Back! - Log

Hi Everyone!!! I’m back!!!

I’m sorry to have slacked on all the posting…. I have been busy these past few days… the weekend came and left in a haste (the Chris Brown and Rihanna concert was a BLAST! – pictures to follow)… we “fired” our old nanny even if her replacement was set to arrive at least 5 days after.. "former" nanny was beginning to be such a pain to have… and I was losing my patience by the minute… her replacement arrived yesterday and I thing she’s an improvement based on initial gut feeling… but I still cant say for certain if she's ok…

But boy am I happy to have another nanny now so I can have time to BLOG! Heeehee… don’t get me wrong, I love spending time with the baby! But everyone needs his/her own quiet happy-time and mine would be taking long, fragrant, bubbly showers and blogging!

My bangs have grown a LOT! And really FAST for that matter! It probably has something to do with the weather (?)... I never knew having bangs would entail visiting the salon every 3 weeks to get them trimmed or else I’d end up blind or cross-eyed! And I seriously need to have an appointment with my hair stylist tomorrow… or suffer having puffy-wavy-side-swept-bangs on Saturday evening (hubby and I have another wedding to attend).

I decided to take my black oxfords out for a spin once more... I got them locally for a little less than $20 only! They feel so comfy and I simply adore them!

I wanted to wear a skirt and my purple tights with this.... but maybe on another day....

I am also loving my caramel-choco-colored nails… I have them on my hands and feet (though they look a bit… no.. not a bit but SUPER scratched because I did them myself… and it’s always a struggle each time)… so I’m in my caramel-brown phase… after the fire red, neon pink, deep purple and midnight blue… I cant figure out which one to try on next…

I've been taking my outfit pictures diligently... but I just didn't have the time to post any... I promise to post them all for you to see... no matter how dull, quirky, casual, formal -- they may be... I promise!

By the way... I can't wait to catch Twilight in local theaters soon!!

Enjoy your evening!!!

Tank: Topshop
Cardi: Online
Jeans: Mango
Shoes: The Ramp
Belt: Online
Watch: Kenneth Cole
Necklace: Online find

If we could count God’s blessings… We’d be up all night…

I’m so overwhelmed with the comments I got from my previous post on the nanny drama…THANK YOU so much for all the concern, the suggestions, the similar stories, and the compliments (to make me smile) from you… you know who you are… my heart is overflowing with gratitude and love! I may not be one of those popular Fashion Bloggers like most of you already are… but believe me, the 1, 2, 15, 20 comments that come in really make my day! I never somehow grasped how solid this blogger-bond we all have is, that what started as a special world where personal style bloggers united and talked/posted about fashion has blossomed into this web of great friendships as we share not just our outfits but also parts of our life among one another. It’s quite a happy thought but sometimes surreal to think of, and I consider you all as blessings from heaven in the form of friends who I haven’t even met in person yet…

Ok I should stop being sappy… and proceed with today’s outfit post:

I had less than 30 minutes to take a quick squeaky shower and dress up today, so as I showered, my mind was deciphering "what to wear" and no matter how hard I tried to think, nothing came out...

So when I opened my closet and saw my scarves hanging on one end... I immediately thought about wearing this scarf as an accent peice.. hubby and I saw these a few months back and bought 2 (his was green and maroon) and then we totally forgot about having them... but I'm glad I looked the "scarf-way" because this scarf is too cute to pass up on!

Struggling with the camera lighting...

And that's me laughing/trying to pacify baby because she was getting fussy in her crib (maybe she wanted to join the photoshoot?).

And I took the red peep-toe booties for a walk again....

Hope you all have a great weekend!!!!

P.S. I will keep you all posted on the Nanny-drama on my next post…
P.P.S I’m loving Jason Mraz’ “We Sing, We Dance, We Steal Things album” especially the song “Live High”
P.P.P.S Chris Brown and Rihanna…. See you in 2 days!!!!

Maroon Macaroon and all the drama!!!

We've been having Nanny Wars part IV at home. My baby's nanny (known for squabbling with each and every helper she works with in our household) has been throwing tantrums and fighting with our other household help which causes quite a considerable amount of stress on our end.

Like an afternoon telenovela:
- nanny goes on a day-off (our nannys and helpers here in the Philippines are stay-in workers, we provide them food, lodging, toilettries, clothing and they can take their day-offs to visit relatives regularly, though most of them don't have any nearby as they hail from the distant Philippine provinces which are shores away from Manila)
- nanny is one day late in returning from her day-off
- we question her why the sudden "incomunicado" behavior and ask why she refused to answer all our phone calls, she answers by saying there was no signal in her "aunts" place (which is still questionable since we were able to get some calls through, though she wouldnt pick up)
- nanny marches to their room and fights with household helper by accusing her of being a mole and an ass kisser by trying to be "the honest one" and telling us all about her escapades with numerous boys during her day offs (which, frankly speaking we don't even care about because thats her personal life) just to make household help look like the good one
-then household help retaliates and cries endlessly
-then nanny refuses to go out of her room for hours and then days....refuses to do her daily chores, doesnt even bother to look at my baby
-and the drama goes on...and on... and on...

So who ends up suffering from nanny's bad behavior?? Of course hubby and I are stressed beyond stress!

Now I'm finding it hard to concentrate on other things beyond the household.... I'm usually not a sleepy, sluggish person but for 2 days straight, I've noticed myself stare blankly into my laptop's screen especially while trying to finish writing 2 manuals (I know...yaaaaawn right?) and I noticed I've been on a grumpy mood more often than not.

I just hope we get a replacement nanny soon.

I wore a wore a skirt + blouse ensemble for work yesterday. I was hesitant about the body-hugging satin skirt... I know my chocolate binges when in stressful situations + a tight skirt are bound for disaster.

But thankfully, the results were I guess, minimal... heehee....

I've been on a dark-lipstick phase for maybe 2 months now. One some days I would notice my inclination to snatching my Revlon matte Red Velvet for a pucker bursting with scarlet, on days like this, I opted for my Estee Lauder Maniac lipstick with a rich wine tone...

I'm not much of a make-up girl but I need to have something on my lips or else I'd end up being the palest of the pale.. I usually go for MAC lipglass, Clinique Full Potential lip gloss (It has a sting similar to Lip Venom for that added plumpness) and Juicy Tubes -- I'm more of the candy girly-girl but my glossies have been on vacation-mode right now.

I added a bead necklace with organza roses to my outfit (this one I bought months and months ago which reminded me of Anne Hathaway's Chanel necklaces in the Devil Wears Prada).


I love the metal heels on my shoes too... I went on a metal-heels phase last last year, but noticed that they were very difficult to walk with, so I just let them out of the closet from time to time.

I also love the coated buttons on my skirt... it reminds me of the guy on the Pringles potato crisps container for some unknown reason.

It was my first time to wear this skirt and I might wear it sometime again with an entirely different top... I already have the look in mind and am already excited!

Top: Old Navy
Skirt: Online find
Shoes: Syrup
Necklace: local department store find
Watch: Kenneth Cole

Weekend Wear: Lazy Dressing

You can tell that I'm lazy to dress up by merely looking at the little details of my outfit: I usually don't have a waist cincher or a belt, a bangle or a cocktail ring and on some occasions, my bag usually does NOT match or go with anything I am wearing (and my purse, to me, always plays a pivotal role on normal "inspired" days).


I wore this ensemble to the supermarket... I was feeling a bit blah and thought that I just needed to get out of the house as fast as I could wearing something decent and far from the usual tees and shorts.

I chose this ruffly blouse and paired it with a pair of cut-offs to veer away from being to girly-girly on a casual day and since I didn't want to look like a lazy dresser (though it was indeed a LAZY day to dress up), I piled the accessories on without even pondering about them.

I thought, as long as they were pointing to the same color scheme... then I would be OK. And I guess it came out as a total So-so outfit...I always try to break my bad habit of being overly matchy-matchy but heck.... it was a trip to the supermarket ONLY.

So off we were to do the groceries... with me and my pale legs.. heehee...

Top: From Bangkok
Cut-off shorts: Unionbay
Wedges: USA Online Find
Sling bag: Nine West
Watch: F21
Necklace: F21

Speaking of being overly color-coordinated, I've seen the trailer of the upcoming movie "Confessions of a Shopaholic" and I just have to say that I'm a bit surprised to find out that Patricia Field was the person behind Isla Fischers matchy-matchy outfits...
It came to me as a surprise, because Patricia has gained so much popularity from doing such superb styling in Sex and The City, The Devil Wears Prada and Ugly Betty. But though I am a obviously big fan of coordinated stuff, something about what I've seen from the movie so far, looks a bit wrong. She usually gets away with putting together unlikely stuff and creating a great work of art as a result (think: SJP in SATC series...), but this one makes me think, "Hey, I know I'm far from being a great dresser, but these safely matched outfits look like I styled them somewhere in dreamland!" heeeheee (nice try Peaches...only in your dreams...)

I've been a BIG FAN of Sophie Kinsella's book series (I even thought Becky Bloomwood and I shared the same life when they came out with Shopaholic and Baby just when we found out I was having my little Lexie...heehee), but on those rare chapters where Becky detailed her outfits, they weren't as color coordinated as Isla's stuff (but hey she looks so good even after having a baby!)...

I dare not question Patricia Field's creations though... who knows? This might be the next big thing! I'm still keeping my hopes high that the movie will have better outfits in store for us... I can't wait for February!!!

Splurging is out??!

I think I’m a bit over my Gossip Girl Ga-Ga days… I’m a couch potato no more but officially a Twilight saga fanatic (the bookworm returns!).

Those of you who have read or heard about Stephanie Meyers bestselling book series would probably agree with me. It’s like J.K. Rowling meets Anne Rice in a teenage “Sweet Dreams novel” effect, which leaves you breathless as you turn from one page to another, wide-eyed with suspense and anticipation while your heart flutters from all the teeny-bopper romance. Vampires have always aroused my curiosity and fascination, I swear I can preach about it all day, but I will save you all from all the lackluster…. Just be sure to watch the “Twilight” movie (I can’t wait)!

On to other things…

I’m still supposed to be on a shopping ban ( I imposed October till December and am still halfway) but backslid a bit last weekend. Well, I wasn’t feeling in a party mood all week, I was even feeling under the weather on most days and hubby coaxed me to impulsively by 3 wardrobe pieces in less10 minutes time. What can I say… he put me on time pressure… I wasn’t even able to fit any of them but I swiped away… bad!

According to The Wall Street Journal latest news, if you are feeling guilty about shopping... you should be! Psychologists declare that splurging is out and self-denial is in, but that buying something cheap is just fine. Ok… I should learn to be more diligent.

Anyways, this is what I wore yesterday… It’s a plain dress which I also bought last September simply on “grab all you can in 2 minutes” – mode. It was one of those days when we only had to accomplish an errand and I, the cunning, scheming, imp that I am, decided to convince hubby to make a quick detour to a clothes shop and since we were pressed for time I grabbed this dress, together with another one I have yet to wear, and then we drove away without even trying it on (again…).

And so, after letting it sit inside its paper bag for a few days….(sigh hopeless isn’t it?), I stared at it and decided that it just was one of those big mistakes again…too flowery..too much patterns…to librarian-ish plus it was a wrap-dress and it had a waist-ribbon which seemed to stick out in the wrong directions... but since I was trying to live within the confines of my closet – I decided to snip the tags attached to it and dump it into the laundry basket…

And now, after a few weeks of hanging around in the closet… Little-Flowery-Dress takes it’s chance to shine!
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I added a little waist cincher to cover the ribbon which I just wrapped unendingly around my waist (if you call that a waist or at least what's left of it), and added some pearls (the necklace was made out of a leftover strand of pearl beads which we used for our wedding stuff...so they're plastic pearls in contrast with the real ones on my ears heehee.

Hope we all have a great weekend!!!

Dress: Mode (from Bangkok)
Waist Cincher: What Women Want
Shoes: Nine West
South Sea Pearl Earrings
Watch: Anne Klein
Necklace: local Lace shop

Tagged: Numero Dos + SS-09 Accessories

Here are the Rules:

1. Link to the person who tagged you : Gilda of TinkChic27

2. Post the rules on your blog

3. Share six non-important things/habits/quirks about yourself

4. Tag six random people at the end of your post by linking to their blogs

5. Let each random person know they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their website.


Ok Here goes:


- I am perpetually pale. - I’ve been like this since birth… I’ve been called an ALBINO by funny little street kids back when I was 7…(they ran away when I wanted to befriend them – heehee…funny but it was traumatic back in the day)! Then back in high school and college, I enjoyed a constant faint tan from being in the beach every weekend (My skin burns easily so I can’t be tanorexic – it’s either go easy on the suntan or be red and sore as a freshly boiled crab!). Though times have changed now, I hardly have time to go to the beach (which is at least 3 hours away from Manila) so I have nothing much to do about my pale skin, most of my siblings have the same skin-tone and some of them cannot survive without tanning… thus, I suffer from being called MAYO – for mayonnaise or NANA- our local term for PUS (which is normally WHITE in color… eww) – it drives me nuts!



- I go crazy over colored Pilot Pens, and now Sharpies! - A practice I’ve brought with me since high school. My notebooks are usually strewn with multi-colored handwriting and without a fuchsia pen… I refused to take down notes (it had to be a special Pilot fuchsia pen… not baby pink, not neon pink – but fuchsia pink!). I love Sharpies too… specially the new hip colors they just came out with… it’s a QUIRK quite hard to break!

- I am a bookworm - I guess it's pretty much self-explanatory. Once I start reading a book and get hooked...there's no stopping anymore! It was such an easy thing to do that back when I was single... I just locked myself up in my room and pretended to be asleep when someone would knock or call (heehee bad!), but now with hubby resorting to silly antics while trying to pull me away from my book (he has an attention disorder you know... kidding heehee) and my baby trying to rip my book apart each time she sees me staring into it when she's with us -- I just have no other choice but to put those books down. If I could finish a book an a few hours before, today- it takes days to finish a book on an "installment basis".



- I am a bag-a-holic. – I haven’t posted much of my babies here, as I try to devote this site to my outfits only (and I also know that my purses might steal the limelight from me… heehee). I’ve been a baghag since high school, I wanted my bags to look different from the rest – so while we all had our Jansport backpacks (mine had to be purple)… I would shift to the bowler bag or patent bags in vivid colors – I loved it when my bags started conversations even with random strangers from school. It then morphed into a designer bag addiction… and though my collection of luxury bags is quite small compared to other baghags out there (check out TPF!!! I have the urge to line my bags up and take a picture of them all, like those ladies on TPF... but I'm still too lazy to do so), I have Coach and Dooneys to start off, then Marc Jacobs, then Louis Vuittons, then Chanels…it’s slowly growing!! I’m targeting a Goyard St. Louis next and I want a tangerine or aqua Hermes Kelly before I reach 50 heeehee!

- I am such a sucker for Cheese and Vinegar - yes, you read that right.... V-I-N-E-G-A-R, Cane, Balsamic, Spicy, Sweet Vinegar... I can eat Cheetos, Doritos and any kind of salty chips with vinegar, I sprinkle vinegar over my rice after eating salty food just for the heck of it... we have a local delight we call "tuyo"-- sun-dried salty fish which I love to have for breakfast at least once a month and I soak the "tuyo" strips in Vinegar before eating them with garlic-egg-fried rice. On the other hand... I can live on cheese... I can devour cheese pizzas in minutes -- mozzarella is love, I enjoy casseroles with cheese melt on top, I sprinkle Parmesan cheese all over my pasta and pizza and even on some dishes, I can sink my teeth into blue cheese, have Fontina cheese with red wine as a dessert, eat table cheese and rice as a meal (oh yeah gross right??) and I can scoop cream cheese varieties ( I love The Laughing Cow) straight into my mouth like candy!



- I have a bad habit of over-cleaning my ears. – my E.N.T. warned me to go easy on the Q-tips maybe at least 8 years ago… but I just cant kick the habit of sticking those q-tips (soaked in Alcohol) into my ears each day. I know it’s really bad… but I hate having to think that my ears might smell like cheese! (ahahah ok am I making you gag with all my vivid descriptions now??)


OK.

I'm done...

I think I've grossed you guys out enough... Please do come back, I'm really not that wierd. I promise to be in my best behavior at all times and leave this odd-ness out of my blog ok??

Just please.. pretty please come back!!!

Please?


So I'm tagging (wish I could tag more than 6, but well there's always a next tag):


Erika of Fashion Chalet
Rachel of Kaleidoscope Dreams
The Fashionista's Roz, Issa and Tokyostargirl of We Wear Things
Dane of Trust Me It's Paradise'

Nina of Femme Rationale
May of Mayk All Day Everyday

Stylish Rachel's recent post reminded me of some pictures which I collected a few week's back from Style.com's Fashion Week-ender. I gathered pictures of my favorite SS-09 Accessories to share with you all, but somehow forgot that I had all these pictures all along.

So finally, I'm sharing them with you all.. let me know what you think.

Let's start off with the bags!!!

Hermes goes western with frills... ( I still prefer the traditional Hermes bags though).


Louis Vuitton goes tribal...

Gucci goes back to the traditional....

Balenciaga goes space-age...

Chanel goes ga-ga over logos....

Fendi goes exotic...

Emilio Pucci mixes his loud signature prints with canvas...

And for all the Cinderellas out there... here come my shoe picks!!

Graphics Galore from Sergio Rossi...

Pastel Power from Armani...

Neon Highlights from Pierre Hardy...

Mirror, Mirror on your feet from Givenchy...

Platforms is still the way to go for Marni...

Sexy Heels from Nina Ricci......

Exotic Ruffles from Christian Louboutin...

Mixed patterns from Lanvin....

Studs + Stitches from Jimmy Choo

Peep-toes in bold patterns from Bruno Frisoni...

Ok..why am I out of breath already??