goodbye June

"What is one to say about June,
the time of perfect young summer,
the fulfillment of the promise of the earlier months,
and with as yet no sign to remind one that its
fresh young beauty will ever fade."

~Gertrude Jekyll

What a lovely quote. (found here) June has such a sense of anticipation for me. As a child, it was making it through the last 2 weeks of school and awaiting summer camp. As a teacher, it is once again making it through the last days of school, report cards, and easing into a summer routine. The unfoldment of lazier days, lake sunsets, and ice cream cones before the summer really starts to fly. The awakening of bugs, bees, flowers, little tourist towns....

the 4th of july is coming soooon.....one of my favorite holidays.
I should really be sleeping now. night night

from

"Let's have some fun, this beat is sick
I wanna take a ride on your disco stick"

umm........no.

I hope I'm never this transparent about anything. Least of all crappy song lyrics.

Lady Gaga just needs to......not.

Roundup

A few of my favorite images from around the web this week ~ courtesy of

check out a few more here

Enjoy the weekend, or what's left of it.
xoxo

diptychs

I love the idea of two different pieces of work coming together - through an obvious or more subtle link. These Montreal-based photographers have an awesome take on diptychs - they take a random, electronically-generated word and base their diptych on that word. Each photographer is responsible for one photo, then they put them together. The results are so authentic and revealing.

An attempt of my own, more here:

Sleuthing

from wikipedia:

Nancy Drew is a fictional 18-year-old amateur sleuth. She lives in the fictional town of River Heights with her father, attorney Carson Drew, and their Hannah Gruen. Nancy's mother died when she was three (10 in earlier versions). Nancy does not have a job or go to school, and spends her time solving mysteries, some of which she stumbles upon and some of which begin as cases of her father's. Nancy is often assisted in solving mysteries by her two closest friends, Bess Marvin and George Fayne, and also occasionally by her boyfriend, Ned Nickerson. Nancy has often been described as a supergirl: in the words of Bobbie Ann Mason, she is "as immaculate and self-possessed as a Miss America on tour. She is as cool as a Mata Hari and as sweet as Betty Crocker." Nancy is wealthy, attractive, and amazingly talented.

So alright. I was a total sucker for Nancy Drew growing up, depsite the unrealistic and somewhat stereotypical nature of the books. I've always loved spying on people and figuring things out. How kickass would it be to do that for a job? My mom was an even bigger fan, as much of the heyday for Nancy Drew was in the 50s and 60s. So when I saw this book, I had to get it for her. It has cute little magnets with the book covers on them and a little "wisdom" booklet of credos and rules.

http://www.nancydrewsleuth.com/

For example: "Beauty supplies: They're not just for primping anymore. Try picking a lock with a bobby pin, disinfecting a snake bite with perfume, using a nail file to trigger the opening to a secret passageway, or scrawling out a hasty SOS message with lipstick." Love it!
My mysteries are so mundane, like The Case of the Missing Cell Phone, or The Hidden Car Keys.

sun hat = $35 necklace = $32 silk caftan = $20 (sale!) scarf = $20

boutique shopping and indulging on a summer day = priceless

Sunday Nights

Sunday nights are the worst time of the week for a teacher (or student) during the school year. In the summer, pure bliss.

What did you do today? I putzed around taking photos in the garden, played badminton with my brother, sat on the beach for awhile, and got an ice cream cone.

Tomorrow I'm going c-l-o-t-h-e-s shopping. Dangerous.

A Visual Orgy

it is official. i am ADDICTED
to
we heart it

I much prefer it to ffffound.com

Wish You Were Here?

I wish you were here too, loves. You know you can always find me by the lake in the summer. Come visit.

Hittin' the Wall

Hooray! This is what I'll be doing on my main living room wall when I go back to St. Louis in the fall. Spotted this on A Cup of Joe, via Design Sponge. I knew I wanted to do pictures, but I put off decorating the main (non-window) wall in my living room for 9 months, because I just couldn't find quite the right shelving or way to display photos. These cute cheap frames come from Ikea and I love the look of so many frames together. It will be a feast for the eyes for sure.

Dig.

I recently became interested in the idea of time capsules after hearing a song a friend wrote about one. What to bury? What to put in? How do we decide now what may evoke nostalgia, interest, fondness, or wisdom in later years? Some online companies make baby and wedding ones for you. I'd rather make my own. I think I'll make one this summer, or at least by the end of this year. Imagine making one every New Year's Day, then opening it the following New Year's Eve.

This one looks fun - very standard, americana.

This one courtesy of the Andy Warhol Museum. To spend a day in his mind...

Bench Mondays

Bench Mondays are the best. You should really click here and join the fun.

my requisite weekly post

That's about what it's been lately. I will make this blog bigger and better. In the summer. I have 3 half days of school left!! and about 130 report cards. So.....

I have a lot to learn about focusing. But I'm pretty happy with this ladybug shot. I just wish the flash hadn't been on. Pretend it's sunlight.

Pre-picnic....yea summer nights.

During picnic.

Post-picnic packup. Bye for now.

queen.

need enormous chair like this. wouldn't even know where to get one. and this thing would probably be hundreds of bucks.

you say it's your birthday

Today my baby brother turned 16. Which makes me feel many things: old, proud, nostalgic, but most of all blessed. Blessed to have watched him turn from a tiny, screaming, diapery little thing, to an adorable baby, to a precocious toddler, to a rather bratty little kid, to a cool regular kid, to a goofy and lovable adolescent, to the funny, talented, charming, gregarious, dedicated young man he is today. 16 years ago my life changed for all the better.

His girlfriend and I organized a surprise dinner. After not always having a place to fit in growing up, he's found the the most wonderful group of high school friends. I love being a part of it all.

I'll admit, I sort of live vicariously through them - the laughs, conversations, clothes, general joie de vivre.
And I want his friend Carrie's sandals, now.

**********************************

Little shoot with Val at the park yesterday - click.

Today I went to a little antique sale at a dealer's house. I got some great stuff from them in the fall for a reasonable price, so I thought I'd check out their spring sale. There was a small dresser with tortoiseshell knobs that I loved, but I just didn't want to spend $60, even though it was a great price. But I did get this sewing machine drawer for 15 bucks. I love it. It goes so well with the dark wood in my living room.

Now it's living on my tv stand to hold dvds at the moment. I'll probably move it later. I sort of feel like I'm still moving into my apartment at times and making it my own, even though I've been here since August. Since I'll be gone most of the summer, I don't think I'll fully get it together until next fall. But that's okay.


St. Louis is so pretty in the spring. I went to Castlewood State Park with Heather and Amy. The river was high but beautiful. The last time I had been there was 10 years ago (yikes!) in high school. I love places where you can just run into the river or lake.

hello there

it's been a while. been busy. finished my masters! and have been working on some other things. blogging has taken a backseat. this summer i'll make my blog as epic as ever, i promise. I did finally get some film developed and slides printed out. why couldn't my mother and grandmother have saved all their cool dresses from the 70s?

You have enough. You do enough. You are enough.

I read this book a lot in high school. Was thinking about it recently. I think I'll dig it out again.

It's so warm and pretty right now. Almost too warm for me - 80s are my comfort limit! If it were any hotter or just a little bit more humid, I'd be complaining. Supposed to be a warm (70s) and sort of rainy week. I love thunderstorms. I'll be working on my last Masters paper all week, kind of holing up - but I don't mind for some reason. The paper actually shouldn't be too difficult - I have the bulk of the work done. Then I'm a "Master". ha!

This weekend was so epic, it was just beyond. I have the best friends in the world, truly. We threw a party for my friend/future sis-in-law at the Westin, it was so fun. We had a suite/adjoining room and had a dance party, hot tub soak, laughing, talking, etc. We also went down to the river, shot a bunch of photos, went out to dinner. One of those nights you don't want to end. Then a good family friend got married the next day, it was sincerely the best wedding I've ever been to. So unique and heartfelt.

Of course I have more pics on flickr, but not too many because I'm getting close to 200 photos on that and then I have to pay for a pro account, which I suppose is worth it but I don't want to. Two of my classes were cancelled today, which is sweet since I'll finish at 1 o'clock and I can get some things done that were sorely neglected this weekend. I'll pretty much be catching up on sleep all this week but it was worth it.

* More Pictures*