Fashion Forward Fridays: Monthly Recap

Here we are friends, the end of the first month of Fashion Forward Fridays. On the last Friday of each month, I'm going to reflect on what trends I saw the most throughout the city and highlight what advice the fashionistas gave during their mini-interviews. All of them showed and mentioned one main thing: color.

Each one of them told me that others should not be afraid to use color and each one of them was stepping out of the box to do so. Now, throughout the month of April, I saw a bit of a change in the typical downtown Pittsburgh style, big thanks to the warmer weather, Mr. Sun! And the main way that I saw these pops of color were in the denim. While I also contributed to this pop color by wearing my red jeans twice this month, I noticed that a lot of other Pittburghers were doing the same with other colored denim and I have to say, I didn't hate it. We'll see if GQ feels the same.

To be honest, when the colored pants first came on the scene, I was scared, mostly because the only colors available came in neons and made everyone that wore them look like some kind of traffic cone or like a highlighter exploded. Awful. However, more recently, pretty much every color has come out and now we're getting somewhere! I love the royal blue and red, but also, I'm dying over the peach and more pastel colors for spring, like one of the looks I mentioned that was shown at Glam for the Cure.

I know that there are "easy" ways to wear colored jeans and I know that both of the looks I created with my red ones, could be considered easy since I paired them with black and white. However, when first diving into the colored jeans, go slow, going overboard on your first time out in them will probably turn out bad and your confidence might take a bruise. Because trust me, you cannot walk outside of your place in red pants and not get noticed by everyone else. (While I've become use to this attention, I know not everyone is a fan of it, so just wanted to through that little tip out there!)


Here's how I took my red jeans from a day to night look...

Not all items are the exact ones that I mentioned.

For my day look I wore Delia's red jeans, the Belle shirt that I bought after seeing Beauty and the Beast the musical, with a black blazer from Victoria's Secret and black glitter ballet flats from Charlotte Russe. And I accessorized it buy using my gray fridge purse and long black necklace, both from mark. which is the young version of Avon. As for make-up I did my everyday routine, nothing over the top.

Not all items are the exact ones that I mentioned.

For my night look I again wore the Delia's red jeans, but this time paired them with a black feathery corset top from Wet Seal, a white fitted suit-vest from The Limited and zebra heels from the Paris Hilton Collection. And then accessorized with the same necklace from the day look, red feather earrings that MJ got me from Burlington and a gorgeous, long black clutch from a local boutique called Boutique la Passerelle, which I am obsessed with! And make-up wise, I did my same routine except a smoky eye with a hint of red as an accent.

So I hope you guys now will take the advice from our April fashionista's Carly, Channing and Teiona and maybe find some inspiration from my two looks to come up with your own fabulous ways to wear color! And hopefully the ever-changing Pittsburgh weather will allow you to break out some fun new colored denim. Happy weekend everyone!

Mod Matrimony: Pittsburgh Wedding Planners

lalalaphotography.com

Recently, I have joined the Mod Matrimony team! This is super exciting to me since I love event planning and I'm like a little girl about weddings. I cry at everyone's wedding, even if I don't know the couple that well. My tough-girl exterior is always crushed by a good wedding. Anyway, what this means to my readers here is that every Tuesday, you'll find me there. For my first post with Mod Mat: The Top 5 Pittsburgh Wedding Locations! Check it out!

Matthew 19:14

Admittedly, I bought the book Heaven is for Real by Todd Burpo because my mom wanted it and it happened to be on sale in the Point Park Bookstore the day I went in to check out what new Vera Bradley items were in stock. Also admittedly, I read Heaven is for Real, that night, about two weeks ago, in about three hours total and have not been the same since I put it down.

Book cover of Heaven is for Real

As Ron Hall is quoted saying on the back cover, "A beautifully written glimpse into Heaven that will encourage those who doubt and thrill those who believe." True words, Ron. At first, before reading the book, I was a bit of a skeptic because I thought it was just another person trying to make a buck off not only their Christian ideals but off of their cute little kid too. There have been countless books written about traveling to Heaven and how to have child-like faith, most which are written in a style that compares to a how-to article that could be found in a cheap magazine. So I had my doubts about this one too.

Now as a former skeptic myself, I might know what you're thinking, in that how could I tell that this book was any different than all the others?

Well, you know that gut feeling you get when you know something is right or wrong? When people say 'I have a bad feeling about this,' or 'I could just tell it was going to be good,' usually there is a deeper meaning to that and if you look in the Bible about spiritual gifts, it's being able to recognize that God's spirit is present or can also be called discernment. And over and over again, even when I did not want it to be true, it's been proven to me and told to me, that discernment is my top spiritual gift. Which in a basic meaning is that I could just tell that this book was legit and at the very least, has a powerful underlying message.

Burpo Family picture: Colton is on the far left.

Generally, the book is about the Burpo family, and focuses on their first son, Colton. It is told through the perspective of Todd, who is the father and is a pastor in their small town. Colton, at the age of four, had a series of trips and stays at the hospital because of a ruptured appendix and not long after the last hospital stay, during a family trip, he mentions that he went to Heaven. Now, I've worked with kids, I know they say some crazy things and going to Heaven would not be a far-fetched idea for them to come up with, their imaginations are limitless, but it's the rest of the story that makes this whole book believable.

Colton talks about meeting family members he never met and never was told about, he mentions specific aspects of Heaven that are in line with Bible that he was never taught before. Considering the average four year old will only pay attention to you long enough to sing Jesus Loves Me, once, you cannot really teach them about anything complex, and to the human brain, Heaven is pretty complex. Now at first what Colton's mentions about Jesus are just plain cute. When any kid talks about Jesus, I cannot help but melt a little. Which seems to be the same impression Colton's parents had to his stories at first, too. It was not until Colton was able to tell them specific details about where they were and what they were doing in the hospital when the doctors rushed him into surgery, that they believed that their son had made an amazing journey to Heaven.

Okay, so I might know what you skeptics are thinking again. And yes, I know that the Burpo's could have made up every last detail of this book - yet I still believe they did not. 

The underlying message of this book is that we as adults think too much. We try to fit Jesus and God and Heaven and the Holy Spirit and all that other church stuff into one specific box, when the truth is, we can't. Even if you are a theology scholar, you will never be able to understand everything pertaining to God. Children get that. That's why the Bible makes mention about how much Jesus loves the children. That's why the kingdom belongs to them. And that's why He tells us to have child-like faith.

In Heaven is for Real, Todd Burpo says, "child-like humility is not the lack of intelligence but the lack of guile. The lack of agenda. It's that precious fleeting time before we have accumulated enough pride or position to care what people might think." And that's just it. As adults we care too much about what our friends think, what co-workers might say and so on, when honestly we shouldn't. I know I'm guilty of this too but we all need to just stop and let God do what He does. If nothing else, this book will give you some peace on that subject.

I also liked that in the book, Todd talks about being angry with God through all of Colton's medical issues because I feel like we're always told never to show anger towards Him. 1)Why not, He already knows what you're thinking so why not just say it out loud too or during prayer at least, and 2) He does understand what it's like to be human, He understands everything we're going through so we might as well just let it out.

Overall, I just liked that this book brought a different view to what it means to believe in Heaven. Because you can talk about it forever but truthfully, we'll never really know until we're there. I also liked that it was a story. It wasn't written in a tone to try to prove anything, when Todd quoted a Bible verse or tells about something Colton described of Heaven, the verse wasn't right there to read, but instead they were all listed together in the back of the book in the Notes section. I really appreciated that not only because it lets the flow of your reading progress instead of pausing over and over again, but also because it was like Todd was writing in a way as to say, 'if you need the proof of this, here's where to look it up' instead of pounding it at you like so many other Christian authors seem to do. That writing style is just off-putting so think about that if you're writing your own Christian-based book.

Whether your skeptical about this read or not, I'd suggest checking it out. Like Ron Hall said, it really will encourage or thrill you, possibly even both. For me, over the past couple weeks, it's really been making me think differently about Heaven. I have always been curious about what it will be like, but now I know I cannot wait to get there, so I'm going to do everything I can with the time I am given here in the world and in this life to make that happen.

Traveling around the world...while staying in one seat!

Last night was the official opening night of the Pittsburgh Public Theater's production of Around the World in 80 Days. MJ and I had a grand ol' time traveling along to the different countries and didn't even have to move out of our seats. Theater and travel are just becoming so convenient!

At the Pittsburgh Public Theater until May 13th!

The show is directed by Marcia Milgrom Dodge and is lined up with a phenomenal cast of Tom Beckett, Ron Bohmer, Jeffrey Kuhn, Meera Rohit Kumbhani and Richard B. Watson. While everyone was amazing at their parts, I have to say that Tom Beckett and Jeffrey Kuhn stole this one for me. Any show that allows the actors to talk in ridiculous accents always is a winner in my book, but Jeffrey portraying Frenchman, Passepartout and Tom portraying just about every other character, just took this show to the next level. Mostly Tom Beckett, because his ability to switch from one costume to the next and one accent to the next, killed me. I loved every facial expression and every bit of effort he was putting into this performance. Even though he made it look seamless, I'm sure it was a workout and I very much appreciated watching! I also very much enjoyed Meera, because while her bio notes a small background in theater, I thought she was fabulous, she's also the only woman in the show, so of course I'll side with her any day. But, from each actor, I cannot talk about how much I loved every time they were on a train, boat or other form of transportation and were able to remain in character and really deliver, while acting out the movement of the type of transportation. For the audience, a few times this just looked silly, which I'm sure was the point, but oh, my gosh, the movements just made the scenes come to life and at times had me and MJ in tears of laughter.

Ron Bohmer as Phileas Fogg. (Keith Hodan: Tribune-Review Photo.)

As always, the set was gorgeous. If you read my last Public Theater review, then you know that I was so impressed by the set of Freud's Last Session. But the scenic designer of Around the World, Michael Schweikardt, might have out done that set with this one. Now granted, this set is a lot less grand than Freud's Last Session, there is no massive bookshelf that I feel in love with, but there were more beautiful large pieces to look at on the stage this time. I especially loved that from where we were sitting, the stair case was almost directly across from us, so from time to time it felt like we were right in the action of the show. My favorite piece though was the elephant, I thought it was so cleverly done and loved how the actors interacted with it. Along with the set, the sound and lighting crew was on point with this show. I especially loved a certain scene about a haywire train that perfectly played out and showed how every single person involved in this show worked together harmoniously. But I'll leave that scene and the elephant to your imagination to entice you to go see this performance a little more.

Above all, I loved that this stage was used how it's supposed to be. Since it's a thrust stage, there are bits of audience members on three sides. Of course most of them are sitting where the audience would normally sit in the front center, however, there are still a good bit of them sitting on the sides. And since MJ and I were on the sides for this show, I especially took notice to the direction of where the actors were.  I love the Marcia took the time to notice that the audience is also on the sides, because not every director does that even when using a thrust stage. I very much appreciated that no matter where you were seated in the audience, at some point in this show you saw the actors from every angle. That might seem like such a small detail to some, but when you're actually sitting on the side, it's nice to see a face. Try going through an entire show without getting a good look at the actors faces, that would not be a fun time. So, thank you Marcia for your direction and using every bit of the Public's stage and thank you Public Theater for another quality show!

Fashion Forward Fridays: Meet Teiona!

On my continued quest to prove GQ wrong and help Pittsburgh be seen as a fashion-friendly city, I headed out today later than usual, to find a fashionista. Fashion Forward Friday's is apparently becoming my claim to fame, so sorry to the readers I kept waiting today with this later-day entry!

Miss Teiona, looking cute!

I actually spotted Teiona while crossing Liberty Ave. heading towards Penn Ave. and instantly loved her look. Mostly though, I loved how confident she looked in it. I hate when people just buy clothes knowing they are in style, but let the clothes wear them instead of the other way around. However, Teiona was owning this look.

She said that her inspiration comes from Rihanna and stores like Forever 21 and H&M are her favorites. Her outfit today was all from Forever 21 and while I'm not usually a fan of pulling clothes right from the mannequin and putting it on, I liked that Teiona was able to mix up this look a bit by her use of accessories.

First, I adore her bag. I love how casual it is but yet how stylish when put with the right pieces. Also, Teiona's headband and earrings just scream 'look at me' so I'm inspired by her gusto to put them together. Also, her floral gladiator sandals brought a nice touch to the outfit, complimenting her headband perfectly.  I loved that she stuck to primarily two colors and then let the accessories do the work for bringing this outfit to life (along with her personality of course.) Teiona's outfit is easy to do, but the way she pulled it all together is what made it a standout.  I love that she uses simple pieces, like a plain white tank and pairs it with navy shorts, a denim jacket and a simple, thin brown belt. While most might stop there, I liked that Teiona brought her outfit to the next level by adding the big circle earrings, headband and matching gladiators. Usually accessories are what make an outfit complete and give it a finished look.

Love this nail polish against her skin tone as well!

I also love that Teiona used a dainty floral patterned headband and paired it with such a tough looking earrings. Where I'm sure most people would pair dainty and dainty, I love that Teiona used contrasting elements to complete her look. The mixture of soft and rough is really coming into play this season and I'd suggest trying it out! I wish I could have gotten a good picture of her hair too, because it was styled in that way as well, with a strong braid but feminine pieces pulled to the back. I can certainly see how Rihanna is inspiring Teiona's style, because she's really the one who started the mixture of hard and soft elements craze and I love her for it too!

Teiona's advice to other fashionista's is to "keep it cute," and her current favorite trend to see is the headband. While Teiona is still in high school, her outfit speaks volumes to her level of sophistication, at least in her closet. But her sunny disposition and giggly personality said that she's still a kid at heart. So maybe that's what we're missing, Pittsburgh, especially this spring, let's try to keep it cute and youthful! Happy Weekend, everyone!