In Love

Every so often I get email updates from the most wonderful and beautiful place in the world---Anthropologie. I've decided that this is my heaven. I could spend hours in there mulling over each cardigan sweater and hand-painted teacup until closing time. Except in my fantasy, I have a limitless credit card and a bank account to back it up.

Their latest fashion campaign is a throw back to an era I love dearly: the 1950s. And they've also put a library spin on all the outfits. What is not to love about this? Who wouldn't want to look this great navigating the bookshelves and decoding the dewey decimal system of a magnificant library?

Adventures

Amsterdam, anyone? I'm putting this on my list of places to travel in the next year or two...

Snow and Ice

It's below zero outside right now and the wind chill takes the temperature into the negative teens. The lake is frozen, the falls are frozen, and our faces freeze when we go outdoors---but I do have to say that I'm enjoying the Ithaca winter.

Instead of the dreary drizzle of rain for several ongoing months in the Pacific Northwest, the snow is kind of a cheerful change. At work, where two of the four walls are floor-to-ceiling windows, I get the feeling of being in a snow globe. It forces me to wear all of those hats and scarves I've collected over the years; what were previously fashionable accessories have now become insulated necessities in the frigid weather.

The temperature also brings out the colorful language in everyone. Because when push comes to shove and your fingers feel like the frozen icicles you see on every house and your face is pink like a sunburn from the wind and the down coat you bought still doesn't keep out all of the cold....there isn't much else to do other than make a curt exclamation of an expletive under your foggy breath.

Pictured: a conversation on a frozen lake.

Cold, cold, cold

It is freezing--okay, let's be truthful here--BELOW freezing in Ithaca. I woke up this morning to find my weather.com widget on my dashboard tell me that it was zero degrees out. So bundled in my ear muffs, red festive scarf, down coat, fleece lined mittens, and Keen boots, I set out to make peppermint mochas and gingerbread lattes for the world at large at 5:15 in the morning.



Fast forward to evening: with the cranberry apple bake in the oven and the inches of snow outside, it feels very Christmasy in Ithaca. But this season won't be complete until we spend a few days in New York City before heading back to Portland for Christmas. The following things are on my holiday-must-do-list:

1. Make and eat lots of sugar cookies (mostly the dough)
2. Watch 'Christmas Eve on Sesame Street' with my dad and sister--a yearly tradition
3. Give all of the pretty wicked sweet homemade gifts that are wrapped and packed in the carry-on
4. Watch as many more Christmas movies as I can (viewed: Home Alone, Holiday Inn, Love Actually, Elf; yet to view: White Christmas, A Muppet Family Christmas, The Santa Clause, It's a Wonderful Life, Miracle on 34th Street, and Charlie Brown Christmas).

Well, dessert is done. Now if only I could get my hands on some Tillamook vanilla bean ice cream to top it off...

"I'mmm dreaming of an Oregoniannnnn Christmas....."

Christmas!

I just can't get enough of the holiday season. It's not even October, but I've already pulled out the Christmas candle (mostly to get the scent of my vegetable soup out of the kitchen) and now I'm watching 'The Holiday' after drinking peppermint tea at work. I DO actually live in the moment, however, because I ate a pumpkin scone this afternoon as a celebration of today--the first day of autumn.

The leaves are already falling (some of them, at least) and crunching beneath my feet. I hope most of the leaves will stay attached to their respective trees until the week of October 11th--when my dad, Sue and Alyssa come to visit! Other tourist attractions planned for their NY vacation may include the following: apple picking (followed by apple pie baking), visiting local wineries on Seneca Lake, and adventuring around one or more of the local gorges. And given my current employment, probably lots of coffee consumption as well.

Curtain Up

Here we go: my attempt at a blog. With our recent move to New York, a fully stocked kitchen of registry gifts, a copy of Julie and Julia from my beloved Powell's Bookstore of Portland, and a full-fledged love of all things vintage, I've decided to go ahead and start documenting the chic and swell things in life. It's partly a convenient way for the family and friends we left behind to see what we've been up to, and partly because there are so many blogs I love and perhaps I want to be like them just a little. But with slightly less fashion sense and amateur photographic ability. Nevertheless, here I am.

I should also let you know that I kind of belong in the 1950s, and that I'm in love with anything that has the word 'vintage' thrown in. So expect a dash of family, a few culinary successes, vintage inspirations, local adventure documentation, and who knows what else in this blog. I'll just give it a go.