Sitting on the beach with a margarita . . .
Doesn’t that sound great? Yeah, too bad I’m sitting in a snowy, slushy, frozen Manhattan, with nary a margarita in site. I have been channeling my dreams of beach vacations into my jewelry designs, however – hence, my Marseille necklace. Imagine sitting on a sea wall, sipping a glass of Cotes du Rhones, and gazing at the clear blue waters of the Mediterranean. Now that’s a vacation! 
Marseille Necklace
Only two more days til the Holiday Handmade Cavalcade . . .
Woo hoo!!!! It’s been a frenzy of activity here, what with getting ready for the Cavalcade this Saturday and spending most of last night stuffing the super-massive goody bags that 200 lucky early RSVP-ers will be getting. We also put together the five raffle bags, and let me tell you, I would seriously consider making extra purchases at the Cavalcade this weekend just to get more chances to win these insane prizes – the bags are stuffed with such beautiful products: full-sized soap, sterling silver jewelry, candles, beautiful notecards, beaded necklaces, and so much more. So come and check it out this weekend at the Knitting Factory!
On a different note, while I was in the suburbs this past week, I made a pilgrimage to one of my favorite spots, the Super Taget, and came across a snack that has truly blown my mind: the Archer Farms brand Dill Pickle Cashews. Seriously, pickle flavored nuts? Why hasn’t anyone thought of this before? I’m gonna try to get some pics of these beauties and put them up here so you can appreciate them in all their glory.
cheesy puffs
New York City is a fantastic place. It’s the kind of place where a person can leave their apartment at ten o’clock on a Monday night and obtain a slice of pizza, a bottle of rose, and a box of red henna, and be back on the couch watching Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservations within ten minutes. Living in New York, however, means you have to accept that there are certain things that are harder, if not impossible to obtain. Like toilet paper in those super-large bulk packs, or Mr. and Mrs. T’s Bloody Mary mix in the hefty-sized jugs with the pour-handles, or Chik-fil-a, or Patio Enchilada Dinners. But the most egregious of all these Big-City omissions is the insanely paltry variety of snack foods. Now don’t get me wrong, NYC the most fantastic city in the world for finding whatever you love when it comes to food, but what I’m talking about here is good old-fashioned chips, cheesy puffs, and corn chips in all the varieties that our suburban neighbors are lucky enough to enjoy.
Let me give you an example. In March, I flew to LA for my friend Matthew’s birthday. Within twenty minutes of de-planing, I had obtained a pirate’s booty worth of snacks: Cheetos Flamin’ Hot Limon, a special edition bag of Cheetos Enchilada flavor snacks (!), and a bag of Combos Egg, Bacon and Cheese flavored snacks *. I mean come on! Until recently, in New York I couldn’t even find a bag of the regular Flamin’ Hot Cheetos, and I emailed Frito Lay to see if I could order a case, which they denied. I also emailed them to see what ever happened to the Ranch Flavored Combos that I remember from my youth, and they told me they never existed**. So it was a double whammy.
So here’s my point: I never get any of the really cool flavors of snack foods. At least not before people in Scranton and Boise and Topeka get to try them. And if you had just found out that Ranch Flavored Cheetos actually EXIST, you would want to get your hands on them ASAP, right?! Here’s the proof:
Who doesn’t want to try these!?! Seriously, what could be better than ranch and Cheetos!
* if you ever see these, back away slowly. I am not kidding, I like some pretty weird stuff, but “egg” flavor totally has no place in a snack food.
** they DID exist, right!!?! I mean, I couldn’t have totally made this flavor up! They were completely insane!
