Tuesday, November 20, 2012

eat, drink, and be merry



The dorms closed on campus at 2pm on Saturday and just hours later MK and I were opening the doors on the inaugural Residence Life Thanksgiving Dinner. With one week to work magic, we both got busy planning the dinner. I took charge of all things creative and MK overtook the kitchen working food magic I didn't even know was possible. 

In the end it turned out into a beautiful evening enjoyed by dear friends. It was a celebration of the first chunk of school being over, and for many of us, the completion of our first travel week. 

For me and MK, it was a true joy to bring together the people we cherish and host them doing what we love to do. Thank you to everyone who came and to my family who let me escape into the world of design and therefore didn't respond to a single email or phone call all week. 

Now we can all eat, drink, and be merry. 

Mary-Kate and Wyatt 

some of our people 
Andrea 



one of my favorite shots 

love these two
the boys 
me and shelley (she looked fabulous again!) 
damage. done.  
 the food master
the ladies i get to work with--the entire TJ/McW staff

Tuesday, November 6, 2012

the words i couldn't say


dear friend,

i am so sorry that our last conversation was awkward. that was basically my fault. you are just too cool for me. you have such a lovely life full of everything you want. i felt like what i'm doing wasn't good enough so I acted funny. and flipped my hair a lot...like what is up with that?

let's go back and have a redo. let's go back to the way it once was where we talked about art and life and our dreams. we used to laugh until we were rolling around on a twin bed and talk until the malian stars burned bright.

maybe we can't go backward, but will go forward with me?

love always,
your awkward and still perhaps endearing friend

winding mind

I haven’t been sleeping well lately. Again. It’s becoming a thing that happens when my headspace is cloudy and I could stare out into space thinking about everything and nothing in particular.

My head has just been elsewhere. I’m becoming that person who is physically present and yet not there. There’s a distance and a displacement. It’s like when you finish an epic book or watch a really poignant movie and it stays with you; you can’t shake this feeling that you were somewhere else and that place isn’t in your present.

Does that make sense yet?

I think it’s the collision of life. If Peace Corps had worked, I would be prepping for coming home for the holidays. I’d be having a dress made to have Thanksgiving with the Ambassador in Bamako and planning Christmas gifts for the family. I’d be planning for a twenty-four hour travel and totally flipping out in excitement.

But that’s not my life.

And yet, nor is my life one at home with the family.

Life is this third option. I’m in Michigan. My family is in Indiana. My brother is in Arizona. My friends are on the East Coast.

Still, I’m totally stoked to go home. I’m going home in about 11 days for Thanksgiving. That will be great. It will be Americana and holiday fun.

But in those eleven days my head is not here. It’s somewhere else. It’s bogged around in life of a twenty-four year old and the thirty-six lives of teenagers. It’s worry and fun. It’s fighting between wild and free and parental.

I let all of them in. The girls and their lives, they are a part of me, and they are in my heart and soul. I dream about their problems and cross my fingers for every audition. I am there for every step. And I wouldn’t have it any other way.

But my head is still fuzzy with it all.

It’s intertwining of a million things--of me and the people around me. It’s the craziness of life and the chaos of being young. It’s fighting for your place and searching for the authenticity of who you are. It’s curiosity and fear, happiness and excitement.

The things in there are hard to articulate. Those are the things that I give away in written word, in a sideway glance, in one comment. It’s the dark and twisty. It’s the unknown. It’s the complicated.

It’s the windy inner world of my mind. 



words



DIY--but have someone else do it

image
how awesome is this headboard? for a reader like me, this could be the perfect little something something. also, if you are a romantic, what about a headboard of love poems and sonnets? i mean that's pretty suave.

for all the info, click here.

i'm still getting into DIY projects, but I have a dear friend who is all about the crafty projects, i'll keep you updated.