Playing with the Camera: My Ring

[Ta da! The result of playing with my new camera this weekend. My ring was designed/made by the very talented Sarah Perlis.]

[For fun I cranked up the contrast in Photoshop to see how it'd look. Wild one, aren't I?
It looks totally unnatural, but was fun experimenting!]

I'm in learning mode with my new digital slr camera. The cat proved to be a difficult subject (Meomi! Stop moving!) so I decided to start off by taking some macro shots of my ring, which resulted in about an hour of fiddling with different settings and seeing what shots look like after cranking up the ISO really high, and a lot of "hmm I wonder what this button does?". I've also been dealing with shaky hands since I have no tripod, but here's the clearest shot I got while bending down in the shade with my dying vase of flowers and my lovely ring.

Ta da! If you are engaged/getting married/married/have a ring, did you take a picture of your ring?

Sarah Perlis - 25% Off

Had your eye on some of Sarah Perlis' work? Now's the time to buy it! She is offering 25% off online orders until February 15th if you enter the discount code 'love' at checkout.

If you've been following my blog, you probably already know I LOVE Sarah's work. This is a great deal, so take a look around her shop here.

Three Days in New York...

...and I have no pictures. I know, I cried too when I realized someone {cough cough} forgot to recharge the batteries. But I have lots of fun memories and will illustrate them with nice pictures from strangers that I will credit. Here is a sampling of what the Boy and I did (or rather ate) on our three day getaway:

Magnolia Bakery
Magnolia has opened up an uptown location since I left New York in 2006, and it's just as cute as the original in downtown. I had a vanilla cupcake a few hours after arriving and it was super yummy. It was a nice WELCOME BACK TO NEW YORK, MO! after waking up at 4 in the morning California time and snoozing on a plane for 5 hours. To be honest, I don't think Magnolia is the best cupcakery in town (I'm a sucker for Billy's,) but there's something a little exciting about fighting 50 other people on the day before Thanksgiving to grab the last batch of cupcakes. Gives me a nice fuzzy New York feeling inside.

[Photo of Magnolia Bakery by Rachel from Cupcakes Take the Cake]

BABBO
Oh Babbo. This was what we were looking forward to. I didn't understand 75% of the menu despite a year of Italian, but I gladly ate everything anyway. This is what we ate:

Coppa with Fiddleheads and Pecorino (I thought "fiddlehead" was an insult. Turns out it's a vegetable.)

Pappardelle with Chanterelles and Thyme (best course!!)

Duck Tortelli with "Sugo Finto" (sugo finto=fake sauce, course=really good but not as good as pappardelle)

Grilled Hanger Steak with Royal Trumpet Mushrooms and Cipolline Agrodolce

Coach Farm's Finest with Fennel Honey (this was cheese, by this point in the menu I was about to keel over from food coma)

A whole lotta dessert (YUM!)

[Photo of BABBO from New York Magazine]

26 Seats
This is where we had Thanksgiving dinner. Thank you 26 Seats for having pumpkin pie on the menu! I also had sea bass with that delicious French curry sauce that I can never seem to get enough of, and then once I do, I get sick because I've stuffed myself silly. I did, however, miss stuffing. Maybe it will make an appearance at Christmas dinner.

Saja Boutique
This was my indulgent Friday after Thanksgiving excursion sans the Boy. Friday morning was purely a Mo morning, complete with a trip to Teany, a little Fluevog window shopping, and *drum roll please* a WEDDING DRESS APPOINTMENT. Some may say I'm nuts since the Boy hasn't "officially" popped the question. But I hope most people just think I'm cute and a good planner. ;)

A while ago I saw these dresses on Style Me Pretty (a really helpful wedding blog,) and I knew I wanted to try them on if I went to New York. They fit the criteria: 1) most of them are made of chiffon, which for no apparent reason I decided would be the fabric of choice for my hypothetical wedding dress, 2) none of them are poufy, 3) they are all fashionably unique, and, 4) the most stand out reason of them all---almost all of them are under 1k, my made-up-on-a-whim dress budget. So I made an appointment at Saja, which was very easy and they were prompt to respond to my email.

When I got there for my 11 o'clock appointment, the dressing room was ready for me with the gowns lined up. The store is really, really cute and the dressing room had a pretty chandelier with a big mirror. I think I was a little spoiled because I was the only one in the store at the time, so I was able to walk around in the dresses without feeling self conscious. The sales associate was super friendly and acted as my girlfriend for the day since I was by my lone self.

And the best part was that all of the dresses were beautiful. I liked all five that I tried on, so I plan to go back and try them on again with a small audience (aka, my sisters.)

Sarah Perlis
This was the big appointment and highlight of our trip to New York. The one that I had anticipated for weeks--our engagement ring appointment with Sarah Perlis at her studio. Before the appointment I probably could have described every ring on her website. So, needless to say, I was a little more than excited. After the Boy asked what ring I would want some months ago, I decided that I wanted something made by Sarah because her work was beautiful, ethical, and completely unique.

First off, Sarah was completely adorable and had everything ready to go by the time we got there for our appointment. She had set out about ten rings for me to try on and "ooo" and "awe" over. It felt like I was trying on engagement rings with a friend and not a stranger!

After trying the rings on, I chose a design and then Sarah had lots of colorful gemstones to choose from for the middle stone. Emerald? Sapphire? Aquamarine? It was a lot of fun to put such pretty gemstones up to my hand to see what it might look like in ring form. I chose a stone, a form was filled out, and that was that. We had an engagement ring. Amazing.

The Boy kept quiet the entire appointment and let me have my fun. After our wedding-related appointments, I practically skipped to lunch at Luzzo's.

Now I'm back. At my desk. Sifting through images and filling in spreadsheets. Le sigh.

But I can't complain too much---it was a pretty fun three days across the country.

Sarah Perlis

[Three Bezel Ring; Pink Sapphire and Rosecut Diamond Ring; Oval Bezel Ring; all images and jewelry from Sarah Perlis]

The Boy and I are spending Thanksgiving in New York with my sis and her boy, and I already have a long list of things I would like to do. We are planning to go to Mario Batali's restaurant, Babbo...hit up Cafe Lalo, one of my favorite places to eat dessert...visit the Met and listen to the kid audio tours...and, drum roll please, check out some of the gorgeous rings by Sarah Perlis.

!!!!

Take note that I am not engaged, but they are still fun to look at and drool over while I pretend to do work. And they are going to be even more fun to look at in person!

Sarah Perlis is awesome because her jewelry uses recycled gold and rough uncut diamonds that are responsibly mined and resourced from a company in Sierra Leone that focuses on environmental responsibility and ethical working conditions. For more information about her awesomeness, read more about it here.