We’ve discovered that, even with our very creative, non-linear artist’s brain, we can learn to manage our financial ecosystem IF we have the right teacher. Here’s a good place to start.
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Hunger-Crazed Cooks Confess 50 Ways to Eat Eggs
When there is nothing in the pantry, there is almost always the egg. Here are 50 ways to cook them from hunger crazed food people and Leite’s Culinaria. Just to spark you imagination.
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This Shining Moment in the NOW
There’s a sweet hiatus between summer and fall in the few weeks after Labor Day when the sky promises to be blue forever and only a dozen, drifting, saffron leaves hint of soon-to-be barren branches. Before moving to a ramshackle farm tucked away on a tiny island in the Pacific Northwest last year, seasons were meaningless. Here, Nature knocks and you listen…
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Blackberry August: Island Harvest Crumble with Poem
Blackberries are considered both a scourge and a blessing. They grow anywhere and everywhere, bristling with thorns, invading civilized gardens, threatening to obliterate freeway on-ramps. But in August, if you see a car pulled off the side of the road, you can bet everyone’s piled out to gather wild blackberries to eat out-of-hand and transform in the kitchen.
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Wonders and Possibilities Hiding in Plain Sight
In Fly By Night, artist Duke Riley trained 2,000 pigeons to fly above the Brooklyn Navy Yard at dusk with tiny lights attached to their legs. The performance invites us to really SEE something we are so accustomed to that we’ve become blind to it:
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A Strategy for Tumultuous Times (Bruce Lee)
I was pondering how to remain sane in the tumult and violence that seems to be our world these days, where lunatics of every stripe are taking center stage, when I remembered this quote from Bruce Lee, the great kung fu master:
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Poetry Vending Machine DIY, with Mary Oliver, Rumi, Anne Sexton
As kids we loved old-fashioned vending machines that would drop a little plastic container holding a treasure — a ring, miniature toy, or candy — through the shoot when we put in a dime or a quarter. Lately, various iterations of poetry vending machines have been coming to our attention, perfect for our adult selves. Imagine…
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What is YOUR Artist’s Studio?
A couple of weeks ago while we were compiling Artist’s Studios with Sofas + Rest Spaces, we stumbled on picture of earth artist Roy Staab‘s that had the notation: The Site Is My Studio. There was Staab creating in the Hudson River in 1989. IN THE HUDSON RIVER! It got us thinking about what our studio is. We realized…
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Naturally Dyed Easter Eggs Made Simple
Two thoughtful contributors sent us info about making natural dyes to color your eggs for Easter or spring celebrations. It spurred us to hone a simplified method for naturally coloring glorious eggs, just in time for the Sunday hunt or gathering…
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Pruning the Old to Allow the New
When we wrote friend and contributor Susan Dworski of many decisions we had were making to change how we worked — limiting some aspects and dreams to focus on others — she likened it to pruning a tree: the essential process of culling and removing branches of a shrub or tree in order to encourage growth. Her words and…
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When Doing a Geographic Renews and Enlivens
Current self-help wisdom asserts that ‘doing a geographic’ to solve your life dilemmas is a Very Bad Move. Blowing Dodge is no answer, they say. Well, I suggest common wisdom could be dead wrong.
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Wall Murals in Vintage Black and White
At A Cup of Jo, we spotted a terrific idea Stylist Meta Coleman employed in her son Henrick’s room at home in Provo, Utah: a black and white wall mural made from a C1900 photo. Here’s how and where she had it made:
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Morning Practice: Reading a Poem…..Again
For some time, our morning practice, before email or anthing digital, has been to read a poem aloud (sometimes with a friend). Recently, we decided to try reading the same poem every morning for a week. We discovered that each day, we’d hear it differently and find something new in those same few lines, as…
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Maira Kalman: Grateful grateful grateful
The Wall Street Journal has a series called “My Week” and we can think of no better to way to start off our week than a week in the life of artist Maira Kalman.
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A Family Home Full of Heart and Good Ideas
“Something boldly improvisational and cheery going on in this house in Australia” wrote Susan Dworski in an email as she described the home Ruth Bruten, writer of Gourmet Girlfriend blog, shares with her husband and five boys. It is delightfully REAL and colorful, and packed with ideas. Here are Susan’s favorites, and ours:
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Father/Daughter Beatbox Competition Makes for Inspired Rhythms
(Video link here.) This loving competition between St. Louis-based beatboxer Nicole Paris and her dad, who taught her the basics — between mentor and apprentice —is filled with wonder and beauty,
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I Believe I Can…..(Gif-Inspiration)
One of the best gifs we’ve seen of late is I Believe I can… We know about flapping our arms hard to barely keep from falling in the water after we’ve stepped OFF the diving board BELIEVING WE CAN. Perhaps if we try a little harder, and shift our attitude slightly …
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Community Starts with One, Saying YES
These three surprising examples of communities reminds us that community starts with one person reaching out, taking action…and then another, and another….
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The Lunar Magic of Solar Lanterns + Solar Cell Stars
On the heels of our post about Staging a Summer Party with Modest Means, frequent contributor Susan Dworski sent this email about Shoji Solar Lanterns, an essential, inexpensive, mood-enhancing element that are, in her words “Pretty damned lunar at night”: Ironically, I just replaced my tattered red Shoji solars yesterday with the familiar bluebird ones. They are…
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Hair as Personal, Cultural, Historical Artform
Nigerian photographer J. D. ’Okhai Ojeikere spent more than thirty years traveling across Nigeria documenting hundreds of braided “Tall House” styles that appeared after Lagos gained independence from Britain in 1960. He took close to 1,000 portraits of different braids, twists, plaits and buns, each carrying a distinct meaning. For us, they are examples of personal expression taken to wondrous heights with the most elemental of materials.
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