Right up my alley

I may be way behind on discovering this, but I've just found this cool website, polyvore.com for creating collages from images and text around the web. It seems it is used primarily for fashion and interior design collages, but I can many other creative applications. It has a great user interface and a bookmark you can add to your link bar so that any image found on the web can be easily clipped while on that site for use in a collage. For years now I've kept clippings from magazines and websites, but have always struggled for the best way to organize them. I've printed them out and put the in page protected binders, I've created inspiration bulletin boards, I've archived them through my amazon.com wishlist and my tumblr or here on my blog.

The thing I like so much about polyvore is that you're able to quickly resize, rearrange, bring to the forefront or send to the back any image in the set. You can of course do this sort of thing in photoshop, but it takes more time as that's not photoshop's sole function, as in polyvore. Bighugelabs.com has a neat collage feature, but they automatically crop and scale images, and sometimes the result leaves something to be desired.

I'm already excited by the possibilities for this tool as a way of visualizing a set of items. Back in March, there was a sale at DWR that nearly made me lose my mind in a frenzy of I need a dining table RIGHT NOW. I know I am susceptible to the urgency of a limited time "good deal" and so I was able to regain my sanity before I acted rashly. I like to comparsion shop, and sometimes it's hard to get a good idea about your options unless you can see them side by side. For example, with the tables, viewing them next to one another makes it easy to find strengths and weaknesses--i.e. I like the legs on this one, but prefer this other color, etc. With polyvore I can add images of chairs too to mix and match potentials there as well.

As we get ready for our big move, part of the preparation has been in selling some of our old things to clean house and pare down our possesions. I don't want to drag around a bunch of stuff I don't love, even if I'm not the one physically doing the dragging. Doing this, I've realized how much my tastes have changed over the past 4 years. As a 22 year old, I had no idea what kind of things I would really use when setting up a wedding registry, and thus many things I thought we really needed, we haven't used at all. For instance, we registered for a beautiful pattern of fine china and have used it maybe on two occasions. It's a lovely pattern, but I'm not convinced it was the best choice for our needs. I assembled our living room here piece by piece with no real plan, and it shows. Now, I like an ecclectic style in design, but there are certain pieces and colors that mix and match better than others. The more I look at images, the more I learn, and I think I've finally internalized the fact that decorating is a process, not something I should expect to do all at once. Of course, Justin lovingly shakes his head at all of this--from the satisfaction I get from comparing tables to my fickle nature and the difficulty I sometimes have making decisions.

Anyway, all that is to say, I think that polyvore will be a useful tool to help me visualize and catalogue ideas. Feel free to weigh in on the things that I post, to help me see flaws in my logic or point out things you like too!

Here's my first quick mock up. So...we already have a bed. It's a sleigh bed we bought in Oklahoma for cheap after we were married and it's perfectly functional. It's totally fine. And I want a different one. I've told myself that after I work on getting things we really need (like a dining table), in a few years I can replace our bed with a new one. Lately I've been really into canopy beds, and these are a few I've really been taken by. Unfortunately, my favorite one (bottom center by Niermann Weeks) is sold only to "the trade," meaning designers, and the selling price to me would be in the range of $8,000. Yeah.....How do I always gravitate to the most expensive possible choice?

Happy Belated Independence Day!

Happy belated Fourth! We spent Saturday with our Blythe buddies grilling and having homemade ice cream. It doesn't get much better than that. Evie was amused by all of the new things to explore at their home. We headed out the next day for a quick weekend getaway to Belgium--those pictures to come.

It's funny how being away, even for just one over night can make you appreciate home. We had a wonderful time on our trip, but it is so nice to be back. I know that the transition we're preparing for with this move will be fun and exciting, but I can't wait to get settled on the other side and re-establish a new place to call home.

Today I'm trying to play catch up with a few things I've let slide. Evie's schedule is still slightly off due to the travel disruptions, but she's happy at least, even if she won't nap. Her latest favorite activity is pulling my books of the shelf and persuing them at her leisure. I'm amazed that she has favorites--she finds the same half dozen books even when I rearrange them to try and throw her off. ;) Her taste is for:

1. Un, Deux, Trois: First French Rhymes

2. Hungarian: Verbs and Essentials of Grammar

3. MAYA: Professional Tips and Techniques

4. The Art of Drawing by Willy Pogany

5. Surrealist Art

6. American Architecture

7. The Art of Hokusai

and 8. Silent Witnesses: Early Cycladic Art of the Third Millennium BC

Who ya gonna call?

Justin turned to me the other day and said, "If I'd have known the pain of this moment, I don't think I would have ever become a father." And we're just getting started, folks. I have a feeling the pain we've felt ain't nothin' yet.

The pain of which I speak was a result of seeing Evie in pain after she face-planted into the floor the other night. It didn't actually look like a bad spill. There have been tumbles that have looked catastophic only to have her giggle and carry on as if nothing happened. Other times, a seemingly small bump will turn the world upside down. It was right before bed the other night when she decided to taste the floor with her nose and from her screaming I knew it was one that needed comforting rather than the old, "Ah, you're okay, come on let's go!" When I picked her up and brushed her post-bath hair out of her face though, her little mouth was covered in blood and her upper lip had already begun to swell.

At moments like this I've discovered there's nothing more in the world that you want as a parent than to make it right. Stop the pain. Fix the hurt. Travel back in time and prevent it from ever happening. I would have given anything to have my lip busted in her place, and from the look of fear on Justin's face, I knew he was thinking the same thing.

Here's where it gets tricky as a first time parent. You don't know how bad is bad. Was this a bad enough bump that she needed medical attention? She was exhausted and ready for bed and the only real option available for medical care was to stick her in the car, bleeding and screaming and drive 30 minutes to the hospital emergency room. I tried calling the hospital, just to talk to someone who could reassure me that she was okay--that there wouldn't be anything they could do about this kind of injury anyway, but the number listed in our phone index was wrong (of course). Still needing reassurance and phone in hand, I dialed the next number almost automatically--home. My dad answered the phone, thrilled to have a surprise call, and then settled down into comfort mode when he heard our plight. He assured me of everything I was already thinking--that it didn't sound that bad, that the fact that she was acting normally once more, giggling and smiling was indication that she was fine. He recalled times my brother and sister and I were injured, from scrapes to stitches and sympathized at our feelings of helplessness as new parents experiencing it for the first time from the other side.

So we didn't take her to the emergency room, and she's just fine. She's not even fussy at meal times, as I feared she might be from pain in her mouth. I'm amazed at her resiliance and terrified by her brazen recklessness. She's more on the move than ever. She has no sense of "the edge" and Justin mused aloud the other day about whether she'd crawl right off the Grand Canyon without hesitation. She's standing for a few seconds on her own now, so I know walking must be not too far behind. She's also decided that sitting in the bathtub is for suckers. This has greatly complicated my life. By the end of bathtime, I'm nearly as wet as her from baby-wrestling.