Haven't you always wanted a monkey?

This is a belated birthday shout out to our Arizona J. 

Couldn't help but think of you when we saw this - we would so get this for 

you if we had a million dollars (or $7k to be more precise ).

Then again, I guess if we really had a million dollars we could skip 

the accessories and get you this and this! 

Oh, and maybe these, too, just to add a dash of that retro 60's cool.

  So anyway, your real (and way under $7,000) gift is in the mail and we hope you had a happy day!

People Eat Blood Sausage

I often find myself throwing up my hands in despair and claiming, "The world is stupid!" M for Mazing says nice things like "You're just not meant for this world" to comfort me but the fact of the matter is Here Is Where I Am.  

The world is stupid. I can't believe how often we choose to make life harder for ourselves. Instead of applying all our determination to finding a way to get dads home with their families, we push for equal rights so now we can all never see each other. We plan obsolescence - cell phones that get 'old' and must be traded for new ones (not to mention the whole concept of cell phones rather than something like a portable ham radio!); cars that run ten years and require a computer engineering degree to repair (why don't we install a manual back-up for every 'automatic' item, ie roll down windows?); computers that are 'old school' two minutes out the door; proprietary ink cartridges (need I say more?)   And the one that galls me the most?  Spending thirty years of our life to pay for a home to live in. Everything else in the world finds theirs for free, but no, we, the intelligent species, have found a better way.

I've been dabbling in  genealogy during my sofa-confinement, and my Ukrainian ancestors built these types of homes for temporary shelters on the Canadian prairies   

and then eventually "moved up" to these larger homes when able - both very light and lovely and reasonable.

 I google searched "homes under $5,000" and discovered the Simon Dale family.  Now that's what I'm talking about!  Check out his link to similar homes, it will make you happy.  So lovely to find kindred spirits, isn't the internet wonderful?  So, I guess not the whole world is stupid.

“Most of the luxuries and many of the so-called comforts of life are not only not indispensable, but positive hindrances to the elevation of mankind.”

— Thoreau

Images thanks to campaugusta, blueskies, town of rossburn,  travel webshots, tiny house design; and boston.com

Playscape It Again, Sam

Just discovered an awesome blog devoted exclusively to the concept of creative, natural play areas. Check it out - she says everything I wanted to say. I wish every child in the world - especially those living in "the projects" - could have thoughtful, lovely playgrounds like these.
I believe children grow up more peaceful, happy, self-aware, and emotionally sound by interacting with a beautiful piece of the world.

NOT Your Grandma's Lace

They Paved Paradise and Put Up a Parking Lot

“…children are disappearing from the outdoors at a rate that would make the top of any conservationist’s list of endangered species if they were any other member of the animal kingdom.”

Ecologist, Gill (2005)

 I have been quite sick the last bit, but the silver lining of this is I have been able to read and study things that have been gathering dust on a shelf in the back of my brain for years. I have felt free to contemplate everything from how to build clear geodesic earthquake pedestrian shelters in Seattle to what is the best chocolate chip cookie recipe? My most recent scrutiny: Outdoor Play Structures.

I have never liked the rigid, static, limited use of most school playgrounds. My early childhood experiences tainted me. My first grade school had - honestly - not one blade of grass.  They had paved the entire grounds.  We skinned our knees, played marbles, skipped rope, and got in a lot of fights.  When the weather was bad they'd bring us in the gymn and have us sit on our coats around the perimeter so as not to damage the newly finished wood floors. (!) No talking was allowed. I got in trouble once because I rolled up my coat and pretended it was a baby and encouraged the girl next to me to do the same. The teacher blew the whistle and made me come stand by her.  Playing was much too radical a concept for recess.

Last year everyday on my way to work I watched them build a new elementary school where a dense forest had been. I couldn't help thinking about how much fun the children could have exploring the pine cones, caterpillars, rocks, branches and sounds of the woods. I secretly hoped they were forward thinking enough that they would fence a part of the woods off for the play ground, but of course they didn't.

When our kids were toddlers we had an old woodshed on our property that was simply a covered shanty with a dirt floor and a pile of wood scraps in one corner.  They spent hours in there.  I could watch them from the kitchen window and that place became whatever they wanted it to be. They made mud pies, forts, pirate ships, cannons, cars, castles.... the list was limitless - which is the whole point, isn't it?! One day they were so into it their play that I literally had to pry their freezing little hands off the wood and get them to come in.  Now that's the creative flow all artist's hope to achieve!

So... my advice?  Don't spend  a small fortune on cookie-cutter swing-sets-cum-forts that hold childrens' attention for forty five minutes max. Read some of the studies by child development scientists like Moore and Wong and find out what my husband's parents knew all along:  A couple of big cardboard boxes and some cold cereal for a snack  will entertain a child far longer than any set of metal monkey bars. 
. 

I'm back!

I don't really  know what I have to say, but here I am.  And this picture reminds me that if you haven't already seen NBC's online series Ctrl you should definitely watch it.  It's quirky and fun and I wish I'd thought of it.

image via

Unavoidably Detained

Be back as soon as I can get away. . .

Cloud Watching

I can't believe no one's commented on my floaty word cloud thingie! It took forever to find the perfect one. Isn't it beautiful? (Though sometimes it reminds me of a swarm of mosquitoes) What I love is how dynamic it is; it's poetry in motion - literally. So expressive. Don't you just want to play with it forever? Dragging your cursor thru, in, around and beside, twirling it, stretching it... Like silver thread thoughts from Dumbledore's mind.

image via art via

May 3, 2010 Update:  Blogumous mysteriously quit working much to my disappointment :(

A Sparkly!

I'm all about Yayoi's dainty silver twig bangle from Candy Store Collective. Whisper thin, just the way I like it.

This bracelet reminds me of a bracelet I got for Christmas when I was six that looked like varying shades of Chicklet gum strung together. I loved that thing! So Irina Blok had me at hello, but then she added tree branches = double whammy of voodoo love.




I so want Nicole Kidman wrists so I could wear this chunky berry branch bracelet by SNG! The inversed image two thirds thru reminds me of a photograph.





And talent runs in the family. AG designed the bracelet below - it's an id bracelet for modern times - your name and birthdate gets printed on it in binary code!




Everyone's talking about Yoon Jung Yun's inner message rings, and I have to add my voice to the throng. There's raised lettering on the inside, so when the wearer removes the ring after wearing for a good amount of time, the message is still there, imprinted on his finger. There are two standard messages - "Marry Me" and "Always" but for three times the money you can have a custom message. Most will go for something heartfelt and romantic, but if you're worried he's going to take off the ring while flirting with stewardesses, you can always have it say "You Dirty Rat". Or maybe this message for the day after the divorce..."I Was Pretending" or "Psyche!"

PS I'm not jaded about marriage ! M for Amazing and I have True Love (4 Ever). Just not so confident in other people's unions.

One Potato, Two Potato....

If anything in this photo makes you drool, than you really have to check out THREE potao FOUR! I don't care if you've been shopping there for years; it's new to me so let me rave :)

Here is a sampling of some of my finds, and believe me, it's only the tip of the iceberg! First up is a Snowden Motorway Plate (almost enough to make me like pink), (2) British Rollsign Numbers, (3) a simple but genius wooden Kid O puzzle of narrow to wide ; dark to light-likely to occupy a child's attention for far longer than many more complicated toys, (4) an awesome map of Manhattan (one can never have too many maps of Manhattan), and (5) these old Check Register Numbers. I have no idea what I'd use them for, but I know that just standing in a silver 1950's anadozied aluminum cup on my kitchen shelf they will make me smile. Funny how my mom's china knick-knacks are clutter but my vintage numbers are art.

And this is the one I let get away. Sob. No matter that I didn't know the site existed. It's astronauts! I should've been inexplicably drawn to them like a magnet. I registered for a restock notification. Like that will ever happen.

Hon-eeey?! Where IS my Super Suit?!

M for Amazing goes surfing every Friday with our boys. ( Which is a another story in itself, considering how unsurf friendly it is here, but I digress...) When he returns he faithfully rinses out and tends to his very-spendy-but-bought-on-sale wetsuit, then carefully hangs it on a hook in our hallway for drying. I forget about this, and invariably on the weekend I will turn the corner in the dark of night and about have a heart attack when I see a quiet man lurking in our hallway!

The Black Stig is alive and well and hangs out at my house every Friday night.

PS Hover over the title - it's cute.

I don't know why I keep posting pictures of destruction. I'm sure it's something psychological that I really don't want to know about myself. The first time I saw this first photo my mouth dropped open for about fifteen minutes. I thought it must've been a mock up or some sort of photography trick. For some reason it's a lot more scary to see a fat tornado than a skinny winding funnel.

Maybe I look at these images for the same reason I look at the night sky. It reminds me

of how small and puny we are. Which is good to think about sometimes when you need a dose of humility, but not so healthy to dwell on.

The very last photo is of the largest man made tornado ever created. Mercedes Benz

built it. Those clever Germans. I'm amazed we ever even built one, I had no idea! It was 113' tall.

But you know what? Amazing as that is, we still have a long ways to go.

[1] Orchard Iowa Tornado Photo via

[2] Nature At Its Wildest via

[3] Mercedes Benz Artificial tornado via

Tongan Undersea Volcano Erupts

Space Chimp. Literally.

In film you learn about juxtaposition. When you're filming you need to watch not just the actors but also the background. For example, there's an Olive Garden Commercial playing now where a father is talking about how he and his wife take their daughter and her roommates out to dinner everytime they visit. If you watch the first few frames you will see that the father's head is exactly in front of a white lamp shade. It looks like he's a lodge member with a fez hat perched on his head. Gotta be careful about that.

I've found the same problem exists in my Blog World. With my eyes in this blog header, I keep inadvertantly making faces out of my opening page. Like this one....










Excuse me now - I need to go audition for Planet Of The Apes.

Oh... for frame of reference, see for yourself...