muerto de risa

hungry?

last weekend i took a chinese cooking class with ning.

we made smoked tofu lettuce wraps, seafood soup, and tofu stuffed with ppork and shrimp.

above is a finished lettuce wrap and below are various stages of making the stuffed tofu.

the stuffed tofu was delicious but my favorite part about the recipe is that it came to ning in a dream while on vacation in mexico.  specific ingredients apperared in her dreams two nights in a row and when she returned to colorado she made it for her husband who loved it.  she normally doesn't dream.

once the tofu was filled with stuffing it was steamed in chicken broth and gobbled up too fast to take pictures.

same with the seafood soup.

yum.

i can knit in the round!

i finally moved beyond scarfs.

2 easy hats: one baby-sized and one husband-sized.

any ideas for other easy projects?  i'm thinking of attempting felted slippers.

i received a few requests for photos of my haircut; i'll try and take one this week but it is pretty much the same as always, just a little longer on top.

have a great week!

mushrooms!!!!!!!!!!!

my a fanciful twist mushrooms arrived this week.  they are my favorite new toy.  i love moving them around and seeing how they look in different spots in our apartment.

right now they are living on the bookshelf in our main room.  i think they like to read almost as much as i do.

vanessa also sent me a packet of her lovely postcards.  thank you vanessa!!!!!!!!

the art in the above photo is an original piece by jen corace (top), a postcard advertising a show in soho by josh george (bottom left), and a metal postcard reporduction of a piece by eduardo chillida (bottom right) bought during our honeymoon in spain. 

there is a fabulous museum dedicated to chillida's work located a short drive from the city of san sebastian.  it consists of an outdoor sculpture garden and an old farmhouse which holds some works on paper and smaller sculptures. 

if i could be anywhere right now i might choose to go back to san sebastian, where i could eat fabulous food, drink txakoli (a basque white wine with light bubbles), visit the chillida museum, search out the chillida sculptures above, and maybe find my first wedding ring (which was lost at the beach).

instead, i will go get a haircut.

have a great weekend!

Happy Birthday Neil!

            

It seems like only yesterday you were turning 66.  Happy 67th!

fool's gold

i wish the 13-year-old me had owned a copy of fool's gold.  penny, the protagonist, would be my hero.  maybe, she still is.  penny is a 15-year-old fashion designer/activist who makes it her mission to end the reign of male jerks at her high school while strutting around in adorable handmade outfits.  AND she lives in colorado.

 

we recently went to a little talk given by the artist and author of fool's gold, amy reeder hadley.  amy (a colorado native) never drew comics before she fell in love with the first volume of rising stars of manga.  eight months later (after teaching herself to draw manga) she entered the rising stars contect and was a runner-up.  after that she was offered a three book deal with tokyopop.  crazy.

 

now amy's working on a new series for vertigo called madame xanadu.  she also spends a lot of time drawing in her fan's copies of fool's gold.  find out more about fool's gold, madame xanadu, and amy at her website.

le look risa

le look cosy et british (boy do i love french!  especially phrases that describe something british.)

mélange de récup' et de charme

un coin de la cuisine en rose dragée

une cabane pour les amis (what a perfect little guest house!)

waste away your day looking at these images and more at marie claire maison.

a house, a legend, and a horse-like elephant

last weekend we finally made it to denver's museum of contemporary art.  i've heard mixed reviews of the museum's new building.  i really liked it.  and the museum in general.  i especially loved the maori art house by rangi kipa. 

i particularly liked how the color popped against the white.

my favorite piece, however, was legend, a video installation by artist, candice breitz.  she filmed 30 jamaicans singing the songs on bob marley's legend album.  each person was filmed separately but the videos are all shown together.  the result is fascinating.  i enjoyed hearing how the voices meshed (when we walked into the museum we thought we heard a live choir) and how the participants moved and "interacted" with the others.

overall, i liked how the art in the museum was accessible to folks who like art, but may not have degrees in art history.  i do like to be challenged, but during a recent visit to the new new museum in new york, i found i was challenged to the point of not being able to enjoy many of the pieces for which i wasn't provided an explanation.

the exhibit we saw there was called, unmonumental: the object in the 21st century and consisted of sculptures made with found objects.  overall, it was interesting to see how the work in an established and prestigious museum looked a lot like "outsider" art sculpture, providing one more argument for why the term "outsider art" may not be a valid one.  some of the pieces, however, were very difficult to understand.  it's interesting that the photos shown on the museum's website are all of more accessible pieces, such as elefant by isa genzken (above).  this sculpture reminded my mom of a creature in a child's room who comes alive once the lights are turned off.  she was thinking of a horse.  it seems isa was thinking of a pachyderm.

baskets are for boys AND girls

ever wonder about how the sun and moon appear and disappear each morning and night?  the answer can be found in the feminist and oh so groovy children's book, amy and the cloud basket.  published in 1975, the book is the story of amy mclune, who bucks the gender roles in the town of pan. 

instead of wanting to spoon clouds on and off the sun and moon as the females of pan traditionally do, she wants a basket to collect the clouds.  at first the men of pan are outraged that a girl would even think of asking for a basket.  eventually, everyone realizes that each person should be able to choose their role in the cloud changing process.  thank you amy mclune!

i highly suggest clicking on the photos to get an even better look at the far out clothing and hair worn by the citizens of pan.  the book is an homage to bell-bottom overalls.

amy and the cloud basket was published by lollipop power press, a feminist publishing collective based in north carolina.  you can buy your own copy for only $88.95 (!!!).  my crumbling copy is not for sale.

teddy love

this is teddy.  when my mother was young, teddy kept her company.  when i was young, she played with me.  she enjoyed borrowing my old dresses, one of which she still likes to wear.  ever since she lost her mouth, teddy doesn't say much.  she never stopped giving great hugs. 

and she always looks up at me when i talk to her.

teddy is totally bald except for a few patches of fur, the largest of which is located on her upper left leg.  her back has been stitched to hold in what's left of her stuffing.  some bears might find this photo shocking, but teddy loves her body.  she is not modest.

teddy wanted to appear on my blog ever since she saw shula's teddy.

there are few things as endearing as a well-loved stuffie.

what i want for dinner tonight...

*soba-ya early bird special

(sometimes jordan and i wish we lived in florida so we could frequent the early bird specials with all of the other old fogies.  dinner at 4:30pm sounds perfect to me.)