Meet Emilia Irene (what I wore home from the hospital)

Two weeks ago, I finally met the tiny creature responsible for all the anticipation, excitement, and heartburn that I've felt since last March. And I find her to be totally fascinating. Of course, I'm biased.

I want to be clear that I have no intentions for the scope of this blog to shift. But my changing shape and the variable of nursing have introduced new wardrobe challenges that will be addressed here. In the meanwhile I figured I should introduce my daughter. More photos will be shared on my pregnancy/parenting blog.

Scenes from Maine

It has taken me forever to write about Maine. This was my first trip into New England (outside of Boston) and I very much enjoyed it. The parts of Maine I saw were beautiful and temperate, full of farms and small businesses. A lot of the quaintness I envisioned from being an avid Gilmore Girls fan rang true (albeit in a less comical and exaggerated way). I loved the sleepy beach towns south of Portland, near Kennebunk and Old Orchard Beach. And Portland itself seemed like such a cool place to live! I wish I had explored it with the thoroughness I usually dedicate when I am not traveling with my dog. I was glad to have Speck with me but the anxiety I felt about requesting her admittance to place after place meant that I went into fewer places than normal.

We could have probably left her at the place we stayed but it made me nervous. You see, we were cat-sitting for some friends at their historic farmhouse. The home is in the process of being rehabilitated and things are pretty rustic. No locks on the doors. No electricity outside of the kitchen. Plenty of dangerous places currently under construction on which a curious pup might hurt herself. And she was a nervous Nellie, in an unfamiliar place. Leaving her at home made her (and me) too worried. So we brought her everywhere. We even bought her a ticket to ride the ferry! And picked only beaches where she was permitted.

For the Fourth of July weekend, we bought live lobsters from a stand at a gas station. They were $5.99/lb.

We took in many sights and ate a lot of seafood. We visited many farm stands and tried to buy as much fresh cheese and produce as possible. We also found so many delicious homemade ice cream shops. Overall, Maine was a wonderful place and I hope we can someday return. I am glad we had the chance to visit for a few days. You can see more photos after the jump.

A happy weekend of gift giving!

This weekend, not only did I celebrate Father's Day (like so many here in the US), but my parents were celebrating their 34th wedding anniversary! Like many married couples, they were together for years before that. And regardless, 34 years of marriage is nothing to sneeze at. Next year they plan to finally take a long-overdue trip to Hawaii to mark their 35th. I hope to figure out something special my siblings and I can do for them to honor the occasion. Hawaii is a place they've wanted to see for ... well 34+ years! But my parents have never been big travelers. They still live in my father's boyhood home, in the area where they both grew up. After they had kids they rarely left town without us (occasional business trips were the only times). And it wasn't financially realistic to take vacations that required plane tickets for the entire clan. My folks were more interested in saving the money to help with the cost of three college educations (not to mention all the other parental expenses they were generous enough to assume). I really hope they do something indulgent and for themselves after all these years!

To celebrate 34 years, we kids gave them a gift that was very inexpensive but that moved them both. At home, I had an 8 by 10 frame that was from the cookie table decor of my own wedding. It was matted to display two 4 by 6 photos, side by side. To turn it into an appropriate anniversary gift, I picked two photo prints of my parents: one from their wedding day and one from mine.

They loved it and it was such a simple, inexpensive idea! In this era of photographic post-materiality, it is a gift just to save someone from the task of ordering and framing tangible prints. And the photographic aftermath of our wedding has yielded many gift opportunities for all three sets of parents.

Chris and his brother also came up with a clever, sentimental, and inexpensive father's day gift that made a bigger splash than the other, more costly gifts they gave. They compiled a list of songs that their dad sang to them when they were kids and turned it into a mixed cd. The entire family was so excited to gather around and listen when they learned what it was. And Chris's dad was clearly moved by the gesture. One of the really interesting things I noticed as a relative newcomer to the family was the excitement his baby sister (who is 20 years younger than Chris but really no longer a baby at age 11) exhibited when she also was able to recognize so many of the songs from her own childhood. 

I'll post some outfits and a review or two this week. I've been wearing some version of my Drawing Parallels skirt with a striped or basic top, as though it is my uniform. Later today I'm also going to post a less-than-flattering Tippi-dress-in-action photo. Happy (belated) Father's Day!

Uncertain Tippy: Hitchcock's Subconscious Influence

Tippy dress from Anthro paired for styling purposes with:

Moth cropped bow cardi from Anthro

Marc by Marc Jacobs mary jane pumps

Kate Spade tote

I am so grateful to Laura of Anthro Closet Chaos for putting out an APB on this Anna Sui Hitchcock-inspired dress called the Tippy. I never saw it in my local stores so by the time it went on sale, I was clueless about sizing. But I wanted it desperately! And I tracked down a size 6 thanks to reader, Melanie. Thank you both!

I have been a major fan of Alfred Hitchcock's work since I was a child, sneaking late night episodes of Alfred Hitchcock Presents on Nick at Nite (back when they played television classics from the 50s and 60s). My brother and I consumed and obsessed over the popular canon of his cinematic creations as teenagers. And I studied the psychoanalytic theories that influenced the director as a graduate student. A few years ago I was gifted a Hitchcock box set from my parents. It allowed me to see a bunch of works with which I was previously unfamiliar. And although I grew to adore some of the lesser known movies, I still love the cult classics.

In fact, I worry that my love for Hitchcock and his masterpiece of special effects, The Birds has colored how I see this dress. Such an influence could be more powerful than sale goggles. It's silly and short-sighted to buy something based on the intellectual and pop cultural associations it evokes for me. Sure, I've mused before that materiality is more meaningful than the mere acquisition of stuff. But I am not so certain that this dress is the right fit for me, despite its evocations. So opinions and yays or nays are welcome! This was a pricier piece than I usually buy (even on sale), during a period of relative fiscal austerity. Help me answer: Do I like this dress only because I like thinking about the film?

Hitchcock's The Birds is a remarkably misogynist take on the shifting norms of gender and courtship at the mid-century. Anxieties over the meaning of masculinity, if and when a woman aggressively pursues a suitor (in the context of heterosexual relationships) permeate the script, which was based on a novella by Daphne du Maurier. Ultimately our beautiful, confident, modern heroine (played by Tippy Hedron, after which this dress was named) is reduced and quite literally henpecked to near oblivion. By the film's end, the audience is left to presume that the "natural" order of things (in the gendered world, where femininity caves into submission and masculinity enjoys supremacy) has prevailed. The woman has been "put in her place" by nature's revolt against human progress. It is disturbing and powerful to witness. To read about Hitchcock's films and gender, check out The Women Who Knew Too Much: Hitchcock and Feminist Theory.

I fell in love with this dress because I was already in love with the film. Then I saw it looking amazing on some of my favorite bloggers! Help me decide what to do. And be sure to check out how those bloggers wear it! See Laura wear the Tippy here. See Becca here. And see Anjali here.

Memories of Tea Time

This year I find myself turning to herbal tea with great enthusiasm. They have become integral to my evening winding down ritual before bed. For most of my life I have been a drinker of tea. Only in high school did I occasionally incorporate coffee, and it was mostly on special occasions, where I felt oh so Seattle and oh so Grunge by heading to Starbucks (yes, I realize how clueless that sounds, but I was 16 and therefore clueless).

Both of my parents worked my entire life. When my grandmother was still living she would watch me during the period of time between school and my mom's return home. Each day after first grade she would have a cup of hot tea and a plate of toast waiting for me. We'd listen to Patsy Cline records and I'd change into my outfit for dance classes. Since then tea has had a special place in my heart. It's funny how repetition can both bring comfort and solidify the status of a memory. My mom has never been a home coffee drinker. She likes coffee but every morning for as long as I can remember, she has had a cup of hot tea with milk and sugar. My own tea ritual is one I tend to practice in the evenings with decaffeinated versions of my favorites: peppermint, chamomile, cinnamon spice. My love for tea and the knowledge of its role in the history of my family made it difficult to pass up this teacup print Sugar and Cream dress once it hit the sale. I realize material objects are just things. We are not a sum total of stuff. But in grief and nostalgic longing, things can become more substantive when they trigger beloved memories.