things you learn on christmas vacation

All the men in my mom's life snore. Loudly.

Dad and Buster. Keeping my mom awake at night since 2006-ish.

New Favorite Thing alert!

Spats. Think of them as wee jacket's for your high heels. HOW CUTE ARE THEY! This pair is from Fabulize's Shop on etsy and I sure do love 'em. These pictured are amazing, but I also love the "Shirring Spat". Being an obsessive DIY-er, I'm going to attempt to make a pair myself; there'll be no fancy flowers or anything and I'll probably get stuck trying to decide on a fabric, so I'm bookmarking these lovelies. Just in case.

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If for some reason I ever need album photos (it'll never happen), these would be them. No matter who else was in my "band".



That's all. Carry on.

when I think of you, flowers grow out of my grave

How bizarre to fly into Chicago on a Wednesday morning with a suitcase full of dance costumes! I was part of the "talent show" opening act for the Dead Man's Bones show at Schuba's Tavern. Cooper Alan and I left Nashville early that morning; our friend Emily was heading back to Australia (sadface!) at the same time so we said goodbye and headed to the Windy City. It took us almost as long to take the train to our hotel from the airport as it did to fly from Nashville. That place is effing HUGE! I felt like the proverbial country mouse, staring out the train windows exclaiming "look at all those people!" Nashville feels like a quaint little village after the massiveness of the Chicago skyline. Our afternoon was spent riding trains, walking N. Clark trying to find an open Thai restaurant and chatting with Robert at Jamba Juice about flea markets (he liked my necklace).



Sidenote: it's pretty amusing to watch people's reaction when you're half in street clothes and half tribal dancer. "Uh, does that girl really spend that much time getting dressed every day?"

The other two performers were cool; one was a magician (there had to be a magician, right?) and the other gal was a live painter who had a band and sang a haunting little ditty at the end of her set. Cooper was going to DJ with me (he wrote my music and it's AMAZING!) but in the end we had to burn a CD instead.. The stage was jam packed with gear so I had about an 8 foot square to dance in, around a drum set, mics and a keyboard. Definitely the smallest space I've had to work with, but the crowd was awesome. Everyone was so sweet after the show! I even met a local tribal dancer who happened to be in the audience. Thanks to all the Chicago gals who asked about dance lessons - maybe one of these days I'll start teaching and come up there and give a workshop.. I used two of Cooper's songs and a mash up of Beats Antique/NIN, and once again managed to choreograph a whole lot of nothing in advance. Got to work on that.. :) Here's a link to my 2nd performance: tinyurl.com/jennchicago

And then, of course, Dead Man's Bones! Their music is quirky and creepy and undeniably fun. Not to mention the adorable kids choir singing and dancing along! I thoroughly enjoyed both sets and I've been listening to the album all day; current faves: "Pa Pa Power" and "Flowers Grow Out of My Grave."



So to sum it up: 9 hours in costume + a ghostly emcee + two dance performances + two badass shows + met the men behind the music + danced to amazing tunes = more fun than should be allowed on a Wednesday night.

All in all, it was a pretty amazing introduction to Chicago. Future trips have a lot to live up to!

This Is My First Post

Keeping this short and sweet, but a longer post about my trip to Chicago on Wednesday is coming, I promise. :) In the meantime, cheers to roses and skulls and weekends.