Fun Finds Friday #112

This clock!



I really like Lisa Congdon's travel sketches.



Thinking about adding these tights to my sock drawer.

+ I don't necessarily believe the non-photoshopped claim, but regardless, these photographs are amazing.
+ Has anyone tried the 7-minute workout?
+ Charles Young is taking origami to a whole new level by building a city out of paper; color me impressed!!!
+ Farmhouse dreams.
+ This mobile polaroid printer is pretty neat!
+ I don't know about you, but I'm constantly judging people... I can't help it!
+ I like Molly's gift guide for homebodies. That's me!
+ This tool is pretty darn cute.

Happy Friday!!! I hope you all had a great(ful) Thanksgiving!

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Project 365, 321-327

321/365: Same subject, different angles.

322/365: I sent this photo to my mom to show her that Lloyd thinks the gifts are for him. Actually, I think he's really just interested in the bows.

323/365: Someone bought a zebra print dress from my Poshmark closet, so I drew a quick zebra on the thank you card.

324/365: Speaking of Poshmark, I got two awesome dresses in the mail. Can't help but do a little shopping myself....

325/365: We switched cat foods a few weeks ago and Lloyd has had so much energy since the switch! He keeps trying to get Sylvester to play with him, but Sylvester isn't interested. I don't think our cats know how to be cats....

326/365: I spent a few minutes admiring the color and patterns in Target's pajama section.... almost went home with some pizza pajamas.

327/365: Caught the sunset before meeting my friend Amy for dinner at a local pub I had never been to. We got fried pickles and they were awesome. I followed it up with some bison sliders.... why don't I eat sliders more often?!


Posts have been few and far between these past few weeks, and I don't see them picking back up again before the new year. I seem to have lost my focus lately and I'm working on getting back in tune with blogging and building up some better content. The new year seems like the perfect time to roll it all out (along with a new layout). In the meantime, these 365 posts and the Fun Finds Friday posts will be my focus.

Currently:

+ Fighting a cold/seasonal allergies that have left me with a sore throat and an incessant ringing in my left ear for the past week. I think it's allergies because it's all sinus related, and the constant shift in temperatures lately hasn't been doing anything to help. I worked a nine-hour shift yesterday and then came home and took a four hour nap, watched Grandma's Boy, then slept for another eight hours. I didn't get anything done yesterday, but I do feel somewhat better today!

+ Looking at a to-do list that is ten bullet points long, half of which relate to the upcoming holidays, the other half of which relate to important adult stuff, like taking care of the recent recall on my car, and paying bills....

+ Blasting classic rock to tune out the construction workers playing pop radio way too loud outside, and trying not to get angry about the fact that their construction project was supposed to be finished over a year and a half ago; at least that's what we were told when we moved in.... The noise and disruptive conditions have gotten progressively worse over the past few months but our apartment company doesn't seem to care one bit, despite Shawn sending them an angry email (or two).

+ Realizing the vast discrepancy in the amount of photos I take of Lloyd versus Sylvester.... you guys, it's not that I don't love them equally! (Actually, if we're being completely honest, I may be partial to Lloyd, but can you blame me?!) Lloyd is clearly just more photogenic. Though, my friend Amy took some really great photos of both of them with her new phone on Sunday. Clearly I owe you (and Sly) a cat photos post.

+ Sipping lemon green tea every day to soothe my throat, warm my belly, and get me through the day.

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Project 365, 314-320

314/365: I love kitty whiskers!

315/365: This guy just looked so comfortable.

316/365: My mom, sister, brother, and I spent the day at the Woodbury Outlets in New York state. I bought myself a new snowboarding jacket and a fleece. I'm proud of myself for sticking to my resolutions and not buying more!

317/365: We're really diggin' making pizza at home. We don't order pizza out nearly as much as we used to!

318/365: All my boys!! The cats just look so happy, don't they? ;)

319/365: I made my healthy bolognese recipe, with spaghetti squash instead of pasta - that's probably about as healthy as bolognese gets. (And it was still delicious!!)

320/365: My parents were in the states for a few days, so they came by check out the place where I work. They also dropped off our Christmas gifts, since they won't be visiting again before the year is up. Such torture! We could open them now..... but we're going to stick it out until Christmas. At least we'll have some gifts to put underneath the tree when we finally get one!

My motivation to take a photo each day has been waning for a while now. There are only seven (!!!!!!) weeks left of the year though, so I'm going to stick it out. The shorter daylight hours haven't done much to help. I don't think I'll be continuing this project into next year... I have some other ideas instead. In the mean time, bear with me. The photos haven't been great.... but I become a homebody once the cold weather sets in, so I'm trying my hardest to avoid showing you only photos of blankets, tea, and cats. Though I don't think anyone here would mind more cat photos!

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Fun Finds Friday #111

The creative and organizer in me loves the idea of this journal.



Food typography.



Can I live here, please? Thanks.
+ Movie posters edited with Amazon reviews...
+ Real life locations that inspired Disney movies - so beautiful!
+ I had never heard of magic cakes until last week... I want to make one!!
+ How do the Japanese make such cute things?!?!
+ This past year has been an exercise in wanting less. I still have a long way to go. (Please, let's not talk about how these posts generally contradict that whole idea....)
+ More of my friends should buy houses so that I can make this for them.
+ Soooo can we please take a note from the Dutch on work mentality?


Happy Friday!!!!!

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Snapshots of Segovia

On my last full day in Spain, my parents gave me the option of visiting the nearby historic city of Toledo, or Segovia. I chose Segovia for no real reason other than the fact that they both seemed ever so slightly more enthusiastic about it. What a beautiful city! It's less than an hour drive from where my parents live, but it felt like we were in a whole different country. I've never much appreciated the historical towns in America because the history only goes back so far... but to stand underneath a Roman aqueduct and to climb the tower of a castle that was built over 900 years ago is an entirely different experience.

The queen's castle in Disney's Snow White was apparently inspired by the Alcazar of Segovia! That explains why the castle felt so fairy-tale-esque to me. Looking at it from afar it just didn't seem real... it looked like something straight out of a storybook. The climb up the tower was incredibly narrow and I wouldn't recommend it if you're claustrophobic, but the view at the top is rewarding.

Another thing that captured my attention was the architecture all over the city. Check out the details of the walls/doors/windows! There were so many interesting attributes everywhere; I couldn't properly capture them all. After taking a tour of the castle and the cathedral, we spent the rest of the afternoon walking around, ducking into alley ways and taking it all in. We ate lunch outdoors at a restaurant with questionable service but delicious food. (That seemed to be a trend in Spain - the service was sometimes disappointing, but the never the meals!)

Segovia was definitely one of the highlights of my trip! I can't wait to go back and see even more of the country. A visit to Toledo is now in order, for comparison's sake. Hm, perhaps I should start planning a trip for next year....

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Project 365, 307-313

307/365: Mail day! A postcard from my pen pal, and a box full of surprises. On a different note, I woke up that morning to a lovely gift from one of the cats. Spoiler alert: it was a mouse! I felt two things about this: proud and amazed that our indoor goons are capable hunters, and disgusted at the fact that there are mice running around our apartment complex, where we live on the second floor. Ew.

307/365: My hairdresser just had a baby and is taking a break until January, so I have to deal with my hair myself until then. The faded pink/blonde thing I had going on wasn't looking so hot, and this colder weather had me craving something darker... so I went purple! It was a little much at first, but now I'm kinda diggin' it. I am in serious need of a trim though...

307/365: Always the silliest little dude.

307/365: They love helping me package things. Also, I re-discovered my craft drawer and found a bunch of ribbons and tags that I had forgotten about - pretty packages!

307/365: This is the only shot I could muster up after an almost 10-hour workday. Shadow play.

307/365: Shawn likes to draw/write on the kitchen window with dry erase markers. He also likes to watch the news in the morning... my thoughts on the news: "Shit is gonna happen, stuff is gonna suck." I'm much happier being oblivious to the homicides, automobile accidents, deceptions and theft in the world.

307/365: Sitting at the bar after work, I met a couple who reminded me of what Shawn and I may be like in 20 years. We were chatting away about things and I learned that they converted a Mercedes Sprinter van into a self-sufficient camper van. I gave them a ride home and got to take a tour! I have long admired camper vans online but this was my first time seeing one in person. So cool!

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Fun Finds Friday #110

Coffee table love!


I love the colors of this skirt.


YOU GUYS. Squirrel bookends.

+ Have you seen this rice experiment?
+ How to succeed at job interviews. Hahaha.
+ Problems, explained by diagrams.
+ It's surprisingly inexpensive to travel across the US by train!
+ How a photographer's perception can alter the way they take portraits.
+ The struggle is real.
+ Would you make your own bacon?
+ Loving all three iterations of this styled living room.
+ I'm always looking for different ways to pull my hair back for work.
+ Honest logos.

Happy Friday!!!!

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Snapshots of Madrid

The flight from Philadelphia to Madrid was one of the more pleasant flights I've taken. It's an overnight flight that is a little over 7 hours long; I had two seats to myself and (with the help of some dramamine) fell asleep twenty minutes after take-off, and woke up an hour before landing around 8am in Madrid. My parents were waiting for me after my mile-long walk through the terminal (the Madrid airport is HUGE), and because I had slept a solid 6 hours on the plane, I was fairly alert and started my trip off on a pleasant note.

My parents live in a suburb about 20 minutes outside of downtown Madrid. I wasn't sure what I expected Spain to look like, but I certainly didn't expect it to be as dry and desert like as it is... the vegetation more resembles that of what you would find in the southwestern US. That's not to say that it's lacking in vegetation, as you can clearly see from the photos. The forests were interesting - all the growth is up high, so you can see straight through the forests at eye-level, they're not congested like the forests I'm used to here. We took my parents' two dogs on walks around the neighborhood pretty much every day, so I got a good glimpse of the surrounding area.

As far as downtown Madrid goes, we only spent 1 of my 10 days in Spain there. Between Barcelona, Segovia (next series of photos!), and just walking around in general, we opted to spend a day or two relaxing and letting our feet recover instead. Highlights from downtown Madrid include shopping (of course!), eating pinchas and drinking wine (of course!), and walking through Parc de Retiro, where we visited the Palacio de Cristal. (The bones in the photos above were an installation that was going on that day; there was no information about it so I can't explain it any better than that!) The architecture in the city is such a great mix of old and modern. Next visit, I would definitely like to spend some more time in the city, exploring some of the more urban corners. I didn't feel comfortable enough with my Spanish to venture out for a day on my own!

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