mon dieu!

oh my gosh! has it really been over two months since i checked in with you all? i can't believe that the time has flown by so quickly and now we are at the eve of christmas eve! things have been so busy in my life that i just have barely been getting everything done that i need to but it's also been really, really great.

well, i just want to let you know that we are all doing just fine in my household. lorenzo and the girl are fabulous as always and lucie, roy and the kitty cats are all doing great as well. work is going good, just keeping me very busy. in fact i have a little bit of news for you all...in eleven days i will be heading to paris for maison objet! yes, it's true, my work is sending me to paris and i couldn't be happier. however, between now and then, i have a lot of work to do. i will be setting up and working our booth at the show in paris and then fly directly to new york to do the same at the new york gift show. whew, i'm already tired!

so while preparing to go to paris, i was sure to get a hotel in my favorite neighborhood, the latin quarter, to be close to my beloved shakespeare and company. i was so sad to hear last week that george whitman passed away at the ripe old age of 98. i was hoping to see him one last time. perhaps i will light a candle in notre dame for the old codger.


i think the best thing about this whole situation is that he had a daughter he named sylvia beach who has taken over running the store for him so i can rest easy knowing that it is in good hands (and i'm sure he can too).


if you have never been to shakespeare and company in paris, the next time you are there, you must go. it is a magical little world all its own.


and i am so excited to be staying right around the corner from the bookshop at hotel le notre dame.


this cute 26 room hotel was designed by christian lacroix and it is going to be my home away from home for ten days while i'm there. oh my gosh, i DIE!

so i promise, promise, promise that i will be better about checking in with you all-- my wonderful devoted reader friends and i will take lots and lots of pictures for you.

happy christmas to everyone and i can't wait to talk to you again soon.
XO

french bow

look at this cute little guy i found over on besotted. almost as cute as my little girl!

falling for fashion

hi everyone! how has fall been so far? i really can't believe it's already here. even though it is my favorite fashion time of year, yeah!

so yes, i have been compiling my fall 2011 must haves for the season and this is what i have come up with so far. some of these lovelies have already made it home with me. oh i can't wait to snuggle up in my new fall wardrobe.


so, number one on the agenda is a new haircut. as you all know, after years of longish hair, i cut it off this spring into a cute new bob. i am still loving my short hair but i do miss being able to put it up so i have been growing it out a little. i found this picture of kirsten and i love, love, love this haircut. of course mine will be darker but this is such a classic retro bob. i can't wait to get over to see my girl soon to start working on this cut.


and here is my latest signature lip color, chili by mac. i'm loving it. mac really does the best lipstick, don't they?


and this was the purchase of the season. i always keep a classic camel coat in my closet and when this came through our latest collection, you know i had to have it. this is pendleton's hip/young collection, the portland collection. i absolutely can't wait for it to get cool enough to wear this.


i decided that i really wanted a buffalo check shirt this year but i wanted it to have elbow patches. then i remembered this great junya watanabe shirt from two years ago and i found a pendleton version of it. i'm just going to wear it as a shirt jacket with jeans or leggings this winter.


last week i found the softest leopard print cardigan like this one at h&m. i think it will be the perfect accessory to mix in with my collection. it goes with everything.


i have been looking and looking for a classic french cuff shirt like this one and i am determined to find it this season. it is just such a staple. i must have one!


and i die for these flared camel trousers. must have! where oh where can i find these. i cannot go on without something like this in my fall collection.


my rain boots have worn out and they have been retired to the back door for taking the dogs outside. i literally had a puddle in them last week so i finally broke down and bought these pillar box red hunter wellies. of course now i'm dying to wear them and it's been nothing but sun here!


and i know that ballet flats are not the best fall footwear but i found these gabriella rocha flats on zappos and i had to have them. the bows are just the sweetest. besides, my last pair of black ballet flats wore out in new york so they needed replaced anyway.


black converse are always a staple in my closet. nothing beats these for weekend wear.


and i'm loving my new clear dome umbrella. this is going to be so cute this winter with my new boots.


and of course i can't forget my most prized fashion accessory, my girl lu. nothing goes better with my fall wardrobe better than this little piece of love.

serge

have any of you seen gainsbourg a heroic life yet? it's showing here in portland at the living room theaters and i'm dying to go see it but i just haven't had time yet.

one of the unfair things in life is that i did not know about serge while he was still alive. i'm happy to have discovered him many years ago but oh to have seen him live would have been amazing. i guess that's another guest for my dinner with anyone living or dead!

by the way, i'm so sorry for my lack of posts lately. the month of august swirled by like a whirlwind and i'm still catching up. i had a great time in nyc that i still need to post about so i'll try to get that done soon.

can you believe tomorrow is the first day of fall? while fall is my favorite apparel season, i'm just not quite ready for the rainy weather to come back. it is still very beautiful here right now so i'm trying to get out as much as possible to enjoy it.

well, it's good to be back and i hope to get back to my blogging as much as possible. thanks so much for hanging in there with me and don't forget to check out my other blog for all things portland.

plus charlotte

well mes amis, i am off to nyc for the next 10 days. there are so many exciting things going on and i can't wait to get back to share them with you.

in the meantime, i would like to leave you with more of the beautiful charlotte.




images from rdujour

beautiful charlotte

i just can't get enough of the beautiful charlotte with child as seen on the film shot by todd cole.


thank you renee over at montmartre's sketchbook for sharing these beautiful images!

kitchen love

i love kitchens. i don't necessarily love to cook but i do love kitchens. one of my favorite things is when we are having a dinner party and everyone there is hanging out in the kitchen with each other.

so why don't most homes have better kitchens? it's a room that in most houses seems like an after thought. i mean, don't we generally spend more time in our kitchen than in our living room? i know we do.

and it's sad but true that our kitchen is not very exciting. our whole entire house needs remodeled and the kitchen is not the top priority right now. so instead, i shall spend my time on-line dreaming of a new kitchen.

and that's how i found this one.


this kitchen belongs to a musician in new zealand and was featured on the selby.


i just love everything about it. the layout, the colors, the decor, the red counter top and open shelves. oh please can i have this kitchen?

and what about that tapestry hanging on the ceiling. i have almost that exact fabric hanging in our entry window. red and gold is definitely my favorite color combination at home.

so now i know, i too shall have a kitchen like this someday.

j'adore

oh i am dying over these french sole ballet flats i saw over on rdujour. must get me some sparkly ones!

happy bastille day!

happy bastille day from portland oregon!  you know i will take any opportunity to celebrate all things frenchie. 

here in portland we had a bastille celebration in the pearl district last weekend.  here are photos from the waiter's race which is the big event.

and this saturday our local french patisserie, pix will host their annual bastille block party, which i'm looking forward to.  any opportunity to eat their salted caramel macarons and drink champagne is good by me!

photos

pearl district

extra msg

alliance francaise

and speaking of rafa...

have any of you noticed how much ben f. from the bachelorette looks like rafael nadal? what a sweetheart, too. which definitely means she won't pick him. i always love the cute sweet guys but then they make it to the end and the girl always picks the egomaniac. what is it with that? oh well, ashley kind of annoys me anyway! i mean bentley, get over it already. there are so many other guys there who put him to shame.

and to my rafa who did not take wimbledon, you are still wonderful and have many, many titles under your belt. we haven't seen the best of you yet!

go rafa!

have i ever mentioned before how much i love rafael nadal?  i might have a time or two.  and now he's heading into the semi finals at wimbledon.  you rock rafa.  good luck!

it's all my mother's fault

i blame it all on my mother... that is the fact that i long for exotic places, interesting people and romantic yet creaky old interiors.


it all started the day that she gave me a copy of the secret garden. up to this point, i was still reading winnie the pooh and madeleine. which were very fine books indeed but once my eyes fell on the secret garden, i was ready for more grown up books. books that maybe everything didn't always turn out perfect and that sometimes people died and maybe not all children had a mother and father. those kinds of books.

after the secret garden, i would lock myself in my room reading books from page to page and longing for an attic bedroom and my own secret garden. which was a big dream because i lived in arizona and we didn't have english gardens there. to this day, i still dream of my secret garden and attic room. and i'm getting closer now because i have a yard and a house with more than one story after many, many years of apartment dwelling.


then there was the house in paris. oh what would it have been like travel alone by train to paris to stay with a spinster and her mother? to wonder what secrets they were hiding up those narrow stairs. and to meet a boy who had no mother and to learn at a young age the complicated dynamics of a girl and boy.


last year i read sophie dahl's, playing with the grown ups and it took me back to these stories that i read as a young girl.

oh if only my family had been a little more bohemian like hers and if my grand father had written the greatest children's story of all time. and what if i traveled to london and was discovered by a vogue stylist who loved the fact that i ate what i wanted and wore high heels at too young an age. oh what a life that would have been!


so today i just made my first summer reading purchase of sophie's first book, the man with the dancing eyes. i long for summer days sitting in the grass and reading frivolous things. this one will be perfect with it's naturalized illustrations. i have a feeling it may have it's own secret garden, too.

so yes mom, thank you. thank you for turning me into a hopeless romantic. and for showing me that even if we didn't have an old victorian house with my own attic bedroom i could one day live in a city with beautiful old houses and one day even have one of my own if i wanted.

well, i guess it's not so bad after all.

blanc de blanc

how about a little sofia coppola blanc de blanc?


i love her simple classic style with a masculine touch. she is understated, glowing and beautiful.

courtesy of rdujour

a little f. scott in paris

have you all gone to see midnight in paris yet? i was finally able to see it over the weekend and i'm pining to go see it again. it so reminded me of my time in paris 5 years ago. there really is something magical about that city, don't you think?

the scene with f. scott fitzgerald and zelda brought back such memories for me. you see, i was traveling through paris alone, on my way to visit a friend in brittany. someone had suggested i stay at the hotel st. andre des artes. so i got a room at this quaint little hotel in st. germain. the hotel is rumored to once have been a stable that the three muscateers had used as a hiding place. i don't know about the whole three muscateers thing but the hotel did resemble a stable, complete with exposed cross-beams in many of the rooms.

my room in the hotel was butter yellow and had two long french windows that opened up and looked out over rue st. andre des artes. across the hotel was a cute little alleyway that had been turned into shops all facing the cobblestone alley that was closed off to vehicles. after a long day of travel, i just wanted to relax in my hotel and get some rest. i headed over to monoprix and picked up some bread, wine and cheese and my favorite shampoo, le petit marsellaise.

when i was passing through nice, i stopped in a bookshop where they sold books in english and picked up a few for the latter part of my trip. one of the books was the great gatsby. believe it or not, i had never read it before!

i returned to my hotel and after dining on my wine and cheese, i opened up my window and sat looking out over st. germain reading the great gatsby. i guess, subconsciously, i was saving such a great book to read in a special setting. i almost read it cover to cover that night before dozing off...only to wake up in paris. no, this was not a dream.

i remember this time like it was yesterday. sometimes i can't believe i really took this trip by myself. and while paris is best to be shared with one you love, i'm happy that i took my first trip there all alone to discover it for myself. now i can go there with the one i love and show him all of the places that i visited and fell in love with. oh to be in paris...

diane's new do

the last time diane birch was in the store, she was sporting a chic new shorter haircut. i thought it looked so cute on her and then a few days later, she changed her facebook pic with her long locks to this one.

i would be lying if i said she wasn't an inspiration to my new haircut!

what do you think of her new shorter cut?

le dream car

yes, i would like one in black please!

iris season

oh iris, where have you been all my life? if i had discovered the likes of you at say 14 or 15, i truly believe things could have been so much different for me!

that's right, i have recently discovered the person that is iris apfel. a 90 something year old former interior designer and business woman from queens, new york.

remember a few weeks ago when i said that i know what i want to dress like when i am older? well this is pretty much it. i just didn't know someone was already doing it. but that's ok, i'm not disappointed, now i just have my own muse.


you know how i have also mentioned my weird frenchie/southwestern design mix? well now i see that i'm not so off the wall after all.


many days when i get dressed for work, i have a really hard time deciding whether i want to channel coco chanel or frida kahlo. usually i pick a safe version of one or the other. but now, i almost feel that i can do both. oh how freeing it is!


here is my outfit today. with my new hair, i feel like a mix of iris and anna wintour. this is my turquoise collection with my favorite tasha polizzi tijuana jacket.




and check out her house. i love it. and while i do like things a little darker and less flowery, i really like a lot of the individual items she has. i would just style them differently.


i even have a similar setee to this one. unfortunately, our big dog ripped the fabric on it and i have been completely undecided about how to recover it. but i'm loving this ikat she has used on her setee. it would work perfect in my house.

photos of iris by the boston phoenix and architectural digest