#mce_temp_url#I know I always have a million and one excuses for my lack of blogging, but I have had some rather large projects on my plate lately.

I have slowly but surely started to cross them off my list. I leave for vacation in exactly one week from today and need to have them all scratched off by then, so it will pay off with the reward of a relaxing retreat.

I will soon have my updated 2010 city guide for Design*Sponge done soon (my 2008 version can be viewed here), and most recently had my home featured on Design*Sponge sneak peeks. I was able to cross TEDxCLE off the list, But now that it’s over, it’s bittersweet as it was truly one of the greatest experiences of my life.  Not just because I was a participant but because ALL of the presentations were incredible and I was just so immensely proud that Hallie and Eric brought this great event to Cleveland.

My presentation was about LIVING A PASSIONATE LIFE and there is no way it would have had the impact I had wanted if I had not had the help of Paul Mazzoleni.

When I met with Paul about helping me create a few visuals to accompany my presentation all I said was that I would like a character, a little girl, that I could use to tie all my slides together, but what he gave me was SO MUCH MORE!  He made the full color illustrations that I used to mark a few key topics in my discussion and the sweetest little girl characters that I was able to use throughout my slides.  I thank him SO much for bringing his talent to my presentation.

The slides in this edit of the presentation are a bit out of order but you can view all the slides separately too.

SOME MORE GREAT PHOTOS FROM THE TEDxCLE event can be found on my friend KYLE’s Blog here.

Tweet This Post 

Share/Save

Sometimes, I understand the severity of a situation right away.  like, when my car started to shake while driving it today, I recognized that this was probably NOT a good thing and pulled over…However, other things take me forever and ever to realize, or more truthfully to care enough about.

I have joked about my inability to cook and even used it as a crutch not to have to do it.  I am like a deer in headlights at a grocery store and throw away more food than I eat 95% of the time when I do actually go to a grocery store.  I say I live alone, so its wasteful to cook because I do not eat leftovers.  I say I don’t eat leftovers because it’s true I never have, but is it really because I can’t ?  Like, physically there will be some repercussion?  Can I NOT make an effort to eat them in an effort to save food and money?  And although I could make a staggering argument for my excuses, I will finally stop fighting myself and I will finally own up to the fact that it is not that I cannot cook it is simply that I have really never given it a solid try, any previous efforts I tell myself or any poor soul I may have been trying for FAR in advance that it will be bad, this is no way to start a project!  What if every time I redid my store windows or worked in a clients home, I started out the project with…”this is going to be bad”….hahahaha, that’s crazy!

I am not saying I am going to wake up tomorrow and go right to the market and get my food for that day and make a big change first thing tomorrow, first of all, my car is in the shop and I have a dentist appointment (true albeit excuses), BUT I have been shaken.  I feel a shift coming on and I am going to do what I can to encourage and support the shift…And what exactly IS this shift all about?  Well, the universe is TELLING ME something…It is telling me I need to stop using the excuse that I live alone or that I don’t know how to cook and start getting healthy and learning to eat better and cook for myself.  I will always go to restaurants, I love the experience too much and there is no need to stop, but I can’t continue eating 100% of my meals outside of the home either…it’s preposterous and further more expensive and further more, inexcusable to have made it to my 30’s without even one recipe up my sleeve.

What brought all this on…coincidence I am not certain, is that I have been exposed to THREE majorly compelling arguments for knowing what I eat, and knowing how to cook it and knowing how to source it locally in the last week. I watched Jamie Oliver’s TREMENDOUS presentation at TED, then watched Michael Ruhlman’s CONVINCING presentation at TEDxCLE (video will be up THIS week here) and have come home tonight to watch FOOD Inc.

It’s scary when you see things like school aged children not being able to identify a single vegetable, or realizing that the art of cooking used to be what brought people together, what families passed down to their children (mother this is no jab at you, both my bro’s know how to cook, you tried like hell to convince me, i just wasn’t having it…and you were right, i was wrong), what some called the way to a man’s heart even.  And discovering the gross shift in the production of our foods and the negative impact that has on the animals, the environment, the farmers, the workers and us the consumers.  It’s irresponsible of me to be so flip about it all.  I am a grown woman.  I honestly think that I take on as much as I do to avoid this nagging requirement I felt to cook, but no more.

Rome was most certainly not built in a day and since I am terrifically bad at, well, being bad at things, this process will stress me out, assault my pride and frustrate me to no end, but one day…one fine day, I will make a meal with great success and I will cook it for my friends.

Tweet This Post 

Share/Save

I am so thrilled to have my home on the great Design*Sponge blog today.  I only moved in a short while ago and have a lot of work to do, but this is very exciting for me!  Look out for my updated 2010 Cleveland city guide too!  You can check out the 2008 version I wrote here.

check out the full post here, or my flickr site here.

Tweet This Post 

Share/Save

love this outfit. just had to share.

Tweet This Post 

Share/Save

Famille Summerbelle Papercut Map Prints.  HOLY.MOLY.  First of all, let’s just talk about how cute that name is, then, THEN, the cute logo…and this is all before we even get to the most incredible maps i have ever seen.  I know they are targeting them for kids, but i must have.

Paris papercut in Pink

london papercut

Tweet This Post 

Share/Save

i think if i could actually find 30 minutes to relax i would make myself one of those construction paper chains, where each day as you run off to school (in my case work) i would tear off a chain until one day there were no more chains to tear and that would mean (as a kid it meant CHRSITMAS!) but for me as an adult it means The CARIBBEAN!!!!  sunshine, relaxation, great excuse for seriously not having to check voice mails, reply to emails, make or cancel appointments, do any bookkeeping.  god. i have never needed a break like i do right now.

So i will allow myself a little time each day to daydream about some of the places I will be headed next month….I CAN’T WAIT!!!!!!!!!

Tweet This Post 

Share/Save

ANTHRO GOES TO THE CIRCUS…

And I would like to join them…seriously, i really cannot bare ohio in February.  I know its trite to complain about the weather, but its not just the weather, its the overall dreariness of the season, the quietness around the shop, the havoc the season wreaks on my skin and hair!  I just happen to be one of those people who loves the HOT HOT HEAT and prefer everything about that time of year over this time of year.

So, I can’t really leave to join the circus, but I do have a few tricks I employ to keep me sane this time of year…For instance, I made a note to myself last year, that i need to go somewhere warm and sunny in March because every year by March I have reached my limit.  So this year I am going to the Caribbean in March, So all I have to do is make it until March 14th and one trick to keeping sane is to fantasize about my island wardrobe….Now it is a big family trip on a cruise.  I have NEVER fantasized about going on a Cruise before, but by now i am convinced it will be JUST what the doctor ordered.   and I do believe there is a thing or two from this catalog that will have to come with me…like the dress below and these amazing red and white striped booties:

Tweet This Post 

Share/Save

Look at what ROOM SERVICE got in today, call 216-281-4221 to hold a shirt for a few days, as they GO FAST!

Tweet This Post 

Share/Save

From the Director Gary Hustwit, who brought us the documentary film, HELVETICA, comes this FANTASTIC film, OBJECTIFIED.

I rented this film tonight on my new apple tv, another gem from design superstars, apple and found this documentary about DESIGN utterly stimulating.  I am a great admirer of GOOD DESIGN, I find that I am very sensitive to the design in everything around me.  You know, sitting in a doctors waiting room for example, can be a real form of torture for me, from what I am sitting in to what I am forced to look at, it very often is an assault on all of my sensibilities!  Or like, god forbid, I have to go to a big box store like a PetCo., the lighting and the signage causes a sense of anxiety in me that makes me utterly desperate to get out!  Maybe I am crazy or maybe I just know all to well the value of good design on impacting my willingness to spend time in or interact with a place or object.

I highly recommend this film for a renewed appreciation for the value of well-designed objects and places, and an awakening to how much our environments and the objects in which we choose to surround ourselves impact and shape us.

below is a trailer from SXSW for the film

Tweet This Post 

Share/Save

well, moving into my new place 2 weeks before my Holiday Shoppe opened was not very good timing.  I basically, moved in, unpacked what i had and that was that, no decorating, no day dreaming about how to transform a room…nothing.  no time.

well, i had a few days off in january and made a few quick changes because while time was still at a premium, i could not live one more day with the pale institutional yellow paint in my kitchen.

not. one. more. day.

well, without much thought at all, i just decided to go nuts and paint my kitchen PINK!  …AND BLACK!  it is STILL a work in progress…i need a little more art, i need a rug, i have to arrange the items in my cupboard, but it is SUCH a relief to be walk into my kitchen and NOT into that hospital yellow color but a fun and happy color.  IN FACT, i have found myself cooking and baking with some regularity since making the change…this, this is notable!

BEFORE: i swear the yellow paint was WAY worse in person:

AFTER:

BEFORE:

AFTER: well sorta, still have stuff to do, but you get the idea

Tweet This Post 

Share/Save