January 27, 2012

:: oh my soul ::

i liked the song in this video and looked up the artist. mike stocksdale. been listening to him on spotify today and am enjoying it. none of the songs have completely sucked me in, yet (in a josh garrels kind of way), but i'm definitely bobbing my head and tapping my toes. worth a listen.

January 25, 2012

:: gray wool + yellow trim = aw ::

my sister sent me an email with "thought of you" in the subject link and a link to this chair in the body.

yep!

January 24, 2012

:: chairs, chairs, chairs ::

ohhh, my! such amazing chair goodness. i would gladly and happily accept each and every one of the classic beauts and display them somewhere, anywhere in my house!

:: lovely work space ::

not sure which i love more, those rustic tables or the super cool & colorful chairs.
blog.freepeople.com via bluemossgirls.blogspot.com

January 23, 2012

:: love by design ::


eero saarinen's list of aline bernstein’s good qualities (1954).

love the roman numerals, that her generosity made the list twice and that he was concerned with the sentence structure in XII (she was a writer). so, so sweet.

January 21, 2012

:: sweet treat ::


blueberry & cream cookie :: compost cookie

momofukustore.com

January 20, 2012

:: that time of the year ::

the other day i was at the mall and passed one of those calendar selling kiosks. i walked right on by, though there was a tiny part of me, for a very brief instant, that wanted to stop and look around. i smiled to myself, thinking back to high school when i would visit one of those stands and pore over the options to pick out the perfect calendar for me. and usually one for my boyfriend for Christmas. the themes seemed endless back then and it's amazing to see that the calendar makers have somehow managed to come up with even more motifs than before. puppies and horses and other cute critters. books. music. movies. tv shows. vehicles. cities and historical landmarks. pop stars.

anyway, i didn't stop. the last thing i need is to shell out some bucks for a calendar that i will diligently fill with important dates...for the first few weeks of the year and then neglect for the remaining 49 weeks.

if you do happen to be a calendar person, though, here's a cute one i came across on the web a while back. love the concept and execution. would be a great promo item for conferences and networking and whatnot (if the cost wasn't so high - could be printed instead of letter pressed, i suppose).


January 19, 2012

:: digging ::

not entirely sure how i'd feel about seeing this look around my town, but in a setting like NYC, on a guy like this, from a site like elle's street chic...i'm totally digging it.

fashion.elle.com

:: not impressed (safari) ::

i've been using safari for the past couple months (long story) and it feels very much (if not worse than) internet explorer back in the early aol days. terrible. how do they get away with this?

January 18, 2012

:: letters home - differences ::


Dear Mama,

Well, here's your boy again and he is just fine. How is everything going back home? I surely wish that I were home to enjoy some of that spring weather that I hear that you have been having over there. We are having a little more sunshine here and it really feels good although it isn’t nearly as nice as that we get back home. The country over here doesn’t smell good in the spring like ours but then it stinks anyway all the time. They don’t have the plumbing here that we have back in the states & that helps stink the place up. They don’t have bath tubs or showers like we have back home either.

I slept pretty late to-day and didn’t get up until about 10 o’clock and really enjoyed it to the utmost. I think that I shall have to do that every day when I get home. Do you suppose that it could be arranged? I could also use some golden rod eggs. Will you tell me just how you are supposed to make them? I know that you boil the eggs and grate the yellow over the white paste like part but how do you make the white part? I’d like to make some and have the boys try them out.

Guess I had better close now and say so long.

Lots of love, Arthur

[april 1945]

:: no excuses - except this one ::

i'm just going to use anti-sopa and anti-pipa as my reason for being slack here. so there.

January 16, 2012

:: most days he forgets ::

last week at church the teacher said of a man he knows, "he was made in the image of God, but most days he forgets that."

it made me think of a guy i met a few months back. by society's standards, he is not a particularly good person. he is dark. deceptive. irresponsible. a liar. an addict. a thief. he has little to no regard or respect for his children, authority or his peers.

it can be overwhelming to think about the desperation, sadness and darkness he possesses and the bad things he does.

but he is a child of God, made in His image. God loves him and has great plans for him.

no matter how incredibly hard that is for me to comprehend. no matter how often he forgets it, himself.

at times i wanted to shout to him, "what are you doing? why won't you let go of your old ways, your bitterness & anger, your addictions & idols, your lies & deceptions and be more like the person you were made to be!?"

it is in my most honest and my humblest of moments i realize - that's probably exactly what God wants to say to me. the manifestations are vastly different, but our sins are the same.


"this year, or this month, or, more likely, this very day, we have failed to practise ourselves the kind of behaviour we expect from other people." [cs lewis]

January 14, 2012

:: josh garrels ::

back in november a friend sent me a link to download a new album. said it would change my life. i was wary, but i downloaded and listened. i loved the first track. and the second. and every.single.one that followed. the album is incredible. i have a new favorite song from it just about every time i listen but "bread and wine" is always up toward the top of the list. a stand out for me.

here are some pictures from the video shoot for that song for the documentary the sea in between. love the feeling in the first one and that xylophone in the second is such a cool idea! can't wait to hear how it sounds when the film is released.





January 12, 2012

:: resolve to be bolder ::

i'd love to say i'm resolving to blog more frequently (notably not the same as "more often"), but that would be a lie. i hope to do so, but i'm not resolving to do so. because i'm nothing if not realistic. nor do i care for "new year's resolutions." i've never quite "gotten" the whole new year's hoopla. don't know why, but it just doesn't excite me as much as it seems to everyone else. in fact, each time i type "happy new year" to someone in an email, i feel like a bit of a fraud. not because i don't truly wish that the new year is a happy one for the person, but because i wouldn't normally write that sentiment to someone, if i didn't just feel like it was what i'm supposed to be doing/saying.

so, yeah. i don't really do the new year's resolution thing. but this year might be a little different. i had a thought during church on sunday. the sermon was partly about our lives this year, if the world truly was to end on december 21, 2012. it made me think. i'm not one to have those "if i died today, what would i regret having done or not done" thoughts. if i died today, i'd be dead and in a place with no regrets. i'm just not one to think, "if i had 24 hours left to live, what would i do?" (yes, i would like to travel more. and i hope i will. but i know that when i die, i will not lament the places i did not go. because i will be in a far more glorious place.)

but here's the thing. i want that (eternal) peace for those i know and love (and even for those i don't know). if i happen to be sitting around on december 20 and the world is to end the next day i would want to look back over the year and know that something i said or did (or perhaps didn't say/do) or even that the way i lived my life helped someone know the Truth. to know the peace that surpasses all understanding.

so i resolve to be more intentional (notably not the same as "pushy") and say and/or do something that could be a light to someone each and every day. seems simple. seems like something i should already be doing. and perhaps for the most part i am/do. but i don't want to rely on "pretty much already doing." i want to be bolder than that.