you can, folks... really.

DC's Right to Marry

As a brand new resident of the District of Columbia, I'm so proud to say that gay marriage is now legal in my city. Beginning today, marriage licenses are being issued to all couples, regardless of orientation. I would go down to the courthouse to watch the joy (and inevitable protest drown-out) in person, but I think I might get too weepy. So from another corner of town, I'm sending my love to that big line of committed couples, whose world is a lot more just today.

Congratulations!

 

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Moving my Money in 2010

One of my goals for 2010 - once we figure out Project: Next Big Step and settle down in a new place, of course - is to move my money. I'm talking big banks v. small banks, and wanting to be on the side of the good guys. I currently belong to a mega-bank, and I'm tired of it. Tired of feeling like one among one million, tired of feeling like I'm supporting the wrong people, tired of feeling like I'm part of the problem.

Enter Move Your Money, a new effort to help folks realize the power of moving their money to a small community bank. Moving my small account to a Main Street bank won't change the world, but if enough of us take a stand, we just might make a collective difference.

View a list of community banks in your area here, and if you have four minutes to spare, consider watching this video. It's a testament to the power of doing public service videos well - and using classic movie clips to make your point. Consider moving your money in 2010, too.

Looking for the silver lining

I'm going to be honest: baseball and politics have put me in a terrible mood this week. I'm grouchy. And over-worked. And tired. Yesterday after work, I fell into two hours of deep sleep from which I only roused myself in order to meet up with some long-lost pals. Our girls' dinner (admittedly, more of the liquid variety for me) was great for my spirits, but I don't think any dinner could trounce yesterday's news.

Consider this: on the same day the despicable Yankees won the World Series, gay and lesbian couples in Maine, so newly affirmed of their right to marry like the rest of us, were spending their first post-election day as lesser citizens than their neighbors. I imagine that many Mainers who voted to repeal the gay marriage law were more passionate booing the Yankees that night than they were when they casually revoked the rights of their fellow citizens the day before. But perhaps the casual indifference of the folks who stayed at home on the couch is even more damning. Me, I'm not sure I could feign indifference about couples who've been together 20 years and only want to be recognized as such. Staying on the couch in the face of those couples is heartbreaking. But that's just me, a silly civil-unions-for-everyone proponent anyway.

I love poring over election returns data, and will be anxiously looking at the age of the average Maine voter from Tuesday. We already know that a huge portion of the opponents to gay marriage are aging Americans (who incidentally, also turn out to vote in much higher percentages than other age brackets). Many statisticians point to this data to explain that in another generation, a ban on gay marriage could seem as incomprehensible to us as a ban on interracial marriage* seems to us today. This one's for them:

from Flickr

Since I can't drop in to say hello without a silver lining, here are two good things: We're working hard on that whole Life Plan thing, and hope to have an update soon. Also, sometimes you just need to wear pretty shoes - not for vanity or fashion's sake, but simply for the way they make you smile when you need to (even if The Evil Empire did indeed strike back yesterday). Today is one of those days.

To a brighter future!

Want more information or ways to help regarding the struggle for marriage equality? The organization we donated to in lieu of favors at our wedding, Freedom to Marry, is a great resource - go check them out.

Bonus Link: Ana Marie Cox: "Glee," Sincerity, and the Maine Gay Marriage Repeal

 * Speaking of interracial marriage, our justice of the peace friend in Louisiana finally resigned. What comes around goes around...

NPR, my beacon of sanity

I can't remember a time I didn't listen to National Public Radio. My fierce fandom is nearly entirely due to my father, who is as hardcore an NPR listener as they come. When my dad is home alone, he'll either have NPR playing on every radio in the house or have it playing on his hand-held radio, which he carries around the house with him. Now that is a fan. The voices - recognizable and reassuring - are instantly calming and grounding to me. The conversation is relevant and piquant, refreshingly free of the mindless chatter or shrieking stereotypes that clutter up television. And if pressed, I must admit that no jingle makes me happier than the chords announcing "All Things Considered." NPR is how I begin my day, how I like to fill my day, and how I like to make the transition from work to me-time. NPR even made it into our wedding vows. Is that more or less fanatical than carrying around a hand-held radio?

It's NPR pledge week this week, as all of you regular listeners are already aware. As much as we always know that NPR only exists with listener (and not government or commercial) support, we also know this: more than ever, NPR rises above the fray of broadcast journalism. So put your money where your ears, head, and heart are. Every dollar counts.

Have you pledged your local NPR station yet?

Mourning Gourmet

This morning's news that Conde Nast is shutting down Gourmet is both depressing and infuriating. I understand that we're in a recession; I understand that the magazine profit model is based on print advertisers; I understand that advertising is down; I understand that something's gotta give. However, I do not understand keeping Gourmet afloat while Bon Appetit (a lesser magazine by all accounts) stays as is. Maddening.

As is so often the case, I feel like the lowest common denominator wins here. Why, for instance, should a magazine like Gourmet, with nearly 70 years of rich history, be given the boot, when there are approximately a dozen magazines aimed at young women on the newsstands right now with a not-so-subtle mission of self esteem destruction? It's the same reason that television shows with cult followings are canceled, while lackluster dramas that are neither terrible nor great stay on the air for a decade. Why beautiful films can't find financing, yet a dozen truly awful romantic comedies are produced annually. Why voters are often forced to support a lesser match to their values, just so that another candidate doesn't win. Why people like Sandra Lee have their own "cooking" shows. I, for one, would like some better choices, personally.

Because I'm feeling wounded, I'd like to remind everyone why Gourmet was the best choice, and why to me this decision is terrible.

Ruth Reichl. We already know how I feel about Ruth, and Gourmet was unmistakably hers. Ruth's joy about eating and curiosity about food - from high-end decadence to low-end street food - was splashed across the magazine every month, and it was infectious to read.

Culture. Gourmet captured the culture of eating across the world better than any other print magazine. It's a medium that's far better suited to television than to print, but Gourmet excelled in bringing readers the faces and ways of life and accents and smells and sounds of other countries, through words and photography alone. No one else came close.

Food Politics. Gourmet stood far and above every other food publication in its coverage of food politics. While alternative media and the mainstream press have been increasingly covering topics of labor, scale, safety, and more the last few years, Gourmet was the only food magazine doing the same. Gourmet's ongoing coverage of Florida tomato slavery in particular stood out as top-quality, forward-thinking journalism, done in a time when a puff piece about tomatoes or about politics might have sufficed instead. Gourmet strived to be more than just "food porn," and was the only magazine to consistently prove itself in the real world arena this way.

Literary. So Gourmet was filled with fantastic recipes, timely political pieces, the voice of Ruth, sure, but what's more, it was literary through and through. I loved the writing in this magazine - smart and evocative and never dumbed-down. Each piece was a pleasure to read, and as a reader, you knew that nothing had been scribbled off and rushed to press. There was care behind the sentences, and you felt it.

Gorgeous. Food photography can be done on a table under a bright light in a warehouse. We might never know the difference. But Gourmet's photography took us other places - to kitchens full of cooks, to picnics out in the open, to backyard cookouts, to streets full of vendors, to fields during the harvest. Looking at Gourmet's articles was nearly as pleasurable as reading them, and that's saying a lot.

History. Gourmet was a magazine built upon its own history, and those kinds of traditions are infinitely appealing to me. On Gourmet's website, you can read what M.F.K. Fisher wrote for them in the 1940s, or what New Orleans restaurants were up to in the 1950s, and on and on. Keeping traditions alive are one of the best ways we step forward into the future. Gourmet's beautiful writing helped us do that. It was 70 years strong, and it knew it. How sad for all of us that Conde Nast did not.

Conde Nast says that Gourmet will continue to have an online and branding prescence, but that all new publishing endeavors will take place under the Bon Appetit brand.

Good News/Bad News, optimist style

Let's play a little game that I like to call Good News/Bad News, with my perkily optimistic spin.

Good news: The dress I ordered on final sale from Rue La La was marked down from $175 to $39.99, and is totally cute out of the package!

Bad news: I wasn't aware that Original Penguin should be on my "C cups and larger order a size up" list. It's most definitely inappropriate for work... and kind of looks like a slutty 1950s waitress Halloween costume.

Optimist says: Wait, this could actually BE my Halloween costume! We're going to have to work hard to top last year's Hall and Oates ensemble, after all. Put T in striped pants, throw some glasses and perky paper hats on us, give us some name tags and notepads, and we are good to go! And this year, I don't think my date will feel conflicted about kissing me, either - I'll be 'stache-free!

Wanna try this with tabloid fodder?

Good news: The blight on humankind that is Ed Hardy appears to be dwindling in these parts... my sense of decency and good taste are rejoicing.

Bad news: Appearances in the tabloids of the esteemed Jon Gosselin seem to be on the rise, and he is almost always wearing an Ed Hardy tee, or worse - Ed Hardy ass-painted jeans.

Optimist says: Surely Gosselin will continue to be roundly mocked for his behavior - he's definitely not done making a fool of himself yet. That means he can self-destruct and take Ed Hardy down with him!

Your friendly news edition:

Good news: Renowned scholar Henry Louis "Skip" Gates Jr. has the kind of neighbors that will watch out for his house while he's on vacation - and the kind of local police force that will respond to suspected break-ins.

Bad news: That doesn't mean his neighbors will watch out for him. Or, you know, even recognize him as the man who lives next door instead of just a black man trying to break into a home. Or that the local cops will believe that he's actually a resident. Surely black men don't live in tony Cambridge!

Optimist says: Time for Cambridge PD to have a learning moment. Just like the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission and the Dallas PD before them. And it's a good reminder that the rest of us should acknowledge that yes, Virginia, we still live in a racist society. (Ignoring that fact isn't optimistic, you know - just naive.) Onward and upward.

"Fiery," huh?

As I have vented elsewhere, the supremely gendered notion of a "temperament problem" irks me to no end. And if the woman in question is a Latina? Well, then, she must be "fiery," too.

So in honor of Sonia Sotomayor, who I'm thrilled to cheer on in her quest to become the first Latina on the United States Supreme Court, let's take in some "fiery" eye candy that's refreshingly free of cultural stereotypes. On to the pretty pictures!

Vintage glass drop earrings from WildArtDesigns

Natural Obsessions yarn so luscious it almost makes me want to learn how to knit

Don't try to get between me and a carne adovada burrito

A certain someone's red satin wedding shoes

I've been stalking the bracelet that matched this coral and gold emunique necklace for months. Sadly, the bracelet sold... but this necklace is equally lust-worthy

Breathtaking parrot tulips from La Vie En Rose

My all-time favorite Oscar dress, a Ben de Lisi on Queen Kate Winslet in 2002