Buyer Beware: Vivienne Westwood Melissas

If you are considering buying a pair or Melissa's Lady Dragon Vivienne Westwood shoes, especially via eBay, you have to go over and read Michelle's post on Decline Designs.

She is currently in the middle of a mess with a pair of counterfeit Melissa's and gives a great breakdown and comparison of the real vs. the authentic.

I contributed some photos of my blue and red pair to show a side by side comparison.

Make sure you educate yourself on what you are buying on eBay before you jump in. Especially since eBay and PayPal are notorious (in my opinion) for making it difficult to dispute won auctions.

I put a bunch of detail shots of mine in my Flickr set, so you can get better views there.

Hey, Sparkler! What's So Great About You?

I CAN NOT believe it has been so long since I've had a Sparkler here!!! With NYC, the puppy and general madness I must have been out of my mind.

Well let's fix that right now!

Say hello to Miss Michells (aka Decline Designs)...



Michelle is a "fashion blogger, freelance seamstress, lover of shoes. And cats!" She has a fabulous site - Decline Designs - and great vintage on Market Publique too.

But don't just listen to me, let's hear from her!

* I really like bright colors, as you may have noticed!

* I love shoes, like any reasonable person. My current favorite brand is Fluevog.

* I'm frequently interrupted to be informed that I talk too fast.

* I'm also frequently told that I'm long-winded. The book I wrote to enter into the Young Authors competition in 3rd grade was longer than all of my classmates' books combined.

* I am a ridiculous softie for animals. We have two cats that we rescued from being strays, and I want a dog too! I grew up in a house out in the country, where we had a lot of animals from a very young age. I've decided that when my husband and I get old and retire, we're going to rescue and foster animals.



* I had a mohawk at one point, and sometimes miss it, only to remember what a pain it was to put it up in the mornings.

* I've been a vegetarian since the age of 12-13, which was no picnic in the small, conservative town I grew up in!

* I'm a bit of a compulsive worrier, although I've got much better about it over the last six months.

* I am a huge, huge Buffy geek. As in, I own all 7 seasons on DVD plus all of the trade paperbacks of the season 8 comic, to date. (the aforementioned cats are named Wesley and Giles, despite Wesley being a female. We found her when she was too young to tell!)



* It's not a commonly known fact, but I love Teenage Mutant Nina Turtles. In fact, I have photographic evidence of my love from an early age.

* I am super, super proud and glad to have the mother and grandmother that I do; they are both total badasses and worked really hard to get where they are today. My grandmother was the one who instilled a feminist ethos in my mom, who in turn instilled it in me (even when I was young and naive and reacted by rolling my eyes and saying "Oh mom, we don't need feminism any more!" *cringe*). I love them both to death.

Thank you, Poochie, for asking me to be a Sparkler! I love your blog and have deep envy for your shoe collection :)

xoxo
Michelle

Thank YOU, Michelle for being a Sparkler! Everyone, go chat her up!


Okay... who's next?!? Come on, Sparkler, Spill it!