It Really Is A Wonderful Life

I cannot believe I’m writing this post from 30,000 ft over the Pacific! I realize this recent leap in technology might not be a necessity but I’m still pretty amazed by it. Well, we’re finally en route to celebrate Frank’s 40th, which just happens to be New Years at the gloriously remote “Villa del Faro” in Baja, Mexico and we couldn’t be more ecstatic! Our plan for the next week involves little more than eating Mexican food, drinking margaritas, dreaming about the future and watching the humpbacks annual return to the The Sea of Cortez. Exhale…

With 2011 ahead of me like a blank white canvas, I’m looking forward to having some much needed reflection time. Of course I immediately began doing the thing I think a lot of us do at the end of every year, contemplating the plethora of things I’d like to change/do differently or achieve next year but you know what? I don’t want to think about all the things I want or haven’t done yet—not when there are so many fantastic moments that have! So this year I’ve decided to take a brand new approach. I’m going write a different kind of list, one that celebrates all the important people, places and randomly wonderful things that made 2010 a great year to be alive.

Without a doubt I can pinpoint the exact snowy night, the NY hotel room and the black and white classic responsible. Like millions of people, I’ve watched It’s A Wonderful Life every December for as long as I can remember and inevitably cry every time. But this Christmas something happened to me at the end where George Bailey opens Clarence’s copy of Tom Sawyer and reads that simple inscription, “Dear George, Remember, no man is a failure who has friends.”

As the tears welled up in my eyes something in me shifted. This last year has given me so much to be grateful for, and as much as I would love for every year to be even better than the last, I refuse to have it dictated by some daunting list of ambitious resolutions. Instead, I’m choosing to spend this New Years Eve contemplating the power of love and friendship–our only real currency in life. I plan on taking this truth into the new year and every year after and for the annual reminder I say, “Attaboy Clarence… Attaboy!

My personal 2010 list of Earthly delights:

• A new found respect for the much maligned anchovy.
• The Hotel Particuliere Monmartre, Paris.
• A handsome husband who bakes his own bread and ferments his own Kimchee.

• Alice Water’s Chez Panisse dinnerware collection at Heath Ceramics.
• Smelling my way through the lilacs at The Descanso Garden.
• Seizing any opportunity to use the word “Glamping.”

• The cemitas from Pal Cabron on 8th and Irolo in Los Angeles.
• The Charlotte Gainsbourg concert at La Cigalle (even without air conditioning.)
• The opening of Eataly in NYC.
• The thai basil/pineapple slushy at Wat Dong Moon Lek.
• Finally reading I’m with the Band by Pamela De Barres.

• Being dwarfed by a giant gold lion at the Chanel Fall/Winter 2011 Haute couture show in Paris.
• Our garden guru Jimmy Williams publishing his own book Seed To Skillet
• The inspired writing of Lisa Borgnes Giramontes on abloomsburylife.blogspot.com.

• Kate Moss’ multicolored clutch for Longchamp.
• Attending a dinner party grilled entirely by Bobby Flay.

• Milking a goat and learning to make chevre at Happy Acres Goat Farm in Templeton, CA.
• Discovering the wonder of the Green Zebra tomato.
• Jamie Oliver’s 20 Minute Meals iPhone app.
• Louis CK’s weird, amazing new show.

• Drinking beer with the locals at The Salty Dawg in Homer, Alaska.
• Chatting about Halloween costumes with Martha Stewart at her Bedford compound in Connecticut.
• Sunday roast chicken dinners.
• Michael Pollan’s wisdom finally being heard by Congress.
• Backstage Dior by Roxanne Lowit.
• Boozy brunches with the ladies at Little Dom’s.

• Kenny Fucking Powers.
• Learning all I’ll ever need to know about eating seasonally and the complexities of turkey mating from Barbara Kingsolver in Animal, Vegetable, Miracle.
• Patton Ozwalt’s tweets.
• The Greenwich Hotel in Tribeca.
• Working with Miles Aldridge.
• The Mango Michelada from Loteria.
• The amazing characters in Katherine Stockett’s The Help.
• Meeting Rick Bayless in his kitchen at The Frontera Grill.

• Burberry’s sheer eyeshadow in almond.
• Who ever you are that built the Golden Girls altar for the Dia De Los Muertos celebration at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery.
• Tom Ford’s Lipstick collection.

• Standing amongst the ancient horticultural treasures in Madame Ganna Walska’s Lotusland.
• Being surprised with a Macbook Air for my birthday.
• Jon Stewart and Steven Colbert’s Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear.
• Frank hosting our first Whisky tasting party.
• Breaking Bad, what in God’s name took me so long?
• My dad and I baking the carrot souffles for our annual Easter feast.
• American Vogue photographing Dries Van Noten’s home garden in Antwerp, Belgium.

• January Jones’ red lip moment at the Golden Globes.
• The XX.
• The repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.
• Bill Maher’s “New Rules.”
• Biba eating her first homegrown tomato naked in our garden.

• Chowing down BBQ oysters on Tomales Bay.
• Chanel Particuliere nail polish.
• The Eton Mess at the Breslin.

• Turning Emma Stone into Charlie Chaplin for her SNL host portrait.
• Florence and her Machine.
• Getting a tour of Thomas Keller’s kitchen at Per Se after eating possibly the most decadent meal ever.
• Wondering what I did before Make Up For Ever invented HD concealer.

• Stumbling upon the Cool Haus Ice Cream sandwich truck for the first time and finding out that even the wrapper is edible!
• Lisa Eldridge’s awesome makeup blog.
• Seeing Monet’s water lilies with my own eyes at his garden in Giverny.
• My khaki canvas Isabel Marant Boots.

• Tailoring my own Tonkastu Ramen at Shin Sen Gumi in Rosemead.
• Having friends who would scour every souk in Morocco to find me the perfect Beni Ourain rug.
• Girls nights at Hankook Spa in Korea Town.
• The Tacos Derados de Camaron truck at Olympic and Dakota (Thank you Cindy Snow.)
• Our herd of hilarious torties and tabbies: Dashiell, Rip-a-lee, Django (aka Mr. Lickers) and Minette.

Happy New Year!