Last week we were hit by a very emotionally unsettling storm here on the coast, that created a ton of havoc in our area. After five days with no electricity, or outside phone service I'm still stumbling to catch up on everything as this mess is getting cleaned up and the flow of living around here is beginning to get back to normal. It's been a tough ride, that's for sure.
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But on the flip-side... What I've been longing to jump on here and tell everyone, is that in a very sudden twist of fate we've been getting ready to move our life down to Ashland(in southern Oregon) next month. I'll be working and sharing a studio space with Anahata Katkin, at PaPaYa! creative abandon full time. So many exciting design projects are already in the works. It's going to be an amazing way to kick off the new year!
(So disappointed I missed the ugly sweater x-mas party though. After last week's stress I could definitely use a few mojitos!)
I was up late wrapping gifts to send to my nieces and nephews last night. Her cherry blossom Santa goes so well with Paper Source polka dots, don't you think?
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It's time for me to get packing, so I'm going to take a little break. I'll also be closing down the liquid shop temporarily, and will re-open it with new handmade pieces after we're all settled in. If you'd like to be in the know about it's return, I'll be announcing it here, through the mailing list, and myspace. Huge thanks to everyone who bought cards and jewelry this winter, and for all of your lovely emails... you're the best!
All of the little shingled cottages in Cannon Beach are always so appealing to me. I love walking down the sandy roads that curve along the ocean front. I've been there on the windiest, wettest days, and still feel the same draw. But this weekend was truly spectacular. The weather was warm, I got to happily rock my Southern California wardrobe. We took a tour of 10 of the historic cottages on Laurel. It always feels a little like virtual reality getting to step inside someone else's shoes on these tours. Every room is open for you to take a peek inside. One attic had a deck outside the window that if you were brave enough to crawl out onto you could sit and take in the ocean breeze and views of haystack rock. They were all summer (vacation) homes or rentals so the interiors weren't very pretentious in nature, but getting glimpses into how the other half live always gets my imagination rolling.
This cottage with the green trim always grabs my eye, isn't the attention to detail great? It's a thin tall house, that always brings to mind folk tales like Hansel and Gretel. Just about every house in cannon beach is shingled like this, so I love how they incorporated the whimsical swooshy oceanic details into the wood.
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I hope all is well with you all, let's pretend it's not Monday... ok?!
Since our move I often find myself missing things of the familiar. Silly things that were once so accessible I would've never thought twice about them. Like five minute drives to Target, and escalators. (Yes, you read that right. I miss escalators!) But on the flipside one of the best things I can atest to about moving out of state is that there are an abundance of things to do that we've never done before.
This Sunday we decided to take a drive, blissed out by the sunny weather we headed across the bridge that crosses the Columbia river into Washington state to go see the lighthouse at Cape Disappointment.
Amazing how Shawn talked me into hiking with the bad shoes I was wearing, up the hill and down again. But even out of breath, with shoelaces that begrudgingly kept untying themselves it was so worth it. It always is. When I really stop to think about it, Target and escalators were a pretty good trade off. Just look at all of the beauty that surrounds us here, we definitely made out like bandits.
Here are a few photos of our garden's "mystery bulbs" that I had been wondering about. It turns out (the hundreds of green stems) were all bluebells waiting to open. Utterly enchanting. I love the sea of endless color, I wish I could better capture it on film to mirror the way it looks in person.
I hadn't realized just how out of date my Projects section had become on this website. I built it back around 2002, crazy how quick time flies. It's in dire need of broken link fixes and new material. This week I'll be updating with fresh photos and links in the miniature section. Big thanks to Jill, for reminding me!
Everytime we end up driving too far up here in our new surroundings, we stumble on an adventure. So the urge to make little quicktime videos on my tiny Olympus handheld digital camera keeps creeping up on me lately.
I tried my hand at making these little videos into something on my iMac tonight. But, saving the video for web always makes the pictures and captions a bit blurry. It's still kind of fun to watch anyway.
A word of warning to those at work, there's music... I can never seem to help myself.
Most of our free time lately has been consumed with house rennovation, which put me in a bit of a (all work no play) funk last week. So we took a well deserved break this weekend to catch our breath and take in the beauty up here. We decided to head toward Youngs Falls, after taking a trip up coxcomb hill to the Astoria Column for a clear view of our town unhindered by clouds or mist. The lady at the gift shop was very sweet when we asked for directions to the falls, explaining how we've just moved here. Her response after pointing us the right way was, "Welcome Home". Yet even equipped with directions and all of our good intentions we still missed our turn and drove too far. We passed old dilapidated barns, and fields with grazing cows, and drove through winding forest roads. During our meanderings we found a lovely garden nursery called RainTree where I fell mad in love with a Japanese maple with it's bright yellow fall colored leaves planted on the grounds (pictured above). I found a smaller one there, on our way out and just had to bring it home. It was so long that it ended up lying sideways between us for the rest of our adventure. From there the seven mile marker noted Cannon Beach, and since we had driven that far already there was no sense in stopping... After weeks of longing to visit, suddenly there we were. I loved the beachy town, with it's wooden shingled houses, sandy streets, and nastursiums trailing over the fences, shutters cut like crescent moons, and beach sand so soft and cool to the touch that I never wanted to leave.
Back at home it's been all about Shawn and I wielding paint brushes. He's outside, I'm inside... I've been pulling Benjamin Moore colors from Domino Magazine, and the Pottery Barn Catalog. I could never doubt either source. Down in the photos below you can glimpse the new color of my studio walls, inspired by an article on laundry rooms in Domino. This color was paired with a black and white damask cotton fabric. Once the color was actually up on the wall, in all of it's bright blue glory... I thought, "wow, it matches my website perfectly"! Besides the exterior color and the studio, the rest of the house is decorated in deep jewel tones. Like these. I once read somewhere that home decorating is usually reflected by the color of the clothes you wear... true?!
Astoria is filled with all kinds of small town quirkiness. Last week the mayor was arrested, 100 sturgeon were mysteriously stolen, Shanghai'd in Astoria performed in Drag at the local theatre, and ghost hunters were meticulously at work. I look forward to reading the Astorian's headlines every day... Really, they just keep getting better.
We're saying good-bye to our tiny bungalow in southern California this weekend to begin an exciting adventure, as we'll be headed to a new home up north in the "little San Francisco of the Pacific Northwest".
I'm looking forward to designing a fresh new garden space, and having a large indoor room for a studio... how decadent!
I'll be back online soon, with all new tales to tell. That's a promise!
