Season's Greetings.

Here's wishing all of you a very Happy Holiday season, whichever you may celebrate (or not)! Enjoy time with friends and family, good food and drink, and just the general spirit of the season.

On my dresser.

Looking through some older photos on my computer; a couple of views of the top of my dresser.

Long time, no post.

Quickly stopping by to say hello... I'm still adjusting to the commute for my new job and to the job itself, so posting will be light for a short while. I hope to be back soon with something of more interest to everyone. Have a great week!

xo Jennifer

Gratitude.

I am thankful for so many things this Thanksgiving, not least among them:

• That my sister has flown across the country from San Francisco to join in our family holiday meal;
• For the loving relationships I have with my family and wonderful circle of friends;
• For my good health and that of all those I love;
• To be gainfully employed (with health insurance! and a 401K!) in an industry I love after 21 months of unemployment;
• For the emotional and financial support that kept me sane and with a roof over my head and food in my kitchen during my layoff;
• And for the many lovely people who visit my blog and Etsy shop... it honestly does make me so happy, especially when you leave me comments, so please be sure to drop me a line as often as you can!

A very happy and healthy Thanksgiving to all of my readers in the US, and a very lovely and happy day to everyone! I wish you all the best, and hope to see you here again in the future.

Good news!

Well, for me that is... I started a new full-time job this past week, 21 months after being laid off from my last full-time job. I am very happy and relieved to finally be off of unemployment and contributing to the economy again!

My new office is right near Rockefeller Center, which means I am dangerously close to one of the most amazing Anthropologie stores. After work on Friday I wandered over to see their new holiday windows and then spent a nice hour roaming around the store. I snapped loads of photos both out- and inside. Below is just a sampling; more to follow soon.

More San Francisco treats.

Here are some more items I picked up while I was in San Francisco last month:

My first piece of Heath Ceramics: a beautiful aqua bud vase...


Handmade vanilla marshmallows from Miette patisserie...


A handmade wooden top and sweet letterpress postcards of NY and SF from Rare Device...


Uppercase #7 and some pencils from The Curiosity Shoppe (the fortune slips were free)...


I'm happy to have brought a variety of non-souvenir souvenirs back with me; they'll be happy reminders of my lovely trip!

San Francisco treats.*

I picked up a lot of great things when I was in San Francisco two weeks ago. Here's the haul from my visit to Japantown (click any photo for a closer look).

From Ichiban-Kan (I got all of this for just over $20!):


From Daiso, where almost everything costs $1.50:


And isn't their logo sweet?


I only bought a few things at Kinokuniya since I'm lucky enough that there's one in NYC. This tote bag was designed by an employee of the SF store and was available in so many colors it was hard to choose!

I'll post photos of some more of my SF goodies later this week.
*Anyone else remember this slogan?

Tricky.

Obviously the love of accessories hit me at a young age.
Happy Halloween to you all!

Ermie.

I am so blown away by Jennifer Parry Dodge's designs for her new clothing line. Ermie, also the name of her great blog (which you should be reading), is named for her great aunt Ermengarde who inspired her creativity. Jen has not only designed all the articles of clothing for Ermie but also the pattern on each and every fabric (some are collaborations with her artist husband Tomory).



I'm so flattered that Jennifer accessorized one of her dresses with one of my Chevron Necklaces; they look great together, in my humble opinion!



PLEASE NOTE: All textile designs and photos featured in this post are © Jennifer Parry Dodge and Tomory Dodge 2008-2010 and have been registered with the U.S. Copyright Office.

SF itinerary. (a very wordy post)

*My visit to SF (10/13–10/18/10): love & happiness!*

1) -arrive @ SFO in early evening
----drinks @ The Plough & Stars on Clement
2) -breakfast @ Fred's in Sausalito (fried French toast!)
----walk around Sausalito
----walk around Clement (including the fabulous shops Park Life and Seedstore)
----dinner @ Parma on Steiner (penne w/smoked salmon & asparagus in light cream, bruschetta, excellent wine)
3) -breakfast at Eats on Clement (apple & roquefort tartine, eggs over easy, excellent coffee)
----walk around Chestnut
----walk around Union
----lunch at La Boulange on Union (monte cristo sandwich, salad greens, cornichons & olives from free bar; wish I had a reason to use the jar of free Nutella!)
----dinner @ Troya on Clement (bread to dip in olive oil, paprika & sumac, and chopped pistachios; kofte kebab; Pellegrino Limonata; Baklava & complimentary Nightingale's Nest Baklava with ice cream)
4) -lunch @ Boccalone in the Ferry Building (panini of italian sausage with fennel & pickled peppers)
----visit Heath Ceramics & Miette Patisserie in the Ferry Building
----Blue Bottle Coffee Co.'s New Orleans style iced coffee at Ferry Building farmers' market
----Rare Device & The Curiosity Shoppe in the Mission
----Ichiban-Kan, Daiso, & Kinokuniya in Japantown
----party (Aktoberfest) in Upper Haight
----dinner @ King of Thai Noodle House on Clement (chicken satay, pad see lew)
5) -breakfast @ the apartment in Presidio/Laurel Heights (omelettes with black forest ham & swiss cheese, slow-cooked bacon, sweet pluots)
----drizzly drive to Napa (outlet shops)
----rainy day nap @ the apartment
----dinner @ the apartment (homemade pizza with pepperoni & red onion, salad with homemade dressing, Kara's Cupcakes for dessert--chocolate with fleur de sel caramel!)
6) -homeward bound :( boo.hoo.

City by the Bay.

Well folks, tomorrow I'm off to San Francisco to spend time with my lovely sister and her wonderful boyfriend. I can't wait to see them! I might get one post up while I'm away, but stay tuned for an account of my big adventure when I get back next week.

Shopping for Chevrons.

The new Chevron Necklaces are now all in my shop. I hope you'll like them enough to take one home!

Camera ready.

I was so jealous of SF for their Levi's® Workshop, but oh my how they've made up for it in NYC!

Fabrications.

I've been dabbling with Spoonflower's tools in hopes of designing a pattern that would translate well to a scarf (in cotton lawn or silk crepe de chine). Here are some ideas I've come up with so far. Any thoughts?




Oh, and Chevron Necklaces in the shop on Monday!

A bevy of Chevrons.

Photos have been shot, and the Chevron Necklaces will be up in my shop this week. Check back here for updates.

Oh happy day!

Wonderful news today... a new baby has arrived in the world! Congratulations to my dear friend Randy and her husband Noah, and welcome to their precious little boy.

These lovely, yummy cupcakes were made by my very talented friend Mara for the super baby shower she threw for Randy and Noah in August.

Oh, baby!

Famapa's little niblet is just too cute for words! Don't you agree?

Chevrons redux.

Okay, so after wearing my original Chevron Necklace for a few weeks I wasn't really feeling it. It could be done better, and now, I hope you'll agree, it has been.

So far I was only able to get photos of the first two color combos, seen below. I've made a few more versions since then but our dreary, gray, overcast east coast forecast doesn't give me much hope of getting photos of them before the end of this week. Once they're shot, I'll get them into my shop ASAP. Really, this time, I promise. Next week. Definitely.

Think ink.

A beautifully filmed account of how printing inks are made. Produced by Vepo Studios for The Printing Ink Company in Toronto. Click on 1080p for HD quality.


Found via Poppytalk

Birth day.

Joanna's incredibly lovely, funny, and sweet story of wonderful little Toby's entry into the world. I look forward to reading Alex's account too.

OK Dog.

These guys really know how to make a creative video! By now everyone knows the treadmill choreography in "Here It Goes Again". Then there was "This Too Shall Pass" (both versions) and "End Love". Now we have "White Knuckles", the most original use of IKEA products in a music video.



The OK Go boys collaborated on this one with a group of very talented pups, most of whom were rescue dogs. At the end of the video there's a note mentioning that these four-legged performers have been adopted, but that there are many more waiting for loving homes. The band are donating a portion of proceeds from sales of this video to the ASPCA and also have a link on their site to donate directly to the organization. A little puppy love along with your tunes? Can't go wrong with that.

It's in the bag.

I'm having some real lovin' for these bags.




Especially since I could never afford these bags.




Then again, I can't even afford the less expensive versions. Maybe once I'm actually working a full-time job again and have already put some money away in savings (the most important thing). Something to aspire to. I'll just add them to my ever-existent list of "Items I want but don't need but they're just out of my reach price-wise anyway so it really doesn't matter".

Benedictine mystery.

I love to read. I'll read pretty much anything I can get my hands on. Growing up, I would read the text on cereal boxes at the breakfast table!

Sadly, lately I've not been reading as voraciously as I used to. Before I was laid off, I spent more than ten years commuting daily to New York City from Long Island. I always had a book with me on these trips, and managed to fly through many good (and a few bad) books of fiction, biographies, memoirs, satire, science, cultural studies... At home I'd always have a book of lighter substance to read at bedtime, when my mind was drifting off to sleep. Now when I'm home I spend way too much time looking at the 193 blogs that I currently follow, or flipping through magazines, or dozing in front of the television. Not very stimulating (well, the TV dozing isn't), or productive.

I joined a book club a while back, partly to get out and meet people, and partly to get myself back reading on a more regular basis. I'm now in between books for the club, having finished Fly Away Home by Jennifer Weiner (more in the light substance category) a couple of weeks ago and waiting to pick up my reserved copy of You Lost Me There by Rosecrans Baldwin for the next meeting--I definitely can't wait to read that one! So last weekend at the library, I was perusing the list of books to read that I always keep in my little Filofax, and came across The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart. This is a book intended for 5th to 9th grade children, but I must say that's it's got me hooked. I won't go into the plot here; you can find out more about the book and the next two in this series on its website (full of fun logic puzzles, book excerpts, and more) or by clicking on the Amazon link in the book's title above. All I'll say is that I'm about 200 pages in and find it flying by. Children being relied on to save the world from an evil-doer, a great theme.


Oh, and I almost forgot to mention the incredible illustrations by Carson Ellis on the cover and each chapter heading! They really add to the story.




PLEASE NOTE: All images in this post are copyrighted and owned by Hachette Book Group.