Hi. I’m Dani. And I want you to use the fine china.
Not metaphorically. Well — okay, a little metaphorically. But also literally. If you have a set of dishes you’re saving for a special occasion, I want you to go get them out of the cabinet right now and use them for Tuesday night pasta.
That’s what Sincerely, Dani Rose is about.
A few years ago, I had back surgery. It came out of nowhere. One minute I was decorating cookies with friends — the kind of ordinary, lovely afternoon that doesn’t feel like it needs to be savored because surely there will be a hundred more just like it — and the next I was getting myself home on instinct, something feeling deeply wrong with my back. After a week of being unable to leave my bed due to absolutely awful pain, paramedics were ripping an expensive set of sheets to get me onto a stretcher board. My back did not care that I was in the middle of launching new work projects. It did not care about the dogs, or that my husband was still job hunting, or that the timing was genuinely terrible. Bodies are like that. They don’t negotiate!
I had been waiting. To lose weight before wearing the dress. To wait until a dinner party or guest to burn the Glossier candle. To feel “ready” before starting an MBA program…
Recovery has a way of making that kind of thinking feel very, very stupid.
You don’t get the time back. The Tuesday you spend in the uncomfortable jeans because you’re saving the cute ones for something better? That’s a Tuesday you actually lived in. The candle that collects dust in the back of the cabinet because you were waiting for the right moment? That was the right moment. Every moment is the right moment, until suddenly it isn’t.
Start now. Use the fine china. You’re allowed.
A couple of years later, I’m ready to share with a philosophy and a slightly unhinged commitment to wearing patterned midi skirts to the grocery store.
What you’ll find here
Sincerely, Dani Rose is a blog about style, home, Orlando, and culture — all filtered through one lens: ordinary life deserves to be treated as extraordinary.
That looks different depending on the day. Sometimes it’s an outfit post featuring a thrift find I’ve been obsessed with for three weeks. Sometimes it’s a guide to the best coffee shops in Orlando that make me feel like I live in a movie. Sometimes it’s a deep dive into a musical I cannot stop thinking about, or a guide to collecting Depression glass on a real budget, or a meditation on why getting dressed in the morning is actually an act of self-respect.
It’s all connected. It’s all the same thing: showing up for your own life.
A few things about me
• I’m based in Orlando, Florida — and I genuinely love it here.
• I’m a plus-size woman, and this blog is built on the radical premise that style is for everybody right now, in the body they actually have.
• I’m pursuing my MBA, I sing in a choir, and I have dogs who are on the couch as I type this.
• I believe in Disney magic the same way I believe in good bread and the right lipstick: completely and without irony.
• I will absolutely talk to you about a musical for longer than is strictly socially acceptable.
Who this is for
“Alexa, play ‘This One’s for the Girls’ by Martina McBride”
No, but really. You’re probably in your late twenties or thirties. You love beautiful things but sometimes feel like your “real life” hasn’t started yet — like you’re waiting for some future version of yourself to finally deserve the good stuff.
This blog is your permission slip.
You don’t have to earn the fancy candy. You don’t have to wait for the body or the space or the relationship or the promotion. You can start now. You can wear the dress today. You can light the candle on a Tuesday.
The fine china is for today. Come on in.
With love and extremely strong feelings about Hoop Dee Doo at Walt Disney World,
Dani
P.S. You can find me on Instagram at @SincerelyDaniRose