On this Monday, I would encourage you all to start doing what you love so you can start loving what you do.

Sometimes all you need to know is that someone will catch you if you decide to take that leap. I truly believe that you can’t feel fulfilled in life if you are unhappy with how you occupy your time. What gets you going in the morning? Think about the things that excite you. Start thinking about feasible ways to make a living from it.

Don’t think that it can’t be done. Everywhere there are real life examples of people who have made it work for them. Define your own personal level of success and then figure out how to bring more joy to your life.

Go for it. Do what feels right. It always works out in the end. Don’t sleepwalk through life. I try to live by these ideas.

Some background information on this photo: Shot in 1937 for a Dutch Magazine on the Seaside Life.  More historic photos can be found here.

♥ the alchemist

Okay, I have a quick confession to make. I’ve never seen the complete version of the movie Stand By Me. I thought I had because I know what the movie is about. I can recall watching it a couple of times and seeing enough of it to have been convinced for all these years that I saw the whole movie. I just assumed I couldn’t remember all of it because it had been forever since I’d seen it.

However, this past weekend the boy and I went to a midnight movie screening of Stand By Me in the Lower East Side. It was then during the film that I realized that the main reason I couldn’t remember all of it is because basically I hadn’t seen the whole movie. Granted, it was only a few scenes that I couldn’t remember. Oh well, that didn’t stop me from being inspired by the costumes and settings.

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How is it that I still don’t have any jewelry from Digby & Iona???

I first wrote about them back in 2007 because of this awesome stag ring.

I still covet it.

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Hello!

This Monday is a little damp and dreary. Perusing the interwebs I found the perfect dress to beat those Monday blues. If I Only Had a Heart dress by Alexandra Grecco on Etsy.

♥ the alchemist

It’s Friday, y’all. It’s GIF Party time!

For those who don’t know what that means, it’s where a bunch of moving images come together in one spot for both yours and mine entertainment.

I found myself in plenty of eye-rolling situations this past week.

1) Listen, stranger on the train, I really don’t want to hear you discuss your latest sexual conquest with your friend. Can’t you see that I’m trying to be intellectual over here reading my book? I don’t care that you finally got some last night and what exactly you did to her.

This is the face I made when I realized what was being talked about. I quickly turned on my iPod to drown out the noise. Unfortunately, I couldn’t drown out the ick factor for at least five mins though.

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Well, well, it’s been a long time since I’ve made one of these lists.

That’s not to say that I haven’t been swooning over anything, I just haven’t been documenting it here.

So without further ado, here’s a quick list of what’s been making me weak at the knees.

♥ Old episodes of Jacques Pepin & Julia Child’s Cooking At Home Show on public access television. Okay, okay. Laugh all you want but I watched it one night after a long day and really enjoyed watching the cooking antics of these old kooks. They hardly agreed on anything but it was kind of cute and charming. Julia with her distinctive, warbly voice and Jacques with his thick French accent, sometimes I didn’t know what the hell they were talking about but it was fun nevertheless.

♥ RuPaul’s Drag Race Season 2. Good Lord, drama, drag queens, lipsynching, it’s a television extravaganza. I’m hooked. Fierce, fierce and then some more fierceness. “The time has come for you to lipsynch for your life.” – is one of my new catchphrases.

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Karen of Where Did U Get That blog is a girl after my own fashion heart. Long, flowing dresses with tough accessories, sequins, sequins and more sequins. Plus, her footwear collection is on point. I’m really loving her style.

♥ the alchemist

I love that design houses are releasing little videos to accompany their latest collections. Making a visual 3-5min representation of your work is an added bonus that just watching models saunter down catwalks wearing the clothes.

One of the first mini-videos I ever fell in love with was Erin Fetherston’s Wendybird directed by acclaimed Ellen Von Unwerth. Here is Vanessa Bruno’s Printemps 2010 collection starring Lou Doillon.

vanessa bruno- printemps été 2010 from maggieontherocks on Vimeo.

♥ the alchemist

Hello lovelies!

For the most of us, this is the start of the work week. Even though, I don’t have to participate in the morning commute aka the rat race to work sometimes even I still need a little reinforcement for dealing with Monday morning.

Imagine if you had this view of the sunrise every morning!

photo by: Muse

♥ the alchemist

I have a thing about jewelry, especially rings. Bigger=Better. Bolder=Better. Except for a few keepsake rings I have, the majority of my rings are either huge, cocktail, vintage or a combination of all.

This is why I have a thing for these wooden rings from I Am Dorkas. Yes, wooden! Plus, they have a sculptural beauty to them that I really love.

Look at how gorgeous the Riptide ring is. Good thing it can be resized because I’m seriously thinking that I might need this in my jewelry life :

Or the aptly named, Lights Out, which really packs a punch.

The Time Stamp ring is a hand-hammered brass two-finger beauty:

Designer Mariana Dorkas Jamadi has made this business a family affair working with both her mother and her beau to create stunning jewelry and lovely textiles. I’m looking forward to seeing what else they churn out.

♥ the alchemist

For anyone who isn’t in the NY city area, you may not know about the ridiculously lovely weather we’ve been experiencing lately. People have been walking around practically in a daze, stunned by the warmth of the sun and the thought of not having to wear five layers in order to keep warm. I think we say this every year, that the winter was the worst we had but this year takes the cake. I mean we’ve experienced about three blizzards! The latest one happened on me and the boy’s date night and we went out into the slushy abyss anyway in defiance of the weather gods.

So, we’ve been granted a reprieve and the warm weather has been wonderful. I can’t help but think about all the things that I want to do, all the spring clothes I want to wear. The lace dresses, shorts, sandals. I want to dig my bare feet into the grass and smell the lush aroma of cherry blossoms. It’s no surprise that I have been collecting a few photos. With the threat of rain looming for the next several days, I’m gonna use these images to keep me warm and inspired.

♥ the alchemist