Wecome To Living In Costa Rica ...Your Homecoming Includes A Shakedown At Customs!

Go HERE for part one of this humorous series about our move to Costa Rica:

Part Two

We were standing in the heat, about a mile from the airport, on hot sticky tarmac with half a dozen Costa Ricans, also called Ticos as they refer to themselves, unloading our ten thousand bags and cats, rattling in Spanish, which to this day I still cannot speak or understand...except for a few choice words. It was probably a good thing at this point on the hot tarmac that I didn't know how to swear in Spanish.

Ticos generally don't like cats and are terrified of them thinking of them the way Americans think of rodents...which I never really 'got' the entire time I was there. So having to handle ours, even in kennels, was something to be discussed, debated endlessly, feared, but eventually accomplished. Look at these faces! How could anyone be afraid of these oversized plush toys?

Latin American is not known for its timliness or efficiency and just because they tell you Costa Rica is not really a third world country any more, you really shouldn't believe them. At best it is a second world country with serious issues around timliness among other agonizing cultural traits that just didn't mix with my North American JAQ expectations...I know gotta learn the local fare, but at that moment I still hadn't become anywhere near local.

Getting our belongings and pets ready to head off for immigration and customs was something out of a Keystone Cops movie and I was literally terrified to let my babies go without me. Just loading everything on the truck took over an hour! And by the time we were reunited with them it was another hour at least. We were put into a van clinging to the family jewels which our hosts wanted to liberate from us and take on the truck with the rest of our luggage. Since that wasn't an option we lugged the heavy bags to the terminal and awaited the arrival of cats and luggage...and waited, and waited!

I've learned through my years of travels there are several phrases I needed to memorize in the native language of whatever country I was in and 'Where is the bathroom' was always the first and most important. Donde esta el banos? Simple right? Wrong! I could not remember how to say this little tiny sentence. When I did finally get something like it out of my mouth the guys looked at me like I was from Mars. You don't get to go potty until after you go through customs. They didn't know Tiny Bladder and that I was permanently damaged from holding it in and now about 7 hours later still praying for intervention by the pee angels. I knew it would be hopeless to beg as they were unsympathetic and my Spanish was non-existent anyway. Still probably a very good thing I was unable to swear in Spanish. So my next best move was to ask for a wheel chair because it was easier to hold it in sitting.

Once again who woulda thunk we still had hours to go before I could pee and we could leave the airport! The terminal was almost empty, a total blessing. The dog was with us on the leash and no one said a thing about it except anyone who saw him wanted to pet him and of course he ate it up! He was more interested in marking the entire airport, so unlike me, he peed his way to customs in every corner on each and every chair leg and trash can. I was hoping no one was looking and wanted to drop my pants and squat at one point on the nearest kiosk but bad luck seemed to follow at every corner. My Tico escort was glued to me with no escape possible.


Our adventure in full swing, we had the unfortunate luck of being the ONLY ones going through customs at the hour we entered the country and the agents were bored and needed something to do to justify their having jobs. So they nearly strip searched us! Everyone of our 25 bags, two knap sacks, purses, fanny packs and pockets were emptied. Ooos and Ahhhhs aside, they were convinced we were theives and smugglers and the jewelry was contraband, so they confiscated it...ALL OF IT! Well, not all of it. They didin't get the stuff in the kennels. So fearful and superstitious about cats, they backed off and wouldn't go near them even to peer into the kennels. And that was good because in those cozy kennels was all the gold.

A cacphony of hysteria broke out. I started crying and wailing because that was the only way I could get their attention, the cats were howling and mewling as only cats can do, Winston was barking non-stop and Bryana stood there stunned and silent. We spent hours and hours trying to explain that the jewelry was ours and not stolen, but the customs agents were not interested nor did they understand us. I got angry, I got funny, I got hysterical, I waved my hands around like a manic in an asylum, I started threatening, I swore...in English, I pleaded, begged and tried bribery offering them each some jewelry for their wives...to no avail. Although this is not me in the video, it sure as heck coulda been...except for the Chinese part. And I bet she can't swear in Spanish either...



Someone who spoke Spanglish finally arrived and after hours of cajoling and begging, pleading and finally greased palms for the lot we came away with our things, our jewels, our pets and no dignity...and I STILL had to pee! But HELL, we were in paradise...right?


End of part two. Stay tuned, part three coming in a couple days.

Some photos "Courtesy of CostaRicaPhotos.com"
Thanks to all other internet sites whose photos I have used. Too many to mention. These are my cats tho'!

How Do We Live Our Lives? With Abandon and Lotsa Moxie!

It was pouring rain as we loaded our bags into the back of the Land Rover, our Toyota and Paul's broken-down old yellow-orange VW van with failing fenders, chunks of character and 1960s bumper stickers. That is, we loaded our bags...27 of 'em, and our eight cats, one dog, one mom, one daughter and half a ton of jewelry and headed off for the airport. Of course it was raining! What else?! The gods were crying with joy and sorrow, mixed blessings and grief for our leaving our lives and climbing into the tiny cigar with wings that would take us to a new beginning, the fulfillment of a hard won dream fantasy. We were moving to Costa Rica, the whole fam damily and doing it against all odds and when no one else had the balls to do so even though everyone seemed to want to run away too!

I'm a recovered Jewish American Princess or should I say Queen, a JAQ with a serious defect in my personality. I like taking risks and adventure and don't much give a damn about status, position or clout in the community. Not into stability, the right husband, the acceptable outfit or being politically correct. I grew up having many of my dreams bashed by circumstance or by mom and dad and learned when I became an adult that taking action and bringing into reality those dreams, fulfilling them and allowing myself to live and be me was one of the most important things I could do for myself...and for my kids. And so it was and still is. My kids might not agree with this, but I sure gave it my best along the way. We are all dream makers and in our family we do our best to live them too! So, Costa Rica became a reality instead of a moment in time where we might have been left wondering what would our lives had been like if we had not actually picked up and left.

For me and Bryana, the only 'material things' we are REALLY concerned about are our pets and our jewelry...and for Bryana, being young...of course she loves the guys...not that they are material things, but sometimes I wonder what Bryana actually thinks as she flings them aside in a steady succession of collecting. I used to love collecting them too but then I got old and the only men in my life now are the ones in men!oh-pause.. But who cares? We're not talking guys here, rather jewelry and fulfilling dreams...LOTS of jewelry. Two knap sacks full, my purse, a fanny pack, the back of all 8 cat kennels and all twenty fingers, two necks, four wrists and four ears. I'm talking a LOT of jewelry!

Yep, after years of dreaming about it, being afraid to do it, wanting it, swearing up a tree about it, threatening to leave and pulling back...FINALLY we left. She quit college, bored with the idea of a stable income and great clothes from practicing law and I quit my life bored with the idea of spending the rest of my days working 'til I was carried out in a pine box and disagreeing with whatever government was in power. So we did it. We sold everything we owned...have you ever tried to do that? It sounds easy but is not so easy. Believing we would never come back, we sold EVERYTHING in the house, in the shed, in the yard, the cars, the house and the shed...and packed what we didn't sell. We were down to basically nothing and that nothing filled the 20 foot container truck from one end to the other...with 200+ boxes and my adjustable bed and of course the 25 suitcases and two knap sacks, purses and fanny packs. What was left of our entire house was packed in a big truck and off we went! No one believed we would go, but we did it and lived to tell about it for another day.

Our trip was not originally about jewelry but very soon became a jewelry odyssey and an animal story of great proportion and humor. There was no way we could get all our pets on a commercial airliner safely, feeling confident that one or more might meet its demise in the holding section down under with the luggage. And since we figured out after hours of research it would cost many thousands of dollars anyway, we solved the problem by chartering our own Learjet airplane, a very small cigar with wings. Yes we did! We lived like the rich and famous for a few moments and it was such fun! Can you see it now? Each little party puddy cat and our corgi dog in it's own seat with a tiara or a jeweled collar holding a Martini or a Champagn cocktail and a cigar and wisking off into the clouds towards Costa Rica?

Our two handsome pilots were astounded when we appeared with our paraphernalia and through all the wet muck and the rain. Even with our menagerie, our soggy clothes and dripping hair they still found time to flirt with us. OK, OK! It perked me up for a few minutes and then I fell dormant again. After they loaded the 25 bags, eight kitties and the dog we both climbed on board clinging to our two knapsacks full of jewels, purses, fanny packs and sloshing clothing to make our great escape from American tyranny as we saw it. Winston sat cheerfully soaked in Bryana's lap, the cats slumbered peacefully under a blanket of sedatives, our jewelry slumbered peacefully wrapped in miles of bubble wrap awaiting the next adventure when we got THERE; and I tried to figure out how I was going to make a 6 hour flight without a potty except for an old 5 gallon bucket I brought along for emergencies. The thought of baring my over sized butt openly with no privacy to the two jokers in the cockpit was sobering enough to jam my pipes and help me hold it in for hours. To answer your question, our plane was so small there was no bathroom and to have one would have required a larger plane and an extra $15,000. So we flew to Costa Rica and I kept my knees jammed tightly together until we arrived. It never dawned on me that I would have to hold it in another 6 hours in the airport!

End of part one. I'll be posting this story in bit sized parts over the next few days, so be sure to come back to read the next chapter in our adventure! Thanks to the many sources for the stock photos, to numerous to mention individually. These are not our animals. It was just too difficult that day to take photos on top of everything else!

A New Twist On The Wearin' O' The Green!

I was thinking about St. Patrick's day coming up and how festive a holiday it is. Such a fun time when I was younger and could still hold my liquor! And how everyone wears green and become Irish by osmosis for the day. Of course it's so much easier to become Irish when you're rubbin' shoulders with folks and your blood is thinner from the green beer.

These days, with 'green' being the new catch phrase for all things recycled, reborn, reinvented and reclaimed, I couldn't help thinking about a new twist on the wearin' O' the green! Nowadays we can wear 'green', wear GREEN and be green all at the same time! And if you're anything like me, having one drink does the trick when it comes to being green... :-) So, start celebrating early and scroll down for our new 'green' ideas.

Once upon a time, these beautiful earrings were antique clothing buttons or antique cuff links just sitting in a drawer discarded for lack of use. Since we at Posh Adornment hate to see things go to waste, especially beautiful things that no longer have use in today's fast paced, electronic world, we were inspired to convert them into wonderful, wearable earrings that can be displayed to their fullest glory once again. How unique and absolutely one of a kind! We have been going 'green' with these beautiful old buttons and cufflinks and recycling them for some time, giving them a new lease on life and selling them at our mall space. Now we've decided to make them available in our online stores. Our expert jeweler removes the original backing and attaches wires of sterling silver, 14K gold or gold fill. We have made the wires nice an long which balances the weight of the earrings and helps them hang just right on the ear. They look absolutely fabulous!

This week we're rolling out our first offers on these beauties and wanted to share them with you. You like? Let us know please, please. You can find these earrings for sale on our website Posh Adornment or in our Posh Adornment store on Etsy.

Art Deco GF 14K Gold Engraved Earrings

Antique Cut Steel Sterling Silver Earrings France




Lg Antique GF 14K Gold Portrait Earrings Goya

Victorian Art Nouveau GF 14K Gold Engraved Earrings

And if you're a little more traditional and like to WEAR the color green for St. Patrick's Day we've paired some of our gorgeous green jewels with a few other Etsy seller's and their gorgeous green frocks for a bright, cheerful look for spring that can't go wrong. Read on!

Art Deco Green Spun Satin Glass Czech Necklace

The Queen of Spring Party Dress
from violetfolklore on Etsy


Natural Emerald Marcasite Sterling Cocktail Cluster Ring
70s green mini dress
from dustyrosevintage on Etsy


Art Nouveau Green Slag Glass Filigree Drop Earrings
60s Tropical Print Sundress
from brycehill122 on Etsy


Art Deco Green Chrysoprase Glass Necklace Czech
Bright Green Sailboat Sundress
from alleycatsvintage on Etsy

I hope you like some of our ideas for going green this St. Patrick's Day and everyday this spring! Enjoy the day and stay safe.

Cameos Are Forever, Birthdays Come Once A Year!

It was Bryana's birthday a few days ago, and I'm a little late wishing her a Happy Birthday...but then again, she missed her due date by a couple days so I guess we're even. She is the co-founder of our Posh Adornment website and our Posh Adornment store on Etsy even though you don't see her much. She is the main support staff and holds all these many things we do together with her amazingly capable ability to do anything and everything. I don't tell her often enough, but she's really incredible!

Bryana is my first daughter... my only daughter and she's been a peach from day one...actually from before day one. Before the beginning Bryana was the perfect baby in utero and the perfect shopper. After she was born she slept through the night from the beginning, awoke with a gurgle and a smile and loved pretty clothes and jewelry from the git go. Always fashion forward and having great flair, she loved hats and set trends even as a youngun'. She began life at the mall...well, she began life a little before the mall but she spent her earliest days nesting in her nice little warm, dark place in my belly AND at the mall. There was one day in particular at the mall that has sealed itself indelibly into my memory when I was about 5 months pregnant.

It was cold and I was dressed for winter. Never liking panty hose or tights I struggled to get my maternity tights on twisting in ways that my swollen body would not allow and swearing as they kept twisting back on me so I had to continually yank and pull until they went all the way up. And then when they were all the way up, they weren't really all the way up. Because my belly wasn't yet big enough to fill out the kangaroo pouch at the top of the panty hose, they kept going beyond all the way up to the very top of my head. If I had been clever I could have wrapped a rubber band around the top of my head and used them as a cocoon or used them as part of my bank robber disguise but I wasn't that smart in those days.

But I was sort of smart and thought best thing to do was to roll the waistband down to just under my bra and pin them to the bottom of my bra to help them stay up. This was a mistake!

Bryana and I were shopping that day, me in my nifty maternity corduroy jumper, high fashionable winter boots, fur coat and rolled up or down panty hose pinned precariously to my bra. With every step I took the tights were pulling and threatening mutiny and I was left wondering if the girls would tumble out from the bottom of my bra and find a new home in the top of my rolled down panty hose or burst out the top of my bra and find no home at all! And to help matters along Bryana was looking around too checking everything out and making ready for when she could shop on her own. With every twist of her head my rolled panty hose shifted and twisted in sympathy and unison.

It was fortunate for me that I was standing in front of The Gap when the crisis happened. The ripping, whirring sound, the snapping and shussing when the delicate fabric of the tights ripped through the pins and at the speed of light, kept rolling down only to stop at my knees in a morbidly tight tourniquet of elastic and terror instantly disabling me and preventing me from moving with anything like a normal gait. I was finally a mermaid with essentially a tail and two feet attached. All I could do was stand there because when I attempted to walk my feet moved in tiny little circles and the rest of me tilted, threatening to fall flat on my face. Bryana, in the meantime was sqirming and wiggling, trying to get a look at it all from the inside out! You see her face here as she clings with every breath of life to the zip line in the tree tops in Costa Rica? That is not a smile, it is the look of abject terror. That is what my face looked like that fateful day at the mall and it must have stuck permanently in Bryana's memory banks and comes out in similar mortifying situations.

Back at the mall 25 years ago, you might be wondering why I felt it was fortunate to be at The Gap rather than say, in front of Barney's Coffee or a shoe store, no? I was mortified and managed to mince-waddle my way into the store where there were only young, skinny girls were working and begged them to let me use their bathroom. "I'm sorry we don't have public restrooms. There's a public bathroom on the bottom level of the mall." It was this comment where I began to perfect my red-nailed maniacal banshee routine you can read about in my story of my son's birthday here. After explaining my plight and actually lifting my skirt to show them what happened, one scrawny young thing took sympathy on me and helped me roll myself, flipper and all into their back dressing room where I was able to rescue myself. Shoving the girls back in their holding chamber and reattaching the cursed tights in a different and much more comfortable manner, I bought a baby outfit for Bryana and happily exited the mall for the day and went home.

In my haphazard and eccentric life there was always a reward for surviving incidents like these. My then husband and father of my child had a knack of coming up with the best ever jewelry that took away much of the pain and helped me forget my travails. I received this truly astounding, huge cameo which has always been one of my favorite pieces of jewelry and one I have never seen duplicated anywhere, ever. It measures 2 1/2" tall by 2" wide and is beyond fabulicious. Incredible detail and a gilded silver frame. It's also not for sale...soooorrrry!

But if you like cameos these beauties ARE for sale and can be found at our website Posh Adornment or at our site on Etsy.com under the same name, Posh Adornment. Just click the link to read more about them and while you're there have a look around, browse and enjoy our new site!

This is a large and very fine pin or pendant Cameo Of The Goddess Flora set in 14K white gold filigree.

These beautiful earrings are made from the lava of Mt. Vesuvius and are beautifully hand carved Victorian Cameos Of The Goddess Athena, goddess of wisdom. Set in finely detailed brass engravings and for pierced ears.

This is an Art Nouveau Moon Face Lady's Head Czech Cameo Pendant set in brass with an oak leaf ornamentation. Very beautiful, rare and unusual.

And a final HAPPY BELATED BIRTHDAY BRYANA. Love, mom

Eye Popping 840 pound Emerald Has Its Day In Court!

Get a load of this! An 840 lb Bahia emerald cluster originally mined in Brazil is sitting at the Los Angeles court house waiting to be claimed and for its 'real' owner to be decided! Appraised at just below $400 million, this baby is one prize I wouldn't mind having in my curio cabinet. They say the the actual pieces of gem emerald are the size of arms! Wow, I bet Angelina Jolie who recently wowed us at the Oscars with her 2die4 emerald earrings that appear to weigh close to 500 pounds each would ante up to be the new owner of this heavyweight! And she's probably one of the few who could afford it too!

I have been a rock hound all my life, well maybe not ALL my life, but since I was about 11 years old, and love the idea of going out looking and digging for beautiful gems and crystals. That's actually how I got my first real love for gems and then when I realized you could add precious metals to that I discovered jewelry. But it's the gems that have their magnetic pull on me.

Look at the mind blowing specimens on Elegant Crystals to see some unbelievable works of art made by Mother Earth herself...without any help and not even one single sculpture course taken! If you are taken with any of these and decide you want to buy one, tell the owner, Crystal Bill that Susan from Posh Adornment sent you. I know him well and I bet he'll give you a special price! Here's a few of his goodies for your daily dose of pleasures!

Crystal Bill's 1200 pound Amethyst Royale Geode measures 6'7" high and 26" wide and as you can see a live person fits comfortably inside! Found also at Elegant Crystals.And here is what the raw material morphs into when it's in jewelry. A fabulous natural amethyst necklace consisting of large round beads and gold spacers. Heavy and sensuous and found here on Posh Adornment.

And for those that like a chaser of royal purple gem quality amethyst mixed with their solid 14K gold, check out this large, amethyst heavy four leaf clover set in solid gold also on Posh Adornment.

A perfect cluster of pure silica quartz also known as rock crystal weighs 422 pounds and measures 15" tall by 32" wide. Now THAT'S a coffee table sculpture for those with a devilish taste for the sublime!

And speaking of morphing, this is what can happen when a good stone cutter gets ahold of rock crystal! This amazing, loooong antique Edwardian faceted rock crystal necklace wraps around the neck up to three times and is a show stopper any way you wear it. A rare find and also at Posh Adornment.

What do you think of this humongous Russian Giant crystal point from the Ural Mountains? Also weighing in at 400 pounds and 36" tall. Doggie not included in the purchase price but it's a new twist on cheesecake ads where the girl lays across the car. Instead, cute puppy hugs large obelisk!

And not to be left out and given equal time, the kitty cat cheescake photos too! This Angel of Light gives new meaning to Crystal Balls weighing in at 288 pounds and 19.5 inches across. Incredible, no? Wow! All found on Elegant Crystals.com and sold by Crystal Bill.

Enjoy!

Snowman Hits Atlanta!

We really, really DID get a nice snowing yesterday and here is a resident snowman we saw to prove it! I guess they used all the snow in their yard and probably went over to the neighbor to borrow theirs too! What I especially love is the greenery in the background and the early flowers and bone dry lawn. But it was fun to pretend we were all up north yesterday. It's supposed to be about 70 degrees by the end of the week, so the truth about Puxatony Phil's winter prediction is still out...at least for us. Come back and visit y'all!