Deutschland: 3 days!

I leave for Germany in 3 short days and I can hardly contain my excitement!


I'll be staying in Dusseldorf with my sister's au pair family for most of my trip and will be taking day trips to surrounding cities in Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands, and France. Stay tuned for pictures!! :)

FFFFound!

Sometimes when I'm exploring the gobs of websites devoted to photography, design and architecture I feel like I'm about to implode with inspiration (which is actually a daily occurrence). If you're looking for inspiration like me, or if you just like looking at cool things, pretty things, colorful things, dramatic things, challenging things...then you should do yourself a favor and head on over here.

But wait, before you go here's a tip: When you find an image you like (it won't take long), click on it and then see where the next image takes you, and where that image then takes you, and the next, and the next, and the...

let me know how you cope with the sense of imploding.

Oh, and a warning: Just know that when you head on over to that site you should be prepared to lose the rest of your day. enjoy!

King Corn

This trailer for King Corn hits pretty close to home. I grew up on a farm in Northwest Iowa where we grew acres and acres of corn. Since the countryside was saturated with them, cornfields were just a part of the scenery to me...something I rarely noticed or even thought about, not to mention worrying about where the corn actually went or what it was used for after combining it every fall and taking it to town every spring.

I'm definitely renting this movie and following it up by reading The Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan. A book that I hear will change the way you think about food, much like the way Fast Food Nation and Supersize Me did.

If you've seen King Corn or read The Omnivore's Dilemma, I'd love to hear your thoughts.

fotos on flickr

Hi friends.
I just set up my very own flickr account. So, check it out and let me know what you think. I'll be updating and reorganizing soon.

recent knitting project: finished!

I am PRIT-TEE darn excited about this one. Just finished it yesterday. (it's a baby blanket).

change is good

Let me know what you think of my new color scheme. it might change tomorrow so you better come back and see.

....what? you think this blue and grey is too depressing? seriously, leave a comment.

earthquake in the midwest?

yes. illinois had an earthquake. and I felt it at 4:30 this morning. But at the time, since I was sleeping, I couldn't coherently figure out what it was. I seriously thought it was just extremely strong winds that was making my 4 story, solid stone apartment structure shake. Yes, wind. Hey, who woulda EVER thought Chicago would have an earthquake? ?? We are the windy city after all, and I was sleeping....

anyway, my mom called me this morning and asked me if I felt the earthquake and immediately i remembered the strong "winds" and kinda freaked out. that was SO crazy.

Apparently I'm really sensitive because only 1 other coworker felt the earthquake and only 3 people felt the aftershock at work, even though, while it was happening, I was like "OH my GOSH, do you guys FEEL that??"

It's quite a weird sensation and it actually made me feel woozy and nausous. Besides those physical side effects, I'm having some mental side effects as well. It's kinda scary and foreboding. Kinda like the way I felt when Heath Ledger died*. Like, "wow, I didn't see that one coming....i wonder what other unsuspecting, earth shattering (sorry for the pun) events are coming our way.

*I'm not obsessed with Heath Ledger in anyway. I was just beyond shocked that he would overdose. He seemed like such a clean cut nice guy. Just goes to show that people can put up fronts and you never really know what could be going on under the surface.

i love type

Do you love type? Do you know type? Find out here.
I only got 26 out of 34. I need some more practice.

Can I just say that I love seattle?

What a great weekend it was to be in Seattle. It was snowy here in chicago (yes, snowy) but it was beeeeea-u-tiful out in the pacific northwest. it only sprinkled a little on the day I left and it was 75 and sunny all day saturday. It was so fantastic to hang out with Abby and see Rachel again. We did a lot of somewhat random things, but it definitely made the weekend unforgettable. And again, Seattle is beeeeea-u-tiful!




The weekend consisted of:
1. delicious food: fish tacos, french pastries, gourmet pizza, mango quesadillas, risotto cakes, savory vegetarian chili...yum!
2. a road trip to see fields of tulips. unfortunately, the tulips hadn't 'popped' yet, but the daffodil fields didn't disappoint.
3. a quilt museum
4. a glass museum
5. fabric stores, yarn stores, bookstores, pottery stores, oh my!
6. lots of laughs
7. IKEA
8. architecture
9. money handouts. some lady randomly gave me $1 on the street.
10. fantastic views. "well hello there mountains"
11. Pike place market
12. Flying fish
13. endless cups of seattle coffee
14. Glorious blisters on my feet from all the walking.
15. Calatrava, Chihuly, Koolhaas

The amazing new seattle library, designed by Rem Koolhaas (it was really kool ;)

Wanna see more pictures? Click here or here

i can tie my tie all by myself

hey!

hey you!

yes, YOU! the one reading this blog!

I know what you're thinking. you're thinking, man, i wish this girl would get RID of that nasty blogger template with the putrid ochre background and disgusting brown font! For pete's sake, isn't she a graphic designer??

Ok ok, you're right. I'm gunna work on it. Actually, I've been working on it (or at least thinking about working on it) for quite some time. But yeah, I named this blog what I did for a reason.

So, stay tuned. I'm conjuring up at least 50% of my creative energy and honing it in on sprucing this place up.

A-List

Let me just preface this video by saying
1. I'm American.
2. I LOVE a nice list.
3. Case-in-point:

compressed hay-bales

IKEA's in-store restaurant serves little bread-like cracker things that look full of multi-grain, european-exotic deliciousness. Upon taking one at breakfast yesterday, Abby looks over at me blankly and, seeing the curiosity in my eye, says, "kinda like a compressed hay-bale"

she was right. the jam helped a little.

vacation time

I haven't left the city in 3 months and i'm starting to go stir crazy. i'm gettin the itch. spring fever. wanderlust. restlessness. i long to put my feet on the soil of anywhere besides the midwest!! so goodbye chicago, hello pacific northwest!