"Flourish" by Yellena James

What’s in my lasersights of love this week?

• Homemade green tea lattes. Skim milk + vanilla syrup + green tea= yummy treat.
• The lovely lovely artwork (see left!) from the talented Yellena James. Go check out more visual candy!
• New responsibilities at work! I get to lay out one of the national sections of the paper and I am super pumped about it.
• Marching into March.
• Rock Band on the XBox 360—which we used to play all the time and then sort of stopped but played again recently! It’s still way fun.
• New yarn that I can’t wait to work with. I am cruising through the currently-on-my-needles project just so I can play!

What’s makin’ your heart go bang!bang!bang! this week?

Love love love.

• Random cross-country flights to places that winter is a foreign concept. Also: seeing my bare ankles for the first time in almost 5 months.
• Truly helpful & awesome airline employees (Coley @ John Wayne for United was my hero on Sunday)!
• Who Whut? Cafe on Chicago Avenue at Franklin. Their caprese panini is divine. Om nom nom.
• Early-birdie spring cleaning. Part of me is hoping that if I get a jump start on this now that it will magically induce spring in Chicago. Think it will work?
• Fresh yarn. Mmmmmm.
• The XX: Yes, I know they’re like indie darlings from more than 15 minutes ago but hot damn, I’m a slow starter when it comes to music. Delightful noise in my ears.
• Trying to drum up a few more freelance clients—because I certainly do not have enough to do, right?
• Yeasayer: Ambling Alp. This song makes me chair dance.

Anything making you dance in your chair?

This week I’m dropping love bombs on the following:

• My cranes! While I don’t love the cold that this particular draft brings, I do love that my cranes (which are for sale in the shop) are always dancing. Makes me miss installation art in a big way.
• My camera & using the video mode as illustrated above.
• This wonderful article about achieving creative flow.
• Knitknitknitting away. Cruisin’ on some items for the shop (which I won’t be putting up until the fall—sorry!) and some baby gifts for friends’ who are expecting!
• Starting an inspiration folder on Flickr. It’s a private album, just for me of beautiful images I discover.
• Ways to increase your productivity. I always believe I can be a better machine.
• The color of mushrooms.
• My very first tutorial—there are definitely more to come. AND apparently, Paper Source (one of my favorite companies—I could go crazy in their stores!) offers a ready-made Quotation Dry Erase Board one if you’re one of those instant gratification sorts.

What’s exploding your heart this week?

OMGWTFBBQ!
What did I love about this week?

• My husband. He is always awesome but this week, in the grace of his awesomeness, he gave me a Wacom Tablet. Which means I can draw on my computer! HOORAY among so many hoorays!
• I love a good “your mom” joke; got one?
• Having a baby named after me (Julia). How rad is that?
• Cardboardsafari.com. Holy shit yes! I have a “deer head” on my wall without grossing anyone out.
• Deep breaths. There have been so many changes or impending changes happening that I just have to express my gratitude for oxygen to my brain. Yup.
• Feeling on top of shit at the exact moment that I am typing this. Before & beyond: I can’t say. But right now? WIN.

<3 How was your week?

Found on FFFFOUND! <3

• I’m really enjoying the process on the Wallpaper Girls series. Thoroughly. & happy with the finished product as well. I think I might have to start scrounging thrift store for old weird frames to spray paint gold and put a clump of these lovely ladies somewhere in the apartment.
• Business plotting.
• Lemon knots from Whole Foods.
• “Everyone gets to much information all day long that they lose their common sense.”- Gertrude Stein via Quotes on Design (i <3 this website!)
• FFFFOUND! in general. The little visual nibbles all day long in my google reader make me one happy lady.

What’s floating your boat this week?

Things I Love this Thursday?
Here’s my list of lovebombs:

• Pomplamoose, which I know I’ve said a thousand times but dang lovely pretty songs.
• My new wallet, a gift from my most fabulous bff— it’s got an adorable appliqué owl on it and actually fits all my cards (like transit & zipcard & insurance—not a zillion credit cards!). So awesome! Thank you, Celeste!
• Brunch on Sunday with my husband and our very good friend (we consider him family) and doing the crossword puzzle at the restaurant.
• Food. I’ve realized how many of my joyful moments are in relation to food items. Chorizo & egg on wheat for breakfast. Cholent. Chorizo & Chicken. Swedish Fish. Strawberry Ice Cream. I swear, if there is something ailing you… there is always a food that can fix it. Emotionally anyway! Hahaha. Yes, I do eat my feelings.
• SNL actually being funny:

What’s setting off your heart this week?

lovely green things

Things I love on this lovely Thursday:

• This probably goes for always but GREEN. I love this damn color.
• Particular love for my green headphones & mouse. I might need to buy a second one of the mouse to bring to work. I love it so! It even has side scroll/click action but without getting all gunky like the mighty mouse.
• Learning the picot bind off method for cute & flexible bindoffs!
• Knitting something for myself!
• Getting some pink streaks back into my hair.
• A new morning routine! Waking up at the same time as my husband (he’s worked at home for the past 3.5 years!), getting ready together and standing in the kitchen, eating breakfast together. It seems silly but it’s one of those scenarios, that I’ve pictured in my mind as being a romantic notion of the one or some such idea and feels a little like we’re in a movie. Essentially: it is a tiny daily thing that makes me all moony. Yay!

Nu assis, 1910 by Egon Schiele

What do I love on this lovely Thursday?

• Egon Schiele. My mother-in-law gave me the big book of his work for giftmas. It’s lovely & inspiring.
• Getting the giraffe & panda cards up in the shop!
• Finishing up 3 custom orders this week!
• Finally felting some boxes that I knit up for clothing storage. I’ve never felted anything before so it was a fun experiment. They all turned out but one in particular is perfection and giving me loads of other ideas.
• An aahhhhmazing sweater I found at crossroads trading. It is by far the softest and warmest thing I have ever owned.
• Totally re-organizing my closet. It’s one of those things that I put off & put off and completely dread doing but once it’s done…it’s so nice!!
• An excessive use of exclamation points!!!
• Ravelry! I love this website so hard. If you’re a fiber fanatic, you should sign up if you haven’t already! Find me on there: juliemackattack & add me as a friend.
• As always: plotting. But this time, my Weekly Moleskine Planner is really helping me kickass & take names. I have so many new things brewing for rottencupcakes!

Alright, lovelies, what’s making you bat your eyelashes & make kissy-faces this week?

penance with the paint gods.

What in the world am I loving this week?

• The color red.
• Girly Times. Getting some starbucks & then a manicure/pedicure with my bff. Perfect. Also: my nails are a pretty shade of red. Already smudged & chipped but that’s ok!
• My magic bag that somehow manages to fit everything I need it to without becoming a massive blob. Makes me feel a bit like Mary Poppins.
• New inspiration and ideas that have been pumping in my brain. It makes me excited!
• My awesome and cozy electric throw, a supreme giftmas present from my mum. Bonus: it’s a cat magnet!
• Picking up the paintbrush again—acrylics for now. But I am sensing that I’m gathering courage to approach oils again sometime this year. I’ve been working my way back to fine art. I sort of abandoned it when I graduated college in 2005 in favor of graphic design & Being an Adult & Getting a Job. I love design. But I also love art. (I do think these two things overlap; they’re certainly not mutually exclusive but that’s a whole other post!) So I started sketching again with more seriousness. Then watercolors. Now I’m introducing acrylics again into my repetoire. Gouache may be next (even though I despised it in school). Eventually: oils. Basically: I’m making penance with the paint gods.

Holy Moly! I swear the time slips by so quickly—& I know I am saying that all the time. Perhaps the truth is that I am too slow? Except no: my pace is my own and not anyone else’s.

Thursday, what do I love?

found on leloveimage.blogspot.com

• Drawing with oil pastels. It’s made me pretty excited to venture again into a different medium and one with such vibrancy.
• Managing to actually cook at home all last week!
• My first pattern sale! Yay!
• The approaching holidays, surprisingly. I usually am ambivalent but I find myself getting sort of excited. And then I hear christmas music and get not excited again. Ha!
• Running errands with my husband. I normally do them on my own & it’s really nice (&weird) to do them together.
• My husband’s chili. Om nom nom.
• Chocolate malts!
• Thinking about my goals for 2010. Mind you, they’re not resolutions. They are goals. Which are totally different, right?
• Big, ugly over-sized sweaters that I wear around my house. And my old lady house shoes. Both of these things make me happy (our apartment is cold!).

What do you love this week?