I need to stop buying myself stuff. REALLY. (Help.)

I have a sexy new candy-cane-stripe dress. (And by new, I mean vintage.) I'm definitely not a habitual vintage shopper, but a friend of ours was having a party/open house for her eyeglass shop in the space she's currently sharing with a woman who owns a coffee and tea shop, and we were there, and there were vintage clothes there as well. And jewelry. And chocolate-dipped strawberries.

Possibly that didn't make sense. These people that live behind us? River (daughter, Chloe's age), her brothers, Cynthia (mom) and Bruce (dad)? They are our friends. Cynthia owns an eyeglass store. It caught on fire. The coffee/tea shop next to hers also caught fire. Now they are sharing space a few doors down. They had a party. It was pretty great, because now I have a new dress. I'm having a little trouble figuring out what to wear with it though, as winter tends to be a little chilly for mid-thigh-length sleeveless dresses, and I don't know how to match things.



Christmas list update: I really want buckyballs (from thinkgeek.com). I also really want grey tights, white tights, and jeggings (don't judge me). I also REALLY want Spill & Spell (they still sell it! At Barnes and Noble!) and Set (also sold at B&N!). Really though I mostly only want Set because the last and only time I played it, I got beat repeatedly by a six year old, and that isn't really okay with me. I need to practice. To be fair, she beat everyone else too, and every single time (except her older sister--this is a genius family), and she'd start picking up sets before all the cards were even down, but still. She was SIX.

Also, the BAm Nonrequired Reading this year (2010, in case that was unclear: Best American Nonrequired Reading 2010) is edited by Dave Eggers. Want. Also wouldn't mind having the BAm short stories, essays, science writing. Or Bill Bryson's new book, At Home: A Short History of Private Life, because I love him. A lot. Or pretty much any Oliver Sacks book other than The Man Who Mistook His Wife For A Hat, as I believe I've mentioned before.

OR THE NEW WHEEL OF TIME BOOK. Please forgive me for yelling. It's difficult to contain myself. I mean, I know I should wait for the paperback, I know I don't want to own the hardback, but I want to read it NOW. It's called Towers of Midnight, if anyone was wondering. It's written by Brandon (?) (I always get his first name wrong) Sanderson.

Also: Anything by Neil Gaiman that isn't Coraline. Also, 1,000 Things To See Before You Die.

A Day With Momma

I got to spend the day with my mom today, and it was awesome. We went and loaded her car trunk full of wood from a tree our friends had cut down, then went to the store, the bank, and the Clothes Rack. I am a terrible shopper, but I've acknowledged the fact that I know jack about what looks good on me when I see it on a hanger, so at this point I'll pretty much try on whatever people pick out. My mom and I have the same body type (go figure), and she is not a terrible shopper. I now have three largeish bags of new clothes. Incidentally, today marks the first day of my new life as an indentured servant. Guess who unloaded all that wood by herself?


I didn't end up getting this dress, but I did get the boots, which you can't really see but which are fantastic. I'm glad I took a picture of the dress though, to console myself about not owning it.

I may have been swayed in the "not buying" direction when my mother asked me, "so are you going into a new line of work?"