Calling all you sorority girls--enter my giveaway
http://socialclimbers123.blogspot.com/2009/10/preppy-sorority-give-away.html
Today's guest blogger is Southern Living: Preppy Style! She is adorable and if you aren't reading her blog you must immediately!
http://jenniferdtrent.blogspot.com/
Check out her blog for a giveaway of my book!
We met in blog land and if we lived closer I know we'd just hang out and gab far more than our husbands would ever understand. SLPS is warm, wonderful, kind, friendly and albeit a true blue blood--a lovable one (just the way we like them in preppy blog land)! After reading my novel, Social Climbers, she contacted me to discuss:
"I didn’t discover I was a WASP (on my maternal side) until about 4 years ago. I had never heard the word, didn’t know what it meant and whenever it was discussed, I went with the flow as if I knew what everyone was talking about.
I am a WASP, I can track my ancestors back to the revolutionary war and England and am a member of the DAR. I always knew I’d be a member, but never understood its significance. I’m from a town of approximately 30,000 people in Kentucky. There is not a “Main Line” as discussed in the book Social Climbers however, there is the “wrong and right side of the (railroad) tracks” (quite literally) and then there is the “UC (upper class) side of the tracks” where I am from. I lived in the coveted OakTree Hills subdivision, went to a private, co-ed school with uniforms and played the violin. I have traveled all over the world, went a small liberal arts private college of 900 students (not IVY of course) and now live in South Florida with my WASP husband (where I drove a luxury station-wagon at the age of 24).
I was not a normal child by any means. I was not popular (I played an instrument!) but I had my group of friends, including my then best friend Cara, who is also a WASP and our friends from other schools. Cara dressed like a WASP but did not do anything remotely close to WASP behavior. She looks the part but didn’t act the part. This, I now realize, is part of the reason we drifted apart and haven’t spoken in years I also have realized in recent years that all the so-called popular kids in middle and high school were not WASPs, like me and never left to really experience the world. With my high school friends, I played golf, attempted tennis (with a wooden racket), swam at the country club pool in which we associated, took violin lessons and studied for my private college entrance exams. I traveled in the summers for music camps housed on college campuses and every February, I stayed in the ritzy Galt House hotel in Louisville for the annual music festival, where I was catered to with fine dining by college music scouts (none of them from my alma mater). That was the extent of my high school days.
My parents also do not hold true to the typical WASP behavior, well, in a way. They are liberal democrats, unlike me. But now that I think about it, they are very outdoorsy, enjoy the occasional wine and cheese party and have a custom made sailboat that was shipped here from England. They do not dress WASPy however, they behave WASPy .
My husband and I have one daughter. We nicknamed her Lallie (pronounced “lolly” like lollipop) and her name comes from her WASP family last and middle names. She attends a private Montessori school at the age of two. I had her birth announced in my alma mater’s monthly alumni newsletter, announced it in all the newspapers in which we’re associated and mailed out professional birth announcements to all our friends and family. Her first birthday party included a guest list of over 75 people and she already has an assignment for etiquette school when she turns four-years old. She is pure-bred WASP.
I started reading Social Climbers a few days ago. I’m about 60 pages along in the book. *****
The other day, my husband was out playing golf in a tournament. I am a working-mom, so I arrived home prior to picking up Lallie from school and was asked if I would like to join him and some other friends and wives at the clubhouse for drinks and appetizers (the country club in which we live). I was wearing typical golf attire, a Lilly skort, Lilly polo top, a gingham pink sun visor, sunglasses, carrying my un-marked Coach bag and my Steven Bononnos, monogrammed none the less. Husband brought me a glass of wine and I played socialite by talking with the mayor, a commissioner and a few other town big-wigs (I work in commercial real estate and my husband is an engineer, so we know our fair share of UC’s). During a lull in conversation, I looked around and saw my wine glass, teetering in my hand near my lips, that’s always how I hold my wine glass (sometimes with my arms slightly cross with my elbow resting on my other hand). I reviewed my outfit, looked around at the women who had come to me to say hello (not me to them) and make the double kiss-of-cheeks. I notice my bag was checked, my husband brought me my drinks. I realized right then and there, that I am a Social Climber myself.
This is very interesting to me. I have never been the preppy type. I was in behavior, just not dress. Think of it this way: My friend Cara, looked the part, but didn’t behave the part, I was the complete opposite – I behaved the part, but didn’t look the part. I never dressed preppy until about 3 years ago, when I became pregnant with my daughter. I started researching websites for adorable nursery items, tracked myself into other preppy websites and have since become a preppy dresser. I make grosgrain ribbon topiaries (all preps must make something), I am involved in the DAR, Junior League and possibly my college sorority alumni. I became involved in these not only because I want to “do good” but because I wanted to meet people and be social.
I am a social climber (in some sense, as I’m not northeastern and didn’t do the Ivy League thing – but you know what I mean). For the first time in my life, I am the most comfortable I’ve ever been, in my own skin and that to me, is a very good thing!
~~~I found out later after writing this, after speaking with Beth Dunn and actually finishing the book, that I am not a Social Climber. I have Social Status (if you need definitions, READ THE BOOK!) The difference between myself and a Social Climber is basically this: I want to have fun, do “good” and socialize with good people, without stepping on the toes of others for the mere gain of social status. I’m not in it for the status (I already have it) and I’m not a b*&#h (I hope!). I’m in it for the fun and frankly, I can’t help how I was raised….as they all say “It is what it is!”****
Xoxo
Jennifer"
See! Isn't she just pure through and through?? And so honest. The thing I love most is that she is so content and happy being herself. How many of us would love to say the same thing!
I hope everyone has a beautiful day! I'm off to my local Lilly Pulitzer store which is gasp....closing! Devastation.
xoxo
SC
