Romantic Fashion Picks

Today's post in inspired by some of my fashion picks on Pinterest. I love this top above by Anthropologie. It is romantic and feminine, flowing but not shapeless. It would certainly be cool and airy for the summer weather. It is made with polyester,cotton, wool, nylon and acrylic. I think it would look good with a pair of jeans or with a pair of slacks.

It is also $138 which is more than I personally have ever spent on a single top. Sometimes, it is worth the splurge. Depending on your budget, it may be worth your while as quality well-made clothing has more endurance. If you are a skilled seamstress (or happen to know one), you may be able to draw some inspiration from this and create your own version. A creative one-of-a-kind fashion statement is a wonderful thing.

Pair that with this floppy sunhat with flower by Luxury Lane.

The hat is $48 from lookingfabulicious.com. It's lovely for summer, for a day on the beach or out at the sidewalk cafe, both functional and fashionable. The cream rose brings out the cream color of the top.

These espadrilles by Michael Kors, $79.99 from zappos.com, would be a safer pair of heels for the boardwalk. The gold tones complement the creams.

I adore this bag from Fossil, inspired by Italian bags of the '70's. It is feminine and folky at the same time. The applique and embroidery are charming and reminiscent of traditional folk art flowers. It would add a punch of color to the outfit, and the pink flower accents would pick up the pink of the hat. The material is a cotton and leather blend. The interior is 100 percent polyester jacquard, and there is a magnetic closure.

It is $139.99. So, again it may not be the best choice if you are on a tight budget. Maybe, you can only afford one splurge, maybe all, but these are just some of the fashions that have caught my eye recently. Maybe, these ideas will just serve as a springboard for your own creativity. If you are skilled in needlework, you can easily replicate the folk flower look on a fabric bag, knowing your style is both classic and current.

"Leonardo" Notebooks

I was inspired recently to start a project with a friend, to share a Leonardo-style notebook. Here is my first entry from that shared notebook.

Today, I hatched a crazy idea that will help us both develop our creativity and our writing as well as help us bond.

I've been reading a book called "How to Think Like Leonardo DaVinci" by Michael J. Gelb. DaVinci is a fascinating person to me. He was not only a great artist but a great inventor and a talented genius in all sorts of areas, the reason why, today, a multi-talented person is called a "Renaissance man."

 The concept behind the book I'm reading is not that anybody can learn to be a genius on DaVinci's level but that everybody can learn from DaVinci's approach to learning and creativity. The book makes suggestions for exercises and one of those suggestions is to keep a notebook like DaVinci. You may have seen replicas of his drawings, sketches for his inventions and writings

This reminds me of the time when I read "The Journals of Rachel Scott" years ago. Rachel Scott was one of the teen girls who was killed in the Columbine shooting. Like Cassie Bernall, Rachel Scott was a devout Christian, and her journals illustrate her faith. The published journals we direct replicas of the original, showing both her handwriting and all the doodles and sketches with which she illustrated them. At the time, I also learned that Rachel Scott shared journals with several of her friends. She'd make an entry, exchange the journal with a friend who would write her piece and back and forth. This actually inspired me when I wrote about two female friends in my novel, "And the Violin Cried." The two friends share a journal that is a combination of a journal, sketchbook and scrapbook.

The back cover of one of Rachel Scott's last journals



My youth novel


So, my suggestion is that we combine these ideas and share a Leonardo notebook, Rachel Scott style! We can exchange the notebook every time we see each other and make at least a small entry each day we have it in our keeping.

Like Leonardo's notebook, the notebook should have both textual and visual elements.

Ideas for textual elements: a letter to one another, random thoughts, a poem, a story idea or the beginnings of one, a journal entry about happenings in the day, quotes from a song, Scripture or anything inspirational, slice-of-life writing (Look up Wikipedia article on slice-of-life writing or the lyrics to "Tom's Diner" by Suzanne Vega, an example of slice-of-life writing) or basically anything.

Ideas for visual elements: sketches and doodles (They don't have to super artistic,) a comic strip, a candy wrapper, ticket stubs, a short article clipping, pictures cut from catalogs or magazines...endless possibilities.