Teeny Manolo

Unlike my last foreign film list, this one features only animated movies. Yes, Disney, Pixar, Dreamworks and other US movie studios seem to have quite the monopoly going on the animated front. But, there are more than a few movies from other countries that deserve our attention as well.

My Neighbor Totoro Sisters Satsuki and Mei must go live in the countryside with their father while their mother recovers from an illness in the hospital. They find their new “neighbor” is a magical forest spirit, and this movie about their adventures together is pure magic.

Spirited Away Yet another movie directed by the legendary Japanese director Hayao Miyazaki (you’ll find most of the movies on this list are his), a young girl named Chihiro is forced to work for an evil witch. She finds inner strength, and is eventually able to free her parents and her friend, who have been under the witch’s spell.

Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit Brits Nick Park and Steve Box have created two of my favorite animated characters. This movie finds Wallace and his dog Gromit battling a mysterious Were-Rabbit. Can they save the vegetables from the hungry Were-Rabbit in time for the annual vegetable contest?

Kiki’s Delivery Service Kiki, a thirteen year old apprentice witch, must find her place in the world.

Howl’s Moving Castle The evil Witch of the Waste turns young nineteen year old Sophie into an old woman. In her quest to end the curse, Sophie finds love as well as her true self.

Chicken Run- Aardman Studios, who brought Wallace & Gromit to the world, made this movie about chickens who are trapped on a chicken farm. They dream of leaving, and after many escape attempts, the situation becomes especially dire after Rocky the rooster lands among them. Can the super-smart Ginger, along with Rocky, who promises to teach them how to fly, lead the way out?

Castle in the Sky Inspired by Gulliver’s Travels, the story follows orphan Sheeta and her friend Pazu as they outwit the evil Muska. Watch as they travel through the magical world of Laputa with some rowdy sky pirates.

Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind A thousand years after a devastating war, Princess Nausicaa is humanity’s best hope for survival, as she is the only one who understands the importance of saving the polluted forest which borders the lands on which they live. The first of a long series.

Wallace & Gromit in Three Amazing Adventures Two of these adventures won Best Animated Short Oscars, and one was nominated. These are three hilarious short films with claymation characters that will have you and your kids rolling on the floor.

The last product I’m going to review for this summer of Stila is the Eyeshadow Quad in Marrakesh.

And I can sum it up neatly in one word- beautiful!

Now as I age (ahem) gracefully, my ability to wear super-shimmery colors is getting a bit tenuous. Nothing shows up crepey eyelids like a bit of shine. The shadows in this quad have a teensy bit of shimmer, just enough to look awesome, yet not enough to highlight any signs of advancing closer to forty, or uh, (cough, cough) thirty-seven.

The colors can be worn together, alone, or in any combination. They would be extremely flattering to pretty much any skin tone. I love this quad, and I think you would, too!

As for the Super Fantastic Stila Giveaway Part Deux, we are going to carefully judge the haiku over the next week, and the winners will be announced on Sept. 6, 2008. Thank you to all those that entered, it’s going to be a tough decision! You all blew me away with your creativity!

Ahhhh! School is in the air! For some of you, including me, school days have already arrived. But, it’s never too late to enjoy a great school movie with your kids. Most of these are for older kids, so as always, parental discretion is advised. But really, that goes without saying, doesn’t it?

High School Musical Resistance is futile! This mega popular movie has been going strong for almost three years and counting. Can the star basketball player and the shy new girl become a pair? It’s a Disney movie, what do you think?

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone The classic that first introduced us to Hogwarts. And who in their right mind wouldn’t want to attend Hogwarts?

School of Rock Jack Black, in probably his best starring role. He becomes a subsitute teacher at a stuffy prep school, and nothing but fun can happen with Jack Black as your teacher.

Napoleon Dynamite Follow the nerdy socially challenged Napoleon through his trials and tribulations in high school. Love those tater tots, and don’t forget, vote for Pedro!

Dead Poets Society If you did not shed a tear at this movie about a group of students at a boarding school and their special bond with their teacher, then your heart is a lump of charcoal. Go have a barbeque instead.

(more…)

Our summer of Stila continues, and if you haven’t yet submitted your haiku, I have one question for you. Why not? Ten minutes worth of exercising the brain cells could net you almost $200 in FREE MAKEUP! Do. The. Math. And, even if you don’t win, you are creating ART, and art is priceless, is it not? As well as good for the soul.

Now, onto things that are good for our face.

Another product I got to review was Stila’s Color Push-Up in Berry Flash. It also comes in Rose Flash and Blush Flash. It is a compact, moisturizing blush that you simply sweep on. No brushes, and a minimum of blending with your fingers. It is light in texture, quite sheer, and did I mention extremely blendable?

Its compact size makes it perfect for sticking in your purse. Going out to dinner after work? Use it for an instant, easy bit of color. Because we all know that even with carefully applied powder in the morning, the blush is one of the first things to go, right after the lipstick.

Good stuff, my friends. Good stuff.

Well, my life may not be normal, but it sure is glamorous: today when I was supposed to be posting I was instead locked in an art gallery which contained no list of staff phone numbers (I snooped everywhere, I tell you) but many, many paintings on the themes of powerlessness, distress and alienation. We bonded, those paintings and I, while I waited for someone, anyone with keys to come and release me from my empty, gilded cage.

Fortunately, raincoaster here is a resourceful woman possessed of a large handbag, and thus is never without a paperback and at least one back issue of Vanity Fair. So it was that I became re-acquainted with an old friend of mine, the book Elegance, by Genevieve Dariaux; through the intermediary of the book Elegance by Kathleen Tessaro.

Some background: Dariaux’s book is really the definitive literary examination of the concept and practice of elegance (What Would Jackie Do notwithstanding, and I’m sorry but Breakfast at Tiffany’s was about a call girl and Capote really wanted Marilyn Monroe in the role, so there). Tessaro’s book is a well-done chick lit look at what happens to a particular woman when she tries to live by the rules set out in the original. Dariaux also wrote Entertaining With Elegance, which I’ve had for perhaps twenty years and believe me, between that and Miss Manners you’ve got the distressing concept of social interaction just stone-cold covered.

In any case, Tessaro’s book quoted a part of Dariaux’s book relevant to the TeenyManolosphere and I thought I would reproduce it here. It fits very well with the Frugal Indulgent’s Manifesto which I quoted earlier:

Little daughters are understandably the pride and joy of their mothers, but they are very often also, alas, the reflection of their mother’s inelegance. When you see a poor child all ringletted, beribboned, and loaded down with a handbag, an umbrella, and earrings, or wearing crepe-soled shoes with a velvet dress, you can be certain that her mother hasn’t the slightest bit of taste.

It is a serious handicap to be brought up this way, because a child must be endowed with a very strong personality of her own in order to rid herself of the bad habits that have been inculcated during her early years. The more simply a little girl is dressed - sweater and skirts in the winter, Empire-style cotton dresses in the summer - the more chic she is. It is never too early to learn that discretion and simplicity are the foundations of elegance.

Of course, to translate this to our modern world requires some rearrangement; for instance, anyone who’s seen Joe Simpson and his offspring knows that the above does not apply exclusively to mothers, if it ever did.

You find the most interesting things in foreign catalogues. Things like this baby blender from John Lewis in the UK.

from Cory Doctorow’s Flickr stream

I’ll take my baby smoothie with extra wheatgrass, please. Hmmmm, wonder if they have a baby oil press to match?

As I mentioned before, Stila was ever so generous with me, and even though I am giving away a ton of makeup, I also got to keep some for myself!

You may or may not know that I love lipstick.  Actually, I have a confession to make. I am a complete lipstick whore.  At this moment, I have approximately twenty liptsicks.  And it isn’t enough.  I will never have enough, I tell you!

Ahem… Back to the review.

When I saw the High Shine Lip Color, I knew I had to try it.  The packaging (as always) is so pretty, with little vines and leaves etched onto the inner tube. 

The lipstick itself goes on fairly lightly, it isn’t greasy or heavy.  Stila describes it as buttery, and I would have to agree. And I have to point out that there is a large difference between “shiny” and “glittery” and this has a lot of shine with not a lot of glitter.  Which is fine with me, because my days of nightclubbing are a thing of the past.  It wears well, and it has now become my favorite everyday lip color.

If you think you might want one for yourself, go and enter the Super Fantastic Stila Giveaway, for the High Shine Lip Color is just one of the many goodies in the first prize package. 

Ahhh, that time is coming, if not already here. Yes, the time to ponder what the heck you are going to buy your kids for their back to school wardrobes.

So for the next few weeks, I’m introducing a new feature where I focus on trendy back to school clothes, done two ways. Er, well, sometimes even three if I can swing it. And today, I can indeed swing three versions of the same concept in three different price ranges. Let’s get to it!

80’s influences are back, baby! And that means, of all things, argyle! Doesn’t it just take you back?

Lilly Pulitzer Kids Girl’s Darcie Cardigan Soft cotton cardigan comes with front pocket detail, rib trim, and contrast elbow patches. Tres cute at $68.00.

GapKids girl’s Argyle cardigan A little sparkle goes a long way with this cotton sweater, perfect for layering, $34.50.

Old Navy girl’s patterned polo Granted, it isn’t a sweater, but at $12.00, you will have plenty of money left over to buy some turtlenecks to stick under it.

Because there is never a bad day to feature shoes!

And, because who can resist a great pair of Converse Chuck Taylors for back to school? My son’s school suggests that sneakers/tennis shoes are the best choice, as they need to be able to jump around on the playground at recess. So, why not have them be comfortable and stylish at the same time?

Goes with pretty much everything, from jeans to skirts! At a price of $33.00, not too harsh on the wallet, either.

Here is the boy version, not as “cute,” because boys after a certain age just refuse to do cute, but still cool. These come in slightly pricier at $38.00.

This year, the Munchkin requires a backpack for school.  So of course, I go to Target to check out the selection. I have a shameful addiction to Target that I don’t like to talk about, but I will admit going there to look at backpacks.  And uh, maybe ten or fifteen other things.  It’s a disease, I’m telling you. 

Anyhoo, I was singularly unimpressed.  I didn’t like the quality of any of them, and the garish graphics of The Hulk and Spiderman and whatnot didn’t win me over either.  I have this really big problem with buying something like a backpack, which will be used the entire year (and possibly beyond) and then having a character on it that is suddenly “uncool” or that he doesn’t like anymore. 

I decided to go online, just to see what there was, out there in backpack land.  And then I found this:

The Solid Classmate Backpack from Land’s End. For about nine bucks more than what they charge at Target, this is as its name suggests, solid. The construction is fabulous, the shoulder pads cushy. There are lots of fun compartments, even a secret velcro one. It comes in a lot of colors, and also happens to come in sizes for kids ages 4-7, which was very important to me. Nothing worse than a backpack almost as big as the kid carrying it. Oh, and Real Simple Magazine (which I also lurve) rated it “Best Backpack” for ages 4-7.

I highly recommend this backpack, and if you hurry, you can use code INSIDER and PIN 534534534 to get free shipping.