Moncler

Top of my NYE resolution: riding on a camel thanks to this Moncler ad. Great styling.

Happy Christmas

I had to return to Chicago pretty early to work (bleh) after having two days off. In traditional fashion, I have come down with my annual sickness that makes my head feel like a balloon and my mind work like a man turning a large cog around an old clock. Last night I got home, exhausted and wheezing only to find several greetings from my friends far away (Cleveland, Miami, Connecticut, Chicago, and Massachusetts) which made my day.

I couldn't feel more blessed. Now what to do for NYE. Hipster blowout in KC or party hopping back in the homestead?

Lori Nix

Lori Nix's tiny dioramas entitled "The City" are coming to Chicago January 7 at Catherine Edelman Gallery. I couldn't be more excited to see them in person! Look at how precious they are-- so abandoned yet so amazingly luxurious.

Wise Words

Oui

I found my ideal engagement ring. So simple but so me. And of course it's from the Dior Bois de Rose collection which means it's meant to last.

Bedroom Blues

My roommate and I have been talking about it more and more, and it seems like we are both starting to come to terms with living in the same apartment for another year. That usually isn't a problem, but for someone who pays no care to taking out the trash, let alone having a presentable living space, it's time for a change.

Below are my three pieces I am home to make my bedroom transformation. I called my Dad tonight and yes, he is on the hunt for a stump I can bring home with me. It's pretty minimalistic but it goes with the woodsy but not quite Navajo theme I am hoping to achieve.

Pendleton Glacier National Park Blanket

Tripod Lamp

Stumps. Yes stumps.

Drink Me

Alice in Wonderland all the way. This is all I have been drinking lately. The bottles sucked me in....only thing Missoni I don't get dizzy looking at.

Teen Mom

NYE 2011?

One day it will be my dream come true. One day, one day. Let's stay positive.

Trash or Treasure

Sometimes I feel just like this. Thanks Photodiarist.

DIGNITY

I had my first large benefit for the charity I do work with this Saturday at Prairie Avenue Gallery. Everything went beautifully. I am just so thrilled all the work paid off-- as we raised nearly $10,000 dollars for projects in India, Pakistan, and East Africa in one night.

Pictured all the people on my team who helped put everything together. Each one of them is so lovely, I really feel blessed to have met so many amazing individuals through this organization.

I'm Loving It

I am dying to see this in my upcoming trip to New York. FAILE Collective is one of my top artists (if you can even call them that).

Obama Rally 2010

Papa Joe got us some VIP tickets to the Obama rally with Alexi, Daley, Obama, Common...pretty much anyone you could think of. It was such a good night Halloween weekend. Ah, sunrays I miss you already.

Promotions Life in a Nutshell

So true I can't even laugh anymore. This is how I feel every day, banging my head against the wall. Deals! Hot prices! Sales margins! Give it to me!

Roommate Love

When a man is getting better he understands more and more clearly the evil that is still left in him-C. S. Lewis

This Is Your Life

Wildest Dreams Week

So I have managed to get into the habit of naming my weeks, months, often years based on the pattern my life is taking at the time. Last week was "Wildest Dreams". It was so good I am happy to say that the tide of my life is changing and I feel excited every day that this reverse entropy is taking place. With chaos comes order and vice versa right?

I just can't believe how deliriously happy I have been despite the fact I am exhausted with the new job, the charity, and preparing like crazy for applications for both fellowships, school, and the mad networking for getting recommendations. But I am so close to reaching that point where all the work is paying off!

I am obsessed with this website: Pininterest. Look at how beautiful life and aesthetic things have in this library of pure gorgeous.

Rent the Runway Part III

So Drew and I have been driving around and can't find a drop box to save my life. Looks like my rental is going to be extended-- hopefully I don't get charged twice. I had to buy two sets of earrings since the Pakistani saleswoman ripped me off charging me $50 for a set that fell apart before I even wore it.

Everything was straight out of a beautiful movie you want to be your real life. Bowties and Bangles was held in Union Station with purple lighting and a slight echo to everyone that spoke. Dancers performed and everyone was mouthing the words to their favorite songs. From an outside perspective I just kept my mind on analyzing everything going on thinking, "This is someone's real life." Most of the people in attendance were much older starting at about age 36 and going up from there. I watched from a balcony as the Steve Edwards Band performed "Crazy" by Cee Lo Green while the security guard mouthed the words quietly to herself.

I was very happy to get to experience something I undoubtedly will be much older to go as an attendee, but just to be there was a great occasion. At one point during the auction everyone was pledging for Save A Child and literally holding up cards with sad childrens facing pledging to help educated 10 children, 100 children, et cetera. It was quite saddening thinking of the juxtaposition of the two worlds at once.

From a white girl from Kansas, it reminded me of a speech William Parrish gives in the movie Meet Joe Black. I wonder at what point when I have lived more of my life I will be able to feel that same sort of nostalgic comfort. Maybe on my wedding day at the Aldrich Mansion, that would be great. The little girl inside of me who just wanted Gloria Vanderbilt's bedroom would be thrilled I know.

What a glorious night.

Every face I see is a memory.

It may not be a perfectly perfect memory.

Sometimes we had our ups and downs.

But we're all together and you're mine for a night.

And I'm going to break precedent and tell you my one-candle wish:

That you would have a life as lucky as mine,

where you can wake up one morning and say,

"I don't want anything more."

Rent the Runway Part II

My beautiful dresses arrived today and I couldn't be happier. Life is going so well and this has been such a celebration week. First the big new job, a burlesque show, friends coming into town tonight, and the benefit on Saturday. I couldn't be more thrilled. Below is the Golden Draped Gown by Halston Heritage. It won't make the cut (nagl) but it looks great from the back-- this is what happens when you try a size 10 with lame fabric.

Rent the Runway Part 1

I am very excited to go to my first gala this Saturday as a volunteer with the American India Foundation. It's down at Union Station, and sounds like my dream come true. Bollywood dancing, dresses, helping people, and meeting more Patels.

Unfortunately I am mega strapped for money these days and am relying on a credit card to pull me thru this dark era. You never know-- a mega millionaire could take pity on my situation and my heart of gold and offer me a shiny job right on the spot. But the question remains, what do white people wear at an Indian formal black tie event? Answer: Rent the Runway.

THE CHOICES

1. Alice by Temperely Enchanting Emerald Gathered Gown
2. Halston Heritage Golden Draped Gown
3. Halston Heritage Pretty Poncho Dress
4. Carlos Miele Draped Sapphire Dream Gown

I love all four of these choices. Look at the adjectives: dream, enchanting, golden, pretty. Could this sum up what I want in a dress any more? No. Unfortunately I have huge hips that limit what looks okay and what doesn't. My roommate Drew has been helping me narrow down my choices and it turns out I want them all except I waited too long to order them.

Rent the Runway has a special deal that it's only $25 more to rent another dress. Luckily this relieves my plus size beauty queen anxiety for not being able to rock the gold lame. So Enchanting Emerald and Golden Goddess here I come!

Adventures Galore

I have been riding the wave lately in terms of job progress and finally got over a serious valley. But now that the harder part is over, what does that leave? No more crying to strangers on the street while drunk? No more crying God for what seems to be my perpetual self- destructive lot in life? I often wonder if I am just one of those people who functions best when things are hard because I thrive having things to complain about or keep me interested by the constant challenges.

I found this company called The Adventurists who "fight to make the world less boring". They hold competitions mostly in India and South America by mongol or rickshaw that benefit charity. It sounds like something I would sign up for if I had the cash. They romanticize and idealize an experience that could be potentially fatal. On a single HTML page I managed to find a warning.

"These adventures are genuinely dangerous things to do. The website is written in a light-hearted fashion but you cannot underestimate the risks involved in undertaking this kind of adventure. Your chance of dying can be very high, some past teams have been seriously injured. These adventures are not a glorified holiday. They are an adventure and so by their very nature extremely risky. You really are on your own."

What if every adventure in life came with a label like this? The bad boyfriend, the no-end job, the school that isn't worth the money, or just the everyday ways in which we make our lives more interesting?

Destination Marfa

I am feeling antsy and this is where I would go if someone handed me some money to-day. Marfa. I am trying really hard to get into this band but it's progressively getting harder to get into bands. Most of the time I just want to dance.

Listening:Ustad Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, Cascade, Alexis Penney.

Mama's 60th

I am back in Chicago and sometimes it is hard to leave a place where I have so much only to return to feeling like I have so little. It's like replacing everything anyone could want in life with a few material comforts that Chicago has afforded me. When I think about why I feel compelled to put myself thru such torture it is good to remind myself that any of my successes will ultimately benefit those I love, just as they have taken care of me when I so need their help.

My sister told me today she thinks when I am 30 I will adopt a fat Mexican boy named Joaquin. I really liked the idea of me and just a bunch of kids hanging out and throwing water balloons eating ice cream. It's kind of awesome actually. Too bad that's years away from happening.

Biltmore Beauty

When I was a little girl, I remember going to the Biltmore House in North Carolina and being absolutely memorized touring the grounds. I still have the postcard of Mrs. Vanderbilt's purple velvet and gold room which I kept close as a reminder of what I expected my own aesthetic to take after. I found some infrared photos someone had taken of the grounds, and I miss having those kinds of beautiful things to latch onto. The Midwest doesn't come close to the scenery of the south.

This Was a Good Day

My brothers wedding was really happy. Lots of drinking Red Stripe and moshing. Right before a big trip to Italy. Things were hard, but at the time it was really happy day in the midst of dark times. Important to remember these days right now.

Lisbeth Salander

I try really hard to find women to admire, and sometimes it's really hard. I get exposure to is pretty women, lady-like women, or slutty women-- where are the heroes, the villians, and the ones who are not afraid of anything? Steig Larsson is so point on with Lisbeth Salander in The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, and the other books in the Millenium trilogy. Take them down Lisbeth!

I identify with her motives. Maybe a little too much. Girl crush alert!

Crazy Love

So yesterday I watched this movie called Crazy Love, a 2007 documentary about Burt Pugach and his younger mistress Linda Riss. Pugach jumped off the deep end, and after Linda attemped to move on with another man (after finding out he was married, of course), Burt had beautiful Linda blinded by hiring some men to throw acid on her face. He goes to jail-- and of course, the beauty has no one to take care of her, although the couple eventually get back together. WTF right?

I think as someone who is no stranger to crazy love, it's important to walk away. But do you just get used to that level and are unable to identify with anything less? Let's hope not. But God, does this face look so much like my ex. And it's creepy!

Home is Wherever I'm With You

I am watching a cat lick a bathtub spout, and it's making me really depressed. Okay, a lot of things are. Where is home when you only have yourself anymore? I got an email today about "discount to fly home", and it was an email to fly home to India. Is it a sign? I wish I could just go home to India and find what I think I am supposed to there.

I am sick of talking to new people every day about jobs, about my depreciating livelihood, and going out to convince myself that I am fine where I am not. But I'm not content-- and no matter how much I wish I could control things, they are out of my control and I need to be patient.

I Like All the Girls

Just look at how beautiful these people are. Can you really blame me for my down-and-out thinking? Everyone in Chicago is pretty ugly, except for me and the people I know of course.

Robert Bruce Rocks and My Life Sucks

There hasn't been much to report on. Kansas City is still better than Chicago. No one will admit it, but they always end up pretending it's New York. Some kid stayed with me from SF, and kept blabbing on the phone that he was waiting for Kanye and Common to show up at my apartment. Guess what Jafar-- they aren't coming because everyone knows it's a coast game.

Darcel Luv

LDV Global Design-- Mobilier Conceptuel