I recently lost my lovely grandmother Jeune Ruen (Muzzy). I feel the need to write about her because her style has had such a large influence on me. Muzzy was inherently chic, she wore hot pink lipstick, ivory jewelry and a bracelet with a jade elephant charm. Whenever we visited Muzzy there were jars filled with sweets and we would drink shirley temples with lots of maraschino cherries. She loved Frank Sinatra, especially "My Funny Valentine." She enjoyed watching her birds in her backyard, gardening, playing bridge and reading. When my sister and I were in College, we would drive to Palm Beach for the weekends and Muzzy would take us to Cafe L'Europe for champagne filled lunches. She collected beautiful artwork and drove a pink Cadillac in the 60's. Her hair was the prettiest shade of white, I used to think it looked like ice cream. She bought me my first Lilly Pulitzer dress and is probably one of the reasons I work there now. She was very honest, sometimes too honest, which we always laughed about. She loved parties and entertaining, a skill she passed down to all of her daughters. Mostly, Muzzy wanted to please her family and make everything beautiful, and she always did.
The illustration above is a collection of some of Muzzy's favorite things. The photo above is from my last visit with Muzzy in Palm Beach
