Birdcage Vintage Shop Update

The beautiful frames come courtesy of Grunhild

You might have noticed that I was MIA this past weekend. On Thursday, I made a quick dash to NYC for a casting with Target, and then on Friday, Erin (my sis) and I headed down to Laurel, Delaware to pass the weekend. We hit up thrift stores along the way (it's about two hours south of where my parents live), and did some more thrifting on Saturday.

On Saturday afternoon we shot about two hundred pictures or so of me in dresses and shirts that we had thrifted. The end goal is to put them in our new Etsy store that we are so excited about. It's so fun to have a hobby, and even better since I get to work with my sis who also happens to be my best friend.

By Sunday evening, when I had returned home, we had already made three sales! What beginner's luck! I have some more posting to do to the store, so keep checking back.

In other (related) news, Erin has devoted herself to all things digital scrapbooking. She's lucky enough to have the programs Fireworks and Photoshop Elements, which means she can play around with images and do some pretty cool things. She's already made our shop look a lot cooler by creating a new header and avatar. Check it out:



I'm just jealous because I don't have the software to do such things. (Does anyone else find it strange that Macs come loaded with movie editing software and music editing software, but not a true photo editing software? I mean, am I wrong in assuming that the photo editing software would be the most useful of the three?) Oh, and my Flickr Pro account expired today. Boo hoo.

XOXO,

I LOVE Zooey Deschanel!

And my best friend loves Joseph Gordon-Levitt.

Maybe she'll go see this with me when it comes out?



XOXO,

Sex, Lies, and Photoshop

Yesterday I had to email some photos to a printer in New York so that I can get 9"x 12" laser prints for my portfolio. The photos are from a test shoot I did a while ago (I wrote about it here and here), and I never printed them out because 1) I don't like them all that much (I really hate my expression in these!) and 2) I can't afford to spend my money on these things at the moment. But, I have a casting in the city tomorrow (yep, I'm road tripping up from Delaware and will be in the city for less than 24 hours), and my agent specifically asked me to get these pictures printed.

As I was going through the cd of pictures from the shoot, I was struck by how different I look in the originals and the retouched photos. I wish I knew a way to put the retouched photo over the original so that as you moved your mouse over the picture, it would toggle between the two.

As it is, you can see that there are some pretty major differences between the two. I'm obviously paler, with ivory skin, but also you can see that the bags under my eyes are gone, as well as stray hairs, veins, and my infamous (some people like it, others hate it) cleft chin.

The biggest difference in the second set of photos is that I have instantly lost ten pounds (or 4.5 Kilos). My left hip seems slimmer, and the right leg conveniently disappears into nothingness.




Of course by now many people in the blogging community know of the snafu that was Complex Magazine posting an unretouched picture of Kim Kardashian on their website. As soon as the gaffe was realized, the magazine pulled the picture and put the retouched one in its place. Judge for yourself how much work was done on her in Photoshop.



I'll leave it for you to decide how you feel about the retouching of celebrities and whether magazines should let readers know what they're doing.

This is a recent video from The New York Times that deals with this exact subject.



And, just for a bit of humor here, be sure to check out Photoshop Disasters, a website that posts pictures of some pretty awful photoshopping.

XOXO,

Am I the only one who hasn't seen this?

via Been Thinking About

I don't know why but these sorts of things always bring tears to my eyes. I love that song, too-- what a perfect choice for her to sing!


XOXO,

Make a Ring out of a Quarter

via Lucy's Tales from Home

How cool is this? Lucy's husband made it out of a 1962 quarter for her while they were still dating. He would sit outside his parent's house in his truck each night, hitting the edge with a spoon until it made the perfect shape. Afterwards he drilled a hole in the middle, polished it a bit, and voila! You can still read the writing inside. Another post by a different blogger tells of how their grandfather had made a quarter ring during WWII for his wife back home. He has since passed away, and that's the only ring her grandmother now wears.

How romantic!!!

Dear future husband, not that I'll imagine you'll read this, but if you do, I.Really.Want.One. (Here's another hint: pick a symbolic year. My dad was born in 1949 and my mom in 1952).

And fellas, at a loss to figure out what to give your sweetie for a present? If she's anything like me, she'll love this. Believe me. It's awesome!

How do you do it? The most important thing is you'll need a silver quarter to make one woman's ring. That means it needs to be made before 1964. They're not that hard to find-- you might just happen to have one in your pocket or change jar, or if you can't find one, try ebay. It doesn't need to be in good condition as you'll be hammering it anyway, so pay $1-2 and you'll have what you need.

I've found detailed instructions with pictures here. Have fun!


XOXO,


Edit: My friend, Matt, told me that you can get silver coins for current years as well, which is what he did when he wanted to make a necklace for his wife for their wedding anniversary. He procured a silver Ohio quarter (where they're both from) with the date of the year they married, and turned it into a necklace. For silver quarters in recent years, search online, on eBay, or talk to a coin dealer. I think they should run you about $20.00


Edit: My friend, Danny, ended up making a ring inspired by this post.  You can view it (and learn about his process) here: http://td2243.blogspot.com/2009/08/ring-2-part-2-ring-3-part-1.html

I Tweet, Therefore I Am

via Swiss Miss

I'm just tweeting to tell you I blogged. Guilty!

XOXO,

Easter Sunday on the Beach

In October of 2007, I headed to Dubai, United Arab Emirates for three months to try my hand at modeling over there. I had heard rumors that it was the land of plenty-- that they were putting up buildings at breakneck speed, and that models were needed for advertising. Moreover, Dubai was positioning itself to be the city of the future, what with the world's tallest building (the Burj Dubai), the first 7-star hotel (the Burj al Arab), and other modern "wonders of the world."

I did have a wonderful time, and was happy that I took the risk and went. Aside from the job opportunities that presented themselves (I worked a ton!), one of the best parts of that trip were the friends that I made. I joined a local church there, the United Christian Church of Dubai, where I was immediately welcomed by their large multinational congregation.

The United Arab Emirates is a Muslim country (located on the Arabian Peninsula, it is sandwiched between Saudi Arabia and Oman) and, as such, the practice of Christianity there is a bit, well, tenuous. Prior to visiting for the first time, I read that I would not be able to bring my Bible into the country. While this may be technically true (I'm not really sure), I didn't have any problem bringing my own in. There are some discernible differences between here and there-- namely, that instead of having churches in various locations, they're all located on one little track of land, which was bestowed as a gift from the Sheikh.

My experience there was that they (the Arabians) were fine with us (the non-Arabs) doing our Christian thing as long as we didn't try to bring it to them. Their policy seemed to be that as long as we kept it to ourselves, we could practice it.

That's why this is amazing and is probably the first time such a thing has been done in Dubai. The following video shows about 200 worshipers from UCCD (my former church) on the beach at Umm Suqueim taking part in the Easter Sunday Service.

The original video is posted here. Please note that the video seems to run in Explorer and Safari but not in Firefox.

XOXO,

The Model as Muse

Me at the age of 15 in front of my model collage. How many faces can you recognize?

I have always been obsessed with models. I can't remember when that infatuation started, but I think it had something to do with me being stopped by an agent (well, not a real one, but one who worked for John Casablancas) when I was twelve years old. The infatuation might also be related to the fact that I came of age during the era of the supermodel. Whatever the reason, I LOVED 'em. I wanted to hang out with them (you can't imagine how excited I was when I met my first supermodel, Niki Taylor, at the King of Prussia mall in 1998), papered my walls in pictures of them, and knew every possible fact about their lives. Sad, I know.

The Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City seems to share my fascination; The Model as Muse Exhibit opens to the public on May 6, with a costume gala hosted my Kate Moss; Justin Timberlake; and Editor-in-Chief of American Vogue, Anna Wintour. Color me excited.

In related and thrilling news, the much anticipated May cover for Vogue has been revealed. It features nine models on fold-out pages. The issue is being released in conjunction with the exhibit, and includes all things model inside.






Inside the issue we find the incomparable Natalia Vodianova playing dress up as some of the great models of the last hundred years:








I simply can't wait to get my hands on this issue!

XOXO,