Sunday, December 30, 2007

the hour draws nigh.

have you come up with your resolution(s) yet?

i haven't. last year my resolution was to be amused. (and i have been. in part, thanks to many of you bloggers.)

this year...

the only thing i can muster "umph" about is resolving to practice loud and obnoxious behavior. like the cranky ninety year old cuss that i sometimes feel i am.

but i'm still thinking.

in case i can't come up with anything else, i'm sorry for 2008 in advance.

p.s. i found this post about old people and liked it.
p.p.s. i really really like old people who do whatever they want. like they EARNED freedom of expression. and i really like when multiple generations live in the same household. and i really love that my abuelita has very nicely manicured hands and she always pats the seat next to her for me to sit down so she can scratch my back. oh and my other grandma? she collects expensive perfume and comments about the good looking men she hires to work in her yard. and O'lover's grandma Lillian? She tried to teach us how to play bridge last week. She has a lifetime of strategy up her sleeve. She's also a bird watcher. And anyone trying to mess with their natural habitat...may they be forewarned. 'cause Lillian, the daughter of the late honorable Judge Young, has connections and will direct the righteous lawsuits to hail down from heaven. and clobber the greedy bastards.
PART 2:reunited with gorgeous Wenderful at long last! when we first got there, everyone was on the dance floor. then the evening entertainment graduated to the talent night after party. we're talkin' about the kind of talent that makes your jaw drop (and made me strangle-hold the couch pillow in a fit of awe and utmost jealousy.)
I met Wenderful (btw, not her real name) when she was in the rock star betties. Then we lived together at the Art Front warehouse. here Wenderful and her sister Mel (also a good friend) are jerryrigging a capo for Wenderful's groom, B-Dunn.Wenderful is part of the Mormon Von Trapp family (note: they would never call themselves that, but i just want you to understand!) these guys write their own music. and switch instruments like my sister and i switch outfits, anytime, anywhere. Mel (to the right) and her cute husband Jason (not pictured) were in the band Desmo.- this is a link to the song "temporary baby".

we were listening to their amazingness and requesting favorite songs until we finally left well after 1 am.


And since this post needs a pic of Wenderful in her wedding dress... i love her! thanks to Wenderful and all for the great FUN!

when we got back to the lime green cottage O'lover felt renewed to work on projects, like installing can lights. i felt renewed to watch. and think about how my man looks like a 70's cop. with those sunglasses. and the side burns. sigh.
xo,
quel
PART 1:

the sniffling, sneezing, sore throat, coughing, aching, stuffy head, fever, sleep better to feel better medicine...has nothing to do with this post.


But O'lover was sick. and i was tired. Which meant...cringe...we missed out...shudder. we sorely missed her solstice party, and his solstice party, and Tom and Faye Parker's solstice party, and their Christmas party. all of these festivities were on the same night and we had been so excited to make the rounds. ah well.

the next day slick roads and general malaise would again conspire against us but we were not going to miss out on Wenderful's St. George wedding reception as I had already missed her New York city nuptials. So after shaking my fists at the snow falling from the sky and jutting out my chin in defiance of all that would keep us cozily in bed, the O'lover and I downed some cod liver oil cure-all - the essence of fisherman's wharf in a bottle - and got in the volvo.

on the way south we stopped at this charming place. (you must see the inside, full of art!)
we chatted with owner Bob (organizer of the Mt. Pleasant rhubarb festival) and also bought two crates of spirits and gourmet vinegar. then we visited our eyes were dazzled by... this is where we purchased Wenderful's wedding gift. the must have for every kitchen, a Joe Bennion honey pot. with no more delay we made it to the reception.

Friday, December 21, 2007

when we bought our pioneer house we thought the first thing we'd do was paint the exterior. we collected every color sample from home depot, lowe's, kwall's, jones paint and glass.

and then we bought this book.
and this book.
and this one.
and...
yup.
even after road trips to collect grasses and take pix of the mountains in certain light, and jenny n, (our neighborhood's resident interior designer) driving me all over trying to trigger a "YES!" and ollie and i taking pics in the avenues and sugarhouse...

our house is still this color.i call it lime sherbet.

A lovely 97 year old woman named Florence Curtis lived here before us. She was a bridge player, on the beautification committee for downtown provo, her birthday was the same day as our anniversary, she went skydiving when she was in her eighties. her husband passed away in this house. and seven years ago when "paint your heart out" offered to paint her house she refused to let anyone select a new color.

it has always been the same shade.

and bless Florence, it might always remain. the truth is it's grown on me.

anyone need to borrow some paint books??

Thursday, December 20, 2007

On what I don't normally talk about

we're using the holidays and family coming into town as an impetus to get things done around here. while ollie is doing electrical work, which involves repeatedly turning the power on and off, i've had to take a break from my construction projects. i've lit the house with candles. and i've lounged in the hot tub three times already.

and now my pores are open.

maybe the steam has gotten to my head.

because i'm going to talk about religion. which is a matter that I DO NOT DISCUSS openly, much.

first let me say, i am a product of "this" culture (whatever that means...). i am a product of provo. i love the concept of "zion". know that concept? then i'm talking mostly to you.

as a kid (and beyond) i always wanted to have my oil ready in my lamp. just in case. i lived at the edge of my seat, an automaton for God. and then it gets weird...when everyone else was living the high life during their teen age years...i was volunteering to restock library books and help clean academy square on saturdays. when everyone else was going to parties and experimenting with life, i was reading about the dead sea scrolls, i had already read the old testament, every single word (several times as i kept wanting to get more out of it when it was just inducing deep sleep), i had read the BOM (and mostly enjoyed it) six times by the time i was 19, and of course hungered and thirsted after all hugh nibley, everything about polygamy and polyandry, journals of zina huntington smith young, journals of other early pioneer women, much of the journals of discourse, anything about the school of the prophets, richard bushman, fawn brodie, leonard arrington, YOU CAN SKIM OVER THIS LIST, miracle of forgiveness, the teachings and writings of spencer w. kimball, wilford woodruff's prophesies of doom, Jesus the Christ, of course the doctrine and covenants, the pearl of great price, and then i got a hold of software with the entire LDS library on it. i did topic research. i loved righteousness and mysticism and prophets. some of what i found had me in tears. i tried to bend my will to the doctrine as best as i could understand the law of sacrifice, etc. etc.

because i wanted that oil. for my lamp.

i cried when peers would take up smoking. i would argue with patricia anana krakoviak, the only polish catholic at provo high. i was a member missionary and really really really wanted her to convert. she entertained my arguments but never caved. she later became the youngest graduate from BYU, still a catholic.

i gave people spices for their food storage as presents. because people tend to overlook the spices.

and during much of this time...I ONLY LISTENED TO THE SOUNDTRACK OF OUR HEAVENLY FATHER'S PLAN over and over and over.

oh and some Erasure. because i wasn't completely crazy.

all these years later, after continually feeding my obsession with mormon history classes, a stint in the mormon history association, rubbing shoulders with many great teachers. having michael quinn to my house for dinner. having janice allred lend me her book about heavenly mother (it was too dense for me). Missing my favorite history professor who was fired from BYU, because he only went to church every other week making him less than fully active (as the story goes). having more than half of my friends leave the church...and i argued and pleaded with them to stay.

my heart has been broken. in several directions. because i LOVE conviction. I'm most comfortable being in conviction.

but i've since mostly put things aside. and wonder.

now i'm practicing listening to myself. instead of deferring to what an "authority" says, i ask myself "what do you think about this or that?" And then i get to find out!

i am blessed to have a hugely supportive husband. who trusts my process. even when i haven't trusted it, when i've been in the absolute thick of IT, he doesn't worry or try to correct. or even worse get hurt and defensive.

enough.

wow, i feel authentic. many of you already know all of the above. but, i steer clear of all "this", still sensitive subject. and anyway when i do tell you you don't believe i was ever this hyper religious (and way more....you can ask amy or my sister, use the code word "abbey").

soooo much love and BEST WISHES for you & your process,

quel, off to nurse a tequila...JUST KIDDING, gosh.

Monday, December 17, 2007

We're all busy, no? Introducing a new concept...abbreviated blogging! Perfect for the hectic holidays. It's a snap! The idea is to post pix with minimal commentary. yay for off the hook easy!
Advent tag at Susan KB's house.
Susan B Awesome and i went to the Brian Kershisnik lecture at the BYU MOA. Funkalicious at Cherie's house.
Alex Caldiero at Gallery OneTen.
Susan KB. love love love her! i need more of her please...so here's more!
The Big A pretends he's Max (Reo and Liz's cat).
Christmas party at Ashley Sander's house in SLC. my heart is still warm...

This post is dedicated to Teresa, who sometimes gets tired of words because she proofreads all day, and who I really wish would start her own blog.

xo,
quel

Sunday, December 16, 2007

Mr T, aka the LIGHT OF MY LIFE, just celebrated
birthday numero uno!

The kickoff party was with a bunch of med students. (I don't recognize this lot.) He went from lap to lap opening gifts. Then the next day Mr T chilled at the dinosaur museum. Notice the man in the background. I have nicknamed him "peter" as in pan as in i never want to grow up and am way too intently diggin' up some pretend dino bones.
In a mere five days Mr T will be having yet another birthday shindig...HERE! in Provo, Utah. in our cozy lime green cottage, next door to sir whistler and across the street from the man who hikes the Y everyday, and just over the alley from the guy who's married to his upteenth wife, and around the corner from the bonnie lady whom we call "the treatmeister" because she just won't stop giving us TREATS (once she left an antique swiss spinning wheel on our back step).

love,
Mr. T's auntie quellie who can't hardly wait

p.s. thanks for the pix Chris!

Saturday, December 15, 2007

I LOVE ART...
...THIS MUCH!

"Hey Ollie?"

"Yeah."

"I just kissed a bronze dude."

"Hmm."

"Are you going to beat him up?"

"I'm going to have to melt him down."

Monday, December 10, 2007

Vignettes Gone Wild
new discovery! the effects menu on iphoto. i'm partial to the vignette effect.
Jason is one of our house guests. this is a two month old pic. his beard is a lot longer now. kinda like "beards gone wild"...this sometimes happens after graduating from BYU. He's been staying with us since he finished his internship at Aprovecho in Oregon. Ashley Sanders has written about him on her fabulous "project deseret" blog. He's the catalyst for two of her posts. Jason is really smart. and funny. and tells it like it is. which usually results in a good laugh.
O'lover wicked up some fritatas for our house guests. yum to the 10th!

Natalee doing contact improv at the tea party on tuesday.
Annalisa is teaching me how to dye wool. Who knew it could be so dangerous? She also taught me how to cross country ski this past week. Who knew it could be so addictive?
Colby took this pic during gallery stroll. Amy and I are standing in front of one of Connie's paintings.

Well, that's the week in review. Someday I'm going to document a week and tell you every gory detail. Like how Saturday night past 1:00 a.m. I thought i would die if i couldn't go cross country skiing right that very second. O'lover held me until the shaking stopped. I really need to find my own gear.

Sunday, December 9, 2007

R.I.P. Pyracantha
Last night, while trekking back to the coop to tuck our hens in, we discovered that our twelve foot tall Pyracantha had fallen during the snow storm.
It was a good bush...sigh...but its nickname was "fire thorn" for a reason...kept us watching our step...

After garnishing our wreath, I wondered what else we can do with the berries... Pyracantha jelly? Wiki says they're not poisonous...

so long old friend. our backyard will look a little naked without you.

Friday, December 7, 2007

Sitting in the kitchen, waiting for a peach cobbler to come out of the oven...Is it just me or are our computers kissing? How very indecent! They're not even the same species! Not to play into the apple vs. pc debate but James sometimes swears at his laptop while my sweet laptop gets nothing but love from me.

So tonight O'lover and I braved the rain and went on the gallery stroll. We met up with James at Coleman Studios. And...huh...it's only occurring to me right now that we forgot our car downtown. James gave us a ride home after three hours of meeting up with people and looking at art. And we did a lot of shopping too.

Here's a pic of the Gallery One.Ten where we emptied our wallets at their Art Market.
James and Alfred strike a pose at the new Muse Cafe.
Rebecca and Ryan Neely celebrated their one year anniversary for MODE boutique today. Congrats! i just offered them some work as gallery stroll coordinators. they said "yes!" They will take the gallery stroll to a new level.
Maht and Liz Paulos at their shop, Coal Umbrella. Today was the grand opening. The place looks amazing!
Ok, the following couple/partners in Coal Umbrella... They are so cute it stings. I never remember their names because I'm so distracted by their hair. There must be a way to splice my hair genes with theirs so my kids have an improved chance of getting some curls.
Fun people. Great art. And this wasn't even the half of it.
Tonight is going to be the BEST night 'cause the downtown provo gallery stroll has expanded to include 5 new venues! i'm starting at gallery one.ten and then working my way north.

hope to see YOU there!

Thursday, December 6, 2007

If a post just magically appeared EVERYDAY, without any effort from me, then you'd probably already know about the Doggie Crime Wave of December '07.

We woke up to find my wooden hair brush gnawed to bits. luckily there was plenty of DNA, or actually slobber, to identify the wrongdoer. Soon after we found that said culprit also chewed the side of my built-in wardrobe and munched the clasps off of some innocent and very pretty bras --forcing them into early retirement.

And then, the second worst offense to date, was captured on surveillance cameras. And this crime was PREMEDITATED. Look at the doggie scoping out the luscious snowpeople. You know what he's thinking... yes, he really did run over and PEE on her snowwoman.

happily, posts don't tell everything about every day's events, or else you'd also know about the Duck Assault of November (Pewter is doing fine now). and you would not want to see what remains of the famous Yoga Mat Massacre of last October.

No sentence has been pronounced but let me tell you. sometimes when Farmer barks to be let back in the house i make him wait a millisecond longer than i ought to. which i guess makes us both guilty as charged.

and yes, the dog has loads of chew toys. there's no excuse for that waving mouth of snapping teeth.

Sunday, December 2, 2007

When it comes to attending a lecture by someone fantastic (Michael Pollan). who wrote a few books i really like (The Botany of Desire, The Omnivores Dilemma). about a topic that the O'lover is obsessed with (FOOD)...i make it my duty to scooch my chair up..and lean forward...and stick my leg out. So there's no mistaking that I am indeed the CLOSEST audience member.
me and Michael...ahhhh...Many thanks to my grandma-in-law Lillian. Besides being a constant inspiration (she is a very strong woman and environmental activist) she is the matriarch of the family I so luckily married into. Oh! And she also provides the hot item tickets to the author series up at Sundance.

signed,
star struck and clutching my autographed copy

Saturday, December 1, 2007

We're going to have a simple holiday. We haven't even put up a tree. Our new tradition is to slow down. almost to a metabolic halt.
image from the New York Times Thanks to RH who recently sent me a link to this article.

In the old days, when humans were in sync with the seasons, before the madness of alarm clocks and every hour of every day needing to be accounted for, people would pile up with each other and their live stock and snooze away the winter months. Fast forward a bunch of years later and i for one am still feeling the lure of hibernation. My strong impulse is to squirrel a medley of nuts in my cheeks and bury myself in the hay with anything that gives off some heat.

It's time for a big SLEEP!

And big dreams. And losing oneself in the flow of music, art, anything, without regard for schedules and lists.

Last night, O'lover and I went to the Messiah Sing-In. I got caught up in the truths of all those exquisitely expressed notes of music. The heroic journey of both Christ and Handel (the composer) renews my faith in suffering, in emotion, in hallelujahs, and riding the waves of it all. And by the last "amen" I felt like i had been granted a bonus life time.
Walking home from the concert...pretty, ey?

xoxo,
quel

Tuesday, November 27, 2007

Dear Reader,
Do you have any friends that in your eyes could ne'er do wrong? That no matter WHAT you ADORE them?
Well, my talented, brilliant, and idealistic friend Ardell has merited "pedestal status" for ETERNITY.

Ardell has probably had more influence on me than just about anybody.
If she says, "start composting" I say "how high." haha.
no really.
If Ardell says "plastic is tacky." I say, "hmmm...a wooden toothbrush. right on. "
I can trace many of my favorite habits and preferences back to Ardell.
A free lance editor by trade, she places emphasis on organization and coordination of everything. If Ardell takes you under her wing, your paper/manual/whatever will read flawlessly and she will facilitate breakthroughs you never imagined possible. I wish I could take a peek in her brain to see how she's filed away all those hundreds of dissertations she's written cough cough i mean "edited." I swear, she deserves some honorary degrees for her rewriting cough cough i mean "editing."
Thanks to Andi, for hosting the very fun Ardell-is-in-town party.
In this pic Ardell has just earnestly sought input on an OCD color project she's doing.
This is her precious daughter with moi. Darling Miss M was born the day before Gallery OneTen opened its doors. It's how I remember the age of the gallery.
Ardell lives on six steep acres in a tall house in a narrow Colorado canyon. Very picturesque.
If Ardell's location choice could be settled by a good game of tug of war... I would win! because no matter what i would not let go of my end of the rope until she was BACK because...I wish Ardell were around always.

signed,
girl tearing up the cottage looking for a non blurry pic of Ardell to accompany this post.

Thursday, November 22, 2007

Happy (full)filling Thanksgiving Y'all!

After the family feast O'lover and I retreated to our cozy home for an important session of some long overdue truth telling about a matter as significant as any other matter...What do you want for Christmas?

But first. really quickly, i'm putting on my gratitude attitude for a stream of consciousness what-i'm-thankful-for list:

-O'lover's kindness and strength
-my family. They're good people.
-thoughtful friends
-folks who extend themselves to make things better
-the word "rucksack" and random words strung together
-pretty door bell rings
-homeopathic meds
-hot homemade applesauce (apples from our tree) with walnuts (gathered from the park)
-living outside of the rat race
-the clicking of knitting needles & whirrrrrhummm of the sewing machine
-"Pushing Daisies" on www.abc.com
-and to go full circle...I'm so so grateful for O'lover, the holiday season. and the fact that what we want for Christmas is delicious times with delicious people sprinkled with some "good will for all" on top.

But, hey if we must have gifts (and admittedly we must)...i'm voting for original art or anything homemade or used.

What do you think about "concocting" gifts from materials at hand rather than buying them? Raw truth please.

Tuesday, November 20, 2007

The Provo Downtown Alliance has been asked to take on the flowerbeds on Center Street this next year. With our currently very modest budget this new mandate has been...entertaining. Because you just have to laugh when more and more (and more) is expected of a very small staff. I joked and said we should resort to casting zucchini seeds. Zucchinis have flowers...
Little did I know how truly brilliant this idea was until roaming the streets of Chicago! Vegetables! I wish I had more pix. But there was cabbage, broccoli, chili peppers, rainbow chard, arugula, and other leafy greens EVERYWHERE. It looked beautiful and for the survivalists...there's no security like food security.
What do you think? Pray tell!