The Reinvention of Me: What Comes Next

A few days ago, a friend of mine sent me a pair of gold flats to try from his company Cinderollies.  I’ll admit, I was never a big fan of flats because honestly, I hated feeling “short”.  Sure enough, when the beautiful blue and black box came, my mind soon changed.  You see, I’ve spent the better part of my life in heels for obvious reasons (and that will probably not change for quite some time).  Granted, I’ve become wiser about choosing shoes that I know will be comfortable but when you’re out all night, it can be a different story.  Cinderollies’ primary purpose is to relieve your aching feet of those sky-high heels at the end of the night.  And for that reason, they serve their purpose.  (I’ve also found them quite comfy at home too.)  The best part: They roll up and tuck into quite a small handbag (yes, I pulled out my collection and actually tried).

Their website gets creative with some of the uses for these, including handing them out to guests at your wedding at the end of the night – a great idea.  At $20.00 a pair, it’s worth keeping in your work bag, your car or anywhere else you might actually forsee them being used, especially in case of an “emergency”.

Check out their Facebook page or purchase on their website.

Enjoy!

There was a time in this nation when, for African-Americans, racial barriers existed for everything from marriage to bathrooms. When it was less deadly to be seen and not heard – a time when friendships between women of two races simply didn’t happen, especially if one of those women was your maid.

First-time author Kathryn Stockett writes about the struggles of African-American maids in the 1960s and the women they worked for in the novel The Help. Set in the segregated and volatile town of Jackson, Mississippi, The Help focuses on three women. The first is Aibileen, an African-American woman who has worked for white families for more than 20 years with a special love of raising children. The second is Eugenia “Skeeter” Phelan, a white woman recently graduated from college who wants to be a writer. Third is Minny, Aibileen’s best friend, who has a reputation for back-talking to her employers and for being the best cook in town, especially for her pies.

When Skeeter returns from college she sets out to write a “meaningful” book and enlists the help of Aibileen and Minny to gather stories from the black maids in Jackson about what it’s like to work for white families. Between the efforts to convince other maids to participate, cover their tracks to keep their book a secret and the challenges of working and living their lives, the three women develop a deep respect and appreciation for one another.

Written from the perspective of all three women, Stockett did a wonderful job of creating three distinct voices for the chapters. It is obvious by the word choice and tone which woman is speaking, even if the chapters were not named. Despite its theme, The Help is not preachy or self-righteous but rather an interesting glimpse into the past, into a time that most of us, thankfully, have never experienced.

In addition to racism, the book also touches on sexism and classism as the main characters and the women around them deal with being “the weaker sex” and the struggles that come from being considered “white trash” or a “society lady.”

Overall, The Help is an uplifting read about friendship, overcoming prejudice and loving oneself. But don’t take my word for it.

I recommend you read it before the movie comes out.

So far, out of all the books I’ve read, this one happens to be my favorite, as it combines three things: an air of mystery, history in Europe (particularly the turn-of-the-century in London) and an amazing story of the course of someone’s life.

The Forgotten Garden, by Kate Morton, according to the Simon and Schuster site, “A tiny girl is abandoned on a ship headed for Australia in 1913. She arrives completely alone with nothing but a small suitcase containing a few clothes and a single book—a beautiful volume of fairy tales. She is taken in by the dockmaster and his wife and raised as their own. On her twenty-fi rst birthday, they tell her the truth, and with her sense of self shattered and very little to go on, “Nell” sets out to trace her real identity. Her quest leads her to Blackhurst Manor on the Cornish coast and the secrets of the doomed Mountrachet family. But it is not until her granddaughter, Cassandra, takes up the search after Nell’s death that all the pieces of the puzzle are assembled. A spellbinding tale of mystery and self-discovery, The Forgotten Garden will take hold of your imagination and never let go.”

What’s not included in this description is how the story is told from three different periods in time: 1898-1913, 1975 and 2005. When Cassandra began her search,  she found out that she inherited a cottage on the border of the Mountrachet family property that the locals say is cursed.  With the locals’ help, she’s able to piece together her grandmother’s history, which includes understanding who her real mother is – that tale alone is dark and gloomy.  In the process, she finds a hidden garden that those who have entered, say it’s the most magical place they have ever been.  It left me, not just wanting to move to the English countryside, but also to own a garden such as this.

I was unable to put this book down and I’m sad that it has ended.  I highly recommend it.

No, I’m not speaking of removing one’s own ear.  Instead, I’m referring to the attempt at dabbling in an artistic talent by recreating infamous works that well, could give Van Gogh a run for his money (or in some cases, saying he will put his ear back on if the “painter” would just stop).

What I am referring to… While at The Container Store, my boyfriend and I were browsing around the bins of stocking stuffers and amongst the USB drive keyboard vacuum cleaners, first aid kits, magnets, clips, etc. were two painting kits, authorized by the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam.  Made by Art 101, the kits include one of two infamous works you could paint (Sunflowers and Irises were the two for sale) on an 8″ X 10″ sketch canvas.  It also included 7 acrylic paints, 2 paint brushes, 1 palette and an 8-page painting guide.  Since I was eager for an arts and crafts evening, I was rather excited at the prospect of being Van Gogh and, my boyfriend was fully supportive of my need for a creative endeavor and bought me both.

When I got home, I set up my “studio” at the dining room table – towels laid down just in case I discover I’m a messy painter, a cup of water to clean the brushes, paper towels to wipe the brushes off, the palette, paints and brushes to my right; and the canvas in front of me.  Thus, I was ready to begin my masterpiece – the days of stick figures and finger painting would now be behind me.

I opened the very helpful guide on “How to Create my Own Masterpiece” and found it to not just give instruction, but also give a history of the painting, as well as Van Gogh.  I felt inspired (no, not to cut off one’s ear) and with one giddy sigh, I began mixing my first color.

Along the way, I learned a few things about painting (which all my artistic friends will laugh at or at least think to themselves, “You didn’t know that?”):

1. The canvas has a base coat, which is helpful.  But, the outline of the image is very dark – it takes 3-4 coats of paint to hide the lines.  The good news: acrylics dry quickly

2. For finer lines, I seriously suggest buying a very finely-tipped brush that can make the process a bit easier.  The brushes they provide are ok but it will smudge and/or you have to paint very slowly.  This process, again, has to be repeated 3-4 times to hide the black lines.

3. I am a great color mixer.  Seriously – I didn’t even know I was good at it.  Although my own painting came out a bit darker than Van Gogh’s, his is much older than mine and thus, I believe his has faded.

4. It’s a long process to mix every color just so, as well as to recreate some of the same shadows and lines.  For me, it was 4 hours of work but for not one second did I not enjoy the process.

5.  It’s easy to paint over mistakes as acrylic is permanent and won’t blend with other colors.

6.  I am my own worst art critic.  My suggestion – take a step away from the painting and return 30 minutes later.  If you still feel it’s not great, there’s someone else out there that will think so

So $8.00, 4 hours and one masterpiece later, I can’t wait to do my second piece!  What do you think?

From Nancy Drew, to Agatha Christie, to the Stephanie Plum series, I’ve always loved a good mystery book.

A few weeks ago, my boyfriend suggested I begin reading the Coffee House Mystery Series by Cleo Coyle.  I sometimes protest at a new mystery series, as I feel they require thought and strategy, not just an outlet to escape for a while.  However, once I picked this up, it was hard to put down.

The site gives a great synopsis of the book:

Ten years ago, Clare Cosi left an unhappy marriage along with a job she loved: managing the historic Village Blend coffeehouse in New York’s Greenwich Village. For a decade, she was happy raising her daughter in the quiet suburbs of New Jersey; but now that Joy is grown and gone, life has gotten way too quiet for Clare.

With a little cajoling from Madame, the Blend’s flamboyant, elderly owner (not to mention a persuasive pot of Jamaica Blue Mountain), Clare agrees to return to her old job—and right from the start she gets one heck of a jolt.

On her first morning back as Village Blend manager, Clare unlocks the front door to find her beautiful, young assistant manager, Anabelle Hart, unconscious in the back of the store, coffee grounds strewn everywhere.

As Anabelle is rushed to the hospital, police arrive to investigate, but Detective Mike Quinn finds no sign of forced entry or foul play, and he deems it an accident. Clare disagrees; and after Quinn leaves, there are a few questions she just can’t get out of her mind, like why was the trash bin in the wrong place? If this wasn’t an accident, are her other baristas in danger? And are all NYPD detectives this attractive?

What’s missing out of this description: Matteo – her ex-husband and the steamy romantic undertones, brought throughout the book.  I’m definitely excited to read the next one!

I, just like most women, love light-hearted books that include topics, such as romance, shopping, fashion, traveling with handsome men and the like.  Interestingly enough, when I read these types of books, they have always been penned by a British author.  Fabulously Fashionable, by Holly McQueen, falls in line with all of this… with one drawback… 3/4 of the book made me cringe.

The main character in this book is Isabel Bookbinder – an aspiring fashion designer/magazine PA/celebrated personality.  She is described as the black sheep in the family, in that she is always lying to everyone about her accomplishments, in order to fit in with the rest of the family (her mother thinks she does drugs and her dad believes she is an underachiever).  She’s dating a wealthy lawyer, living with him in London, but seems to be dreadfully bored and almost whiny, especially when commenting on how she is a self-proclaimed feminist and they “work” not play tennis.

These “fashionable” aspirations of hers are grand in theory but her methods of attempting to achieve these, spark an emotion of embarrassment out of the reader.  In addition, the “miscommunication” she had with her boyfriend, while he was on a work trip, made it even more difficult to get through the story line.

About 3/4 of the way through the book it becomes less painful, as she miraculously gets a job that lands her where she dreamed to be and a love affair that many women in DC could probably relate to.

Overall, I’d give this book about 3 out of 5 stars as it did the very thing a book is supposed to do – spark emotion (mine just happened to be a lot of eye rolling and mental yelling, to the tune of, “GET OVER IT ALREADY!!!”)

There was a time and place growing up when the Town of Vienna was small – REALLY SMALL.  It was the type of town you see in movies – slightly run-down but full of history.   Everyone in the town knew each other and would gather together for block parties, festivals and parades.   Over the last five years, it’s seen a beautiful transformation, particularly the main strip – Church Street.  Church St. went from a tired strip of shops, vacant lots and train tracks to what looks like a small charming ski town.  It still holds the centuries-old bank building, Freeman House, clock shop and toy store but it also boasts some great new additions like Bazins on Church.

The owners Julie and Patrick Bazin were property shopping for a place to put their restaurant when they were driving through the Town of Vienna and saw a vacant plot of land on Church St.  From that moment on, they just knew it was the right space.  Thus, almost five years ago Bazin’s on Church became a reality, as well as a great success.

I walked up the brick walkway to a warm, inviting door that matched the charm and warmth of the city.  Once inside, it looked like a cozy ski lodge, dressed in warm woods, brick walls, warm fabrics and warm aromas.  It’s the type of place where during the day, women lunch and in the evening, couples come with or without their families to dine or singles get together to meet at the bar.  It’s a one-of-a-kind place in Vienna – something that was desperately needed.

The menu matched the atmosphere – almost all of it warm, fall-like comfort food with things like Chicken Pot Pie, butternut squash ravioli, and sweet potato and coconut soup.  Since my mom was with me, we ended up sharing an appetizer – Profiteroles with goat cheese (I just ate the filling) with pickled seasonal vegetables.  I ordered an entree of a lemon-marinated grilled chicken breast salad and for dessert, pumpkin chocolate cheesecake (again, I ate the filling, which is all that mattered

I’d highly recommend that people make a day of this town and include Bazin’s on Church as a stop in their itinerary.  They are open every day except for Mondays and serve lunch Tuesday – Friday from 11:30am – 2pm and dinner 5pm-10pm.  Saturdays is dinner only from 5pm – 10pm.  On Sundays, they serve brunch from 11:00am – 2pm and dinner 5pm – 9pm.

One of my favorite activities in the entire world is reading for pleasure.  It’s something I never get to do and welcome the opportunity when I can.

While trying to look for new work, I’ve taken up the activity again.  Thanks to my wonderfully amazing boyfriend, I’ve now got several books on his borrowed Kindle to read (and have spent more time pouring over books at Barnes & Noble, than a kid drooling over candy in a candy store).

This week’s book, entitled, “The Mating Rituals of the North American WASP” by Lauren Lipton, does what a book should do: spark emotion that wants you to throw it up in the air and yell to the characters, “What is wrong with you people?! Don’t you see?!”

Plot summary: Peggy (and her best friend Bex) own a small cleaning supply store in New York and has a documentary-producing boyfriend who is afraid to commit. She goes off to Las Vegas for a bachelorette party and wakes up in a strange man (Luke)’s bed and finds out she got married to him the night before.   Luke is a WASP from New Nineveh, CT with a family name to uphold (which dated back from the 1600′s).

When Peggy drives up to New Nineveh to get the marriage annulled,  Luke’s Great Aunt refuses to let this happen.  She tells the couple they are to stay married one year (seeing each other only on weekends, since Peggy had a store to run) and if they then choose to end the marriage at that time, they can sell the family house (a sprawling mansion that is falling apart) and split the money.  They agree to the arrangement.

The book outlines the major events of the next year and how Peggy and Luke struggled to keep how they married a secret from the town of New Nineveh, how Peggy struggled to fit in as a WASP, as well as how to  keep her own love life together without telling her on again/off again boyfriend she was already married; and ultimately, how the two struggled, separately, to keep themselves from coming out with their true feelings for one another.

I love that the book left no questions unanswered at the end, that it used both literal and figurative poetry to round out the story, and that it was able to marry a modern day love story with a classic romance novel.  Definitely a must-read!

When my boyfriend and I walked into the bar of Farmers & Fishers this past Saturday evening, we were assuming to get another quick bite to eat before heading home.  What we didn’t expect was the overall experience we would get whilst dining there.

For those of you who have never been to this restaurant or have never heard of it, it sits on the Georgetown Waterfront, amongst the usual favorites: Sequoia’s and Tony and Joe’s.  It’s an organic place with something on the menu for everyone.  The food there is so fresh and so full of taste that I found myself repeating the words, “This is amazing” over and over again.

The first order of business was finding something to drink – in this case, something warm, as I was too stubborn to wear a coat, literally in denial about the temperature outside.  We requested Irish Coffees with Baileys, something our bartender refused to do.  He said that if he was going to make an Irish Coffee, it would be done the right way.  This is how we came to meet F&F’s Chief Mixologist and Restaurant Consultant, Jon Arroyo.  Jon has an awesome story of how his life transpired.  He was a trained actor who found himself in DC, becoming well-known for his creative (and rather tasty) drink menus and natural talent for advising restaurants on their bar concepts. (You may have also seen him at Artini.)  We spent quite a bit of time chatting after our meal.

Onto the food…

Our first course (out of two) was chocolate bacon lollipops.  I’ve NEVER dipped bacon in chocolate and I’d happily do it again.  The bacon was thick (although it could have been a bit crispier) and the chocolate was the perfect amount of sweet.  It was an interesting taste that seemed to cancel each other out, yet oddly tasty at the same time.

Our second course was just as great, if not better.  I chose the grilled corn tortilla tacos with a chicken, granny smith apple and feta mixture, while my boyfriend chose the organic roasted half chicken with vegetables.  Again, all of it fresh and all of it amazing.  I don’t believe I’ve ever been so excited to eat tacos in my life, nor so eager to go back and eat them again.

I’d highly recommend this restaurant to anyone who is looking to try some good food in a great section of town.

Yesterday evening, I was invited onto the District Dish to talk about an upcoming event.  This particular episode was being filmed at Carmine’s in Washington, D.C. – a brand new family-style Italian restaurant, known for authentic Italian dishes.  Most people (and most likely my cousin first) would ask me what on earth I could eat at a place like that, aside from a salad.  Answer: LOTS!

Jill Collins, Carmine’s PR representative, was an amazing hostess who walked me through their special menu – whether you are gluten-free, garlic-free, dairy-free or a vegetarian, they are able to provide you an extensive enough menu that you feel as though you have plenty to choose from. (Those menus cannot be found online but trust me, I’ve seen it!)  After reviewing the menu, she chose a gluten-free pasta pomodoro for me to try.  She also brought out their signature salad,  a “side” of Eggplant Parmesan (could easily feed two), spaghetti with their infamous gigantic meatballs, bread (obviously the latter three being for everyone else).  In addition, they had two amazing wines for us to try from their vineyards in Italy: a red – Montepulciano d’abruzzo and a white – Trebbiano d’abruzzo.  Truly everything was wonderful and incredibly delicious.  But, not only was the food great, so was the atmosphere.

At 20,000 square feet, the restaurant can hold 700+ at any given time.  There are no small tables (or dishes) there, as it’s family style, which means if you’re on a date, you might want to consider a double date.  With rich woods and black and white family portraits on the walls, you feel like you’ve stepped into an Italian family’s home.  But my favorite part – the wine glasses – true, authentic wine glasses.  In Italy, it’s not customary to drink wine in stemware at dinner – they use what we would consider small water glasses, something I found to be much more enjoyable, only adding to the experience.

Just when we thought we were done eating, another additional surprise comes out for us to try:  (Side note: Come to Carmine’s on an EMPTY stomach and bring friends, especially for this part.) The Titanic.  The Titanic is a flourless chocolate cake, covered in 6 scoops of ice cream, a ton of whipped cream, strawberries, almonds, bananas, hot fudge and tube-like cookies (to resemble smokestacks) – in other words, a gigantic banana split.  Just like the dinner dishes, it’s meant to feed 4-6 people.  There were 6 people at the table and we touched half of it, groaning, moaning and holding our stomachs, while vowing to “work it off” the next day.  Yet, there wasn’t one frown at our table.

We all agree that the experience we had at Carmine’s was amazing and that it was worth noting to family and friends.  I’d like to thank District Dish, Kate Michael, Jill Collins, Sonya McKay, Bev Kirk and the entire staff at Carmine’s for a wonderful evening!