Creole Wisdom

listening good!

The Five Browns! They are really good, usually I don't believe the media hype- but it's really true! They are amazing. Check them out! So glad I downloaded their "The 5 Browns" CD!

if it ain't broke

...don't fix it!

hahah! That's how I've been feeling lately. Things are progressing really well (myself and school, matt, getting ready to move into the apt, etc...) and I'm just not used to things going well : )

Work is so egausting. I really wasn't ready for a 5 day/8-5 job. LOL, I'll never be ready for that. Honestly, I wish it was 3 days a week, it would be so much easier. Today I stayed home because I just couldn't do it... counting down the days till August 18th when I'm done... As you know I've only taken a few days off so far-

But Arlene my buddy is coming! I'm so happy. She arrives on the 3rd and stays until the 6th! I am so excited.

Here's a recent lo I did:

a treasure that tugs at my heart

I discovered this photograph by Bruce Davidson while paging through a coffee table book at the library. When I saw it I literally looked at it for twenty minutes and ever since I've been well, obsessed! Ever since I've been doing a great deal of reserach on Bruce Davidson and this picture and others in the collection Brooklyn Gang (1959).

Here's an excerpt about the collection and Davidson's experience following around a streetgang in Brooklyn: “The Brooklyn Gang 1959,” Davidson documents the antics of a group of teenagers in the mid-century urban environment. From the perspective of the 1990s it is striking that the subject matter seems to be reduced to a style that prevents the viewer from empathizing with these subjects.
These subjects seem to be escapees from Grease, West Side Story, or rockabilly’s Stray Cats. Davidson, an Eisenhower era Nan Goldin slumming with the locals, reveals an iconography now laced with nostalgia. Male sexuality and toughness are symbolized by tattoos, cigarettes, pompadours, and pubescent muscles on feminine lithe bodies. Although they were scofflaws in their day, they seem about as threatening as Bernstein’s dancing Sharks and Jets. This gang, The Jokers, now seems naive and funny in light of the present associations of gangs with cultural otherness and drive-by shootings. With all the hindsight media constructions that have come to inform our historic attitudes about the 1950s, it seems incredible that leather wearing white Catholic toughs were ever outside the social order.

In these photographs we witness a performative mode before postmodernism, which consists of imperfect primping, preening, and posing in the manner of James Dean. The media awareness of youth then was not as cultivated as it is. (William V. Ganis)

There's something so wonderful when you find something you love and you can just put your whole heart in it. Whether it's a project or scrapbook or even an old picture! It just can make the day so much better... finding a treasure-

For a second one hot summer day more than forty years ago Davidson caught a glimpse of young love, and just plain old teenage vanity! Even more he got himself inside the lives of these Brooklyn kids and just captured it perfectly.

fourth of july weekend (part II)

What an exciting holiday it was!

What a fun night! It's been a while since I've actually sat out and watched the firework show. Last year I was in Pensacola, Florida and got to see everything from our condo balcony, but seeing it all up close and personal is pretty fun!

I did get some nice shots, come and take a peak in my fireworks album!

Fourth of July Weekend (Part I)

We had a wonderful 4th of July weekend! It has been so nice to be off of work (six days total, the longest I've had a break since I started!)

On Sunday afternoon mom and I met the Smith family for a wonderful picnic at Minnehaha Park. Having only been to one area of the park a long time ago I really had no memory of what it was like.

First of all, it's huge! It's wonderful, with falls and a cafe and trails. Not to mention beautifully restored buildings, that mom actually was a park of during her Junior League days.

Here's an album of the day: Minnehaha Park.

One of the things I loved the most were the restored buildings.

and how could I forget these two cute girls, Brittany & Alicia? They are growing up so quickly!

the perfect bed and pjs

You know, if you spend half your life in bed it's important to have good stuff-

I'm always in search of the perfect bedding. So last week I decided that I wanted another blanket for my bed, and mom suggested we make a duvet cover (after searching and finding nothing cute and nothing afforadable).

Did I forget to tell you that my mom is a spectacular seamstress? She sewed tons of clothes for me growing up and makes just gorgeous things for the house- Last year she made me matching toile curtians for my dorm room : )

So yesterday we headed over to this bolt fabric store and picked out some awsome prints for my duvet cover and some fabric for the pillows on my couch (I have two rooms in the new apt: a small bedroom and connecting study/living room area, yes I scored big time this year!)

What do you think? These two are for my bedspread (one print for each side): and these two are for my pillows (I just love that vintage-y floral, btw the couch is red)

So my bed is taken care of right? Well aside from the actual sewing it is, but I still needed a nice robe, right?

Here's the thing. I get cold at night, really, really cold. But I already have a bulky robe already, and I actually wanted a lighter one so I could sleep in it-

Target has great stuff, and no where else could I find a plain one- we found it this weekend (in white)!