londonsgirl's Xanga

| Christmas Photos I |

Wed, 30 Dec 2009 03:03:17 GMT

J. Crew under snow (Christmas Day)

Brooks Brother's window display

Cinemark Palace on Christmas Day to see the newly released "Sherlock Holmes" film.

Our mantle.

Neighborhood.

Coffee. Candles. Dogs. Pajamas. Leather couch. Cashmere throws.

Presents.

My "Narnia" themed decorations ;)

Christmas at the lodge.

A section of my house.

Steak.

Sun, 27 Dec 2009 23:55:23 GMT

(conversation with dad after this very long and emotionally and physically exhausting day)

Me: I'm a little down. My life needs adjusting. I'm turning 22 soon. I never get enough sleep. I'm not where I want to be in life and I know that it will take blood, sweat, toil, and tears to get anywhere near my dream. School has been just so expensive. And... I'm craving a steak.
Dad: Hm.
(long pause)
So you're craving steak? Wow.

He cooked me a steak :)

Now to fixing my other problems...

It Was a White Christmas...

Sat, 26 Dec 2009 05:16:19 GMT

Christmas is ending now... the clock arms have almost reached midnight and I am forlorn for tomorrow I have to get back to work. Early. This day has been a dazzlement (not a word? okay). First day off from work, school, and wedding prep for what seems like centuries. Today, my body reawakened to the pleasures of being comfy at home... the warmth, glow of a dozen candles burning throughout the house, getting up and not having any place to rush off to, slowly enjoying a breakfast on fine china at the dining room table, savoring each bite, slowly going through all of my Christmas records one by one, placing them in the turntable & turning the volume up. That alone was enough to completely restore me.

But on top of all of that, presents... and wonderful, well-thought out ones at that. A promised visit to the spa, J. Crew gift card, things to organize my life with, notebooks, books, office accessories, new DVD releases, more down bedding, antique items, checks, a few small luxuries, etc. Loving everything :)

In the afternoon, I slipped on my navy silk dress and tall black boots and set off in the continuous flurries for the Cinemark Palace theater in the Country Club Plaza. Piles of 15 feet of snow covered the middle of some of the roads. I got my picture by one of them.

"Sherlock Holmes" was playing and I just had to see it. How did I not know that Robert Downey Jr. was playing Holmes? Somehow I didn't and so it surprised me a bit. The Iron man takes on Holmes. The whole movie was completely different from what I was expecting actually. Holmes was a complete rogue. Rugged, a bit psychotic, and forever offensive. Likeable, of course. Jude Law was magnificent! Upon leaving the theater, I was told that I looked like Rachel McAdams -- that makes the third time this year that someone has made that remark. Its nice to hear but I know my mirror at home doesn't lie. Sigh.

After the movie, my sister and I took a regretted jaunt around the Plaza and we went a bit too far from our car (and from any warm place that was open). The snow fall picked up and the chilly air became chillier. Every limb became numb and the snow started to feel like tiny bits of glass hitting the face. Incredible weather. The wind was so fierce that it looked like a blizzard. Marvelous. And something to be enjoyed from the safe indoors.

Our neighbor guys shoveled our drive and sidewalk for us. Thoughtful gestures like that belong depicted in a Norman Rockwell painting.

Back at home I re-lit the dozens of candles and collaborated with the sister on food for the evening. Every Christmas, we crave Asian food. So thats what we stuff ourselves on. And that is what we made. Perfect additions were pots of coffee and chilled cider which I had placed out in the knee-deep snow earlier. It was fun seeing the whole green glass bottle completely submerged in the snow.

Relaxing in the media room with my down comforter and my new copy of "Julie & Julia" was simply divine. A perfect ending to a glorious holiday and the ultimate inspiration for blogging again!

I hope you all had a joyous Christmas day!
Cheers!

Megan

Audrey Hepburn Dec. 8th Auction.

Sun, 20 Dec 2009 22:31:08 GMT

Audrey Hepburn passed on her unwanted clothes to lifelong friend, Tanja Star-Busmann: little black dresses, sleek and sculpted or crusty with lace; slender evening gowns in fresh sorbet colors; snug hats, bobbing with tassels; and the occasional personal items from the gamine movie star, like a striped matelot sweater or a herringbone tweed coat in which she would walk her Yorkshire terrier Famous.

The sale's poignant finale is a wedding dress that was never worn by Ms. Hepburn, on or off-screen. Made by the Roman Fontana sisters in 1952, before she broke off an engagement to an English aristocrat, the budding star characteristically asked the designers to give the dress away to "the most beautiful, poor Italian girl you can find." Worn by a peasant girl, who became a farmer's wife, the dress lay wrapped in tissue paper for four decades before being offered for sale at this auction.

Thursday, December 10, 2009

Thu, 10 Dec 2009 02:17:27 GMT

"Don't you lose heart, Pole," said Puddleglum. "I'm coming, sure and certain. I'm not going to lose an opportunity like this. It will do me good. They all say--I mean, the other wiggles all say--that I'm too flighty; don't take life seriously enough. If they've said it once, they've said it a thousand times. 'Puddleglum,' they've said, 'you're altogether too full of bobance and bounce and high spirits. You've got to learn that life isn't all fricaseed frogs and eel pie. You want something to sober you down a bit. We're only saying it for your own good, Puddleglum.' That's what they say. Now a job like this--a journey up north just as winter's beginning, looking for a Prince that probably isn't there, by way of a ruined city that no one has ever seen--will be just the thing. If that doesn't steady a chap, I don't know what will.' And he rubbed his frog-like hands together as if he were talking of going to a party or a pantomine.

Notable Dialogues From a Day.

Wed, 09 Dec 2009 03:45:53 GMT

Mom: Megan, I'm having a casting director from New York here at 4:00. Just so you know.
Megan: Whyy?
Mom: She's going to find me actors who can speak Mongolian.
(she walks away)
Megan: Oh.

(Megan is getting into Beth's car)
Elizabeth: Hi!
Megan: Hi! There's a casting director from New York City in my living room right now.
Elizabeth: Oh. Why?
Megan: She's working with my mom to find actors who can speak Mongolian.
Elizabeth: Oh.

My mom is involved in so much work-wise that I can never keep up with what she's doing.

(in the car with Elizabeth, later, and on a completely unrelated note...)
Megan: You know, we should really do that thing that we've always talked about. Get several single, like-minded girls together and buy an adorable house like... there (pointing to a stone cottage across from Aixois French bakery). We really should. But of course, as soon as we go through all of the trouble of buying a house and getting all settled, men will probably come around and spoil everything and suddenly we'll all be married, never being able to enjoy living in it.
Elizabeth: Lets buy a house.

| Lies I've told my 3 year old recently |

Mon, 30 Nov 2009 00:47:10 GMT

Trees talk to each other at night.

Before your eyeballs fall out from watching too much TV, they get very loose.

Tiny bears live in drain pipes.

If you are very very quiet you can hear the clouds rub against the sky.

The moon and the sun had a fight a long time ago.

Everyone knows at least one secret language.

We are all held together by invisible threads.

Books get lonely too.

Sadness can be eaten.

I will always be there

{by raul gutierrez}

| The Update |

Sun, 29 Nov 2009 16:21:06 GMT

Its been awhile!

I can only say that I am barely alive but that things are going quite well. Albeit hectic. Each day I seem to be running off of less and less sleep. The past couple of weeks I have been working over 40 hours... occasionally reaching to 51 even. The overtime pay is nice but sometimes doesn't seem to suffice with how absolutely tired I am after everything! I am in full time school of course... plugging away desperately. While my work has been bringing in sufficient grades, I feel that for it being a semester of important classes at the university, I was not able to give it the appropriate attention it required. Last minute cramming and memorization is never the best approach to these things. Good grades are nice but retaining the information seems more of a battle sometimes. We'll see how I pull out in the end. I'm giving it everything I've got.

On top of those big schedule items, I have freelance graphic design work filling in the holes. Always a blessing though I never seem to be able to say no and sometimes, I really should.

My family and I are all eagerly anticipating the 18th of December, the marriage of my older brother Scott and the lovely Rachel Richardson. Of course we're in charge of the rehearsal dinner and so that has been quite exciting! We've booked the caterers, started on the decorations (spray painting branches metallic silver, for instance), figuring out the music accompaniment, etc. I've been working on the graphics for the wedding (invitations, save the dates, etc.) and it has been a blast! I would love to do this as a side business. One of these days, of course.

I'm grateful to where the Lord has brought me the past couple of months. As I've grown into a place of deeper contentment and peace, He has brought unexpected surprises and joys into my life in the way of new opportunities, new ways of approaching things, and delightful/wonderful new friendships :)

On some random notes...
Jacob Turk for Congress.
I'm absolutely obsessed with J. Crew
"The Brothers Bloom" is fantastic!
I need to get my sister married off now.
Italy, Mexico, Washington D.C., and Turkey in 2010!
I love wearing skinny ties with pencil skirts, blouses, and cardigans.
Pumpkin is my favorite color of the season
I find that I know only 4 men in the whole of my acquaintance who can dress properly
I'm taking my coffee strong and black these days
The new "Emma" series is just simply the best thing that has happened this year in the world of film
Fine china (and other luxuries ;) are for single girls too.
I'm always in the last group of people to finish taking a test in the classrooms because I'm extremely thorough and I want my handwriting to look extraordinarily neat. Sometimes it seems that professor's give extra points merely for being able to read my answers.
I'm a bit less naive now when it comes to men (I'll laugh about this statement later)
My love and enthusiasm for classical music has resurfaced... I listen to it when going to bed and while getting up and dressing in the morning.
I can now tie a bow tie.
Kombucha is a miraculous drink! If you haven't tried it yet, you really should. It completely reinvigorates the body and makes you feel alive and healthy. Yes, its a fad that works.
"Enduring" is such a painfully beautiful concept. I'm working on it through each trial.
Haven't had to pay for a Starbucks drink for at least two weeks :D
Time with family is so precious.
Its slightly scary but so neat when the family dynamics begin changing. Relationships between you and your parents turn to more of friends who watch out for each other (lol). You welcome new additions to the family circle. Things change.
My hair is getting blonder. Naturally. Yay.
When you start keeping a vigilant tea time each day, it soon becomes an absolute necessary aspect of my routine and it grieves my day to have to miss out.
Caramelized onions make practically everything taste better.
It can be utterly astonishing how different people see you from how you see yourself. The way you look. The way you act. You are way more wonderful than you can possibly imagine.
One of these years, I want to spend Christmas in Berlin.
Jimmy Durante's singing voice evokes the feeling of "welcome home" to me.
No matter the gazillion times I've eaten out at a nice restaurant, it never ceases to be a special experience. I have a smile on throughout the whole meal.

Cheers!

How Tweed It Is ...

Thu, 19 Nov 2009 23:49:12 GMT

The Tweed Run is a group bicycle ride through the centre of London, in which the cyclists are expected to dressed in traditional british cycling attire, particularly tweed plus four suits. Bicycles acceptable on a tweed run are normally expected to be of classic appearance, and are generally single speed, fixed gear, or vintage. Other bicycles are acceptable as the organizing group is not strictly a vintage club, but some effort to recreate the spirit of a bygone era is always appreciated.

In 74 Days...

Wed, 11 Nov 2009 18:26:49 GMT

I'm going to sleep on the beach... for a week.