Things I Learned From Helping Out at a Fashion Show

 (just to clarify, it's not a fashion show with a runway and all that. They basically take a hotel and hundreds of different companies are represented in the hotel rooms, and boutique shop owners go around buying goods wholesale for their stores)

1. A surprising number of people who work in/around the fashion industry are not fashionable at all.

2. Also, some are full of crap. Like one woman who said her store was "coastal chic with a modern edge", and then added, "Basically exactly what I'm wearing." She was wearing sweats. Luckily people in the full-of-crap category was a small minority.

3. "Vegan" is just the hipster way of saying "not real leather" when it comes to bags.

4. Fredd and Basha's leather bags are hand stitched in Thailand (fair trade), and the leather gets softer and softer with time, so it ages really well. I know this because I said it about forty times.

5. Complimentary breakfasts are always disgusting. Even in really, really nice hotels.

6. Devil Wears Prada is full of LIES. 99% of the people I met were super nice, low-key, and down-to-earth. And, like stated above, unfashionable. Huge relief.

7. If a woman asks you to try on one of the sample coats to see how it looks on someone wearing jeans, you should turn her down. Especially when you're six months pregnant. Results are very depressing otherwise.

8. There aren't a ton of ways you can screw up an order form, but I think I successfully found them all.

  In all seriousness, though, I'm very grateful to my awesome sister-in-law, Angeline, for asking me to help out (and I even get MONEY for it--I would have gladly done it for free), and it was a freaking awesome experience. I feel like my coolness factor went up by twenty points, just stuffing bags and folding socks. Thank goodness my in-laws have enough awesomeness that some of the excess lands on me occasionally.

  Anyone else have intimidating/awesome in-laws?