My friend Ali spent the last year and half in the process of finding and buying her very first house. And now that she’s moved in and has started the process of remodeling a portion of the house – there is clearly no rest for this girl – I am so happy for her! Congratulations Ali!
I could see how stressed she was throughout the entire ordeal and I hope now she can get back to what she is supposed be doing i.e. hanging out with me—whether it’s talking dogs, having a glass of vino, or eating our favorite lunch together (i.e. a Trader Joe’s log o’ goat cheese, eaten by itself and in entirety, with a spoon. You should try it.)
When I hang out with Ali, I tend to behave less like an adult and more like a kid. And it’s not just any kid I tend to act like. It’s…a fat kid. And sometimes even a mean, fat kid. Can you believe that?! Me neither! So I will try to explain so we can all better understand.
One thing Ali and I have in common is our love for food. We have very similar tastes when it
Continue reading Ali’s house
I have never deliberately taken photos of the plants in my garden before. Which is kind of strange considering I have had so many different gardens in the past 5 or so years. And that I spend all summer alternating between engaging in war with crab grass (which is my nemesis) and standing around smiling proudly at my planties and flowies. So here is my first deliberately documented garden.
I love bougainvillea so was really happy to find a bush of it growing in the garden of our new place in Oakland. I quickly noticed that many other people in the neighborhood had bougainvillea growing in their gardens, but their’s were bursting with blooms while ours had just a few flowers and seemed mostly made of sticks.
All it took was a sprinkle of fertilizer to make the blooms burst out of our bougainvillea. Now it is happy-looking and there are so many flowers, I often cut pieces off to bring indoors.
I LOVE fuschia – it really brings back memories of the garden I grew up in. It was the only decent plant I could find at the Home Depot by my house a month or so ago, and as
Continue reading my Oakland garden
I was giving my Facebook profile some attention the other day and I couldn’t think of any “favorite quotes”. This struck me as kind of a shame because I know I have read a lot of fantastic quotes. Actually there was one great quote I did remember word for word:
“I am gonna march you over to the zoo and feed you to the yak.”
This was a line in Breakfast at Tiffany’s, and it was spoken by the character Mag Wildwood, who was quite intoxicated (and apparently cantankerous) at the time. Maybe it isn’t the one quote I should remember—after all I did graduate from UCSB with a BA in English—but at least IMDb recognizes it is a memorable quote from the movie.
So since working on my FB profile I have had my ears and eyes out for great quotes, sayings, and phrases. And yesterday I found one I have liked ever since I first heard it: Loose Lips Sink Ships. It was written on a poster size piece of paper that was pinned over the doorway at a friend’s house in Oakland. It’s an Oaksterdam house, if you get what I mean.
Anyway, I never knew that
Continue reading Loose Lips Sink Ships and other images that are vintage in more ways than one
I haven’t posted in a very long time, but I have a really good excuse: I moved to Oakland (yay! finally!), and once we finally got the place somewhat organized and livable, my work at C&T Publishing just blew up and I’ve not had but a minute to write a blog post here.
I still don’t have time to talk about everything I want to talk about because I’m hoping on a plane to Indianapolis for the National Art Materials Trade Association (NAMTA) trade show at 6am on Tuesday morning and haven’t even finished making some project samples I want to take. Aaaahhhh!
But I am going to talk about the reasons I have been so busy at work.
I wasn’t too excited about moving to Vallejo in December, 2008 but I must say it has really grown on me. It has more character than the other East Bay Area cities I’ve resided in, and I think that’s why I started a blog about Vallejo this past year. I just can’t imagine houses randomly collapsing or “clothing optional” antique stores existing anywhere in the Contra Costa County ‘burbs, where I lived for five years preceding our move to V-town.
Even though I was doing the Vallejo blog, I didn’t realize I really liked my life in Vallejo until a couple weeks ago when I realized that it was partly my own fault that 2009 wasn’t a great year for me. All year long I was in this state of desperation, constantly searching for ways to make more money and stressing over the limitations of my situation. I spent a lot of time being frustrated with things like the lack of space in our tiny cottage, the $100 a month I had to spend on bridge toll, and the thousands of stupid cats that line the neighborhood streets making it impossible to walk my dog
Continue reading My Super Exciting Vallejo Nightlife
I had more fun than you did on Halloween. Guaranteed. And I knew I’d be able to say that before I even got to the party. You end up shooting the shit with people on BART from Oakland to SF when it’s Halloween night, the Bay Bridge is shut down to traffic, the train hasn’t moved for 10 minutes, and you find yourself smashed between Kim from The Real Housewives of Atlanta and a Wild Thing from Where the Wild Things Are. You ask where they are off to for the night. They tell you. You say “that’s cool.” Then they ask where you are off to in your awesome nun costume. And you, or I actually, get to say “why Treasure Island, of course.”
I don’t know if you can see it, but I finally got a picture of Bama’s “goddamit I’m happy!” face. It had been awhile since I’d seen it and I am determined to see it a few more times before it starts getting dark by the time I get off work.
Hun-ting, Hun-ting, Hun-ting!
It was a strangely stormy day at Lake Herman.
I usually refrain from writing posts that make me look silly, because isn’t “silly” the opposite of “professional”? But the story of this morning is just too good, and too long for a Facebook status update.
So I decided that this would be the day that I make my first attempt at roller skating with Bama dog. She’s extra randy this morning and I had a late night. The image in my head of me holding the leash while she runs at top speed pulling me along and getting all her energy out without me having to exert anything was too good to ignore. I’d been thinking about doing this for months, but fear had been holding me back, and good things come from facing fears, right? So on with it.
It didn’t surprise me that Bama was a little bit afraid of the skates. I thought it would work in my favor — like she’d run from the skates, pulling me along, and staying out of the way of the skates. She did run out in front of the skates at first, but after looking back at them with punky expression on her face a few times, she all of a
Continue reading Monday Morning Mishap
Vallejo needs a blog and I really haven’t been doing much crafting lately, so what the hay? There isn’t much content yet, but when you have a moment, why not check it out: Vallejo City Blog
The post Daily Photo: Clothing Optional is by far one of my best so far, if you ask me, though I have high hopes that this blog could function as entertainment to a certain segment of the Vallejo population, If you are reading this and you love in Vallejo, please share your ideas and what you think would make the blog cool and visited by our fellow Vallejoans. I’d love to get some partner contributors if anyone is game, because the perspective is limited if I’m the only one writing (duh).
That’s it for now. I have an exciting development to tell you about soon, but I can’t quite yet. sit tight and no, its not a new blog about Taco Trucks.
I have found two quilters so far in Vallejo: Janet Sylvain and her daughter Summer, who’s beautiful quilt and home furnishings shop Pieced on Earth Quilts, is one of my favorite places to visit in downtown Vallejo. These ladies are not only skilled and talented quilters, but their merchandising skills are hard to find these days. Their in-store displays of quilts, table runners, cushions, and antique and re-upholstered furniture make the shop very warm and inviting. The works of other local artists are exhibited alongside the Sylvains’ own pieces, creating a rich mix of materials, textures, and colors. Although you can take the ideas and inspiration you find in this shop home with you for free, you won’t be satisfied until one of the shop’s many treasures become a permanent fixture in your own home.
The first thing I noticed about the quilts in the Sylvains’ shop was that they are made with complete disregard for a certain “rule” that many a traditional quiltmaker would never dare deviate from. And that rule is “100% cotton.” I love that these ladies break this rule! The variety of fabric types and textures found in their quilts really make the designs pop
Continue reading Downtown Vallejo: Pieced on Earth Quilts
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