Italy part II: Food Festival

Well, I did promise you another instalment of my holiday in Italy [in case you thought I’d forgotten or something], and this time we take a little food tour… some of the delicious produce for which Italy is so famous. Although it was technically Spring, it was still quite chilly and happily the roasted chestnut vendors were still on the streets of Rome. This is a snack which is not found in South Africa, so I gleefully gobbled up a paper cone of these piping-hot nutty treats.

Fruits so colourfully displayed at a stall in Siena:

Ice cream. In Italy, the ice cream really is good enough to have twice a day. A treat which my children took a decadent delight in!

A little vignette set up in the villa garden with my perfect combinations of flavours: ripe tomatoes, pungent garlic, crusty bread, grassy olive oil & tangy parmeggiano. I really could live on simple food like this everyday:

Salamis, cured hams, prosciutto cruddo, parma hams. And more charcuterie than you can shake a bread stick at. Cold-pressed extra-virgin olive oil, to be found around almost every corner in Chianti, made in the traditional way by local artisans.

So have I made you all a bit hungry?

For those that missed it, click to see the previous post of my Italian trip Part I.

Poof!//

The Body Shop giveaway winner is...

The winner of a gift bag and sold-out summer bronzing products from The Body Shop is...

Brittney of A Day In The Life Too!

 

Brittney said...

heck yes i did all of those things. so jealous of all you dallas bloggers! that looks divine. annnd...please pretty please pick meeeeeee! (i'm slipping random.org a twenty right now...)

Congrats Brittney!

Outfit Post: The tyranny of the "bikini body"

Memorial Day weekend, 1981: I am seven years old. My parents are hosting a barbecue and have invited my grandparents, aunts and uncles, cousins, and neighborhood friends. The air smells like roasting barbecue briquettes, daylilies, freshly cut grass and hot dogs.The rhythmic spurt-spurt-spurt of the sprinkler permeates the air. I am wearing an enticing two-piece yellow terry cloth bikini which ties around my neck, and my cousins and I shriek as we run through the needle-sharp spray of the sprinkler. My waist-long hair drips water down my back. I feel happy, unencumbered and free.

Flash forward to Memorial Day weekend, present day: I am 36 years old. My husband and three children chatter excitedly about going to the neighborhood pool. I have zero desire to go to the pool, because going to the pool means wearing my swimsuit in public. I stand in front of my dresser and try to calm myself down. I try on two-piece after two-piece, self-esteem plummeting in the process. Swimsuits lie tangled on the floor. My thighs seem to expand with each selection. My body takes up too much space. I am flabby and fat and all-together unacceptable. I feel like a failure.

Every summer, I go through the exact same ritual. I become obsessively focused on the notion of the perfect bikini body, an entity I am certain every woman possesses except for myself. The NY Times recently ran an article exploring the notion of the bikini body, examining the effect it has on fear-inspired marketing campaigns and as a symbol of physical perfection.

There's no way of figuring out when the phrase "bikini body" was first uttered or when its tyranny took hold. It's common knowledge that the two-piece as we know it was invented in 1946 by engineer Louis Réard who christened it after Bikini Atoll. The style became popular in the 50's and by the 80's was standard beachwear. As our culture increasingly enshrines physical perfection, the bikini has come to inspire dread and awe. It wasn’t always so. In the 1960s, when bellybutton-baring suits first became popular in America, “it was a youthful phenomenon definitely,” said Sarah Kennedy, the author of “The Swimsuit: A History of Twentieth-Century Fashions.” Then the high-fashion set and movie stars began to put on bikinis, and by the ’70s, she said, the bikini was “worn by all ages.”

And a few extra pounds didn’t disqualify anyone, considering the fitness revolution was still roughly a decade away. (The NY Times mentions that in the book there’s a 1940s photograph of a fresh-faced still-brunet Marilyn Monroe looking smashing in a two-piece, a roll of pale flesh at her midsection.)

Writes The Guardian's Laurie Penny:

When it finally became popular in the 1960s, the bikini was a symbol of physical liberation, of beautiful women reacting to the stern sexual prudery of previous decades by exposing as much skin to the sun as they pleased. Today, as with many iterations of the sexual emancipation rhetoric of the 1960s, wearing a bikini is no longer associated with pleasure and daring, but with anxiety, dieting rituals and joyless physical performance...The bikini body has become cultural shorthand for a moral standard of female perfection whereby any physical flaw should be regarded as a source of shame, an obstacle to collective fantasies of glamour and happiness.

When did  the bikini become the standard of all beauty? I'm going to theorize that the first Sports Illustrated swimsuit issues, published in 1964, had a lot to do with it. With that publication, swimsuits became explicitly linked with the standards of female desirability. Also, the Swimsuit Issue is published in the winter and had little to do with the reality of actual women being at the beach, let alone swimming, and a lot to do with unattainable goals.

"Bikini body" is the going code for "acceptable." It is always in bikinis that the tabloids feature the "best" and "worst" bodies. Type "bikini body" into Google and you get the following suggested searches:

bikini body workout
bikini body diet
bikini body tips
bikini body fast
quick bikini body

The bikini body has nothing to do with overall health, or fitness, or lifestyle. No, it's about shedding "winter weight" fast, before some arbitrary deadline known as "Bikini Season," at which point we're forced to confront a two-piece suit with, naturally, the requisite "bikini wax," and no trace of cold-weather pastyness. Jezebel argues that the "bikini body" craze goes so much deeper than fatism or fatphobia. It is part of our society's relentless insistence that a woman's body is not her own. It is an object to be criticized.  Our society seems to think that a woman wears a bikini not for herself, but for the public to decide her worthiness.

Will the world end tomorrow if I can't cram my butt into a bikini? I was going to ask Stephen Hawking, but, after some careful mathematical calculations, I was able to come up with the answer on my own: No. Does this mean that I still don't have days where I hate my thighs and stomach so much I want to carve them off of my body with a fillet knife? No. But I understand that those days will happen and that they really don't matter because there truly is NOTHING wrong with my body. I've put it through a lot in the past 36 years and it's stuck around and carried me through everything.

So my motto is this: Just be healthy. Eat things that are nutritionally good for you and exercise, but don't forget about delicious, delicious baked goods and gelato from Pacuigo. Don't deprive yourself of things to satisfy the warped and nonsensical views of people that see you as another bottomless pocket and empty head. 

Do what you want, eat what you want, wear what you want, and be who you want.

Now I ask you: How you deal with the pressure of the "bikini body?" Does wearing a swimsuit in public make you break out in a sweat? Do you avoid going to the beach, pool or lake because of this fear? Does wearing a swimsuit cause you to dread summer activities? And do you have a favorite swimsuit that makes you feel great about yourself?

Thrifted Gap chambray shirt: thrifted vintage dress; Old Navy belt; White Mountain sandals; TIKKR watch; Charming Charlie bracelet; Forever 21 necklace

Vintage Streetstyle

So if The Sartorialist had been snapping his amazing shots in the 1940’s, I reckon this could be the kind of thing he’d have photographed..

Ladies – prints, stripes and checks? Check!

Hanging out…

Stepping out, chic and stylishly…

I’m always aware and intrigued by the parallels between our contemporary styles and the vintage versions. I absolutely adore the 1920’s and the 40’s. Don’t you just love vintage fashion? Which is your favourite era?

image credits 1 here 2 here 3 here 4 & 5 we heart it 6 here 7 here [all found via the lovely pinterest board of Adore Vintage.]

Memorial Day giveaway!

Happy Memorial day, everyone! I hope you're enjoying your day with friends and family and barbecue. Because if there's one thing that Memorial Day makes me think of, it's barbecues. But then again, most holidays have some sort of correlation with food in my head. I'll have to give that some thought. Later, when I'm done eating my burger and potato salad.

Today is the second to last day to enter my giveaway for a gift bag and new sold-out summer bronzing products from The Body Shop! Don't forget to take a moment and enter here. The drawing will be tomorrow night.

Weekend Escape

Good Morning! As an antidote to it being Monday, how about an excursion to one of my favourite inspirational sites, The Coveteur. Ever wonder what is packed in the weekend travel bags of some of Vogue’s stylish editors, photographers, and designers? The Coveteur team photographed these holiday ensembles and I absolutely love the colour and energy of each of these!

This quote by Dries Van Noten, taken from The Coveteur site, sums it all up: "It's more interesting to have just a picture of a small detail - then you can dream all the rest around it. Because when you see the whole thing, what is there to imagine?".

Don’t you agree with that sentiment when you see fantastic shots like these? Now start imagining where these fabulously stylish people are off to on their vacations…

[images from Vogue.com and The Coveteur. Collages by Dressed by Style]

On Sundays I Smile - Week in Review May 29th

On Sundays I review the past week and I Smile. And I share these moments with you.

On Tuesday I got a pedicure and was enraptured by all the colors of nail polish. Am I the only one who stands, transfixed, in front of the display for an embarrassingly  ridiculously long period of time trying to choose a color? I ended up going with OPI's I'm Not Really A Waitress, which is the color I choose 99.825% of the time anyway.

On Wednesday I went to the Bishop Arts district in Dallas. Bishop Art is one of my favorite places in the city - a little six block radius of boutiques, vintage stores, restaurants, and coffee shops. You can eat the world's best raspberry pie and drink iced lattes and gawk at old trucks and vintage shop and people watch and pet various unidentifiable breeds of dogs.

And, if you're brave (and slightly insane) you can ask some random guy to take your picture in said old truck. And grin maniacally while doing so.

Bishop Arts is also home to The Soda Gallery, a store that sells sodas from all around the world, including 30 different kinds of root beers. They even have Fitz's, the world's greatest root beer, brewed in St. Louis. Be still my beating heart.

A mile down from Bishop Arts lies a section of Oak Cliff and possibly one of the scariest neighborhoods in Dallas. It's also home to a goldmine of a Salvation Army. It was there that I unearthed these vintage 1970's sunglasses, which are so big they make me look like a bug and eat  my face. I should also mention that I stood in the cashier line in front of two completely inebriated old men, one of whom peed himself. Good times.

Another genius thrifting find  this week was this completely fetching, sequined and bead encrusted nineties vest. With a golfer on it. I'll admit I wasn't going to buy it, but after tweeting a pic (you're following me on Twitter, aren't you?) was talked into purchasing it by ten Twitter friends. All of whom I will blame if I look redonk in it. Though for $2.70, how could I resist? Now I just have to figure out how to style this glamorous piece of fashion iconography.

Now it's your turn: What are some things that made you smile this week? Grab my button (created by Kate of Divergent Musings - HUGE THANKS to Kate!) and blog about your Sunday smiles; share your weekly smiles in the comments; or smile just because it makes you feels good.
 

While I'm smiling, here's what went down on Dress With Courage this week:

• I talked about the labels we wear on the inside; 
• Wondered whether, like Miranda Kerr, you're comfortable hanging around the house in your underwear;
• Embraced my inner diva and shared my "Oprah List"; 
• Continued by Thrifting 101 series with a trip down the fashion time line through the 1980's, in order to help date thrifted clothes;
• and answered questions regarding hair care for Fashion Beauty Friend Friday.

I'd also like to take a moment and welcome all my new followers.

I'm really, really happy you're here. As always, you make me smile too. If you're visiting my blog for the first time, please think about follow me through Google Friend Connect, tweeting with me on Twitter, or becoming a Facebook fan. 

Fashion Beauty Friend Friday: Hair care

This week, fashion Beauty Friend Friday is focused on hair care. I'm not much of a hair girl - I haven't had long hair since I was in middle school! - and I'm really intrigued to read what other bloggers have to say about the subject. We've talked about going the all-natural route when it comes to hair care, but we’ve never discussed our usual routines. So here goes…

The Friend Friday group by Modly Chic is a way for fashion bloggers to share more about themselves and join a friendly community of bloggers. Find out more about the group by checking out the Fashion Beauty Friend Friday Google Group. And don't forget to check out Modly Chic - it's such a great blog.

1.      How often do you get your hair cut?

I get a haircut approximately every five weeks, and even then it's just a trim to neaten things up. Despite being a pixie, my hair looks best when it's a bit grown out. I suppose it's a shaggy pixie.

2. Do you go to the same stylist each time, try someone new, go to the cheap hair cutting chains or live it up in a salon?

I go to the same stylist every time. I've been going to Toni and Guy for years, and though I believe every stylist there is probably great, I like to stay loyal to one hairdresser. She understands what I want and always gives me a consistently great haircut. And she's not too chatty. Nothing is worse than having to make small talk while getting a hair cut. I like that time to relax, read a magazine, and let my mind wander.

3. Do you color your hair? How often? What’s your natural color?

I do color my hair myself, over my bathroom sink every four weeks with good old Loreal Preference. I started going grey my senior year of high school and began coloring with henna. That was my gateway drug, which led to Nice and Easy and finally Loreal. I went through a brief phase when I had it colored professionally, but I just can't justify the $100+ expense when that money can go towards more worthy causes. Such as thrifting. My hair has been all colors - super dark brunette, white blond, strawberry blonde, burgundy and now a bright orangey red. I haven't seen my natural color in close to twenty years, but if I recall correctly it's brown with very faint red highlights. At this point, I suspect I'm approximately 80% grey. And I'm only 36. Le sigh.

4. The one thing you always do to keep your hair looking great is:

Not wash it every day! Red hair is really challenging to maintain - the colors fades easily and it can get pretty brassy. Washing it every other day helps maintain the color. It still fades faster than when I was a brunette, but I think it helps. I also occasionally use a color-depositing shampoo every now and then, but I'm not thrilled with the residue it leaves on my hair. I think it makes it look a little greasy - ick. I actually did a post about the care and feeding of a redhead here.

5. What hair trend do you love and wish you could rock?

I will probably always dream of having long hair, simply because I just don't have it and probably never will. In college I was friends with a girl who had long, stick straight, thick hair that cascaded down her back to her waist. I still lust over her hair. I daydream of ponytails and the pervasive "blogger bun."But I don't have the patience to grown my hair out. And being a mom to three doesn't really permit the time and energy required to maintain such a crowning glory.

Elle 's b-day ....

                                                                                               CLICK TO SEE MORE

               ♥  Jovana, ♥ Branislava, ♥ Anja, Nenad (journalist and stylist at Elle) , ♥ Marina, me and ♥ Jelena                        

                                                                       bloggers with Elle editor in chief Sonja Kovacs

    

                                                                             Boris Calic with his friend

                                                                                        ♥   Jovana

                                                                                       ♥    Marina

                                                                                              Ivan Radojcic

                                                                                             ♥   Anja

                                                                                      ♥    my gorgeous super stylish girls

                                                                                        ♥ Jelena

                                                                        Late coffee/wine/juice time ( after party ) :)

      You know that new song  from Beyonce : "Who run the world?" Girls, girls.... She probably had this in her mind ....

                                              And then, we got serious... :) Empty streets at night, city lights and us....

                                                                                           photos by Marina 

                                                                                    one of the best shoots that night ....

                                                                                           

                                                                                               by me

                                                                                               dress: software,
                                                                                               sandals: zara,
                                                                                               clutch: vintage,
                                                                                               bracelets and rings: non branded
                                                                                               photos by Marina
Wednesday night, reception at French Embassy, Elle's sixth b-day . Should i say something more? :) We had  great evening! Enjoy in photos!
Sreda veče, prijem u francuskoj ambasadi, rodjendan magazina Elle i naravno mi! :) Nakon toga još jedno "kafenisanje" i slikanje na praznim ulicama... Nadam se da će vam se dopasti! :)