although gloomy june tried to murk up newport beach with its grey sky and misty-morning, coastal fog, and then seemed to party crash until early evening, i still managed to find major summer sunshine during the weekend.

apparently my birthday is more of a birthday season this year, because even though we are past 30 days, the celebrations, the presents and the cheer still keep rolling in. on saturday my gorgeous friend, mary jo matsumoto, feted me with lunch and festivities at my favorite a market.

we went bananas over shelly register’s homemade banana pudding- officially my dessert of the summer. you can buy these puddings {also available in butterscotch & chocolate} in perfect, little single-serve containers, although i’m able to single-serve myself with 6 of them. #dumbgirlproblems

as if the pudding wasn’t enough sunshine, mary jo gifted me with her new bougainvilla beach wallet i’ve been dying to have.

it’s even prettier in person. the perfect summer wallet: it’s a cloth and nylon floral beauty that’s made for the beach. mary jo nailed everything that is fun, hip, casual, and oh so beautiful about southern california when she created this wallet.

everything in her shop is an ode to the jubilee of living in this paradise. it’s so hard to choose a favorite. but right now mine is my bougainvilla beach wallet.

thank you mary jo.

summer also happened in the form of fragrance. this summer i’ve switched from my beloved gardenia and yuzu flowered if to the heavy jasmine-scented acqua di parma gelsomino nobile. this so-called species of jasmine grows only in calabria, “which gives it a refreshing, green, and airy aspect reminiscent of the famous italian gardens of the renaissance.”–look, i don’t exactly know what the gardens smelled like during the renaissance, {but i know what pretension sounds/reads like,} and i do know there wasn’t indoor plumbing or febreeze in the 16th century, so this description isn’t exactly great marketing to me. but one spritz and i was sold. so if that’s what caravaggio’s ferns and cacti smelled like, amongst all the chamber pots and city sewage, then sign me up for auto-ship. and as for pretension? um hello, this is a brag blog. 

okay! and i’ve found, after several false starts…my official summer read: the yonahlossee riding camp for girls! it’s SO up my alley for what i like in the summer: it’s historical fiction {1930’s,} it’s in the south {north carolina,} it’s a coming of age, it’s set in the summer {a girls’ camp?} and i think there’s some juicy, gross family muck. 

check: ✔ check: ✔check: ✔

seriously what more could i want…

tolstoy it’s not. but am i really EVER going to read tolstoy?

do you know how many times i just had to go look up tolstoy’s spelling?

so i showed you mine. now you show me yours…any objet’s d’été currently rocking your season?

love you lots! like totally!!!