Ah, Summer

This is what much of my summer looked like.

Five-year-olds can be sweet.

Mama with her birthday girl and baby friend

Slip and slide

Cousins

Bell peppers peeking out

Party Pizookie (our favorite was the Triple Chocolate)

Dodger seats at Universal Studios

Swim lessons class pic -- last day of class with instructor Thomas

Happy swim friends, with some of my favorite ladies and their kids

Expect some Fluevog love on my next post later this week. Till then,

xo, Gladys

Family Summer

A couple of weeks ago, my husband's brother visited us with two of his children (his wife and two youngest kids stayed home in Utah). It was a long, fun, and very hot weekend. A minor-league baseball game on "Star Wars night" plus fireworks during which I had to hold my hands over my poor son's ears. A trip to a plant nursery that, weirdly, featured a huge model train layout -- almost a whole town built by the collective crafty hands of a local model train club. A first-time visit to a small museum of impressive old fighter jets. Then a family barbecue and a trip to Universal Studios in Hollywood. This is what summertime is all about. This and ice cream.

xo, Gladys

Roses and Patent Flats in Turquoise

Dress: Tulle Clothing via ModCloth | Shoes: Fluevog Amie (Integrity family) ON SALE

I had lots of fun with this simple outfit. I wore it to my friend's daughter's birthday party. Longtime readers might recognize this very fun dress. It seems I wear it at least a few times every summer, but I also posted on it earlier this year for Easter. (Here are 2011 and 2012.) This time I paired it with my gorgeous new Fluevog flats -- the Amies in aqua I bought on sale -- which turned out to match beautifully. For some reason, the shoes photograph a lot more blue than they are in real life. I tried to fiddle with the colors in these photographs, but they're still not as green as they should be. The color is actually more turquoise than aqua, but it's captured pretty well in the Fluevog stock photo. (Btw, I asked my husband to include the hose in the pix because I thought it was funny how closely its color matched my shoes!)

And here I am with two of my favorite ladies, M and E, at the end of a hot summer day. The last time I posted a photo of the three of us together was late May, and what a difference two months of hot sun and regular exercise make -- we're a bit tanner and more toned! E has made the greatest strides in such little time. I only swim two to three times a week, but she exercises to Jillian Michaels videos almost everyday (which I don't have the discipline to do), and it shows. She looks adorable in her retro bathing suit! (I'd post a pic but I don't think she'd want me to. ;-))

xo, Gladys

A Busy Season

I'm so very late on posting these pix from our July 4 swim lesson + barbecue. It was such a fun day. We stayed out in the pool so long that my tan hit some sort of threshold so that I darkened at least three shades semi-permanently, and now who knows how long until it fades? Our friends stayed until the very last possible moment before they had to make their way to their families for dinner. The three of us -- husband, son, and I -- climbed up the small hill in our backyard and waited until dark to watch fireworks. Because it's a big fire hazard where we live, we aren't allowed to set off any in our neighborhood. We didn't get much of a show because all the fireworks were kind of far away, but it was a beautiful night. We eventually returned indoors, popped some poppers, and watched the awesome Macy's fireworks show in New York on the telly. My son certainly preferred that to waiting outside for random sparks.

Why the two-week hiatus? Well, I'm not quite sure -- maybe burned out from all the Fluevog excitement from June? But it has been a busy two weeks. The weekends were particularly packed. My husband took his ham radio test and passed with flying colors. I went with friends to a sing-along showing of the film Grease. I enrolled my son in kindergarten. In-laws stayed over for a couple of days. We visited both sides of our families. We went to Universal Studios. We've continued our summer swimming lessons here. I've been reading through several of the books waiting in my Kindle. And my hair is growing out wildly and is in serious need of another good haircut.

Also, somewhere in the middle of all that, my husband got into a car accident, and we're still dealing with the aftermath, insurance process, car rental, etc. No one was hurt, thank goodness, but we're going to need to get a new (used) car; we drive old cars so his was "totaled" -- i.e., it cost more to fix than to get a similar used car. We're sad to say goodbye to his car, and my husband is still a little shaken up from the experience. In almost twenty years of driving, he's never had a serious accident like this.

But it's nice to be back in this space. Summer really is flying by quickly this year, and I enjoy documenting it. It's hard to believe, but school starts for us in early August. That's less than three weeks away! Meanwhile, in the next couple of weeks, I'm hoping to finally be able to harvest some of the vegetables in our garden. It probably won't be as fruitful as last summer's haul, but it will be fun again to eat tomatoes and peppers the same day they're picked. I hope you're all having a great season, wherever you are in the world.

xo, Gladys

My Mom's New Kicks

Happy 4th of July to those who celebrate it!

So, I left you all hanging a little bit at the end of my last post. What was the second pair of shoes that Fluevog L.A. gifted to me and that I subsequently gave to my mother?

My mom in Fluevogs

The Hope | Promise oxfords in purple, still available for sale at the Fluevog website. I'm not sure why they were one of the free pairs, but I'm very glad they were. My mom texted the above photo to me the other night when she went to see Josh Groban in concert at the Hollywood Bowl with a few of her friends. Her verdict? The concert plus fireworks (celebrating the 4th of July a little early) were "fantastic," and the shoes were "very comfy." Glad to hear it, Mom!

This is what the shoes look like under indoor lighting. Not as pretty since you can't really tell they're dark purple. They look more like a reddish-brown here. Still very handsome shoes, though. You may have noticed that I have the same style in a different colorway (navy/cream). I can personally attest to their comfort. I took my pair to Seattle and enjoyed the heck out of wearing them. No break-in period. :-)

Finally, I would be remiss if I didn't let you know that the gorgeous burgundy/light pink colorway is currently on sale at Fluevog for 30% off. I'm surprised that these are on sale since the colorway seems pretty classic. (Previous colorways that went on sale were orange and a bright teal/blue. Definitely trendy colors.) You can see the burgundy in action here, when my friend M tried them on at the store late last summer. Gorgeous, I tell ya. You're lucky if you get them!

xo, Gladys

New Shoes + Fluevog Party on Melrose

Happy July! If it seems like Fluevog Central over here, I KNOW. June surprised me that way. Since my kid got out of school, my summer so far has consisted of 1) family vacation in Seattle, 2) swimming and potlucks with friends, and 3) Fluevogs. Throw in some extra hours of sleep, and it would be ideal. But I can live with it as-is. :-)

Integrity | Amie in aqua-green. Coffee | Arabica in black/turquoise.

As I previously posted, the Fluevog summer sale opened last Friday. I got an invite from the Los Angeles store to attend their sale preview event last Thursday evening, June 27, which turned out to be a party with sweet giveaways. The deal? The first 30+ people who purchased something (on sale or not) were eligible to pick out a pair of unworn vintage Fluevogs that were languishing in the back of the store for one reason or another. Usually, they were former floor/demo shoes that now showed a mismatch in color between the left and right shoe, which meant that they couldn't be sold. (You probably know it gets really sunny in Los Angeles, so the demo shoes get a little sun-faded.)

I got to the store a little late (it started at 5pm) because of traffic hazards on the freeways (grr, L.A. freeways). Luckily for me, however, my friends Jih-Fei and Francine had my back. Both had never tried on Fluevogs before, but they were game to join me at the party. Jih-Fei got there the earliest and stood in line*, so he was the 24th person in. I was number 37. When it came time, he traded numbers with me so that I could be one of the first 30 people. He said he didn't have a specific shoe in mind anyway and wanted me to get the vintage shoes. (So thank you, dearest JF! I owe you!)