Day Sixteen: Dream

Ralph Lauren 'The Heiress' home collection.  I tore this advertisement out of a magazine years ago and still love it.

'When I was very young, growing up in the Bronx, I saw the world through a glass window, not the one that looked out on the schoolyard where we played basketball, but the one that looked out on my dreams.  Like most young people, I didn’t know if I would ever achieve those dreams, because when you’re not born with money and you have to go out and work to buy a shirt or a pair of pants, you take nothing for granted.

I remember seeing a pair of blue suede shoes in a store window that I passed every day after school.  I loved those shoes, and I really wanted them, but I didn’t have the money.  I couldn’t wait for my birthday hoping they might be a gift and then I would finally have those blue suede shoes.  I think I’m still that boy standing in front of the window filled with the same excitement, yearning for something just out of reach, not blue suede shoes, but something beautiful and timeless that conjures up a world and takes you there.'  -  From the book Ralph Lauren by Ralph Lauren and Mary Randolph Carter

Reading through this fabulous book, I was struck by Ralph’s self-admission of being a dreamer. Growing up he said he created his own vision of a life well-lived which included an English style residence in the beauty of America, sailing off the Maine coast and being a cowboy on his own ranch.

Say what you will about Ralph, but he really does have the gift of visualising and creating wonderful settings.  These settings encompass outfits, retail stores, homes and even his entire life.  Armed only with his imagination Ralph has created his dream lifestyle from the ground up.

'I never went to Africa. But if I had, I might never have done the clothes that I did. They were about a romantic Africa, what I thought a safari was like.' - Ralph Lauren

On a rather smaller scale, I feel a bit like that with the French thing. I have been to France once and so have had a brief experience of Paris, but much of my inspiration lives in my head.  And I love that!

My French girl living in a tiny apartment in Paris is the stuff of my imagination. And it makes me so happy to think about it.  I don’t need to be constrained by real life issues, say, if I decided to actually move to France.  I can let it influence how I live my life here and create my dream lifestyle with inspiration plucked from many different sources.

I surround myself with constant inspiration in the way of my beloved books, blogs, magazine articles, music, pared down and simplified surroundings and purposely trying not to pile too much into my life so that I can be relaxed and serene.

Any time I feel like a need a bit of a boost, all I have to do is remember my dreams and set about shaping them into a life that is everything I’ve ever wanted it to be.

Day Fifteen: The Staycation

The Langham Hotel in Auckland.  The decor is glorious!

This is the first item in my current Thirty Chic Days that requires money, but I think it’s worth including.

When we started our business almost ten years ago, my husband and I realised our occasional weekends away would have to stop since we were running a six and now seven days a week business.

At the time I mentioned to him there were boutique and also fancy hotels in our city that we could stay at on a Saturday night and ‘go away for the weekend’ but still be able to open our shop.  ‘I’ll never pay to stay in a hotel when I’ve paying for a home just down the road’ was the response I got so I forgot all about it.

I don’t know what changed his mind (promise I didn’t nag), but we’ve done this many times now.  Maybe 2-3 times a year we’ll stay at our favourite Langham Hotel and indulge in five-star luxury for 24 hours.

We pack our nicest clothes to dress up for drinks and dinner, and I always take a few books and magazines so we can relax in our room.  There is even a roof-top pool where we can pretend we are movie stars sunbathing in big sunglasses, right in the centre of the city.

Yes, it’s expensive-ish per night, but we always book special offers where you are offered a discount and extras such as valet parking, a bottle of bubbles, breakfast etc.  And it probably costs us a similar amount to driving to another town and staying in a lesser place.

I arrive home refreshed, and actually I’m always really excited to come home too.  There’s nothing like ‘going away’ but there’s nothing like arriving home again.

Do you stay at places in your own town or is it the craziest idea you’ve ever heard?

Day Fourteen: The Peaceful Home

I’ve read before that the more in control of your life you feel, the happier you are.  I think that’s why decluttering, organising, pottering and homemaking tasks are so popular.  In a relatively short time, for little or no money you can take control of your home, and make it your oasis of calm away from the outside world (which is largely out of our control).

I had a think about what attributes a restful home would have for me so that I can incorporate these ideas as time goes by.

- Tonal, soft colours.  Decorate with touchable textures.

- Clutter-free so the eye can travel unimpeded around the room.

- Clean.

- Candles and soothing music played at a low level to create an ambience.

- Learn the basics of feng shui – often you can correct an ‘off feeling’ in a room by moving furniture around to create a better flow.  At its most basic feng shui simply means a room feels comfortable to be in.

- Be organised.  When an item has an easily accessible place to live it will more likely get put it away.  Clutter builds up when something has nowhere permanent to go.

- Simplify and surround yourself with only that which you love.

- Speaking in a pleasant tone – no fish-wife shrieking or calling out.  I try to remember to use my feet rather than my voice.

What would you add to this list?  What’s your favourite way to make your home a sanctuary?

Day Thirteen: Chic Nails

Faux books which hold my nail goodies, and Ecoya Vanilla Bean hand lotion.

Something that always helps me feel more pulled together is spending a little time on my nails.  I’m with French women here.  Apparently ‘they’ (not generalising at all) prefer short, neat, natural-coloured or un-coloured nails, with painted toes.

Working five days a week in a busy shoe store I cannot wear polish on my finger nails because the colour is chipped within one day.  Sadly.  On the upside, my nails never go yellow from being covered up, so there is that.

The job factor helped when I was decluttering my nail colours.  I now only have four shades and one of them is nude.  For special occasions I use the nude on my fingers, and I save the others for my toes.

Just for the record, none of my nail colours have any metallic or sparkle, they are all creamy.  I’m not young enough or old enough for shimmer I think.

The colours I use on my toes are a purple/black prune type colour, a bright red/orange and a taupe colour that was supposed to look like that lovely putty beige I’ve seen on women, but instead just looks dirty and horrid on me so it will I have to go.

I love the look of dark or bright fingernails but I’m always so nervous of chipping the colour before I get to where I’m going.  That would positively ruin my night.  Maybe I’ll get brave one day.

My nails get to a certain length and then one seems to go.  That is the cue for all the others to be filed down to the same length.  My mother’s worst nightmare (if that doesn’t sound too dramatic) which I absorbed growing up, was nails of different lengths on the same person, so I always have to have them the same length.

By the sofa I keep a nail file and thick hand cream and I can multi-task while I’m watching tv.

I admit I did have a year-long flirtation with acrylic nails more than a decade ago and it was fun for something different.  But these days I’m very happy to be low-maintenance and low-cost.

How about you?  What do you do with your nails?

Day Twelve: Excitement

Image from dailymail.co.uk

Thanks to a few different sources and also from my own experience, I have come to the conclusion that excitement is the key to achieving anything you want to achieve.  I believe becoming excited about something is the fuel that will enable you to make positive and lasting changes to reach your goal no matter what that goal is.

For example, when I created my minimal wardrobe, I’d backed off so many times because it just looked too hard to do and my wardrobe didn't seem that bad anyway (my thoughts).  Reading up on others Project 333 experiences (on Day Three of Thirty Chic Days) made me excited about doing that for myself and I practically launched my body through the wardrobe doors so eager was I to get started.

That’s when I realised I could do this with anything.  And the great thing is, you don’t need to be excited already or have someone else make you excited – you can create your own excitement literally from thin air!  Talking something up and talking positively about it will make you happy to be doing it and the rest will follow.

Often I read Amazon reviews of a book I’ve enjoyed and I will only read the five-star reviews because who wants to read about people moaning.  Especially if I love the book I don’t want others negative views to cloud my own.  After reading five-star reviews I actually love the book more than I already did and I end up re-reading it.  I've done this a lot.  So why not do my own five-star reviews for anything in my life?

I’ve been really ‘not energetic’ with exercise for a while now.  I want to get back into my daily walks for fitness and also sunshine exposure as per yesterday’s post.  Instead of looking at it as something that I should do (and therefore do not do it) I am now excited to be strolling the streets and enjoying late Autumn with the trees a blaze of beautiful colour simply because I reframed it in my mind.

Instead of feeling obligated and resisting going for a daily walk, I'm telling myself:

- It will be fun and I feel excited to be going for a neighbourhood walk

- I will be très chicly dressed in my daily outfit with appropriate shoes and some big sunglasses

- I will be French in my mind as I ‘take the air’

- I will enjoy myself and feel my body being tall and strong as I stroll along

- My body will thank me  - my muscles, my blood-flow, my lungs, they will all be thrilled

When you become excited about something it is not a chore to carry through with a promise to yourself.  You want to do it!  Like most of us, I don’t like being told what to do, whether it’s by someone else or myself.  Making myself want to do something is the answer.

Creating excitement around an area you want to improve on really does put butterflies in your stomach.  It’s kind of like falling in love with someone new but you don’t have to wait for that to happen (and you won’t want to if you are in a happy relationship!).  Fall in love instead with yourself and your exciting ‘new’ plans.

If you have some self-improvements things in the back of your mind that you’ve tried and failed at before, dig one out and think of all the exciting ways (write them down!) you could achieve that and how you are going to feel afterwards (amazing, obviously).

One thing that always inspires me to make positive changes in my life is my love affair with Paris and France, and any little reminder always helps me remember my initial excitement around the world of French Chic and how I want to be the chicest and best version of myself.

Reading through Michelle’s Italiagal blog recently took me right back to my Paris trip (too long ago – thirteen years!) and made me fall for Paris all over again, and remember that bubbly feeling you get when you’ve stumbled onto something new and wonderful.

‘Motivation is like food for the brain. You cannot get enough in one sitting. It needs continual and regular top ups.’ – Peter Davies

‘To keep a lamp burning we have to keep putting oil in it’ – Mother Teresa

What lifestyle change would you like to reframe in an exciting way to make yourself want to do it?