I want to....

Live in a place where I can wear these (and just these) comfortably in the day.

Halfway across the world

Hello, I love you. We even almost have the same name. I looked through your website and I think I fell in love at least five times, in the depths of a yuppie soul that I never even knew I had. You have room recipes- what a delightful concept! Would you like to come and live with me in Singapore?

And this is why...

Sometimes I feel like I would like to be a guy.

(I suppose I should qualify, on reflection, that I mean a WASP-Y guy, like Alec Baldwin or Matthew MaConaughy. Just to make my cigar, socked moccasins, leather thongs or baby blue shirts look better)

Of course, my husband makes all the above look TERRIFIC (except the socked moccasins, which are really a very hard look to pull off). Happy Birthday Z!

Flower power cake

In a way, I'm a bit sad that my Saturday flower-modelling classes are over, it was such a nice way to spend time, with a few like-minded girls, doing something crafty and pretty on an afternoon. More proof that I wouldn't really miss corporate work!

This is just to satisfy my need to bake something pretty (which crops up maybe once every week and a half and is only mildly satisfied by throwing hundreds and thousands over smooth peaks of icing).

The first is the cake my friend made for the class finale. Isn't it a beaut? The second picture is how I could picture that cake in a party line-up, kind of juxtaposed again greens and pinks, like those awesome peony-in-a-mason-jar-s. (The actual cake from the dessert table, is sort of a geometrical teaser, cut from flower cutters but not actually made into flowers!)

Aren't the latter pictures yummy? Both the cakes and the natural flowers, which just can't be beat!

INvitations

You wouldn't think, would you, that half a year after getting married, I would still be perusing wedding invitation cards? As a caveat, these are really all types of cards (and you know what a stationary junkie I am) from a website that I have watched grow from strength to strength. It's called Minted.com. They standardise and take away the fuss of designing invitations, while bringing you fresh designs.

Like Apple apps, they invite designs from independant designers and just about anyone through their 'design challenges', then hold public voting on the designs. This way, they keep their product looking fresh, they get great feedback on the sellability of the product and they have a lot of low-cost, high-margin designed product.

If I had one wedding-related crusade, I think it would be for Singaporean hotels to update their invitation cards or at least, offer couples a range of simple but modern and elegant designs. Singapore is a printing hub, you would be amazed at how cheap printing is here, yet, we have possibly the ugliest and the least imaginative wedding cards known to ... asian men. I know it's so-called tradition to receive a granulated maroon red carboard foldover with a large gold Xi embossed on the front but really, I fail to see why it's at all desirable. Like tea ceremonies and big, late banquets, I'm sure China will break with this custom before we do.

White, still, at the end

There is something to be said about white bouquets, non?

A post-birthday rant

I have often felt that all my birthdays went sort of downhill after 22. Somehow age and personal growth kind of built up to that magical, independant yet irresponsible number and after that, it never really seemed so attractive again.

When I talk to companies, one of the most demurred questions is, when you say double-digit growth, do you mean...teens or twenty-teens? Something with a 2 in front of it, now that is a real double-digit, it's good stuff. But now, age-wise, I am headed to a region that is beyond good stuff. It's so high, it doesn't even get talked about. I'm starting to feel there's nothing between me, my parents, retirement and old age but the business of life. It's a pretty awful feeling, the type that makes you want to buy aviator shades, denim shorts and a snowboard and literally, run away from Van Winkle.

The other thing that is troubling me, is that I seem to be... aging in design taste. And that really does bother me. I'll be the first to admit I was never bohemian. I don't like dirt and tarnish. And a roll-on carry is as close as I've ever got to backpacking. I'm picky, rather than appreciative of vintage. I'm no more than grey-felt-with-red-stiching-and-a-spotted-guinea-feather bohemian, I get it. Still, I was always sort of a post-industrialist at best crossed with Pottery Barn at worst. I believed I was modern Californian casual even if, I was a closet conservative. I would have short jasper grass lawns over dark potted fronds anytime.

So please tell me, why I actually like the two pictures above? I actually like the mirrored surface cupboards, the white walls and the staid tan carpet. I understand no longer being young, I just can't grasp that I'm starting to like the estate look. Then I found out this is one of Elizabeth Taylor's properties in Palm Springs. Palm Springs furniture. Grief!

The next thing you know, I'll be all-in for geometric cut-out screens and velvet-flocked wallpaper and Kenneth Cobonpue deck furniture. Then life as I know it will really be over.

I'll stop ranting now. And just to make myself feel better, I'll add pictures that I liked. Like, from before I got old.