Adventures!

Q: Is there anything better than a piping hot cup of tea beside a roaring waterfall?
A: No. No there is not.

Yesterday self and boyfriend packed a thermos of English breakfast, a bag of tortilla chips, and a bowl of raspberries and hit the road, with the vague idea of dithering away an afternoon in Champoeg Park. The road itself, with its wide open vistas and clusters of happy cows and hop farms, berry farms, orchards, nurseries, and fallow fields seeded with retina scorching swaths of California Poppies, proved to be so captivating that we just kept going, detouring through Butteville and along the Willamette river, stopping at a gas station for a hot dog and a road map, which led us, eventually, to Silver Falls. After hiking down to the North falls, we clambered/slid down a rocky little trail and bummed around on the river bed for a bit, then clambered back up a ways and perched on a sunny outcropping just above the plunge pool. With the late afternoon sun dappling the rockface and the mist from the falls drifting onto our faces, sharing a little metal cup of still steaming black tea, it was about as perfect as life gets. Too bad neither of us had a camera...then again, sometimes a picture just can't do justice to the image it was meant to capture.

Love.

I am such a dork for my cat. He's like a little dragon. A really obsessive cranky creepy little dragon. Also, he matches my bedding perfectly. Could a girl ask for more?

six very shiny reasons why Victoire de Castellane is the queen of haute joaillerie...

The tiny black onyx frog! Eeeeee! On opal! *thump* That was the sound of me passing out from the excitement that such a thing even exists.

These.

Tiny amethyst pomegranate seeds and hand enameled serpents make Eve's dilemma perfectly relatable.

Genius for those of us without pierced ears. Now if only I had seven or eight grand laying around...

What's that? You hope I would find something better to do with it than buy useless adornments?

Pssssh. Priorities, shmyorities. 

Ooooooh, look, more!

Girl crush.

What is it about gals n' guns? This saucy riflewoman makes period reproduction costumes that have serious history geek cred.

In related news, I spent most of my afternoon going through two plastic garbage bags full of Victorian clothing that was rather unceremoniously donated to the museum where I work. While the idea of cramming these little (literally, almost nothing over a modern size 0!) masterpieces into garbage bags kinda makes me want to vomit, most of them were in pretty great condition....over the next few weeks I will be working on cleaning, repairing, preserving, photographing, and archiving them. You'll be able to follow my progress with the collection on my other blog, which I'll be starting up this week. A lot of work? Yessssss. Super-fun? Yessssss! Seriously. This is what I live for.

This seems silly...

...As I'm pretty sure I haven't got any readers, but, just in case I do, there have been some rather significant changes to my blog.

1. The name. Since part of my job as curator/publicist of a national historic site is building a website and blogging, and I'll be blogging as "the Curator" (whoo-hoo-hoo! Look who knows so much!), I decided to rename my personal blog something a little less pretentious and a little more...um...painfully dorky?
2. The intent. Originally this was going to be a photo-journal, and, while I still like the thought of documenting my life visually (outfit posts! Wheee!), turns out I suck at it. So, in the name of getting this pretty little zeppelin off the ground, I'm just going to post whatever I find interesting enough to keep my attention for the next thirty seconds.
3. The format. I upgraded! Its super-pretty! Yay me!
4. That's it.

Speaking of spiders...

This is Big Mama. She is the guardian of the water spigot in my garden. Gardening has never been my strong suit, not least because, while I find spiders compelling and beautiful in a controlled environment (What? That exists?), in the chaos of their natural habitat THEY COULD BE ANYWHERE. And, usually, they are. Especially the baby ones. While I fully realize the ridiculosity of a grown woman who is so terrified by the sudden appearance of something that tiny that she is compelled to jump and flail around the shrubberies shouting random obscenities and leading the neighbors to conclude that she must suffer from some form of gardening tourettes (poor dear), I'm still completely unhinged by them. I much prefer the relative slowness and predictability of Big Mama, even if I do find her staring a bit unnerving every time I go to water the raspberries.


EDIT: Apparently Big Mama is a boy spider. So, good for him. Since Big Papa might just be the sleazeballest name ever, I am going to call him Bernard.

Dream on...

When I took my current job, part of my salary was a house. Amazing, right? To compound my wonderment, the house in question is a tiny 1800s all-American fairy tale cottage; a one story, two bedroom (one serves as my studio, at least in theory), two porch, black and cream fully landscaped shangri-la. Ok, so the garden is a little "lush", and bristling with spiders, and the insulation is still horsehair and plaster, the closet space is non-existant, and the whole house needs fresh paint....but its still undeniably lovely. And its mine. While a full overhaul is financially out of the question, I can at least dream of the things I want to fill it with!

To start things off with a bang, a couple of genius reworked Victorian plates. Chewie, of course.......And Gizmo! What better way to temper taste and refinement than with shameless nostalgia?

The most perfect little pet bed...I forget where this photo originated, but half the charm of this idea is that it would be an easy (and so worth it!) DIY. Vintage suitcase + claw feet + comfy graphic pillow = love.

From Anthropologie, a gorgeously graphic gold rimmed charger, and....
...A sweetly mod little cache pot.
The iconic British WWI morale poster...for the kitchen, I think!
An amazingly cool vintage print from the most delightfully random Etsy shop ever.
And last but not least, the Andrea rug from Ikea, which I have been stalking for years now...like walking on clouds at sunset.
Pffft! I should just save up and buy it already!