Fill yr mind up with all it can know

Wednesday List:
all week Joslyn and I are posting a selection of lists from our Friday adventure.

Thanks for yr gorgeous lists Schmutzie and This Eclectic Life

Thirty-Five Things I Want To Accomplish Before I Am Thirty-Six Years Old (Schmutzie)

1. Have every last bit of laundry done all at the same time just once.
2. Join a yoga class without anyone I know in it and not give in to my anxiety about group activities.
3. Floss my teeth every day.
4. Write more poetry.
5. Exercise at least every other day, even if that only means shaking my butt to music while doing the dishes.
6. Properly schedule my writing and other creative tasks.
7. Do a minimum of one kind thing for someone else and one kind thing for myself daily.
8. Go to my gynecologist every six months like I am supposed to, because I should know better after having cancer.
9. Go to the dentist in spite of my terrific fear at the mere thought.
10. Eat when I am hungry.
11. Become a published author in a book - you know, those things that have printed text on paper.
12. Lose some of my toaster-related fear. It is not a malevolent appliance. Really.
13. Get a better camera.
14. Publish a book of my photography in conjunction with my x365 pieces.
15. Eat more vegetables and fruit as though they are not chores to be trudged through.
16. Clean out our closets and shelves of all the detritus that clutters our living space.
17. Finish knitting projects, both old and new.
18. Hang more of my photography around the apartment.
19. Reclaim and nurture the creativity I have irresponsibly been allowing to drift.
20. Listen to more music.
21. Read more books of all kinds.
22. Sit on a beach with my feet burrowed into cold sand in the shade.
23. Get past my hatred of the flub under my chin.
24. Go to more art galleries.
25. Learn to cook a wider variety of dishes and enjoy doing it.
26. Create my own art.
27. Do what I say more often.
28. Get a tattoo.
29. Have sex more often, because I will die one day.
30. Learn to crochet.
31. Celebrate more, just because.
32. Allow in people who want to know me.
33. Learn meditation and welcome it as a daily practice.
34. Feel less guilt. I cannot be a robot, so I should put that aspiration aside.
35. Get a new couch.

So, since I’m going to be 55 next year, it’s a long list! I have to list 54 things I’m going to do before my birthday. I apologize in advance for being so old.
54 Things To Do Before I Turn 55 (This Eclectic Life)

1. Remember to look at the list.
2. Choke down oatmeal twice a week, because it’s good for me.
3. Drink a glass of red wine each day, because it’s good for me. Maybe I can dowse the oatmeal with the wine to make it more palatable. Or not.
4. Give my husband spontaneous foot rubs (foot rubs are good for the solesoul).
5. Stop making bad puns.
6. Leave sticky notes all over the house to remind my husband to give me “spontaneous” foot rubs.
7. Take time with my cats each day to just play.
8. Learn from them how to be completely lost in the moment.
9. Learn from the cats how to be totally relaxed. No one relaxes better than a cat.
10. Take as my motto: “If you think you can, or think you can’t, you are right.” I don’t know if I can do that, but I’ll try.
11. Give someone a hug every day.
12. Remember to use deodorant before I give out hugs.
13. Have a party…for no reason at all but just to celebrate.
14. Remember birthdays…not mine, but other people’s. Maybe even do more than remember, and get the cards in the mail.
15. Finish the five remaining afghans for Share A Square so I can call it a “wrap.”
16. Stop making bad puns.
16. Get all the medicine bags and charms for the Good Medicine Project.
17. Answer all my comments from this month and stay caught up with the answering.
18. Don’t beat myself up if I don’t get them all answered.
19. In fact, stop beating myself up, but give myself affirmations, because “I’m Good Enough, I’m Smart Enough, and Doggone It, People Like Me!”
20. Re-read To Kill A Mockingbird and savor every delicious word.
21. Learn to use this polymer clay I bought to make beads and stuff.
22. Turn on the music and dance every day (when no one is looking).
23. Remember to shave my legs, even though I’m not going to show them to you. It’s just gross when you can braid your leg hair.
24. Use my Nordic Track for exercise instead of as a clothes rack.
25. Laugh uncontrollably every day at 10, 2, and 4 instead of drinking Dr. Pepper.
26. Go to Austin to see the bats.
27. Get new glasses because I’m blind as a bat. I’m seeing double double.
28. Finish painting the closets.
29. Call a few friends I haven’t talked to in ages and remind them that I love them.
30. Don’t be Scrooge at Christmas this year, even though Christmas decorations in August makes me see red.
31. Stop making bad p…
31. When Depression tries to strangle me, fight back.
32. Keep my chins up.
33. Turn my frowns upside down so that I can have symmetrical wrinkles.
34. Remember to water the plants. My money tree died. No seriously! I had a money tree and I killed it. Daddy always said I was hell on money trees.
35. Write five new ghost stories, because I’m sick of my old repertoire.
36. Pretend I am going to get jobs where I can tell the new stories.
37. Lower my cholesterol, so I never have to hear another doctor say, “How are you alive?”
38. Stop procrastinating. At least, think about it.
39. Break rules.
40. Figure out what the rules were that I broke.
41. Apologize to all concerned for the rules I broke.
42. Don’t break the rules about speed limits, especially if the Highway Patrol is in the area.
43. Take time for long, hot baths. I’m clean! But, I take showers and baths are more fun.
44. Sort through all the papers I have accumulated and actually throw some of them away.
45. Don’t get them back out of the trash can.
46. Take walks barefoot in the rain.
47. Make sure it isn’t freezing rain. Get a pedicure afterward.
48. Take occasional naps (after I tie up all five cats and stash them in the garage).
49. Write more haiku poetry.
50. Give myself permission to take artsy-fartsy photographs.
51. Don’t expect that everything I try will be perfect the first time out. Even Einstein didn’t make a perfect light bulb the first time.
52. Remember that Einstein didn’t make the light bulb…Edison did. Well, they both started with “E.”
53. Never, never never say “goodbye” to my beloved husband without telling him, “I love you.” You never know….
54. Exhale.

The yummy photo is from Schmutzie's awesome Etsy Shop!

Get me delivered to yr email xo

Just to dig it all an' not to wonder

Last night I was dreaming of Athens, Ohio. I kept walking around and trying to find the right type of wood I needed for a project. Anxiety dreaming that revolves around my small biz I am sure. I kept asking folks to help me and then all of the sudden this strange man helped me find the forest and it was an old professor I knew. It was this guy. I had not thought of him or his avant garde art for years and years and here he is in my dream like he was my best friend.

Once at university he came into the coffeehouse where I worked and dropped a black sharpie marker and I kept it. I would sit under his massive mural over at the art college and eat my lunch and smoke cigarettes. Sometimes friends would meet up and sometimes not. There were no cell phones then remember? Well my mom had a car phone but she was very hip as an insurance agent and all and it was the size of a loaf of bread. But can you believe we once had to just hope to connect with others?

I digress.

Aethelred Eldridge was so strange and cool and one of the first people I knew in real life that was an artist and living his own authentic life. He just carved this life out and lived it. He started the Church of William Blake for God's sake. Many cool folks like the Grateful Dead and others hung out on his Mt. Nebo land. It always amazed me. Unconventional folk are so flipping cool.

Some of us would go out to this old swimming hole that I was told was his property. It was way cooler of a place than I was then. If you went during the day there were nudists and weed, but if you went at night with some friends you could see more stars than you ever thought possible as you stretched across the old wooden floating dock listening to Van Morrison's " Sweet Thing" fill up the darkness all around you.

The edges of the trees that surrounded the swimming hole were like perfect paper cuts.

Yes- so today I think about this
and race to find Van Morrison's greatest hits
bc have you listened to "Sweet Thing"
it will get inside of you..

Get me delivered to yr email xo

Fill yr mind up with all it can know

Tuesday List
all week Joslyn and I will post lists from Friday's adventure!

Thanks for yr gorgeous lists Liz & Modern Eve

A List (Liz)
The smart & always-inspiring Amy at doobleh-vay (along with new-to-me but also inspiring Joslyn of Simple Lovely) has issued a challenge that I find enchanting. It's to make a list of small, meaningful things that we hope to achieve in whatever time period we want. Here's my list for the next 12 months.

1. Finish Keri Smith's 100 things
2. Make a quilt for Dash
3. Make Mark Bittman's No Knead Bread
4. Shop local next summer
5. Celebrate Winter Solstice in a meaningful way this year
6. Walk more
7. Take myself to the movies in the middle of the day
8. Reach out to my neighbors (I have a plan for this that involves "no pressure boo bags")
9. Walk away from a mess
10. Take Dash to the snow
11. Grow tomatoes. And squash. And peas.
12. Go camping
13. Stop at every lemonade stand I see. This will require keeping cash in the car. If you knew me you would know this is a challenge.
14. Go to the park more often
15. Get a real basketball hoop for Dash & Josh
16. Attend the local production of the Nutcracker
17. Watch Lance Armstrong ride through the streets of my neighborhood
18. Find a really, really great bra and buy 20 of them
19. Finish having my tattoo removed
20. Count my blessings every day
21. Elect a new president (I guess that's not small, but my part in it will be)

25 before 26 (modern eve)
1. Cook a turkey
2. Take ballroom dancing classes with husband
3. Create a piece of mixed media art
4. Have a garage sale
5. Run a 5K
6. Enter an essay contest
7. Refresh my Japanese
8. Convert old home VHS to DVD’s
9. Plant an herb garden
10. Create Europe scrapbook
11. Spend the entire day with my nieces
12. Teach a marriage education course
13. Golf with girlfriends
14. Have my Grandma teach me how to play bridge
15. Get a library card and use it
16. Do a completely anonymous random act of kindness
17. Take my hunter’s safety course
18. Design my mom’s business website
19. Finish re-upholstering slipper chair
20. Make family chickey-soup recipe on my own
21. Have neighbors over for dinner
22. Learn how to give a good massage to husband
23. Read an non-fiction book
24. Collect and donate old dresses
25. Bake homemade bread
what would make your bucket list?

Photo from the divine Alicia Bock! Swoon!

I was thinking that maybe I'd get a maid/ Find a place nearby for her to stay

Wanna be this again for Halloween Joe?, originally uploaded by turnsharp.

The countdown to Halloween is fully on in our house.
Finn will be a red Power Ranger.
Blaise a red devil thanks to Auntie Ter in England! xo
Mom will resume her role as batmom.
And Joe...Well, we think he should find this costume again.
I would love some coffee served by her!

Fill up your mind with all it can know

Monday List- all week Joslyn and I will post lists from Friday's adventure!
Thanks for yr gorgeous list Ann!

31 things before 32

I turn 32 in less than 4 months.

1. Start planning for a move to Germany.
2. Re-do my website.
3. Start gathering ideas for a book I want to write and submit 3 query letters.
4. Get a job.
5. Get a new pair of jeans.
6. Go jogging, several times.
7. Go for a scenic bike ride that includes a picnic lunch break.
8. Declutter my home.
9. Purchase a drawered cabinet.
10. Take more pictures.
11. Re-do my wall decoration.
12. Start taking pictures of my food so I can put them in my food blog.
13. Introduce my food blog to the Internet.
14. Buy some decorative pillows.
15. Spend the night at a hotel on the beach… spend two nights at a hotel on the beach.
16. See a play.
17. Go to a museum.
18. Clean out my car.
19. Plant some kind of vegetable.
20. Organize my home.
21. Buy holiday gifts off of etsy or dawanda (wow, I have to do that soon…)
22. Make some of the recipes from the many cookbooks I have.
23. Research more countries and what’s happening in the world. Not just this country.
24. Look for good master’s programs.
25. Start planning my own business… helping artist and makers get the audience they deserve.
26. Go to the planetarium show.
27. Organize photos, actual and digital.
28. Finish the bathroom and kitchen work… yikes, that’s tough.
29. Rearrange bedroom furniture.
30. Get new curtains for the living room.
31. Laugh every day.

This list could go on and on. But, I’ll stop now. I hope to see yours, but if not, I’ll see what other doobleh-vay & simple lovely readers said.

Get me delivered to yr email xo

gorgeous papercut by mister rob ryan

just afloat on the sea/find myself on a page of history

My Joe loves the "Carry On" films. He loves them so much he has to own the box package special editions and such. They remind him of home, of his childhood he says.
They are so British he tells me.
like Monty Python or the queen or HP Sauce
The films were first made in the late 50's and ran through the 80's. They are full of innuendo and parody and sauciness and are really quite hysterical. The Brits pride themselves on their humour (and they spell humor like that)and these cult classics are shining examples of this.

Joe says that Christmas was so marvelous because all the family would sit round and watch all the films on the BBC.(That BBC, I think he loves it more than me... it is like a person- like a real live person how he talks of it. THE BBC!)

anyhoo...

I am thinking of scratching one of the items off my list soon by having a "Carry On" party.
I want to invite a few folks over and screen one of the films while having fish and chips or a "Ruby Murray" (cockney for curry) and some Newkie Browns.

I want to watch Joe laugh and laugh with his whole body. I want to hear his accent come through thicker and stronger like it tends to when he drinks beer or is around other Brits.
I want to notice his accent as I daily do not after a decade.
I think it is still warm enough in the evenings to bring the projector outside and have this party! I am off to make another list.
kiss kiss

and check back all week for lists from other fabulous folks who are playing along with me and Jos. Get yrs in soon! xo

Get me delivered to yr email xo

pics from the BBC of course

This one's for you this one's for me/do it in the name of love

I am sad about Paul Newman today.
He was good people.
He gave money away.
He seemed to have led a full rich life.
He was a race car driver and an actor
and hot even in his 80's.
I just loved him.
You know how it goes.
Here's to you Paul.

I am going to repost yesterday:
Please play?

My divine friend Joslyn and I have been chatting for a while now about how we need to make lists that are for our lives and how hard it is to create and sustain that giant "bucket list" over the course of a life, but how it is far more manageable to keep ongoing yearly goals and lists.
After some inspiration from the amazing Hula Seventy, Jos decided to do a list of 34 things before she turns 35 later this year and since I am turning that magical number too I hopped on board too.
These lists are meant to be realistic and in the spirit of being good to yrself.

Simple things. Small things. Meaningful things.

Now here is the fun part:
Please join us in sharing yr lists.
What do you want to do before yr 25 or 43 or 55?
Next month? Next year? How can you make the time to be good to yrself?

Inspire us please?
Share with us by linking to doobleh-vay and simple lovely blogs and posting yr own list.
Leave us a comment that yr participating too.
We will pick one each day next week to share with the world.
And perhaps a little prize at the end too?
Kiss Kiss

1. Go see a movie alone and moderately dressed up.
2. Get a pedicure.
3. Take that ballroom dancing class with Joe.
4. Make Moroccan Chicken again like I used to.
5. Smile more
6. Write a thank you letter once a week to someone.
7. Spend more time off the computer/write in my paper notebook more.
8. Contact three more "out of reach" stores with my product.
9. Join the soup club and rock out with fall soup making.
10. Practice at least five random acts of kindness.
11. Go to a pumpkin patch and not Whole Foods front stoop.
12. Find a way to get Hunter Boots.
13. Entertain again. Scary as it may be- one small party.
14. Write my Love letter for Karey
15. Write a letter to Karey.
16. Organize my writings and office.
17. Bake a seasonal pie.
18. Have a milk bath.
19. Query three more magazines.
20. Go to the read to yr baby festival in town.
21. Make Mr. Kelly from the Hardware Store some cookies.
22. Go to this bakery more.
23. Teach the boys a new song.
24. Read a chapter book to them and not skip pages or make up random narrative about main character shopping for Prada handbags.
25. Get serious about handmade holiday.
26. Make Joe giggle.
27. Make more phone calls and write more letters to those I care about.
28. Visit our land in Athens and stop and get a Cafe D'Orlean's Coffee.
29. Watch the Carry On movies with Joe.
30. Go a whole day without saying no to my children.
31. Go a whole day saying no to all adults if I please.
32. Get a writing schedule on a paper and tack it onto the wall.
33. Get a check-up.
34. Walk to the Firehouse with the boys again and stop at Cottage Candy on wander home.
Please visit my review blog for some Monkey Love:
here

Get me delivered to yr email xo

When they insist on knowing my bliss/I tell them this

My divine friend Joslyn and I have been chatting for a while now about how we need to make lists that are for our lives and how hard it is to create and sustain that giant "bucket list" over the course of a life, but how it is far more manageable to keep ongoing yearly goals and lists.
After some inspiration from the amazing Hula Seventy, Jos decided to do a list of 34 things before she turns 35 later this year and since I am turning that magical number too I hopped on board too.
These lists are meant to be realistic and in the spirit of being good to yrself.

Simple things. Small things. Meaningful things.

Now here is the fun part:
Please join us in sharing yr lists.
What do you want to do before yr 25 or 43 or 55?
Next month? Next year? How can you make the time to be good to yrself?

Inspire us please?
Share with us by linking to doobleh-vay and simple lovely blogs and posting yr own list.
Leave us a comment that yr participating too.
We will pick one each day next week to share with the world.
And perhaps a little prize at the end too?
Kiss Kiss

1. Go see a movie alone and moderately dressed up.
2. Get a pedicure.
3. Take that ballroom dancing class with Joe.
4. Make Moroccan Chicken again like I used to.
5. Smile more
6. Write a thank you letter once a week to someone.
7. Spend more time off the computer/write in my paper notebook more.
8. Contact three more "out of reach" stores with my product.
9. Join the soup club and rock out with fall soup making.
10. Practice at least five random acts of kindness.
11. Go to a pumpkin patch and not Whole Foods front stoop.
12. Find a way to get Hunter Boots.
13. Entertain again. Scary as it may be- one small party.
14. Write my Love letter for Karey
15. Write a letter to Karey.
16. Organize my writings and office.
17. Bake a seasonal pie.
18. Have a milk bath.
19. Query three more magazines.
20. Go to the read to yr baby festival in town.
21. Make Mr. Kelly from the Hardware Store some cookies.
22. Go to this bakery more.
23. Teach the boys a new song.
24. Read a chapter book to them and not skip pages or make up random narrative about main character shopping for Prada handbags.
25. Get serious about handmade holiday.
26. Make Joe giggle.
27. Make more phone calls and write more letters to those I care about.
28. Visit our land in Athens and stop and get a Cafe D'Orlean's Coffee.
29. Watch the Carry On movies with Joe.
30. Go a whole day without saying no to my children.
31. Go a whole day saying no to all adults if I please.
32. Get a writing schedule on a paper and tack it onto the wall.
33. Get a check-up.
34. Walk to the Firehouse with the boys again and stop at Cottage Candy on wander home.

Get me delivered to yr email xo

Image from Penelope Dullaghan I heart her

as my memory rests/but never forgets what I lost

Most nights Finn gets either mom or dad in his room splayed out on his bed right after storybook time and right before sleep. He gets chats and talks and back tickles. It is only fair this year as last year he kinda got the shaft with an infant around who really hated sleep. So this year Blaise gets tucked in and then it is off to spend some dusk time with the big boy.

Often we will talk about things that happened during the day or tell stories or just listen to his radio. We listened to "Summer of 69" last night over the cheesy light rock station he tuned in and I was thrown right back to Mandy Klinebrowl's house out in BFE and we were all like ten years old and jamming to that freaking amazing album. We were playing truth or dare and my most risque dare was to stick my bare butt out the front door at midnight and scream, "Hunky Dorey Nelsonville" (the nearest town) Seriously? It was 1984. I was ten and back then ten was still very very young.

Finn was amazed that I knew all the words and could air guitar the music and rock out. He laughed and laughed. He then immediately demanded I resume my post as back tickler. He loves it. Don't we all? I hope everyone had a mom or dad that tickled their back. It is the greatest of quiet love. It is fingertip bliss.

Last night we talked about alcoholism. God, what a topic for me and the four year old. I think I kinda described it well enough for him to understand why someone we love is sick and not around. We also talked about being really sad and how sometimes it just takes time for people to turn their face to the sun again. Yes, I really do talk to my kids like this. Are you kidding I am hoping to raise at least one poet.

When I am anxious or stressed I wish I could tickle my own back. But I read about how you cannot ever tickle yrself bc basically we are so smart with these big brains in our heads. Our brains(and I think it is the big bad boy the cerebellum) already knows what we are going to do before we do it and basically cancels it out.

The brain can discard random shit at will, like the way our tongue feels in our mouth or the fact that we might be rocking back and forth, but it focuses on a tap on the shoulder. It focuses on our emotional heart.

I wonder if I shake my head violently and in just the right manner I can get it to allow me to tickle myself and ignore sadness.

How are we so smart and amazing but so broken sometimes?
Will I ever stop thinking about things like this?
Will I ever just be able to sing?



Standin' on a mama's porch
You told me it would last forever
Oh the way you held my hand
I knew that it was now or never
Those were the best days of my life

Get me delivered to yr email xo

pics via bryan adams website

Is that you baby or just a brilliant disguise

the Sansom window project:

Those brilliant folks from Something's Hiding in here. (Love them) have been working with Urban Outfitters to host a wicked cool installation in Philadelphia, Pa.

From the website:
inspired by industrial letter signs, multi colored text, and everyday sayings... we made our own marquee sign out of wood. now the fun part begins, we want to collect your messages to post on the sign. we're not looking for insightful proverbs, but rather ordinary, simple sentiments.

So send in yr messages/yr whispers/yr screams.
How freaking cool is this?
I sent one.
Go here and be inspired by art
it really is freaking everywhere...
and if yr near you can go and check it out...
directions here


found via candancetodd.blogspot.com
merci.

Get me delivered to yr email xo

and their hair floats up to heaven

I got half my crap done. I have to be online while they sleep to do some business for Little Alouette so I had to share what brought me to such a place. I am delirious with mind chatter that is inspiring and good right now.

This man. Matt Bauer. Oh my God. Thank you L my childhood friend in Portland now... She tells me he is playing in Columbus soon. Swoon.
There is such intensity and I love watching the video of him in Brooklyn-just looking at all the musicians in that studio space is exhilarating isn't it? They are in a zone that makes me jealous. Goddamn I love a day when I discover something new!

Holy hell I love this song. (listen here before video)

thank you to this awesome blog for photo and song.

Everytime I see yr face/ it reminds me of the place we used to go

today I like, originally uploaded by turnsharp.

I am being held hostage by my life.
If I don't tidy, organize, and work on the stuff that brings in the bacon I am in trouble.
Enjoy this today...some of my contacts over at Flickr and the stuff that inspires me. Are you on flickr? Let's be contacts?
I love to get lost over there.
Kiss Kiss

Charlotte sometimes dreams a wall around herself

So when writer Jane Daniels Lear tells me in this month's issue of Gourmet that a Charlotte Mold "is arguably one of the most alluring pieces of culinary equipment in the world." I want one.

I am smitten with it's sweet heart handles and the fancy idea of piping ladyfingers onto baking sheets and really impressing my family and friends this holiday season. I was once at a party with fancy Charlotte de Pommes, but I didn't eat any because well at parties I tend to just drink. But that is neither here nor there.

Um, I really think I just want the fancy pan with heart handles.
Why can't I just admit it.
It's lovely.
It was made for a queen.
I would put fruit in it.
I would use it to carry things to dinner parties.
It would hold my keys on the counter...

Get me delivered to yr email xo

I'll Take More Than Another Riverful

On children being with grandparents:

Being alone with Joe reminds me of how I do feel underneath all of the worldly crust that cakes itself all over our lives.

Under the worry and concern and drive and spin is that amazing gravitational pull that moves me quickly from wherever I am to his side.
I would curl up inside the corner of his grin if I could.

Last night we did not go out or do anything fabulous.
We played an intense game of Scrabble and watched a tear jerker of a movie (The Bucket List) and through everything I couldn't believe that there was no little child pulling my attention away from this beautiful man.


"Moi, je veux te dire que je ne te quitterai jamais. Et puis, si tu es triste, je pourrais toujours te donner un peu d'alcool pour te rechauffer le couer. xo"

artwork from the divine hidenseek

and maybe that's all that we need is to meet in the middle of impossibility

I spent the evening talking for hours and hours with my friend. Our talks were focused on our friendship, one that has spanned 25 years. We talked about our issues- the very real ones that we do have. The ones we may want to ignore bc sometimes the history you have with a person can try and be sneaky & trump or hide anything that is wrong.

I realized something in my garden as twilight came and passed- I realized that relationships are constantly in flux and it is our duty to touch base with those we love and inquire about balance every now and then. Women's friendships turn round on the same principal as a marriage- they need tending and attention.

Friendships as we become older though need to be able to be given the opportunity to change and shift without failing too. There are not level playing fields really anymore between me and the handful of women I love like mad. Everyone is so different and in such polar places, but the middle is the matter. The crux of it is what first brought me to love this girl. This perfectly lovely curly haired girl who only had the economical crayon pack while I had the spoiled 64 box big boy and we would share and she wore unicorn sparkly shirts and the world was so easy then. The crux of it is gooey and full of adoration and bliss and I am thankful it is always going to be there even with garden nights full of tears and beers.

Tell yr friends you love them today.
Ask them if things are OK.
Find out if you are in balance.
Be more aware and you will feel
that the space around yr heart stretch.

Image via Jessica Gonacha

and that little doll Martha is having a GET YR BLOG NOTICED contest. Hmmm. I would love her to notice my blog or my shop. I would turn cartwheels naked in the garden! xoxoxo

I close my eyes and fly out of my mind

I am so happy to be included over at Alpha Mom.
I am a contributor to the new cool Guide to Everything column. I am so honored to be over at such sacred space!
Alpha Mom rocks! Yeah!

particularly random:
did you know that wrens are supposed to be the king of birds?
they tell me so here
and it is pretty there

Wren is a name I liked for a kid.
I also loved these names:
Aberdeen
McCall
LuLu
Olwyn
Magnolia
but I think we picked cool ones
Blaise and Finnian rock



Happy Friday
Kiss Kiss

Get me delivered to yr email xo

And bending over backwards just to try and see it clearer

My alcoholic friend * gives me self help books all time. It is a lovely gesture really as she knows that I suffer from being slutty with the stress, but I often swirl my eyes round in their sockets behind her back because she is well, not recovered. I wonder if she lends these to me to just get rid of them or they really are helping her. I don't know, but anyway one of them was sitting in my book basket and since we do not have cable anymore and the library has been closed for days due to the storm I am about desperate for reading material. I read constantly. I am a read the cereal box kinda gal, the shampoo ingredient reading woman, every stupid medical pharmaceutical chart at the doctor lady...you get it.

Anyway this book was one of those "Don't Sweat the Small Stuff" publications and I thought it was going to be dumb, but I actually got right into it & it had lots of good ideas. I kept thinking about the author though and wondering if he was actually so damn chill as he sounded, but that is like everything. Like with blogs...Do these people really do all this? Does yr home look so fricking tidy all the time? Are you a robot?

I digress...There was a section on Random Acts of Kindness.

The phrase "Practice random kindness and senseless acts of beauty" may have been coined by peace activist Anne Herbert I read somewhere. I recall hearing about it in Europe the summer I was 18. It was in the Hofbrau House in Germany. I was drinking large beers and chatting with these Danish folks about how I was from Southeastern Ohio and how I was sure they had never heard of it before. But as it would turn out they knew well of my geographical location as they were fans of High Times magazine and knew that Meigs County was where the world famous Meigs county gold marijuana was grown. Small world.

Anyhoo, they chatted with us and later when the evening became a blur the older of two told me not to forget to practice some random kindness in Europe. I might have thought that was a come on and he meant I should be a bit wild, but I kinda knew that he knew that I was a good soul and my travels would always involve searching and the heart.

It was soon after that when I started hearing about the idea of being kind for no reason other than being kind. It sounded so novel, but it really wasn't. My family taught me that, my mom was a food pantry volunteer for Christ's sakes. It just never clicked with me until around that age. I went through a wild kindness streak in college where I would pay tolls, give love freely, and secretly gift others. It felt good. I feel like I am due for some of that old goodness back in my life again. People are pissing me off left right and center, there are people I love that make no sense, and the world is scary place right now with Sarah Palin and all- I just need to focus. That little book last night started a small wheel turning. Random Kindness. Random Kindness. I am also going to apply this concept to myself. Now that is novel.

Get me delivered to yr email xo

Release the links/ undo the clasp

Blaise loves bracelets, originally uploaded by turnsharp.

Blaise loves my shiny sparkle trinkets.
This is his favorite bracelet.
He wore it to the the store today.
I think it suits him.
I love sparkle too.
He says and signs the word more
over and over feverishly if you take it away.
How can I take it away from him?
Why would I want to?

I'm going off the rails on a crazy train

Old photo of Finn Mohawk!, originally uploaded by turnsharp.

Yes Finn I really shaved yr head as a toddler.
You don't think so?
I have proof.

have a face I cannot show/I make the rules up as I go

Conversation while walking to the bank

why do people die mom?
Well, when we get very old or very sick we can die
old granny is very old right and she is still alive right?
Well, yes this is true, but she will die someday
when you die do you see God?
Well, I think so. I think you see all the people that have died too
I think heaven is like a big party or a discotheque
when you die do you fall to pieces and then swirl up to heaven?
Well, yes sort of Finn
will you and dad die mom?
Well, someday yes, but not for a long time
why do we live if we have to die?
Well, we have our life and it is like a gift
We are on the earth to find our path and follow our happiness
To do our jobs
What is my job on earth mom?
Well, it will change and evolve but right now it is to
shake me and rock me and to ask question after question
and point yr finger at funny things and kiss and run and draw
and giggle and learn and break my heart wide open at least once a day
and teach others and
Goddamn it Finn I love you so much

Get me delivered to yr email xo

The world was moving and she was right there with it (and she was)

> photo via Oh Happy Day>

I was smitten with her before I met her in real life.
She is delicious and darling and now she has went and made me swoon over her little baby Moses and his closet room with this amazing photograph that I stared at and then looked up and then went wild wondering why I was so artdumb and did not know of this man before.

I heart Jordan and now I heart Robert ParkeHarrison.
Thanks gal- I love finding all the new in the world. Kiss Kiss.

Get me delivered to yr email xo

A soul in tension that's learning to fly

I have power again! And I have no idea why?
Our street is closed and there are three giant trees in the middle of the road and power lines a swinging in the wind,but I am not going to question it.
I am just delirious with happiness.
I had two writing deadlines this week and was crying!
I also went to the market yesterday morning!
I was trying to save my meat in buckets of ice!
I had a chicken in a champagne bucket and beef in a pitcher!

I still am in a bit of shock over what it must be like to be in a real hurricane or big storm. This is nothing really. We were able to go to bed and sleep and know that everyone was safe last night at least.
We were lucky.
outside my house:




*****and I have extended the CONTEST until 9/20 for a chance to WIN FREE YEAR SUPPLY OF SCOTT'S TOILET PAPER and A WICKED COOL BOOK here and here. (my little review site)
Wipe yr butt for free for a year? come on!

Get me delivered to yr email xo

hard day's night

massive wind storm here yesterday
no power for us
am typing from nearby town
getting some supplies
I hate being away
but it might be a couple days
GRRRRRR...

Get me delivered to yr email xo

Not like you do

I woke up with this song in my head. I had a neighbor in the early 90's who played this album over and over at night while wooing women.
Paper thin walls.

We are eating Raisin Bran at the table today out of red ceramic bowls. The wind is blowing something wild here. Ike lives on. The lights are out and we are all kinda bobbing our heads.

Finn says she sounds sad and all I can think about is short skirts, Autumn nights just chilly, and drunken boys and girls in old apartments.

Get me delivered to yr email xo

Looking back at the years gone by like so many summer fields

IMG_6916, originally uploaded by charlotte wales.

I found out about Giffords Circus over at the Sweet Emma's.
Those British-they are so freaking charming and delightful.

I don't know what I love most...the eclectic artful show, the fact you can dine on local and organic food at post circus dinner party, or the amazing amazing truth that you really still can run away with the circus. You can- look here. How freaking dandy?

I wonder about these folks and their lives. Oh to be able to follow them around for a month and tell their stories. I wish!

pics from bbc.com

When every single word makes sense

That photo is one of the many many
hung up in my local Starbucks
today...customers coming in to say goodbye.

Our local Starbucks is closing. Cutbacks. Blah Blah Blah. It was one of the best Starbucks ever!The folks were amazing and I swear to God they all liked their job and worked with such style and passion. They were master Barista's!
I am serious.
It was my haven, our little escape from the day.

Shame on you Starbucks.

Wasn't yr slogan "Let's meet at Starbucks" or something last summer?
Well- why close the cafe and keep the drive through open in my town?
let's roll up and meet at the freaking drive through for a coffee shop experience? Whatever.

I am sad and I didn't even want to love you when we moved here. I wanted my old local fair trade place. But ya know what? It wasn't all about yr roasting brilliance that made me suck from the teat. It was those fine folks who knew my name and were genuine and kind. It was about those folks we really did come to know over the froth.

Get me delivered to yr email xo

no not us/ we are far too young and clever

So my pal Joshua Henkin is going to give away a signed copy of his cool book.
Come over here today and leave a comment to win.
Dude- MATRIMONY: A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK OF THE YEAR

and dude. On the review site there is a chance to win free year supply of toilet paper!
It is a banner day.

Get me delivered to yr email xo

it reaches into where I cannot hide

I almost had no time for you today lover.
I am sorry.

It was just all the excitement.
We finished a full three day week of preschool where everything is so little and neat and tidy that I hesitate and linger at the classroom door. I kinda want to roll Blaise down the long hallway and run into the room myself. I want to be in that little classroom where everything is just so simply about playing. So free. Finn announced his teachers were ever so nice today. He kills me with his sayings.

We also got to hang out with our old pals from Athens and tour round their home that is a mix between Paumes and Anthroplogie and fall right in love with a little flying pig doorstop and have hummus for lunch.

And then Blaise went and ate some marbles-
well at least one marble...a black shiny glass one
But poison control seemed to think it will be fine.
It was scary for a second. I saw him going for the dish.
I got one out of his mouth and his eyes were wide saucers for a split second and then he grinned and it was gone.
Please don't leave me scary messages about bowel obstructions or anything to make the nervous eye twitch return.
I am watching over him very closely.
I think he is OK.
Say a little prayer for my marble eater though.
It was a day.

Get me delivered to yr email xo

put yr arms around me baby/put yr arms around me baby

Falafel tastes like donkey tonight.
Welcome to my world.
It is busy round here and I am working on lots of coolness- I will share soon.
I am just not at all together.
I open my reader and look at folks inside their perfect little worlds and then this is dinner at my house:

I know it is perfect here too though, in a strange way.
I love table dancing in the dining room that so wants to be my kitchen.
One whole year of eating in this wretched space. Ugh.
I can't wait to sell that other house and do this addition.
UGH.
Could I complain more?
I wish I had some sort of diagnosis to my issues.
I have been blue this past month. Blue bonnet. But, I am not depressed. I am just not. I am just very slutty with the stress and I live a very visceral life. I am my own kind of nightmare to myself.

Things are going to get better and the most important of all things are right in front of me:

I mean, look at these three boys.
They are gorgeous and yes in the background you might hear this song.
What kind of mother am I?

But when I’m surrounded I just can’t stop

See that small little bed in the background. That is the bed that belongs to a preschooler as of today. The bed that used to be my father's as a little boy. The bed that Finn sleeps on every night. The bed that I curled up on for an hour today and may or may not have wet with my tears at the thought of losing Finn a bit more to the outside world. It is exciting and terrifying at the same time. When I think about it too long I start to feel my chest tighten. Like all day.

Get me delivered to yr email xo

You keep saying you got something for me

black wellingtons, originally uploaded by meredith m. grant.

Dear self.
When you start to make some money from this freelance life you can have some Hunter boots. When people start buying yr wood like mad you can have them in red and black. You can. You must wait now.
Just for a bit. Be patient.
It's hard to control yr lust.
But you must.
kiss kiss

Size 11 like a drag queen if yr listening Hunter wellington company.
size 11.

One day soon Im gonna tell the moon about the crying game

I had that outfit and haircut once. I was drinking a Jack and Coke at a dive bar in 1995 and a very drunk man told me I looked like Uma. I kept moving a lot so he wouldn't focus too much and realize that was very untrue.

And one time I spent the whole day in a coffee shop penning a letter to Tarantino telling him how I would be perfect for his next film. I had just seen Natural Born Killers and was hanging out with acting students. I thought I had it in me. I don't think I used the internet much then and I was too lazy to find Quentin's film production company address. I never mailed it.

Get me delivered to yr email xo

And you bleed just to know you're alive

I wanna read this book.

When did you last write a love letter? When did you hold one from someone else to you? The parchment in yr hands? I have been thinking about love letters lately. I have been thinking that I used to write a lot of love letters. I have loved so much. Lucky I guess.

I wrote them to lovers, to family, to familiar strangers. I just wrote and gave freely. Nowadays I feel like I just click out sentences and blips to folks on the computer. I feel like there is never enough time or enough work space to spread out my paper and pens and heart. My fingers are shaped liked typing. I need to stretch them, to flex my phalanges with inked sticks.

Do you know that amazing feeling of rushing to a paper envelope and tearing it open as soon as you recognize the slanted handwriting of a lover? Yr heart on speed? I miss that. Do you? Joe writes to me sometimes and I fall to pieces on the floor immediately bc I die every time for his candor and simple charm. He says writing is not for him so much. Well, he can write and woo me that is for sure, but his truth does live inside of his mouth and what he is never afraid to say. He can speak what I want to whisper but cannot. He can say anything. I need a pen or a keyboard.

I am writing a love letter to a family for the auction I held here. I have started it in my mind. Laying down words like stones along a path I will follow soon.

Love letters are flying round my mind. I might even give one to my local barista when she hands me my coffee in a paper cup tomorrow. I could be tempted to mail small written words to bloggers I love. You know that bloggers were good love letter writers in their day...You just know it.
I will slip letters in Joseph's lunch sack like I used to. I will write to my father in law bc he loves the letters that fly from my heart to his tiny village in England.
I will give.
And if the universe works like they say- I might get one back soon.

I wonder if any of my old letters are alive still out there in orbit. In boxes or basements or bureaus. Are there any love letters that survived the end of me? I have a few still. They are precious. They are some of the best reminders of how I got to be with Joe. They were my primary education in love. They are like old maps of my heart. The ones that hurt me and the ones I hurt. If you line them all up they make sense. Like a compass to my big love. Growth.

My grandmother burned every single love letter my grandfather ever wrote to her after he died. She took them outside and stood in the Autumn of my 14th year over a trash can and set fire to them. I guess they were precious to her too.

Anyways, I was just thinking about all of this today. I was just thinking about it.

Get me delivered to yr email xo

These are the contents of my head

alpha runner, originally uploaded by turnsharp.

A simple way to work on ABC's and 123's that involves running around and being silly. Make a number or letter road.
I gave no direction to him and he made up like five games in 20 minutes.
Yay for kinesthetic learning and Fridays. Kiss Kiss...

And love a little longer/And soon you will be there

Dreaming of spooky soundtracks from movies I have long forgotten I loved. The Sweet Hereafter was a movie that haunted me always.
I think it was the soundtrack that got all up inside my soul most of all. That girl Sarah Polley has been in my dreams for two nights. I am sure it is because I heard one of the haunting songs on the radio recently.

It was one of those strike ya still moments when you realize you have not heard this particular song for a decade. Like ten years at least. And yr rather sure about that. And the songs grabs you and shakes you and flings you somewhere. Like I went back, right back to Athens, Ohio and a small apartment on a hill off Columbus Road where my friend and I would hang out with this amazing woman. She was my professor and mentor for a short time in my life. Everything she said made sense and everything she introduced to me threw light on the fact that I was so young and she was so wise, but because she was not my parent I relished in it. She made us listen to the soundtrack to the movie one still winter evening and I agreed that it was beautiful and haunting. I opened the ear in my heart.

The Sweet Hereafter

Led us, he said, to a joyous land
Joining the town and just at hand
Honey bees had lost their stings
Horses were born with eagles' wings.

The sweet hereafter
Waters gushed and fruit-trees grew
The sweet hereafter
Flowers put forth a fairer hue.

All the little boys and girls
With rosy cheeks and flaxen curls
Sparkling eyes and and teeth like pearls
Tripping and skipping
Run merrily after the music with laughter.

The sweet hereafter
Waters gushed and fruit-trees grew
The sweet hereafter
Flowers put forth a fairer hue
The sweet hereafter
Everything was strange and new.

As they reached the mountain's side
A wondrous portal opened wide
A cavern was suddenly hollowed
The piper advanced the children followed
When all were in to the very last
The door in the mountainside shut fast.

The sweet hereafter
Waters gushed and fruit-trees grew
The sweet hereafter
Flowers put forth a fairer hue
The sweet hereafter
Everything was strange and new.

/ Get me delivered to yr email xo

Let me get this ringing out of my ears/ Let me get these stars out of my eyes

I watched the original Thomas Crown Affair last night with Joe. We are trying to watch old movies now that we cut the cable. I loved the remake of this movie so much. I thought Rene Russo was as hot as they come in it. My Gawd. I thought I would not like the old movie but I did.

I fell right in love with the old movie. McQueen and Dunaway are so delicious. Just one day I want to walk around looking so goddamn perfect and cool. Just one day.

Get me delivered to yr email xo

But if you try sometimes you just might find

Finn started soccer last night. Joe and his pal Will are coaching the team. It was a night we looked forward to for a long time. Finn could not stop talking about soccer and his team and the majestic wonder of it all. I feel like he is more like me than I want him to be. Sometimes I think Finn pumps up something in his mind to such a high power that it cannot ever measure up in reality. He is like me- trying to get directly to the denouement of a situation without unraveling and experimenting with the complexity of it all- without a true catharsis.

It could have been all the sugar at the birthday party prior or the little sleep or the sharing of his dad or any number of conditions that made him weep and cry and act more like a baby than a big boy across that massive soccer field last night. It could have been anything but it really embarrassed me. It broke me down a little in front of all the other families I think.

I had told my good friend Angie as we sat on the blanket in the field prior to the practice that I thought she was type A in a good way and she replied quite quickly that she thought I was rather type A as well. I think I might have huffed for a minute but then I realized that she was most likely correct in her assumption. But I wasn't always like this.


I wish she would have known me before I lost all my invincible skin and before I had kids. I hope that all my old friends can still squint there eyes and see me unafraid and charging at life. Those days are really far away sometimes. Days when not much would shake me or get me down. Days when problems were like math- not real. Days when I knew exactly who I wasn't. Days when I would think nothing of smoking a joint or spending the whole day writing one perfect poem. Days when I really didn't care what others thought. Like at all. I keep writing affirmations on my chalkboard, but they are not working.
Is there a procedure to remove this type A lesion? Anyone? Anyone?

Why let your shoulders bend underneath this burden when my back is sturdy and strong?

THANK YOU SO MUCH! The auction winners are here:


We have the fabulous Emilee from the Nilsson Family blog top bidder at 40 for the teethers

We have the fabulous Mel from Beanpaste blog top bidder at 15 for the knit wear

We have the fabulous Karey from Mackink blog top bidder at 50 for the love letter

You guys rock and I love that the family will get $105.00 more.
Please winners send the payment to the donate button on this website and then forward me the receipt and I will ship items. Thank you so much.

Also- I just wanted you to know that Karey over at Mackink has asked me to donate her love letter- she said this so beautifully :

I'd like to donate my love letter. to the Nielson children. from you on behalf of all of us who were moved by their family's story. how their family, in the span of of a few tragic moments, grew...

It will be my honor Karey.

And as all of the auctions close- let's try and keep this family in our hearts and prayers. This is a long road and they will need our attention. Try and send good thoughts out to the universe or God or whoever you whisper to...try and not forget how lucky we are each moment.

Get me delivered to yr email xo