creatures

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Bus-ting Out The Plea-ts

Sorry for the unexpected blog break. I try to stay consistent, but sometimes life takes over. I absolutely had to clean my house. I mean had to. As in: set aside hours to get it holiday finished. Which is so mundane, but true. And then we went to the Rose Bowl Flea Market on Sunday (recap tomorrow). It was a busy and fun weekend. I hope you had a beautiful weekend and feel refreshed for this week! I know I do!

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Okay. I hope I am “busting out the pleats” and not “busting out of the pleats.” One word makes a huge difference.

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Thankfully this dress is very forgiving. In fact, I have decided this shall be my dress I wear any time I want to really make a meal out of a night.

Not on Thanksgiving. Surprisingly, I never really eat a lot on Thanksgiving. I like my turkey breast. Dry. Not dry, but devoid of gravy. A smidgen of mashed potatoes. Also devoid of gravy. And one roll.

That is it.

All that I eat on the biggest eating day of the year.

I was a very picky eater as a child and on this day of traditions I have never been able to break from the food rules I set in place as a three year old. I take traditions very seriously.

Oh. And one slice of chocolate pie. Hold the whipped cream.

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Maybe I am leaving out the bottle of wine.

It doesn’t count.

It’s liquid.

And my three year old self would not understand.

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So, this is my eating out for a nice dinner dress. I have never been an order a salad girl. I’ll take the baked potato, steak and the dessert please. And, no you may not have a bite. I didn’t wear this dress for nothin.

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The swing shape coupled with the pleats is as easy as it gets. I can see this dress looking good on a multitude of body types. You just have to embrace it for what it is.

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A swing dress.

It is supposed to swing.

Away from the body.

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I like the gold buttons on the back and the sleeves. It is a sweet little detail. I paired the dress with my Anthropologie Fanned Feather Necklace I purchased on Black Friday from Anthropologie during their sale (now sold out online, but similar earrings are still available).

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I really like black paired with brown and the gold on the necklace matches the gold on the buttons of the dress.

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I ordered my dress on Black Friday directly from the designer, Dear Creatures, for 40% off their price making it a fantastic price. Anthropologie also carries it and calls it Pleated Millie Dress. It is now sold out in black at Dear Creatures. However, I have seen it keep popping back at Anthropologie. I own it in baby blue, too, but it is just not as good. I definitely recommend the black version.

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I love this dress. As I have stated, the dress is forgiving.

I am not.

I am writing this in bed next to a snoring husband who fell asleep in the middle of the zombie movie we were watching together.

In the middle.

Of. a zombie. Movie.

In the middle.

Of. the. night.

He’ll be pleating for my forgiveness in the morning.

And you know what?

I might have room left in my heart. And in this dress… to give it to him.

Maybe.

In exchange for pie…

And I’m only craving humble.

P.S. Now closed: Please do not forget to enter My Giveaway. It ends at 9:00 p.m. PST tomorrow night. : ). Even if you do not enter, the comments have been making me happy cry all week. I love reading the comments. It has brought me indescribable amounts of joy this week. If you are feeling down or want to feel inspired, I recommend reading them. And thank you if you contributed to those comments this week. My heart overflows for you.

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I Hate Pigeons

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The blasted rats with wings.

“Coo. Coo. Coo.

“I hate you.”

It all started back when my daughter was three months old.

Rewind.

It all started when I was pregnant with my daughter and we moved into a rental home.

There was a rustling in the eves. I looked up. And a thousand pigeons stared down at me.

“Oh. Aren’t they cute?” I ignorantly thought.

I assumed anything would have been better than the apartment where we had been living. A girl I went to high school with lived in the same apartment complex. She had woken up the week before when a bullet went through the pillow next to her head. The neighbors upstairs had gotten into a little spat. No biggie.

It happens.

We moved the next week.

Into a different kind of nightmare.

A nightmare occupied and governed by a new beast.

A beast innocently called, “pigeon.”

There is nothing innocent about a pigeon.

Don’t let those children’s books, “Don’t let the pigeon drive the bus!” fool you. There should be a book entitled, “Don’t let the pigeons near us!” or something similar. Maybe a little darker. Maybe involving a certain pigeon and a bus with the kind of happy ending I could get behind. Anyway, I digress…

They were everywhere.

We could not clean up the droppings fast enough.

I gave birth to my daughter and rarely left the house for three months. This led me to conveniently ignore the pigeons. I thought they were an annoying nuissance. Nothing more. Certainly not a death trap.

Okay. Let’s fast forward. My daughter is three months old. It was raining. I went to lay her down in her crib for her nap and I felt a drop of water hit my hand. I looked up and the entire ceiling above her crib was swollen with water. It drooped low and menacingly above our heads.

I quickly ran and placed my daughter safely in her bassinet in our bedroom. Then I moved the crib towards the doorway, away from the bowing ceiling.

I then called my landlord.

“Hello. Yes, this is your tenants. The ceiling in our daughter’s room is completely filled with wa-.”

CRASH!

I ran into the room. The ceiling had caved in. The area where my daughter’s crib had been mere minutes before was now littered with broken plaster and jagged beams.

To say it was scary was an understatement.

It turns out that the delightful pigeons fiends that had roosted there had feces that could melt a roof. And they did. And it was.

And then the roof was fixed.

Here is the kicker: Apparently this was the third time this had happened! And they let me put my baby’s room there. And they never exterminated the house! And we moved two months later.

They do exist!

Now that I am aware of the detriments that these creatures can create, I am always watchful of a single pigeon. I will not let these tenants move in. Not for one day. Not for an hour.

The other day, I heard it. It was the sound from my nightmares.

“Coo!”

“Mom, is that an owl?”

“No, son. That’s a demon.”

I went outside. There it was, resting on my chimney. Taunting me.

Seriously, look at it looking at me.

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Why? Why do I spend all of my efforts on my thighs? If the pigeon was closer, I could have used my thigh’s awesome power and clapped it to smitherines. But no such luck. It was not getting near my trap.

Then I thought of it.

I scrambled to the pool area. I grabbed one of my kid’s high power water guns. I filled it with pool water.

And I took aim.

I fired.

It hit the side of the roof.

The pigeon was not phased.

I refilled my gun.

Missed again!

At this point, I was covered in water. I was wearing rain boots (photo shoot for a story). It was eighty degrees and sunny outside. I was screaming at the bird. I was giving the bird the bird. And I am sure my neighbors were cooing in their pants.

Refill. Shoot. Miss. Scream.

Repeat.

Finally the pigeon took pity on me. Or I had turned into a bigger monster than it.

It left.

I hope it did not leave to get back-up.

Oh well. I have a whole pool full of water and many more refills in me.

This war ain’t over.

“Coo! Coo! Coo!

I’ll get you.”

Has a war ever been won with water guns? I am afraid I am about to find out.

*I recognize the pictures are of a Dove and not a Pigeon. In my flurry of uncharacteristically fast movement I forgot to get a picture of THE Pigeon. If you squint, you can just pretend like I do. Of course, I don’t squint. I just drink wine. Cheers.