Daily Drop Cap

Being a sucker for typography, I drooled as soon as I saw this new site, Daily Drop Cap. Below is a K that I love, and I think it would be great to print on nice paper and framed. I also love this idea to go in a baby's room with their name spelled out, it would look so eclectic!


Source: The Daily Drop Cap

The Master Calendar

As anyone who hangs out with Andrew and I know, we live strictly by what we deem as our MASTER CALENDAR. The master calendar hangs on the fridge, and no plans can be made without it. Since I somehow can't get fully transferred to an electronic calendar (I've tried), we print out a whole year's worth of months. I was extremely excited to see two new ones to print since we normally stay within the range of extremely bland, white calendars... A Print a Day has posted two for free (!) download:

Matryoshka Calendar

Carnivorous Plants Calendar

The Russian Doll calendar is a little too feminine, so the Carnivorous Plants it is! It also goes nicely with my recent love of plants that look like they eat people.

Riding in the Rain

On Monday, I received an especially exciting email in my inbox, from Amy over at Pikaland, a blog I frequent that has whimsical and colorful illustrations. She let me know I had won a print from a recent giveaway she had done on her site! The print is by Jamie Shelman, who has some great drawings. The most difficult part now will be to decide where to put it in the house. I hope Tank doesn't get offended given I don't have an illustrated picture of him.


Thanks, Amy!

A new friend for Black Friday

One of my favorite organizations, the Denver Dumb Friends League, is running a great special on Friday, November 27. They are reducing their adoption fees in half for cats, dogs or small pets with any amount of black fur. Stats say that cats and dogs with black fur are adopted half as often as other pets. In Denver's case, there seems to be an overabundance of black Labs & Australian Cattle Dogs, both highly intelligent and loyal breeds. I'd like to share one of those black Labs, Lucy, that went to a forever home in August, to my friend Christy's house.

Lucy is now living the high life, with lots of play time and a long lost brother named Winston (also a black Lab).


I hope the same fate for many other pets this Black Friday!

Ponte Vecchio Limited Print Addition

I am so excited that we have some new art to put up in our house (a much needed addition since we haven't added art since we moved in two years ago!), a custom Glicee print from my friend Lee. It is a beautiful print of the Ponte Vecchio, a place I was able to spend some time several years ago when I studied Art History abroad in Florence and Rome. Andrew and I had it framed & matted (being a purist, it has a black frame & white mat.) Then we found the perfect spot above the dresser in our bedroom for it. You'll have to excuse my cell phone photos, I was just so anxious to share... (Check out some better photos here)



More art-related posts coming soon...

Creative Decorating

Given that I am still on a succulent craze, I did some research into Audrey II's heritage. Turns out, she is a Haworthia Radula, from South Africa. And even better, as I was doing my research (Mickey still has no formal identification, that will take more time), I came across these fabulous wreaths. Now, I'm not sure how long they would stay looking good, but wow, do they look great in these pictures.

Source

Tank-a-thon

I love this photo Leslie took recently of Tank, it captures his smiley personality perfectly. Sitting inside on a very snowy evening makes me very happy to have Tank & Andrew here keeping me warm!

And because I can't forget all of the other dogs out there without homes this evening, I am always hoping you find a home soon.

"My little dog - a heartbeat at my feet" - Edith Wharton

Hey Mickey!

I've added another to my collection! Meet Mickey, Audrey II's boyfriend.

Why I Love Fresh Air

As a NPR-junkie, one of the shows I usually catch on my way home from work is Fresh Air with Terry Gross. I don't know what it is, but every story is interesting. What I really enjoyed hearing yesterday and today was a two-part series called "The Perils of Overfishing." I like to consider myself fairly educated on our meat and dairy production in the US, but I'll admit I've never been as compelled to learn about fish.

What I discovered over the past couple of days, however, was that there was a lot I was missing out on. The interviewee, Daniel Pauly (a professor at the Fisheries Centre of the University of British Columbia), quotes that in the past 50 years "we have reduced the populations of large commercial fish, such as bluefin tuna, cod, and other favorites, by a staggering 90 percent." This figure shocked me.

In the interest of thinking about fish consumption, I was equally as excited to learn that instead of consuming larger fish, like farmed Salmon, which takes 3 pounds of fish that the Salmon eat as food to create 1 pound of salmon, we should be eating the smaller fish, like sardines, anchovies, and herring. This creates, in turn, a more sustainable ocean ecosystem. Here's a great resource on sustainable fish that I will certainly be using from now on, Seafood Watch, which has a free downloadable pocket guide and an iPhone application.

Feed Me, Seymour...

I know I'm the last person to get on the succulent bandwagon, but I got a succulent baby of my very own today! I will have you know, this is a wise succulent, a 30 year old plant! It is now happily sitting on my kitchen counter, in hopes that it will soon grow its own babies I can pass along. Thank you, Leslie!

Meet Audrey II, a la Little Shop of Horrors:
And I will tell you what I learned from Little Shop of Horrors, don't make your plant mad.

Duly noted.

White Denim

I heard an electric song this morning called "I Start To Run" by what might be the coolest name for a band ever, White Denim. In my excitement to hear a new good song, I thought I would share with you some of my recent downloads to help get me through fall (which feels like winter after 20 inches of snow last week)...

"The Walls Are Coming Down" - Fanfarlo
"I And Love And You" - Avett Brothers
"Good Day" - Luce
"World Spins Madly On" - The Weepies
"You should Be Doubly Gratified" - Mike Doughty
"100,000 Fireflies" - The Magnetic Fields
"Little Bribes" - Death Cab For Cutie
"Fireflies" - Owl City
"If I Ever Feel Better" - Phoenix
"Naive" - The Kooks
"L.E.S. Artistes" - Santigold
"Evelyn" - Gregory Alan Isakov
"Go On, Say It" - Blind Pilot
"Galang" - M.I.A.

And since I've shared my fall playlist with you, I would love to know what you've listened to recently, or what band name you wish you had thought of first... (Rainn Wilson, I wish I had thought of "Fail Whale.")