Car Ride From the Beach

We do what we can to pass time on the nearly three hour trip(s) home from Ocean City to see Lyla's ZuZu, otherwise known as Trent's Mom, Judy. If at all possible, I have been trying to avoid putting Dora on in our recently purchased DVD player. The thing is terrible anyway, and Lyla is always accidentally kicking it off, and asking where the sound went. This leaves us singing and talking about pirates. I thought I'd share what a typical ride with Lyla is like. She definitely provides the comic relief.


Another thing she's been starting to do is insert her own lyrics to songs she's learned. In the first video above, she actually does sing the correct words to Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, but you will see in the next vid, she improvs. The word should be (as she was taught): Mommy and Daddy sittin' in the tree. K-I-S-S-I-N-G. First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes Lyla in the baby carriage. I'm going to try to get her remix of ABCs/Bah Bah Blacksheep/Old McDonald on tape, that one is hilarious.

Lyla's Birthday

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We had a small gathering of family and Lyla's close buds this weekend at the house. We were originally just going to Build a Bear workshop, and having a cake, but on Tuesday the whole thing turned "Jen" on me. I was suddenly ordering Andy Nelson's BBQ, renting chairs and tablecloths, and hiring a face painter. All in all, I think it went just fine, but I was stressing because I had a work site going live, and was juggling checking emails on my Blackberry with keeping the day's events on schedule. Luckily, Lyla went down for a nap, which I never thought would happen, but that did result in us having to push the party 30 minutes, as well as us having to wake her from a deep sleep to rush her over there. I swear, any time there is any gathering of my family, Lyla either has not had a nap, or we've woken her up from one and she is cranky. The poor kid. She is so good, and yet, every time we get everyone together, she's Les Mis.

In the hour she slept, I ran to Party City to pick up the four dozen balloons needed to fill the backyard. I won't go too in-depth about the kind of derelicts that work at PC, but let's just say they don't go out of their way or maybe even know how to problem solve how to fit 48 loose balloons into someone's car without the manager present (for the record the manager saved everything and even helped me at the car). The one girl who didn't even know what I was talking about when I asked her if they could be tied together, was also talking about getting a full scholarship to some private college in Maryland. Her sentence went like this, "I is going there if I want to, cuz they is givin' me a full scholarship." I thought to myself, she must have had to undergo some type of interview to be awarded a full scholarship, and one would think that grammar of some sort would be a requisite for getting the type of grades that would warrant a scholarship right? I don't think she was going on an athletic scholarship either. Well, maybe she was, but she didn't look like an athlete of any kind. She looked like she'd been smoking Marlboro Reds since she was 12, and dying her hair bleach blond since even earlier, because her bangs were burned away, and the rest was sprayed up in a flower shape in the front. Her accent was half Dundalk, half fly girl. So, she had me all intrigued with what her story was, and how she came to get this mysterious free ride. I may need to investigate that further and report back.

Back to the balloons...I pictured the same set-up as the scene in the Sex and the City movie where Miranda and Carrie get in the fight about Miranda telling Big they were crazy to get married. The only stitch to this is that our backyard is covered only by a pergola, and I didn't take into account the balloons ability to fly away from under it. So, instead we had to tie them all to it, which resulted in it looking like every other kid's birthday party. Bah to me.

I then, frantically cut hydrangeas from all of our Gilligan's Island-sized bushes (remember that episode where they grew that crazy radioactive fruit that was huge, and allowed them read minds?). I filled glasses and vases with them as centerpieces which I was pretty happy with since I had no plan for the tables. Needless to say, they were completely wilted by the time we returned to the house. Hydrangeas may be the worst flowers (aside from gardenias) to stand up to the sun and heat. Nice job again Jenny.

I also re-pinned the letters I made from drawing paper on our fence that spelled Lyla. I wanted the kids to be able to write all over it. I did it the night before at 11:30 p.m., but when we woke, all the letters were down but the A. Push pins aren't so easy to put into the fence, so I was leaning with all my might to get each one into the boards. So far, not so good, but I'm getting things done.

After sweating to the oldies profusely in the 90+ degree sun, it was time to dress Miss Lyla, and whisk her off to the mall. The dress she wore was just lovely, I have to say. See inset of it in better view. If anyone questions the price of J. Crew's crew cuts line for kids, don't. It's worth every penny!

So, Lyla was in a surprisingly pleasant mood the whole way. I was happy and calm.

The moment we got to Build a Bear at 4:00 on the dot (we were the last ones there of course), she was not feelin' it.

The girl running the show was as loud as she could possibly be. I understand she needs to be heard, but there were only six kids, everyone was right there, and there was virtually no one else in the place. Lyla just hates loud. She really does. Except when she is being loud, then she's super ok with it. Well, the yeller starts wailing about what her name is, and tried to stick a sticker on her. Lyla wanted nothing to do with it. Why would any kid take a sticker from someone who is clearly yelling at him or her?

More intros ensue, and some hopping and such. Lyla takes to it, and does it. It's only when the yeller puts her on the spot does she start cranking. So, she's hot and cold about the whole thing, and really wants nothing to do with the staying together part. She finally meanders back over, and they have to do all this stuff with the hearts to put inside the bear. Kiss it, rub it all over, and then rub it on the person next to you's head. She gets to rub hers on Finnegan, which was great, and there is a picture above of them doing it which is precious. If these two end up falling in love, I'm so fine with it. What beautiful babies will result.

Anyway, she gets a dog and some dress, and a purse which I think cost like $1,000 or something. Everyone else gets their bears with their outfits, hair pieces, sunglasses, whatev, and we're donezo. The whole thing takes about 45 minutes, and I'm pretty happy when it's wrapped because I feel much better knowing Lyla will be good at home, which she was. I know I'm a Mom and all that crap, and I should expect crankiness and some "No's" in public, but I get very stressed when Lyla is cranky in any way shape or form in public. I just want to flee. I'm a flighter, not a fighter. I won't mention her laying down in the parking lot on the way to the car. Luckily, Leslie saved the day by proposing Lyla hold Finn's hand on the way to the car. Again, my solutions for things never work. Once, we took her to Nordtrom at bed time, when she was going through a two-week tantrum stage, and boy did she unleash. She was screaming bloody murder everywhere and every single person was staring at us. It was simply awful. Then, she calmed down, and was absolutely fine asking to try on hats. Go figure.

We got back to the house, and the rest of the day goes pretty well. The kids hung out most of the time in our 200 degree basement with rotating adults down there. I was feeding them BBQ, M&Ms, and limeade at a rapid rate to keep them occupied. Sprinkled some glow sticks, the face painter, and pin the tail on the donkey in, and we were good.

Although, the kids all yelled at each other during Pin the Tail on the Donkey. No one really wanted to lose, and I was bargaining with them all. I paid most of them off in cash to settle the disputes. Money really does solve everything.

Lastly, we tie dyed, which every adult thought I was crazy for doing, but turned out to be one of the favorite things the kids did. My niece showed me all about it, and how to twist the t-shirts. It was awesome. After 20 minutes of pre-washing, 15 minutes of twisting, 15 minutes of dyeing, 6-8 hours of setting, a 40 minute hot wash to set the dye, and a 60 minute dry they were done! Voila, everyone had a shirt. I should post a pic, because they really did come out great. I highly recommend it. I got the kit for $6.99 at Michael's and just bought every kid a tee at Target.

So, a cool $1,000 later, our smaller than last year's 2nd birthday party for Lyla turned out to be a cinch, and just great.

Is American Apparel Selling Sex?

I was on their site looking for kids t-shirts the other day, and one of the feature images on the site was the one shown here.

Now, I'm all about "Summer Style" but my typical warm weather garb doesn't usually include me open legged in a leotard about to get f-ed on a glass table in the Valley.

Is this supposed to be edgy?

The girl actually looks scared.

I can picture 1 of 4 scenarios taking place here:
1. Photographer says, "Yeah, just open your legs...just like that...that's it. Now a bit more. A little more..."
2. She was posing normally, when an intruder with a knife came in, and told her to open her legs wide before he stabbed everyone on set. She then had to comply to save everyone's lives.
3. She decided to lose her virginity on that very table, and for a wad of extra cash (and perhaps a wad of something else) she agreed to let the photographer shoot it. The fear of her first time, coupled with her crossed morals for doing such a thing were all at play when this very shot was shot.
4. She got this job mixed up with her Nair commercial, and thought she had to show how well the hair removal worked even in something smaller than short shorts.

Mad Men

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Mad Woman

One of my favorite shows is Mad Men on AMC. If you don't watch, you are missing the best show the television people have ever put on. I won't run through the synopsis of the series, if you're smart, you'll find out on your own (that is, if you don't already watch, which you should).

Trent informs me about two weeks ago that they are do a "Casting Call" where the winner gets a walk-on role on the show. I immediately pounce.

As an aside, I should not even have thought of entering since I have terrible stage fright, and can't even imagine how embarrassed I would be if I actually had to go on the set with these people. It actually makes me sick to my stomach to even think about it. However, I'm always up for stuff.

The requirement is to go to a Banana Republic store and get a code to input on the AMC web site as part of entry. BR is doing some kind of Mad Men-inspired line of clothing for the fall. I checked it out, and it's about as miserable as everything else they've put out for the last ten seasons. Can we take a moment to reflect back on how great Banana used to be? Back in L.A., I used to visit the flagship store in Santa Monica, and pine away for the clothes as if it were art in a museum. They always had what I wanted. They designed the best basics with that edge. Now, they design for the homely office worker. Straight leg cotton/poly blend slacks may have been the rage in '98-99, but are they cutting it now? And how many slim fit, wide lapelled white shirts can we have in our closet? Didn't they get the memo that wearing your lapels outside and on top of your jacket collar was never, and will never be cool. Cc Brenda Freese on this fact please...someone.

Anyway, we got the codes from the store, and we were set to enter.
I was in Los Angeles for work for a week, so this was throwing our timeline in getting this thing off the ground. Plus, people on the site vote to say who looks cool, and the winners are chosen from the leaders, so entering late hurts. Oh, I forgot to mention, the picture has to show you in your best Mad Men-esque depiction.


I had many ideas like: aloof mom (which was already done by someone else), prim worker, drunk mistress, sexy seductress, and finally worked over girl.

Last night was the deadline, and we were feeling uneasy about making the deadline. Trent went to the grocery store, and when he got home I had teased my hair, put on my Jackie O outfit, and made myself up.

Trent shot about 20 blurry shots of me upstairs on the third floor in various poses. I am completely unphotogenic, so all of the posing and lip pursing I learned from America's Next Top Model was obsolete for someone like me who not only isn't that great looking, but also photographs poorly. I also look a lot like a drag queen with make-up, but I had to put some on. In the black and whites you can't tell, but in the colors I'm totally dolled up. I added those too just for reference.

Ok, so we get all the shots, and I choose one to upload, and I am ready to go at 10:30 p.m. on the night of the cutoff. I get on the computer, and enter all the info. The first time, I accidentally uploaded a file that was too large. The junker AMC site however, doesn't deal with the error correctly, and I get a generic "we cannot save your info at this time..." So, I upload the correct size, and it tells me the email is already used. Oh great. The programmer that created this page, really knows nothing. The account was created in the database, even without the image, or the completion of the form. This is 101 of web dev by the way. After about a million attempts of creating new emails, and using both codes, I could not get it to work. I tried everything. I was so mad. Here I was, gussied up, garters, and everything, and no go on the entry. Damn them.

So, the pics are above. They run the spectrum of sweet, to beat up with mascara runs, and puffy eyes.

Some other poor slob will win, not me, and I will resort to watching them instead of myself in the limelight. I guess my big break will just have to wait for Survivor, The Amazing Race, Jeopardy, or Rock of Love. Love ya Bret.

AF's Cheeky Cousin

I'm a big fan of the t-shirts at Ruehl, the slightly higher end brand of Abercrombie and Fitch. The sizes run bigger, the jeans actually fit my butt, and they only pipe half as much cologne through the air conditioning vents. So, on average, I only throw up twice while walking through the shop. I was sad to hear that Ruehl will no longer exist, so we paid it one last visit while I was visiting my friend Rhonda in L.A. last week.

This news is not about Ruehl though, it's about Gilly Hicks, A&F's newest creation. This company is truly the Britney Spears of the retail business. They continue to invent new stores to attract the young teen, and I fall for it every time. I'm in the center of the ring just like a circus.

They play like they're from Sydney, and when you walk in the front door they say, "Welcome to Gilly Hicks, the cheeky cousin of A&F." As annoying as the 16-year old "cousins" are that work there, and as skimpy as their uniforms are (they make the girls wear navy and white combos of outfits that are as close to underwear as their underwear is), I have fallen hard for them.

The decor is amazing. It does resemble Ruehl in that it is very dimmly lit, with only spotlight lighting over the displays. Everything is dark wood in the likness of a British colonial manor house (part of their ficticious story), with incredible cabinet work, and wallpaper tiles that brighten up specialty rooms. The whole store is set-up in vignettes, much like Victoria's Secret was before they went main stream, switched to laquer displays, and started knocking off the
already offensive Juicy suit.

Most of the bras are the molded, padded ones, that are not really my thing. However, in one little spot they have what they call lingerie. The other sections all hold underwear. This is how they try to get away with selling underpinnings of this nature to tweens, who probably all have bigger boobs than I do anyway since they've been eating hormone milk, overfed chickens, and Beefaroni since birth.

The lingerie area is impressive. It's the fanciest part of the store, and the items are really beautiful. I have only paid for really nice underwear a few times, and garments equal that of La Perla and Agent Provacateur. All lace, with gorgeous hardware that is easy to slide on perfect cottony straps. I bought two bras, and two pairs of knickers. The bra and underwear set I bought lovely ties in front and in back, and make me feel like I could pose for Jacques Magazine (minus 40 pounds, with a nose job, and better hair of course). Unfortunately, the lingerie isn't terribly cheap, but it isn't terribly expensive either. The bras are about $38, and bottoms about $14-16. The underwear section is less expensive, but you need to pad it up if you buy in that area.

This place was actually so vast, (and dark), that I lost Rhonda. She has a similar condition to me, in that she is averse to cologney stores, so she was dashing through the middle perfume section to get away from it (at a rather high speed I should add), and I was busy getting glamoured by the place, and we split. I searched for about 20 minutes for her, and had all the school girls in the place helping me. I finally left hoping she went outside, and sure enough she was out there leaving me a message. It really put a spell on me.

As a side note, the perfume at this place is different than its woodsy cousin. I can't say I enjoy it any more though. It is very feminine, but it reminds me of the smell I have when I feel like I might stink, and decide to put deoderant on. Or, when someone else smells, and they try to mask it with perfume. If you enjoy the scent of slightly smelly pits, covered by honeysuckle, this is the fragrance for you.

There are not too many of the stores, but they do sell online, so you can buy there, and I do recommend the lingerie section of the site where the fancies are (ladies, your men will thank you).