We couldn’t help but post this last one – 25% off everything at Philosophy.com. They’re not quite our favorite brand ever – but we have a soft spot in our teeny little heart for their gift packaging. Plus, we can definitely clean up (er, honestly, no pun intended) for holiday gifts. Use code ENJOY during checkout. We will, however, admit to being completely creeped out by their personification of holiday cookies. Animals are one thing – cookies are just plain weird.
Gingerbread Man Bubble Bath and Shower Gel, was $16, now $12
LB
Our inbox is already starting to get flooded with deal emails – we couldn’t keep these two quiet.
Through November 30, take 30% off special deals orders on American Apparel over $100. Not spending that much? Take 20% off orders under $100. Use code SPECIAL30 or SPECIAL20 at checkout. It’s a sweet deal for basics like tanks and shorts, and we’re even contemplating branching out and trying a onesie (hey, for $8, how wrong can it be?).
Today only, Delia*s (yes, putting that star there was painful), is offering 20% off all orders. Delia’s may be for the Twilight set, but we absolutely swear by their denim. They offer a huge array of sizes and inseams, they’re inexpensive – while the assortment isn’t quite as varied as we would like, we’ll deal. Our favorites? The Taylor – super skinny, low rise without being indecent, and they wear well. Extra bonus – the discount code (SE20) appears to stack with other promos – so 2 pairs of jeans that normally cost $49.50 came to a total of $69.90.
-LB
We rarely have fancy dinners in our house. In our extended household, there is generally one and a half fancy dinners a year; Thanksgiving and Christmas. Both have very small groups in attendance, and while the general feeling is fancy (nice china, candles, table runners), any effort at decorum is generally lost as soon as the evening blessing starts. In fact, we recall one year when our slightly elderly uncle (very formal, himself) was about to present the table with his presence and the Christmas dinner blessing. Our dog walked under the table, and poked his head out (he was very much a part of the family and welcome to roam wherever, whenever). When he poked his head out, the table cloth fell around his face, much like the standard image of, oh, the Virgin Mary.
We have always, always had a problem with ‘keeping our smart mouth shut’, so we exclaimed, immediately post blessing, ‘look! the dog is playing baby jesus!’.
We spent the rest of the meal in tears and hyperventilating from laughing so hard, dodging scathing looks from our extended family, and watching our poor parents try really, really hard not to laugh along with us.
While we appreciate the formality of the holiday dinner table, we think it sets the room up for snide comments and disaster (maybe it’s just our own discomfort with the whole air of things). We would vastly prefer to break out the fancy dishes, the linens, and some table accessories, if you will, that lighten the whole show up. We really love these napkin rings from Paloma’s Nest, and we thoroughly, thoroughly enjoy that you can customize them to say whatever you want.
We are sure our parents would opt for a set of 4 that reads like this:
If you girls don’t keep quiet
and behave yourself
we will leave you here
both of you
and then purposefully set the table.
We love that you can customize them, and we would so encourage anyone who bought these to have fun. Use your guests names, give everyone a question to ask the table, have an inspirational quote, use them to make an announcement. They’ll be beautiful AND get the point across – silently.
S/4 Custom Table Talk Napkin Rings, $48
We generally don’t look to Etsy to buy anything vintage; in fact, it’s rare we buy vintage at all. Our shape is not cut out for it, and we honestly don’t have the patience to look at much more than vintage coats and the random dress here and there. For some reason, this is entirely unrelated to the subset of patience we have to go through Etsy – where we can browse for days at a time. We were looking through the pounce option (a neat little randomizer; it does the browsing for us), and we came across what appears to be one of the most lovely dresses we’ve ever seen). We are absolutely loving the flowing lines of the dress and the absolute simplicity – it’s rare to find that these days. We poked through the rest of the Allen Company Inc and it’s one of the most well-edited vintage shops we’ve seen – WITHOUT prices being through the roof. We think $45 is completely acceptable for a dress of this beauty, and the prices for other items are pretty much in line. We also love, love, love the really simple styling and photography in this shop.
A new found favorite, but we think we’ll keep coming back.
Vintage Dress, $45
LB
There is absolutely no excuse for us to be spending money; our credit card bill is so high that we are planning on not eating until December, we have more clothes than we know what to do with, and it’d be nice to have a savings account. Hautelook makes it tough with their American Apparel sale at 11am EST today; our love for AA has been well documented, and we just recently delved into a few new styles that we definitely wouldn’t mind having in a couple of different colors.
Word of caution, though – be sure to check the deals section on American Apparel’s site before committing to something on Hautelook. Those deals are, as Crazy Eddie would say, insane.
If you need an invite to Hautelook, email us before 10:50am EST
LB
We stalk Etsy almost daily for the perfect bag. It’s like an ongoing hunt, and sometimes we think we’d be disappointed if we found the perfect one – then what would we look for? We thank our antique-collecting parents for this trait (we were traipsing around flea markets at the age of 4, trying to help them find intact Mah Jong sets and Lionel trains). We’ve come very close to what seems to be the perfect bag on Etsy before, but there’s always been some kind of issue – either the price (we appreciate paying a premium for handmade, but we draw the line at over $200 for items, sight unseen), or the shipping, or there’s been some kind of random, stupid thing we don’t like. We think we may have found the bag to end this hunt, and it’s also the most expensive item we’ve bought on Etsy – so we are anxious, triple fold. We expect it this week, so fingers crossed!
Zhenun Leathers doesn’t have a massive array of styles, but the styles she has are simple (yet functional. One bag we bought had the straps sewn so closely together you couldn’t put your arm through). There are simple top closures, a reasonable number of pockets, strap drops appear to be arm sized. And, most of all, the leather! We are a sucker for aged, multi-tonal leather – nothing is less exciting than flat, almost painted looking leather. The dark whiskey leather Zhenun uses is everything we’ve been looking for – and we really, really hope the Ton Sai bag lives up to our expectations. Though, if it doesn’t, at least we’ll still have something to search for!
Ton Sai bag, $170
LB
So today we start another week of our favorites on Etsy. While we still sometimes tire of slogging through page after page of owl/squirrel/anatomical heart screenprinted shirts/necklaces/diaper bags, we can almost always find something that makes us stop and look a little further, and we either end up buying it or stalking it until we do so (more on that later this week).
We’ve been huge fans of Erica Weiner for quite some time – we love jewelry that isn’t fussy, is still pretty, and has a bit of a sense of humor. While we have yet to buy anything from her regular collection, we check out her Etsy pretty regularly. She sells samples, one offs, and tests new designs out here – so chances are, you’ll get something few other people have. Plus, there’s something to be said for buying from the artist directly.
We’re currently REALLY into the pendants she has – they’re almost dangerous (especially to people like us) but they’re still really delicate and feminine. The Waldorf-Astoria Cocktail Skewer necklace is our current favorite. We would wear this with absolutely everything – to work, out of work, jeans and a t-shirt, with dresses. If you could be in love with a necklace, without being creepy, that would be us right now.
Waldorf-Astoria Cocktail Skewer, $100
LB
We are sometimes very unsure of our fashion decisions. We’ve definitely toed the line between eccentric and weird, stylish and dated, fashion forward and confused, and so on. We shop alone more often than not, so we sometimes make extremely regrettable decisions (which is largely why we shop at places with excellent return policies).
This couldn’t have been more true than when we were shoe shopping last week. We needed a pair of non-boot, non-heels, non-running shoes. Our flats that we lived in were literally disintegrating; they have holes, the soles have come off. They’re little more than teeny pieces of leather held together by a few stitches at this point.
We’d heard great things about Toms, and we really liked that they gave back to the community; nay, not only give back, but seem to exist to support and contribute to the community. We enjoyed the way they looked, but we were so reluctant. Were they too bobo like? Or akin to shoes one might wear while incarcerated? We picked up a pair and walked around the store, and then. We saw two girls, very stylish, pick up the shoe we had literally just put down. We pretty much decided then that we were in the clear, and we ended up with a pair of gray ones (above).
Then, today, while reading a gossip website, we saw an Olsen wearing the same shoes we have on our feet at this very moment. We are unsure how we feel about that. But our feet feel quite lovely – we had to try 3 different pairs to find ones that fit comfortably, but we’re pretty much in love.
Toms, ~$44 (pricing depends on style)
-LB
Today through Monday, Ralph Lauren takes up to 40% off most of their site. Our pick, if money were no object? The Cashmere Ribbed Cardigan (we’re dying for a sweater with elbow patches).
Was $755, now $483
-LB
