Instagram Recap: Portland I *Hearts Adore* You

Roses from the Portland Rose Garden

The City of Roses has a special place in my heart and this past visit really tugged at me. Perhaps it was because it was the first time that I really (like really) could see myself living there. Or maybe it was the first time it didn't feel like a city I was just visiting, but rather a city that I could stay in.

Last time we were in Portland, my fella and I had a jam packed schedule. This time around we were still out and about and going to all sorts of places, but it didn't feel scheduled, it just felt natural.

My favorite memory will probably be the day my friend Cari and I (we were in Portland at the same time, hooray!) were taken to Sauvie Island by her sister and her friend. Driving through fields of white flowers, seeing lone large trees in an expanse of farmland, noticing chipping old barns set against a beautiful Oregon summer sky... it was Heaven I tell you! I thought my heart would burst with happiness!

I remember thinking...this...THIS feeling. Where things are slow and moving, and you have time to notice beautiful things like ospreys hovering overhead and the way the breeze bends the long wild grass...

I also met up with several lovely people. Friends I have made through Instagram who have become friends in real life. It is just so wonderful to meet people you follow and have watched the world through their eyes and then to realize them in real life and discover they're just how you imagined them to be? I had such a terrific time breakfasting with Annie from Lantana Vintage, Solanah from Vixen Vintage and now American Threads, and Gretchen from The Neutral Territory. Thank you ladies for taking the time to meet up and break bread together! I always think the best conversations are those around a fine meal and a delicious cup of coffee (which Portland is brimming over with both!)

Ahhh...and the shopping, and the vintage! Oy vey! Portland has many, many, many delightful boutiques and vintage shops to whittle away your hard earned dollars! I only went to a few vintage shops this time around to source for vintage for my own shop (and my closet), but I did go to several wonderful other shops I've been following in Instagram for awhile including Yo Vintage, Lowell and Maven Collective where I had the absolute pleasure of meeting Jax of Tabor Vintage and Kim of Ethan Ollie. You ladies are so wonderful and wish I had more time to have chatted with you both to talk shop, pretty things, and general hoopla.

This is turning into the longest love letter I think to Portland (just kidding, I bet someone has written love letters to Portland and I bet there are VOLUMES of it).

I'm sure the photos speak for themselves and hopefully will say a lot more than I ever could about how much I love and absolutely adore the city of Portland.

I should just move there. LOL.

25,000 Instagram Fans! Thank you! Merci! Salamat!

Almost 3 years ago I signed up for this cool little app called Instagram posting pictures of my life's little happenings (cheese and wine afternoons with friends, farmers' market on Sundays...) and then it lead into little behind the scene peeks of what it was and is like to be a online vintage shopkeeper.

Throughout these few years it has been a wonderful joy (and sometimes bittersweet) to look back at these old photos and see where Adored Vintage and myself have come. While Instagram is the place where I share beauty and loveliness to inspire those that follow Adored Vintage on Instagram, it isn't lost to me all the not so lovely real life moments not shared and captured.

These photos from our Instagram are amongst our top liked photos ever. In a couple years time AV went from a few hundred followers to over 25,000 and I am humbled, overjoyed, and to be quite honest a little shock. Thank you for being inspiring and hopefully inspired!

As a thank you for your support, your love, and well, liking what we like (lovely and pretty moments), we are offering all of our social media fans 25% OFF their purchases in May with the code MUCHADORED. Simply enter it at checkout to save 25% OFF your vintage shop purchase.

{ Click here: Adored Vintage Shop }

Code valid for domestic and international customers. Not applicable for past purchases. May not be combined with other offers. Valid for 1 time use per customer. 

Travels in 2013 | A Year in Review

Another year is passing, a new one right around the corner. 2013 has been an incredible year and the next few days I am going to spend reflecting on this wonderful, crazy, blinked-and-then-its-gone year.

There were a couple times during this year that I really itched so badly to travel! When I was putting together these images it gave me some time to think about HOW MUCH I've actually traveled this year. How much I've done and accomplished. In 2014 I will hope to do much more and go to new places! 

Much of the traveling this year involved vintage buying trips along the West coast squeezed in with a visit with family and friends. Next year, I'll travel just to explore and experience new places. I've already looked into tickets for Ireland, Scotland, New Zealand, Italy... not sure yet where we will go...but someplace new. 

Above are some of the highlights of this past year's travels in Oregon, California, Arizona, and Florida. I'm so happy I have these little tokens of my travels, even though they're not overly exotic and not overly exciting. But most of the time I'm not looking for excitement. Most of the time I just want to soak in the surroundings, breathe in the air, and just BE IN THE MOMENT of where I am. Going away for a bit reminds me that there is so much more to life than work and all the itty bitty worries running a small business entails. 

Sometimes sitting above a hilltop overlooking the Pacific ocean is all the therapy I need for a stressful work week. You know I can look at each of these photos and remember what I was thinking! I'm so happy and so grateful for everything in my life when I look back on these pictures. These travel photos warm my heart perhaps more than photos of my studio. Those photos inspire and drive me to go further, to create more, to be more... but these photos of landscapes, of places I've seen and experienced...they are a breath of fresh air. A moment of solitude. Of contemplation. 

That everything right now is just how it is suppose to be, everything is wonderful, and life is good.

Vintage Clothing, All in the Details

One of my favorite things to do when I get a new batch of vintage clothing to process in the shop is to admire all the details of the garment. On Instagram I often will snap photos of the details of vintage clothing such as embroidery, lace, soutache, embellishment… but sometimes the insides of a vintage dress is so much more spectacular on the outside. I especially love discovering when dresses have pellon linings! For more peeks at vintage clothing details… give Adored Vintage a follow on Instagram!

Florida for Awhile: An Instagram Recap

I think every family is a little bit dysfunctional, but we learn to love each other anyway because that's what family is all about. You love each other despite one another's quirks and shortcomings.


It's been FIVE years since I've seen my little sister and my Mom! My family back story is a little complicated, so I won't go into it, but this past week spending time with my family have been so wonderful!

Then a few days later, my fella flew down and joined us in the sunshine state (and met my Mom and sister for the first time!) My past week was spent getting a little r&r, doing some vintage buying for the shop, playing pickle ball with my Dad + sis, ping pong with my Mom + sis, going to Disney, and laughing with my family. Twas pretty wonderful I'd say!

Robby said my family is super easy going. Which is true, we're all pretty chill. My mom and I are probably the least easy going though. Anyhow... here are some photos from my trip!

The Golden Life: An Instagram Recap

It's so nice to finally take a breath and just be mellow yellow for awhile. I suppose that's the inspiration behind this blog post...the apparent yellow peppering the Adored Vintage instagram feed lately and also the general mood I find I'm in.

What do the colors golden and yellow bring out for you or in you? I've never been a huge fan of yellow to be honest... but lately, it seems this pretty golden hue has been inspiring me a lot.

The past couple of months for AV have been incredibly hectic and crazy. AV is such a close part of my life, it nearly IS my life. It has been weeks of non-stop work and I am really happy to announce all the big things are done and now it's time to settle back into a daily groove.

So what have I been up to lately?



The biggest thing... the grand opening of my brick + mortar I share with my fella, ORN HANSEN. For awhile, we talked about someday opening up a men's and women's general store...and after 4 months of building out the shop, choosing brands, and all the other craziness that goes into opening up a brick + mortar store... we finally opened our doors on September 26th!

Following that, I popped up again at A Current Affair, the premiere vintage marketplace in downtown Los Angeles. As always, I got to meet loads of wonderful people and some of you gals that follow AV on Instagram! I always get so giddy when I get to meet you in real life!

This past weekend, one of my dear friends and I, took some much needed time off from our jobs and spent it exploring the streets of San Francisco, drinking loads of coffee, and singing loudly in the car with the windows rolled down.

So much more of course, but I really don't want to bore you with a laundry list of how busy I've been. I'm sure you can tell.

What's new in your life?

Mending Vintage Clothing | Instagram Recap

Lately on Adored Vintage Instagram it seems I have been doing a lot of mending and repairing of vintage clothing. Well, actually, it's not "it seems", I AM mending and repairing a lot of vintage lately!

A lot of times I am fixing ripped seams, replacing buttons, tacking down appliqués and details, and also mending holes and lace. It's a long process that requires a lot of patience. I find it so calming though!

Instagram Recap: Portland!

Although my trip to Portland was a daily go-go-go, I had the most wonderful of time exploring the city with my fella and discovering new things to love about the city of roses! We spent two days shopping the city non-stop, partly for myself and mostly to restock the vintage shop! (And I've got several treasures to show you!)

All around the city were flowers and so much damn green! I think I about said "It's so frickin green here!" roughly 100 times. We'd go around a bend on the road and I'd let out a big "Ahhh it's so frickin green here!!!" As if I had never seen the color green in all my life! A short trip across the border to Washington landed us at the Pendleton Outlet where I got some terrific new staple pieces for my wardrobe. A rust orange long blazer that reminds me of a riding coat, a nubby grey wool sweater, and a fitted vintage cut dark denim chambray.

I also met up with some very adorable vintage gals. Julie from Fabgabs Vintage, Janey from Atomic Redhead, and the lovely Solanah who was our Vintage Gal of the Month earlier this year. There are some really cute pics Solanah took over on her blog, Vixen Vintage if you'd like to see better photos than my small black and white of us four.

This was a jam packed trip including a celebration of my fella's grandparents 60th wedding anniversary (I pulled out my florist hat and decorated the cake and created the flower arrangements), playing golf on a real course for the first time, hiking up to the top of Multnomah Falls, and meeting wonderful new friends such as Christian from 1924.us, who has inspired me for some time via Instagram.

Oh, there were all those gorgeous flowers I kept squealing over in Edgefield and tasting the most amazing biscuits in my entire life at Bob's Red Mill.

There are several more photos I didn't post, so if you'd like to see more from my Portland trip (including peeks of vintage!) then follow @adoredvintage on Instagram or you can simply visit here: Adoredvintage on Instagram.

Round these parts...

It has been one crazy busy year so far (can't believe it's MAY already!). I really did have intentions to do a once a month recap of the month before via Instagram, but well, other things have taken precedence. I post new happenings on instagram, so if you feel so inclined to follow my daily adventures as a vintage shopkeeper you can find me @adoredvintage.



I also post a lot of previews of what will be arriving in the vintage shop. Oh and occasion I post a fruit tart. I average one fruit tart photo a month. Sad. LOL. Or is it?

Insta Recap | January 2013

Wow! Where has the time flown! February is already upon us and I feel like it was just yesterday I was packing up my apartment and my work studio in Los Angeles and preparing to move to Long Beach. Here are some snaps from our Instagram Feed for those of you that don't use or follow Adored Vintage on Instagram.



January has been a fairly trying month. A lot of successes and a lot of stress. Back in December I thought it would be a brilliant idea to move both my apartment and my studio on THE SAME DAY (because I'm secretly a crazy person!). I went from two small studios to a loft style apartment (with a retail shop in front for the Adored Vintage shop!) with one small closet. Storage has been the number one problem so far.

If you are anything like me, the site of clutter (or perhaps the reality of how much I actually own) makes me feel a little anxious. I don't like seeing things just haphazardly laying around. I want to tidy it up, put it in pretty boxes, make vignettes... and well, my apartment and my shop or in the current state of "piles here" and "boxes there". Can you relate to this? I think I seriously had a mini panic attack after a week here and the boxes just did not seem to be going away!

Luckily the light is at the end of the tunnel. Moving to a new city, moving two different studios into one space, and running a business with you as the sole employee... it's been a hectic crazy month.

I'm excited for February to be a lot more mellow and to really focus on the Adored Vintage shop and really putting down some roots into this garden I am cultivating!

What are you excited for and looking forward to in February?

A Reflection of the Year 2012

This year will forever burn in my mind and heart as the year I felt the most alive. Both my personal and work life was one hell of a roller coaster and I did my best to not fall off the ride even though at times I just wanted to say "To hell with all this!"

I am so grateful, so thankful, and so overjoyed about everything that happened this year. Even thankful for the bad for it taught and showed me that time and time again I stood back up and dusted myself off and kept on going. This year has been a year of forgiveness, of healing, and of love.

And of course it has been an amazing year for Adored Vintage! A few close personal friends know the story behind the name change and why there is now a "D" added to Adore. I won't divulge any details here, but it worked out all right in the end!


In JANUARY I shared the first photos of the studio when I still shared it with my friend, Esther Jean. Throughout the year the studio underwent quite a few changes. Like when I decided to repaint the studio (for better lighting) and when the studio was just for AdoredVintage in the first official tour of the atelier.

In MARCH my downtown vintage atelier was featured on Apartment Therapy: Inside the Lovely Studio of Adored Vintage! I was so honored by the feature! This was my third feature in Apartment Therapy! In MARCH I also participated in A Current Affair: Vintage Marketplace which is the best vintage event in Los Angeles. Great space, great music, an open bar... all for $10! Pretty rad! Um I also met one of my style icons, Clemence Poesy, at my vintage booth!


SPRING was probably the roughest time of the year for me. I was all over the place. I was pretty much hating/complaining about my full time job every moment of the day, working super late (until 11PM sometimes) at my studio to keep my vintage shop running, and was basically just stressed every damn day. I got down to 93LBS at one point and was smoking cigarettes every day.

I really had to get myself together otherwise I knew everything would fall apart. Hesitantly I started attending a new church. I had several reservations as I've never been that religious, more spiritual. But little by little I started to trust and open up to this new community and my life and the way I saw things started to change! It was early SUMMER that my life started to turn around. It was like a rising from the ashes (haha silly pun on cigarettes as I stopped smoking at this point)

During the SUMMER I started working on a new design for a new vintage website. I had debated on changing the name, redoing an entire new logo... but in the end I stayed with the name I really adored. And so came adoreDvintage!


At the end of SEPTEMBER I opened AdoredVintage.com and within a couple of months the site traffic went from an average of 150 a day to an average of 1200 a day! By OCTOBER I had left my full time job to work on Adored Vintage full time and I haven't looked back since!

At the start of the year I had 2 clothing racks in the studio. Now I have 6 and they are overflowing! This DECEMBER, I decided I wanted to open up a shop and also live there and within the same month I had found the place and signed the papers! (God answered my prayers and lightning fast too!)


Also this month I made a rather large investment for my company and it's growth for 2013. I don't want to say too much as of yet, but let's just say my inventory is about to be multiplied by FIVE within the next 30 days.

In 2012 we hit over 1700 daily visits on Adoredvintage.com, over 7,000 Facebook fans, over 4,000 Instagram followers, over 4,000 Twitter followers, and over 7,000 Pinterest followers. A GIGANTIC THANK YOU, thank you, thank YOU for all of your love, support, encouragement, prayers, and fellowship!

As I reflect over the year I am deeply humbled by the grace God has given me. I am deeply encouraged by the support and love from all of you, my friends, and newfound family. And I am so excited for 2013! LET'S DO THIS!!!

California Mini Road Trip | An Instagram Diary

This past weekend my fella and I took a little trip into the mountains for a little R&R. One of the things I really love about California is that in a couple hours of time your entire scenery and landscape can change. In 2 hours you can be in the desert, then the mountains, then along the coast! Ahh, California I love you!





The first leg of our trip was just lots of open skies and open road. We stopped off the side of the road at one point so I could pick wild flowers to press later. The compilation photo above is probably my favorite of my fella and I. We're both wearing our every day garb (him usually in a plain white shirt, me in my favorite denim button up)...it started sprinkling when the photo was snapped of me and clearly I was enjoying that. *hehe*



There was no internet service at our final destination so for nearly 24 hours I was without access to the entire world. The first few hours my mind was basically in a wild panic..."what the hell am I suppose to be doing now?!" But after awhile we just walked around, visited the town center (which consisted literally of one boutique, one cafe, one pizza place, one bar, one church, and 3 real estate offices). Happily the next morning I discovered that the cafe had free wi-fi. Hooray!

The next day we did some serious antique shopping. I think we filled up my fella's truck with tons of loot! Yippie! The little mini California road trip ended with an impromptu stop at a historical landmark, Fort Tejon, which is where the following photos were all snapped.



more photos from my instagram: adoredvintage

Life Happenings Through Instagram

There's been a quiet busy buzz with everything going on at ADORED | VINTAGE. I am finding that every single one of my days is filled up, planned, and accounted for. There's definitely been a lot of love, laughter, tears (of happiness and sadness), and all around crazy around here. But for the most part, when looking back at these little snapshots of my life... I feel very blessed.




I'm definitely enjoying life, but I need a day of doing nothing soon. But that's hard for me. I hate being idle. And I hate feeling like I didn't progress in any way. A day of doing nothing is a day wasted for me. :) How about you?

Anyhow, if you have INSTAGRAM... hope you will follow me!

Find me: adoredvintage

Memorial Day Weekend | The Best Weekend Ever

I'm on a cloud my pretties and I don't want to come down...

I must say this weekend was pretty epic. In a totally "I'm an old fart" kind of way. Alcohol drank... hardly any. Will you count two sips of a fruity beer? I didn't think so. It all began Friday evening when I went to sleep at the luxurious hour of 10:30 PM. You see, last week I was hardly present at my abode as I took advantage of outing invitations every single evening and crashed at home around 1-2 in the morning. Hardly responsible...but again, these outings had very little to do with alcohol (Korean karaoke...yes! Dancing to 90s music under disco lights and sipping on Sprite...yes!)

Anyhow, they say photos say more than 1,000 words. I'm not sure if I've got that one quite right and I'm much too lazy at the moment to google it... so here are a series of Instagrammed photos to recap the weekend of awesomeness.


got me a bike.
been wanting one.
went out and got one.


keep saying i want to redecorate.
finally started.


beach day with the boy.
ran into TWO vintage MG midgets BOTH green in Malibu.
it's a sign folks.


fruit tart noshin' whilst planning California forest adventures.
got photographed by the radtastic jen sosa.
(she is totally rad.)


can't stop smilin' when the sun is a shinin'!
vintage dress scores.


these babes arrived.
it's peony season.
get some!

---

So next time I have a totally shitty MONTH (because up until last week and this weekend, that's the pattern it's been going) I'll look back on this weekend and count my blessings. Happy Memorial Day folks!