Category: NEW

Work-In-Progress (WIP) / The Queen

Lately I’ve had a surge of creativity and it has been a blast. I’ve had such fun working on my ceramics homework. Yesterday and today I played around with using leaves to create different textures and patterns:

Clay and bits of leaf are now all over the house. So worth it.

Yesterday I finally saw The Queen (how fitting that her majesty visited the White House on the same day–total coincidence). Wow, the film was phenomenal. I was completely floored by Helen Mirren’s performance, the breathtaking cinematography, and spectacular script. It was moving, interesting, and thought-provoking. I found my mind lingering over it hours afterwards and it was fresh on my mind this morning when I woke up. Now that is a good movie.

I find it interesting how certain memories are etched clearly in our minds. I remember exactly where I was the moment I learned of Princess Diana’s car crash. Some things, often haunting things, really stay with us.

Faux Boulder date

When we lived in Boulder, we ate out several times a week and frequently met up with friends at local bars or restaurants. David and I used to go out on dates all the time. In our three years there, had tried nearly every restaurant in town and had our favorite places. The waiters knew us. The owners would stop by. Our friends would know where to find us.

Since moving here we haven’t really gone to happy hour or eaten outside or found tons of fabulous restaurants. Yes, we live in California with beautiful weather, but we don’t eat out that much because everything is so darn expensive, and most of our friends aren’t around the corner and able to meet at a moments notice.

So, yesterday was a treat. After a lovely drive in the country (scouting towns to move to with absolutely no luck), we ended up in beautiful Healdsburg, a smaller, more expensive, and less hippy Boulder, but lovely nonetheless. We found the local brew pub, sat on the back patio, and savored the sunshine and yummy pub fare.

Sitting there we realized that we were having a Boulder date. It felt so normal. It felt so right. We had missed it so much. And now we know that we need to do this way more often… Happy hour, anyone?

Here they come

Where have I been? What have I been up to?

Gardening at our house (as opposed to Luther Burbank’s house), making leaf plates for my ceramics class, paring down and throwing out and organizing our stuff that is taking over the apartment, cooking Thai food, reading (up to a couple hours a day now!), and doing some hard-core running. We seem to have finally developed a routine here in California: yoga, arts and crafts, garden, run, eat, read, sleep, and repeat. We’ve been here a year now.

p.s. Check out HepburnTribute.com — that’s been a real source of time suckage lately.
Still lots of things to adjust and tweak, but it’s on its way.

Easy steps to be more eco-conscious (part 2)

Evidently, David and I are even hotter than we thought because we’re ecosexuals.

    “Ecosexual: n. A person who’s into hybrid cars, low energy lightbulbs, and recycling. Now that environmentalism is hot, ecosexuals are getting increasingly fashionable.” (Defined by Wired Magazine; learn more at Treehugger and SF Magazine.)

You know you want to be one too.

+ Switch to recycled
Recycled toilet paper, toothbrushes, aluminum foil, computer paper, garden hoses, pencils, clothing, mouse pads, printer supplies, crayons, trash bags, etc. If you are adverse to cloth towels, napkins, and handkerchiefs, buy recycled paper towels, napkins, and facial tissue.
“If every household in the U.S. bought just one four-pack of 260-sheet recycled bath tissue, it would eliminate 60,600 pounds of chlorine pollution, preserve 356 million gallons of fresh water, and save 988,000 trees.” [via link]

+ Bring your own grocery bags
Many grocery stores will even credit you 5 cents for each bag you bring in!
“This is common practice in virtually every other country but our own. The U.S. uses 100 billion plastic bags annually, consuming about 12 million barrels of oil [with] less than 1% of plastic bags are ever recycled, using a sturdy reusable bag will eliminate hundreds to thousands of plastic bags over its lifetime.” [via link]

+ Encourage plants to clean up
Certain plants can help remove air pollutants like formaldehyde, benzene, and carbon monoxide and are excellent at cleaning up indoor air pollution. The top 10 plants most effective in removing these toxins from the air are: Bamboo Palm (Chamaedorea Seifritzii), Chinese Evergreen (Aglaonema Modestum), English Ivy (Hedera Helix), Gerbera Daisy (Gerbera Jamesonii), Janet Craig (Dracaena “Janet Craig”), Marginata (Dracaena Marginata), Mass Cane/Corn Plant (Dracaena Massangeana), Mother-in-Law’s Tongue (Sansevieria Laurentii), Pot Mum (Chrysantheium morifolium), Peace Lily (Spathiphyllum “Mauna Loa”), and Warneckii (Dracaena “Warneckii”). [via link]
Don’t have a green thumb? Golden pothos, English ivy, and peace lilies are all easy-to-grow toxin fighters.

+ Double up on printing
Configure your printer so that it prints on both sides of the page or simply put your printed pages back in the printer to reuse the other side. Download these signs to post in your office around copiers and printers to help reduce paper use.

+ Unplug it
Unplug your cell phone charger and hairdryer when not in use. They continue to guzzle energy even when plugged in and turned off. Alternatively, plug everything on a power strip and use the switch to turn it off instead of manually plugging and unplugging things).
“If 10 percent of the world’s cell phone owners did this, it would reduce energy consumption by an amount equivalent to that used by 60,000 European homes per year.” [via link]