A Prayer for the Smith Family

This is Malachi Smith. Yesterday, after fighting a battle with cancer for almost his entire life, Malachi went to be with the Lord. I only know of Malachi through a mutual friend, but I've been blessed by him and his family through reading his mother Rachel's blog.

This is a real-life example of what I was talking about Wednesday when I reminded myself and all of you that the choices we make every day tell other who we are what we are living for. It's clear that the Smith family are people who choose to honor and praise God, regardless of their circumstances. Their hearts, while undeniably breaking, still beat for His glory.

If you don't read any other entry on Rachel's blog, please read the one from yesterday, and then drop to your knees and pray for this family. And then praise God for every day you get to spend with your loved ones.

Lord, Words escape me, because my human mind doesn't grasp why things like this happen. But You are the God of all of our lives and circumstances, and even when we don't understand Your ways, we can trust Your heart. You work all things for Your glory and our good, including Malachi's death. Please surround the Smith family with your unfailing love. Comfort and bless them, for they have been faithful to You. In Jesus Name I Pray,
Amen

Taking Care of Business...

Short post today. Just two small "housekeeping" items for ya:

1.) There's only three days left until the Happily Ever After Book Club kicks off with our very first read: Tim Gunn's Guide to Quality, Taste & Style. There's nine chapters in the book and four weeks in November--that's two chapters the first three weeks and three chapters the last week.

During November, I will devote one post per week to a discussion of the chapters we have just read. You can either email me your thoughts ahead of time (jennprentice@gmail.com) or you can post something in the comment section below each entry. "The club" will meet every Monday, with the first meeting being November 7.

2.) Thestylegeek.com is almost ready for consumption!!!!!!!! If you get a chance, check it out and let me know what you think of the colors, the widgets (calendar, blog roll, Twitter updates, etc.). I'll be working on it this week and desperately want your feedback!

I've already ported my current blog entries over to the site, but I won't officially stop posting on here until midweek next week. Don't worry! I'll let you know!!! If you're a current follower of this blog (for which I cannot thank you enough) you can subscribe to the posts I make on thestylegeek by clicking the subscribe button in the top right corner of the site. The button will ask you where you'd like to "subscribe" at, and I would suggest "Live Bookmarks."

If you choose "Live Bookmarks" you can find a list of my posts by clicking the "Bookmarks" menu at the top of your web browser. Thestylegeek.com should show up in the drop down list. Mouse over the site name on that list and a number of my posts (newest to oldest) will appear. Click one and start reading! (It sounds complicated to explain, but I assure you that it's not hard to do.)

Ok... I better get going...My co-workers would probably appreciate it if I showered before work today!

Until Tomorrow,
Jennifer Lynn

It's Your Life

A couple entries ago, I mentioned that I would creating a personal manifesto in order to help me decide what content I want to feature on my new website (TheStyleGeek.com). FYI on the site- My friend Justin is actively working on putting it together for me. The biggest hurdle is as soon as I choose the most appropriately girly theme...

Anyways- back to the personal manifesto. I'm still in the "vision mapping" process. This is where you take a stack of magazines and cut out images that "speak" to you. I went through half of my magazine stack last night and so far, I've "talked" with 19 different images, including Tory Burch with an Indian man, the editors of Vogue in the front row of a runway show during Fashion Week, a few cute and cuddly animals and two pictures of Rachel Bilson, my personal style icon. (Have I mentioned that I "heart" Rachel?)

Tonight, I revisited the pictures I had cut out yesterday and was at a loss to figure out how to turn some of these images into possible website content, much less how they connect to the core of who I am as a person. That's the thing. For me, my website is more than just a place for people to keep up on the latest fashion trends or technology gadgets. (Get it? STYLE GEEK??) It's a statement about my character and what I value. So far, it seems that my life revolves around clothing and while that's one component of me, it's not necessarily what I want to be known for. (I can hear people talking about me now: "She's not very...but she sure does have cute clothes!" Umm.. no thanks!)

I've been listening to a lot of great Christian music lately (I have a love/hate relationship with the genre. It's either awesome or super cheesy.) and one of my current favorite songs is called "It's Your Life" by Francesca Battistelli. She sings: "It's your life. What you gonna do? The world is watching you. Everyday, the choices you make say who you are and what your heart beats for. It's an open door. It's your life."

I'd encourage all of you over the next few days to join me in being mindful of the choices you make and what they say about who we are and what's important to us. Who or what are our hearts beating for today?

Until Tomorrow,
Jennifer Lynn

*Photo Courtesy of Gwen Bell

Frighteningly Fun Baking

I feel the need to lighten the mood a little after yesterday's post, and I can't think of a better way to do that than by chatting about the HOLIDAYS!!!!!!

Halloween is almost here and while it's not one of my favorite holidays, it is my personal harbinger of the holiday season. So if I celebrate, it's mostly because I'm looking forward to the days ahead.

That being said, there is one thing that I LOVE about Halloween: Adorable children in cute costumes! On Friday, the owner of our company is letting us dress up (if we want) and letting the employees with kids bring their children into the office in their costumes for some Halloween fun. (A.k.a- Candy!)

I'm sure these kids are going to get their fair share of pre-packaged sweets, so I was trying to come up with something different to pass out to them. Here's what I've found from the people at Bright Ideas.com:

Vampire Bites

Eye Ball Cupcakes

Night Owl Cookies

Those are the most entertaining baked goods I've seen a long time! Unfortunately, they're kinda complicated to make...but I think I'm still gonna give one or two of them a try.

Hope you guys enjoy as well!

Until Tomorrow,
Jennifer Lynn

PS- The weather girl just said we might need to wear mittens when we walk out the door this morning!!!!!!!!! YAY for cold weather!!!!!!!!

Letters To My Former Self Part 2: A More Beautiful You

I've known what I was going to write about this week since last Sunday afternoon's post. I wanted to start off the Letters To My Former Self series with this entry, but for reasons you'll clearly understand in a minute, I had to work up the courage to write this.

If you've spent any amount of time with me, you've probably heard me reference the fact that I "used to have an eating disorder in college." I only bring it up if it fits in with the conversation, and I say it rather nonchalantly so that people (particularly those who haven't known me for very long) don't think I'm some weirdo who likes to stick her head in the toilet.

While my "weirdness" may still be up for debate for a number of reasons, (after all, I do like to talk to my cats in baby voices...), it is not because I used to stick my finger down my throat. On the contrary, a 2008 survey by Self Magazine and the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill revealed that 65% of American women between the ages of 25-45 report having "disordered eating behaviors" with an additional 10% of women reporting behaviors consistent with bulimia, anorexia and binge eating disorder. Sadly, that means that women who don't have bad thoughts about their bodies or engage in unhealthy eating behaviors are the "weird" ones.

Still, I was hesitant to share my personal struggle with all of you, until I re-read a quote I had written in one of my former journals:

"I don't really regret much in my life, but I will never get back the time I spent worrying about what the scale said." -Portia de Rossi, Actress and Former Anorexic.

And that's just it. I can't take back the years I lost to self-loathing, mild depression and bodily harm, but maybe I can prevent some of you from losing time. The following are excerpts from the journal entries I wrote during various stages of my eating disorder and my recovery:

Dear Diary,
I hate myself! I am a fat, nasty, stupid, ugly girl! Gosh! I am such a loser! I have seriously gained so much weight...
WHY?! WHY!? WHY!? Would I binge and then purge? Yep! That's right. I threw up. I didn't take two steps back. I took 20! It's all Satan. He is trying to attack me from all sides, but I won't allow it. I won't give Up! I'm going to kick this disease...
I ate an english muffin with peanut butter for breakfast. I felt guilty because it was probably about 400 calories, so I need to be careful not to overeat at lunch...
I purged, and I then I ride my cabinet of "trigger" foods. An alcoholic wouldn't keep alcohol in his house, so why should I keep things like peanut butter, chocolate or ice cream in mine...
I want to go to the grocery store and get some ice cream and eat until I can't move. Why? Because I am lonely and I feel overweight and hopeless to ever lose the weight I need to lose...
If Jessica Alba is the standard by which mean judge women, then I will just have to do all that I can to look like Jessica Alba...
Unfortunately I have to get in the shower, which means I'm gonna have to look at my fat thighs...
I don't want to be afraid to have dessert every once in a while, but I don't wnat to have large amounts of it in an effort to avoid feeling how I feel at the time...
If I start binging and purging, it's hard to stop. Sometimes it's like an out-of-body experience. I literally feel like something is controlling me and I can't stop...

I'm not going to write much of a response, except to say this: If what you just read reminds you of yourself or someone you know, please feel free to contact me at jennprentice@gmail.com. I'd love to send some encouragement--and some resources-- your way.

Finally, I want you to know that it is only by God's grace that I can sit here and say that I no longer struggle with an eating disorder. Sure, I still have my "fat days" (mostly around a certain time of the month), but binging and purging are not even a thought in my head. My life is a living testimony to Philippians 4:13.

To close, I'll leave you with a link to a song called "More Beautiful You" by Christian artist Johnny Diaz. (I'm sure all you K-Love listeners are familiar with it already.) It's everything I would have said to myself if I had known me then...

Until Tomorrow,
Jennifer Lynn

P.S.- I'm pictured above with my college roommates, Leah and Haley, who initially called my parents during our freshman year to alert them to my eating disorder.

Fall Fashion From N-Z by Zee...Finally!

Alright. After much delay, I'm finally sitting down to write the second half of Monday's entry: My take on Elle Magazine Creative Director Joe Zee's Guide to Fall Fashion from A to Z. The unfortunate thing is that the last half of this list (N-Z) is incredibly disappointing. Zee was clearly grasping at straws to connect a trend to a letter of the alphabet.

Nonetheless, I promised you I'd finish the list--and you know how strongly I feel about list making. FYI- Elle's website keeps crashing my browser, so I'm having a tough time linking the individual trends to their original pages. If you want to see the original article, check out www.Elle.com/fashion. Here goes:

Nuts & Bolts- Or, studs and spikes. This goes along with my anti-rocker chick thing. Not a fan. However, I realize that some of you may be a little more hard core than I am, so I'd suggest checking out Jimmy Choo's new line of handbags and shoes for H&M. Cheap for Choo, but still too pricey for my blood. Lots of nuts & bolts detailing to be found on some of the shoes, though.

Over the Knee- I'm five foot one and three-fourths inches. (Believe me, the 3/4 inch counts when you're under five foot three.) If something's going over my knee, it might as well be a pair of fishing waders. For you leggier broads, though, i think it's a fabulously sexy idea. Unfortunately, the higher the boot, the higher the price. Good luck finding a pair for under $150. If you've got a Charlotte Russe near you, check these out. (I don't recommend purchasing online, as I'm guessing they look pretty cheap in real life, and you'd probably have to send them back.)

Puff Piece- Remember back to 8th grade when everyone was buying those big, Down Timberland jackets? Well, apparently they're back in style this season. If, like me, you gave your fluffy stuff to Goodwill a few years ago, I wouldn't rush out and purchase something puffy just to say you have it. I predict that this is one trend that will fade with the season. If you do feel the need fluff up your wardrobe, I'd recommend purchasing investment (a.k.a- expensive) pieces like a North Face parka or, my personal favorite, a quilted Chanel handbag--or the knock-off creation from up-and-coming Los Angeles based designer tenoversix.

Queensland- Think purple crushed velvet. Yeah. I'm repulsed too. The best way to wear this trend is a Juicy Suit or anything in royal purple. Personally, I'm waiting for this jacket to go on sale.

Realtime- Watches. You've already got one. It's now "officially" en vogue to wear it.

Surrealism- I can't really even describe this trend adequately. The best word I can think of is weird. None of this stuff looks like anything you could wear outside of the runway.

Think Pink- BCBG (favorite designer EVER) is my go-to retailer for fall brights, including hot pink. I'm crushing on this long cardi-wrap and this textured tube skirt. They're both around $130, but will more than likely go on sale.

Updated Updo- This is not fashion! This is a hairstyle! In protest, I will say no more.

Very Furry- Leave it to Lilliana--author of CheapChicas.com-- who I've touted before on this blog. This brown faux leather motorcycle jacket is two trends in one (fur and aviator) and comes in at just $72.99. I've already told Santa about it!

Waterproof- Once again, I'm not sure this is a full-on trend. However, I recommend two pieces: Burberry Rain Boots (investment) and Maybelline's Volume Lash Waterproof Mascara ($6.99 at drugstores, WalMarts and Targets everywhere). In fact, waterproof or not,Volume Lash is the best "cheap" mascara I've ever tried.

Xtreme Eyes- Make-up, not fashion, but if you're wanting to experiment with smokey eyes, check out Almay eyeshadows and eyeliners. The Intense-I line is my favorite. It stays on all day for a fraction of the price of designer labels.

Yellow- This is by far my favorite trend on the list. Once again, I'm going back to BCBG for my recommendation. (Sorry! I know this entire list hasn't been as cheap as the first one.) This sweater is priced at $128, but like I said before, BCBG knows how to throw a sale. I'm planning to make a trip to LA before Christmas, so I'll keep my eyes and ears open.

Zoology- I love animals, but I like wearing them in moderation. Shoes or scarves always add the right amount of "fun" for me. Try these animal print pumps from DSW ($39.99)

Well, I'm done. I hope you guys found at least one thing you liked on this list. Sorry it wasn't as useful as items A-M. Well, I should probably hop in the shower...Time for work. Yay for Friday!

See you this weekend for installment number two of Letters To My Former Self.

Until Tomorrow,
Jennifer Lynn

Photo courtesy of BCBG.com

This Is What I Look Like When I Wake Up Late...

Unfortunately, waking up late also means I didn't get to post an entry this morning. Check back later today, and as always, thanks for reading!