a little dialogue.

i realize i have been communicating via pictures on this blog for a little while. i thought i would throw some words at you to let you know what's been going on.
with the arrival of the month of march, it's hard to not project to the advent of spring. i am a north country girl at heart and love the winter, but i am ready to see the sun and spend time outside without the protection of multiple layers.
to add to the impatience, we are planning a vacation to sandbridge beach in virginia in may. we will be renting a condo for a week right on the atlantic ocean. the condo is across the street from the back bay federal wildlife refuge and we will be visiting at the same time that the loggerhead turtles come ashore to lay their eggs.
i have also taken a few big steps in regards to my artwork. first, i registered to take a course taught by the talented lilla rogers and am excited to learn and connect with other peers. second, i finally submitted to exhibit for our local third thursday art walk, sponsored by APE.
wish me luck!

prime.

finally, the studio renovation has progressed to place where i can lend a skilled hand. the caulking was finished yesterday and the first coat of primer went up today.
on a completely different note, check out my new blog header and let me know what you think.

apropos of nothing.

inevitably, whenever there is some lapse in my blog postings i question what the purpose of this blog really is.
the word 'blog' is now a commonly understood thing, with both its negative and positive connotations. there is plenty of online advice about how to have a 'successful' blog and gain a larger audience. [be sure to post at least three times weekly even if you have nothing to say! keep a consistent theme even though your life, talents and activities are multifaceted!] you can even 'earn money' from your blog. [harass your readers with advertisements! review products that no one really cares about!]
please excuse my cynicism here.
as an avid blog reader, i enjoy many sites that 'follow the rules'. i most appreciate the blog writers that allow a brief glimpse into their mind, talents and daily lives. while i vicariously enjoy other people's exotic experiences, what i really respect is the ability to honor the routine of daily life. most of our days are spent doing the ordinary, repetitious tasks that too easily steal our energy and our creativity. to have the ability to extract joy out of the mundane is a honed skill. when reading blogs i don't look for flamboyance or count the number of posts, i want honesty.
ultimately, keeping a blog is a personal thing. i tend to it because, for me, it's a place to honor events and record thoughts. this space and my flickr page both serve as memory guideposts that are made public for others to follow along if they so choose. there is no implied lesson. i don't feign any great wisdom. this is a documentary of a life and there is great value in that.

mid-winter cleanse.

just stopping in to apologize for any glitchy behavior here on the blog today. i have been doing some much overdue housekeeping. the links on the right, especially the art blogs, have been completely updated. if you find the time, definitely check out some of the super talented folks on that list.
it feels good to dust out the corners!

down the rabbit hole.

.white ranunculus.

i realize i haven't been around here much. i'm sure you understand why.
life has been extremely vivid in the last few weeks. on any given day i can travel swiftly through every emotion possible and sense each one exquisitely. it's amazing the capacity of our sensory experience and how easily we break connection with it. it can be overwhelming to sit in those emotions, both joyful and stressful.
i am trying to be present for everything; even the small volcanoes of worry. hurricane irene brought not only rain our way but also a large dose of unexpected weather related logistic and travel issues that we could have never anticipated. all is well though, which is what i continue to remind myself after each seemingly plan-altering incident. i am not immune to trying to control and analyze, but i also know that happy accidents occur every moment.
i am currently sitting here at the laptop, carving out a little bit of time to record my thoughts even though there are hundreds of fresh flowers sitting on the porch needing attention. those under-hydrated flowers will wait, because this moment is much more fragile and fleeting.
in a few short days i will be simultaneously floating buoyantly with joy and white knuckling my experiences to try to drip every last precious feeling out of them. i will not only vow my unending love to my life partner, but will vow to be present in each moment to the best of my human abilities.
perhaps i won't have another moment to drop in to this blog before the big event. if not, i will be back shortly after. until then, please, enjoy each of your own moments and fully experience what each has to offer!

.yellow craspedia.

time goes by.

shadow (pencil sketch in moleskine)

i am spending less time here on the blog lately.
i never seem to have the time, or perhaps the discipline, to post throughout the week.
i do have thoughts i would like to grab and capture here, but those moments are fleeting and usually don't come accompanied by a laptop or internet connections.
frankly, most times, living life is just more absorbing than recording life. it's only when there are open, thoughtful breaks that i have enough time to reflect and elaborate.
i wonder how writers manage it; always being able to draw up experiences in such vivid detail even when canyons of time seem to have built up. if it's anything like creating visual art, it's about practice.
yeah, practice.
and probably talent.

be afraid.

surprise, surprise.
it's raining again.
and it's raining hard. i normally love it when it storms, but i've had a three day weekend and have been trapped inside the whole time.
luckily, this has given us an ample opportunity to focus our attentions on wedding minutia. i say 'luckily' both seriously and sarcastically.
before i go further let me make this clear, this blog will NOT become a wedding blog. to those not even slightly interested in weddings, let alone mine and adam's, bear with me. i can empathize. before i got engaged, i would have rather poke my eyes out with dull sticks than listen to the blow-by-blow of wedding planning. quite frankly, sometimes i still feel that way...especially when i catch myself getting caught up in it. it's a strange balance to find; the enjoyment of the process, the anticipation for the 'big event' and maintaining a safe distance from the crazy, commercial and sociological aspect of weddings.
but we are in the final months of planning a major life event and the truth is that we are very excited. the more of the details that come together, the more real it all seems. this weekend we designed and ordered the welcome dinner invites, got a contract for sound equipment rentals, updated the website and are 80% done with the wardrobes.
after all, if i can't write about it here, then what good is having a blog? plus, i trust you will all keep me in check!

short attention span.

.waiting patiently for completion.

it's definitely late february. i have a pretty serious case of bored-apathy. that's what i call the feeling of needing to do something but being to lazy to do it, let alone figure out what it is.
i did successfully (re)launch my portfolio website: reneeleigh.com. the content isn't final, but i am just happy to have finally gotten it off the ground. slow progress is still progress!
i also received an advance copy of the moral lives of animals written by dale peterson via librarything's early reviewers program. it's a pretty thick text and with a quick skimming, reminds me of an environmental ethics course i took in college. i'll likely post the review here as well as on my librarything profile if you're curious how it turns out.

ice breaker.

there's nothing like a brief blog hiatus to give me a serious case of writers block.
the longer the break, the more "important" the first post seems to become.  thoughts swirl about why i write in the first place, whether it's a vain/useless/boring activity and the ever present worry about who-the-heck-even-reads-this?
never the less, writing here has become an essential mental clearinghouse and laboratory.
(i am alive) has introduced me to people, places and ideas i otherwise may not have found.  it's a great form of self-reflection.  it keeps me honest, although it would be just as easy to fabricate or embellish my life here.
most importantly and somehow mysteriously, it has been the gateway to my rekindled art creation.
so, i am back and thank goodness this first post is out of the way.

(parentheses)

hi all.  it might be a little quiet around here for the next week.
we're hosting thanksgiving at our place, so please send me your most peaceful and well organized thoughts.  adam's making his first turkey (16 pounds!) and i will be preparing some delicious meatless loaf (although "loaf" isn't the most appetizing word).
i've also got a fancy new printer coming in the mail tomorrow.  i spent a pretty penny on it, but it comes with a $300 mail-in-rebate (which i would like to receive before the next ice age).  that printer will (hopefully) be the gateway to me making (and selling) some prints of my artwork.  i forsee some trial and error in my near future.
happy holiday!

glamour shots.

he kept touching the lens with his wet nose.

louie blu is never one to sit still or take a photo shoot too seriously.

as a side note, it appears the blog's domain mapping has finally completed.
unfortunately, my website links (in the lists to the right) were all lost in the migration.  what a project that was to update!

"your blog is in transition."

please excuse any disarray.
i'm doing a little bit of renovation on this here blog.
firstly, you might notice the spiffy domain name change...once everything migrates over anyway.
secondly, there's a cleaner and simpler look.  i can't seem to be satisfied with a layout for more than a few months at a time, can i?
thirdly, i believe i may be bringing my day-to-day sketches and artworks over to this domain.  i'm still on the fence about this, but we'll see...
i appreciate your patience.
that is all.

where have you been?

i know you're wondering where the heck i've been; especially after sandbagging that brandi carlile video in place of a real post.
sorry to have kept you pondering, but rest assured i am still around.
i admit to being a little less motivated to post since the weather has improved.  it seems that the longer it goes between posts, the more of a task it seems to sit down and write one.  i always have wanted to post more than once weekly, but can never seem to make that happen. 
but i digress...
updates from our annual road trip to virginia beach are forthcoming, but first we're off to log bay on lake george to enjoy our final day off before returning to work.

this is a test.

 

it worked! 
(i haven't been able to embed video on this template, but i've been tweaking the code...i know you're all fascinated)
i intended to delete this post, but it's a freaking good song so i'll leave it.

short attention span sunday.

hi there.
i seem to lack focus today. maybe i have contracted a case of viral adhd.
what? there is no such thing?!?
whatever.
it's more likely that my blogging motivation is waning due to the weather.
we have spent most of today outside in the garden. yesterday we tore down a cheap, sh*tty fence that the previous owners of our house had put up. for the last five years we thought it was the neighbors fence because the "nice" side was facing us. apparently, the previous owners of our house weren't very neighborly and put up the fence "backwards".
now that the crap-fence is gone, we have some extra space for planting. which means we spent the first part of today hopping between garden stores. we returned home with a couple sand cherry bushes, lavender, kale, summer and winter squash and snap peas.
oh, and a rose bush. i'm not sure what happened there. rose bushes are not generally on my garden radar. they seem...well, antiquated. maybe it was an impulse purchase? regardless, i need to quickly learn how to care for this new addition, lest i want to kill it. i'll take any tips or tricks if you've got 'em!

title free.

in the song closer by melissa ferrick, there's this line: "i imagine my brain looks like a carousel on fire".  that pretty much sums me up right now.  putting together a one topic, cohesive post is unrealistic at this current juncture.  so this is what you get today:

•this summer in april business is kinda weird.  i'm not complaining, just a little freaked out.  i'm not sure if the odd weather is to blame, but our tulips are starting to bloom.  the trouble is that they are only about four inches tall.

•i find personality tests fascinating.  and comforting.  it's as though they reassure me that other people think and behave as i do.  this morning i took the jung typology test.  my result was INFJ (introverted intuitive feeling judging), also summarized as the "counselor".  i find this to be an incredibly accurate summary of me; especially this passage:
"They are highly private people, with an unusually rich, complicated inner life. Friends or colleagues who have known them for years may find sides emerging which come as a surprise. Not that Counselors are flighty or scattered; they value their integrity a great deal, but they have mysterious, intricately woven personalities which sometimes puzzle even them [emphasis mine]."

•i am working on a correspondence project.  i am making what could be called postcards and intend on catching up with some old friends.  wish me luck, as keeping in touch is not one of my strong points.

•how folks can justify spending more money on their wedding (which lasts approximately 5 hours) than they do on their vehicle (which hopefully will last more than five years) is a complete mystery to me. 

•i am very particular about how i like my grocery lists made.  i want the items to be in the order in which i will (generally) encounter them in the store.  due to this idiosyncracy, i am intrigued by grocerylists.org.  looking at other people's grocery lists is oddly interesting.  considering the fact that i often abandon my grocery list in the cart when unloading my bags into the car, the chances are pretty decent that one of my lists might be featured.

not quite spring cleaning.

i'm a girl that values simplicity.
clutter makes me anxious and prevents me from concentrating.  i like to order what i can so that i can flow with the inevitable and trans-formative chaos.  i think of it as preparedness rather than obsessive-compulsiveness; sort of like being a girl scout.
while this usually works for me, order and simplicity can also be boring.  i like change and creative impulsiveness too.  this is why i felt that my dry-toast-bored-to-tears blog layout needed some sprucing up.
i'm still getting used to it, but i think it's just what this place needed.
any comments or suggestions?

housekeeping.

i'm just as guilty as the next person of reading blogs mostly through a feed reader.  so when i actually stopped by my own blog yesterday, i noticed the need to do some housekeeping with my link lists.
i deleted a few links to pages which haven't posted anything in the last 3+ months, but mostly i added some sites.

some noteworthy additions include:

•keri smith's, wish jar.  i originally started following this blog when i began considering a return to illustration work.  while i haven't exactly taken that jump yet, i continue to follow her blog as it is very inspiring; not just for artists, but for creativity in general.

•the trail cooking blog.  i found this site when i started making my own backpacking food.  the blog is part of the larger trail cooking website which links to a ton of very helpful information.

•sociological images.  a great website that analyzes the images we see and information we receive everyday.

•information is beautiful.  a site that further enforces my addiction to infographics.

•the bilerco project.  an awesome site which "features LGBTQ activists, politicos, journalists, novelists, advice columnists, and video bloggers who are high-energy, inquisitive, eloquent experts in their professions."

•change.org.  this an expansive website where you can get constantly updated information on a large variety of social and environmental issues.  plus, it's a sharp and well designed web page.

there's a few more over there on the right.  check 'em out and let me know if there's something you read on the regular that seems to match my sensibilities!

birthdays.

growing another year older...it is what we make it, yes?
i try hard to not engage in negative age talk about myself, but it certainly can be challenging. some days the less empowering effects of aging seem so much more obvious, rather than the knowledge and experience it brings.
i think about this now because it is time for two birthdays; my own 34th birthday and this blog's 2nd birthday.
here's to a new year of wisdom, growth and peace! and here's a link to find out some interesting but non-life changing information about your own birthday.

(click the photo for source)

whattcha been up to?

so you've probably been noticing that i've been kinda callin' it in for the last two weeks. let me give you an abridged version of what's been going on.

•my vegetable garden has been crapping the bed. it never really took off this year, mostly because of our wet and cool summer. my eggplants are only now starting to really set fruit and the tomatoes all "caught the blight". the flowers haven't really fared much better. it's most obvious with the sage and snapdragons. everything just stayed pretty small and hasn't been very spectacular. it's not a total failure as any gardener knows, because this year's failures have taught me many lessons for future gardens.

•i've been recently obsessed with cooking with eggs. it started with this article from the kitchn, then it just took on a life of it's own. frittatas, carbonaras (sans bacon), etc.

•i picked up working on my family tree. i added a little more than a hundred people, bringing the total tree to more than one thousand people. a few years back i got stuck and had given up the researching. recently, i found an error in my tree around 1800 which had caused the problem. my great (x4) grandfather, edward had three wives (a double widower) and i had listed the wrong wife in my tree. fixing this has brought me back to the 16th century, which is where i'm stuck again.

•hosting a garage sale is a great way to people watch. especially since the people come right to your house.

•i am particularly finicky about jewelery, but recently found a very awesome beach glass "cairn" necklace on etsy. it was hand made by sarah schneider in california. you can see her work here.

•we FINALLY got to bring home our new "child", louie blu yesterday. he's adjusting pretty well; especially since he's never met a dog before. it will be a few weeks for everyone to find their niches but it will all work out.
here is a gratuitous kitty shot: