light

How cool is this lamp in Rick and Toni's guest room that was made from the leg of an antique porcelain sink?

treasure box

I am having a hard time figuring out how to organize all the photos I want to show you and things I want to tell you from our trip to Rick and Toni's, so please forgive me if these next few posts seem a bit random and rambling.

One of my favorite things to do at the farm is to snoop around the barn (although it can get quite dangerous because if you say you like something, Rick is likely to give it to you.)

Rick has the most amazing collection of stuff that he has scrounged and scavenged, discovered and saved.

He's got everything you can imagine, and some things you can't.

Gorgeous industrial lights and lamp parts of all sorts,

Saarinen and other mid century modern chairs in impeccable condition that Steven's architect friends would kill to have,

Industrial ladders worn in just the right places,

beautiful Pyrex lab equipment that fascinated me for hours,

the most amazing collection of lumber you have ever seen (Ryan is going to turn those pieces of walnut into a new dining room table.)

vintage mustard jars from when mustard jars were cool (many were designed to be turned into banks when the mustard was gone- mid century upcycling),
ceramic dishes made by Coors. (Yup, Coors, the same folks who make beer. The dishes are better.) Real slate chalkboards, all sorts of stools and chairs, doors, cabinets, the list goes on and on and just when you think you've seen it all, Rick pulls out something else.

I told him he should start and etsy shop, but I don't think he was convinced. It may be a good thing, for my wallet at least, because I'm pretty sure I'd be his number one customer.

tripped up

Even though our trip started inauspiciously when we stopped for gas and Steven "lost" the keys to the car (I found them in the ignition), we had the most wonderful trip.
I've got so much to share! more later.

We're off

We're spending Thanksgiving with our friends Rick and Toni, Ryan and Zoe, and Eric and Kim in Wisconsin this year, and I can't wait!
Rick and Toni live in the most beautiful stone farmhouse on the most beautiful farm you have ever seen. They turned much of the farm back into prairie a few years ago and I can't wait to see what 6foot tall grass looks like.
Happy Thanksgiving!

nutritional itineraries

Thanks to this article I read in the New York Times, I am itching to go to Paris. (not that it's unusual for me to be itching to go to Paris.)
A couple of years ago the writer, Tony Perrottet, stumbled on the 1805 and 1810 editions of the Almanachs des Gourmands, which were more or less the Napoleonic era's Zagat guide.

Alexandre-Balthazar-Laurent Grimod de la Reyniere (how's that for an awesome name?) wrote the Almanach with such style and flair that he is considered the grandfather of most modern food writing. One of the most amazing things in his guides were the walking culinary tours he called "nutritional itineraries".

When the Mr Perrottet found these guides he got an idea, wander around the city of Paris with a map of all the places Grimond wrote about. Check out the article to find out about all the places he found that are still in business more than 200 years later!

There's even a map if you want to do some planning for your next trip.

photos by Andrew Testa for The New York Times.

Detroit Urban Craft Fair

We had a great time at the Detroit Urban Craft Fair this weekend. It was nice to see so many people there snapping up the handmade wares.

My favorite things were the hand spun and dyed yarns and the paper superheroes, even though I didn't buy any of either. (I was a little overwhelmed by the yarn, and I wasn't so sure what I'd do with a cut paper superhero.)

I did buy a few things though. A dress for my niece Riley,

a Christmas ornament even though I really don't feel ready for Christmas (it's too warm!),

some silk screened fabric swatches for crafty projects, and some gift tags.

Little Bear

Isn't this the most beautiful photo of our godson Baby Cade and his mama?
(btw, I knitted that bear suit for his big brother a couple of years ago, and I'm so happy that it now it fits Cade!)

The D in DIY

We're headed down to the Detroit Urban Craft Fair at the Majestic Theater this morning, if you're in the area you should too!

take off

I decided to make all my Christmas presents this year until I realized that it was going to be hard for me to make something for my almost 6 and almost 4 year old nephews that they would actually like.
For example, no matter how nice a pair of mittens I knit them, they aren't going to care.

So, inspired by Courtney's post about paper airplanes, I am thinking about getting them this Electric Plane Launcher kit. Using gears and motors kids can assemble something that can make paper airplanes fly at 30 miles per hour.

Maybe I should get them a paper airplane book while I'm at it. Then we can make some paper airplanes together!

What's not to like about that?

RIP

Artist Jeanne Claude, collaborator and wife of Christo, passed away yesterday.
She said that their work, which was always meant to be temporary, expressed, "the quality of love and tenderness that we human beings have for what does not last." which seems a pretty appropriate thing to say.

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On the other hand I think it might be totally inappropriate to post this right now, but I'm doing it anyway because I thought it was the funniest thing I'd ever seen when I first saw it a month or so before my MFA thesis show, and I still do. It should be required viewing for all art school students.

Lovely obituary for Jeanne Claude here.

city of brotherly love

If you are in Philadelphia in the next 10 days head over to the Clay Studio to see my good friend Joanie Turbek's show, Minor Malfunction. (I wish I was going to be in Philadelphia in the next 10 days so I could see the show, and so I could see Joanie.)

For Clay vs Cupcakes Joanie cast a basket full of porcelain cupcakes, and went to a few bakeries to see if people would rather buy a real cupcake or one of the porcelain ones for the same price. Most people opted for the real cupcake. Joanie said to the City Paper, "Sometimes art is not the answer. All artists have a very strong belief in what they're doing, but it's important to play around with that belief a little bit. Sometimes people just want to eat a cupcake."


For The Good Friend Project Joanie attempted to solve the problem of how to keep in touch and be a good friend while maintaining a studio practice, holding down a job etc. She cast porcelain birthday cakes and sent them out to friends with "DO NOT OPEN UNTIL" followed by their birthday printed on the boxes. This way she made sure that she didn't forget any of her friends birthdays that year.

(I've got mine in on the coffee table in the living room, and I love it.)

For Duck Under: People that Play Hard to Get, Always Get the Most Attention, Joanie created a place for the viewer to escape from the hubbub of a crowded room. "Ironically, the act of trying to avoid interaction by using this sculpture will often cause the participant to be the center of attention."

The show is up until the 29th.

decal

Keith is looking into decals for his pots and that made me think of these Droog Design cups we got while we were in the Netherlands last month.

Mina Wu and Jan B. originally made them as a part of the "Value for Money" presentation at the Milan Furniture Fair (I want to go to there).
They made 3 versions- a plain white cup (cheapest), a white cup with hand painted flowers that was signed by the designers (most expensive), and a cup with a flower decal on it (somewhere in the middle).
Visitors to the exhibition voted for the cup with the decal as the best "value for money" and they put it into production.

My favorite part is where the decal folds over from the unglazed outside to the glazed inside.
Sometimes, I'm a total ceramics nerd.

in a pickle

when we were at Chiara's mom and dad's beautiful house this weekend we had the most delicious pickled green beans.

they were crispy, and spicy, with a touch of wasabi! yum, yum, yum!
I'm going to try and recreate their deliciousness with next year's crop but to tide me over, Chiara let me know that available here.

weekend

We had a great weekend, seeing friends and friend's babies, and I'm pretty well convinced that Jackson and Cade are the cutest kids on the eastern seaboard.

Seriously, when Cade smiles (which he does all the time) and Jackson says, "Ab-i-dale" or "Tee- ven" my heart just about busts.

I miss them, and their mom, already!
(sadly, we didn't take too many photos- I stole these from Chiara.)

home state

Inspired by Senator Al Franken's ability to draw the entire US, which I have long thought was just about the coolest thing ever,
National Geographic asked all 100 United States Senators to draw the state they represent, from memory, on a cocktail napkin.
Not all of them have responded yet, but check out the ones that have here. (Dick Durbin's Illinois is my favorite, not just because I grew up in Chicago, or because I really like Dick Durbin, but because he put Superman's hometown of Metropolis on his map.)

baptism

we're off to New York today to become this little guy's godparents. Isn't he the cutest?

Can't wait!

where there's smoke, there's fire

you know what I need? (and when I say "need" I mean "kinda want, but am unwilling to pay for, or do the work to build")

An outdoor fireplace.

The New York Times called them "the poor man's pool", but looking at the photos in their article- I have to say that the New York Times has a funny definition of poor.

We've had some perfect evenings lately, cool but clear and it would just be so nice to sit outside watching the fire and sipping a hot toddy.

But I don't really know where we'd put it, and I've already got too many home improvement projects going on so maybe I should put a cardboard fireplace on the porch and pretend.

(I kind of love the cardboard fireplace. Think Santa could come down that thing?)