LET'S TALK ABOUT / LEATHER JACKETS

have you seen that seasons pie chart that's floating around the internet? it always makes me laugh. it's so sad, and true, and here you are left cramming an entire season's worth of clothes into just two weeks or so. it's brutal. it seems to me like there are only two very small windows of time in which one can reasonably pull off wearing just a leather jacket without freezing to death or else roasting your brains out, and those windows happen to be now, and early fall. this according to my foolproof opinion. and, according to my calculations, we're here! this is it!

a leather biker jacket is suuuuch a good way to make the transition between winter and spring. with a sundress is my favorite way to go, but they also pair perfectly with florals, simple tee shirts, bare ankles, birkenstocks... 

a few of my favorite looks:

this is the leather jacket i finally picked for myself after a rather quixotic quest last year. this one is really, great too. h&m has a great basic faux leather option. and zara! is killing it with their leather jackets right now (zara always kills it, with everything, all the time, so i'm not allowed in there anymore). here are a few that i really love: one | two | three | four | five | six. (to see more even leather jackets i love, check it here.)

what's your favorite season transition trick? are you swapping out your A/W for your S/S yet? it's on my to-do list, right after finish my edits and catch up on pretty little liars, because i have my priorities in check. do you think aria is A? have you seen this? i'm totally on board with aria as A.

this post was sponsored by eBay, who just launched their Curate for a Cause campaign, where for every collection created, eBay will donate $1 to @MarchofDimes. the goal is to donate $25,000, plus one random person will win $5,000 to shop my collections. for full details and to enter, click HERE.  create your own collections now! #imbornto #followitfindit

photo sources: one | two | three | four | five | six | seven | eight | nine

TEN DATES // 06 HITCHCOCK + PANCAKES

it's so nice to be home and to get back to our regular date nights! i've missed this! so last week while browsing through the curated dates at HowAboutWe, i saw there was a hitchcock film festival going on downtown at the film forum. i booked the showing for birds straight away. and then, as an afterthought, i booked us a pancake dinner date at the clinton st baking company, just because. because nobody really needs a reason for pancakes. and those pancakes! so we arranged a play date* for huck and snuck off over the weekend for a little classic horror + some pancakes. 

HowAboutWe has been sending us out on ten dates to celebrate our tenth year of marriage. this was date number six and i tell you i never want it to end. these dates have been such a treat for us. i can't say it enough, this service is worth its weight in gold. we're definitely staying on as members once our ten dates are over. (p.s., click HERE get $50 off your first date!)

neither of us had seen birds before, and now i have a million questions. was there supposed to be any significance to... any of it? or was it all just a vehicle for birds attacking junk? i kept trying to find significance + metaphors in the silliest things, it seemed like they were everywhere! but then they all went mostly nowhere. i think, when all was said and done, it was really just a film  about... birds. attacking junk. i loved every second of it. the film forum is a neat place to see a movie, very intimate, the audience actually feels like one united body experiencing something together. also with a law + order actor. according to brandon. (you can't throw a stick out here without hitting a law + order actor. ;)

you know what i've been enjoying most about this project with HowAboutWe, is there are all these fun things are going on out here all the time, and there's just no possible way to know about them all. how do people find out about these things? you either need to live right in the thick of it + see things as you walk past, or else you need to have massive quantities of information at your fingertips + all the time in the world to wade through it all. it's honestly such a cool thing to have all these curated events laid out for you by HowAboutWe for Couples, all different kinds of experiences, that get you into different neighborhoods and let you see new things + add new things to your repertoire. now i know to keep my eye on what's showing down at the film forum. and now i know that the edges of a clinton st baking company pancake are so severely divine that it's worth the trek down there always. it turns out our friends got engaged there! just the right crispy softness in those pancake edges, i'm telling you. it's just romantic all around.

HowAboutWe has recently launched in los angeles! that's five cities total. if yours is one of them, click HERE to get that $50 off something fun like this pizza making class, or this scavenger hunt at economy candy, or the these tickets to the nets/knicks game (daaang!). if HowAboutWe hasn't made it to your city yet, there's a wait list going on where you'll get a heads up when they do make plans to come to your area. 

we took a long walk around the east village after dinner. we spend, like, zero time down there, it was like discovering a new continent. oh! tompkins square park! that's where that is! that sort of thing. and then we went home + watched the new thor on amazon prime. talk about classic cinema.

i risked all sorts of ear disease to find out if this pay phone still worked and guess what! we had a dial tone! it now costs fifty cents to call someone who cares, whaaaaat.

*here's the asterisk part: the holbrook word for "baby sitter" these days is "friend." i'm not sure how it happened, but whenever we get a sitter we say, "guess who's coming over to play with you, huck!" and he says "my fwend!" and about dies of happiness. if i ever say that and then an actual friend shows up, and not a sitter, he gets really confused. we hired a new girl this time and huck ran up and hugged her before he'd even learned her name. the boy loves his "friends." the minute they arrive he's all "see ya, guys." 

pretty shot of my favorite park to take us out...

this post was sponsored by HowAboutWe, a company that helps people fall in love and stay in love. couples can sign up HERE and get $50 off their first date. and singles can sign up HERE to get 25% off any membership!

p.s. i am wearing / tee: rag & bone via need supply co, pants: c/o need supply co, oxfords: madewell (old), bag: c/o accompany, coat: h&m (old). brandon is wearing / boots: caterpillar, jeans: j. crew, sweater: urban outfitters (old), jacket: coach (it's either this one or this one. i'm not sure, i got his at the factory outlet in troutdale!)

FOR THAT EARLY SPRING CHILL

one / two / three / four / five / six + six / seven / eight

these early, early spring days, where it's not quite spring out but the promise of warmth seems to be lurking all around, this is one of my favorite times of the year. it's just such a funky transitional time, isn't it? one day it's winter, one day it's spring, you can see the buds closed tight on the trees--they're thinking about it--you can see the very tips of the tulips tentatively climbing out of the earth--it'll be gone before you know it, this funky time, which somehow makes it all the more special. it's kind of exciting to watch the seasons take turns like this. it's the tumult of change, the beauty of a sputtering start. i don't know, does it feel like a metaphor for life? that moment before you begin, that moment when your foot is hovering in the air, just before you take the first step... the halt before the momentum. it's just neat.

i'm not really in any rush for this winter to be over. this winter was really good to me + my family. i'm always grateful for an excuse to huddle inside with my favorite people + sip something warm + put on a really great record. we recently found a used copy of the carpenter's singles on vinyl and it was possibly the best purchase i ever made. that imogene + willie candle smells just about perfect, i can vouch for it, and i'm crushing so hard on that ceramic mug. get in my cupboards, sister. and bonus of all bonuses, now's the time to catch your favorite feel-good winter goods on sale! it's a real good time of year out there. i'm milking the last of this for all its worth. :) happy spring!

LADIES WEEKEND IN THE CITY

i've had my head in the clouds all this week, thinking all sorts of things about women. what it means to be a woman, what women need from themselves + from each other, and other womanly things. womanity should really be a word. 

i grew up with a bucketful of cousins + aunts at my disposal + as such never cared a fig for having real friends. my family were my friends, as real friends as friends could ever be. there were easily a million of us lovins living practically down the street from each other in arizona where we grew up + it wasn't until fairly recently that i started to feel like i might need the kinds of friends in my life that these women had always been for me, and it wasn't until fairly recently that i understood just how difficult a task that actually is. it's hard to find friends that double as family when your friends aren't already family to begin with. is the obvious statement of the year. that kind of friendship takes years + years + years to develop. i've only been at this business a short little while, and i like me some immediate results, you know how that goes.

i think what it comes down to is, as a woman, for me, i find that women often let me down. mostly this is my fault. overly high expectations, of course. one has no business expecting from friends what i want to expect from my friends, mostly because i didn't have good examples of friends as friends growing up, i had family. so i put myself in the position where i let women let me down. doesn't it seem like too often we're unnecessarily dishonest with each other? afraid to commit, afraid to be raw, afraid to be vulnerable? so there's just me, as open and obvious as a one-paged book, repeatedly being a dork and feeling dorky about being a dork. but this weekend was a good reminder for me that there are other dorks out there that are already mine. and it's all right.

riiiiiight. but this is a post about chinatown. over the weekend i got to play host to three of my, seriously, eleven aunts. jen + stacey are my dad's youngest sisters, nikki is married to my dad's youngest brother, stacey is four month older than me + jen + nik are both brandon's age. it's crazy, right? nik unfortunately missed the bulk of our naked childhood in the desert, though she's gone on to become one of my most wonderful + dearest friends. jen, i just love jen. jen has a zest + curiosity for life that is so inspiring. and stacey! me and stacey, man... we were inseparable as kids. having stacey in my living room after so many years of not having stacey in my living room, it was kind of a moment for me. sort of an exercise in continuity, if that even makes sense.

in any case, we went to chinatown on saturday and you know what? don't do that. save chinatown for a monday. 

we stopped in at the fish market because that's always a good time, and while we were there a lobster made a break for it and toppled out of the lobster bucket and onto the sidewalk right in front of me + huck, + huck's eyes. wide as saucers. he looked horrified + amazed + afterward i could tell he'd grown at least two inches taller from the experience. it was like he'd learned a thing or two about the world.

we ate dumplings at our favorite dumpling place for lunch + then wandered into little italy for cannoli, and cannoli! i've never loved cannoli but that's because i'm dumb. have cannoli always come in all these flavors? it doesn't feel terribly legit to say this, but anyway, you should get the tiramisu. "you'll love it."

"some woman is gonna want me to do it to her and i'm not gonna know what it is!"

apparently this is, like, *the* place for cannoli. who knew? i guess most of the restaurants + bakeries in little italy buy their cannoli from la bella ferrara, so if you go straight to the source you'll get them cheaper, or something, who knows if this is true, but this part was funny: as i was across the street taking that photo up there of the shop for future reference, a woman stopped me on the sidwalk and excitedly asked, "is there an actor from the soprano's over there?!?" day made.

brandon got these two shots, and ain't they purty? 

the end.

p.s. jen is a writer (she writes fiction!) and she wrote a little about the trip in her author's blog HERE. we were on the same wavelength this weekend big time, jen.

LET'S TALK ABOUT // HATS

happy friday post on a monday! this weekend was really, really wonderful. i had family in town + stayed up all night talking + ran all over the dang place instead of getting any of the things done that i was supposed to get done, but you know what, it was worth it. i'm hoping to post a few photos of our slumber party soon, but until then, hats. 

i've been really into hats this winter, but even more so lately thanks to this crazy confused weather the city's been sending us. one minute it's warm + the next you're parasailing down the sidewalk, i'm telling you, this march is a good one. winter/spring transitional dressing is always a little tricky, which is why i've been clinging to the hats i think. when it's colder than expected + your coat's back home, a hat will save you. when it's warmer than expected out, a floppy fedora will help you look surprisingly summery + carefree. i can't wait to bust out my straw hats once the weather is consistently summery (i've got an amish straw hat waiting in the wings for this summer + i tell you i really really can't wait for it), but in the meantime, i really love the transitional look of a felt floppy fedora set against a set of bare legs. 

a few inspirational images that i've been pinning to my pinterest boards + a few of my favorite hats from around the web, coming right up.

hat sources clockwise from left: one / two / three / four / five / six / seven / eight 

photo sources: one / two / three / four / five / six / seven / eight

this post was sponsored by eBay, who just launched their Curate for a Cause campaign, where for every collection created, eBay will donate $1 to @MarchofDimes. the goal is to donate $25,000, plus one random person will win $5,000 to shop my collections. for full details and to enter, click HERE.  create your own collections now! #imbornto #followitfindit

CLINIQUE STORY CHANGERS / A LITTLE VIDEO

back in october i was asked to be part of clinique's story changer project. my friends at case in soho were tagged with producing the films, so not only did i get to spend two very fun days bumming around some of my favorite spots in town with some very cool people, i also got a neat glimpse into what a film career is like. like, how many takes you might need to catch one very specific shot, and what it's like having a hair + make up team that is dead set on getting your hair as flat + tidy as possible (uphill battle, my friends). i had terribly angsty skin in high school that i really struggled with, and the idea that we can change our stories + play an active role in our own endings is something i feel really passionately about, so all in all it was just such an honor to participate. and here it is! taduh! i really love how it turned out. 

p.s. you can see the rest of the story changers project at clinique right HERE, under the STORY CHANGERS tab. 

WINDSDAYS AND WEDNESDAYS AND OTHER BLUSTERY THINGS

my wednesday yesterday was a really good wednesday, as far as wednesdays go. having a good wednesday is just such a treat, you know? it's not like anybody's guaranteed a good wednesday. i find my best days usually happen on a thursday anyway, so a good wednesday is really just a nice bonus, is what it is.

i had my weekly wednesday sitter yesterday afternoon and i used it to sneak off for a really fun date with a really rad lady to plot out some fun new things, and then my editor called, and it wasn't half bad! it wasn't half bad! i'd been dreading that call in that kind of way where you relish the dreading, because how neat of an opportunity it is to dread a call from an editor over some nonsense book you're writing? we talked strategy and editing and we're going in a fun direction with it--a good direction, a focused direction--and it got me really excited, the sweaty kind of excited though where it's like, oh crap kind of excited, and also now i finally know how to describe the dang thing when somebody asks about it, which is no small miracle. it's about being a queen, naturally. now if only someone could tell me how to describe my blog when people ask me about that. "ummm, i blog about... me?" that one never sounds terribly satisfying.

to kill the last of the hour i had to myself before the sitter had to go, i wandered around aimlessly in a very rainy upper west side dusk. my thoughts were just going everywhere, so i balanced my umbrella between my shoulder and chin and walked really, really slowly while typing an entire new chapter into my iphone down columbus between 71st and 67th. and then i took a photo of myself to immortalize that very moment,  the moment i wore a gray sweater on columbus avenue while looking at my phone instead of where i was going, because that never happens. ;) and then brandon called and said he and huck were waiting for me at our favorite greek place, and i swear to you the birds sang in the trees. it was just, it was just silly, is what it was.

after that existentially magnificent greek dinner, where the rain was tap-tapping just the right way onto our glass windowed seating area, and after the last of the dining room chairs i ordered for so cheap it'd make your eyes roll showed up on time and looked just like i wanted them to, i had to look at brandon and just laugh. i have all the diet coke in the fridge a girl could want. i have devastatingly great boy-men who drive me bonkers in the best way, my hormone fog had cleared that morning, a fog that i've noticed has gotten lighter + easier to see through with every month that passes. i mean, when the good days roll in like this you just gotta grab onto 'em and say so.

in closing i will tell you a true story about today that is going to take this post in an entirely new and vastly more treacherous direction. 

basically the weather out is satanic. the winds are berserk. 19 degrees with a windchill of maybe five, and 25 mile-per-hour winds with gusts up to 50, FIFTY YES FIFTY I TELL YOU. so we were walking to play school, i was pushing huck in the stroller, we'd got to this one spot that was making a kind of wind tunnel effect and it was blowing so hard i actually could not take a single step forward, all i could do was push hard into it and hold my ground and hope it would blow down soon enough that both of us could breathe again + keep on walking. so i'm pushing right? then comes a gust. easily 50mph, and yes that kind of wind can push your stroller backwards onto you. the stroller knocked me clean over + rolled over twice (once over me and my bashed in knee cap), and then we were pretty much dragged five feet down the street while i held on to the stroller for dear life and shouted, "it's okay huck! it's okay!" while he screamed bloody murder. i couldn't even breathe, the wind was blowing so hard and so ice cold, i could barely even open my eyes. luckily a cab happened to be driving past at that exact moment carrying a very burly dude in the back seat. the driver slammed on the breaks while i was basically parasailing down riverside drive against my will, they both leapt out together and caught us before we could scrape our way too much farther down the street. they essentially carried all of us in a big pile into the first apartment building lobby we could find, and then they were gone! poof! i didn't even get a good look at their faces as i thanked them, they were gone before my beanie was out of my eyes. thank you, kind strangers! there in the lobby i did all the checks for broken bones, and we were fine. totally fine! my hands literally have never been that ice cold in my life, it hurt like the dickens as they thawed out. the wind was so steady that the doorman couldn't even get the door open once we were finally put back together, and he weighed 275 pounds! well, that's what he told me, that doesn't sound believable does it. he was probably six foot five though. what do i know?

luckily, huck was strapped in securely at the time with the handlebar firmly in place, so aside from being phenomenally terrified he was otherwise completely fine. (those bugaboos are flubbing amazing and i said a major prayer of thanks that we didn't take the umbrella stroller that morning.) and luckily too when the stroller fell over it knocked the brakes into place, which i'm sure slowed us down at least a little bit? ... anyway. 

and that's my exciting story for the day.

GET ME DRESSED // 10

here's the scoop: my table of contents is due, like, now, huck has play school in the morning and we aren't prepared, i haven't picked up the dry cleaning in over a week, and it's supposed to snow tomorrow? but! i have family in town this weekend (hooray!), and we had some really amazing greek food for dinner, and really. there's not a whole lot you can be mad at when there's family involved plus souvlaki + orzo plus candy bars for dessert. (huck called it his "chocolate cups" and i don't know, could that get any cuter?)

so this little number i put together for church on sunday. after getting a few photos of the situation on our way out because, you know, brandon + i sort of looked at each other + shrugged + went back inside to put our jams back on. it was just a day for staying in and making soup and playing tarzan on repeat and watching huck play "swing on the vines!" in the hallway all day. i blame it fully on daylight savings. what is it with daylight savings! i was just about to write that europe must think we're so weird for doing this but then i researched it first and as it turns out, they do it too! come on europe, that is so disappointing! but iceland doesn't, so it's settled. we're moving to iceland. anyway it's a shame that no one got to appreciate this stellar bit of "transitional wardrobing" i've got going on right here, but then again now i've fixed that, and so. world! bare legs and a big old sweater. i feel like this pale pink color is going to single handedly get me through the last of this winter snow business.

what do you think of that first one? a little moody? brandon likes to get multiple locations going when we're knocking these out, because that is just the sort of husbsultant he is. 

you made it!

p.s. huck

on me: aritzia sweater (sold out, but the gap has something similar) / skirt c/o shabby apple (i love you ck!) / shoes + hat are old madewell models / timex watch

on huck: zara coat (last year) / american apparel beanie / 7AM enfant mittens / gap sweater (appears to be sold out) / zara jeans / that top face is the face huck wears when he's "swinging on vines," it's pretty great, isn't it.

hey i like you guys a lot. thanks for sticking around. ;)