weekending

I realize it's nearly time for another weekend... ah well. I wanted to revive this old "regular" that I used to do in years past, so I remembered to take pictures all weekend long! And then forgot to post them. Oops!

Coffee. Lots of it.

Still getting used to drinking decaf (currently eliminating caffeine & alcohol, doctor's orders, to help with my altitude-sickness).

Streaming KPCC from Los Angeles (because Denver's NPR station is BAD).

Ironing kitchen towels (ironing can be so therapeutic).

Delicious breakfasts by {lovah}.

Some lawn mowing.

And leaf-raking, and stick-picking-up, and bush-trimming, and lawn-clipping-bagging (oh ps. that yard that we wanted so much? hate it. miss our tiny yard and our gardeners like CRAZY).

Screen-installing. Home-airing.

Happiness is: discovering you have a lilac bush in your front yard!!!!!

Spring-bringing. Into the house, that is.

Nature-reveling.

There was also a lot of eating out, with several misses but at least one really tremendous hit. More about that meal at a later date!

Images by Lauryl Lane.

porridge

Breakfast. The most important meal of the day. Harney and Son's Hot Cinnamon Spice tea is a perfect way to the start the day...

Paired with porridge (Trader Joe's Hot Cereal), fresh banana, orange-flavored dried cranberries, a large spoonful of greek yogurt (adds creaminess + flavor), and a dash of pumpkin pie spice. A well-rounded breakfast.

Don't forget the pretty Bunnykins dishes!

Images | Styling by Lauryl Lane.

why i blog

Ah, blogging. I've been having an existential crisis lately over blogging and what it means to me and why I do it and how it affects me and blah blah blah... I won't bore you with the details. (I wrote a 700-word post explaining my thought process over the past few weeks, but when I re-read it, I thought, "this is just the sort of crap that I skip reading on blogs," so ta-da, none of that!).

Every few years I have to take a break from blogging, re-evaluate, try to get over feeling weird about having so much of my "self" available on the interwebs... You know. Self-inflicted crisis. This time the whole thing was instigated by Pinterest, and I had a few freak-out moments resulting in asking Pinterest to remove all the images that had been pinned from my blog/site (literally there were HUNDREDS of them / Yes, Pinterest quickly removed them). Then I had the no-pin meta-tag added to my site. I hope my fears about Pinterest are unfounded-- my friends tell me that I need to chill, and they're probably right (they usually are), but for now, I'm taking a Pinterest sabbatical.

I'm also shifting the focus of this blog. When I started blogging over seven years ago, my blog was my online diary. As more people read it, I became less personal. Then I started my business and the blog shifted into a way to showcase my work. Lately I've felt burdened to write regularly and post as much work as possible, but the truth of the matter is, I just don't have the time for that.

I love blogging. I'm compelled to blog. But I don't like sticking to a schedule, I don't like feeling like I have to post something every day, I don't like the pressure that's associated with being a "blogger." So I'm shifting the focus away from business, and back to daily life. I'll blog less about my work and more about what I'm eating, what I'm reading, what I'm inspired by. As a stylist, I recognize that "work" and "daily life" are essentially synonymous for me, and that's okay. The point is, I need to take the pressure off of myself. The blog will remain public, but it's no longer linked from my business website. I imagine most of you reading this are the family and close friends who are subscribed via RSS feed and have been reading this all along...

Thanks for bearing with me, thanks for commenting and communicating and making me feel more like part of a community.

Good on 'ya. And 400+ words is better than 700+, right? Back to pretty pictures and fewer words, stat!

Image | Styling by Lauryl Lane.

clean slate

I love Mondays. I know that many people consider Monday their least favorite day of the week, because they have to go back to work after a few days of "personal" time. But for me, Mondays are the start of something fresh and new. They are a clean slate. I often work weekends since I'm in the event business, so perhaps my schedule is a bit skewed... But I love the fact that Monday restarts each new week, full of new ideas, new discoveries, new potential.

It's a little warmer out this morning, and the sun is shining. I know winter isn't over yet, but the warmer days every once in a while remind me that we're on the cusp of spring. Spring-- the season when everything springs back to life. I cannot wait for it to arrive! In the meantime, I have some exciting styling jobs on my plate this week and a best friend coming to town for a visit! Hope your week looms ahead with many things to look forward to, as well!

Larkspur, rosemary and monkeytail... promising that Spring is just around the corner!

Images | Floral Design | Styling by Lauryl Lane.

saint james tea room

About an hour from Denver, nestled into the mountains, lies the quaint, historical mining town of Georgetown. When two of my best friends visited over the holidays, I was quick to suggest that we make for the mountains, despite the cold and falling snow.

When I first agreed to move to Denver for {lovah}'s job, I thought Denver was IN the mountains. Imagine my surprise when we landed at the Denver International Airport, which is in the middle of a barren, depressing flatscape. I thought we'd accidentally landed in Kansas. I was very disappointed to find that Denver is about as flat as my home neighborhood of Silver Lake is hilly. So the obvious response? Head to the mountains as frequently as possible!!!

As {lovah} and I are fascinated by history and nostalgia, we find Georgetown to be particularly endearing. The facade of main street is almost untouched by modernity, apart from the ability to string colorful holiday lights across the street, which is, of course, utterly charming.

We visited just a week before Christmas, and with the snow falling softly, the little town really did appear to be a magic winter wonderland.

My favorite destination in Georgetown is the tea room. On a little side street, it is also home to a store full of miniatures-- the type of miniatures you'd use for making dollhouses! The tea room is kitschy but delightful, with beautiful mis-matched china, funky lace linens, and, thankfully, individual space heaters for each table!

With a very wide selection of teas to choose from, each of the four people in our party decided on something different. Four pots of wonderful tea led to hours of sipping and conversation...

We also enjoyed delicious tea sandwiches, in traditional English style, along with scones and clotted cream, and other wonderful delicacies.

The potato soup was the most flavorful I'd ever had! I am now determined to replicate this soup because it really was extraordinarily good.

My favorite tea ended up being the White Avalanche, which has the unusual added element of coconut, a flavor I'd never had in tea before. Erin was the one who chose this particular blend, and I'm ever so glad she did. She also purchased a tin of the loose tea for me, and I've been enjoying it for months now.

By the time we finished our tea time, it was dark out and we set out to begin the rather treacherous and nerve-wracking drive home, as the snow had picked up a bit and I'm not a fan of driving in the snow... but we made it home safe and sound, and I'm already pining for another little excursion to Georgetown and the Saint James Tea Room!

Saint James Tea Room 614 Rose Street Georgetown, CO 80444 303-569-3100

Images by Lauryl Lane.

Cake Styling

A year ago I blogged about styling a cake for Joy the Baker. It was a blast to work with Joy, totally fun, and we had some good laughs over how very unglamorous these photos shoots are behind the scenes. If only people knew... I'm not going to lie, I was a little devastated when the cake I styled failed to pass muster with Joy's editors. You see, it was supposed to be for the cover of her new cookbook. I was sooooo excited about that. I've had my designs on the cover of a magazine... not once, but twice. That's a pretty big deal. But the cover of a Joy the Baker Cookbook? That made my little heart go pitter patter pumpernickel.

Alas and alack, it wasn't to be. The cookbook editors went a different direction. Ah, well, I suppose the cake I styled can live on in infamy on this, my little bloggity-blog. At least I can look at it, and that makes me happy.

Images by Joy Wilson | Floral Design by Lauryl Lane.

monday monday

Monday again. Back to the grind. But such a pleasant grind!

I must confess the Academy Awards were a bit of a disappointment. Apart from the actual awards (most were quite well-deserved, in my opinion), Esmerelda Spalding's heavenly vocals, and seeing my girl-crush, Rooney Mara, looking exquisite... well, the show was a let-down. And I was a little devastated by Billy Crystal's racist remarks. I was reminded why I left the film industry, and why I love the wedding industry so very, very much.

Fun stuff to come this week: flowers, yummy baked goods, and copious cups of tea. Just a few of my favorite things!

awards show weekend

The Academy Awards are tomorrow, will you be watching? It's one of my favorite evenings of the year, the chance to see Hollywood royalty (and many of my clients!) all dressed up in their most formal attire, coiffed, bejeweled, and utterly entrancing!

Every year I hope to see more flowers. Not that there aren't bajillions of flowers at The Kodak Theatre on awards day (I've watched the floral installations before and they are UNBELIEVABLE!!!), but we rarely see the film talent wearing corsages, boutonnieres, or any other floral adornment. With The Artist as one of the number one contenders for Best Picture, I'm really hoping that there will be a return to "Old-Hollywood" elegance this year. Might we even see some classic carnation boutonnieres??? Fingers crossed!

Carnations have gotten a really bad rap in the past, and I understand why. Poorly designed, as they almost always are in supermarket arrangements, they look like crap. But with the proper care, good mechanics, and unexpected accompaniments, carnations really can shine. And as a boutonniere, a carnation can conjure up images of the elite brotherhood of gentlemen who wore a carnation "buttonhole" every single day in England around the turn of the century. Oh dear, now I'm going to imagine myself in the world of Downton Abbey again...

Happy Weekend!

Image | Floral Design | Styling by Lauryl Lane.