windowsill

the big sleep

well, where to begin? i almost called this post "she's a real sad tomato," because we watched the big sleep over the last few days, and the song that lauren bacall sings ("and her tears flowed like wine") has been on repeat in my head ever since. i'm not complaining, though, i loved it. and lauren bacall, too. she is just simply awesome. i've never quite understood the bogart business, but i think bacall is marvelous.

aside from taking the whole weekend to watch the big sleep... (was it because of the film's twists and turns, or my own? i'm not sure.) i've been thinking a lot about my little corner of the world here. you see, i haven't forgotten about my last post, ...but my health has definitely been a tug-of-war between my magpie ways and my body's other ideas. little electrical shocks of the heart were involved. and too many medical appointments. so now i'm seeing just how much i can do.

i have so many dreams, i just have to be patient, they won't slip away if i can't grasp them all at once. there is time.

and what i want to say is that even when it's quiet around here, i haven't left. i love having this space to share inspirations and creative notes and silly things like esme's latest nickname ("punchline").

other things these days: early evening leaf-covered walks, knitting scarves, designing charm necklaces in my dreams, wishing for snow, craving ice cream (?!), more to come...

these days

it's raining today. it's the kind of day that smells smoky, and wet, and makes you thrilled to be inside, with a lamp on and endless episodes of the gilmore girls season 6 to curl up with. the kind of day that smells like october.

last thursday i had a headache, and the world seemed too much for just one day. then lena posted this, and i found dear ada and her grace. and nothing will be the same again. a sense of shoring up the frontlines came rushing through, and i cried because i hadn't realized just how much i had come to believe (and accept) that i was simply alone in all of this. and last week the relief (in both the sense of a burden being lifted and a distinction by contrast) that i'm not was almost overwhelming; i didn't know how much it had dampened my spirits to feel that way.

the next day, though, i'd had a great sleep and the day was quiet and cool and i was filled with this calm sense of knowing that things are coming together. i've been thinking a lot lately about how to balance everything, how my health always seems to demand more from me than i want to give it, and i find myself wondering how to have the energy to be creative in a sustainable way, how to live in the hours of the day, become the time, so that you and the day are one. so much gathers at the edges of life when you try to focus on too much, and the clutter is like entropy, it wears you down.

i've loved reading abby's thoughts on living with intention and i've also been feeling almost overwhelmingly inspired lately, so shari's posts this week have folded in with perfect timing. inspiration and intention: somehow they fit together. perhaps inspiration leads to intention, makes you want to pull forward the truly beautiful in your life; or maybe choosing to live with more intention clears space to be open to inspiration, makes room to attend to it, as it were. this is what i want to think about more.

before i started grad school, i was very interested in this, living sustainably, and honestly, i thought that i would be studying it, at least in part (my program was an interdisciplinary one, so even though my background was english lit, i intended to take science classes, even architecture. it was the first year of a new program, and well, let's just say they were still defining it when we got there, and things did not turn out as planned.) grad school brings its own kind of pace, and demands, and within the first week it was clear that there wasn't much time for simplicity. this last year has been a rediscovery of so many things, and i want to get back to what i intuitively knew years ago, living with intention, and write about it here.

although i much prefer emerson's essays to his poems, there is one of his poems that has stayed with me:

emerson, "days"

daughters of time, the hypocritic Days,
muffled and dumb like barefoot dervishes,
and marching single in an endless file,
bring diadems and faggots in their hands.
to each they offer gifts after his will,
bread, kingdoms, stars, and sky that holds them all.
I, in my pleached garden, watched the pomp,
forgot my morning wishes, hastily
took a few herbs and apples, and the Day
turned and departed silent. I, too late,
under her solemn fillet saw the scorn.

i've always thought that the day was scornful not because the narrator didn't select kingdoms instead of herbs and apples, but because he forgot his morning wishes. in the offering of so much to choose from, he lost his purpose. this can happen to me again and again in any given day, if i let it. i can get SO distracted, believe me.

the key is to pull back, re-collect, remember your morning wishes, and continue.

so right now i'm having a cup of tea and esme's clambering up the back of my chair - now she's decided to curl up on the desk. (she likes to snooze and squint under the lamp.)

tonight we are taking the train to montreal, to see joanna newsom (at a vintage theatre that used to be a ukrainian synagogue - i'm so excited!), and stay with friends for a few days and return home just in time for thanksgiving. i think i need a little getaway, with leaves falling on cobblestone streets and amazing music and friends and food and maybe just a little bit of shopping ;)

have a great weekend, everyone :)

listen to the hum of the day

breakfast: white tea and a lemon scone - delicious. i have a new bakery love: the scone witch. i'm going to try a sandwich scone next ;)

reading the bedside book of birds: an avian miscellany

i can't get enough of apples lately

my favourite: resting my head on ben { gently of course } and listening to the hum of his purr
when my mind is whirling, whirling, it's like white noise, the baby and the washing machine - suddenly all becomes focused

afternoon: working on new designs for the shop, so excited to show you (soon!)

listening to wolf parade: 'modern world' and 'you are a runner and i am my father's son'

crocheting a new cowl:

laughing at arrested development season 3. love love love. it's brilliant and silly and i love how it plays off everything, it's like a whipsmart document of its own demise.

you know, i think ben gets called buster a lot, too. hmmm...

my friday so far...
what sights did your day bring? :)

♥

like this

look within and life, it seems, is very far from being 'like this'. examine for a moment an ordinary mind on an ordinary day. the mind receives a myriad impressions - trivial, fantastic, evanescent, or engraved with the sharpness of steel. from all sides they come, an incessant shower of innumerable atoms; and as they fall, as they shape themselves into the life of monday or tuesday, the accent falls differently from of old; the moment of importance came not here but there. . . . life is not a series of gig lamps symmetrically arranged; life is a luminous halo, a semi-transparent envelope surrounding us from the beginning of consciousness to the end.

- virginia woolf, modern fiction (1919)

where have we been? life lately has been surrounding us, and it seems like all summer it's been impossible to arrange it into any linear fashion (i think the closest i came was a list - or two ;). i have been so very sleepy for so much of this summer, diabetics do not do well with the heat, and there have been other medical discoveries (that i'm hypothyroid too - ha! what fun!). and there is the possibility of moving, very soon, but we shall see about that. we finished deadwood only to find out it's gone for good, and now i go around calling people hoopleheads and other unmentionables. and i'm still in love with these last summer days, although i did spy a red leaf on my tree outside our kitchen window yesterday (yes, my tree - i have claimed it. it's tall and lush and very beautiful. i think it's a maple. i suppose i should know if i want it to be mine, hmm?).

* a little later note: i can tell a maple tree, but this tree is in a neighbour's yard and so although i like to call it mine, it's not really close enough to claim, or to identify its leaves... it's more of a window romance we have....

i'm not quite ready to turn to fall, even though i'm excited to start knitting projects like marieke's etole and soft blankets like adrienne rogers (via design sponge guest blogger lena corwin).... but i think that's what i love about this time of year. it still feels like summer most afternoons, but in the evenings it's cool and starting to smell like that crispened fall air ....mmmm. spring mornings, summer afternoons, fall evenings. the best of all seasons in a day.

p.s. ... too many sad kitties this week. my heart goes out to shari, lisa s, and mav. i hope they will all be okay. just the thought of it makes me say 'hello love' everytime i see ben or esme, although they do go by many other names... esme's known lately as little baby bundt cake (where do these names come from sometimes?), and ben's new name is binker, because he's just that kind of cat. (and because he has a quiet way about him but you know he's always there ;)

i know monday was a holiday but is it wrong to feel like today should be friday?

♥

collect cool thoughts

endless slices of watermelon

toes dipped into a lake for the first time this summer

a clean soft t-shirt with cap sleeves

porch swings

new neighbours

burt's bees grapefruit & sugar beet shampoo

the sound of wind rustling through the trees

evening thunderstorms

music with a lot of radio in it, like mermaid avenue vol. 1

watching seasons 1 and 2 of deadwood

a clean house

playing with collage

reading little stories in the shade, not too long but just long enough

ben and esme sleeping on the cool of the floor

kissing the tops of their sun-warmed heads

plans for fall

time is how you spend your love

thank you for all of your sweet comments! i do feel a sense of myself in what i make but there's so much wonderful stuff being created sometimes you have to step back and consider your own direction. lists are good for that. and random lists from the past are such telling little notes to ourselves!

i loved you and me and everyone... it snuck up on me how good it was. it was filled with these odd moments and then they quietly unfolded into something heartbreaking and true. miranda july and john hawkes were amazing. now i want to read this book, the boy from lam kien, from cloverfield press, found at hoping for happy accidents.

and of course rushmore, forever. would you believe the first time i watched it i wanted to like it but didn't fully - i loved the idea of it but it didn't connect. then much later i saw it a second time and fell in love with it, and now every time, it just kills me.

we haven't even watched bonnie & clyde yet... and there were already more movies waiting at the library! ah! has anyone seen a very long engagement? i loved amelie, so i am very excited to see this.

and more and more i feel that it is the small everyday things - what emerson called "the near, the low, and the common," that make up happiness, or at least a kind of contentment with your life, a sense of knowing this is enough, even as you want to try new things (which does feel endless!) - maybe that just adds to the appreciation of the little things. wanting to fully experience them. i want to think about this more...

but today, it's lovely and hot here. i spent the afternoon on the couch in front of the fan, eating cherries and reading zadie smith's on beauty, freshly picked from the library. it's a delicious rush so far. she quotes the most beautiful thought from her husband in her dedication, and so it became the title of this post.

we're going to see the new pornographers tonight...

and i also made magnet sets this weekend! this is my first time making them - now i know why they are so addictive! they'll be in the shop soon...

i hope everyone is enjoying this summery sunday afternoon!

not too categorical

last night we went over to friends' for a simple porchlight picnic of cobb salad with organic romaine from their garden, and chicken and bacon and what else? feta, avocado, with basil bread...it was delicious. we brought the last of the fresh strawberries from a local shopkeepers' garden and homemade creme fraiche made from yogurt for dessert. later we watched me and you and everyone we know which was waiting for us at the library yesterday (along with bonnie & clyde mati!). and finished the day off with a first taste of the new haagen-daz mayan chocolate ice cream. chocolate and cinnamon are a perfect pair.

i've been easing into a return here. thinking a lot lately about my style and what it means to me. what defines me as a maker of things. a few coincidences in the spring were enough to send me spinning, pondering what it is that makes me different, makes me me. we all see and share so much inspiration, but the way we absorb and filter it is different, and our experience with the beauty we love is all our own. have you ever felt that ache when you see a photograph, a collage, a colour, and think this, this is me. like feeling a physical tug toward it that leaves you with a delicious sense of longing, that makes your heart leap and exclaim oh! what is this?? and you feel utterly at home at the same time.

i'm new to many mediums, so sometimes i can get overwhelmed, but it's also because i want to try so many things. i am still learning what i most like to create after years of assigned interest. ever since i left school, i've been thinking a lot about the girl i want to be when i grow up. the spirit in me that school could not contain, and could not squander.

and what i've learned is to take notice of what draws me in. write it down, in the taxonomy of a list (i would love to research the history of lists; why we make them, how they change meaning depending on the gathered elements and their order, how they are so allusive, stretching tendrils of meaning out to many more possibilities). and so, a list, of what i love: old school stationery (lines! ...), handwriting, soft hues of green and blue, t-shirts resewn into pretty ways, sea urchins (oh!!!), shea butter and lavender - together, afternoon sun, lots of texture, pale cream wool rugs - so organic and clean but knowing it's impossible to stay that way, italian hemp twine, drawers just for little treasures, "she's my rushmore, max," my newly found polaroid camera that i can't wait to try and those four boxes of SX-70 film i have in the fridge.

i love the smell of fresh cut grass, light slants and sun flares, moments, pauses, little details...

i like the quiet assurance of everyday things.

all of these things inspire me, make me inexplicably happy.

there are some new charm bracelets in the shop, made up of charms and beads and little vintage pieces that i love. take a peek.

summertime

it's been quiet around here, but we've been busy ...

- getting out our old fan for those hot, energy-sapping days

- finding an old school desk for $5 at the great glebe garage sale. with a fresh coat of white paint, it'll be just right in our little kitchen.

- eating fresh corn on the cob and grilled salmon burgers. i want to make pickles. and raspberry buckle.

- combing yard sales and vintage shops for treasures and making new ones for my shop

- watching the first thunderstorm of summer last night from a friend's porch, with wind-whipped trees and thunderclaps that sneak up on you and make you jump. awesome.

- wearing my hair up into a loose bun and feeling the soft cool breeze on my neck

- soon we will lie on the grass and watch moonlit movies

- and the smell of a little reefer madness just wafted in through our windows...

yep. it's summertime.

tumbleweeds

i'm still here. i've been thinking, thinking. about what's important. i read mati and i feel inspired, i read emma and i feel sure.

the sun dapples through the trees now and the whole apartment smells like lilac blooms. i have more ideas than i know how to share. but soon, soon...

fresh air

spring cold. mighty force. knocked me down. camped out on the couch with some crocheting and old movies. and the last season of six feet under, which we polished off in three days. sigh... and now it's over. narm.

now i'm craving light, fresh foods, like spring salads (with a delicious hemp oil dressing i just found), and blueberry juice.

spring's here. there are buds on the trees. the air feels softer, looser.

it's making me want to savour it. pare down to what feels essential. slow down. notice. avoid "momentum for the sake of momentum."

and it's really making me want a little square of earth to grow something. i think i'm too late for the closest community garden this year - i had a HUGE space there a few years ago and it burnt me out on keeping a garden... until now. also, that soil was more like gravel to toil with. i turned it over by hand, just me and a shovel, and every few spadefuls i'd unearth some more rocks and debris. except for a huge bush of thyme thriving right in the middle of it, that plot was close to a parking lot. so if i do get a space, i just want something small. it may even just be windowsill gardens this year. i'll still plant some lettuces and spinach, and maybe even some tomatoes, alongside lots of basil and calendula. i have some local organic heirloom seeds (eternal seeds from quebec, and some from greta's) - giant nobel spinach, buttercrunch lettuce, deer tongue lettuce, oregon giant peas... even the names sound delicious. i have extra, so if you'd like to try some, let me know and i'll send you a little package in the mail....