Filed under: Misc.
Watching Days with my Father by photographer Phillip Toledano made me realize two things:
1. We need to have another child soon.
2. I should forgive my father for being such a jerk the last time we went to visit.
I think number two will be the most difficult.
You can watch it here, but grab some tissues.
http://www.dayswithmyfather.com/
We been back in NYC for about a week now, it seems like longer, we are already back into our routines and into the swing of the last days of summer. Finley turned 3 years old while we were away and had a blast celebrating his birthday with his grandparents, cousins aunts and uncles. It was a really good trip. I learned a lot about myself, nothing like being incubated with the parental units for two weeks to help you realize some things about yourself. All in all though a good trip. I didn’t do anything too crafty when I was away, I did get to visit one of my favorite yarn shops near Shaker Hts. Fine Points. They have a great selection of yarns and are always super nice. I did score some discounted Jaeger yarn and a Sidar pattern book to knit a sweater for Finley. I am also planning ton starting a sweater for Tobias for our big 10 year anniversary this fall. Wish me luck, I better get to knitting if it is going to get done in time.
I also had the pleasure of seeing my friend Melissa who I haven’t seen in many, many years. I got to meet her adorable family, see her amazing home, and eat at her and her hubby’s restaurant Sweet Melissa’s in Rocky River. Where the food was fantastic. I was very impressed. I also learned a lot about my old hometown this trip. It isn’t such a bad place. There are a ton of cute, affordable neighborhoods and there is culture. I feel like living in NYC has kind of made me this urban-snob. One of those people that thinks that only good things happen in big cities and that there are only two places, or one for that matter and that is NYC. But I like the middle of the country, and there are people all over doing interesting things. I think reading some of the blogs that I read have really brought that point home to me as well. The country is a big place and there are good and beautiful things going on everywhere.
Anywho, Woooo Hooo Ohio.
Filed under: friends + family
We are closing out our second week in Ohio and I while I am having a good time, I am ready to get back to the big apple. I be writing more once we return. Here is a little illustration of what we have been up to…
lots of mowing lawns, eating ice cream, eating anything deep fried or covered in cheese, little league baseball games, visits with old friends, dreaming of owning a house, reading, celebrating, working, hand holding, beach going, animal seeing fun.
Filed under: 1
We just finished a bout with the infamous cocksockie virus, also known as hand, foot and mouth disease. Why on earth anyone would give such a not big deal virus such a grossly intimidating name is beyond me. Not to say that the virus was a cake walk. It was miserable. Finley didn’t want to eat due to the fact that his mouth and throat were full of canker sores. Add a dash of fever and a sprinkle of body aches and you have a really unhappy almost-three-year-old. We spent the Fourth of July in the ER, waiting to be told he had what we already had figured out he had, but what our pediatrician said he did not have.
Today was better though, we spent the day in Central Park among the hustle and bustle of European tourist. Our dollar may be weak but the rest of the world seems to be doing just fine. We laid around in the grass while Finley blew bubbles, played soccer and ate rice cakes. He was clearly feeling better.
In other news, there was a very interesting story in the times about noise complaints regarding children. I was a great article. It really captured all the feelings involved with this kind of neighbor dispute. I want to photocopy it and shove it under my downstairs neighbors door. I printed it out just in case. Not that the article made a case for people with kids, it just used the right language. They talk about how the whole thing makes the parents feel persecuted. That is exactly what it is, its like you are somehow being punished for making the choice to have a kid. Anyway, read it for yourselves here:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/06/realestate/06cov.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=the%20noise%20children%20make&st=cse&oref=slogin
Filed under: Design
I finally got to sit down and watch Helvetica. I was starting to feel like the only person working in graphic design who hadn’t seen the movie! I really enjoyed it. I thought I would hate it. But it was a really beautiful film on one of my favorite subjects, type. I love typography. It is the part of graphic design that really turns my crank. I love the other stuff to but oooo, there is just nothing like a really beautiful ampersand.
As far as typefaces go, Helvetica is one of my favorites, but I haven’t mastered designing with it yet. I worked with a young lady from Germany her name was Janine and she was an intern at the company used to work at, she knew her way around Helvetica. It was like one of the designers in the movie said, it was as if it was born into her, like some kind of second language. It was funny because she was so good with the modern minimal stuff, the Helvetica stuff. But when we asked her to do something that was warmer, or to use a serif typeface it was like the bottom would fall out.
I really enjoyed the banter in the movie, about what the real role of typography should be in design. Is it the crystal goblet that you see the design through, communicating clearly without emotion but with razor sharp clarity or is it emotional can it sing, can it be the design? Should the word dog should it bark? I have to say when I was in school I thought it should bark, I was a big fan of the post-modern movement in design, the David Carson, Neville Brody he anti-Helvetica movement. But now, I find myself closer to the swiss, grid, goblet theorist.
I guess it just depends on the day, on the project, on the client. But I do enjoy the looking and thinking of it. Here is a list of some of my favorite typefaces in no particular order:
- Avenir
- Requiem
- Sabon
- Bodoni
- TradeGothic
- AvantGarde
- Goudy
- Helvetica
- Gill San
Here is what I am currently reading.
I am in the middle of Animal Vegetable, Miracle and I am finding it a very good read. I really like the kind of info in the book and it is so inspirational. It has already influenced food choices.
I just started Dumbing us Down, I like it, it is pretty rad. It is my first foray into the homeschooling books. I am just trying to do my homework. It is definitely really interesting and has a lot of good points about the traditional education systems. I find that I agree with a lot of what the writer has to say but it hasn’t helped make me anymore at ease about the how to start part of homeschooling. I think I will get that in the next book on my list, Teach your own by John Holt.
Finally, I am almost done with A Reason for God which, in my humble opinion is an amazing book that makes a “intellectually compelling case for God”. Dr. Keller is the head pastor at our church and an amazing speaker. The book is “a compelling overview of the current debate on faith for those who doubt and for those who want to re-evaluate what they believe, and why.”
I have like 5 pages left and I just need to finish it. I think I will have to read it again just to really wrap my mind around some of what is said, I would like to add it to some kind of yearly summer reading list, which would be a list of books I would read each summer for like 3 years or something. I would also add The Great Gatsby and The Hobbit.
Filed under: Misc.
I am really going to try to keep this a positive place. But I am on the daily, dealing with a really annoying problem. I have a downstairs neighbor that works nights. To most people that is no big deal, but if you have a three year old, its almost the end of the world. Frank introduced himself to us by banging on our floor, his ceiling one day. I didn’t even know the apartment downstairs had been rented. I was letting Fin and one of his friends rock out with some pots and pans and drumsticks. It was loud and I mean really, really, really loud. But I figured it is the middle of the day, nobody is home….whatever.
Now it has become customary for Frank to bang on our ceiling whenever he feels that our daily volume is uncomfortable for him. It has happened 4 times, every time he bangs, I go down and try to talk to him like a civilized person who walks erect. I think the ceiling banging is rude, it scares Finley not to count I think it is trashy, I was raised with better manners.
I know we are loud, really loud, but we are loud at 12p in the afternoon or 7p in the evening. I’ve tried very hard. After today, I am no longer trying. I have on several occasions said “What works for you, we can make it so we are loud when you aren’t sleeping.” The response I get is usually, “I don’t know, there is always somebody here it doesn’t really work like that.” [insert blank stare.] You see someone has caught Frank’s fancy, he lives with his soon-to-be wife. So she works during the day and sleeps at night and Frank works at night and sleeps during the day, you can see how this doesn’t work for us.
So, like I said we are loud but since we got the new neighbors, I have curtailed the running and play inside drastically. I would say the noise has to be cut at least in half. In short, I have had it with Frank. I don’t entertain my kid’s friends anymore, I have a carpet that I am not wild about covering my floor, and my kid though still happy, doesn’t get to act like himself in his own home. I am DONE trying to make Frank happy. Frank isn’t interested in anyone’s happiness but his own. Compromise was the goal here and I was willing to bend over almost backwards but today, was enough. He told me that it “has been really loud the last couple of days”, to which I replied, “really two days, before that we were our of town.”
So one can only conclude that Frank is only really happy when we are not around. That he is fine with us living here as long as he doesn’t have to hear us. Ever.
He also was good enough to inform me that they aren’t able to have people over because of our noise, apparently nobody wants to be around. Hey Frank, I can think of one other reason people might not be coming around.
Filed under: friends + family
Or so it seemed. The Catskills are only 3 hours outside of NYC but it felt like we so far from home. In a good way.
We stayed at a beautiful old one room school house with a living room, kitchen and a fireplace. We slept in a little blue house in the back of the property near a stream.
Super charming.
We went fishing, waded in a stream of absolutely clear cool water, built a fire in the fireplace, fed frogs, watched a bunny, pointed at vultures, ate ham, egg and muenster cheese sandwiches, kissed, held frogs, put worms on hooks, napped, did belly flops in the dirt, talked about honeybees, read books, ate pancakes, slept with an electric blanket, prayed for more fish, locked ourselves out of the bedroom cabin, broke-into the bedroom cabin, held hands, colored, laughed, was outsmarted by a catfish.
Filed under: Misc.
- Fall is my favorite season.
- One of my most favorite things to do is to step on dried leaves.
- I would rather be knitting.
- I can’t say something out loud unless I am going to do it, for example I want to start quilting, now have to do it.
- I don’t like the taste of water.
- I have been hospitalized 3 times for dehydration and it sent me into false labor.
- I thought false labor was way harder than real labor.
- I loved being pregnant and hope to be so again soon.
- If I had a ton of money and lived somewhere else, I would have 4 kids or more.
- I think about things too much, I wish I was more impulsive.
- I am not well traveled.
- Raisin Nut Bran is my favorite cereal and is difficult to find
- I took a letterpress class and have managed to forget all I learned.
- I have only recently started to like chocolate.
- Until I was a young adult I didn’t understand that you could by food fresh, I thought concentrated lemon juice in those little lemon containers was how you got lemon juice.
- I like to read but don’t usually have the time.
- I was a state qualifier in 100m hurdles when I was in high-school.
- My relay team also qualified in the 4×100m relay.
- I love all things old and vintage.
- I collect vintage nesting bowls.
- I am considering homeschooling my son.
- I knew I was going to marry my husband almost immediately.
- I don’t really drink anymore but I love Mojitos.
- I think having friends and friendship is important.
- I have recently fallen in love with graphic design again.
- I don’t like politics or politicians but I think it is important to vote.
- I would like to own a house someday.
- My favorite colors of late are yellow and green.
- I have a pug with entitlement issues.
- I think having good manners is important.
- I would like to be a florist.
- Or own an organic farm.
- I do not like okra.
- I’ve never been in a physical fight.
- I have champagne taste and beer money.
- I love ampersands.
- I think all women should get a proper bra fitting.
- I don’t like the term housewife.
- my disdain for doing laundry makes it easy for me to giveaway clothes.
- I would like to see the Grand Canyon.
- I have been married for almost 10 years.
- I have been with my husband for 16 years.
- I’d like to start collecting paint-by-numbers.
- My favorite fruit combination is Orange and Mango.
- My 2nd grade teacher Miss Colonius had the biggest impact on my educationally.
- She took me to 2 Young Authors Conferences.
- I love a garden, hate gardening.
- I am not so good at forgiving people.
- I am really good at holding a grudge.
- I am actively working on both of these things.
- I don’t like to swim.
- I’d rather be hugged than kissed.
- I am enjoying my thirties.
- I’ve never gone sledding.
- or downhill skiing.
- I would rather try and mess up than not try at all.
- I don’t really like my downstairs neighbors.
- I enjoyed the process of giving birth.
- I like using things until they are used up.
- I am not such a fan of new things except for cars and that depends.
- I love Toyotas.
- I wasn’t able to wear thong styled shoes until my late twenties.
- I make a mean apple pie.
- My mom makes the best fried chicken.
- When I was a kid I wanted to be Jewish.
- I don’t know what being a good mom means I just hope I am one.
- I think most things are better done the hard way.
- My husband has an incredible knack for pop culture and knowing what the next trend will be. It is one of my favorite things about him.
- I have a terrible sweet tooth.
- I used to work as a graphic designer for Cleveland Hopkins Airport.
- I also worked as a graphic designer for OfficeMax.
- I like to listen to kids talk to themselves.
- I think that it is unfortunate that it has become cool to hate people.
- One of the best decisions I’ve made was letting my hair go natural.
- Another one was getting married.
- Another one was moving to NYC.
- Another one was having a baby.
- I don’t like to be late.
- I love to shop.
- I love a thunderstorm.
- OfficeMax was probably the worst job I have ever had.
- I prefer short nails to long.
- I am not a fan of confrontation.
- I wish that I was a really good singer.
- I would rather be too cold than too hot.
- I can understand and speak just enough spanish to embarrass myself.
- I like nature but I wouldn’t consider myself outdoorsy.
- The music/musicians that reminds me of my childhood are: Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye, Earth Wind and Fire and the Isley Brothers.
- I get very cranky when I don’t eat.
- I am not so much a fan of men with moustaches except my dad and mark.
- I’ll take a genuine cry over a child whining any day.
- I hate excuses especially my own.
- I am trying to buy more local and organic foods.
- I hate to exercise but I need to do it or else I get really bitchy.
- I believe that you can be a democrat and a Christian.
- I like giving gifts more than I like to get them and I really like getting them.
- I am a good person to tell secrets to because I usually forget them.
- I am a planner with no long-term plan.
- If I could do three thing before I die it would be: Travel to a place that requires a passport, Be a good wife and mother, Own a home.
- I am terrible with spelling and grammer AND I can barely do math.
Filed under: friends + family
“Other things may change us, but we start and end with family”
– Anthony Brandt
