All that Husky stuff

I was just learning to completely tune out all the duck yellow and green stuff. Now it's allllll purple and yellow, husky this husky that.

Rarr.

Origami dinosaurs

For Leda's birthday

Garden at Dharmalaya

Spaghetti dinner made with household items

notice I said items, not food.

Leda is the best at finding delightful things on youtube.

Western Spaghetti

Today's cool thing

Puts yesterdays cool thing to shame...

Origamido. Origami, for reals.

Free to a good home

Or a bad one... we don't really care.

We're getting rid of:

a small black tv cart
a twin futon frame
cinderblocks
a toaster
a coffee grinder,only used once or twice
many pretty cans of paint
a black desk - short but deep - with a keyboard tray

Possibly more to come. Free to anyone who can pick them up, or make it easy for me to drop them off.

Expect one of these in the mail

http://home.no.net/origami/tablecards.htm

Asha's graduation dinner

These pics are from way back when. When asha graduated 4th grade, Erik and I took her out for dinner. We went to a place called Ratatouille, on Willamette. It was medium to high end vegan food, very delish. The best part was paper table cloths - which we proceeded to decorate. These drawings are mostly asha's, but some are mine.

Mine, ranunculus & story in back ground

My dinosaur, asha's salt and city (she makes brilliant cities), erik's pterodactyl


The every fruit sparkle plant - colaboration

stawberry hampster



Asha's army of hearts


Erik is fighting her army of hearts with an army of stomachs


The finished piece

by the way

This park starts less than a half block from my house, it's directly on the way to my new job and it holds the Japanese gardens.

http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=seattle+arboretum

We signed a lease

The last few days have been a blur. Thursday, I happened to find a posting on craigslist that sounded too good to be true. It was in a location hadn't been looking at, but something made me open that link. I wound up calling the owner, Roberta, and we clicked instantly. So, late that night, we decided to put together a trip up to Seattle. In 12 hours we found 6 and scheduled showings at 6 other apts, and were on the road friday night.

Anyway, as soon as we walked in, we knew. The place is large - 1000 square feet, with 2 bedrooms, living/dining room, a largish kitchen with gas stove, and a pantry. Haven't you always wanted your own pantry? It has very high ceilings, is on a gorgeous street with huge trees, and we're not responsible for the landscaping, but we can garden as much as we like. It's got 2 porches. It's half a block from the Arboretum - which is amazing. The area is adorable, with cute little shops, and hills, and trees. It's 5 blocks to lake Washington, and right on bus routes that go down town and to campus. It's perfect.

So, we signed a lease last night before coming home, and we'll be all set to move in. My last day of work here is 10/09, we'll move most of our stuff and me and the kitties up that weekend, and I'll start at my new job 10/13. Erik is going to stay in Eugene for a couple extra weeks, he'll move sometime at the end of the month. If you see him at the end of October, give him a big hug for me. I'm worried he'll be lonely in our empty house :(

Erik took a few pictures while I was filling out the application. There were still people living there, and he had bad lighting and the wrong lens, etc, so he didn't take many. I wish we had more! But believe you me, I will be taking pictures once we move in and start nesting.

This is one wall of the kitchen. Behind you would be a door to the back porch. You'd be facing two doorways, the one you see to the left goes through the pantry, then dining room, then living room. To the left you'd see a door that leads through a sort of round hallway (in the next picture), which opens to two bedrooms and a bathroom.

See the refrigerator and fish tank? I want to put a breakfast nook there!


Here is the previously mentioned roundish hallway. The hallway and pantry are back-to-back. Strait through it is the dining room and then living room. If you were to walk into that little hallway, on your left you'd see, in order, larger bedroom, bathroom, smaller bedroom. The larger bedroom has a built in bench windowy thing, kind of like a bay, but rectangular, and you can sit in it and think about how cool your house is.


This picture is taken from the hallway. It looks through the dining room, into the living room. The dining room has a huge bay window. A desk has been built into it, which we're not sure if we want to keep.



Serriously, come visit us. Any time after 10/10. We've setting up the second bedroom to be a permanent guest bedroom. Just drop me a line, and i'll put you on our calender, fluff the pillows, and put dinner on the stove.

I'll be moving to Seattle 10/10

My last day at the library will be 10/09. We'll be moving that weekend, and it's going to be awesome.

Erik is coming with me, but a couple of weeks later. He doesn't have a job lined up, but he's starting to talk about all kinds of exciting things - like going back to school, trying out something outside of libraries. Trying new things is really hard after nearly 9 years in the same position (wow!), so I am very very very proud of him.

We are trying very hard to find a place that can have a guest bedroom, so please come and visit us!

Also, I think we'll be happy to come down and visit, so let us know if your house is a good place to crash. Having visitors can be fun, but everyone needs their home to be their private space too, so I don't plan on inviting myself to stay at anyone's house.

And I will be having a going away party. something spiffy, with everyone and their mother invited. But I don't know when because we have to make at least one more trip up to Seattle to find a place to live!

The Tacoma Museum of Glass

I'm kind of a museum junkie. It's the second on my to-do list when I travel, right after aquariums, and right before finding new and interesting restaurants. Basically, i like them all - except the Portland art museum, which is kind of small and dull, and very expensive.

I went to this summer, my two favorites were the Tacoma Museum of Glass, and the Legion of Honor.

The Tacoma Museum of glass just rocks. Partly because I love glass, partly because they do a great job with their exhibits - they always have something really cool and interesting - and party because they have an on site theater style glass blowing studio. You need a break from walking around staring intently at pretty things, you can go and space out and watch them make pretty vases and stuff. I could watch forever.



The Chihuly walkway





Yes, I'm lying on the ground





The studio

Outdoor reflecting pools with rotating exhibits




No photography inside, but i snuck a few

The gift shop




I wore my glass necklace to the museum (necklace by sam)

Yay for friends

Half off cocktails at the vintage. Basil lemon drop and avocado pizza. Fire breathing dinosaur puzzle, magic beans, and pony bourbon. Sleepy friends, folding friends, happy friends. Feeling better.

So, guess who's moving to seattle?

This is officially on the DL, it's not a totally done deal - there's still some red tape, but I know my new boss Mary will cut through it.


YAY!

Yellow razor

In our shower, we have the worlds oldest dodgiest window. An elephant could fit through the gap between the panes. The other day my razor fell down, and somehow caught just right. I was in a rush, so I grabbed a new razor and left it there. I've really come to appreciate it, the way the yellow catches the light. It's so pretty. Erik and I have both had photo sessions with it.

Collaboration with Asha

Asha has such a wonderful drawing style. When I was her age, I was lucky if you could tell what I was trying to draw, but no matter what it is, it lacked flare, interest. But her stuff rocks.

Lately I feel like I'm relearning to draw. I'm doing away with a few conventions I was taught in early art classes, and it's much more fun without them.

Two of these are mine, two are Asha's. I love them together. You might have to look at them a little bigger, they're drawn with .18mm & .3mm pens




Here are a few more of her drawings. Aren't they lovely? I asked her to make me the fanciest spoon she could. She threw in the smallest spoon she could draw next to it.... this card is 2"X1.5"



Next she drew a cupcake. This was a dilema for her. She said cupcakes are important, and require prominence. but they're also cute, and that requires smallness. She settled on a large cupcake decorated with very tiny cupcakes.



Bees attack tiny town. The town is my fave, you should look at it larger.



And a dinosaur card made for yours truly. His name is bing-bong, his skin markings are made of hearts.

Some photos from Eugene

I haven't been away allll summer....