Carousel: Week Ending 12th February 2010
[ 12 February 2010 ]
Good morning!
First up, some housekeeping!
You may have noticed we have a new header… Do a hard refresh if you can’t see it! The photo of the blossoms was taken last year in Washington Square Park — I’ve put it there as a way of trying to will Spring to come a little faster! Fingers crossed, huh? The photos of me are by Chloe Rice, the photobooth picture was taken at Otto’s Shrunken Head & the other two pictures are of things in my office! I hope you like it, I think it has an optimistic Spring/Summer vibe, & it makes me really happy to look at it!
ALSO, henceforth, the “iCiNG” name is no more! It’s a name I came up with over three years ago & it’s time to shed it, like a snakeskin! The site is now called Gala Darling or galadarling.com, whichever you prefer, & it makes much more sense. Don’t worry, though! You are all still my nonpareils & I still love you!
Thanks for listening! xo
Panda-monium: Sixteen panda cubs pose for a class shot on their first day at nursery ahhhhhh!
gapingvoid’s thoughts on blogging, 2010. Amen.
I never ever ever play games online but Robot Unicorn Attack makes me laugh so hard!
Jump into the steel hooves of a robot unicorn, prancing freely amongst the lush purple grasses and rainbow-strewn backdrops of your wildest fantasies.
Plus, the music is a loop of Erasure (!!!!!!) & sometimes your unicorn gets decapitated. I like it a lot.
So this guy is doing this thing, The 100 Girls 100 Days Project. I found out about it as I was browsing through Craigslist. He’s dating one girl a day for 100 days, & he’s almost finished. It’s kinda interesting & weird all at the same time. I like people who do projects like this, though. I read about a girl in Time Out New York who decided to go to a party a night for 50 nights, & then realised it was so much fun that she kept it up. Sometimes forcing yourself to stick to a schedule is a great way of breaking a boring routine.
Never Too Much Glitter is a blog all about nailpolish & cute manicures.
Jennifer Hawkins Takes Stand For Natural Beauty, aka poses nude for Marie Claire & says no to photoshopping.
I am absolutely fascinated by this before/after photo of Heidi Montag, & I really & truly have no judgment of her for doing any of those things. While I prefer her “before” looks, I think cosmetic surgery is amazing. Her face has been completely re-shaped! Regardless of how you feel about cosmetic surgery, you have to agree that the science behind it is quite brilliant & clever.
Ally emailed me about this rad, FREE eBook, How To Be Remarkable!
BEFORE I DIE I WANT TO… is a cool Polaroid project… which you should contribute to.
Sok, who is a huge sweetie, emailed me to tell me about her friend’s fundraising efforts for Haiti.
She wanted to raise 1,000 (NZ) for the earthquake effort and if she did she would wear a cardboard box for a day – which she did super quickly! Her next goal was 10,000 and she would get a little tattoo if she reached that much. I’ve been completely blown away by her awesomeness, she seems like a quiet and shy person when you first meet her, and then she goes and does something like this off her own bat and follows through with it :)
P.S. I made this is a DIY blog. Thanks for the link Latha!
I love these quotes by John O’Donohue!
Will You Be E-Mailing This Column? It’s Awesome. People share news online that inspires awe, researchers find. CASE IN POINT BABY!
Wikifashion Needs Contributors! Wikifashion was started by nonpareil Madeline, & it is brilliant! Dive in & get involved!
I met Keiko Lynn at the Fashion 2.0 Awards on Wednesday night. She is adorable & very sweet.
If you didn’t get any invitations to Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week, don’t worry! Most of the designers are streaming their shows live! Click the link to see the list. It’s just like being front row, except better, because you can watch while wearing your pyjamas & eating a packet of biscuits. Word!
Fafi has a new range for adidas Originals which is amazing. That jacket! & the shoes with sequinny holographic panels?! Ahhhhhhhh!!!
(Yes, lots of Nitrolicious links! I love Wendy.) Louis Vuitton has a new range of handbags, thoughts? I love those tails but I really, really, really wish they were fake.
I am not really a sneakers gal, but Jimmy Choo is releasing a capsule sneaker collection & it’s pretty cute. I like those blue ones! I love the Jeremy Scott for adidas Originals too.
New Zealand Design Blog is a round-up of cool creative stuff coming out of NZ. I mean, hello!!! The writing is funny & very NZ too, I reckon… !
In other news, don’t you love the word brooch? It looks one way, sounds another. Sneaky.
Overcoming Creative Block. Comments a go-go!
Awesome: “Harper’s Bazaar’s Personal Style Competition is looking for one fabulously stylish winner, who will receive a trip to New York City, a photo shoot to be published in a future issue of Harper’s Bazaar and a $10,000 shopping spree provided by Saks Fifth Avenue…” Who wouldn’t want to win this?! Enter here!
Beyond Happiness & Unhappiness, an interview with Eckhart Tolle.
Commercials Are the Culprit in TV-Obesity Link from the NY Times.
But research shows that young children are exposed to about 30 hours of food-related advertising annually…
Spy Emerson Reflects On Swimming Cities, ahhh, beautiful! I wish there were more pictures!
Free Advice. Fantastic. A guy in Copenhagen spent a week, five hours each day, giving free advice & coffee to people on the street. I would love to do this. Check it out.
Can best friends be good life partners?
Click on A Clipper In The Clouds to read about the Aircruise — a hotel in the sky which travels slowly, is powered by natural energy & has windows which can be opened…
One Step Closer is a figure skating exhibition to benefit the prevention & treatment of HIV/AIDS. It’s in New York on March the 27th & it’s only $15. Thanks to Yukino for letting me know! It’s a very worthy cause, check it out.
Radical Self Love Central!
Check Yourself: Accidentally Contributing to Media Standards from The Demoiselles is about sisterhood & how we sometimes use our sisterhood to attack other women. Definitely something to think about. It is brill. Read it!
Allegra’s doing The Self Love Project!
@holleighz shows off her radical self love totem! Aw, beautiful!
A fantastic idea for Radical Self Love is having an inspiration day like Verhext did. Alone or with a friend, it’s an amazing way to get yourself tuned back into the “cosmic hum” (as she puts it!).
Woooooooooo, check out Madly In Love With Me Day! (Feb 13th!) Thanks to Siona for the link!
Rachel’s 10 Self Love Commandments!
I’ve linked to Operation Beautiful before but it deserves another plug… I was reminded of it by @crimson_kisses!
Your Love Mantra by astrological sign! Awesome, I love it. Thanks @hachikoxbb!
Oola wrote about Radical Self Love in Finnish!
Alzy’s Fashion Friday: Radical Self Love Wardrobe post is fantastic.
I believe radical self love starts with lingerie, macaroons. There is no time I feel sexier & more accepting of my body than when I’m strolling around my apartment in some knockout skivvies.
Oh, you are so adorable.
“Every atom in your body came from a star that exploded. &, the atoms in your left hand probably came from a different star than your right hand. It really is the most poetic thing I know about physics: You are all stardust. You couldn’t be here if stars hadn’t exploded, because the elements -– the carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, iron, all the things that matter for evolution and for life -– weren’t created at the beginning of time. They were created in the nuclear furnaces of stars, & the only way for them to get into your body is if those stars were kind enough to explode. So, forget Jesus. The stars died so that you could be here today.”
(Lawrence Krauss) (via The Animal Orchestra)
Have an incredible weekend!
Love & love & love,
Tags: carousel Follow me on Twitter! Listen to my latest podcast! Love & Sequins 9: Manifesting & magic-making!
Thanks for linking my Radical Self Love Wardrobe, Gala! I’m glad you enjoyed it.
I love 100 Girls 100 days & found him on CL as well. I thought it would be a chauvinistic, Tucker Max-esque project, but it’s not. This guy actually has great ways of looking at his dates (most of the time).
“Before I die I’d like to be possessed by Satan” — Beyond genius. I’d love to do this before I’m 30! :D
I miss the iCiNG name…starting to feel less and less like a community and more a blog about Gala being wonderful. Even with the radical self love project.
Regardless, I still read this regularly.
Hi Gala! This is only the second time I have ever commented after reading your site for over two years. I was “inspired” because of the link to the new Louis Vuitton bags – I kind of sat there with my mouth hanging open. The backpack with the tassels and keychain/phonecord-thingys hanging off of it on the 3rd page is pretty atrocious! Some of the bags are great. Some are really awesome if you have a lot of long things to carry around in them…
And I agree about the foxtails – pretty awesome, but not if you don’t want the real thing! Although, I’ve had a purple foxtail attached to my bag for awhile now that I got at the Texas Renaissance Fair and it only cost $10 – it’s real (and now I feel guilty!) but I think the store had faux-fur ones as well, in a spectrum of colors and sizes.
Beccalise — I hear you, I just don’t feel like the name fits any more. I was never really happy with it & when someone suggested I get rid of it a couple of weeks ago, I was like, “YES!”. Not to mention that people always mistyped it (like “iCiNg” or “iCInG” or whatever) & they get confused because the title & the URL are different. The change makes sense to me — regardless of how you slice it, this is my blog, so calling it galadarling.com seems to be logical. (Like nubbytwiglet.com, jazzimcg.com, thisisstar.com, mollycrabapple.com etc. etc. etc.) & I’m sorry that you feel like it’s a blog about me being wonderful, that’s not the intention — I’m just sharing my life, as I have been since the beginning…
That Unicorn game is SO addicting and now I think I need to go invest in a little Erasure ~
‘Before I die, I want to be possessed by satan’. HAAAH, aim high!
Glad you liked the astro link, Gala. I definitely wrote mine (Leo!) in my Radical Self-Love Bible (RSLB) right across the page from another cool mantra I found (Om Namah Shivaya—roughly translated, it means “Greetings to She Who I am Becoming” and/or “With great respect, I honor my heart”).
P.S. Love the new banner. Probably my favorite one yet.
P.P.S. Have any amazing V-day plans? (or amazing V-day outfits planned?)
emily — !!!!!!!! Om Namah Shivaya, wow, those translations are two of the best things I have EVER HEARD. Okay, have to do something with that. Beautiful!! Thank you so much for sharing!
P.S. Thanks! I love it too! I feel like it’s all light & happy! Even though it took me a zillion years to put it together, haha.
P.P.S. Actually, yes… Chinese New Year celebrations with my beloved & then a hot date with Betsey Johnson! (AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH.) It’s gonna be good. Details to come! How about you?
should I take offense to the “weird” part of that comment?
Well, sadly, I have to work on Valentine’s. Not-so-sadly, we are celebrating tonight. But the details are a surprise! If it involves sushi & couple’s massage like I think it may, I will be a very lucky girl (Oh, who am I kidding? No matter what we do, I’m fabulously lucky!)...I’m actually headed over to the mall to look for the perfect outfit right now…You’ve reminded me that I should wear my Betsy Johnson rose earrings, however. Your plans sound amazing!!
Enjoy your day & I’m glad the mantra inspired you also! ;)
Travis Dillinger — Haha, no! Not at all. If you ask me, weird is the highest compliment. Kudos on your project. Did you get a book deal yet?!
Actually, what’s weird is that I have mentally been thinking of this site as Galadarling.com for while now and not iCiNG. It feels like the natural progression of things if you ask me.
I don’t have a book deal yet, why do you have any connections to help make that happen? :)
Jennifer Hawkins looks that perfect WITHOUT any photoshopping? Well no wonder she didn’t mind doing it. Apart from a slight crease in her side because of the position she is sitting in I don’t really see what they would have photoshopped anyway. I’m pleased to hear her admit she looks so great because she exercises and eats well, I hate when models etc are like “Yeah, I eat burgers and chocolate all day, this is just how I look naturally”, doesn’t send a good message about healthy lifestyle choices, and makes those of us not ‘naturally’ thin and toned feel worse.
I was a bit surprised when I saw that the “iCiNG” was gone. I liked it but the show must go on, and it wouldn’t do any good if this space stayed the same.
I love all the self-love links!
The name change makes sense to me. I was wondering what was up with the old one.
BTW I really enjoyed this carousel week ending, particularly the pandas. I’m crazy about them. :]
Heidi Montag makes me a little sad. She was absolutely beautiful to begin with and her need to change herself just reflects the negative self image people in the industry feel. D:
the name change makes sense but it makes me sad :(
also, you’re missing the horoscopes on the header now!
and don’t forget to update your RSS feed, it’s still showing up as iCiNG for me. :)
The change from iCiNG to Gala Darling makes sense to me – it made me giggle when I read people were always mistyping it, because I always had to come back to the website to make sure I got it right!
I love the astrology love mantra idea…too bad Libra isn’t up yet!
I think the things cosmetic surgery can do are amazing, but I have to wonder about the upkeep! Wouldn’t you have to go in for regular re-fixing of your face?
Good Carousel this week, thanks for the links! :)
Thanks for the ‘overcoming creative block,’ it came at a great time.
Also, you can add me to the list of supporters of the name change. :)
I think we broke the unicorn game.
I just wanted to link you, Gala and anybody else who is interested, to my self love-blog I just wrote my first entry in:
polkadottedelephants.blogspot….
And I also wanted to say that I love the single ladies-flashdance and the self love-video. <3
I found this site one day two years ago while searching for “Icing vegetable hair dye” just sayin…
Thank you so much for linking to my radical self love commandments Gala. I think the name change makes perfect sense as I was one of the many that could never remember how it was spelt!
I think its really cool that there is a website about things people want to do before they die. I actually have a list that i keep adding to when i get ideas some of them are simple like holding my first child and others are a little off beat like baking my own wedding cake! I really think everybody should have one because im not really the person to have the patience with a journal!
Gala Darling is once again my favorite place to visit. I love all the new stuff you’ve been doing lately, and I actually dig the name change. I never understood what iCiNG meant…
Oh, and I just did a blog post on Why Single Chicks Need Sexy Lingerie too. I know you’re all relationship-happy and stuff (and so am I, actually), but I thought it might be good read for your peeps. :-)
www.stockingsandlingerieblog.c…
I have always thought of this blog as galadarling hehe. I love thw new banner and I think people come here for what gala darling has to share…and then what others have to say..so it’s gala and the community making icing. Calling it and coming here to gala darling makes more sense.
I have a carousel suggestion!
hipsterpuppies.tumblr.com/
It’s the funniest/cutest thing ever.
Also, you are great, Gala! I am a freelance writer and I bought your Love and Sequins #7 about professional blogging. I got a great deal of excellent, applicable tips. Thanks again!
i love the new banner, gala – especially the blossoms (desperately longing for spring here too!)
and the pandas! oh the pandas!!
p.s. absolutely loving self-love month…i’m learning a lot about being really joyfully alive...and tomorrow i’m going shopping. heckyes.
Happy weekend! xx
OMG GALA THE PANDAS!!!! Hahaha! I have a new desktop now, that is for sure. I can’t believe I’m still giggling.
Also, the new heading is fabulous!
I really support you in dropping the icing thing. I never really got the meaning of that anyways?
Also, your carousel this week is rad! If I want to send you in the direction of something, do I e-mail you or just add it in a comment?
P.s. i made this… is a great find.
I just got the perrrfect book for my Radical Self Love Bible. :) stoked. <3 I’ll blog about it more & link it up soon.
Also, everyone who reads this site are very lovely people. so cute & nice.
*Hi Becky from Boston!
xxo
GALA! Please check out my blog and my flickr, i promise that you will LOVE IT!
quitecheekygirl.blogspot.com
you are an inspiration to me! the radical self-love program is helping me in so many ways! ;)
i just danced and jogged on my treadmill for 45 minutes without feeling like a goof. i plan to keep this up everyday!
champagne kisses and fairy-tale wishes,
chelsea nicole
xxoo
Love the name change, but I think getting plastic surgery comes from a radical self-hatred & realllyyyy isn’t something that should be promoted during radical self love month! Heidi Montag needs to listen to Love & Sequins #1 & learn to love herself just the way she was made :)
I LOVE YOU!!!!
Thankyou so much for mentioning Nicola’s efforts :)
I too am fascinated by Heidi Montag’s new look, and it’s nice to hear someone not judging her for it.
Also I believe I should start more days with lingerie and macaroons – awesome. :)
I don’t know about anyone else, but the 100 Girls/100 Days blog kind of skeeves me out. I read a few pages of it, and the whole thing seems rather creepy and misogynistic, especially given that none of the girls know that they are part of this “project.” If they consented to being a part of it, that would be one thing, but the way it is the whole project seems pretty ick.
Still, great carousel on the whole! The “Before I Die…” project is amazing.
“The Playgirl’s Guide to Radical Self Love” is a fantastic tag line for your site!
I’ve been wondering what all the fuss about Heidi Montag was about. Thanks for the link to that layout. She looked really youthful and unique beforehand, her post op appearance seems to be just another hollywood cliche. In fact she now seems to look 28 rather than 23?
C’est la vie, at least her surgery turned out well and she’s happy with herself now. That makes it ok, regardless of how the rest of the world feels, you cant really put a price on personal happiness. Just hope that she stays happy.
Ha, I never even call it iCING anyway, its always been galadarling.com to me.
Becky’s video was soooo adorable! I love seeing other readers and being reminded of how similar, yet fantastically different we all are!
Gala, like Sam, I had forgotten about icing as well actually, Galadarling is what it is to me and I adore it – and you still!
I do like to think of this site as icing on top of a cake; the really sweet, good bits!
Those pandas are just so gosh darn cute!
Also loving 100 “single ladies”!!!!! That kind of advertising works for me.
Maybe you could advertise your website by having 100 Gala Darlings with pink hair, eating cupcakes and taking outfit photos. Or 100 fabulous ladies blissful in radical self love :D
Hi, dear Gala,
first time commenter (longish time reader) here. :) I wanted to say, I love the new name, congrats! It makes sense as this is really your blog, you create it the way it is, and are the reason people come back to it. I know I do.
Also, MAJOR thank you’s for the Radical Self Love project!
Just thought to let you know your search text still says iCiNG!
=)
I love what you’re doing gathering all these Radical Self-Love links. I myself have been blogging about Self-Love since it is my Word of the Year. I just wrote a Self-Love Manifesta today: vbook.blog.soulspackle.com/?p=...
(Btw, I’m on Twitter as @Soulspackle, but that account isn’t indexed in searches so hashtags don’t show up. I have been using @sarastellaria to use #radicalselflove :) )
hey gala!
i love the blossoms. reminds me of summer also.
and i like the idea of “before i die” thing hehehe. thanks for the links!
first : those pandas made my die
second : i love the guy whose dream is to be possessed by satan.
you always find the best things, i spend quite a bit of time clicking on the links then reading them – thansk for curing my boredom!
I always thought of your site as Gala Darling anyway :)
Thanks for the link to my How To Be Remarkable eBook! It’s a real honor to get a mention from such a wonderful site (full of such good-looking people) :)
Those Pandas are so adorable? At first glance I thought they were teddy bears, but they’re real ones! So cute:)
I also love your new header.
Totally agree with the name change…less confusing and at the end of the day, the blog has always been about your vision, your writing and a chance to connect with others and provide positive affirmation. It’s all channeled by you…so it makes perfect sense to call it galadarling.com. :)
I read a book once about a woman who said yes to every person who asked her out for a year. It’s called the year of yes :)
Some time ago, I needed to buy a building for my organization but I didn’t have enough cash and couldn’t order anything. Thank heaven my father suggested to take the <a href=“http://lowest-rate-loans.com/topics/business-loans”>business loans</a> from trustworthy creditors. Hence, I did that and used to be satisfied with my small business loan.