Summer Child

{My skinny mini 1980's self enjoying my grandparent's sprinkler,
 just as much as my skinny mini 2010's self enjoys an empty pool, a rubber raft, a book and a cocktail.}

 

A few weeks ago, I was at my sister's.

Hangin' out, keeping watch over her littles.

The Dudes were out front,

cleaning up what in my mind was about to become a major disaster

involving a broken bucket, a push broom, and a pile of dirt in the driveway.

I had just taken E upstairs and was singing her to sleep with a cautionary tale about Brenda and Eddy.

Through the open window next to me I heard giggling

coming from the general direction I had left the boys sulking in.

The giggling kept getting louder and louder until it was directly under me.

And then I heard water running.

And shrieking.

And O yelling "Time tunnel! TIME TUNNEL!"

Just like the conductor on Dinosaur Train, his favorite.

I wasn't sure I wanted to know what was going on.

My curiosity eventually got the better of me, though, and I walked out to see two little boys,

hair dripping, wearing nothing but wet shorts and big goofy grins.

(They had gotten dirty sweeping up the dirt and had to hose each other off, of course.)

While I was drying O off and getting him ready for a nap a little later,

I asked him about the time tunnel.

His eyes got all twinkly and his grin once again got big and once again got goofy.

"It's nothing."

he told me, giggling.

And then he went to sleep.

But a few days later, I got it.

I had just turned on the hose to rinse something off.

As soon as that water hit the air,

I got it.

The smell of the sun and rubber-warmed water transported me back to so many

childhood summertime memories:

running through the sprinkler, "swimming" in a plastic wading pool,

and, of course, rinsing off the dirt of a hard day's play.

The hose was a time tunnel.

 Probably not the same time tunnel my three year old nephew was experiencing,

but no less magical.

xo

 

 

 

The Honeysuckle and the Bee

It was one of those super hot nights last summer.

Too hot to sleep.

Instead, I was wasting the soup-thick moonlit hours lingering over images,

finding inspiration but not the energy to do anything with it.

Too hot.

I paused for a long time on  Local Milk's post about honeysuckle.

Honeysuckle.

It sounded like a dream.

And at this point, it was a dream.

The summer sun had long ago dried the sweet blossoms that grow like wild weeds around the perimeter of the yard.

Next year, I promised myself.

 

So, when the tiny flowers bloomed again come late spring,

I kept my promise.

On a particularly bright and sticky late Sunday morning I set out,

my bare legs seemingly singing out a silent siren's call to every mosquito in a ten mile radius.

But I didn't care.

I was gathering honeysuckle with intent.

I just didn't quite know what that intent was yet.

As my basket filled with fragrant blooms, my mind drifted.

 

Eggs. Sugar. Cream.

Such deceptively simple ingredients yielding infinite possibilities.

Ice cream it would be.

And ice cream it was.

I set forth, sans recipe, with a vague knowledge of what I was doing and a whole lot of honeysuckle.

And, you guys, it was a dream.

A perfectly captured, edible snapshot of summer.



 

Honeysuckle Ice Cream

 

4 cups honeysuckle

2 cups whole milk

2 cups heavy cream

8 large egg yolks

1/2 cup sugar

pinch of salt

 

Gently rinse the honeysuckle, picking out any leaves. Allow to dry on a towel.

Combine the honeysuckle flower, milk, and cream in a bowl.

Cover and let sit in the refrigerator 24 hours.

 

Strain the milk and cream through cheesecloth or a fine mesh strainer into a heavy saucepan.

Bring the mixture to a boil; remove from heat.

Whisk the egg yolks, sugar, and salt in a large bowl.

While still whisking, very slowly add the hot cream mixture into the bowl

(you'll want to keep whisking so you don't cook the eggs).

 

Return the mixture to the pan and cook over medium-high heat until a candy thermometer registers 170 degrees F.

Pour the mixture through a strainer into a large bowl.

Place the covered bowl in the refrigerator overnight or until the custard becomes chilled.

 

Pour the chilled mixture into the bowl of your ice cream maker and follow manufacturer's instructions.

Place finished ice cream into an air tight container and place in freezer for a couple of hours before serving.

Enjoy.

xo

 

It's Only A Change of Time

 

Time.

It's such a strange concept, when you really think about it.

It seems to exist on two liquid planes; polar opposites.

Long moments tick by, honey-slow, sixty seconds seemingly stretching themselves to fill in the space of an hour.

Or, the minutes seem to flow past lightning quick, as if moved by a current, the second hand spinning like a child's top gone out of control.

 

 

We humans, too often not content to simply exist in the moment,

view time through a haze of "the grass is always greener":

silently willing those slower moments to get on with it,

places to go, things to do,

thumb twiddling not among them;

desperately clinging to the wings of the moments that fly,

begging, pleading for it all to just slow down,

even if just briefly.

 

 

But time isn't the one at fault.

Time is a constant.

Non-changing; solid and true.

It's us.

Always so busy, rarely remaining idle.

It's the world we live in.

The constant hub of life spinning around us, like that out of control top.

Pulling at us,

on the outside feeling the drag, those moments seeming to stand still.

From the inside we are pushed,

everything rushing past too quick, a whiplash of time speeding by.

 

{Clocks by Bee Vintage Redux. That's me.

 Made from repurposed vintage china plates and wallpaper.

They will be debuting for sale at Clover Market in Ardmore, PA, next Sunday, June 22.}

 

 To freeze time is a lovely idea.

Hold on to a single perfect moment for as long as possible.

But that's what our memories are for.

Infinite space within our brains to keep hold of those perfect moments.

As for time, well, maybe we should just try to accept, enjoy those moments for what they are:

moments.

Live within them.

You'll be a much richer person for the experience.

xo

 

 

Another Roadside Attraction (Vol. 1)

Road trips.

A quintessential summertime activity.

I had this idea, last year, that the lot of us could take a virtual road trip together.

Visit all of those tacky, kitschy roadside attractions that have pretty much no sense of purpose other than to lure in tourists with their quirk and eccentricity.

But I got lazy.

And it never happened.

So let's do it his summer, shall we?

It'll be fun.

Every Thursday, we'll put on our cut-offs and tank tops, jump into some rusty old clunker of a car, roll the windows down (with a hand crank, of course),

slip some Tom Petty into the tape deck, and set out on down the highway.

Every week, a new stop.

Each more bizarre than the last.

{This giant dinosaur, originally a Sinclair Oil gas station in Spring Hill, Florida,
is located just a few miles down the road from where my grandparents lived
when I was a kid.
It still stands today, just as it did then, operating as an auto body shop.
Image via Google images.}

Buckle up, kids.
This should be a fun ride.



99 Bottles of Beer on the Wall

Hey.

You guys still around? 

Probably not. But that's ok. I doubt I'd stick around, either.

I'm such a flighty blogger. 

I think I made a resolution to do something about that. 

In 2013.
Regardless, I'm back with a new post.
Just shy of five months after the last one.
But I've been busy in that five months. Very busy. Thinking.
Thinking very very hard about this:
Just before Christmas, I was vending at a show, selling people hooks like they had nothing but
hang ups.
Bad pun.
Anyway.
A friend of mine made a brilliant suggestion:
"You should make bottle openers."
Yeah. I should.
Seemed simple enough.
Except, how can they mount to the wall?
They've gotta be pretty secure, you know?
When I finally figured it out, the answer was so simple it was almost stupid.
Kind of an "A-ha!/ Duh!" moment.
So I made some.

And immediately sold some.
And now I'm making some more.
Pretty ones, covered in delicate bouquets of vintage flowers.
Because I like pretty things.

And some that are covered in maps, of lands both far off and close to home.
Because everybody belongs to somewhere.
And maps are cool.

So there we have it.
A new product for summer (and a goal met).
If you want one, you can find them here.
And I've graced you all with a new post.
Which makes me happy.
Today is a good day.
xo and bottoms up!



 

Fits and Starts

Alright, alright.

Last year wasn't a total suckfest.

I did get a new niece. And she's pretty fantastic.

And there were some other not so terrible spots, spots that I filled by starting things.

I'm very good at starting things.

But not so very good at finishing them.

Like "Infinite Jest".

 

I started reading it on vacation. In October.

 It was one of those perfect beach weeks: warm-bordering-on-hot, sunny, and off season, so there was no one, no one, around.

A seemingly perfect time to dive into this giant tome of a book.

I got through 171 pages. Of a 981 page book.

Instead, I spent my time napping and working on a wicked sunburn.

And haven't touched it since I took it out of my suitcase.

I enjoyed those 171 pages. And I fully intend to enjoy the remaining 810 before the end of 2014.

I also started knitting a blanket,

A blanket that I thought about knitting for, like, 2 years beforehand.

So maybe I'm not so good at starting things, after all.

But anyway.

This blanket is a patchwork extravaganza.

A million little squares.

Each knit in a different pattern

(I have this old Reader's Digest book of stitch patterns. I think it belonged to one of my grandmothers.)

The going is slow.

It may wind up on my bed by the time fall winter 2014 rolls around.

Or maybe 2015.

I also finally started watching the first season of "Girls".

Wait- I might have actually started that this year.

Either way. I plan on finishing it sometime in the next 12 months.

Under my new blanket, with my feet propped up on my giant ottoman of a book.

Cheers to that.

xo

Auld Lang Syne

And so here we are.

Here, in a bright and shiny new year.

And here, in this place, my own personal, but decidedly not private, corner of cyber space.

And it feels good to be here.

It feels good to be anywhere that isn't the year that just passed.

For that year was a dark and terrible place. Right from the get-go, and through to the very end.

A dark and terrible year that taught us invaluable life lessons; like don't ever, ever, ask how it could be worse.

And to never take a moment for granted.

A year that none in my family wanted to see, actually see, the end of; opting instead to hide under the duvets, desperately willing ourselves to sleep through the chime of midnight, emerging on the other side in a clean, fresh year.

And so we did. And here we are.

And maybe this year isn't as bright and shiny as years past, but it is new.

Wrought with opportunity and unchartered territories.

For us, anyway.
And we will navigate these new and choppy seas.
And we will seize opportunities- another lesson learned.
We will carry on.
Why shouldn't we?
There's too much in this great big world to not stop and appreciate just a little bit of it.
So here's to new beginnings.
New adventures.
And to feeling alive again.
xo

Summer Lovin'

One of the great joys of summer is, undoubtedly, a good, juicy, beach read.

For me, this usually means becoming engrossed in a Patricia Cornwell novel.

Not exactly trashy, by most standards, but not exactly cerebral, either.

Just a mindless escape for a few hundred pages.

(After all, isn't the escape all we really want in a summer read?)

However, when it comes to warm weather reading, most, it seems, gravitate towards romance novels.

Don't believe me?

Take a look at the half concealed covers of those lazily reading on blankets in city parks; on beaches;

barefoot at the edges of fountains.

You'll probably find at least half of the word "Harlequin" and at least part of Fabio's face peeking out between fingers not quite wide enough to hide the whole cover.

That is, of course, unless that romance novel has fallen into

 the incredibly talented hands of Lauren Scanlon.

 

 

But it's what Scanlon, a paper cut artist, does with the inside of these books that really wows.

Using, fittingly, the floral motifs of vintage bedding as her inspiration,

she and her army of blades attack page after page of tales of burning lust and desire

with the same passion she used to read those same pages, given to her by her grandmother, as a child.

 

 

 

 

{all images Lauren Scanlon}

 Summer reading has never looked better.

xo

 

 

It's All In The Details

 

When it comes to clothing, I am an absolute sucker for a quirky detail.

I swoon over a perfectly off set pocket or pleat.

Gasp at the hem stitched in a color that doesn't belong...but really, couldn't be more perfect.

And if something has a clever tag? Particularly one with a scrap of ribbon or a tiny charmed doo-dad hanging from the end?

No question, that particular garment will be finding a new home in my closet.

So you can imagine the breathless squeal I emitted when I happened upon these beautiful Isabel Marnat pieces with dreamy landscapes printed by French artist Emilie Faif.

 

 

And though these gorgeous scenes are concealed inside the garments, you can place a sure bet that, were I to see them hanging on a shop rack, and had the deep pockets it would take to make them mine, I would most certainly do so.
And I would feel especially lovely every time I wore them,
despite the fact that no one would see the details that make the pieces so special.

{all images via Emilie Faif}

Like my own private art collection.

xo

Go Go Go! On An Adventure

I've been pretty quiet around here lately.

Ok, fine. Downright silent.

But not without good reason.

I've been busy...cultivating...other aspects of this handmade lifestyle.

I've added a slew of new shows to an already busy repertoire.

I've gotten the pretties into a few shops (VIX Emporium in Philadelphia, PA and Modern Charm in Terre Haute, IN...and maybe more to come ;)).

And with all of this cultivating and growing of opportunities to sell comes the need to develop and make more, and most notably, new, product.

So I've been busy doing just that.

Some of it has yet to catch on.

But some of it...well, phrases like "gangbusters" and "like wildfire" come to mind.

And all it took was a simple change to something I was already doing (always room for improvement; for change).

I've been making my pretty hooks since the beginning, but they've only really taken off in the last year.

But when I changed it up with the addition of a map?

Boom.

 

 

 

It seems people have a fondness for a sense of place.

It seemed a pretty good recipe.

So I applied it to tote bags, too.

 

Kapow.

They pretty much sold out at the first show I had them available at.
So now, while I keep myself busy enjoying this virtual road trip traveled through accessories,
I am plotting my next big move.
Keeping busy.
On all fronts.

xo