They say you were something in those formative years

The press. They're callin' me the "Big Daddy of Punk"

(originally posted on 3/11/09 -Might have been my favorite post of 2009)
Just because. GAAAAA!

On the Street....So So Punk, Worthington

Our own Sartorialist fun today





title post- Sid and Nancy 1986

There must be a song that describes the way I feel right now

There are so many ways of looking back on a year. There may perhaps be a day of each year that marks you though. That takes a fat black sharpie pen and scribbles over yr soul. A day- good or bad that just kinda sticks. I thought I had lost the photos from dad's wake until a few weeks ago when I got a new printer. Like magic I was able to find a few of them in a folder from my old printer system and it was bittersweet. Looking back over these photos from a day so long and sad, but yet so lovely.
The wake at Uncle Richard's was so beautiful. It was so strange because that whole day we were all looking around for dad. Like he should have been there with a light for the ladies and a story and smile. I listened for that voice that sounded just like Anthony Hopkins to say the wittiest things possible and lure me to pints.
It was like the day was missing this one thing.
Him.
I peeked around corners and looked for that man several times.
I stood on green green grass and watched my Joe.

My look back at 2009 is hard at times.
The hardest part about looking back on the past is knowing that the past repeats itself and we must be able to be stronger than we ever thought possible more times in a life than we want to.
I hope there is a heaven and it is glorious and we all can be able to cherish and relive the parts of the people we love the best. It's like sometimes you don't tell the people you love enough why you love them.
I want to drink a bitter with dad someday in some sparkly place and tell him that he always made me feel beautiful and that he was such a good father to his children and that his grin was just perfectly wicked and I love that it has been passed on.
xoxoxox

Vote for doobs in the homies?

My blog has been nominated in Apartment Therapy's 2009 Homies awards in the Kids at Home category. If you'd like to vote for me, you may do so here.
I know you have to register- but it is a hot second and I will know you love me! Ha!
(But it would mean a lot! xoxox)

image via aintshesweett.tumblr.com

is hidden away in a memory's bouquet

originally posted last year on BOXING DAY! Enjoy!




Thank you cards are terribly important to me.
I am behind on my own birthday thank you notes now and it makes me feel prickly, but with the kiddos I like to get right on it while the memory is still fresh. My parents made me sit down at the wood table and take pencil in hand at a very young age and express gratitude. I can remember that it was a bit taxing as a child and somewhat annoying as adolescent, but I think it has made me a better person.

I think it taught me two things:

Yr time is love- a phone call is quicker- but yr time and effort show love & the handwritten word is sacred.

So- I make my kids think about taking time away from play and the drama of the day to say thanks and I also plan on keeping a small writing center this year for Finn to explore the lost art of letter writing.

(INSERT MAJOR DREAMER HEAD HERE)Someday I want to hold a letter writing workshop and travel the country in a silver Airstream and show people how delicious is is to write love letters again.
I love texts and little words floating in and out of computers, but the sound of pen to paper makes me most delirious.
The way letters bend and sparkle across a page cannot be rivaled by even the greatest font foundry. The way "I love you" looks in bold black sharpie or the backwards wonky letters of a preschooler can buckle my knees and break my heart...
Write letters.
Love Letters.

***Here is a simple and fun way to make thank you notes for those little ones who cannot yet write a proper thank you.

1. Take a photo of child with gift.
2. Ask the child how the gift makes them feel.
3. Write that sentiment on the blackboard along with thank you.
4. Print photo and include with simple handwritten child signature or scribble scrabble.




How sweet of a thank you is this?
And for those truly against having to send thank you notes or super eco friendly - you can email it although I think you know what I think- mail it mail it!!


Happy Boxing Day!
This is my husbands favorite day.
It is the day of true sloth like behavior for this family.
(Leftover food and drink and feet up-like all day)

^^^^^^^^^^Some other cool chalkboard links:

Here and Here and Here
xo

Get me delivered to yr email xo

2010 drips off my tounge

It's like the shedding of skin if you let it be.
Fresh and new and full of anything you want.
On this Christmas eve I am fueled with caffeine and optimism.
Some of 2009 sucked donkey balls, but lots was sprinkled with bliss too.
Most years are a mix of the two no matter how idealistic and swoony we wanna groove.
But I love me a January. Don't you?

And 2010 sounds like a crazy nutball if you say it over and over.
Like when I was ten years old that sounded like a time blasted in the future so far from reality.
Like a place where a wicked old version of myself was wedged

I am putting on a very sexy black dress tonight and spending the evening at my sister's house with loads of food and fun. And I won't care that Blaise will ruin my dress in like 30 minutes with some hand print or that Finnian won't go to bed or that Joe will drink so many beers that he just grins and grins. I will just keep it tucked in my head - those thoughts of how lucky we are.

We get to walk the earth and eat ham and drink champagne and make love and stop everything for a couple days and celebrate. We get to believe in higher powers and break ourselves against emotions and cuddle tiny souls and LOOK And GO and DO.
We get to live in the world, but also in our minds and THINK and BE.
And MAKE and DREAM.
And even during the times of the calendar year that are kinda wonky like right now...We get to be here and our blood runs fast and circles around our body and we shine out against air like perfect whispers of NOW.

and then soon there is a whole new year to have
It's pretty damn grand

And if yr reading this right now
yr a part of it all
and me
and I love you

Merry Christmas 2009

It took me until just then

The snow falls slowly and we all feel warm in the house. Cookies are on the counter and Catherine "the babysitter sent straight from God" is here and making things feel relaxed. I may have a nap today. Our shop is now finished with holiday goodies all sent and sorted and it feels so good! We had a busy etsy shop and a crazy busy dot com this year!

I found my Christmas spirit late last night
I found it in a dive bar and my friend Keith was there too
and the fairy lights everywhere reminded me of my childhood
and I wiped my eyes with my sleeve
And one fat tear fell into my drink and
it is OK that the holidays are a mix of sweet and sad

I think that is what happens the more times we go round the sun.

pic via iamblessed

you wear sandals in the snow

We could have made a mint back in the 90's when we would smear Vaseline on our faces and spread glitter all over our lips like giant dare to kiss us billboards.
We could have started a make-up company before everyone else did
and glitter became so ridiculous.
I remember walking into a pub with red fire glitter lips and how could they not all stare?
And then the day sounds like Sarah McLachlan to me.
Like all day long.


pic via here

the days of december

I have been living in my head for a couple weeks. When I get covered in stress I tend to go inside and live deeper and flatter than a pancake.
My friend told me the other day that my head is a bad neighborhood and I believe him.

I still have a unspoiled view of the holidays though. Our family is in town from UK and they are like this amazing sugar striped fantasy that I get to enjoy.
My kids are twinkling like I plugged them in a lightbox
and they spin faster than cars on ice with glee.

Everything is really delightful if I could disconnect from my brain.
If I could only pull some plug.

It's like when you go to sleep and you try and make yrself dream a certain dream. You close yr eyes and pull images and try and push them into that sacred space of time floating around free and peaceful. But you often can't dream that dream that you want. It's like the people all look different like stand ins for the ones you wished for and instead of going to the park you end up at Home Depot and there may or may not be monsters.

Or something like that.

But the sun is shining on my face through the windowed room where I make things go from brain to fingertips to you and it is nicer than anything else and I am just going to sit here and enjoy it for the 7 minutes I have to myself today.

And the world is beautiful around me and I just need to break the surface.

Gifting Ideas

Greeblemonkey's beautiful work.



O How I love those trufflegirls.

Little Alouette giveaway

I have some giveaway fun today.

Head over to the fashionable Friday Playdate for a LITTLE ALOUETTE giveaway (I also heard there will be a copy of Sleep is for the Weak in the mix!)

AND HERE:
I want to give away a copy of Sleep is for the Weak also here on doobleh-vay as I think it makes a great gift for the mamas in yr life.
Rita was so cool to give us a couple copies to you folks!
Just leave me a comment below and good luck! It's a great book!
(I will choose Thursday at random a winner!)
xoxoxo

At least there's pretty lights

I am pretty sure that I listened to this song while I sat in the black leather bucket seat of my dad's Super Sport El Camino. There were trees flying past my eyeball corners on Rt. 33 and the sun baked me brown and all I could do was wish the song went on and on all the way to Athens.
I must have been ten years old.
I love it when I find a song again and spend the day with it like a little lover.

and also in NYC I drank a lot of beer.

blog-friends-iambossy, originally uploaded by i am bossy.

Kirtsy Book Party NYC

Kirtsy Book Party NYC, originally uploaded by UpsideUp.

I loved NYC. I loved the energy and the passion and the skyline scraping my dreams. I loved being around my KIRTSY/BLOG family too. They are like tiny angels I found somewhere along the ride of this indie life and I love them.

The Kirtsy Party at MEET in SOHO was fabulous and I was able to see old friends and meet new folks!

Have you bought the book yet?
GO!
THE BOOK!

Hands on Small Business

It was a dream leading Hands on Small Business Classes for Microsoft Office Live and Kirtsy!

I just wanted to share some of the amazing outcomes of these classes with you:

The first class was at the Kickstart coffee and scooter shop in the funky Short North district of my city. While I was setting up shop and getting ready to meet all of the cool new pals I saw this chick sitting near me and I made some small talk with her. She looked to be studying and I was most likely annoying her. But I wasn't annoying her. She was intrigued.
Sunny joined us and we found out that she was a PhD candidate at OSU and her boyfriend had just unexpectedly died. She was heartbroken and trying to find the time and energy to help continue a legacy of scholarships that he had started for students who needed financial assistance in following their dreams.
Heart. Grab.
And just like that we got her involved in social media.
One night.
Over candy bars and coffee and a bunch of women.
Hello life.
I love it.


And all the sessions went magical like this. We found one another at so many different levels of knowledge. Some just starting out on the social media journey and some advanced and seeking more and more. We leaned on each other and right from the start of each class I encouraged all of us to take the floor and share knowledge. It worked. We went through the information and little light bulbs went off all over the rooms at intervals.

The excitement was palpable for some.

The resistance to platforms like twitter waned and we all looked forward to the future-

to the NOW of business.

We shook out 2.0 selves out and stretched.

At Wild Goose we were fascinated by each other and all of the gifts that were presented at the table and at Panera/WhollyCraft we laughed and laughed together and found help with issues we were struggling with and even some business bartering.
Women were hugging each other at the end of sessions and dates were being planned and networking just happened naturally. I can't forget the mentoring and friendships and connections galore over wine at the fabulous HOUSE WINE!

The locations were perfect and the people just kept coming in the doors and when they turned to leave- they had a bit more skip their step. The economic landscape is a bit tricky right now for small business and this course was really helpful in providing some FREE information and FREE applications and platforms.

It rocked.
It was kinda beautiful.
I felt empowered and helpful and it was a great place for me to share.
I would be honored to do more work like this.
Work that truly matters.
That has reach.

In January, Amie Adams will be leading two more virtual HOSB sessions.
So no matter where you're located, you can catch HOSB LIVE on your computer!
Everywhere on Jan. 8

Everywhere on Jan. 12
Find out more at the Hands On Small Business site.
CHECK IT OUT!

"I've been drunk for about a week now, and I thought it might sober me up to sit in a library."

I was trying to tell my friend John about reading The Great Gatsby and how the last line of that book was stunning. How it has sat relic in my head for years, but I couldn't grab it for some reason. I could only see myself reading Fitzgerald and listening to Joy Division in my tiny bedroom in Union Furnace, Ohio. I could only feel the sentence.


In my adulthood I have been rereading books a lot. I read with wicked wanderlust as a child and young adult and I know I missed much of the matter because my body and soul had not caught up with my cognition. I was given free reign in the elementary school library at age 7 because I was pushing and pushing and needed to hear the crack of spines and tote heavier books back home. My parents met with the teacher and the librarian and they let me read anything. It made all the difference.

My mother has at times tried to censor me or pretend that I may not think they way I do, but she never one time censored my reading. She let me bite down hard on all of the words even when I was more Nancy Drew than Judy Blume. Even when I could never have understood what the hell love was or why people hurt each other. She just let me look and my whole life has been based on that freedom.
Just take it in and later filter it out.

And then last night as I placed my hand on the Fitzgerald book in my office it came to me like a vision. A man walked right past my eyes and he was wearing a bowler hat and had on a sandwich board and it said:

So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.

Hope Can Burn Brighter Than Fire

I accepted an offer by Tide and Megan to write about HOPE this holiday and join the TideLoads of Hope at the Holidays carnival at Blog Nosh. I thought about HOPE and what that means to me this holiday season.
I wrote from the heart about my family and I invite you to come and read the post here.

"Life is constant change and flux, but the holidays seem to stop us in our tracks and make us think harder and reflect a little longer on the life we live. We think more deliberately about family and friends and the world and peace and hope. We make lists- gentle reminders of the folks that matter to us. We reach out and become “better angels of our nature” if only for a few weeks of the year."

You can share your own stories of hope, along with Blog Nosh Magazine, Velveteen Mind, and a gathering of inspiring bloggers, and enter your own post link in the blog carnival below. Explore featured bloggers as well as three featured posts selected from carnival participants listed in the linky (that could be you!).

Lend your voices now, then participate live during a two day event in New Orleans, Sunday and Monday, December 13 and 14, as we tweet stories of resilience from laundry recipients and volunteers on the ground. Follow along on twitter via #loadsofhope and be sure to follow @TideLoadsofHope.

It's a great thing. Please join friends. xo Amy

character

Crafty Mccrafterton writing workshops make me hot.

I decided to write with the lovely ladies of Writing Well Challenge/Character at {W}rite-of-Passage.

I love the idea of character. Even the start of one as it's the jelly that makes my peanut butter better. Here goes some bits of a character I am working on for a short story.

You are about 39 years old and are married to Merle. A man that at one time pushed blood so quickly to your girl parts that you ran from bars and restaurants in rain or snow or sleet to throw your body with his on beds unmade for hours. Only now you stare at him in silhouetted shadows late at night and turn over in the bed, back to him, like a sign that screams stop. There is something about him that signals to you like a beacon, something that whispers it is all too much work to bother.

The eighth step of your staircase squeaks and if you hear it after you have gone to bed you pretend that you are asleep. Merle sweats all over you and the sleep afterwards is nothing like it was long ago in the deep sex of the city tiny apartment. Long before the children came and when you still had promised stamped over your perfect body and mind. When you still dropped sentences of gold from a mouth that tasted life.

Your young children are not so young that they cannot make themselves a bowl of cereal without help. They attend school. They need you less and less. They tell you they hate you when you say no to the newest video game or plastic collecting card. They sass. They are greedy and you feel like giving up on them. You are disenchanted with mothering. It does not make you a bad person. It happens though. For some it only lasts fleeting moments in parking lots of hot asphalt in July. For others it lingers.

You were the darling of the department and shiny and pretty and new. And then after all of the babies and the booties and the cake from the local bakery you left that path didn’t you? You left that path to carve another and it was frosty with the disillusionment of you. You knew it in the pit of your stomach that it was a bad idea to just be a mother, but you allowed others to robe you in their wisdom and jealousy. The whispered things like this is the best thing and if I could do this I would and you will have time later to go back.

They all lie to you, like Jezebels in Starbucks on rainy days.

That one time it all got too much

there is fire in my belly and it wants to be let out
my desk sits against a window
against the window I have leaned a painting of William S.Burroughs
and in this painting his eyes are red
(against the black and white painting)
and he and I say things with our eyes
together
I open the top of my head
it is hinged
I reach in and take out the Portable Beat Reader
that is tattered and torn and I sing to him in operatic style

and he likes it and then I stay up for two days writing my novel
while my normal family sleeps so softly
while they all sweet and good take slumber and
create a woman in those dreams
who is not just like me

all of this and nothing

Not sure but there is a feeling of wanting to listen to Wilco & The Psychedelic Furs all day long. I tire of explaining myself to people. Isn't it enough to know that I am just different and made like mountains of molehills and the world spins faster than a top spun by the fat finger of a child? Isn't it enough to just exhale and blow all of my breath in one simple direction. All of my breath pointed towards yr house of cards and they fly right out my window like tiny suicides. They hit the ground like bricks.

Oh yes, I went to NYC. It was just what I needed. I am waiting to scrounge some photos and tell you all about it. I have like five stories. You know I always do.

I think I am about to experience some sort of literary explosion. I am bubbling.