Gasp!

Could it be? I actually have another roomination for all of you!

It's interesting that I am drawn to this particular room because it doesn't contain any elements of my personal style. I prefer rich bold colors, midcentury modern accents, quirky mismatched furniture, and vintage building accents like crown moldings, etc. But, I think the fact that all of this is missing and I still love this space shows that this apartment is impeccably designed.

The designer, James Rixner, mimics the angular construction of this modern apartment with his furniture choices. His peices are classic, sleek, comfortable, and well-made. The color palette is understated, soothing, and cohesive. I appreciate his use of texture on the wallpaper with its subtle graininess. He emphasizes shape by accenting the room with white pottery. The large-scale vases near the windows create height and visual interest. The chandelier is the "pop" in this room. (The elusive "pop" that every design show is talking about.) It is fun, bold, and almost organic in form mimicking a snowflake or a dandelion.

While I can't imagine eating in this room or children touching this room with a ten foot plastic kid's fishing pole, I appreciate this design for its stark, chic, and contemporary elements. It may not be the most liveable space for me personally, but I would not mind listening to Norah Jones and having a cocktail with the owners while we discuss the latest art gallery opening. But, rest assured, I would definately stay from the red wine :)

Our House is a Very, Very Fine House. . .

Last weekend, I had my family over for a Mother's Day lunch. It wasn't a monumental day in the grand scheme of things. For me, though, it was a very special day.

Traveling and living in other places was an awesome experience, to say the least. But, even in the awe of new tastes, experiences, friends, cultures, etc, all I ever wanted was a place to call "home." No matter how many pictures I hung or homecooked meals that permeated the walls of the places I inhabited, no location I lived ever came close to the warmth and comfort of my childhood home.

So, one can imagine my surprise when I moved back to Chicago and felt like more of an outsider in the city of my youth and my parent's home than I did in Utah or even the ghetto. How could this have happened? Isn't this the place I longed for during years of, at times, extremely lonely travel?

Okay, granted I was 26 and living with my parents and had a rather, umm, "humble" amount of money in the bank; which was not how I envisioned myself at this point. I also had no idea what I wanted to be when I "grew up" and there were a lot of challenges happening with my family, at this time. ("Challenges" that opened up whole new levels of joy.) So, all I actually wanted was a one way ticket out of there. No offense to the "50 and over crowd", Mom and Dad.

I learned "home" was not crawling back to the womb. My parents house would always be a place of love, comfort, and belonging, but it no longer felt right to set up camp there. Home needed to be a place I created for myself. Home, for me, could no longer be built on a transient foundation. A true home was not a place of temporary stay. Home was something I was going make in my heart and in mind. My "home" would endure with me, even in times when I would get restless and have an overwhelming desire to flee.

I've known that I always wanted this crazy, cold, huge, lively, beautiful, quirky city of Chicago to be my home. The challenge was to redefine what I needed from this new home. Because the needs I had as a young girl of eighteen when I left the first time simply no longer applied.

So I can finally say, after almost exactly two years after I moved back to Chicago, I officially have a home. I have a home! I have a place that isn't just in my heart or in memories. I have a physical place that gives me a sense of safety in this chaotic world. I have matching plates and glasses. I have large scale artwork. I have bed linens and a dining room table. Hell, thanks to Sean, we have a flat screen TV. I've really moved up in the world!

I am not valuing these things because our materialistic society says that these are things that I need. These are simply signs of making a commitment and an investment to a place I love. Painting the walls and adding special touches show that Sean and I love where we live. I have a refuge where I belong. I have four walls that are filled with memories and love.

I shared my special abode with my family for the first time on Mother's Day. It felt very special to be able to have them over (even if we were just eating turkey sandwiches.) I lit candles. Sean and I cleaned everything spotless. There were appetizers involved. It all felt very "adult."

I'm starting to think maybe growing up ain't so bad because I am truly grateful right now to be close to my family and, at the same time, have my own life and a beautiful home in this grand city of Chicago!

Stop and Smell the Flowers

Welcome to Spring Everyone!

On a pricelessly beautiful day like today, when little green buds are busting forth everywhere and the sky is a big blue sea of daydreaming happiness, I'd like to salute vintage flower pins as a perfect way to revitalize spring fashion.

Sometimes I think I am growing out of my vintage obsession and moving into more sensible, mature, attire. Then, I look at my vintage pin collection and I become enamored with the dainty innocense of these precious little treasures.

So, drive with the windows down, drink lemonade, walk in grass without shoes, and wear the gaudiest, most unmatchy, FUN pin you can find in rememberence of days when picking flowers was a very important utilization of your time.

Look Who's Back, back again!

Yes, I have been the real slim shady lately when it comes to my Blog. I knew this would happen at some point and apologize for my lack of writing.

Admittedly, though, my life has been pretty insane the past few weeks. I finished my finals last week and have been promoted at work without my previous position being filled. So, I have been a busy gal without a moment to spare. Did I also mention that I got the wild hair to paint my whole apartment? Pictures and final projects to be posted soon.

So, with this whole promotion thing, I am now the proud owner of my first ever cubicle. Yay me! With this new space, comes a new design challenge. My question to all of you is, "how have you decorated your cubicles/work spaces so that you are able to finish your work AND create a calming atmosphere amidst the chaos of an office atmosphere?

As I research this via the internet, I will keep you all posted on what I find. But, I'd like to hear your suggestions since I am extremely interested in Commercial Design as opposed to residential design. I find it so interesting that we spend the majority of our time at work and seem to invest nothing in making it an enjoyable and aesthetic atmosphere for ourselves. But, this is also coming from the girl who is devising a color scheme and planning on creating cubicle art for my workspace (Note: I'm a nerd.)

More to come. . .

Eat, Pray, Love

Again, I will reiterate that sometimes I do put forth the effort to discover books, movies, music, etc. on my own. And, sometimes, I'm lazy and I go into a bookshop on a Friday after getting paid my meager wage and want to treat myself with a new book and I'm tired after a long day of work and I just go on what my friends recommend or what has been on the NY Times Best-Seller list. (At least I frequent local book shops. I've got that going for me.)

Anyways, I bought Eat, Pray, Love last Friday on the recommendation that it might just change my life. My friend wouldn't even let me borrow her copy. Not out of selfishness, but embarrassment that she has written all over the margins and highlighted passages all throughout. And, though, I have been feeling quite content these days finally going to school for something I love and living with a man I love, I have never been one to turn down an opportunity for reincarnation. Plus, I couldn't help but be intrigued; I love highlighting books and making notes! I was an English major afterall.

And, I have to say, the can of worms I knew this book would open has not only caused several crying jags and an existential crisis, but also bizarre dreams combining emotions from several places and times in my life. Even my subconscious can't get away from Elizabeth Gilbert's powerful prose. (I choose the word, "prose" because of this book's poetic and poignant nature.)

She speaks to the reader (and my soul) like you are sitting in the local coffee shop talking about everything and nothing at all.

I can't help but feel haunted by the parallels of my life compared to hers and am currently navigating how I incorporate my previous "lives" with the one I am currently living. No, I am not getting all Shirley McClain on you folks. By "previous lives," I mean the many incarnations I have gone through (see "Scarves" Post below.) How does one take a life less ordinary and come to peace with the ordinary?

It's so easy to see beauty around you when you are traveling and seeing things with fresh eyes and a completely clean-slated heart. But, how do you keep this open-minded perspective when seeing things you have known your whole life?

This has been a struggle for me since I have moved home to Chicago, started my first requisite nine-to-five job, a serious relationship, and the rebuilding of friendships I left high and dry for years. Commitments sprouting up everywhere--when I was used to running in open fields of freedom for years.

It feels like I have been spinning my tires on ice trying to get away from the present reality of my life without actually going anywhere. (Not unlike trying to get my car that was frozen in ice in front of my apartment building for a month to move--thanks for the metaphor, my sweet Cirrus.) And, I haven't quite understood where that inclination was coming from. I see now from this book and some meditation on my life that I have been living in frantic fear and anxiety. I've been thinking thoughts like "this is it, this is the rest of your life." (Insert ominous echoing voice over.) I actually wrote my best friend last night that I hoped I wouldn't regret making the choice to move home when I turn forty and look at my life.

PS, that's in TWELVE years! Who the hell can predict what they are going to be thinking twelve years down the line? TWELVE years ago I had just had my first real kiss from my first real boyfriend (Who was shorter than me at the time. Our dance pictures are awesome.) If you asked that awkward sixteen year old what she would be like when she was twenty-eight, she couldn't have possibly conceived how cool and interesting her life would become. Not even close.

So, if anything, Eat Pray Love has reaffirmed to me once again how important it is to question everything and really listen to the answers, the neccesity of suffering to insight growth, to let go of fear and fill that void with faith, and to become secure with my inherent human flaws. It's okay to not have everything figured out and it's best sometimes to just stop and quiet yourself.

Please read this book all of you. If, for nothing else, than to do a little Spring Soul Cleaning. Daylight savings time is this Sunday afterall.

"It's a sacrifice to let [thoughts] go, of course. It's a loss of old habits, comforting old grudges and familiar vignettes. Of course this all takes practice and effort. It's not a teaching you can hear once and then expect to master immediately. It's constant vigilence and I want to do it." -Elizabeth Gilbert








(The picture is me, circa 1996.)

Chivalry is Dead. . .

Or, at least, in serious need of those medical shocker things that they use to resuscitate people in House! (Only after House has discovered the patient is going into cardiac arrest because they dislocated their finger and the joint is now leeking a rare poison to the ear canal cutting off bloodflow to the hypothalamous or some crap like that.)

I consider myself an independant woman of the 21st century, but yesterday I was questioning if we haven't all just shot ourselves in the foot. I had at least 5-7 able-bodied men walk past me as I backbreakingly scraped a foot of ice and snow off my car--a half hour homage to winter in Chicago. I even knew one of the lovely gentleman. He gave me a nice salutation as he kept walking on by. I could tell it didn't even occur to him to help me. This would never have been the case in my mother and father's era.

Am I saying we should go back to the days of pinafores, waiting by the phone, or dances where you leave room for the holy spirit? No.

But, what is the line here on common decency?

Yes, I was able to clean the snow off my car by myself.

No, I didn't need a man to do it for me.

Would the simple gesture of a gentleman asking me if I needed help, at which point I would have kindly declined, sufficed?

Yes.

(Make a mental note, guys.)

To Know You is To Love You (And Vice-Versa)

Have you ever caught yourself harboring resentment towards someone you have never even spoken to?

I'm embarrassed to admit this, but it happens to me all the time. At stores. On public transportation. In restaurants or bars. When new people start at work. With my neighbors. I really find the most creative nuances to define as annoyances. I don't like someone because they wear flood pants. I can't stand this guys gel-filled hair. Look at her crooked teeth (by the way, my teeth are NOT straight.)

It could be that someone swaggering around. Why not just walk? I hate overconfidence and arrogance. I don't like that person. (Who defines a swagger anyways?)

And, it makes me wonder how I can be so completely shallow and closed-off. Small-minded at best! How is this possible when I have friends of all different ethnicities, backgrounds, etc? I have always worked in jobs where I have a lot of interaction with people. I have even lived in other countries and all around America. I did a year of Americorps, for Christ's sake. How can it be possible that I judge so many people?! I swear I am not a bad person.

And, then it hit me one day--I hate everyone I don't know and love everyone I do! What kind of sense does that make? As in, I hate people, but love persons.

This was especially made apparant when I taught English in China. As a whole, I would get extremely frustrated with the Chinese poplulation. But, one-on one, I made some of the dearest friendships I have ever had. Ones I still cherish to this day.

So, why do I do this?

Is it a defense mechanism? If I already dislike them, why would it matter if they don't like me? Latent behaviors from being picked on in grade school?

Is it pure intollerance? Willful ignorance? Yikes.

Please tell me I'm not the only one who is like this. Please tell me someone else has judged someone on their bad highlights and later came to find that said person is one of the most intriguing and wonderful friends ever--chunky highlights and all!

To all those people in the world who I have never talked to (and am probably irrationally judging right now), would you like to get a coffee?

(And, why is that random guy in the other room talking so loudly?! So annoying. . .)

Blog Intro

Successful design encompasses different dichotomies. Effective design takes convention and makes it innovation. Well-thought out and meticulously executed ideas translate into apparently simple and effortless design. That which is old is made new in a different context. Design should be practical, yet aesthetically pleasing. Universally understood yet uniquely presented. Succinct, but thought-provoking. The restraint it takes to design something well creates freedom for those encountering the design. Good design is inherently ironic. Mastering the paradoxes of design is going to be a life-long goal of my design career.

This is my design philosophy.

A little about me. . . I'm an Interior Design student in my fourth semester at Harrington College of Design located in downtown Chicago. I'm attending part-time, since I work full-time at the school in the admissions office. I already have a degree in English and Psychology. So, I'm hoping to make my writings a fusion of all of my interests--design, writing, studying the quirks and beauty of the human experience, etc. I am also interested in humor--specifically sarcasm.

I will be keeping track of all the fun, exciting, and most often tediously wonderful creations I get to work on for school and as freelance work as well as keeping running commentary on whatever subject seems to inspire me. More to come soon. . .