THE PERFECT VACATION 1: PUERTO VALLARTA

Bad Tereze! Bad blogger! Where have I been for the past 2 months?

Well, in Puerto Vallarta, for starters. As anyone who knows me knows, I will mortgage my soul to travel to a fabulous place, so I went to Vallarta even though Citigroup stock is at... $2.11?

P.V. is on my list of perfect vacations. Here's why.

Vallarta is many things at once. It's authentic -- as honky-tonk as it can be, it's built around an authentic Mexican fishing village, which has been declared a landmark. No new building can be done in the Old Town. All the development takes place north or south of this wonderful and pretty town. The streets are all cobblestone, the buildings white and painted stucco.

Vallarta has a glorious location. The Sierra Madre mountains come right down into the Pacific. It sits on the second largest bay in the world (I think. Maybe I made this up.) Anyway it's a huge wide curve of a bay. You gaze out at the Pacific and to the left and right are hills and mountains. Behind you is 'the jungle' as it is locally known.

We rented a villa for a week in Conchas Chinas, where the villas tumble down the hill. From our 90' terrace we watched the sun set over the ocean while we sipped our margaritas. We stay in a building called Las Terrazzas, and it may have one of the best views in town. There are 6 villas in Las Terrazzas and I've stayed in two of them, both divine. This last trip we stayed at the Casa de la Noche. Check it out!

the pool at Casa de la Noche

We spent a second week at my friend Sandra Leonard's fabulous B&B cum art center, Hacienda Mosaico. Sam, as she likes to be called, invites teachers to come down or a week and teach their craft - from journal making to glass beads to mosaic sculpture. I sometimes take a class but I sometimes just book a room at this simply fabulous hidden jewel. It's off the usual tourist route in an area called Versalles. It's filled with amazing objects and furnishings created by Sam (and sometimes her generous guests). Sam did most of the mosaics (see picture - this is a mosaic that lines the exterior wall) and painted the oilcloth rugs... and she's also a talented glass artist and jeweler. (Oh, and she's gorgeous, by the way.)

Vallarta is at once sophisticated, funky, artistic, brash and serene.... all at once. The town has a beautiful Malecon that runs along the sea, lined with palm trees. Everyone strolls along the Malecon... The streets off the Malecon are filled with shops and restaurants, but not just the usual tourist junk... This is a real artisan's town, and it is filled with galleries and personalized boutiques. It's wonderful fun to shop here. Even if you don't buy, it's wonderful to look. (Now, to me, shopping is like going to a museum, so if anyone ever gives you a hard time about shopping or looks their nose down at you, you have my permission to quote me.)


The food is terrific. There are plenty of 'international' restaurants but when I am in Mexico, I want Mexican food. And it is varied and excellent. You'll have a chance to taste many new flavors so don't think you'll get bored eating Mexican every night. Some of my favorites: El Arrayan, where you can try Chile en Nogada, an elaborate stuffed chile with walnut sauce and pomegranate seeds; and El Repollo Rojo (The Red Cabbage), filled with funky paintings and a special Frieda Kahlo menu.

Another favorite: Hacienda San Angel, a boutique luxury hotel tucked away in a quiet street way up the hill. Like so many Mexican treasures, the exterior tells us nothing of the spectacular and luxurious gem hidden behind the walls. If you're not staying there, you should have dinner there one night.

Then there's the weather - really reliable. I can't tell you how many rainy vacations I've spent in the Caribbean (sorry, Caribbean!) But Vallarta has a rainy season - June to October - and the rest of the year is dry.

There are beaches like La Palapa, at Playa de los Muertos where you sit in your beach chair and sip your margaritas while the waiter fetches your ceviche and you watch the people. Here the stores come to you so you don't have to leave your beach chair to look at the local crafts. And there are some really nice things on the beach - textiles, baskets, the ubiquitous silver jewelry. If you like silver jewelry there are really nice things to be had in Vallarta.

There are also isolated, wilder beaches, if that's your thing - like Playa Conchas Chinas. We were the only ones on the beach. No one to serve us margaritas, of course, but it wasn't a long walk to the nearest cafe.

I've been to a lot of places in Mexico and I still think Vallarta is one of the most special places in Mexico. Cancun and Playa del Carmen don't have the old fishing village - they're more modern constructs for tourists, and they feel that way. They also don't have the artisans you'll find in Vallarta.

Speaking of art... Mexico is one of the most artistic places on earth. The Mexicans make art out of everything - I've seen chairs decorated with bottle caps that are absolutely fabulous. They invented the handbags made out of gum wrappers. Everyone makes those now, but I saw them first in Mexico. Even the art galleries, which normally don't interest me much, are filled with really stunning art, very different from what I've seen in New York... and WAY more appealing to me. The art here goes with the climate - it's brilliant and bold and strong, with bright bold colors. Take a look at this fabulous diptych we saw by a painter named Abelardo Favela.

There are nearby towns that are also wonderful. Bucerias is about a 20" drive north of Vallarta and has quieter beaches. Further north is Sayulita, with rocky beaches and a couple of wonderful shops. I bought the most beautiful beaded jewelry in Galeria Tanana, a fabulous store here that helps support the local Huichol Indians who produce this intricate work.

So that's where I've been. Now I'm back, sitting on my couch and knitting. In my next post I'll bore you with that...

ZOMBIE WEEKEND

This was the weekend after Citi hit $3.71 (or was it $3.88?) and the newspapers were full of dire articles about its fate. And I became a, well, zombie.

I called a couple of people and told them I was wiped out. Then I started to worry about my pension. Then I sat down and added up all the money it would take for me to stay in my apartment. Then I thought of all those people in 1929. I always wondered what that felt like.

Then I went back into denial.

Technique for return to denial: contact a lot of people who know more than you do; like, people who still work at Citi, people who majored in economics, lawyers who know the laws about pensions, etc. Tell them your woeful tale and signal slyly what you wish you'd hear back from them. They will, for the most part, read your signals and tell you what you long to hear. Find them credible. And voila, you are back on the couch knitting and watching tv and thinking you really won't have to give up your apartment and move in with your mother after all.

But it's a good thing I have all those Hermes scarves. The only investment that hasn't lost its value. Go Hermes!

LIBERAL ANXIETY... or, HOW I GOT THROUGH THE ELECTION

Our long national nightmare is over! Lord be praised! Our rogue state can rejoin the world. I can start talking to Republicans again (well, maybe) and maybe get to sleep before 2:30 a.m. (Also maybe).

For us serial obsessives, that means fewer long nights with Nate Silver's brilliant http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/ and more time looking at the Hermes scarves I can no longer afford (alas) or knitting blogs, my latest obsession.

I swear Nate Silver got me through the election. I must have checked that site ten times a day. Every night I'd say to myself, 'OK, I'll just have a quick look" and the next thing I knew it was 2 a.m. Whenever I got had a conversation with an anxious liberal - like, five times a day - I'd send them to fivethirtyeight.com. (Nate, you owe me!) Nah, not really - I owe you. You got me through the election.

...AND ALL THAT GOLD

I'm a goldsmith and a jewelery designer and maker. In fact I am starting this blog because hey, you out there, I want you to buy my jewelry!

I work directly in gold, fabricating pieces directly out of the metal. As in: melt the gold, alloy it, mill it, make sheet, make wire, make your jewelry. This is the way the ancients made their jewelry - as in the Greeks, Romans, Etruscans. A good site to see some of this glorious legacy of gold is Ancient Roman Jewelry. The Metropolitan Museum also has stunning examples of classical jewelry, and their shop has many reproductions.

Nowadays jewelers like Reinstein & Ross and Mallary Marks (you can find her jewelry at Barneys ) create jewelry using these classical techniques. So if you like what they do, you'll like what I do. Only I'm way cheaper.

I studied classical jewelry with master goldsmith Cecelia Bauer, who teaches here in New York. If you've ever had a hankering to learn this arcane but glorious art, contact Cecelia and sign up for one of her wonderful classes.

I also carve models in wax. This is an entirely different process which lets you create very different designs. I think of it this way: working in metal is kind of 'engineering' - you have a certain creative vocabulary. Carving wax is more like sculpture - it's freer, with fewer constraints. A piece of wax is kind of like a blank canvas. (Okay I'm mixing my metaphors, but you get the idea.) In wax you can carve intricate bas relief (check out my VENICE bracelet ). My teacher, Boris Goynatsky, originally studied engineering in his native Ukraine (he was a poet, too!) and his work is masterful.

I also like to work in glass - I make glass beads and fused glass pieces - but it's hard to pursue glass in New York. I gave Urban Glass a whirl but it was very expensive and frankly, not very gemutlich. So now I only do glass when I find some fabulous workshop in some fabulous location - Kristina Logan's class in Provence, and a bead class in a wonderful town in Le Marche, Italy, called Coldigiocco. Kristina Logan is an extraordinary glass bead artist (her work is in the Smithsonian). Kristina teaches all over the US and overseas as well.

And I'm an enamalist. (Enameling? what's enameling?) Enamel is glass on metal. We work with finely powdered glass which we use as a painter would use oils. We can make enamel paintings - check out the Frick Museum if you want to see some breathtaking masterpieces of enamel portraiture - but we also can create jewelry and objects. Enamel techniques include cloiosonne enamel, where you use fine wires to create small cells and fill the cells with enamel; and champs l'evee ('raised fields', I believe is the translation) where you have lowered areas in the metal which are then filled with enamel. Check out The Enamelist Society to find out more about this simply extraordinary art. The Aaron Faber Gallery in New York carries some beautiful examples of contemporary enamel artists.

ABOUT THOSE SCARVES

So it turns out being obsessive about Hermes scarves isn't such a bad thing.

My stock portfolio went south... way way south.... like Antarctica south.... but my Hermes scarves retain their value. Why buy a T-bill when you can wear your liquid assets around your neck?

When you stop working (I was 'bridged to retirement' but really, I just lost my job, and couldn't find another) what you end up doing is kind of 'cobbling together' a living. One of the ways I do this is by selling my Hermes scarves. They retain their value, even as the economy tanks. I was selling my scarves on ebay (http://www.ebay.com/) but ebay just put limits on the sale of some brand items. Apparently this is supposed to address the problem of fakes. I don't see how exactly the limits accomplish that, and queries to ebay bring only the canned responses about the 'buyer's experience.' (Huh?) So we scarf hunters are looking for other venues. A couple of new sites are looking to fill the void. Try http://www.what2wear411.com/