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Coffee Break: Samburu Sandal

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black leather sandal with gold accents; the sandal has one strap across the vamp of the foot and one across the big toe

These sandals from Amaru feel really sleek and fun — I love the way the gold accents almost look like liquid. The almond toe feels fresh, also.

The sandals are $550, available in whole sizes 4-12 at Saks — you can get them in black or tan. (It is actually plated in 24K gold!)

A lot of the brand's styles are similar.

Pst: Sandals aren't appropriate at every office – know yours!

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104 Comments

  1. You guys are so good at this – any suggestions for casual meals to feed a crowd of ten people? The constraints are:
    1) 1 adult woman who does not eat any salt, sugar, or fat. I can’t totally accommodate her but try to do at least a separate lean protein for her.
    2) 1 child who only likes chicken fries.
    3) 2 adult men who think it’s not dinner unless there’s a big animal protein on the plate.
    4) Food prepped in a vacation house.
    5) no one is good at grilling.

    1. Takeout.

      More seriously this sounds like the nightmare of non overlapping dietary restrictions my family has (vegetarians+ vegetable-haters, no red meat+ no fish+ no poultry, no spice and only spice etc). It sucks and trying to have everyone eat the same thing is an exercise in futility. The only thing I can suggest if you’re determined to cook is a taco bar or a gyro bar or a sandwich bar with lots of options.

      1. +1

        Make your own taco/Quesadilla or some sort of make your own Asian bowl. Cook up a bunch of chicken to shred in a slow cooker to go with it. Beans/tofu as vegetarian protein options.

        Picky child’s mother can make the chicken fingers. Seriously.

      2. Thank you for validating the part of me where my head is exploding over this.

        My instinct is to make something that most people can eat, and let others fend for themselves. But my mother in law (the no salt/sugar/fat eater) is incredibly, obsessively worried about what everyone will eat and will they like it. So my choices are either to find something that works for everyone or to literally listen to her worry about it for days and days and days leading up to the meals.

          1. She’s literally not capable of it. It would ruin everyone’s vacation for her to cook meals, including mine. I know the better course of action would be to hold a boundary, but this is just one of those instances where me giving up a little on cooking will create much more family harmony.

      3. +1 this sounds awful to me! But I don’t like cooking on vacation when it’s just my own family.

      4. +1 to takeout. It’s a vacation. I don’t cook or clean on vacation. I do those things at home and a vacation is supposed to be a break. If takeout is too expensive get different kinds of frozen lasagna and bagged salads from the grocery store.

    2. Check out the blog Recipe Tin Eats, everything I’ve made is great and she has good options for groups. One is a slow cooker Mexican beef which has been a crowd pleaser and doesn’t require much beyond switching it on. I’d do that with some roast chicken breasts and Mexican sides?

      1. this – or maybe a pasta salad bar? kid will probably want plain white, everyone else could add dressing/veg/cheese/beans to taste.

      2. This, or some other kind of assemble-your-own with food stations, like burritos, pizzas, burgers, and so on. Make ‘extra’ portions of the meat part for the dudes. Even the child might be interested in the food bar because it means assembling their own dinner and putting exactly what they do or don’t like in it.

        This method also avoids the whiners who want to complain that you put a thing they don’t like in their meal. You put it there yourself, Bob!

      1. This is going to be perfect. I also have a great source for delicious pita bread. Thank you!

    5. The Pizza Hut feed a crowd special – can’t remember the name but it comes in a comically large box. You can get the chicken wings without sauce for the child and a salad for the adult woman.

      1. Is that the one with the box with drawers that have pizzas and wings inside! I’ve always wanted to get that but our household is too small.

    6. If you’re on the West Coast, tri-tip is easy and can be grilled or done in the oven. Then add a veg or two, like corn on the cob, and you’re set.

      TriTip is harder to find on the East Coast.

        1. Another vote for Tri Tip. Remember it’s served with garlic bread, not potatoes, and always a side of beans (pref pinquito but pinto will do) and a crisp green salad.

    7. She sounds awful and since she is your husband’s mother, why is he not dealing with her and planning meals? Don’t lift a finger. Let him do it.

      1. i would hope so — but apparently it’s been known for a while that the plaintiff doesn’t even design wedding websites at all? it all seems like perjury or something.

  3. Would these sandals be appropriate at any office? I can’t see them being okay in any workplace except a very upscale boutique where they are sold, in which case only the owner could afford them.

    2. in my mind if your office allows sandals then it should allow these – why not?

      1. Probably because no one wants to police who should wear what shoes and when you have something like this, your feet need to be really well taken care to look nice. Hence the default of more covered up sandals that will suit a wider range of feet types.

      2. In my office, these would be annoyingly loud and only worn by our pleasant but vapid receptionist whose style trends towards ladies of a certain are going out for brunch & mimosas.

    4. I am surprised by this myself, but I think they might be appropriate on a summer Friday at my office if you’re administrative staff. (Texas. What can I say.)

    5. They’d be appropriate any day of the week in my office. We don’t have a dress code. But we also don’t have these salaries.

    7. They may not be verboten, but they aren’t “appropriate,” which is a word I chose for a reason

      1. I agree with you. They look meant to be worn with a reformation dress in Greece. The shoe equivalent of a spaghetti strap silky tank.

  4. Money question here, young family in a mid-to-high cost of living area with a hot real estate market. We are trying to decide between selling our first home or keep it as a rental that is currently making $700 of profit per month. If we sold the home, I estimate we would make ~$300k profit. One of us thinks we should keep the home and let it appreciate while we make a little profit and pay off the mortgage in 8 years, and the other thinks we should sell and invest the profit in the market. If we set aside the risk inherent in both options, which one is likely to achieve greater financial gain in a 10-20 year timeline? What would you do?

    1. The good news about decisions that don’t have a clear answer (if for no other reason than that there is too much uncertainty to make calculation assumptions) is that you can focus on deciding as a couple what makes you both comfortable and not worry about which one of you is “right” or “wrong.”

      1. Agree with this. If any of us could answer that question accurately we would be full-time professional investors!

        When I was in that situation I decided to keep the house. However, at the time I already had substantial money in the stock market so it was partly an issue of wanting to be diversified.

        If you do decide to keep it, I strongly recommend hiring a realtor to handle the marketing of the property and screening of tenants. It costs money but I’ve always done it and haven’t had a dud tenant yet.

      1. We’d invest $150-200k and put the remainder into our current home – pay down the mortgage and do some remodeling

    3. Depends on the interest rate on the mortgage and how it compares to what you’d expect to get in the market on average. You should know the former, and Google can tell you the latter.

    4. I have a STRONG aversion to being a landlord (too much work!) and I’m very risk averse, so I’d sell it.

    5. Sell. <$9k/year for a part time job IF there are no major vacancies, repairs, evictions, etc. no thanks.

      1. Absolutely sell. Especially if you have never been a landlord before.

        You have a young family. I’m sure both parents are very busy. Do you want to spend the limited free time you have dealing with landlord issues?

        What if the roof leaks next month and it needs a roof?
        Or you have picky tenants that ask for things to be fixed all the time?
        Or you get squatters who don’t pay?

        And don’t think you can always screen good tenants. A lawyer had previously rented my last apartment, and she stopped paying for over 1 year, got out just before eviction. She knew the tenant laws very well, and totally scammed this young couple, just starting a family, wanting to rent their condo instead of selling when they moved to their first house.

        I have a cousin who owned property in Oakland and the squatting was so bad he eventually had to abandon the property. The loss was astronomical. I know there’s no place like Oakland in the last few years, but his experience impacted me.

        Don’t do this as a young family. You never know.
        Vanguard index funds all the way.

        1. This is very thorough, thank you. That sounds like a horrific situation and I could see it happening to us, definitely. We use a rental management company and pay a couple hundred dollars a month to manage the property (factored into the profit), but we’d still pay legal fees and absorb any losses.

        2. We really, really thought about hanging on to our previous home when we bought our new one, and renting it out, but we were leaving the neighborhood because there were a lot of irresponsible renters moving in and we didn’t feel like our luck getting good renters who wouldn’t trash the house, park leaky cars on the lawn, and constantly get in fights that warranted police response would be any better than that of our neighbors who were renting out their homes. Basically, we were afraid about all the above issues coming to pass and being stuck in a situation we hated, but did not have an easy way out of. So we sold the house, and while I sometimes think about having that extra stream of income, I also think that it would have just been too much to maintain our current home, manage the rental, and work our two full time jobs, while also raising our kid and taking care of our pets, etc. etc.

    6. I was in that position several years ago and we decided to sell. I am not good at being a landlord – I don’t like it, I don’t have time, and I never enjoy house projects even when I get to live in the house. For me, it was an easy decision based on my lack of interest in continuing to maintain a property.

      If you are handy, good with home projects, etc., then I think it makes a lot more sense to keep the property.

      Your property tax regime and rent control regime also have an impact here. We live in California, where we would have kept our low property taxes forever (thanks to the evil proposition 13, which also gutted our schools), but we also have increasingly aggressive rent control that made being a landlord much less appealing.

    7. Is the one who decided to sell aware of how much time and money it’s going to take to be a landlord?

      The 10-20 year question is impossible to answer, but the housing market is good NOW.

      1. I heard that the ratio between cost of a home and cost of rent is the highest in fifty years or something. Put differently, at this particular moment in time, renters should stay renting and anyone who can sell a rental home should do so.

    8. I mean, I would sell because the idea of being a landlord is a no go for me, and I AM really handy, etc. etc. I have a job already, I don’t want another + the risk of a dead beat tenant who is hard to evict. I’d sleep much better with my money in the market.

      Perhaps the compromise is to sell the house and invest in a REIT that follows your local market if you feel real estate is a better investment than a broader index at this point.

    9. You might want to factor into your pros and cons capital gains. If it’s your primary residence now, you most likely wouldn’t have to pay capital gains when you sell it versus if you rent it out for a while and then go to sell it. You could have that revenue factor into your taxable income. Whereas if that was invested in the stock market you can control your taxable income a little more.
      I have in-laws with several rental properties. Which worked out great in there era where they had energy to be land lords and the money was fairly passive. But now they are retired and needing to simplify their life style. The rentals are becoming a problem as they’re not easy to liquidate with out a big ripple effect to their taxes.

    10. Landlord here and I’d sell. If you want to get into real estate, do it intentionally and buy something meant to be rental property. If you encumber a SFH with tenants, you’ll likely ultimately lower its market value. And you generally won’t get enough rental income to make it worth it. Be an intentional not accidental landlord.

    11. We kept our first place and rented it out. It only worked because one of us wanted to transition to managing real estate anyhow. I would not do it otherwise.

  5. Hopefully a fun and low stakes discussion: a lot of readers have mentioned being or having been outstanding athletes. I’m an enthusiastic and good, just not outstanding, athlete, so I’m fascinated.

    Anyone go pro? Had the option to go pro? Get recruited by D1? Think it changed the trajectory of your life? Discussed it in interviews (apparently, CRE apparently loves former athletes)?

    1. I was recruited for DI soccer and water polo. I played water polo. My team was always tops or close to tops in the country. I also played later with a City-athletic club (think NYAC in NYC or Olympic Club in SF). It is on my resume, is always a topic brought up by interviewers (I am long out of college). When I graduated from college I went to Wall Street, and on Wall Street, they loved my athletic background.

      Many of my college teammates were Olympians or played professionally post-college. Recently I was at a baby shower for a teammate, and out of 13 of us, there were nine Olympic medals, spanning bronze to gold. It’s fun that we have this in common and I’m super proud of the sports heritage and strong academics of my college. I was not a dumb jock–most jocks at my university can not be dumb due to admissions requirements.

      1. This is so cool! We spent our first decade of parenting actively limiting extra -curriculars and then out of nowhere our 12 year old fell into competitive water polo (it’s actually a dual swim w/p club). Such a cool sport!

    2. I was in the top 10 at nationals in high school at my event in track and competed D1. I had a really mediocre college career. On one hand I think it handicapped me because I spent so much time on track and cross country that I didn’t have time to pursue more career related extracurriculars and also didn’t have as much time to focus on my studies. On the other hand it comes up in almost every interview. People love to talk to me about their upcoming marathon or their most recent running injury. I feel like I should take college accomplishments off my resume at some point but it’s such a conversation starter than I haven’t yet.

    3. So I was a very good high school athlete in an endurance sport, but developed a severe eating disorder that put college competition off-limits for me. After college and when I was out of recovery, I moved into another endurance sport. When I was in my early 30s (which is prime age for a woman in this sport), I was competing internationally and on the cusp of going pro but realized that no matter how much I loved it, it was more important to me to have a financially stable life (which I wouldn’t have as a pro athlete in this sport). Ten years later I still do my sport for fun, and I’m a huge fan of the pros, but I don’t regret my decision. Even male athletes in my sport don’t make that much, except for a handful of top stars; I have a financially secure life now and still benefit health-wise from having bee an athlete for so long. Plus, I’ve been able to have kids which would have been really hard at the body fat levels I was at in prime competition years.

    4. I was recruited D1 for crew. I rowed for 3 years. I made good friends through the sport. I have done literally nothing with it since I quit after my junior year. Some people in my expanded circle are still very involved – still competing themselves or coaching. I was just at a wedding with several Olympians.

      Most of my career has been in government so it was never a foot in the door (since everything is so by the book). The one time I worked in the private sector, I was asked about it in interviews. That job had a few D1 athletes, including someone who played on the senior national team for her sport. They were all a lot older than me though so it wasn’t much of a bonding point.

      My entire mom’s side of the family is D1 athletes. One is a head coach at a Big 10 school. Another played semi pro.

      It changed the trajectory in that I improved my self discipline and all those other benefits they tout. My very good high school abc college friends are former teammates.

      It didn’t open doors professionally for me, but it did for some relatives.

    5. D1 swimmer, recruited but not top tier schools; partial scholarship. Definitely no option to go pro.
      I think it changed the trajectory of my life in indirect ways, for example, my experience looked excellent on resumes and was discussed during law firm interviews when I was in law school (wouldn’t be relevant now, 15+ yrs post-graduation). But it’s not like an alum gave me a job. My closest friends are my college teammates.
      My parents sacrificed a LOT for me, especially in terms of time, and I am extremely grateful to them.

  6. I wish all the talk of diversity and inclusion from companies was honest. I’m just especially bummed today because the implied cis het normativity is strong. Signed a closeted big gay neurodivergent NB.

    1. I like to remind myself how far we’ve come that it’s even a talking point. Society is a work in progress. We aren’t perfect and we all have a ton of work to do but we’re better at most of this than we have ever been and that is still something to celebrate.

    2. How can one be gay and NB? If you are neither a woman or a man, then how can you be homosexual? Doesn’t same-sex attraction require same sexed bodies? So is your sex female and your gender non binary? Would a more finite description be ‘queer’?

      1. Yeah queer would technically work too. But someone can be NB and gay depending on their AGAB and their particular relationship with gender.

        1. I just can’t grock how being NB and gay isn’t an oxymoron. If you are NB then you reject your assigned sex. By opting out of the sex binary you are no longer same sex attracted. Therefore, you cannot be homosexual without changing the definition of homosexual. Unless you acknowledge your sexed body in which case you are basically performing gender nonconformity with extra steps and the NB boils down to fashion, gender theory and politics. Not sex.
          The meaning behind sex-based attraction is meaningful for a reason.

          1. Why are people obsessed with labeling and categoring themselves using words that don’t have shared definitions?

  7. how does everyone store their china and barware? we have a hutch which feels old fashioned but is also lousy at optimizing space. also, how do you know it’s time to let go of wedding-gift china — even if we never use it it feels like i should hold it until i die.

    1. Honestly?

      In boxes in the basement.
      The barware we use regularly is just with our regular glasses.

      I say either get rid of it or use it. Don’t display it.

    2. We store the daily-use stuff in the kitchen, which was remodeled some years ago to have really nice pull-out cabinets. The rest (of which there is an embarassing amount) is in the two built-in linen closets in the hallway of our ca. 1950s house. (Linens, of which there are few, live in the relevant bedrooms and bathrooms. Table linens live in a chest in the living room.) The next project on Hubby’s list is to add pull-outs to those, to turn it all into something of a mini-butler’s pantry.

      We have multiple sets of fine china and use it all regularly, so I’m not the one to answer your second question. Pro tip, though: You’ll use it a lot more if you give yourself to put it in the dishwasher.

      1. Give yourself PERMISSION to put it in the dishwasher.

        Also, I agree that you should get rid of it if you’re not using it.

        1. Many years ago my mom saw me put my fancy china in the dishwasher & said the gold will wear off eventually…my response was..key word….eventually. I love fine china and the pretty stuff on my table everyday!

    3. I use it every day and put it in the dishwasher, and clutch those pearls ladies, even the silver! It makes me happy to use the pretty things so that’s what I do with everything. Use the crystal glasses, the good china, the pretty table linens and elevate your everyday.

      1. Does the silver get clean in the dishwasher? Does it get tarnished or do you do anything special to polish it?

        1. Oh it definitely gets clean, it tarnishes a little, but I’d rather use it than care. It can be easily polished back up, too.

        2. I put my silver in the dishwasher, too. I’d have to polish it whether or not I put it in the dishwasher, so why not?

    4. My old house has a built in china cabinet plus a butler’s pantry. Everyday dishes go in the butler’s pantry, china goes in the china cabinet, and anything that doesn’t fit into either of those two has to go.

    5. An armoire. I use an antique now, but I used one from the “electronics can’t be seen” period before that. It’s important for it to have shelves – at least 2 depending on the size.

  9. Does anyone own a rowing machine? I have an old (90s) Concept II rower that at some point had the footpads replaced with wooden blocks. i HATE the blocks. should I look for replacement parts (and if so what kind is best) or just try to upgrade to a newer rower? unsure how much anyone will use, but if it’s a better experience we might. my son did crew this past spring.

    1. We have the baseline water rower. It’s a lot smoother than a concept 2 and stores super small. I’d encourage you to check it out, and it’s what Orangetheory uses – if you want to pay for a class and see how much you like rowing for 10-20 minutes.

      1. My Orangetheory just sold their water rowers and upgraded to new versions which have incorporated tracking software. The old ones were identical, but for the software, and they sold them for a reasonable price. I would keep an eye out, as the franchises are all upgrading (or already have), as I understand it.

    2. I have a water rower. Bought it to replace a concept two. the sound is so soothing and it is a nice rowing motion.

    3. Are you friendly with your son’s crew coach? They might have good local/practical suggestions for your question about replacing the blocks.

      We bought a new concept 2 in the last year when my daughter started rowing. My husband uses it probably 5x per week, and my daughter used it consistently throughout the winter to supplement her school training.

    4. You probably have the Model B that I have. It’s indestructible.
      Concept II sells retrofits, look for “Flexfoot Retrofit Kit.
      $40 will solve this problem, and you’ll get the standard footpads that most of the modern Concept IIs have now.

  10. My MIL talked to DH and told him she was going to send us $10k per kid (we have 3) for their 529s. I don’t know how the conversation went exactly, I wasn’t there.

    I’ve never gotten a cash gift like this before. So we/I send her a note? Do we have the kids (4,5,8) do something? Do I just trust DH thanked her appropriately?

    Fwiw if it were my parents I’d reach out to let them know the funds made it in, and thank them again verbally.

    Also FWIW, DH is the only child and his mom has quite a bit of money that she is starting to want to “unload” as she ages. This isn’t a hardship type gift and will likely not be the last.

    1. I’d say his family, he takes the lead, but if you know what MIL would like it’s fine to nudge your husband in that direction. My parents are very well off and have given us ~$50k so far for our 5 year old’s eventual college education and have indicated there’s a lot more coming. I haven’t really done anything other than say thank you verbally when they mention a cash transfer. They’re very involved in our lives and the lives of our child and don’t expect a written thank you. On the other hand, my husband’s rich uncle we rarely see gave us a $10k cash gift once, and I urged my husband to write him and his wife a thank you card. So I think it depends a lot on the relationship.

  11. Any birthday gift ideas for my friend who lives in Plano, TX and has a busy job and two small children in daycare? She likes Mexican food and Thai food, doesn’t have a huge sweet tooth, not much time for hobbies. Not sure if she will really enjoy or have the time to do massages etc. In the past she’s liked some things I sent her like foam rollers and a Mexican restaurant gift voucher, and merch related to a comic she likes, but this time I’m coming up empty.

    1. This is so generic, but I love buying my coffee in the morning and am generally too cheap to do so. I really like when anyone sends me a Starbucks card. Feels like a splurge every time I go and use it.

    2. A collection of hot sauces, spices or similar?
      A membership to something local like a botanical garden or museum? (My kids love to run around botanical gardens & i always enjoy visiting).
      Some nice hair mask or other beauty items she might not get herself?

    4. Flowers. When I had 2 kids in daycare and was working full time they were a luxury. I wouldn’t send a gift card. She won’t have time to use it for a few years :).

      1. Counterpoint, I have two kids in daycare and would love a restaurant gift card. I hate the idea that all mommys are martyrs who never get to go out to a nice meal, and that’s not true at all among the people I know in real life.

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