My life in lists: Guest blogger Allisa Jacobs shares her life in colors

My life Color List

Hello, this is Allisa Jacobs & I’m thrilled to be here, guest posting! Linda writes a fantastic series, My Life in Lists, and I knew I wanted to create one too...featuring my life in colors.  From bold & moody to bright & sunny I’ve gone through a spectrum of color preferences. I can say for sure though, that I’ve never ever been a fan of pastels.

Here’s a little peek at my life in colors:

1970’s

Born the last year of the 70’s, I love looking back & seeing my lovely flower-child of a mom dressing me in all things bright & fun; grass green, tangerine, marigold & apricot.

1980’s

 
Growing up, my rural town was a little late in getting fashion memos, especially for the eighties trend of neons. But boy, when we did, I was all about the neon lime green, black & white! A splash of hot pink? Sure!

1990’s

After coming out of my teenage moodiness of hunter green & maroon, I finally embraced our high school colors of orange & yellow (still believe we loved orange before it was cool!) and other cheerful palettes of blues & pinks. The Mary Kay lady told me blue & rose pink were my colors. I held onto this as an nonnegotiable fact for a very long time. You can see this in photos from my junior year prom- cobalt blue formal dress & matching blue eye shadow with matte pink lips. (Where was my mother!?)

2000’s

Moved to California & was ready to conquer the world. Full of confidence & excitement, I proudly sported bold colors; grass green, bright coral, indigo, turquoise blue, & sunshine yellow.  As a new high school teacher, my students often made fun of my fashion choices – one of my students dubbed my favorite green trousers- “John Deere pants”. But, I loved going through the world with so much color.

Now

I’ve mellowed a bit in some ways. I can’t pull off those green pants if I tried. But I’m also seeing colors in a whole new way…through the eyes of my curious toddler. He loves anything orange. Which means, by extension, I do too (again). I’ll wear an apricot colored top to make him smile & my new sneakers have a slash of tangerine down the side. I feel like I’m settling in to my color preferences...a bit less about fashion (or Mary Kay ladies) and more about what feels good to me, like….maize, mango, persimmon, ocean blue, and chocolate brown. I think color choices really do reflect our feelings & stage in our life...I can’t wait to see what palette I’ll gravitate towards next!


[Thank you, Allisa, for introducing a great way to review our lives!  I, too, did a stint with the 80's neon but then gravitated to black in the 90's.  While my decor palette tends to be on the neutral side, I love bright colors that  I see in other's interiors.  I may have to rethink my whole color scheme now!

Allisa incorporates beatuiful colors into her handbags.  Be sure to visit her shop here and her blog here.   If you are on Twitter, you can follow her: @allisaJacobs here.


Allisa and I are guest blogging for each other.  I'll be writing a post on her blog in the coming week or so about what I did in my "other life;" My professional life before owning a small indie business.]

blog it forward: what inspires me

Participating in blog it forward (BIF - 300 bloggers connecting to each other through posts from their own blogs) today...it's my turn to share with you what inspires me.

Much like defining success, narrowing my focus on what inspires me has been tough. I'm inspired by something different every day. Yesterday, for instance, I found myself inspired by fearless 3 - 10 year olds learning to ski for the first time ever. Their ability to learn quickly and effortlessly was amazing.

print by Hide 'n Seek

I am continually inspired by my family: my husband's daily fortitude, my youngest son's wit and compassion, my older son's wisdom and discipline. If I ever need to be inspired, I simply look to them.

I find a lot of inspiration in the kindness of others. It doesn’t take a disaster to see others reaching out to help one another. The biggest inspiration can come from the littlest gesture of kindness.

photo by She Watched the Sky

I always find inspiration in nature through colors, and clean lines; intricate patterns and organic forms.

photo by Kodilu

A visit to my local hardware store often inspires me to look at items for their simplicity in shape. Something we overlook everyday, like laundry detergent containers, can become beautiful pop art simply by grouping them together.

photo by Ned Lyttelton

I love reading modern architecture magazines like Dwell, Elle Decor and Metropolitan Home, and Sunset or gardening books. Fashion magazines and blogs inspire me through words and photos. Yesterday's BIF blogger who linked to me, A Diary of Lovely, is a great example of such a blog.

Beautiful photography inspires me, particularly modern abstract and macro.

photo by Tengtan

Everyday icons, the sounds of the city, and the urban landscape inspire me.

photo by me

The creative energy of others is also a huge inspiration. All I need to do is spend 5 minutes on Etsy, and I'm pumped to make something new.

You, my readers, are a great source of inspiration. You always have something wonderful to add and I know that I can always count on you to cheer me up, answer my questions, or simply "listen" to me.

Okay, I can go on forever. This is just the tip of the iceberg. Be sure to check out tomorrow's BIF blogger, Alexander Salvage, where you will get another great dose of inspiration!

Why I blog - read it on Scoutie Girl

Some of you, particularly family and friends, may wonder why I blog. I often wonder myself. When Tara, at Scoutie Girl, asked her contributors if we wanted to post about why we blog, I jumped at the chance. You can see why I blog here on Scoutie Girl.

Do you blog? If so, why? If not, ever tempted or morally opposed?

Have a fantastic weekend. I'll be blogging next week from the slopes of Park City, UT!

My life in lists: blue jeans through the decades

As I was deciding what to wear this morning, I pulled my skinny jeans off a pile of denim. The voice inside my head snickered. Should I be wearing skinny jeans at 43? Maybe not. I'm not super skinny. As a matter of fact, I recall someone telling me I have "birthing hips." However, I bought these jeans a few years ago, at the height of the resurgence of skinny jeans, because they are perfect to wear with riding boots in winter. I found that I also love to wear them cuffed above my ankles and under tunics .

This got me thinking about my blue jean preferences over the decades. Believe me, I've had many.

In the 70's I was dressed pretty hip for a small child. Of course, I hated it then but now, looking back, I see that I was pretty trendy. My mom made many of my outfits. I had a polyester lilac pant suit with bell bottom pants and a crocheted fringe vest.

[Sometime I'll have to tell you about the crocheted underwear...not such a great idea for a little kid. They become very heavy when wet.]

I distinctly remember asking for a pair of blue jean gauchos for Christmas one year. I loved them. They had leather trim pockets and I wore them with lace up boots (seen here in an earlier post).

In the 80's it was all about peer pressure and I had to have tapered jeans from County Seat . At the time, County Seat was a younger version of its rival, The Gap.

[M, I guess this would be the equivilent of your desire to shop at Abercrombie.]

They sold all the hot names: Levi, Girbaud, and Guess. These jeans were meant for teenagers with developing hips. My hips didn't develop until college (then, they became "birthing hips." See above). The jeans looked a bit like riding judphurs on me as they slightly ballooned at the top, but I loved these pants so much I wore them constantly.

I loved my 90's fashion sense (someone had to). That was when I went kinda glam/goth/grunge in college. Ever trendy, I mixed my "grunge" style with a glam elegance: black tights under ripped (shredded) jean shorts, tailored suit jackets, and my favorite army boots (seen here in this earlier post). Katie Holmes is bringing back the trend seen here. Do I dare?

[I'll look for some hot 90's pictures of me to post later. I think I have one where I'm wearing my dad's army trench coat. Man, I was rock'n!]

My jean of choice during this entire decade was boy jeans...real boy jeans. I literally bought them from thrift stores because I loved how they sat low on my hips. Of course, this was before "boy jeans" fit became available for women in stores. I actually still prefer to wear my jeans this way!

Today, I own many different types of jeans: boot cut, skinny, straight, dress, etc. It has always been hard for me to find a pair of jeans that fit, so when I do, I grab them.


I'm proud to say I've avoided the "mom jean" trend...so far.

Okay, let's hear it! Tell me all about your love/hate relationship with jeans!

My life in lists: perfume choices through the decades

I distinctly ('stinkly') remember my mom's perfume, Tabu. It is the first recollection I have of the power of perfume. Over the years, I've gone through many different brands and scents. I used to ask for a new perfume each Christmas and if I was lucky, the perfume would come with an extra make-up gift set.

One year, my dad told me that I should have a "signature scent" and not constantly change brands. He wasn't telling me this so that I could emulate Coco Chanel but rather so I'd stop asking him to buy me various expensive brands at every mood swing.

As perfumes seem to last forever, I still have several of these bottles sitting on my childhood dresser in my dad's house.

This is not an exhaustive list but rather a brief summery:

1970's

Blue Jeans by Shulton


Love's Baby Soft

1980's

Anais Anais by Cacharel



Lauren by Ralph Lauren



1990's

Obsession by Calvin Klein

Today:

Sometime in the mid '90s, I found a great shop in Chicago and fell in love with an oil blend called Egyptian Musk. Haunted by my dad's words about having a "signature scent" (which, btw, also includes style, but that's another post), I've been wearing it exclusively ever since (tres Coco, no?!). Now, not every Egyptian Musk is the same and I've been in contact with this store and it's various owners over the years so that I don't loose this scent. It practically oozes from my pores and even on days that I don't wear it, I've been told you can still smell like it.

Tell me about your perfumes. 'Fess up, was it Charlie or Jean Nate? What was/is your favorite or must have brand?

Oh, and guys, I know you can join in on this one! Remember Drakkar anyone?

Listography: the ultimate journal for list makers and my newest blog feature - #101

While shopping on the Cape, I happened upon this new series of journals called Listography: Your Life in Lists. My first thought was what a great gift for my mother-in-law, the queen of list making. My second thought was that this is perfect for those of us with an aversion to keeping diaries...namely...me. What a fantastic way to chronicle and share bits of my life in an easy to digest format (the made for TV version will come much later).

I bought these two copies. I need to buy more...and for many different people. [friends/family spoiler alert: this is your next gift.]. Since I blog, I decided that I'd add my listography as a blog feature. These will be evolving as I know I'll come back and add to the lists. After all, part of the reason I have to make lists is because of my forgetfulness. So, join in the fun...leave me comments with your own additions to each listography post. Today's list:

What were your favorite childhood shows?

Gilligan's Island - (I liked Mary Ann)
The Brady Bunch - (found Jan disturbing)
HR Puff and Stuff
Captain Kangaroo - (loved Mr. Green Jeans)
Sesame Street - (all time favorite)
Electric Company
The Banana Splits
The Partridge Family
The Monkees - (Micky Dolenz was my fav)
Land of the Lost - (spent countless hours pretending to be in the L of the L)

...as a 'tween...

The Twilight Zone

Fantasy Island

Charlies Angels

Love Boat

Love American Style

Carol Burnett

You can learn more about these and other Listography books here.

Hump Day Humor - My life in boots

My youngest son is currently obsessed with anything army: camouflage, plastic army men, dog tags, etc. Recently, he ran up our basement stairs with absolute glee. He had found a pair of army boots...my army boots. My absolute favorite, most comfortable boots of all time. Yes, E, your momma wore combat boots (not the official kind). After struggling to understand that they were mine, he happily accepted them as his own.

Several days later, I saw a pair of vintage 70's boots on the front page of Etsy. This got me thinking about each decade of my life...in boots. An aside, you know you are getting older when fashion trends begin to come around AND when you think of your life in decades. I'll save you the math, I'm in my 40's...my EARLY 40's.

I'm proud to say that my first boots were indeed leather. They were similar to these white booties best known in the 60's. No, nothing fancy like today's mini me Chuck Taylor's or Nike's that my boys had for their first shoes.

In the 70's, I wore polyester pant suits (homemade, purple, and bell bottomed much like Marsha Brady). My mom crocheted me a hip fringed vest that matched my Barbie. My favorite pair of boots were these lace-up boots which I wore with my blue jean gauchos (do they use that term anymore) with leather trim pockets. Man, I was stylin' in grade school!

For the better part of the 80's and early 90's I lived in my army boots. These boots (photo is of my actual boots) molded to my feet, and were resoled several times. I may even consider wearing them this winter. They are my all time favorite boots. I'm not certain any other boots will ever top these. Some may not agree with me, but I think these boots (as well as biker boots) will never go out of style. And can be worn with jeans, skirts, leggings, naked, etc.

In the 90's I also spent some time in some thigh-high boots. These are not for the faint of heart, but I loved pushing the fashion envelope. What can I say, I'm a slave to fashion.

Which brings me to today. My current favorite happens to be my wedge heeled boots. My second favorite. But I guess what defines the 00's in boots would be the Uggs. I had vowed never to buy a pair of Birkenstocks or Uggs. While I kept the promise (I didn't buy them), I did acquire a brand new pair of powder blue Uggs from a friend (thanks, Peggy). I began wearing them around my house to keep my feet warm. Then I slowly wore them outside to run quick errands. I'll admit that they are very comfortable.

There you have it, my life in boots. I'll have to do the same with heels, flats, sneakers, etc. That will be several other posts.

I'm dying to know...what are your most memorable boots??