Five Finds

I'm baaaaaccckkkk!!  Screw the flu.  And that's all I'll say about that.  My only saving grace during my week+ in bed was my iPad, on which I streamed all kinds of bad 80's television.  Thank you, Netflix, for keeping ALL eight seasons of Magnum, P.I. alive and well.

Oval Plate by Brian R. Jones

"Sweet Tooth" Necklace by Elva Field

www.brianrjones.com
I like his happy, graphic pottery, but I think I might like his interviews (He calls them Jonescasts...) with potters even better.  

www.elvafields.com
Neck Candy: Elva re-uses vintage bits and baubles to make colorful, one-of-a-kind jewelry.  Pretty accessories which reduce, re-use, recycle!!

www.artaxis.org
Be careful with this one.  If you love ceramics, you may never leave.  Be sure to leave a trail of breadcrumbs so you can find your way back!

Plate by Jason Burnett
via www.artaxis.org

Once in a blue moon, my husband's and my music tastes collide and the universe rewards us.  Meet Nicki Bluhm and the Gramblers.  Their "Van Series" on YouTube is sort of fantastic.  Locals: They're playing March 26th in Philly at World Cafe Live.  And bless them for making Hall and Oates cool in my husband's eyes.  ( I think it was the kazoo...)

2013: More or Less?

Yesterday I found this brain of mine cluttered up with all kinds of flotsam and jetsam.  Taking up square footage are definitely important things that have earned the space they take up.  Things like: how to help my kids thrive and be happy, this year's ceramic designs, a new direction for Mudstar, plot points in this piece I'm writing.  Then there are the stupid things that should be relegated to one shelf in my mind's closet:  like why porchetta is the new darling of the food world, when beards are going to be over, the size of my thighs, and why can I not find music in the new millenium that I can identify with.  Writing was not going to get done that afternoon, so on a hike I went, through Chauncey Woods.

There is something about trees, and inhaling the cold fresh air, and the crunch of leaves and cry of crows that always makes me calm down and remember what I thought was important in the first place.  Do I really want to spend 80% of my time on stuff that made me 20% happy?  (Rhetorical.) What do I want more of this year?  What do I want less of?

Less of this.

More of this.

Less of this,
(though pretty sure that's impossible...)

Definitely more of this.

I would like fewer parties where I need to wear Spanx, and more gatherings where this is acceptable attire. 
(Hi, Millie.  You look pretty fantastic.)

And oh.  For sure, more of this.

2013 is brand, spankin' new:

What do you want more of?

What do you want less of?