rockmount my world

sometimes i'm lucky enough to have experiences in my life that i'm not even sure of why i'm worthy. one such experience occurred last week while i was in denver.

i know you are all well aware of the fact that i grew up in the great southwest. it's a fact that while i was living there i did not appreciate nearly as much as i do now that i can look back on it in retrospect.

when i was growing up, all of the men in my family wore the western style snap front shirts that have recently made their way back up the fashion ladder. and even though i am not so much into the western style of dress, i've always had an appreciation for it because that is the way cowboys dressed up and expressed their sense of style, for which i'm all about.

my grandfather was dressed in such a manner when we laid him to rest and most of the other male guests were dressed in this style and i was wearing my finest cowboy boots that i had purchased specially for the occassion.

my point is that an appreciation for western wear is not lost on me even though i don't often put on my annie oakley gear any more.

oh yeah, back to denver...

i met the owner of rockmount western wear while i was in town and i was so surprised by how excited i was to have met him and to visit his old historic store in downtown denver. if you're not familiar with rockmount, it is the oldest western style shirt still in production and the first to be designed with the snap front detail. there is even an original in the smithsonian collection in washington d.c.

rockmount is in it's third generation, now being run by steve weil, who's grandfather started the company in the forties and just passed away last year at the age of 107. steve's father also passed away last year, leaving him at the reigns of the ever growing business and taking over the main design work as well. i was surprised to learn that a company this old is run so small and that steve is a very hands on person. if you email the company's website, you most likely will get a response from steve, directly. that is so cool!

and, as unassuming as steve is, i could tell that he was very excited about the celebrities that embrace their designs including bob dylan, eric clapton, the pretenders, mark chesnutt, heath ledger and jake gyllenhall (in brokeback mountain) and the white stripes.



so, if you are ever in denver, i highly recommend a visit to the historic rockmount western wear store. it's a store and museum all in one and very cool to boot (no pun intended)!
1626 wazee st 303.629.7777



and i can't forget to mention our dinner after visiting the store at tamayo. this is a modern mexican restaurant with a heavy spanish influence. when we talked about going there, someone mentioned that their portions were not very large. umm, not true! i thought that for a tapas style restaurant, they had really great portions and i couldn't even finish everything. i started with the halibut ceviche and then had an amazing chile relleno for dinner and it was more than enough. although, that could have been due to the fact that i had a ton of their yummy guacamole to start out with. you can find tamayo at 1409 larimer 720.946.1433

my closet and me

this is how my closet looked a month ago when i posted about it in this post.


i think i've regressed since then because everything seems to have worked it's way out of the closet!

do you remember a while back when i posted about the state of my closet? i said that if there was one thing i did not heart, it's my closet situation. i did not inherit any kind of martha stewarty organizational skills in my life at home even though i'm pretty organized at work. well, although i still haven't made much progress in my closet, i'm super excited about fall and i figure this is the best time to get the darn thing organized starting tonight. so here's the plan:

1. i'm going to go home and turn on some great new music by a fine frenzy. doesn't this album cover remind you of old jane birkin photos? i thought this choice was appropriate due to the frenzy that my clothes are in.



2. i'm going to go through all of my clothing and pull out anything i do not wear or love any longer to make room for new things that i do love.

3. i'm going to take everything out of my closet that is not directly related to getting dressed, like sheets and bedding. they can go in another closet.

4. i'm going to pull out the items that i have in other closets that could go in my clothing closet like my coats and jackets so i'll have everything together.

5. i'm going to make a list of any shelves, hooks, etc. that i will need to display my clothing and accessories so i can see them better.

6. i'll make a run to ikea for above items.

7. i'm going to pick out paint and wallpaper to go into the closet to make it pretty.

8. i'm giving myself one week to get it all put together so expect a report back from me by next weekend.

i'm so excited about fall and my new fall clothes and i really want to start out this new season as organized as possible. since this becomes a very busy time of year for me, i really want to start off on the right foot so i can manage my time better.


i still really really want it to look something like this.

what are some of your fall resolutions? is there anything you do to start off the "school year"?

i missed you pdx

hi everyone! after a whirl-wind tour of denver, i'm back home in my lovely portland. i must say, though, that denver was fabulous--the weather, the company, the food, the sights, the shopping...whew, i'm tired.

i apologize for such a short post but i wanted to keep my promise that i would be back today. however, it's tamale night tonight and lorenzo is hard at work so i want to get back to help him out (and eat some tamales). so here are two of my favorites from my trip to denver and i'll be back tomorrow with a little more.


the lights of larimer square downtown were so pretty. it was raining the night i took this so it's a little blurry but i still thought this looked cool.


we went to dinner at this great french restaurant called z cuisine. it was really cute, the food was great, the service was great and i had one of the best glasses of syrah i've ever had.


this was our server and hostess. they were the cutest, sweetest things. the hostess was very pregnant and wearing black chuck taylors. how cute is that!


this was the view into the kitchen from our table.


and this is what came out of the kitchen to our table. ooh la la! it was good. i loved the salade gourmande and the steak frites but really, everything was great.

so if you are in the denver area, check out z cuisiine. it was a really great experience and thank you brooke for taking us there. it's in the cute neighborhood lower highland (i think) at 2239 w 30th ave 303.477.1111

ciao for now

i'm heading to denver for a business trip and i won't have my computer with me so i can't post until i get back. but when i'm back, i'll share some photos of my denver adventures and get back to posting.

i'll miss you and see you back here on tuesday. have a great weekend!

paris in portland?

several years ago, i was going through a phase, you know--that phase. the one where you question everything in your life and wonder why you are who you are, why you work this job or that one and not the really fabulous one that you think you should be working. or why can't you be more intelligent, beautiful, successful and all of those other self-doubts that we are so good at focusing on rather than the fact that maybe your life is really just where you might want it to be.

i had been preparing for my upcoming trip to france and italy. i had been studying both languages religiously because i didn't possibly want to be seen as an ignorant american traveler. i had researched exactly where i wanted to go and whom and what i wanted to see. i quit my job, the one i had found after i graduated from interior design school and was a perfect fit for me. i just wasn't ready to accept that this may be it, that at 34 years old, i had reached my biggest goal so far and it just simply wasn't enough. so i had set other, bigger goals like becoming fluent in five languages. no, one other language wouldn't be enough i needed to know FIVE. now i look back and think how silly (not to mention exhausting with all of that conjugating).

i fell in love with florence and venice and in retrospect, should have stayed longer in florence rather than heading on to lucca. lucca was a small town and while it was a great place to learn italian because not many people spoke english, i never felt connected with it. perhaps that is because my first night there, i got lost and it started to rain and get dark and no one would help me until after several hours, i met a nice man who spoke english that helped me find my host family. so i completed my program there and took the first train out to nice early the next morning.

when i arrived in france, i felt like a weight had been lifted. i don't know why but i felt an immediate connection with france and was happy the minute i walked off the train. i stayed in nice a few days and went on some really great day trips from there before heading north to paris. on the train to paris, i met a girl named sophie who was a little younger than i and lived in avignon and commuted to paris every monday morning where she would stay the week and then head back to avignon for the weekend to be with her boyfriend and family. sophie was very sweet to me even though my being in the wrong train seat caused her laptop to get coffee spilled on it in all of the commotion (i swear i was in the right seat, the crazy car number was wrong). sophie and i hit it off and she really helped me out when i arrived to paris with no clue where to go (thank you sophie, wherever you are). i got off the train in montparnasse in the rain and instantly knew that i was in love with paris.


one of my first views was this one from the top of montmartre (photo by landscape photo)

my time in paris was amazing, i loved everything about it (except that i was alone and couldn't share it with anyone) but after a few days, i headed to brittany to visit a friend. i remember like it was yesterday, sitting on that train and asking god to help me find a way to stay in france because the one place i thought i would rather be than portland was paris. and you know what, be careful what you ask for! i found myself being invited to stay in france indefinitely (granted it was not paris) and when faced with the choice to leave portland, i couldn't do it. it's not easy to leave a place you know and love, not to mention the language barrier which in spite of my studies, i was far from being fluent. i felt like an idiot and cursed myself for not taking french more seriously all of those years i studied it in school. so when i was scheduled to leave france, i happily boarded that plane to come home, to mount hood and portland and my old job that had hired me back freelance for a temporary job.



and this is when i knew i truly did love portland. but i still think of paris, a lot. and some day i will go back but for now, i find my own little piece of paris all over portland. and sometimes my life is just like one of those french films i love to watch. and you know what? now i have some one to take to paris with me, and i found him right here in portland. xoxo lorenzo. and i still can't speak five languages but i'm ok with that!

these are some of my frenchie portland favorites.


southpark
you already know how much time i spend here.


cinema 21 (photo by zazzle)
i watch a lot of french films at this theatre and guess what, now they serve beer and wine. yippee! i loved this photo of the marquee featuring "ballet russes". i thought it was appropriate since picasso and jean cockteau both worked with the ballet russes.


you can't get more quintessentially portland and paris than down the street from cinema 21 at le happy. i mean this is a creperie that has a special that includes a pabst blue ribbon. how portland is that!


then i can cruise back over to the eastside for some chicken liver mousse at bar avignon...


...followed by some fab macarons at pix on division.
photo by cake and commerce


photo by m portland real estate



there is also a true french crepe cart right down the street from my house. this is a much shorter trip than going all the way to montmartre.

and this blog and book series transport me back to paris wherever i happen to be.


after i returned to portland, i found the website, french-word-a-day that not only helps me with my studies but features amazing photos of france.


i also found the aimee leduc series by cara black which features a different paris quarter in each installment. it literally walks you through the different paris neighborhoods while solving a murder.

is there any place you love to visit? what are the places you have found in portland that remind you of this place? i would love to hear about some of your escapes.

covet love

i'm so excited today to tell you about two events in one going on tomorrow evening over at the lovely little boutique covet. covet is holding a fashion's night out in the store where you will receive 10% off all of your purchases and get to hear some really great music. if you have not yet visited this tiny gem of a boutique, this is the perfect opportunity.
covet is located at 429 sw 10th ave.


stop in early and say hello to the beautiful owners athena and ray before ray begins playing at 8:00pm.
(photo by covet)



if you have never heard redray frazier play, you are in for a wonderful surprise. i think of ray as portland's own lenny kravitz but the lenny from the "let love rule" days. ray has such a beautiful and soulful voice and sounds amazing whether playing with a full band or on his own playing an acoustic set. and i must admit, he's very nice to look at well!

so head over and do some shopping and listen to some great music as well.

a swift heart

so we made it through labor day weekend and the summer is drawing to a close. it's amazing how once the long holiday weekend is over the air feels different. i was at the court block party last night and everyone was commenting on how fast the summer has gone by and that they can tell fall is in the air. even the trees are starting to change color. i had to drive to salem early this morning and it was very cool and foggy. yes, it is the end of portland's short summer.

as you know, though, i look forward to fall. it really is my favorite season. here fall is nice because it still isn't raining everyday, we still have a little sunshine and our beautiful greens turn reds, golds and oranges. besides, we have something very special in portland during the fall--our very own version of hitchcock's "the birds" going on over at chapman elementary school.



fortunately, though, our version of "the birds" is much safer as our birds are not ruthless killers but tiny vaux swifts.

over the years, vaux swift would stop off in and around portland on their migration down south to south america. however, with logging and urban growth, they were losing places to stay and somehow found and adopted the chimney at the chapman school as their place of refuge here before continuing their journey south.

since 1994, approximately 30,000 swifts spend the night in the schools chimney where they can feast on small bugs to store up to continue on their trip. when they first started staying at the school, teachers and students would dress warmly in the fall so the school would not start the furnace until the last swift flew out of the chimney for the day. now the school is heated by gas so the swifts don't have to worry about furnaces anymore. basically, the chimney is still there just for the birds.



so evenings throughout the month of september, people gather at the school to watch the swift's performance at sundown. you will see birdwatchers with their binoculars, families with their children and picnic diners with their champagne.

you will see a few swifts at first begin to circle around the chimney. each rotation gathers more and then more swifts and almost magically, the moment the sun sets they all dip into the chimney like bees to a hive.

it is truly a memorable scene so if you haven't ever made it over to see this performance, you have the month of september to check it out. for more information, go to the audubon society's swift watch.
the chapman school is at 1445 nw 26th and guess what their mascot is now? you got it, the swift!

(photo by mike houck)

swedish love

have you tried the restaurant broder over on se clinton yet? the other night my friend suggested it and i've been meaning to get over there so i was excited about checking out a new restaurant.

while they have been open now for about three years they have mostly become known for breakfast and just recently begun serving dinner.


we were not sure what to start our with so the server suggested the surf board which is three different cured fish one being the swedish national dish of pickled herring.


we also started out with this asparagus and tomato salad that was so beautiful we hesitated to take it apart. i'm glad we did, though, yum.

after our starters, we shared a burger that was really rich and delicious. the cheese they used was a chevre and i thought that was a nice touch for a burger. the burger had a lot of flavor and was sooo juicy. i just love a good burger!

the service was really great and they were very sweet to lulu and made sure that she was taken care of as well.


broder occupies the space of the old henry's cafe which i have always loved. if i had my own restaurant, this is the type of space i want, long and narrow. it kind of reminds me of the restaurants in new york that are located on the ground floor of old brownstones.

i have always admired swedish interiors for their beautiful simplicity and this was true for broder as well. i loved the simple decor with the pale blue accents and the sparkling white lights.


ok, i know this is weird but i had to take a picture of the bathroom entry because it was just so simple and pretty. i absolutely love the blue the white and the black accents.

broder is located at 2508 se clinton 503.736.3333

i'm looking forward to trying breakfast over there next.

get chucked

fugitives and refugees

if you either live in or are planning a visit to portland, i highly recommend this unconventional travel guide via chuck palahniuk, the author of fight club. as you may know, chuck has lived in portland off and on for many years and here he lists some of his favorite locales. i read this book a few years back and really enjoyed his very unique insight into my fair city and he made several suggestions for places that i had never been. i have visited some of the places, like the crematorium in sellwood as well as the "bins" (our nickname for the big goodwill over near milwaukie) but there are oh so many more destinations i need to get out to see. check (or chuck) it out!

portland hearts its dogs

or at least some portlanders do. here is an interesting article my friend emailed me about dogs in the grocery stores here in portland. read it and tell me what you think? do you think we should allow dogs in places like grocery stores and restaurants?

well you all know how much i love my lulu but i realize that there are just certain places that she cannot go and i have never tried to sneak her in. most places here do allow you to bring your pets in to their stores but i always ask if it is ok and never assume. i think it should be a common courtesy to respect people's businesses. and, if your dog has certain personality issues that they perhaps do not do so well in public or stressful situations, maybe it's best not to push them. pets do have a sensitive side that we all need to be aware of and can easily feel threatened.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/03/us/03dogs.html?_r=1&th&emc=th

because if you're not careful with dogs in the grocery store, something like this may happen!

heartsy walk

yesterday lulu and i went for a walk throughout the neighborhood and came across some interesting "art". you know how i love to find these random artsy objects around town and so in honor of today being first thursday, our local gallery day, i thought it would be fun to share some with you.

i hope to see you out in the pearl tonight for first thursday. i'm excited about the opening ceremony/pendleton fashion show.


this is an interesting home-made no parking sign.


there are critters "walking" along the backside of the stump.


ooh, a little pink polka dotted beetle.


there is a little village on top of the stump. i wouldn't park here in appreciation of their creative solution to keep people from parking in front of their house.


look at this funky entrance to a backyard off of the alley.


you are greeted by a lovely person typing. hey, where are your feet?


and another great backyard fence across the alley that someone decorated. isn't that orange garage great?


i love the coral color of these flowers.

happy artsy thursday!

love the lover

tonight i rented one of my favorite movies from videorama, "the lover". i haven't seen this movie in years and can't wait to watch it. i remember the first time i watched it and i was so stunned by the risque content and the beautiful images. i think this was one of the first "artsy" films that i had ever seen. i had just finished college and this was out in the art house theatres the same year. the images this movie imprinted in my mind still make me want to travel to vietnam some day.


remember how grown up she was for a fifteen year old? i absolutely loved this outfit she put together with the slip, the hat and the high heels (not to mention the red lips). i certainy never dressed like that at fifteen!

and how amazing marguerite duras' life must have been? i just can't imagine how so many great works came out of one human being. a few years ago a friend gave me a book called "writer's houses" and it featured marguerite's house. she lived in it for many years and never changed a thing. it was so beautiful.

marguerite duras


jeanne moreau as marguerite

have you ever seen the movie "cet amour la"? it is the story of marguerite later in life when she took on her much younger companion and he spent many years with her up until her death. it was a very good movie and gave you a lot of insight into her life and struggles. jeanne moreau played marguerite and who better to play her? even though i have seen many pictures of marguerite, i always remember her looking like the beautiful jeanne!


sometimes i feel like this when i think about really working on that book i've been writing very, very slowly for the past four years!

my heart will go ahn

priscilla ahn

lately i'm loving the music of priscilla ahn, she is just what i love to come home to after a days work--pour a glass of wine put on some relaxing music and reconnect with my home and family after being away all day. isn't it funny how there is always music out there that complements the mood you are currently in? i don't want to sound like an old lady but anymore i just want to be calm and peaceful and relax in the evenings. my life has been and always will be somewhat busy but at least now i feel like i can enjoy just where i am and the soundtrack of my life will always play a big part.

what are you listening to these days and what is it that you like to do to unwind after a days work? i'd love to know!

pink heartini

so i went to the pink martini show friday night at the oregon state fair and had a really great time. thomas lauderdale did an amazing job composing a recreation of oregon oregon!, a musical created to celebrate oregon's 100th anniversary. china forbes and our former governor, barbara roberts came out for the closing number and it brought a little tear to my eye thinking about how much i love oregon and the people here. i was really happy that my friend and i were able to be there for the show.

then after the oregon musical, pink martini came out for a set and played many of my favorite numbers including "hey eugene". i love this song because you see a completely different side of china. they also played one song off of their new album that drops on october 3rd, "splendor in the grass". i can't wait for the new album and you know i'll be at music millenium to pick up my copy.


china looked fab as always in her flowing tiger print dress. i tried to take some better pictures but my little camera just doesn't do so well at night. maybe for my birthday i could get a new camera? hint hint!


i thought it was sweet during the finale when china sat down with thomas as he played the piano with the military band. it really shows how close they are as friends and colleagues.