Dreaming of Spring

Outside it's snowing ...



... but it's sunny inside:






A girl can dream, right?

We finally had our snowstorm in NY, I was getting jeleaus of all those people under the snow. The effect of the storm on our household was that my husband, who was supposed to leave on a business trip to Miami today, had to change is travel plans and left yesterday, to be sure to arrive in time for whatever it is that he's doing there (something like golfing with clients). So I'm home alone again all the week, which means more time for blogging (and also more shopping temptations as "when the cat is out..". I. Must. Resist. The 20% off promo)

However, this is going to be a short post because I'm going to leave you for one guilty pleasure of the snowy days: watching TV. I NEVER watch TV in the afternoon, but there is something irresistible in being in bed watching TV while is snowing outside. Especially when the DVD of one of your favorite series is waiting for you: I just received the season 5 of Weeds (I love the show) and I can't wait to see what pregnant Nancy is up to.

Have a fantastic snowy Wednesday!

Coming up in the next post: more new arrivals IRL pics

OOTD: Grey, Silver and the Crystal Symphony

I wore this outfit this morning to run errands after dropping off my daughter at school. I really liked how the belt and the Crystal Symphony necklace brightened up the otherwise total grey outfit:





I hadn't worn the Minnies in a long time and they looked a little bit tired. So far I washed them in the machine, on a delicate cycle, but I might need to send them to the dry-cleaning the next time. Or I might need to buy a new pair (the navy or the denim ones) for spring ;-).

And now on the Crystal Symphony necklace. I always liked it but because I have a very similar one (actually more similar to the new colletto one, with round crystals) I couldn't justify to spend $98 on it.
One day in January (it was one of those lucky days) I walked into a store and saw it in the sale section. There was no tag attached but I obviously recognized it. I went to the register and asked what was the price. The SA had to look up the style number in the jewelry book and I saw that HE didn't recognize it because he was trying to find a match in the book for the thing that I was holding in my hands. I wanted to help and I told him (TWICE) "It's called the Crystal Symphony necklace" but he smirked at me (as to say "I know what I'm doing"). When he entered the style number, the price rung up at $19.99 and that was BEFORE the additional 30% off. Now, I hadn't seen it in a store in a very long time and the in-store sale prices tend to drop very quickly so, after asking him if he was sure, I promptly paid for it and when he informed me that it was final sale, I said "Yes, please, so you can't change your mind" (another smirk). A few days after, I saw another one in another store (with tags this time). The price? $69.99. And that's when I found out that the SA had made a mistake with my necklace, but I didn't feel too bad for my "stealing" it because I knew that I had done my best to hint him on the right direction.
That's how a crewless SA can help sometimes.


Happy Tuesday!

How the Saints Costed me a Frances Cami

Saints be damned, how could they win the Super Bowl? No offense for the people from New Orleans and not that I'm that big football fan or that I'm particularly fond of the Colts; it's just that I had bet against my husband that the Colts would win and with more than a 10-point difference. The price? A heart Frances cami that was on hold for me in a NYC store.

Saturday morning I went to the two Midtown JCrew stores to checkout if they had more of the new arrivals (I was hoping to find the vintage boatneck tee that is backordered until the summer) and I found a heart Frances cami in my size in the sale section. Because I had already made another purchase and I had nothing left on my gift card (and I had zero cash with me), I had to leave it at the store (not without putting it on hold for 24 hours).
Once home, I "tested" my husband and told him that if he wanted to offer me something for Valentine's Day, there was something on hold for me at the Midtown JCrew store (he had some errands to do in the afternoon in Midtown) the he could pick up for me. I had no reaction (I am not even sure that he registered), so I preferred not to insist.

Yesterday we were getting ready for the Superbowl and because we always bet something to spice up the game and to give us a reason to watch it through the end (for us Europeans American football can be pretty boring but we watch the Super Bowl because it's an American tradition and it's a way for us to "blend in"), I bet the Frances cami.
As I said I'm no football fan and I can barely follow a game but I knew that the Colts were super-favorite and a friend of ours said that he was expecting them to win hands down, so I wasn't going to put my Frances in the hands of the underdog team.
The rest is history and for the time being I have to content myself with these pics of the Frances (with the Scallopped zipper cardigan):




I called the store this morning and asked them to hold it for me until tomorrow, just in case.
Have a nice week!

P.S.
I took some more pics in the fitting rooms and I will post them later or tomorrow morning

JCrew Spring New Arrivals: Some Fitting Room Pics

Last Tuesday while my daughter was at school I went to the Collection store to checkout the new arrivals. It's dangerous to try on spring clothes just after a beach vacation because in general everything looks better with a tan (at least on me) and in fact I came home with one item that I probably wouldn't even thinked about buying if my legs had been pale as they usually are in winter.

And because I was still feeling a little bit on vacation, I was immediately drawn to this:



I take back everything I said on JCrew swimwear, I would have bought this beauty in a heartbeat had it come out before my vacation (it's the bikini that the model is wearing on page 62 of the Catalog, under the tunic and, strangely, it isn't featured anywhere else in the Catalog). But my next beach vacation will probably be in July (we are planning to return to the Hamptons) and I'm sure that I can catch it on sale before then.

But you're probably more interested in other more city-appropriate new arrivals, so here are my picks (they hadn't everything at the Collection store and many of the new arrivals have already been reviewed on several blogs, so besides the items that I tried on because I liked them for me, I tried to pick-up items that I haven't seen on others).

First, the Laporte drape blouse, in the pale lilac and my regular size 0:



It felt big and a little bit messy. The drape didn't fall nicely (in case you haven't noticed on the website it has an elastic band at the hem) and it is clearly a high maintenance top. For the price it was a pass.

Second, the much-talked about Neapolitan Pencil skirt. This one is beautifully made and the texture is the same than last summer coccodrillo pencil skirt. I think that IRL the print is a little bit more subdued than on the pics (the charcoal is not as predominant) and the violet is really a violet and not "plum".
I'm a 2P in the wool perfect pencil skirts. This one doesn't come in petite but the 0 was perfect in the waist area (it fits a little bit smaller than the wool one and MUCH smaller than the double-serge cotton pencil skirt of the past summer). However it was a bit too long on me and I would need to have it hemmed:




I left it at the store because I don't wear pencil skirts that much to justify the purchase and in compairison I liked the coccodrillo print much better. But if you wear pencil skirts an you like this print, this one is absolutely beautiful and flattering.

As a top in the pics above I was wearing the Jcrew tissue garland tank in lavender.
I really liked this tank (BTW, the embellishment is made in a different, more substantial, cotton than the rest of the tank, which is why the flowers are not droopy and kind of standup like a bouquet) and my only problem was to decide among the lavender, the coral pink and the sepia, that I'm wearing in the following pic with the Vintage zebra-stripe broken-in boyfriend chino short:



These shorts were one of the two new arrivals that had really caught my eyes on the website (the other being the vintage boatneck top, that wasn't in store and now is already sold-out in the camel color in XS). However I didn't LOVE them, so I passed.
By the way, I don't know what size the model is wearing in the catalog but if you go with your regular size they are way shorter.

Probably I didn't love them because my heart was already taken by another pair of shorts:



They are in-store only and they retail for $59.50. Here's a close up on the beautiful Liberty print (that by the way, also comes in a perfect-fit shirt. Did you hear me Dinagedeon?):



How cute are these shorts? When I tried them on though my first thought was "Bummer if I were 14, or even 20, I would totally buy them" because they are very short as you can see and the Liberty print adds to the gamine look; but then I walked out of the fitting room to ask for a size 2 (even if the 0 was perfect) and an old (like 70 plus year old) and very chic lady gave the shorts a look that said "Bummer, if I were a little bit younger, say 40, I would totally buy those". So I asked HER, and not the SA, if she thought that they were too short or young-looking for me. And without saying a word, but just shaking her head from side to side, she sold me the shorts, because I just trust a chic old lady on what's appropriate for my age.
So because I brought them home I took a picture with a better light, but still the pics don't do them justice:



Back to the fitting room, I was curious about the Black blossom jacket, but I didn't like the fit (boxy). This is an XS:



I have to say, I'm not a fan of this print (I didn't care about the cardigan at all when I saw it, even if it looks fabulous on some JCAs), so I didn't try the mini nor the shorts.

Speaking of flowers, the Iris embroidery tank top was enormous on me (in my size):

I can't recall if it was a pullover of had a side zip but it really felt like a tent. Total pass.

The SA insisted for me to try the new Denim Minnie pant that I already have in the non-demin version from this fall. I thought that I wouldn't like these in denim but they were very flattering:



While I wear a 00 in the Minnies, I sized up to a 0 in these as they are less stretch than the non denim-version. My only problem with these is the ankle zipper: even if it didn't bother me as much as I thought it would before trying them on, I think that it will soon look a little bit dated. But if I find them in super-duper sale I'm probaby going to get a pair.

The best for the end (I'm joking). They had a "limited edition" tee with a $125 price tag. You're supposed to be wearing a piece of art as each tee is hand-painted by an (unknown) artist and you pay for that. OK, maybe the artist who painted your tee will turn out to be the next Pollock and you will have made the best investment of your life, but in the meanwhile you're going to wear this (or something similar):



Have you seen the movie "My daughter could have painted that" (about the 5-year-old artist Martha something)? That's what I thought when I saw the tee (in fact it has a striking resemblance with one of my daughter's latest art pieces, named "Elephant on the bus". The difference is that I don't allow my daughter to paint on my t-shirts. But maybe I should and I could sell them on the Internet for $125 bucks). Anyway, it also comes in pewter if you are interested ;-).

Btw, I finally went with the sepia in the garland tank, because I was picturing it with chinos. I have tried it at home with my scout chinos, what do you think of this color on me?



I'm probably going to return it anyway because, strangely, this tank is $42.50 online and $45 in store (as I found out once home) and I can keep it as a ride-along for the next order with a free shipping code (I'm not going to wear it well into the spring anyway).


Have you ordered any of the new arrivals yet? Do you think that Jcrew has taken the concept of "art" tee-shirt too far with their Limited Edition tees?
Any questions, let me know!

One Dress, Two Ways

One day, around a month go, I walked into a Banana Republic (where I don't go very often these days) and fell in love with this dress:



It's the BR silk lace-print dress and I felt immediately pretty as soon as I tried it on. And when you are forty going forty-one you don't feel pretty very often, at least not in the way as it used to be. You can feel elegant, chic, good but pretty? Very rare, I tell you.
I was very tempted to buy it but 1) it was a size 2 and even if not big I would have preferred to try a size 0 at least for comparaison and 2) it was an holiday silk dress from the Monogram line, which is the Banana equivalent of the Jcrew Collection line and even on sale plus 30% off it was still expensive (around $90) so I decided to wait a little bit.
A week before my vacation, the Gap run a promotion "the more you buy, the more you save" across all the brands where you could save up to 25%, and because I had to buy new clothes for my daughter I checked the price of the dress and with the promotion it came down to $59, that was more in the price range that I was willing to pay for it. The 0 was available, so I ordered it.

The dress doesn't seem to be popular as almost all the sizes are still available on the website but I have to say that if I hadn't seen it in store and tried it on, I wouldn't have given it a thought. Also, the only customer review on the BR website is a bad review (of someone who said that it wasn't as expected) and it's true that the description can be misleading because it doesn't mention that it has a sash tie and that it's meant to be worn with the bow tied (otherwise it's just shapeless).
But with the tie? Pretty:



The adjustable straps are removable (which I prefer) and print is prettier IRL than on the website (where you can't really make out the lace motif):



It's a cocktail party dress (read: not a lot of wear) but what really sold me on this dress is the fact that when I tried it I was wearing my toothpick cords in soft ochre and as much as I love them they are a pain to take off in the fitting room. So initially I tried the dress OVER the cords and surprisingly I liked it that way. Add boots and you have a bohemian tunic that you can wear during the day:



And my BR knit coat is perfect to top it:



I felt like this dress can be versatile and that's the reason why I caved (I'm laying, I caved because I felt pretty).

What do you think? Would you wear it as a tunic over pants? Which one of yopur recent purchases made you feel pretty?

Caribbean Vacation Pics

So you probably remember that when I was packing for our Caribbean vacation I tried to keep my stuff at a minimum and not overpack but I actually ended up underpacking. I am a last-minute person and an eternal undecided as an aggravating condition so I can't push myself to close a suitcase until the very last minute before I leave, when I generally throw in a lot of clothes from the pile of the "discards" that didn't initially make it to the suitcase but that under the pressure of the imminent departure I suddenly feel I would regret not taking with me. Well, that didn't happen this time because for the first time EVER we didn't hear the alarm clock. We found out later that the alarm went off but the volume was on mute (my husband always uses his Blackberry alarm clock and he is an experienced traveller) and at 3.30 am in the morning what are the chances that one wakes up by oneself (my daughter, who wakes up very often in the middle of the night, was sound asleep and didn't cooperate)? By some miracle my husband woke up an hour later and then we sort of went in panic mode. We managed to get out of the door in 10 minutes (that included waking up our daughter and get her dressed) but no need to say that I had no time for last-minute decisions on my vacation wardrobe. I have to thank my husband who forced me to put all the little extras in the suitcase before going to bed, so that I didn't forget anything that could have ruined my vacation (like sunglasses, sunscreen, camera etc). However, I could have used one or two more sweaters, especially because instead of packing my black pashmina for the evenings (nights tend to be fresh in the Caribbean because of the wind) I packed my black cashmere scarf (of course I found out only when I arrived at the hotel and unpacked) which is not the same thing (not only a cashmere scarf is surprisingly itchy worn on bare skin but it looks ridiculous in the Caribbean). And I wouldn't have minded taking with me that colorful Custo tee-shirt that I had bought at Lohemann's especially for this trip and I considered wearing during the flight until the last minute, when, maybe in wishful thinking, I picked up the "Bon Voyage" tee instead (that I also wore on our way back to NY, see pic above).

In the end we weren't that late for our flight and after this rough start (that gloriously ended with my daughter throwing up in the taxi to the airport just when the taxi was approaching the platform at the departures to let us out) and the fact that I lost my coat during the trip (not sure if I left it on the plane when we disembarked in Turks or on the minivan that took us to the resort or in the first room where we posed our baggage because I completely forgot about it until the captain on our flight back last Saturday let us know that the temperature in NY was 18 degrees. It was an old coat but I was quite fond of it) everything else went well. We had 80 degrees average and a sunny sky for all the week, which is quite a record in my Caribbean experience (there had always been a day or two when it gets cloudy or stormy).

The flight was smooth (a direct flight on AA) and the resort was a mere 15 minutes ride from the airport (the advantage of a flight at 6.50 in the morning is that by noon we were around the pool). We had booked a basic room (even if their basic rooms are already named "Deluxe") and we were upgraded to a suite because apparently they only had twin bed rooms available in that category (it wasn't easy but my husband is a good negotiator). The advantage of being in a suite (besides the obvious advantage of having a bigger room with some fun amenities) was that they were located much closer to the beach in a complex of smaller bungalow-style buildings surrounded by beautiful tropical plants.
The resort was bigger than the one where we stayed in Jamaica last year, and it was composed of three "villages" that had each a distinct flair (we stayed in the older part of the resort, which in my opinion was the more authentic). It had 16 restaurants (if we include two cafes) to choose from and we tried almost all of them, besides the two adults-only (we could have taken a sitter but we thought that it wasn't really worth it). I found that besides the main buffet-style restaurant the food was much better than in other all-inclusives, especially the meat that is generally not very well cooked in this kind of resort.
Each "village" had its own swimming pool, but again, I think that the one that was just a few steps from our room was the best (more natural, if not the biggest):



You can't really see it in the pic but the just behind the waterfall (where it's dark) there were a couple of tables of the tex-mex-themed restaurant (one of the best for atmosphere and food). We never had dinner in that particular spot because it was too close to the pool (and noisy from the falling water!) and I was afraid that my daughter would fall in the water (it takes a second), but I think that it was pretty cool.

The beach was beautiful but not "spectacular" in my opinion (I don't want to sound snotty but I have seen even better). I think that it suffered from the erosion caused by the last hurricane that hit the island as it wasn't as wide as it appears in many magazine and brochure pics (although this pic doesn't make it entirely justice):



However, the color of the water was a dream (that's me with one of the infamous Jcrew bikinis from last year. My new Tibi bikini didn't get much photographed unfortunately):



The Boden tunic was a hit. I wore it almost every day to breakfast. The color really blended beautifully in the landscape:


The highlights of the week in terms of evening entertainment were the Sesame Street Parade (where we got to follow the characters preceded by a local marching band all along the resort, quite funny) and the Friday night beach party. I ended up wearing mostly the two Lohemann's maxidresses, alternatively. Sadly I didn't have the occasion to wear the rope dress as the resort was more casual than I thought and we only had "family dinners". I would have probably worn it if my husband and I had a evening out without my daughter in one of the adults-only restaurant (the only ones with a more dressed-up dress code) but as I said that didn't happen.
For the Friday night beach party, I wore the other Calypso dress. I have tons of pics from that night but the one that I prefer is probably this one (the expression on my daughter's face just cracks me up):



Another pic that makes me smile is this one:


If you click on it you will see that my husband and I are reading the same book, precisely the latest Grisham, "The Associate". In the frenzy of the late wake-up the day of our departure, I did forget something of a vital importance for a vacation: my books!
The only book that I had packed was the Grisham that I had bought for my husband (he rarely reads fiction - in fact only when we are on vacation - and he reads almost exclusively Grisham books, long life to him!) but because I can't possibly conceive a vacation without reading and Grisham is better than nothing I asked him if I could start it. After a few pages I was hooked and he wouldn't probably had a chance to read it if I hadn't find another copy to borrow at the resort "entertainment center" (a cabana with a few books and board games). What makes me smile is not only the pic in itself but also the fact that when I asked a lady who was walking by to take a pic of us, she didn't get it at all and she waited for us to look at the camera and smile or something until I told her that we were reading the same book and we thought that it was funny (she still didn't get it I think but she took the pic anyway).

I will end this post with a few pics from the Sesame Street parade (if you are a fan or you have kids you will recognize the characters):




Cookie Monster had clearly forgotten about our little romance last year (that hairy monster!) but this year I had a weakness for Bart and I even tried to follow him home one night but he could get away (hehehe):



I hope that you enjoyed the post. Bon Voyage!

I'm Back!

Hello ladies, I'm back from my vacation in the Caribbean. We had a great time and I will fill you in as soon as I'm finished sorting the pictures. I have something like 358 pictures to go through (I ended up with that many not because of the variety of things that we have seen and photographed but because my husband is a keeper, he would shoot 30 takes of the same picture and didn't delete any, even those that you can immediately see that are not worth it because, say, you closed your eyes or you missed completely your subject by a head).

So, in the meanwhile, I'm going to post two OOTD that I have worn just before leaving. I know, pretty boring compared to the Caribbean but I didn't want to leave you without something to comment on ;-).

I wore the following outfit on the Thursday afternoon before leaving. I had another "interview" for a nursery school (actually it was my daughter'r turn to be "interviewed" this time and it didn't go very well, unless not saying a single word during a playgroup were you're supposed to show your best self is a quality highly appreciated by the evaluators. At least she didn't cry). Anyway, again I had to be dressed for the occasion and I didn't fill like wearing pants this time (you know that in the winter I'm wearing pants 99% of the times).
First, I tried an outfit with my dusty blossom pencil skirt but I decided against it because it was a little bit too much "Upper East Side" cliche, so I broke out my Ravine dress that was just imploring me from the deeps of my closet to be taken out. It can be very elegant (actually, this is the reason why I hadn't worn it yet, after missing the occasion of a Xmas party) and I wanted to play it down, so I wore it with a tissue turtleneck and my Glenbrae boots (my inspiration for this outfit was DaniBP over at DaniBP Mop Philosopher, who always rocks the look "ladylike with boots"):

I really liked how this outfit came together and I felt good in it.

I wore the second outfit the morning after, to the hair salon. Now, as you probably have noticed in the pics were you can see more of my face I have A LOT of hear and my appointments with the hairdresser always last forever and are a real bore. Moreover, this time I was with my daughter (I couldn't go the day before when she was at school because my stylist had taken a day off and I haven't a regular daytime babysitter that I can call whenever I need some time by myself) and I can tell you that even if she was very well behaved and played with what she could find (which wasn't much even if the ladies at the salon tried very hard to entertain her), spending almost two and a half hours sitting while mommy is having her hair done is NOT FUN for a toddler and I had to give up on the cut after the color because she couldn't take a minute more of it.
Anyway, I wore this outfit:




The silk floral top wasn't the wisest choice to wear to a color appointment but once put it on I couldn't manage to take it off. I had already worn it with the same cardigan and another pair of cords in the fall, but with the navy toothpick it's almost perfection. I was in a hurry and I forgot to wear the hazelnut leather skinny belt over the cardigan, but I liked it anyway.

That's it for tonight. My husband is travelling all this week, so I plan to have a daily post or two if I can. Stay tuned for the Caribbean vacation post!