graffiti art all around

current tune: "Come Around" by: MIA featuring Timberland

I feel like I've been vacating a void of un-inspiration and utter blah-ness lately. I did however manage to purchase some new art supplies, and spray paint!!

Here is a look of what I've been getting into:

pretty pastel-like colored goods to hold all my imaginative, random, crazy things!

I picked up some of my favorite spray paint at the Syracuse Commercial Art Supply.
(same brand I used for my Canterbury cart)

While accomplishing some work at the art & design building I stumbled upon Shepard Fairey, the artist who not only created the "Obey Giant" work, but also the "Obama: Hope" pieces as well. I was ecstatic! He is a remarkably awesome political and graffiti artist who I will definitely used as both inspiration and model for upcoming work.

mass media bunny frenzy!

current tune: "Acid Food" by: Mogwai

I've started work again at the lovely corporate America pit stop for an early death at minimum wage...aka McDonald's. Just burgers and fries...burgers and fries....

On a lighter note I have gone head over heels for this witty, humorous, and amazingly adorable comic called "Bunny."

There are minimally drawn bunnies in a daily comic relating to worldly issues, ridiculousness, and humor. I thoroughly enjoy it and the talented witty and artistic creator for having that be a part of my life.

Here's a little tidbit of the awesomeness:

<3>check out these ridiculously cute comics out for yourself and fill a gap of boredom with bunnies!

a love for daisies

current tune: "El Pico" by: Ratatat

Yesterday my lovely friend, Kari O'Mara introduced me to a great television show I had been completely missing out on! The ABC show, "Pushing Daisies."

The show is highly saturated with intense color and charm, and almost resembles a cute Tim Burton-esque style of its own. The characters are each charming, and quaint with their own little flaws and quirks that make the show simple wonderful!

The protagonist, Ned, is a baker who runs and owns his own pie shop! This alone made me want to sit down and give the show some of my attention and I soon fell in love with the "gifted" and unique baker.

You can visit the show and find out more about its loveliness at its website, Pushing Daisies.

Ned and Chuck steal my heart every time I watch it with their little blunders and adventures! I am thoroughly ecstatic that Kari introduced me to this show!

enjoy!

decorating a room for one!

current tune: "The Purple Bottle" by: Animal Collective

I confirmed my upcoming classes for this spring semester, went with my friend Kari to the bookstore to drain both savings and all cash from your student wallet. Fortunately for me I did not have to purchase any books to my knowledge yet.....but I will get hit with continuous art supplies as the semester rolls on. So today's purchase was slimmed down to 5 new pigments liners, a 14x17" drawing pad, and a NYLON magazine.

I started the day off in a lazy way of sleeping in, showering, and making coffee with my grandfather's old 1970's mini coffee maker. It is exceptionally petite and does its job! And then proceeded to re-arrange my once previously arranged room again while watching the presidential inauguration streaming online via myspace. I was happy to see our new president!

I enjoy cutting out magazine bits or just pretty photos or advertisements as decorations for my ever blank walls within my dormroom, so I commenced with these lovelies:

and a little decoration for my door. (more in progress)

then I decided to make myself large monthly calenders instead of having the bookstore profit off of something I could create myself.

and this little cutie I found during lunch in the veggie friendly cooler! I just had to grab him!

Today was spent in a slow relaxed sort of manner that will soon be unheard of during the semester, so I am trying to enjoy what I can.

happy little notes

current tune: "Anything I'm Not" by: Lenka

Well, I'm making myself a cozy home where I'll be residing in for the next 4 months...a.k.a. my college dormroom.

Instead of tackling totes of supplies and clothes I decided to personalize my cheap white dry erase board I purchased at my local wal-mart today.

just some little personal pizazz with a black sharpie and white-out!
it's a nice little welcome to the outside of my door.

I haven't been up to much besides loading up the merc to head out to central new york for more schooling...

tomorrow I have a planned wegman's trip with my friends to hopefully grab some snackies, juice, and maybe the possible chocolate covered coffee beans!

first time bubble tea

current tune: "Como Te Extrano" by: Cafe Tacuba

Wednesday, Matthew and I decided to go and try bubble tea! My lovely friend Gracie-lou enjoys it, along with some of our other friends, so we decided to go out and try it. With a name so cute and uppity we thought it would be a splendid idea!

We found the most adorable little tea room on Lark Street in Albany, called The Good Leaf Tea Company. It's small, cozy, intimate, and the tea and little tea-made desserts are both as cute as they are yummy!

there are cute little quirks everywhere!

they even had truffles and chocolates in the shape of buddha!

it was cozy and comfortable!

there were teapots, and loose tea and other accessories as well.

Matt had a bubble tea with milk and tapioca cubes at the bottom and I had a light raspberry bubble tea with coconut cubes! We also split a delish green tea cupcake, which was equally yummy!

the tearoom was altogether quaint, and decorated with a calm pretty atmosphere.

We enjoyed this little tearoom thoroughly and were very happy to have visited this place for our first adventure with bubble tea! I, of course, will be frequenting this place as often as I can when I come to visit Albany with Matt again.

I have friends that would adore this place, and I will hopefully be bringing them in them the summer when they come to visit. We were beginning to think the only tearooms we'd ever find would be in England.

check it out!

movie: gran torino

current tune: "Like a Rolling Stone" by: Bob Dylan

Last night Matt, Guiley (one of our apple employee friends), and I went to colony center to go and see "Gran Torino" staring Clint Eastwood. Now, with a badass name like Clint Eastwood, the movie has got to be worth a viewing. All three of us really enjoy Eastwood and think he is an exceptional actor, so we were excited to see his latest film!


In my opinion, this was a fan-fucking-tastic movie! It was real, gritty, emotional, and filmed amazingly well. The story can easily be related to real life with all the characters and present conflicts, and of course the audience falls in love with Clint Eastwood all over again.

For me, on a personal level, Clint Eastwood is the spitting image of my full-blooded Italian grandfather, and the character Eastwood created for himself was as if he playing my grandfather (without the guns and violence). His demeanor, his characteristics, his morals, everything reminded me of him, whom I love, and it helped me relate to his character even more.

I love Mr. Eastwood, who reminds me a lot of the great Paul Newman, who are both extraordinary gentlemen.

The trailer gives me chills every time I watch it and almost makes me want to cry, I suppose as a method of catharsis, but also because these very issues are going on in the world today.





The movie is well worth the viewing and I would recommend it to anyone!

photographic love

current tune: "You, Me, and the Bourgeoisie" by: The Submarines

Today was busier than anticipated and I accomplished quite a bit, and still have sooo much time left in the day (...well night).

I decided I would finally get to one of my friends requests for the cute phrases and pictures I do, and stop procrastinating on it. So I got to it (while watching Star Wars VI with my mom and sister) and made up some little creations!

Of course, these are scanned images of the originals and are not perfect.

In between doing that I cooked dinner (...again). Making a fettichini alfredo with a homemade alfredo sauce, courtesy of allrecipes.com

I will hopefully be getting going on my "thanks" cards and will be posting pics of those soon as well!

hello productiveness!

weekend adventures!

current tune: "The way we get by" by: Spoon

How I love tiny-almost-forgotten-small-population towns!

Matt and I went to Westernville to spend a weekend with his grandmother and family. It's the experience where too many people are over for the amount of bedrooms there are so there's people sleeping over place on sofa's and random mattresses everywhere! Boards games, and children helping to make food are expected, and there's always a hungry mouths to feed.

comfort food!

I spent the weekend cooking, as I do every time I go up to Westernville. Saturday night I had the chance to test out my pizza dough slapping skills and made three pizza pies. It was the kindf dinner where you allow the smallest members of a family help with the preparation and cooking of the meal; followed by bakes chocolate chip cookies!

I also had the luxury of swimming with Matt in their pool. It's a hand-built homemade pool from the 1970's constructed by two past architects...aka Matt's late grandpa and his grandma. Despite the fact that there's an economic recession, and unemployment is increasing in their family, spoiling the family children by heating the pool for a short period of time every couple of years is a must! It's small in size, and random in disfunctional house, but a treat and an adventure!

hello there, scuba steve!

One of the best finds this weekend was the playing the first version of Oregon Trail! Matt and I found the original Macintosh version on the internet and played it for the first time in almost a decade! It brought back memories of elementary school, and was so exciting to play on the 2D small graphics game!

true love.

I return to school in a short while, and am both excited and not at the same time. I'll be balancing my hectic life once again, while also trying to be crafty and artsy, when projects are not due!

good morning juice

current tune: "Ice cream" by: New Young Pony Club

Today's day was spent with the productive prosper of cleaning, laundry, sorting, and baking! The skies were sunny and very welcoming, from the perspective of a cozy home.

good morning juice!

the view from our kitchen window.

After the productiveness, I went up to Northville to visit my very good friend Jordan who is leaving to go back to Oneonta soon. We spent the day with his three silly little dogs and father, baking cookies and enjoying each other's company. We later decided to cook dinner for his family of a homemade fettichini alfredo, veggies, and boneless chicken breast. Jordan taught me how to make my own homemade alfredo sauce, which was sooo delish! I'm happy I learned the simple recipe for further reference.

I'll be spending the weekend in Westernville, NY with Matthew and hopefully hitting up Fayetteville and Syracuse to job hunt before I go back to school next week.

au revoir!

building a card army

current tune: "Baby I'm Yours" by: Math And Physics Club

I've been bumbling around the house while the weather has been not-so welcoming outside. To counteract my failed soup from last week....a failed cheesy potato chowder....I decided to go out and hit up the grocery store to make a tried-and-true favorite, chili!

I made a big batch of meat chili for my family and Matthew's family and a little veggie batch with Morning Star meat substitute crumbles for myself!


I love cooking especially with so many vegetables! If I could I would put as many veggies as possible in my chili! This time, it was only red peppers, green peppers, sweet onions, green onions, chopped tomatoes, and four different beans (pinto, kidney;etc.) The more veggie goodness in one batch, the better!

On a different note, I've been going strong on my chipper little hello cards! My goal is to have a batch of at least 50 so that I can separate them in 10 counts with a sweet ribbon and possibly simple white stationary boxes. Today, I managed to pump out 30 and I still want to go strong! Maybe when I finish this batch, I'll move on to "thank you" cards or "thanks" for short.

hello! the start of a good thing.

Of course I kept myself partially occupied with all my cutting and gluing with of my family's personal classics, "My Neighbor Totoro." This movie has been with my family for a very long time, so of course I could do my work and knew i wouldn't be missing anything I couldn't recite on my own. It's such a warm and fuzzy movie, that it made me feel good watching it as I crafted in my family's livingroom.

"...so you're really a totoro?"

just a simple hello!

current tune: "Sundialing" by: Caribou

The weather seems to have heading back to throwing snow and ice in our direction. With all the bad weather and cold temperatures, I've been staying at home doing some cooking and just trying to keep myself busy.

As usual I busy making a mess in my family's house, on the livingroom floor.

the results came to this:

Little cards with the simple statement of, "hello."

It's so nice getting a little greeting card that is just saying, hello!

I would like to eventually make "thank you" cards like this as well.
I need to start making my list of goals for 2009 that I intend to achieve. One of those will be creating my own etsy shop with the inspiration from wonderful artists online and those around me.

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I've been doing a bit of re-decorating here in the hopes of making it come to together. Unfortunately that means learning to deal with html and computer details.....*sigh*

I'm far from classifying myself from being a computer nerd, so changes will be small and steady and hopefully well received.

much love!

psyschedelic inspiration

current tune: "Dry the Rain" by: The Beta Band

Matt got me into this band, and now I'm head over heels for them. If you haven't heard of "The Beta Band," check them out. They're psychedelic sounding, and just low-key-alternative good.

Beta Band on MySpace: http://www.myspace.com/thebetaband

Unfortunately they stopped recording in 2004, but their music still lives on.

This post is an inspirational one. I often check out lookbook.nu to get inspiration on my styles and just in life. Here are some photos that I personally love:

inspirational love.

It's funny what inspires us and what we're physically attracted to.
If anyone has good inspiration, share the wealth!

p.s. thank you, Matt for introducing me to The Beta Band <3>

movie: slumdog millionaire

current tune: "Show me what I'm looking for" by: Carolina Liar

*note: please don't pay attention to this silly tv show-made-youtube-video, just listen to the song.

Last night Matt and I went ventured down to Albany to our favorite indie movie theatre by the name of Spectrum 8. It's a small local theatre that shows foreign, artsy, indie, and any other under-the-radar film that is not usually shown in the main cinemas. It's cozy, intimate, and reasonable priced, and has never let us down; making it my favorite cinema to see movies in!

The movie we chose to see last night was, "Slumdog Millionaire," which had been recommended to us by Matt's friend.


After watching this beautifully filmed movie, I fell in love right then and there in my movie seat with the characters and the message. In my eyes, this is a movie everyone should see and appreciate!

watch the trailer:

enjoy!

p.s. to my lovely best friend gracie-lou, you'll love this film and I really think you should see it!

a new start!

Current tune: "Lucky Today" by: Cloud Cult

warning!! long post ahoy!

The New Year's came and went and I had a very good one in Albany. I had a party with Matt (and his roommates) in his flat with some of our friends from high school and other friends in Albany/ Apple employees.

Sublime, and The Beatles were played and all my food was a big hit! Everyone loved my paper pirate New Year's hats as well! Also! To all my British folk out there....I had Strongbow again! Matt located a place in Albany that sells imported beer, so he grabbed some for me. It was so delish! I had the chance to have a bit of my England back with me!

New Year's Day was spent going to a '50's-esque diner in Albany and in Schenectady with Matt's aunt and cousins that are still up from Texas. Where I was inspired to make some art! Of...the modern variety....I suppose....

"we're all mad here."

We stopped at Colony Center to look about in Barnes & Nobles before going to see The Spirit. I was overjoyed by the bright and very cute wallpaper in the hallway before the restrooms; which equaled an opportune photo op!

Matt looked really good against the cute background.

Then we had some fun finding things at his aunt's!

We found a sweet gas mask!

I found this as well! It's the flying spaghetti monster at his best! I fell in love with this picture and want a copy of my own! I thought it was sooooo great!!

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Cloud Cult was a band I actually just found today while I was watching Die Hard 3 on tv; it was on a Progressive Insurance commercial.

So, I thought I would do some poking around on youtube.com to check them out.

A seven member band, as many indie bands forming seem to be quite large, from Minnesota with a folksy sounding and almost hippie-jam band-like.

Here's there myspace : http://www.myspace.com/cloudcult

happy listening!