Thursday, June 17, 2010

arts + crafts

A good friend and I drove to North Carolina last weekend for the wedding of an old schoolmate. We brought the happy couple a birdhouse (among other things) that we made out of old books. I hope they liked it!







On our way to North Carolina we stopped outside of D.C. to pee and to hang out with Joseph Smith. I'm not trying to offend anyone here, but... if you are a Mormon, your religion freaks me out (oops, originally I wrote Moron... what a fortunate typo!). On the plus side, your buildings are cool.



Making the birdhouse was really fun. My next project is going to involve making some sort of case for these beauties that I found out with the trash the other night!









Some of them are a little battered but I think it gives them more character.

Friday, February 26, 2010



I feel like I am trying to pack for all of these vacations. It will be 60-70 in Vegas but I may want snow boots in Denver. I will need a bathing suit for both parts of the trip. It certainly isn't a staycation for me but it will be for Sarah who, as it turns out, did not invent the the staycation.

Saturday, February 6, 2010

Sara's Office 02062010

It's been awhile, lady brains. Max and I moved and we are very happily settling in to South Philly. I mean VERY happily. We love it here. The house is really wonderful. I wanted to take a bunch of pictures this morning but we got so much snow that it is covering the windows downstairs and so it is too dark to photograph the living room/dining room/kitchen. I was able to take some photos of my office. It is one of the least finished rooms in the house! But... it's something!

Eventually I will get a new desk chair and an arm chair in which to curl up and read. I also plan to paint it this blue green color soon, although in real life it doesn't look much like this paint chip at all.


You can click on the pictures to see a bigger version.



It is a little hard to see in the picture but I have the sewing machine set up with the pedal on the bottom shelf so it is (kind of) a usable workspace. The rasterbation is just something we had hanging in the old apartment. It is pretty beat up but it will stay until I have time to put more art up. I have piles of things I want to hang up in here but I haven't had a chance yet.



I made an effort to put out the things I wish I used more - my cameras, stationary, a calligraphy set I'd like to master - to inspire me to get off my computerbutt and onto my productivebutt. That book is a really awesome set of paintings about Ulysses that my old boss's husband found for me at a used bookstore.



My desk... not so exciting. Yet!



The bright pink thing is a "picture frame" I made in... fifth grade? It has a picture of my childhood dog, Max, who died last year. My school papers live in that basket and I like to keep the picture on top of them - it makes me smile every time I reach for my work!



The pictures above my desk are drawings that a neighbor and family friend made of/for me. She did one every year from my eighth birthday until I graduated from high school. Every detail is something about me - a house I lived in, an outfit I wore that year, a book I was reading/writing, etc. - I really love them!



Eighteenth birthday. My prom dress.



Sixteenth and seventeenth birthday.



Thirteenth birthday. I taught horseback riding lessons then. The sweatshirt says "Delaware Water Gap Queen of Teendom!" I think it is the only piece of clothing she included that I didn't actually own. The purple cape was a wardrobe staple of mine. Just kidding. On the bottom left is the Delaware Water Gap. The house in the back right is the house I grew up in. There were three houses tucked back in the woods, of which we owned one and the lady who drew these owned another. The houses were originally built by three different families who had last names that started with A, B, and C, so we always called them the ABC houses. In almost every picture there is a little bar of ABC music notes.

Oh, and, this is what it looks like when I read Finnegans Wake. Note the glass of wine.