As Christmas approaches, we’re getting ready for home shopping withdrawal. That’s because the three nets we watch usually shut down, in terms of selling.

In the case of QVC and HSN, they often run extended videos of hosts with their families — like Rick Domeier making cookies with his sons, or Lisa Robertson whipping up a recipe — instead of having live hosts hawking products. We get to see another side of the hosts, and it’s kind of cute — to a point.

QVC stops airing its regular shows 4 p.m. on Christmas Eve, and doesn’t resume until 8 a.m. Saturday. HSN has a similar schedule, and we just can’t remember what ShopNBC does.

Right now QVC, HSN and ShopNBC are running clearance shows, getting rid of old merchandise to make way for new inventory. In some cases, with one look you know why the stuff hasn’t been sold yet.

In others, you can pick up a good deal, as we did when we ordered a set of three “whimsical” butterfly, ladybug and dragonfly diamond and sterling stack rings, at a $20 price cut, down to $50.

But the world doesn’t seem quite right on Christmas when you turn on QVC or HSN and the programming isn’t live, and no one is pitching anything.

Washable suede!  What genius thought of this wonderful version of suede??  Whomever it is, we love them.

A suede jacket that can be washed….ooh la la!  Washable suede by Jessica Holbrook, as featured in her lovely lined jackets, is practical and stylish.  Plus, you don’t have to worry about being super-duper careful when you have it on.    A simple spin in the washer and a tumble in the dryer makes it just like new.  (Yes, you are not dreaming….we said a tumble in the dryer)….

Jessica Holbrook is one of QVC’s most popular designer brands and specializes in the washable suede.  Skirts, jackets and blazers….you will love!

Dream-Adventures carries Jessica Holbrook clothing including washable suede pieces.  We also carry all the famous QVC brands at way less than “On Air” pricing.  Don’t pay retail!  Don’t pay QVC On Air price….shop Dream-Adventures for your favorites including Denim & Co, Quacker Factory, Susan Graver, Bob Mackie, Dialogue and more!

May your days be filled with Dream-Adventures!

HSN CEO Mindy Grossman

The home shopping network is taking space for executive offices in Manhattan, far away from HSN’s HQ in Florida, The New York Observer reported Monday.

HSN is renting at the luxurious, newly renovated tower at 545 Madison Ave., according to the paper.

Grossman’s company will be renting the whole 18th floor, glass-encased penthouse of the LCOR building, The Observer reported. It will provide digs for some HSN executive offices, a marketing center and some studio presentations.

The story quotes LCOR exec David Sigman, who says, “Home Shopping Network was looking for high-end, highly visible executive space that also had great light and views.”

If we were HSN shareholders, we’d be questioning why the network will be paying sky-high rents for space in Manhattan.

An HSN official contacted The Homeshoppingista to stress that HSN’s home office and corporate headquarters will remain in St. Petersburg.

But it looks like Grossman wants to stake a claim for HSN in Manhattan. She strikes us as an uptown girl, and that’s certainly the direction she is taking the No. 2 home shopping channel. Madison Avenue is what HSN is aspiring to.

Grossman’s strategy is to attract younger, hipper women to HSN. To do that, she has brought on a load of new Manhattan-based vendors, such as Stefani Greenfield and Badgley Mischka. Now, they won’t have to take a plane trip to Florida.

The blonde Grossman’s strategy that has meant that veteran HSN vendors such as Suzanne Somers parted ways with the Southern Channel. The blonde actress-author-entrepreneur is now on ShopNBC.

Of course, The Observer had to take some pot shots at HSN. Welcome to Manhattan pretensions.

“What better place to hawk tracksuits and sweater sets than a Madison Avenue penthouse?” The Observer wrote, calling “the Home Shopping Network…that seemingly inevitable destination of ex ‘Project Runway’-ers” and P. Diddy.

First of all, HSN changed its name years ago from Home Shopping Network. And second, it’s QVC that has the former ‘Project Runway’ winner, namely Chloe Dao.

It is true that Sean “Diddy” Combs is selling men’s fragrance on HSN, and it sold out on his first visit.

Fergie plans to flog royal knock-offs on QVC, Photo from News of the World

Duchess of York Sarah Ferguson, the royal rebel, is reportedly negotiating with QVC to do a line of knock-off’s of the royal family’s china, glassware, silverware and line, according to the News of the World newspaper in England.

The New York Post picked up that story in an item it ran in Monday’s paper.

Of course, the Post had to play up that old home shopping stereotype, by writing “The crown jewels are going cubic zirconia.”

The British paper really took Fergie to task, saying she “was secretly planning to flog family silver knock-offs.” The paper described Fergie as “cash strapped,” and that she was going to copy royal family heirlooms and her wedding gifts.

The News of the World said Fergie had already had talks with QVC execs in Los Angeles (puzzling, since QVC is based in West Chester, Pa.).

QVC’s PR department said it would get back to us. We’re still waiting.

The royal family threw a hissy fit when Princess Diana’s ex-butler, Paul Burrell, was selling jewelry based on the late Diana’s pieces, the British paper reported.

But Fergie is apparently determined to create her own “brand,” as marketing morons out it. She is trying to negotiate with QVC in secret before the Queen’s ire is sparked, according to News of the World.

One quote in the story says that Fergie has a lot of fans in America, “and that’s where the money is.”

Fergie’s plans shouldn’t come as a huge surprise. Back in September, she told New York Post gossip columnist Cindy Adams that she was talking with designer Tommy Hilfiger about doing a clothing line for QVC.

Have you ever had one of those days that started so poorly you wanted to crawl back into bed, pull the covers over your head and when you woke up it’s as if all the bad things that ruined your morning never happened? I had one of those days today except things got worse before the day ended quite well.

I went to bed before eleven o’clock last night, so I woke up well before the sun came up. After I checked my email, I went back to bed and three hours later I woke up with a raging head cold. Absolutely the last thing I needed today. I had plans to drop by the salon and get my hair done since I’m growing it out again, and afterward take a quick cruise up to the local mountains to get some fresh air and take pictures. It never happened. I was so devoid of energy I was too lazy to cook breakfast and I had Pizza Hut make a delivery.

I read Shopaholic Takes Manhattan on my PDA for a little bit and then something wonderful happened before sunset. Jonas Gustavsson started in goal for the Leafs. Not only did Jonas play well in his first start since his heart surgery, but he didn’t let a single shot get past him. That’s right. The Monster shut out the Boston Bruins on Hockey Night In Canada, the first Leafs shutout since…oh, I don’t know. All I can tell you is it’s been a very long time since the  last time that’s happened.

During the first intermission things got a lot better on the home front. My landlord left a nice surprise gift on my front door, plus my Diamonique stud earrings arrived in the mail. They’re a little bit bigger than the real ones I sold and they pop just like the old pair. In other words, they’re perfect.

Back to the Leafs game…as the final minutes ticked down my mind drifted toward Vesa Toskala, our embattled former starting goalie. He’s had two hideous starts in a row and now that the Jonas Gustavsson era has begun in Toronto it’s time to either ship Vesa across town to the Ricoh Center to finish out his $4 million contract with the Toronto Marlies or to someone willing to swallow his salary for the rest of the season.

I know Vesa has a thing for handbags like yours truly but blood runs thicker than handbag love and after two and a half seasons it’s obvious Vesa is not worth the first round pick and two second round picks John Ferguson Jr. sent to the San Jose Sharks the day before the 2007 NHL Entry Draft.

And yes, that’s my Jessica Simpson wristlet in the above picture. Not only is it chic but it’s perfect for those short runs when all I need to carry is my keys, license, debit card, cell phone, cash and lip balm without shoving all those things in my pockets where they can get scratched up and damaged –or poke me in inappropriate places.

Ramona Singer, one of “The Real Housewives of New York City,” made her final visit to HSN for this year with her jewelry collection Thursday night.

Singer, who comes across as a much nicer person on HSN than she does on Bravo’s reality show, had on a grey freshwater pearl and diamond enhancer pendant — and a matching ring and earrings — from her collection for the home shopping network.

“I actually wore these pieces on my last episode,” Singer said.

She was referring to the fact that Bravo just wrapped up filming the next season of “The Real Housewives of New York City.”

Singer is not just another celebrity lending her name to a product. Her husband is a fourth-generation jeweler, and her mother collected estate jewelry and taught Singer all about it, she told HSN viewers.

Singer’s pieces have a vintage feel to them, and are very similar in look to those of upscale Madison Avenue designer Judith Ripka, who does a collection for QVC.

For example, the style of the hinged cuff bracelets that Singer and Ripka do are very much alike.

Singer considers her cuffs her signature pieces. “I wear two at a time,” she said.

The reality TV star got a little choked up when she explained that one of her rings, which had pink topaz and diamonds, was modeled after a ruby ring that her mom owned. Her mom is deceased.

Love of jewelry must be in Singer’s family genes. Singer keeps all her HSN rings in a box on her dresser, and she said her teen daughter noticed them recently and asked for one. The young lady wants to be able to pass that ring on to her daughter, according to Singer.

She also claimed that a Manhattan retailer is clamoring to sell her jewelry line, but that she told him it’s exclusive to HSN.

On today’s show:  We took a look at the past year and recapped the  Top 10 Omar intro’s, Top 10 Internet Roundup videos, Top 10 “Moments with” and Top 10 K&B sound bites.

We also called the QVC for Lisa May’s Christmas gift, Adam Carolla’s ”This Week in Rage”, Santa Karl stopped by to talk to the kids and more.  

Fashion designer Dennis Basso had QVC’s Today’s Special Value Tuesday, a faux mink throw for $47.

On QVC’s 10 p.m. “Tuesday Night Gifts” show, Basso was on with host Lisa Mason. We were working on a story for NewJerseyNewsroom.com, so we were were only half listening.

But we heard Basso say he will be on the Martha Stewart (a native of Nutley, N.J.) show Wednesday.

According to Mason, “Martha Stewart will be giving this exact same throw” (as the QVC TSV) to her audience members. We don’t watch Martha, so we don’t even know if she has a studio audience.

As Mason pointed out, QVC customers had first dibs on this “hot” faux mink item, which also had a matching pillow for $29 and a TSV Extra, a matching teddy bear, for $18. Cute.

Jewelry junkies like us, who have been complaining about QVC nixing a lot of its jewelry shows, are in for a treat Friday.

The No. 1 home shopping is not only dedicating the whole day to jewelry, but the Today’s Special Value is trading in on one of jewelry’s hottest trends: the key pendant.

The Friday TSV is an Affinity diamond key pendant that will be selling for $120, on three Easy Pays of $40. That’s a lot cheaper than the thousands of dollars Tiffany is asking for its signature key pendants.

Victoria Wieck's HSN Key, Not QVC TSV

The QVC version has 1/3 of a carat of diamonds set in sterling silver. It is two inches long, on an 18-inch rolo chain.

We love the key look, and are planning to find one we like for ourselves.

Our mom just bought one on HSN from Victoria Wieck that was studded with Absolutes, and came in silver or vermeil yellow or rose gold. It is $60.

Robert Lee Morris has been making organic jewelry and accessories long before ‘organic’ was popular. He famously designed them for Donna Karan in the ’80s and now he designs jewelry for Elizabeth and James (Olsens’ label), along with his own namesake label. Mr. Morris is more silversmith than designer. Some of his jewelry are still forged the old fashion way– metal against metal, in heat. His jewelry is more metal work, with a few gemstones here and there, nothing bling-y, at all. And lately, I have been on the search for not only organic jewelry, but symbolic ones at that. It may be the call of a new year, of possibilities, but I do believe in the power of symbols, talismans, amulets– whatever you may call it– there is energy in metal, stones. When I stumbled on Mr. Morris’ line, RLM Studio for QVC (apparently everyone is doing it!), I thought, ” This is the democratization of fashion at its best!”

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What I ended up getting was the sterling silver infinity ring, a symbol that has meaning to me– not to mention its just plain gorgeous!

Hi Friends,
Get your xmas and birthday quality gifts right here on QVC http://sites.google.com/site/geezonebiz/geezone-events-2/qvc-uk
HAPPY HOLIDAYS!!

Stay Grateful, Loving, Happy & Blessed!
Love, Light & Abundance
Gee!
Geeone – Helping U 2 Help U!

After a couple of appearances on QVC, our clients at Nutorious are selling like, well, hot nuts! Jenny did an awesome job on the show and the new packaging has been flying off the TV, to homes all over America. Judging by the sales and the rave reviews by the presenters, our strategy of creating a brand on the outside to reflect the addictive quality of the nuts on the inside, was just perfect.

Our Brand Elevation process directed the brand to be “naturally and simply addictive”. This became a solid strategic  platform, from which all packaging and communication was built. (From the logo and tagline to packaging, website and sales material.) Like the great recipes of the nuts, a great brand recipe was just as important. Click on the QVC video link (to the right) and watch with a bag of your favorite nuts. Enjoy!

Get your head out of the gutter, peeps. Santa is not bringing me a pair of hot men for the holidays. I just bought myself a pair of Diamonique stud earrings from QVC. 1 carat total weight. Platinum clad on silver. Gorgeous!

When I sold my .50 ct diamond earrings a few months back I wanted to buy a pair of Diamonique earrings as a replacement but I never got around to it until now. In true form I got these for about the same price as a large supreme pizza and a two-liter bottle of soda delivered to my front door. They should arrive just before Christmas.

Metro chic without the hole in my bank account? I like that a lot!

The Cool-er eReader has come to QVC.

The competitor to Amazon’s Kindle is QVC’s Today’s Special Value Friday, at $229, with three Easy Pays of $76 to make it easier to swallow.

The home shopping network is touting the fact that the e-reader is preloaded with 29 books and that you also get a choice
of 10 other free book downloads. It has a 6-inch screen, is PC and Mac compatible, and comes in eight colors.

The device holds about 800 books on 1GB internal memory. For more storage space, you can get a memory card up to 4GB (not included).

The Cool-er is compact, weighing just over six ounces and only 1/2 inch thick.

“Unlike a computer screen, this unit features E-Ink technology that gives the screen a paper-like display and replicates the experience of reading a book,” QVC says on its Web site. “Plus, you can customize it to fit your needs: choose from one of three font types and eight font sizes. You can even change the page orientation from portrait to landscape.”

QVC’s Today’s Special Valyue includes the eReader, a built-in rechargeable battery, silicone case, earbuds, USB cable, 29 pre-loaded books, the 10 free book downloads from a list of select titles, a quick-start guide and an instruction booklet.

(Click image to enlarge)

Clockwise from top left: Nails inc The Hills collection £21.50 qvcuk.com, Gossip Girl season 1 and 2 £39.98 amazon.co.uk, LA Candy by Lauren Conrad amazon.com , Crystal pink compact mirror £10 monsoon.co.uk, Juicy Tube no.94 £12.15 johnlewis.com, The September Issue £9.98 amazon.co.uk

HSN CEO Mindy Grossman, Without Cleavage

Not that there’s anything wrong with that. We guess.

On Wednesday we first spotted a video clip called “A Message From CEO Mindy Grossman under “company overview” on HSN.com.

In the seven-minute video, Grossman gives investors and customers an eyeful, along with an update on the nation’s first home shopping channel, founded in 1977.

Grossman is wearing a low-cut, V-necked black sweater, and she’s rocking some cleavage. Now would QVC CEO Mike George or ShopNBC CEO Keith Stewart do that?

Anyway, Grossman does her spiel about how her strategy is working at HSN, which is in its second year as a public company.

“HSN is a non-stop, 24-hour, 365-day retailing giant,” Grossman says, noting that the network is in 93 million homes.

The executive also cites some of HSN’s vendors and lines, including Iman, Serena Williams, Wolfgang Puck and Lancome.

We think Grossman, a veteran of Nike, may be wearing a Heidi Daus bracelet. We’ve looked as close as we can, but we’re not absolutely sure.

After the previos group presentation we had to decided to drastically change our ideas,so close to the deadline this could turn out to become a possative or negative decission.

We have changed it so we are now advertising a simple chair on a shopping channel.

For research we brainstormed how to present the chair and looked into existing shopping channels.

We just got back to Jersey after attending NBC Universal’s party for the press. The soiree Tuesday night, held on the 52nd floor of 30 Rock in Manhattan, was officially off-the-record. But we can certainly tell you who we saw there.

As we were checking our coat, Kathie Lee Gifford was putting on her’s and leaving. Her NBC morning-TV partner, Hoda Kotb, was still inside at the shindig.

The event, sponsored by NBCU chief Jeff Zucker and his communications team, came on the heels of news that the nation’s largest cable operator, Comcast, was buying the home of the Peacock Network along with its stable of cable channels, which includes USA Network, SyFy, Bravo, Oxygen, CNBC and MSNBC. The seller is General Electric.

A shirt-sleeved Zucker briefly addressed the gathered media, and made some funny jokes about the coming merger (we can’t say what, it was off the record, remember?)

There were both NBCU talent and suits at the holiday party. NBC News anchor Brian Williams, a Jersey guy, stopped by, as did Lester Holt, Ann Curry and Amy Robach from “The Today Show.” Jimmy Fallon popped by when the party was ending.

As for execs, in addition to Zucker there was NBC Cable Entertainment chief Bonnie Hammer, Bravo honcho Frances Berwick, NBCU’s women’s and lifestyle chieftain Lauren Zalaznick, CNBC president Mark Hoffman and “Saturday Night Live” creator and producer Lorne Michaels.

We have written about Bravo’s “The Real Housewives of New Jersey” for NewJerseyNewsroom.com, and NBC has big home shopping connections and affiliations.

First of all, GE/NBC currently owns about 32.5 percent of ShopNBC on a fully diluted basis of 37.6 million shares. NBC’s 6.4 million shares represent 16.8 percent ownership and GE’s 6 million common stock purchase warrants represent 15.7 percent.

Secondly, the stars of several of NBCU’s cable show have home shopping lines, including: Tori Spelling, who is in Oxygen’s “Tori & Dean: Home Sweet Hollywood,” on HSN; Rachel Zoe, from Bravo’s “The Rachel Zoe Report,” on QVC; Isaac Mizrahi, who hosts Bravo’s “The Fashion Show,” on QVC; Padma Lakshmi, from Bravo’s “Top Chef,” on HSN; and Ramona Singer from Bravo's "The Real Housewives of New York City." on HSN.

The party gift was a DVD of the third season of NBC’s “30 Rock,” appropriately.

Loyal QVC viewers — us included — who have been griping about the lack of jewelry shows on the home shopping network should be happy Tuesday.

QVC has dedicated most of the day to “Jewely Gifts of Distinction,” kicking off the event with a Today’s Special Value from Judith Ripka.

The TSV is gem button earrings, for both pierced ears but also in clips, that come in five different gemstones, including our favorite, crystal quartz. The earrings are $100, on three Easy Pays.

Today QVC is also offering jewelry from high-end designers Stephen Dweck, with his new Dweck Diamonds line, Michael Dawkins, Robert Lee Morris, Barbara Bixby, Echo of the Dreamer, Barry Cord and Ann King, who is married to noted jewelry designer Steven Lagos.

So far, we have not seen Judith Ripka on herself. Her son seems to be subbing for her. At midnight, host Jane Teacy introduced the TSV and mistakenly said it was from Joan Rivers, leaving Ripka’s son looking a little uneasy. But Treacy then went on to get the name right — Ripka, not Rivers.

We guess Jane wasn’t used to be up past her bedtime, on the air at midnight.

Former ShopNBC CEO Rene Aiu Has Reason To Be Smiling

ShopNBC’s parent company, ValueVision Media, filed a 10-Q with the Securities and Exchange Commission Monday disclosing the Dec. 1 settlement of the breach-of-contract lawsuit that Aiu filed back in Nov. 21 last year. ShopNBC will record a charge of $1,505,000 in the third quarter to pay the settlement.

According to the filing, Aiu will get gross cash payments of $875,000 for severance-pay claims; $250,000 relating to the sale of her residence; and $360,000 in attorneys’ fees. That adds up to $1,485,00 to us, not $1,505,000, but we can’t explain the small discrepancy. Maybe we did the math wrong.

Whatever. It looks like Aiu, who was hired by ShopNBC March 3, 2008, made out quite nicely. She was a veteran of HSN and something called Jupiter Shop Channel Japan when she came to ShopNBC, assigned to try to turnaround the troubled channel. That March and April, she recruited three other senior executives to create her management team. Cost for those four execs in fiscal 2008: $1.1 million.

But ShopNBC didn’t give Aiu much time to do her thing. Six months after she was hired, on Aug. 22, ShopNBC management “terminated” her and the other three new company officials. The board named chairman John Buck CEO, and hired QVC veteran Keith Stewart as president and chief operating officer.

ShopNBC CEO Keith Stewart

We were working at Multichannel News and covered ShopNBC’s second-quarter conference call in August 2008, when investors ripped Buck a new one (we couldn’t write that at Multi) for firing Aiu so quickly, without giving her a chance to do her thing. In all our years of reporting, we have never heard a more hostile and bitter conference call between investors and a company.

About four months later, Aiu sued ValueVision, i.e. ShopNBC. According to the Minneapolis Star Tribune, Aiu alleged in the suit that Buck had given the OK to her turnaround plan, and to her hiring the three new execs. But Aiu charged that Buck was not a very happy camper when she suggested that compensation to ShopNBC officers and its directors be cut, “as a a sign of solidarity with long-suffering shareholders,” according to the Star Tribune.

The paper also reported that Aiu claimed that she and her new team learned that ShopNBC’s business among its best repeat customers had been eroding for years, and that the board was unaware of this looming problem.

The lawsuit alleged that when Aiu presented her findings and suggestions to Buck, her told her to can the new management team. A couple of days later, Aiu and the three senior execs she brought in were “terminated,” as they tend to say in lawsuits.

The Star Tribune said that Aiu’s suit alleged that Buck intimidated employees who disagreed with His Highness. The litigation also alleged that Buck hit vendors up for discounts.

In a nutshell, Aiu charged that she was shitcanned without good cause and that she was — how shall we say it — stiffed out of $2.1 million in severance pay, the Star Tribune reported.

Stewart was promoted to the CEO position on Jan. 27 — the day after Multichannel News pinkslipped us — and Buck went back to his old sole title of chairman.

Stewart brought in a group of fellowQVC alum, and they are actually doing a great job of mounting a turnaround at ShopNBC. The network is not out of the woods by a long shot, but Stewart has managed to diminish the flow of red ink from a river to a trickle.

Susan Graver, a famous clothing label carried by QVC Shopping Channel, features a fabric in many of her designs called Liquid Knit.  This fluid, drapey fabric is amazing.  It is light, but it lays against the skin and moves with you.  It is so flattering, not clingy.

Seasonless, it moves through the 4 seasons with ease.  Available in a variety of pieces from dresses to tanks to shirts, we guarantee you will not be disappointed with anything in Susan Graver’s Liquid Knit collection.

Featuring 92% polyester and 8% spandex, this machine washable fabric is so easy to care for.  Double bonus!

And better yet–buy Susan Graver at Dream-Adventures for way way less than the On Air price you see on QVC!  Check our Liquid Knit items, or our entire Susan Graver stock.  We carry many designer labels including Susan Graver, Dennis Basso, Bradley Bayou, Denim & Co, Quacker Factory & more.

May your days be filled with Dream-Adventures!

I think it’s kind of hilarious to spend more than I make in a given day.  This occurred almost every day for month while I was planning my wedding – though admittedly I wasn’t particularly well paid at the time.  I would come out of my cubicle and announce that I’d just booked a 1939 Rolls Royce for a tour of the monuments or decided to add chocolate covered strawberries to the menu.  I held that job out of pure generosity on the part of my employer – if I did 50-50 wedding/real work it was a good week.   Lately Etsy.com has been helping me with my spending goals.  Etsy, for those of you who don’t know, is handmade universe – like one enormous craft fair without all the walking. Plus you can avoid phallic glass sculpture, barrettes made from beer bottle caps and the horrors of  fiber art.

This guy makes ipod chargers out of firewood!

You can’t do random searches – start with the Editor’s Picks or you’ll see a lot of sad pics of  macramé and great-grandma hands modeling jewelry.  Lately I’ve bought an adorable bear named Ben who came all the way from Croatia, little felt owl from Malaysia, bracelets made of wool from Poland and a hot wheels baby blanket from Idaho.  Luckily the addiction has coincided with Christmas shopping or I’d have a ton of adorable uselessness choking the hallways of my house.  But I love finding a couple of tiny padded envelopes waiting for me by the door when I get home – they are all so artsy and cute with drawings and sayings on them – one was made of a laminated Thai newspaper.

The finance lady at my wedding planning job was maniacally addicted to buying jewelry on QVC.   I think she finally had to get some kind of help for it. She would have packages forming a drift next to her door if she was out of the office for a few days.   She always bought the entire matchy matchy set of something and talked a lot about how valuable it all was.  I don’t think anything QVC sells is investment quality but then again, a little Bear named Ben isn’t how lot of people would spend $40 (even though he did come with a baby chick friend so he wouldn’t have to make the journey alone!) so I can’t really talk.

Warmth and the calming effect of a falcon hood.

Recently Rachel Zoe visited the QVC studios on her Bravo series.  Actually it was Rachel and Taylor her impossibly white gossamer blond, incredibly disaffected Ray-ban wearing assistant.   What they omitted from the episode was that QVC is in West Chester, PA – my husband’s aunt and uncle live right near there and have taken the studio tour – but it seemed like Rachel and Tay-Tay were still in Manhattan.

I guess Rachel would die if anyone knew Team Zoe stepped foot in Pennsylvania.  I wish they had stopped at a diner for some good down-home PA Dutch fare – maybe some yummy pickled beets or other family-style deliciousness.  That would be highly unlikely because Rachel never ever eats on camera.  Strange, considering there is an ongoing storyline that the tabloid press is torturing her with the indescribably offensive  and ridiculous notion that she has an eating disorder.

I kind of admire the idea of going on the offense – I’ve always been an advocate for confessing before you can be tattled on…but take a gander at this gal.

She is so tiny and bony and thin she can hardly hold up her head and giant mane of hair.  Someone should tell her that beefing up a few dress sizes will take years off her face – the last time I was pregnant I got fatter and younger looking every day.

In my opinion Rachel has a stupid amount of clothes.   The whole show is what a friend of mine would call a “Material Feast” – once in a while his parents would go on a MF that consisted of chucking out old furniture and electronics and replacing them with new versions of themselves.   It was like their things had an expiration date and one morning they’d go downstairs and find that their sofa or stereo had to be immediately disposed of like a jar of furry salsa from the back of the fridge.  (50% of what is in my refrigerator at any given time will send you to the ER if you eat it – time seems to whiz by in there and I can’t keep up.  Just FYI.)

The other constant of the show is her long-suffering husband.  I’ve met several couples like this pair –one member of the band is the lead singer and the other is the roadie.

All that poor Rodger does is wait around, fully dressed,  for Rachel to make him late to a party and fear his credit card bills.  She spends a scary amount of money, so much so that it’s kind of anxiety producing to watch her shop.  She spends way more than she makes in a day and she makes a lot.  And now she has the opportunity to buy her own stuff on QVC!

I’ve got to get back to work – there’s a necklace made of a vintage reproduction wax seal of my initials I want to make sure no one else buys…

QVC’s new designer, Isaac Mizrahi, has his first QVC Today’s Special Value Monday, a pebble leather purse with accessories.

But if you have been reading our blog, you would have known about this TSV back on Nov. 14, when we wrote about it.

We can’t take all the credit, however. A QVC forum sleuth unearthed the intelligence.

The purse is $200.

As we are seeing, Mizrahi loves bright colors in his purses. We especially love the “cactus,” because it reminds us of Arizona, which we love.

We were in Tiffany & Co. at the Short Hills Mall in Jersey Sunday, just browsing. We spotted a customer carrying a handbag that looked very much like the satchel Iman, David Bowie’s wife, does for HSN.

The Tiffany’s saleswoman complimented the patron on her purse. The customer didn’t anything. We saw the purse’s logo, and it, again, suspiciously looked like the logo for Iman’s Global Chic HSN collection.

Fess up, lady! Admit it was from HSN.

The “It” satchel from Iman goes for $120.