Monthly Archives: June 2010

Bertrand Normand’s Ballerina



John worked late tonight, so it seemed like a good night to watch something in my netflix instant que that does not interest him.  I chose Bertrand Normand’s documentary film Ballerina. The film follows five Russian ballerinas from the prestigious Mariinsky Theater (Kirov Ballet). The five dancers are all at different stages in their careers and all uniquely different from one another.

I love this image, seen in the film






and here is a snippet from the film, my favorite part. Uliana Lopatkina rehearsing the dying swan in Swan Lake. Her silhouette in the light is amazing.




a DIY success!!!

Remember the amazing tulle garter i loved on etsy, but it cost $75? (now that its wedding season the price has sky rocketed to $89.00!!!!) The one which I questioned how easy it might be to recreate? Well…I have recreated it. Apologies to etsy seller Florriemitton, her garters are much more beautiful, but this is a bride on a budget and a crafty one at that, if I must say so myself.

So, here’s what I did. While out running errands today after work I found myself near a David’s Bridal, so I popped in to check to see if they had a simple garter that I could embellish upon. I found one I liked, and the price was right ($12.00). Next I jotted across the street to JoAnn fabrics and got one yard of tulle ($1.49)- i bought nylon tulle rather than silk, the quality is not as nice but its a fraction of the price and lets be honest, no one is closely inspecting this thing and you only wear it once.. and then I went to Michael’s craft store where I purchased a three pack of gold wishbone charms ($4.99).

the goods

The process was super simple. First I cut a strip of tulle about 2.5 – 3 inches, I turned the garter inside out and pinned the tulle in place, rouching as I went along. In an ideal world one would make the garter and the tulle lining at the same time so that they could be sewn flat before the elastic was inserted, but my way worked just fine. In order to avoid sewing the tulle to the interior elastic band or sewing it too tight when the garter was in its lax state; I put the garter around my thigh inside out and proceeded to sew it while wearing it. I started with a straight stitch (done by hand) toward the top of the garter, weaving between tulle layer and silk garter layer making sure to get enough of both to keep things in place. Next I removed the pins and did a second straight stitch line toward the bottom, just to be safe. You could stop here if you like, but i wanted a fuller look so I repeated these steps and added another layer of tulle. Lastly, I flipped it to right side out and added my good luck charm! I am so pleased with how it came out and it seriously cost me less than $20 and probably about a half hour of production time. If you wanted to be extra fancy you could stitch a 1″ silk ribbon (maybe something blue?) to the inside to line it, preventing the tulle from scratching your leg at all and finishing it off nicely..
Here are the results:

Bump, Bump, Bump it up!

When Naoma did a dry run on my wedding hair a few months back, she couldn’t quite get the bouffant as solid as she would have liked, so we jokingly suggested we try a “Bumpit”…but we kind of weren’t joking. So the other night I swung by Bed Bath & Beyond and bought a Bumpit set at like 8:00 at night….”um..will this be all for you mam’?” Slightly embarrassing as seen on TV purchase. But tonight i decided to give it a try. I just did a super quick, half-assed job to see if it worked and if it would stay in place etc. I think with Naoma’s skills it just might be what we need!

I think it should sit higher on my head for the look I want, but overall I think this bad boy will work. and if i feel like rockin’ the “snooki” on any given day, I just might, thank you very much!

Whiskeytown Lake

Last weekend our buddy Matt invited us to join him in birthday celebration. So a bunch of us headed up to Whiskeytown Lake, just outside of his home town of Redding, CA for some fun, sun and friends. It was a nice escape. We rented some boats, stayed out on the lake all day then camped the night. We shot some footage of the trip on our Kodak Zi8 which is basically Kodak’s version of the FLIP but it shoots a bigger frame size and allows for different frame rates. Either way its still a tiny little hand held camera, so some of the footage is a bit bouncy, all the same though I love re-living the memories through the little film John put together.