sunday repose

listening to: neko case ~ middle cyclone

dreaming of: space for a clutter free craft/sewing roomfound over at A Field Journal blog

watching: amelie (AGAIN!)

reading: animal, vegetable, miracle by barbara kingsolver
excerpt from page 16: "Food cultures concentrate a population's collective wisdom about the plants and animals that grow in a place, and the complex ways of rendering them tasty. These are mores of survival, good health, and control of excess. Living without such a culture would seem dangerous. And here we are, sure enough in trouble."

thinking this is such a great idea:

Survived

So, I survived my 20 yr high school reunion last weekend. Actually not only survived, but had a wonderful time! The night went way too fast......5 hours just isn't enough time to catch up on 20 yrs with 50 people! I think for most of the night I was just hanging back, looking at people. It's so surreal to see everyone as "grown-ups". So, all in all, it was a great night and hopefully we'll be able to keep in a little bit better touch now.......with facebook there's no reason not to! Gotta love facebook.

Oh!! And, I finally found THE photos to hang on the bare expanse of a wall over our tv. I'm so excited to get them framed and hung. I will post a picture as soon as I get it done. For a sneak peak, here they are:

If you'd like your own, you can buy them here from Urban Design Photography. They are so amazing in person! Oh yah, and remember the photo "Greener Grass"(see July 17th's post) by Alicia Bock? Well, my super thoughtful sister got me that print for an early b-day present! I am so lucky...and can't wait to see that one, too!

Finished Wish Flags......

We had our last art class last Saturday and we were able to create our wish flags for Heather's new baby (who should be here any day!) Here's some pictures of the finished products:

It was such a fun class....I was sad to see it end, except for the fact that the room we had to be in had no a/c...and we were having the worst heat wave EVER. Besides that, I learned so much from our teacher, Joe and the rest of my cohort. Joe said he thinks we should all finish getting our degrees and start our own school.....wouldn't that be awesome?!

Art Lesson

OK, so on Saturday we have our last art class. I'm glad to have my Saturdays back, but sad that the class is ending. It has been great. I feel like I've learned a TON of stuff from our teacher, Mr. Kasik. He's not only taught us about art, but also about getting and keeping kids interested by using props, jokes, magic tricks, music, sound effects, etc...etc.....things I would have never thought of before! So, anyways, our last class is going to be all of us teaching an art lesson to our fellow classmates. We only have 15 minutes to do this and that frightens me a bit. Art takes time!! At least for me it does. I've decided to do a lesson that mixes culture, compassion, empathy, creativity and community. We're going to be making "Wishes in the Wind Flags"....and we're going to be giving our finished product to our classmate, Heather, who is expecting a little girl in early August. I'll start the lesson by showing and talking about Tibetan Prayer Flags.....we'll talk a little about their meaning and use in the Tibetan culture. Since we only have 15 minutes, I'll have everything ready to go. All the "students" will have to do is draw/write their "wish" for Heather's baby on their piece of fabric, attach it to the background fabric and string it with the others. It might be more like 20-30 minutes, but it'll be fun!!! I found the idea here.....a newly found FAVORITE blog with tons of great crafty ideas. I'll let you know how it turns out. This is what I have so far........

Some stuff I saw today that I have to share......

love love love flowers in jars......

from Queen of Tarte blog



no words for these, except I wish they came in red



and this, titled, "Greener Grass"

is an Alicia Bock photo that I want....badly.....to hang over our tv....
but, I want 3 photos in a row (this one in the middle) and I'm having
a hard time choosing two others to go on either side.




and these might just have to be my 20 yr high school
reunion kicks....hmmmmm.....maybe

Seize the day!

Ok, so I've been wanting to start this blog for a very long time....actually, I DID start this blog a very long time ago, but never actually started it. That's confusing, but what I'm really trying to say is that I've been wanting to start a blog for a long time and have decided that TODAY is the DAY!

Part of my problem with starting a blog was...."what's it going to be about?" A blog for my little side business, "bellybaloo" (www.bellybaloo.etsy.com)? That'd be cool, but it's such a side side business that seems like I'd run out of stuff to talk about. Plus, I shouldn't be talking about it too much, but rather DOING for it. Another thought was to just do a personal blog....posting pictures of me and b and such, of my kind of boring, hohum life....I mean, I love my life, but I think people out there might not find it all that interesting. Especially since I don't have kids...seems like that's what makes a lot of "personal" blogs that I've read, fun, is having kiddos to talk about and post about.....I shouldn't say that I don't have kids at all......well, not normal human kids to blog about....I do have kids of the furry, four-legged variety, which I'm sure you're all dying to read a blog about!! :) Anyways....I've decided to just get this blog started w/ whatever.....some bellybaloo stuff.....some personal, what I'm doing today-eating today-making today-reading today kind of stuff.....maybe some teacherly kind of stuff since that's what I'm going to school for at the moment....and maybe even a few furry, four-legged kind of posts to round it all up. And on that note........

Meet Tim and Beatrice: