carved oak farm animals dad made

dad carved oak farm animals, one every now and then, over thirty or forty years.  thirty or forty years before that he had his own real animals on the family farm on five mile road in michigan.  his cow was named bessie.  his father was a professional photographer before becoming a "gentleman farmer." so i guess he probably took the picture.

merry christmas!

christina's christmas dinner table

i really love to shop in dollar stores and in chinatown for charming old fashioned things- not kitschy stuff but handmade things or things that seem like they might have come from an old country store. i make a lot of acquisitions for christmas stocking stuffers.  i found the red and green pencils 20 for a dollar and added aluminum pencil sharpeners (6/$1.) with replaceable blades, and cute kickerland dice erasers (6/$1.) i got at a charity shop.

the bamboo (sustainable!) cooking forks and spoons came in packs for $1.50 each and so did the cotton dish towels

early christmas morning, main street, annapolis.

in chinatown roman candles were 50 cents each- good gift with $2. sturdy metal fire extinguisher lighters!

misc

hunter s thompson and i enjoyed 2 bottles of champagne and a bloody mary while occupying the north pole at santacon south street seaport.  i was lucky to have been very slightly and tangentially acquainted with jim rouse who conceived and built south street seaport (and columbia maryland and baltimore's inner harbor and... )

jim rouse came from relatively humble eastern shore maryland, and though he became one of america's richest men his vision and dream was to help keep the american promise of upward mobility alive.  if jim rouse had developed liberty square i'm sure he would have sympathized with the occupation.

nomad cambridge

store windows i did for nomad in cambridge massachusetts.

america's long war in iraq is at last officially over.  a friend served, and a friend's husband served. part of their story is here.

update: christopher hitchens, who supported the war, has died the day after it's end. a friend of mine knew him slightly.

RIP? since he was never big on rest or peace, it doesn't seem right to wish it for him.  i've got the same feeling i had when teddy kennedy died- the world's lost one of it's giant characters,  passionate humanitarian... charming rhetorical pugilist... and it's a little less fun.

from mackapar

a little  colonial shed half a block down from mom and dad's house in annapolis.  it's part of a(n?) historic property that once belonged to francis scott key's uncle. francis scott key spent summers there as a kid. he later witnessed the revolutionary war battle of baltimore about which he wrote the poem that became the united states national anthem.

birthday flowers from deb!

THANK YOU deb, meg and mary!!!

annapolis, this morning

evolution now padlock necklaces

 a series of necklaces- old watch chains and fobs with tiny antique working padlocks.
available here