June 4th 2010, A pledge from Me---No Shoe Porn today

There are moments in a persons life that are truly indescribable, they change you, they stay with you forever, they bring incredible joy, and in truth most of us will only have handful of these moments during the course of our lives. I'm 33 years old now and 34 is right around the corner, so far I have had two of these moments.
The first moment came on an early morning in October 2003 when my niece Kassie was born. The second that a delivery room nurse named Dora placed her in my arms I was completely gone. She's bright and funny, sweet and affectionate, quick witted and bossy, she is curious and kind. She's my mini me and loves to take pictures and dress up. She's a handful to be sure, but lights up my days.


The second moment came in the twilight hours of February 2008 when my nephew Nicholas was born, it seems that my capacity to love doubled instantly the second I saw the doctor literally pull him out of my sister. My little boy is mischievous and sweet, huggable and grumpy, adventurous and shy. He's my little buddy and he means the world to me.


Every week I spend hundreds of dollars of shoes, make up, cabs, clothes and handbags. These things bring me momentary happiness and while I enjoy them and shopping I know their effect is fleeting and in no way compares to what Kassie and Nicholas bring to my life.
Nicholas has an unidentified syndrome that has multiple attached medical conditions. Right now it seems we know all we can know from his current doctors and additional information is needed, which means trips out of state and out of the country are necessary. Now even though I throw money around like it grows on trees we are not in the position to finance these trips. The money I spent on shoes in the month of April alone could have paid for an upcoming trip to Washington for Nicholas. I am aware of that now, and I'm disappointed with myself at the moment. But it's all good, I can make a conscious effort now.
My pledge is to simply think before I drop my card down on the counter of a store or restaurant. I'm not in a position to come up with vast amounts of funds but I can certainly make small adjustments in my spending that can have little to no impact on my daily living but can add up and give me the ability to donate towards my Nephews travels, doctors and to help others.
I take a cab to work and home every day which costs me $25 a day, if I take the bus home I will have saved $62.50 a week that I can put toward charitable efforts. I buy a $4.00 iced coffee at work every day, if I get my iced coffee at McDonald's it only costs $1.50 which will give me an extra $12.50 a week. What I'm trying to say is it's the little things that can be cut out and provide assistance to others, it seems like such a small thing but every individual dollar can help.
I am very aware of that now, possibly too aware. The amount of change that we can make happen for those in need by making these small adjustments to our daily lives is great.
I'd like to ask you all to look at your daily spending and see if you can make any changes, then pick any charity that moves you and help in any way you can.

For those of you that are interested in learning more about my little buddy please visit his website:
http://nicholasalexanderrivera.webs.com/

I also want to take a moment to thank all those who have been helping us in our efforts, we have great people around us helping by making donations, planing fundraisers, making raffle donations and donating time to our fundraisers and spreading the word. My sister Nicholas and I thank you all very much.

Shoe Porn or Shoe Horror's? Wicked Wednesday 5/12/2010

I'm switching things up again with this week's Wicked Wednesday installment. As I was surfing the internet looking for a pair of plus size bubble or tap shorts I stumbled upon a fascinating pair of shoes on torrid.com.

These wolf themed platform pumps by Iron Fist literally jumped out of the screen at me. The shoe features the image of a wolf with bloody fangs on the front peep toe and it's body is detailed throughout the body of the shoe, a dainty satin bow and red sole complete the shoe. They are appropriately called the "Wolfbeater" and are a part of a very varied and interesting range of bags and shoes by Ironfist.


So here comes the switcheroo, instead of talking up the shoe porn aspects of this shoe and relating them to a type of person as I usually do I'm posing the question "What do you think of this shoe?" Is is kitschy, innovative, avant-garde, scary or just plain ugly. I'm not really sure if I like this shoe, but I don't hate it and can of see how it works. It's falling in between kitschy and kind of ugly for me.

PS:I loved the responses I received to the shoe porn challenge and will be posting about it next week!!

Shoe Porn Challenge!--Wicked Wednesday 5/5/2010

I thought I would do something a bit different with this weeks shoe porn installment. First I selected a shoe that differs greatly from my previous selections and secondly I want to ask you the readers how you would wear it.
I have selected a recently purchased brogue(or oxford if you prefer) shoe from H&M. I love this shoe and I absolutely think that although its a canvas flat it qualifies as shoe pron. It's different, it's bold, it's sparkly and hey if worn in a certain way can be sexy.



Now as much as I love this shoe I quickly realized that I could only think of 1 outfit to wear it with and that was skinny jeans and a tee. Now I'll be honest I own many many many many many things that I have only worn once but times are tough and I am attempting to get more bang for my buck and would love to use this shoe more than once. It's simply too cute to be a wear once and toss aside item. Also I think that it has more than one way in which it can be used I just cannot think of any. Which is where you come in lovely readers, I want you to tell me how you would wear this shoe. What outfit of your own it works with is OK, or simply a recommendation like what type of clothing you think would work. Details are important, I do not need to know the makers of any items but style, cut and color are crucial. I am a very visual person so I am asking you to paint me a picture, or if you want to link to pictures that good as well.
There is an awesome website that I frequent called Polyvore.com. Polyvore allows users to create wardrobe collages with the millions of photos of clothes, shoes, accessories and backgrounds that have collected. It a great way to virtual "window shop", below is one of my recent polyvore set's. Please feel free to send me a polyvore if you would like, but it's not necessary.

Rock & Ruffles by tania831 featuring Rock and Republic shoes

Now I'm not going to ask you to do work without a reward, so the poster of the suggestion I select (hoping that I actually get at least 1 if not more) will be a guest blogger on a future Wicked Wednesday. You can select and write up a shoe porn selection and describe which type of partner the shoe represents.

EDITED TO ADD:
If you are going to use polyvore you do need to include the shoes in the set. Unfortunately a photo of the shoes is not available on H&M online and it takes great difficulty to add a non online store photos to a set.