TBMD

I'm probably the only person left on earth who doesn't own an iPod, hahaha. But that's changed since I won an iPod shuffle (which I like to refer to as the iShuffle :P) from my company. I was 1 of 25 chosen from a random drawing for referring candidates to jobs :O That's a double bonus because I've never won anything in my life!

I wasn't too thrilled about the silver because it's so... neutral. That's probably the reason why they were chosen :) I thought about exchanging it at the Apple store, but there wasn't a color I really wanted and who knows if I can even exchange without a receipt. So, I kept my silver iShuffle. Is it crazy that it took me 15 minutes to open and take it out?! For such a small box and deceptively simple design, there were a ton of tape keeping it in place.
Next up was moving songs onto my iShuffle. I can readily admit I felt like such a dino and needed to read the instruction manual to figure out how to use the thing and sync it up with iTunes :P So after fiddling around with iTunes for half an hour, I finally was able to import about 50 songs in. And voila, I could hear music! Hooray! I guess I'm just not really a music person, but I found the whole setting up your playlist, organizing songs, etc. to be such a chore. It's definitely an easy-to-use product once you figure out how to work it. That's not much of a surprise because it is an Apple product after all! One gripe I will mention is that the control on the earbud is situated too high for me. I wish there's a way to move it lower. I suppose it's something I'll get used to, so no biggie.

I actually first saw these Burberry rainboots last spring, but they sold out so quickly that I had no time to contemplate whether I should make the splurge or not. I guess they sold so well that to my delight, Burberry decided to re-release them again this spring! In the year since though, Hunters exploded onto the scene (at least to me :P), so now I had a dilemma... Hunters or Burberrys?! Hunters were cheaper, taller in height, and according to a lot of people, the true rainboots maker. Burberry had the pattern that I love -- it doesn't scream Burberry like their famous plaid pattern, but subtle enough for my liking.

I figured I will go to the stores and try them both on, walk around, and see which one looks better on me. Just as when I made up my mind though, I saw Bloomingdale's online shoe promotion for these Burberrys at $50 off! So I ended up buying both the Burberrys and Hunters because I knew no matter how much I love the Burberrys, I needed to give Hunters a shot or I will always wonder about the what if.

Kudos to Bloomingdale's fast shipping because both boots came within a week, even in the midst of the east coast snowstorm :) To my surprise, both boots fit my calves just fine. I had read that the circumference at the opening is ~15" which was a bit tight for people with larger calves. I always thought I had large calves according to one of my roomates in college -_- so I was a little worried about this. The Hunters were taller in height, so they were actually quite a bit harder to pull on and off. I literally had to sit down and tug them off, whereas the Burberrys slipped right in and out (of course I was wearing skinny jeans). I did, and still do, like the height of the Hunters, but the Burberrys were just so easy to wear and so light that they were the ones I decided to keep :)

One thing I have to mention after wearing these around for practically all of last week, the boots are more sheer than I thought. I like to wear funky patterend knee-high (wellie) socks from J.Crew underneath my jeans, and for the ones that are bright (ie: hot pink toes), they show through the boots! It's not a deal breaker, I suppose, but enough that I'd want to warn people about. I will just be more conscious of selecting my darker socks to wear with these boots :P Ok, enough rambling and onto pictures!
Buy them right now at Burberry.com!

*Stock image courtesy of bloomingdale's

Rebecca Minkoff's Black Basketweave Morning After Mini (MAM) bag was my true first "designer" bag. Up until then, I had been carrying around a brown nylon agnes b tote and decided I want a black bag because brown just doesn't go that well with everything ;)

I saw so many leather all black bags but always felt they were on the plain side. That is, until I stumbled across a picture of Lindsay Lohan with her Rebecca Minkoff BBW Morning After bag :O The basketweave detailing just adds that extra sumthin' that had been missing in my search. The bright blue zipper track sure does add a pop of color as well. As with most cases, by the time I find something I truly liked, they are no longer in production :(

But no worries, my scouring finally paid off when I finally found one on eBay a couple weeks later in the MAM size. I'm pretty petite and based on the dimensions, felt the MA was bigger than what I'd like, so I was glad I got my hands on the smaller version. I believe this is a recut of the original (as Rebecca Minkoff often does special orders) because the blue zipper track isn't as bright as the original. I was a bit disappointed, but it's something I can live with :) Just look at the gorgeous pebbled leather and the tassels! (I heart tassles if you couldn't tell already :P)

*Lindsay Lohan image courtesy of The Purse Forum

My Balenciaga City bag in galet, from the 2009 F/W main collection is my current love :P (This season's sold here) The city is probably the most recognizable style from Balenciaga and hardly ever goes on sale. It's the perfect size for everyday and for work. The best part about Bal's motorcycle line is the wide range of colors released every season. The timing of galet couldn't have been more perfect as I'm finally realizing that grey is the perfect neutral. I will admit that the previous season's argent caught my eye, but it was a tad too light and I was afraid of denim transfers.

It's hard to judge the size of bags based on online measurements, so I took a trip down to my local Neiman Marcus and was surprised at how small the city was. Now that I think about it though, they definitely stuffed their bags to the max, so that probably contributed to the diminishing size. Nevertheless, when the galet color popped up in the city, I snatched it up so quickly and didn't have time to second guess myself on the size. I figured I don't carry that much normally anyway and so many people deem it the perfect size, it should work for me, right? Yeah yeah, that's a huge leap of faith I took for so much money :D

When it arrived though, I instantly fell in love with the leather -- how soft and silky it felt to the touch, the color -- a true medium grey, and best of all, the size -- perfect just like everyone said :P Some pictures right out of the box:

*Stock image courtesy of Luxe Voute