Happy Happy Thrift Thrift - September 22, 2013

Happy Fall!

Amy and I hit two of our favorite thrift stores on Friday and I think this was my best trip ever in terms of what I spent vs. what I got (and please note - NO BOOKS! None! I have issued a challenge to myself, actually, to pull out 50 books this week to get rid of. It's time. Also I may or may not admit that I'm going to my favorite used book sale of the year next weekend for half-price day...but it's the only sale I go to anymore! And so. 50 out. ANYWAY.)

Store #1 was having a sale. All summer clothes were a dollar a piece. A DOLLAR. The prices at this store are already very cheap, but this was fantastic. It's still warm here in Georgia, so I can still wear a lot of these now.

Also, here's my secret - a friend of mine told me about Twice - a site where you can buy and sell high-end used clothing. If you want to sell, you are limited to a strict list of brands. Twice will send you a postage-paid bag to fill, then they make an offer on what you've sent. If you want anything back, you have to pay to get it back - otherwise they donate it. And then they sell really nice clothing at deep discounts. I thought I might be able to make a bit of money back to finance my thrifting trips - so some of the stuff you'll see below is actually destined for Twice. But not much. (I'll tell you what pieces I bought to try to resell, OK?) If you are interested in Twice, here's my referral link: liketwice.com/cRhhf

I tried something different for the pictures - hanging everything up. I don't know if I would consider this a success, but you'll get the idea...

Adorable Ann Taylor Loft black button down shirt. I actually picked this up thinking I could resell it but IT FITS (but it's a weensy bit short - I think I can work with that). I have an idea for an outfit. Woohoo!

I had to - obviously - mess with the contrast/brightness on this (in a really terrible way) but it's an ADORABLE J Crew T-shirt with a little ruffly bit on it. And it's heading off to Twice for resale! Bye! [Update: Twice accepted this and paid me $2.50.]

Super super cute Ann Taylor Loft cardigan that is headed outward. I think this was $2. [Update: Twice rejected this, calling it "dated." I disagree but there is no arguing when you try to sell to Twice.]

Not quite short-sleeved Gap black shirt.

Oy. Terrible picture here, sorry. Brown Target shirt with longer than short sleeves.

I couldn't resist this Gap waffle shirt. I think it was $3.

Absolutely darling Ann Taylor Loft dress. MINE.

White House Black Market capris in perfect condition. These are going to Twice. [Update: Twice also rejected these and called these "dated." I have no idea why as to me these are not. Lesson learned.]

"Angels" brand jeans. I liked how they fit from the knees up a LOT. Not totally convinced that wide legs are for me, but today I'm wearing the wide-leg jeans from the last thrift post and they're pretty cute so. $3.

Levis. A tiny bit tight in the waist and I know that's not ideal but they were so cute otherwise and with a long sweater...right? $3

Gymboree sweater for the kid. Except she won't be this size for years. But for a dollar, it was just too cute and too perfect to pass up.

Same exact story as the brown sweater above. This one's a 2012 sweater, even.

Grand total with tax? $20.

Then we went to my favorite little store. That's where I bought the sweater/coat/duster from the previous post. And then I bought everything else. I will try to break down the prices when I know, but I wasn't even sure. Some things were $2 (like the duster). Some things were $1.50. Some things were 50 cents. I spent $15 total on everything.

Really cute Liz Claiborne top. I wasn't sure about it but it looks nice on and is a bit of a change for me. It was on a rack with "specially priced" clothes but it didn't have a special price, so this might've been $2.

Plain waffle shirt.

Plain black T-shirt because I can never have too many.

Plain black waffle shirt.

Green Old Navy top.

I loved this reddish top. But when I hung it up for the picture, I saw that it has a snag/hole on the front. BOO BOO AND MORE BOO. I am undecided as to whether I'll keep it for layering purposes or toss it.

Beer!

This Vespa shirt is the tiniest bit too short but, come on, it's so darling. I can wear a tank top under it and nobody will be the wiser.

Why, it's another plain black T-shirt!

Terrible picture of a navy blue Old Navy sweater/hoodie (the hood is dragging down the neck, thus the weirdness).

Tadaaaaah. I now am pretty much set for the fall. I also went to half-price day at a nearby consignment sale for the kid and filled in her wardrobe ($13 for 4 pairs of pants/jeans, a T-shirt, a sweater, a long-sleeved Gymboree shirt, and...something else I'm forgetting). I love it. I LOVE IT!

Channeling My Inner Tyra - Almost a Thrifting Post - September 21, 2013

On Friday I went thrifting with Amy again (hadn't been for a bit).

I'll do a full-on catalog post soon because I love doing those posts, this is my blog, and so there.

But one piece deserves a post all its own.

I saw this wonderfulness on the rack and pulled it out as a joke. I tried it on, laughed, and then...I couldn't put it back. It had to be mine. It needed to be mine. It WAS mine.

It was a mere two dollars. TWO DOLLARS.

I don't fully understand what the INTENT of this piece is, but I feel that I should wear it to the grocery store. And while vacuuming. And to kindergarten pickup. And while flossing.

My friend Amy took some pictures of me wearing it and I channeled my inner Tyra. Find the light. Remember your neck. Smize.

I am no fashion blogger. I am no fashion model. I was being silly and over the top in our fun "photo shoot." But I like this picture of me. And I never like pictures of me! (Also I never ever wear my hair down because I am in desperate need of a haircut plus I am so low maintenance that throwing it into a ponytail every day is so much easier. But after seeing this picture, I think I actually need to change that.) And this coat...sweater...duster...thing....I adore it in its ridiculousness.

Enough words.

Let Me Tell You About: The Vignette App - September 10, 2013

This post - my thoughts on Vignette (Demo), the camera app for Android phones - was requested by a lovely commenter.

This is purely written because I feel like it, without any reimbursement at all. The people behind the Vignette app don't even know I'm doing this. The app is free (well, the "demo" version that I will tell you about is free - there is a paid version that I'm considering but as of this writing I haven't bought it). I get nothing nothing NOTHING for writing about this and there are no referral links in this post.

Also, while I have serious dreams of being a serious photographer, I'm not one. Vignette is an app for a phone. My phone takes decent 5MP pictures, and the demo version of the app limits you to a 0.8MP picture, meaning that right now I can't print high-quality pictures from the tweaks I make with it. So if you're looking for fancy photography advice, look elsewhere. But come back to chat with me after - I'd love to learn what you learned!

And finally, I wish I could afford an iPhone and the resulting monthly charges, but I can't. Vignette (Demo) is for the Android platform and I don't have any idea about what will appear for iOS, sorry. My phone is an HTC One V (not to be confused with the high-end HTC One, this is a sort of middle-end phone for Virgin Mobile (which I can afford, hooray!), and no, I would not recommend that you get one...).

PHEW. Let's get to the app. You can find it here.

Why do I love it?

Vignette has many, many customizable options for your pictures. You're not just limited to a few filters that mimic old-school cameras. It comes with a ton of pre-set filters within various categories - but then you can tweak each and every one so that it's exactly to your liking. Then you can combine the filters with customized picture sizes (including presets for Facebook and Google+ profile pictures, square sizes, panorama, and various ratio options) and frames.

While you can take a picture outside of the app and then import it to add all of your fun effects, you also can use the in-app camera, which also has many customizable options available. You can take four pictures in a row for a photobooth-style effect, for example. You can take a double-exposure picture. You can set a self timer, and you can take time lapse pictures. You can even take a picture underwater with specific settings for that if your phone can handle it. (Note: Vignette doesn't protect your phone from water damage... ;) )And then you can tweak the timing of everything if you want. Of course, after you're done, you can add all of the filters and effects on top of whatever you do.

When you're done, you can export said picture to wherever you like - including Instagram, of course, where you can layer yet another filter on top. But you also could take your picture with one filter, save it, and then import it back into Vignette for yet another filter. Filtering is fun!

This person made a nifty cheat-sheet showing you what a single picture would look like using many of the pre-set filters: http://www.flickr.com/photos/belay/4913376053/lightbox/

And Vignette itself also has a page set up to show you many of the available variations and options: http://vignette.neilandtheresa.co.uk/filter-examples

Did I mention that I absolutely love filtering my pictures?

For example:

Taken at Super H-Mart - a pretty wall of Mexican sodas of all kinds.

Tweaked to bring out the colors, made square, added a soft frame.

All colors but green removed.

All colors but red removed.

I forget what I did but...hey, it looks pretty funky, eh?

And then other silliness:

Not square!

Photobooth style.

Super-processed looks-like-old-negatives style.

More photobooth fun.

And more...

I had installed this app on my phone years ago because at the time Instagram didn't offer tilt-shift and Vignette did, but now of course that's a nonissue. I also got stuck on making pictures look like old Polaroids with Vignette - until I got sick of them. And then the app didn't work properly on my phone, so I wandered away from it (I have other photo apps I also use in rotation - I'll tell you about those another day but in brief, I also adore Pixlr-o-Matic and ActionSnap). But a few months ago I rediscovered this gem and it had been updated so many times it was nearly unrecognizable and was...fantastic.

What I don't like is that there is some guessing involved - there's no as-you-do-it preview (at least not in the free version). You open the picture, then you open a screen with options, you choose your options, and then you return to the picture to see how they all turned out. But then you can save the picture and change up the filters, change up the filters without saving, or just dump everything. You can also save your favorite tweaked filter as your own to use over and over again, which is a lot of fun.

So that, in a lot of words, is why my current favorite free photo app is Vignette (Demo).

What I've Been Up To - and Shana Tova - September 3, 2013

It's almost 5774 (and yes, I had to look that up) and Rosh Hashanah - "early" in the year. Here now.

Despite my changing beliefs as time goes on, I am extremely proud to be Jewish and I have always appreciated this time of year for the opportunity to slow down, take a few breaths, and reset. This year I am especially looking forward to that temporary peacefulness.

This also means we're in the time of year where people schedule things - things I'd really like to attend or be involved with - on the High Holidays (there are at least two things on September 14, which is Yom Kippur, that disappointed me with their scheduling this year, but every year there's something I suppose). I just had to get that out of my system.

Shana Tova. May you have a sweet new year.

Here's what I've been up to in the past few days:

At the Decatur Book Festival...

I did in fact meet Francesca Lia Block and she is delightful. (And I forgot to say about 100 things to her, but I also remembered to say 1,000 other things so I guess that's OK. Hopefully she and I will meet again, either in LA or...somewhere in the universe!) Also she was incredibly inspiring during her presentation/interview/Q&A and gave me some ideas that I hope will guide me back to working on some of the longer-form writing projects I have sitting on my hard drive.

I saw Rob Sheffield - he's manic and awesome and he made me reminisce about the karaoke nights I've had - in private rooms, in bars, with friends, with strangers, and rarely singing on stage but often singing in the audience.

I watched a cooking demonstration by Joe Yonan, who is the Food and Travel editor of the Washington Post as well as a cookbook author. The recipe he cooked was very simple - corn and pasta and not much else - and it was divine (they passed out samples). I want his new book (Eat Your Vegetables), which is vegetarian recipes for one (great for lunch, I suspect, or for nights when the rest of my family - ahem - wants macaroni and cheese for the millionth time and I want something a bit more special).

I also have been attempting new cooking projects. I made two different batches of pancakes with two entirely different recipes and froze both. Batch #1 had white whole wheat flour and whole wheat pastry flour, no eggs, cow milk, lots of baking powder. Batch #2 had eggs, almond milk, white whole wheat flour and unbleached regular flour, less baking powder. Batch #1 was eaten mostly by me and was pretty good. Batch #2 is in the freezer right now.

Part of the overarching experiment was freezing by laying things flat in the freezer first (on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper), then putting the frozen things in a bag so they don't stick to one another. So far, despite my freezer being both tiny and full, this process has worked well - both with pancakes and with frozen bananas. (I make banana "ice cream" on nearly a nightly basis - frozen bananas, a splash of almond milk, my Vitamix, 1 minute on high, eat. When I find marked-down browning bananas at the grocery store now - as I did yesterday - I do a little happy dance.)

And I tried making boba at home for the first time. I've bought tapioca pearls before and then left them in the pantry or fridge until they were thrown away. This time I forced myself to cook a batch. They were far easier to cook than I expected and they came out nicely chewy without being tough or powdery. Hooray!

Cold-brewed coffee, almond milk, simple syrup made with Zulka Morena cane sugar (non-GMO!), and boba. However, without the big fat colorful straw, this wasn't as exciting. I'll have to grab some of those the next time I buy bubble tea at a shop.

The tapioca pearls came from a trip to Super H-Mart, where I also purchased Mexican soda in tamarind and sangria. I haven't tried either yet - if you're interested, let me know and I'll post an update sometime about how they taste. Both sodas have terrible ingredients - chemicals and dyes - but hey, they also have real sugar instead of HFCS, so that has to count for something, right? Also, I try so very hard to eat clean and to be good and to avoid certain ingredients, but I simply cannot be perfect. So I bought them - and I will enjoy every sip.

The colorful wall of Mexican sodas at Super H-Mart.

And that's about it. What have you been up to lately?

Kindergarten Update! - August 28, 2013

As some families are slowly starting to realize summer is ending, our school year is now in full swing and we're nearly through the first six weeks! We actually have our first weeklong break just around the corner.

Things have been interesting as the school finds its footing with my kid and she with the school. There have been multiple staff changes - nobody's fault, but one person apparently gave notice early on in the year and there was a scramble to replace her. So my kid has had three different parapros helping her - and while she's a very resilient girl, it still has been a bit disruptive to her and to her classmates (the parapros are supporting the entire class, but my kid has been getting extra help when they go from room to room). The first was lovely but a bit hovery. The second tried really hard but I think she was in over her head.

Now we have someone in place who seems great - she's been in the school since day one and has been assigned to spend more time with my kid. I really hope that the consistency going forward will bring some sort of calmness. So far, my kid has been pushing boundaries and pushing buttons, acting out and bringing back some of her old behaviors, but this parapro has handled it calmly and with understanding. Here's hoping.

Standardized testing has begun - in fact, as of this writing, I think she might already be done. Yes. Standardized testing in kindergarten. It's just to find a baseline for her, and she will retake the test twice more to ensure that progress is being made. All of the kids in the entire school system do this. And while I see the data as being very useful, I still wish it could be collected in a more organic way. But I am not stressing too much over it - she will do whatever she does and get whatever scores and we'll use those numbers as a starting point. I know she can read - she even willingly demonstrated her letter recognition to her teacher during an assessment, so that's good. I know she absorbs everything around her. So...standardized testing? Eh. We do what we have to do. They did set her up for success, allowing her to use her talker and a touch screen during the testing. But if she has low scores, it's up to the teachers and staff to bring them up next time, right?

And we've already had one awesome IEP update - in a meeting with the special education teacher and the speech therapist, the SLP announced that my kid needed more speech therapy and added more time to her IEP right then and there. Yes, you're hearing me right - I didn't say anything, I didn't have to fight or argue, I just sat there and thanked the therapist. Also I really liked the therapist's approach - in part, she noted how even if my kid can't make certain sounds in the middle of words (yet), she needs to know she should for literacy purposes. She needs to know that there's a "p" sound in the middle of "apple," for example, because the letter "P" is there. It was a great look at speech in context. I loved it.


So the first six weeks have been bumpy but not terrible. And what do I hear over and over? "She's so sweet, so smart, so lovely." She has friends who love her. The teachers do seem to get her. The inclusion teacher still needs to figure out what inclusion means to her, and I feel like she needs to stop saying "This is new to me" over and over - yes, it's new, it's new to all of us (which is how I respond). But she has a lot of love and I'm trying to stay positive.

So that's our first update. It will be interesting to see the test scores, to see how my kid does on the first days back from break, how the year progresses. Stay tuned!

I Might Get to Meet Francesca Lia Block (and I Am FREAKING OUT!)

A few months ago, I checked author Francesca Lia Block's blog and idly scanned her upcoming appearances. And then I seriously screamed out loud. SCREAMED. The Decatur Book Festival! Down the street from my house. ARE YOU KIDDING ME?

FLB is a writer who is so important to me. She's up there with Tori Amos as one of my heroines, one of my touchstones, someone who helped shape who I became. It's so hard to put this into words (there's that evil little voice cackling at me "you call yourself a writer?!" Oh shut up, evil little voice. You suck...) You'll just have to trust me. I wrote about her in grad school and when I had to present the paper, I got choked up. It's a gut feeling I have about her, rather than one I can really explain, I suppose.

So I never thought I'd get to meet her. I don't remember her doing a book tour in the past, or at least not one that came anywhere near me in New York, Massachusetts, or Georgia. My friend Liz was lucky enough to take several writing classes with her in California and I thought that six-degrees-type connection was the closest I'd come. But now it looks like it might really, truly happen next Saturday!

I am fairly certain I first learned about Weetzie Bat in Sassy magazine (see: another important piece of the Marla puzzle). I ran out and read it and I was hooked. I loved Weetzie. That book was magic. And then - THEN! - I read Witch Baby and there was the connection. The character of Witch Baby really grabbed me in my angsty early 20s, grad school, figuring out the real world, Boston, New York City, home but not home.... "What time are we upon and where do I belong?" Oh yes. YES. Cherokee Bat and the Goat Guys was wonderful, but when I read Missing Angel Juan, my heart cracked open. (I desperately wanted to send a passage from that book to someone who broke my heart - I even copied it out and put it aside to send, though I never did.) That book is everything to me. And then I befriended someone who worked at Horn Book and she hooked me up with an advance copy of Baby BeBop. Years later, Liz shared her advance copy of Necklace of Kisses with me - another book that really resonated with me, as I had aged just like Weetzie had. It was fascinating to find a character I'd grown up with growing up too. (I've also read and loved Pink Smog - perfect! Weetzie full circle! Although I didn't really mind feeling that Weetzie herself just sort of...appeared, fully formed, in the world, it was nice to get a look at who she had been and who she would become.)

Beyond the Dangerous Angels/Weetzie books, the other FLB book that had a huge impact on me was Guarding the Moon, which is about her first year of motherhood. I read it before I had a child and after, and I got something different out of it both times. And then there was Zine Scene, her book with Hillary Carlip about zines. As a 90s zinegirl, that book was also really meaningful for me - and friends of mine are in it! And I think I've read everything else she's ever written. I'm a wicked fangirl, I swear, and I cannot WAIT to read Love in the Time of Global Warming next.

(Probably the rarest thing in my collection is my first edition (paperback) of Ecstasia - I found it at a bookstore in Harvard Square in the late 90s for something like $2 and I treasure it. I don't know if I'll bring it along next Saturday or not...)

And now she's coming to my city. I don't know what to say! What to bring to have signed! What to wear! I think that as with the times I was able to meet Tori Amos, I might have to write a note instead and hand it over. My voice is sure to shake. I might cry. I probably will say something ridiculous instead of profound. But then again I might be brave - try to find my almost-40-brave-self - and tell her how much she means to me. How much her words have meant to me. How she's my rockstar. How when she interviewed Tori, my brain may have exploded just a little bit. How...everything.

Everything.

The First Few Days of Kindergarten - August 5, 2013

So far, so much better than I expected, though the first two days were more about easing into the school year and we have 177 days to go...

The little blonde girl with the little green walker...

Let us address my concerns from my previous post:

Did the new teacher read her IEP yet?

Not exactly. Her new general teacher is overwhelmed right now - it's her first year with an inclusion class and she seems...a bit freaked out. This teacher also has 25 kids in one class - in this inclusion class! - and I think she's a bit understaffed (a temporary situation that I was told about) and she's managing all the things that go with a new year. I walked into the open house last week and immediately launched into questions. Mistake. Open house, I learned quickly, is not the time for in-depth discussions nor for freaking out a teacher. Oops. She said she'd looked at the IEP briefly and basically told me to talk to the special education teachers. Which I did - and they did read it and were pretty knowledgeable of my kid. It will be OK.

Did the staff set up a meeting with the rep from the talker company yet?

One of the special education teachers did! She said she was the only one who could make it but it's so much more than I'd hoped for.

Is there a new physical therapist all set and ready to go?

Yup. And apparently she was VERY impressed with all that my kid can do, including not only going on a swing but pumping appropriately! So now we can set a baseline and just move forward. Exciting.

Who will carry her talker?

Everyone seems to take turns. It's fine. We switched out the initial backpack I sent for the thrifted laptop bag we'd been using at home. There is some trickiness that I may get into in a future post, but the logistics seem to be OK.

Who will make sure she gets her special (IEP-mandated) mid-morning snack?

They're on it. Last year we did drinkable yogurt, but it seems this year that refrigerated snacks are more difficult (and I am not a fan of the sugar in drinkable yogurt anyway) so we are going to be sending other things instead. I hope to eventually wean her off this need, but for now it really does make a difference in her behavior for the rest of the morning.

How exactly will she get to that tricky inaccessible-until-you're-on-it playground?

Well apparently I underestimated my girl. On the first day, they did have a wagon ready for her, so they could bring her quickly to the playground (which she can then navigate). However, teachers and the principal told us that she's actually going up and down the stairs very well and nobody thinks the wagon will be necessary after a while. Awesome!

Will they understand just how smart she is and let her express that while also managing her outbursts?

One of the aides told me on the second day that if she could just work with my kid for the rest of her life, she'd be happy. My heart sang. Everyone seems to get what's going on, at least so far... On the other hand, on day three she reverted to one of her basic attention-seeking behaviors - tipping her milk over, followed by tipping her salad dressing over - giant mess. It's a very deliberate choice that she makes to do this (I've watched her look right at me, pick up her cup, and dump it onto the floor with a laugh), and I found out it happened - as always - because she had decided she was done with her lunch and nobody was noticing this. It's a behavior we struggle with at home, and I let her aide know that - and that we all need to work together to stop it - she needs to learn to wait. I'm hopeful that it's just her usual testing phase and that once she learns she's not getting away with it, she'll quit it. I hope. It's frustrating for us all - including her!

Plus, after seeing drop-off on the third day of school, I was reminded that there are neurotypical kids who are handfuls-and-a-half too. It's just...kindergarten.

The rest of my "what ifs"...well, we'll deal with them. It's early early days.

Friday morning was the first Community Circle of the year (where the kids sing songs and announcements are made - there was even a faux-flash mob where the teachers got up and danced, which was very cute). We were in the corner and watched my daughter walk in with her class. She pointed at us and said aloud "That's my mom and dad!" and then she essentially behaved herself. She clapped, she sang, she stood (with help - I watched to make sure that went smoothly and it did) for the Pledge of Allegiance (in English and Spanish!). At one point her main teacher turned to give another kid a thumbs up and my daughter saw and LIT UP and gave a thumbs up back - and her teacher's face lit up too, and I got all choked up.

I didn't really want my kid to be a trailblazer yet again - part of a teacher's first inclusion class again? Really? We did this once before and it was rough. But it seems like this time around there's more support for the teacher. Mine is the only kid on wheels in the school as far as I know, but it seems like accommodations are being made quietly - we were told that a railing will be put in on a certain set of stairs, for example, and I have a funny feeling we'll see some new ramps here and there too.

And meanwhile my daughter is taking more and more steps - I think we're up to eight at a time - and her longtime PT suggested that she not even use her walker at all in her classroom, so I've passed that along to her teachers. She can cruise, crawl, or, yes, step. Her PT said we need to teach her to view herself differently now - as a kid who is upright and who can walk. The fact that every time we turn our backs she's laughing and walking (and falling) suggests to me that we're on our way.

So for now, I choose to believe that we will have a very good year. But I will keep on updating along the way.