Monthly Archive for June, 2010

Sneak Preview

Published on June 28, 2010 in Ensemble and Morphed. 5 Comments Tags: , .

Yesterday was a dream come true for me.  The hubby and I spent the whole day playing dress up and running around the island taking photos with our favorite photographer, Christie Pham.  It was her idea to do a one-year anniversary photo shoot and since we always have so much fun with her and her husband, Matt, we jumped at the opportunity to hang out.  We invited some friends and the 6 of us bounced around the island posing and doing frantic wardrobe changes in our cars. It was amazing!

I can’t wait to see Christie’s photos.  She is so talented, I know they will be wonderful (hopefully in spite of the post-wedding weight gain for the hubs and I). She will be processing the photos in the next few weeks, but I wanted to show a little sneak preview in the meantime.  All of the photos below were taken on my husband’s new iPhone 4. (We have some funny videos as well).  BTW, the iPhone 4 is brilliant!

The top photo was taken on my poor iPhone 3GS with an app called “Shake It”. Christie told us about it and it’s great.  The app simulates an old polaroid camera complete with the sound effects and wait time.  The photo itself is of my little sewing area right on the coffee table.  I was rushing to finish altering some of the outfits for the photo shoot right before we met.  Glad I woke up at 6am on Sunday to get them done!

Here I am trying to blend into the wall.  We were waiting for the actual shoot to take place – our friends were on the other side of the building, thankfully in nice contrasting colors.  But, I am already thinking of outfits that will work here for future blog posts.

I was extremely excited to finally wear some of the vintage items that I inherited from the hubby’s grandmother.  Among those was this polka dot, silk top (one of the alteration pieces from the morning) and the amazing mink fur coat.

I’ll save the ensemble details for later.

Ole smoke stack stop

Published on June 25, 2010 in Ensemble and Random Thoughts. 1 Comment

After rambling around the west side, the hubby, sister and I decided to stop to take photos of the old sugar mill smoke stack in Waipahu.  The harrowingly tall and majestic smoke stack is all that remains of the once-largest sugar mill on the island of Oahu.  It sits at the back of a dead-end road, in the middle of a barren field, adjacent to what is presently a YMCA.  Children were jumping into the pool and blasting modern pop hits from the radio completely unaware of the history that stood forgotten right behind them.

photo: the.honoluluadvertiser.com
Oahu Sugar Co. built the mill and smoke stack in 1898.  For almost 100 years, it operated and produced a large portion of all sugar that came from Oahu.  In it’s heyday, the mill served as the most important industry and epicenter of life in the small town.  In 1995, due to the decrease of sugar production in Hawaii, the mill closed it’s doors.

romper – morphed from a discount store
belt – Target
maryjanes – Creative Recreation
sunglasses – thrifted
necklace – handmade by me
earrings – kenneth cole

Heading out to the Highway… Inn that is

Published on June 23, 2010 in Personal and Random Thoughts. 1 Comment Tags: .

I’ve never done a food post before, but this one is special. We took my dad out to a little hole in the wall called Highway Inn for Father’s Day and ate the most scrumptious Hawaiian food. The restaurant was opened in 1947 by a local couple and their family carried on the tradition of cooking and serving great meals to their customers for 3 generations.

Recently, this little gem was featured on the Food Networks’ Diners Drive-ins and Dives and it’s popularity increased.  Happily we were seated as soon as we entered the restaurant and beat the lunch rush.

The seafood and poke counter.  Poke – chunks of fresh raw fish and other types of seafood are tossed together with onions, scallions, sesame seed oil, sea salt and soy sauce.

We chose the ahi with onion, limu (seaweed) and soy sauce.

Kalua pig plate: shredded smoked pig, lomi salmon, pipikaula, rice and haupia.  Heaven!

Creatures of the (not so) deep

Published on June 21, 2010 in Ensemble and Personal. 1 Comment

I had the very fun opportunity to spend some time in the water recently by participating in the Reef and Ray Adventure at the Ihilani Resort and Spa on Oahu. The best thing was that I got to take a bunch of kids and their mentors from work to also experience the adventure with me.  It’s a great program and definitely something that everyone should check out if they are ever in the mood for some sea-worthy fun!

I was mostly there to take photos of the group, so I tried to stay as dry as possible. I wasn’t about to handle the animals with my camera, but everyone else had a great time feeling the sometimes slimy, often pokey and always interesting creatures. Above are different types of sea stars, cucumbers, urchins and shells.

We fed fresh fish heads to this majestic hammerhead shark from behind a rock partition.

This spotted eagle ray is one of the most incredible living creatures.  They have almost canine-like qualities including a cuddly snout.

beach cover up – hand me down Green Dragon
sunglasses, coach purse – vintage
beach ballet flats – Crocs
earrings – Kenneth Cole

Strum the strings of my heart

Published on June 17, 2010 in Ensemble. 0 Comments Tags: , , .

Take a gander at my new (but old) hand-sewn vintage top. I found it a couple of weeks ago at a thrift store. I can honestly picture my grandmother having a blouse just like this that she made from scrap cotton material. It’s so lovely with the tiny floral print, bell sleeves and peter pan/bow tie collar.

The guitar is my husband’s and I cannot play a single thing.  But, it was on the ground and provided a nice contrast with it’s warm honey hues so there it went right into the photos.  I believe he’s had it since middle school and it’s survived quite a number of years and storage fiascos.  Aside from a short-lived stretch of piano lessons when I was a kid, I’ve never tried to learn an instrument.  That’s definitely one of my quarter-life regrets.  Maybe one day I’ll get around to taking lessons.

What are your ‘wish I had learned to do that’ regrets?

top – handmade and thrifted
jeans – 7ForAllMankind
belt – a hand-me-down
earrings – Forever21
wedges – Paolo
guitar – CF Martin