Mid-Century Modern kitchenware

I found these amazing kitchenware items in a thrift store in Palm Springs, for a buck apiece. They must have landed there by way of someone's fabulous grandmother's kitchen from the 70's...they are beautiful original designs in dark brown teak wood and silver. The cheese slicer I discovered today makes a beautiful paper thin curl of even the hardest parmesan...the pretty inscription near the handle says " Spar Norway, Stainless Steel 18/8". And the spatula in the coolest shade of 70's brown has a patent number in its inscription "Mepal-Melamine-Rosti Design - made in Denmark for Hutzler Des. Pat. No. 211.656 - how fab is that? Did every family have one of these in their kitchen a few decades ago? I have no idea what the weird drink thing does, but i imagine it's a strainer for cocktails...i will have to get some expert advise on this topic please, little s - can you instruct?

sxsw roadtrip

sxsw

Road trips. They are the ultimate! My sweetheart and I decided to drive to Austin from California for the ultimate festival, SXSW. Two and a half days on the open road to get there, two days to get back. We are gentleman road warriors, a little bit hard-core in the driving mode but really desperate for some green veges by the time we arrived in TX. The southwest stretched before us with beautiful colors and sawtooth mountains. I fell hard for the relatively small town of Tuscon, AZ when we stumbled onto a Native American radio station broadcasting soulful traditional songs as well as songs from the 1940's and American country. We woke up on a mesa overlooking the city, found a real family-owned Mexican restaurant, and headed to Las Crucas, NM. The local co-op there had an amazing selection of health food and supplies, and we also found free wifi, delicious falafel sandwiches, and a turkish coffee that literally saved my life (or at least saved my brain for a day) all at the perfect International Cafe. It was really worth the drive to have the experience of the land and the miles that are between places here in the States. I arrived home empowered, and ohh so very grateful for my pristine bathroom. Oh yeah, and I took lots and lots of pictures...

The Suit Jacket

The Suit Jacket

by Betsy Brown

I love pockets. I love to use my pockets, in pants, in skirts if they are fabulous enough to have them, and definitely in jackets. Today I bought a chic navy pin-striped suit jacket, a separate, and it feels so good – fem and man all at the same time. I am instantly powerful, city, winter, with my new jacket on. And the pockets – they are all over the place! From the side AND top loading normal pockets, front lapel, and an adorable inside pocket with a button that is perfect for secret items, what I don’t know yet, but my imagination is alive with possibilities: lipstick naturally, cash, cigarettes, lsd, love notes, telephone numbers, wow, so many secrets I can imagine…do you have any suggestions dear friends? At least now I know how to open the half-sewn pockets, before I moved to nyc I had no idea you were supposed to OPEN the stitching, and I missed out on all the sheer usefulness and fun... until my smart metro boyfriend showed me how it's done.

New Years Eve

I kicked off 2010 trying out a new camera for a New Years Eve / wedding party combo. The "Meg" is a Diana camera clone, with a stand-out red colored body and cute peppermint stripe winder button. It's named after the drummer in the White Stripes, a story that I told many many times, a moderately excellent conversation starter. In true diana camera style, the film didn't wind correctly and I struggled to find candlelight and wind the darn thing all night. I also opted to try out the ringflash - wow, was that a hit with friends at the party -what is THAT?? they exclaimed! Shooting on the bulb setting and firing the flash while holding the shutter open was actually fun - it was like the really old photojournalist days where you pop the flash and dust and fumes surround your subjects and you feel like something just happened. And in true old-fashioned style, I have to wait for the lab to process the film before I can see if anything is there.