beautiful things

absolutely loving this beautiful collaboration on the marginalian. an animated version of emily dickenson's bloom with music by joan as police woman. it's breathtaking and it was exactly what i needed on this dark, cold, rainy february day.

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heather moore (of skinny la minx fame) is doing a great noticing project #theattentionproject on instagram. in january, it was weeds, now it's "just before you let go." i definitely noticed a lot of picturesque weeds on my january walks. now i need to take a closer look at the things i'm about to toss (or should be tossing).

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loving the @dear_white_staffers account on instagram. they're giving me hope for the world. or at least for the country of my birth. still hoping not to be stateless. 

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have you binge-listened to the trojan horse affair yet? it's so, so good. like first season of serial good. we need more podcasts like this in our lives.

five things friday :: november 1

#fivethingsfriday
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thing 1: it’s a new month, so i took a new route today, exploring roads that were new to me. husband says it makes our brains grow. and i’d like to think he’s right. at the very least, i saw some fall colors and this church, which looked pretty despite the drab, grey day.
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thing 2: new episodes of queer eye! in japan! it makes husband being stuck late at work on a friday night more bearable. #imnotcryingyourecrying #teamyokosakuma
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thing 3: when husband said he would be late and foiled my plans of a dinner out, i decided to make myself some soup. husband isn’t a fan of soup (one of his few faults), but i figured i could just please me, since he wasn’t home. and please me i did -i roasted two eggplants, a whole cauliflower and a head of garlic in the oven. they were drizzled with olive oil and sprinkled with sesame seeds and herb salt. meanwhile, i sautéed three leeks in butter and bit of my homemade herb salt and thawed out a container of herbed chicken broth I had in the freezer (thank you past me). once the veggies were roasted, i popped them into the broth, along with the buttery leeks and blitzed it all up with my immersion blender. i had planned to add a bit of cream, but it was so rich, smoky (thank you, eggplant) and delicious that it didn’t even need it.
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thing 4: learning new things these days. it’s stretching my brain in the best ways. it is as much a physical process as a mental one.
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thing 5: i’ve been thinking this week about The Muse - who it is, where it is, how to make it appear. i suspect it’s really just about hard work and regular practice -whether it’s an artistic muse or a writing muse. the muse might actually just be discipline and practice. #revolutionary #impracticing

#fivethingsfriday

1. why didn’t i write a book to my child from when she was born? of course, it wouldn’t have been this luminous, beautiful thing that knausgaard wrote. but it would have been my beautiful thing. for my beautiful child.

2. this dark, dreary, rainy part of the year is hard to get through. but candles and comfy socks and cats make it more bearable. all seasons have their time.

3. jane the virgin. what a series! so charming and full of hope amidst the drama. and we need hope amidst the drama these days.

4. life can change in an instant. hold on for the ride. so tight.

5. other people can never really understand your life. no one is in it like you are. this is both terrifying and beautiful.

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these seem much longer on instagram.

a week of pinspiration: no. 1

pinspiration no. 1. this was the pin. 

we've only just begun.

stay tuned.

we've already got tomorrow planned.
(and by we i mean me & sabin)

it's a whole week of pinspiration - also known as actually making something based on all that curating.

things you can do when you have a cough

have i mentioned that i have the cough from hell? it's keeping me up half the night and giving me fits all day long. i get some relief from this opium-laced cough syrup, tho' it also leaves me unable to operate any machinery heavier than my iPhone. the lack of sleep is making me decidedly crabby.

so i went to the library for a little inspiration. i picked up a book of pretty pictures of workspaces and fell in love with the light and with the ladder and with the stacks of books in this shot.

the low ceilings around here meant my old ladder from the bathroom at the old house was too tall to be used, so instead i took one side of an antique iron bed i brought over from the US when sabin was a baby and used it as a ladder to hang up some works in progress - both as decor and as a reminder to work on them.

i picked up another book at the library...of course it's on nordic food and i love the look of this vegetable garden bread - leaving the veg rustic and whole in a focaccia - i'll definitely be trying this as soon as i feel better.

i pulled myself together and hung up some of our paintings that we did at the old house. they used to hang in my blue room and now they're on the wall behind the couch. i don't know why i didn't hang them ages ago. it makes it look like people actually live here.

there was even time for a bit of bunny love. the bunnies are wild demons as they chase one another around the cage, but as soon as you bring them inside, they're snuggle central.

and now, back to my knitting...

what do you do to pass the time when you're feeling under the weather?

the traces we leave behind...

husband spends a lot of time with his inner architect and i spend a lot of time on pinterest, pinning to boards with names like husband could make this and lysthus (featuring inspiration for my next blue room in the garden), kitchen goodness, the rather prosaically named house ideas, and gardens. the best part is, husband really builds the stuff he draws. now if i could just use all that inspiration i pin...

i'm so charmed by husband's building detail drawings. i find them all over the place. tucked into books, written on the edge of a newspaper left on the table. sometimes they're even scrawled on a board that gets incorporated into the actual thing when he builds it.  he comes by it honestly, since his father was an architect. just as i am compelled to write as the child of a long line of journalists. maybe that's why the traces i leave are words and notes scribbled in the margins of the books i read. and these musings in cyberspace.

hello twenty twelve!

a brand new year, fresh, pristine, just like a brand new egg.  2012, i have a lot of plans for you. 

i know it's just another day on a calendar, but it does feel like a fresh start.

let's use it wisely, shall we?

so i've been thinking...

~ everyone should go to the beach at least once a month, just to clear their heads.

~ about whether you can eat the seaweed found on our northerly beaches.

~ and if so, which kind?

~ about the great wars of the last century (i'm reading ken follett's fall of giants, which is set in WWI) and the residues they have left behind.

~ about the need for an editor. and perhaps also a translator. or maybe just some english lessons. unless they really did want people to line up their dogs...

~ that sometimes the best course of action on a sink full of dirty dishes is to pour a glass of wine, turn out the light and go settle into the big chair with a good book. after all, those dishes aren't going anywhere.

~ leaving one square of toilet paper on an otherwise empty roll does not excuse you from changing it.

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what are you thinking about in this liminal week, while we wait for the new year?