Rock & Swap thank you's and love you's.

Oh, Rock & Swap attendees!  Sarah and I cannot thank you enough for coming out and kicking it with us on Saturday. We had a terrific time, and your fun-loving attitudes were, for me, a tasty dollop of awesome.

Before everyone arrived, Sarah's sweet husband and ridiculously adorable daughter, Avery, were there to help set up.  Now, Reader.  Look at this child, and tell me she won't someday leave a mile-long trail of broken hearts in her wake?

For serious! Girlfriend's got model face and everything! This one picture of her talking with Erin (one of our bartenders at Beauty Bar) just kills me:

I'm not sure if you can't quite make out her little hand pointing at him, but needless to say Avery is establishing something pretty important here. (Maybe it was the fact that she and I were literally dressed in the same outfit. Dress + tights + boots. Avery, I'm calling YOU girl next time I've got a style crisis).

One of the things Avery said to me, though, was this: "Mommy must be happy that so many people are helping her!" And she is totally right, so I want to pause here and give a big public thank-you to Treaty Oak Rum, Beauty Bar, the totally beautiful women operating the on-site Cupcake Bar (Lori Schneider and her assistant, Rachel), the foxy minx Stephanie Villalobos and her Laced With Romance crew, and loveball Laurie Gallardo from KUT for donating your time and services. This was my first swap, and you guys made it kind of magical for Sarah and me!

Anyway, back to the event. The first arrivals were these three women who showed up just a few minutes before we got started, and promptly made me feel like a million bucks. They walked directly over to my contributions, held a dress up, and one of them said: "PARTY TIME." Yes, party time! That's exactly what that dress said to me, too! Then, one of them held up a shoe, and said: "this is too CUTE, I just want to eat it." (PS: I don't think she did). Operations were crazypants at times, but each moment I looked up, people were laughing, trying things on, and just generally enjoying the madness. I saw my buddy Candace (genius Electric Promotions gal, and designer of our event poster) about four times at the event, and each time I did, she appeared to be wearing an entirely different outfit. This made me grin like like a fool.

During the event, I also learned that:

A) Retail workers deserve the utmost respect, because I probably burnt 1,000 calories running around that night, and

B) There were a LOT of things we can improve if we do it again in the future (better lighting, perhaps cap it at a small number of people...we completely welcome your suggestions to make it run more smoothly, and know that we've got a lot to learn).

After all of it was said and done, there were 14 leftover bags of clothing from the event to donate to Arc of Texas!  They are on their way over to my house as we speak, and speaking of non-profits/volunteering, I want to give a shout-out to our sweet friends and family members who were our volunteer "crew" for the evening at the swap. Damn, y'all are rockstars.  There was one guy there who was like my hanger ninja, and infiltrated all crowded clothing areas to dive in and get the empty hangers for items not already on the floor. Hanger Ninja, whomever you are, you get a serious high five.

Here are the items I nabbed for moi...  

Pause. This Zara top is divine as is. But don't you like it even more when Claudia models it?

Here are two photos taken with a different camera of me wearing a blousy knit sweater I got at the swap.  They aren't the clearest pictures in the world but, alas, film. She's an unpredictable muse.

Haha. Definitely blurry! Oh well.

Thank you again, everyone. And Mom if you are reading this, thank you especially for coming out, laughing with all the girls, showing off your finds, and basically being my cheerleader in every little life endeavor. Hope you're having fun in Vegas right now, and I love you.