Welcome Spring! Evenings are lighter and longer, the weather is warming up and we’re ready to dine outside without our toes freezing! Here are five things to make this weekend fun and fabulous.
Watch
My favorite Lin-Manuel Miranda musical isn’t Hamilton (although I love that one), it’s In the Heights. I saw it with Miranda in the lead role when it opened on Broadway, I’ve seen it in London and Chicago, and I would see it again in a second. It’s coming to HBO Max and theaters on June 18 and I for one can’t wait. In the meantime, here’s the trailer. Looks so good!
Read
Our bookclub is tackling Caste by Isabel Wilkerson and while it’s not light reading, it is engaging and thought provoking. Wilkerson outlines the hierarchy of human divisions and points to a way out of the destructive patterns of race, class and power that divides America. The Atlanta spa shootings—a hate crime of racist violence against mostly Asian women—brought home how much we all need to work to educate ourselves on the roots of America’s racism.
I also needed something a little lighter to read this week, so I revisited Home Cooking: A Writer in the Kitchen and More Home Cooking: A Writer Returns to the Kitchen, both by Laurie Colwin. I first read Colwin’s essays when I was in my early 20s, and I credit Colwin with giving me permission to enjoy feeding my family and friends. She died in 1992 at the too young age of 42, but her calm, can-do attitude toward food and sustenance remains a guiding point for me.
Beauty
This endorsement comes with a bunch of caveats. Blinc, $26 is the mascara I use every day, but I’m only recommending it if you’re an eye rubber who ends the day with raccoon-like circles around your eyes by mid-afternoon. That was me! I tried waterproof mascara, expensive mascara (I’m looking at you Dior!), but I still ended up with a greasy tissue, cleaning up under my eyes. Blinc absolutely solves that problem. It doesn’t give you the thickest or longest coverage, but you won’t end up with circles of smear under your eyes and it miraculously washes off with just warm water at the end of the day.
Do
Several friends have told me about recent health scares—all thankfully turned out to be minor and solvable—because we’ve all put off going to the doctor for routine checkups. This article on NPR reminds us that we shouldn’t wait, we should schedule those mammograms, skin checks and pap smears today! Self care is more than bubble baths!
Buy
All I want to purchase right now is something green and growing. To help keep a new houseplant alive, follow the always excellent @happyhappyhouseplant on IG for tips on watering and even propagating. Turn that one Monstera plant into a forest of green or keep that ZZ alive and growing.
Style Challengers 