summer is for picnics

i think there is no better date than a summertime picnic. last night i joined a favorite handsome fellow for a sunset picnic in church hill. we ate delicious foods and watched the sun disappear behind the city.

the sky turned the loveliest of colors and fireflies twinkled.

ah, summertime, you're the best.

au revoir simone at the met

david black takes beautiful photos. i'm particularly fond of this shoot he did with the lovely ladies of au revoir simone at the met.

he also directed this beautiful video their song 'all or nothing.' i'm in love with the french version.

Au Revoir Simone "All or Nothing" (French Version) from DAVID BLACK on Vimeo.

huckleberry wanderlust

oh my. after a lovely long weekend of magic and fun in the city, i'm finding it ridiculously difficult to concentrate on simple tasks like thesis research. i'd rather be embarking on more summer adventures.

the truth is, i do have quite the adventure on the horizon, which increases my wanderlust and consequent inability to be productive right about now.

speaking of adventures, i don't know these boys, but i'm thinking i ought to. apparently, last summer they built a raft and huckleberry finned it down the james river for several weeks.

Going Nowhere Slow from Least Most on Vimeo.

that looks like a bona-fide summer adventure if you ask me.

away we go

i'm off the big apple for a weekend of fun in the city, friends.

planning on catching a free yeasayer show on governor's island, seeing my long lost sisterlove, attending a birthday party, making new friends, hitting some museums, and eating lots of delicious foods.

hope you have a lovely weekend and magical june adventures!

ps. photo from the u.s. national archives' flickr. lots of treasures there, folks.

lost and found

yesterday my sister sent me this photo she found of my mom and her siblings taken on easter sunday, sometime in the early 1950s i'd guess. i love stumbling across old gems like this. my dad raised my sister and i as a single parent, so these types of treasures feel like a special sneak peak into a world i never knew.

my mom is on the far left, and i love the sweet, but perhaps a little secretive (?), smile she's wearing.

i also love their fancy easter hats. so lovely.

homemade maraschino cherries?

yes please.

apparently, they're not as sticky candy sweet as those old jarred ones found in the shirley temples of our youth, but are actually quite delish.

can't wait to try these.

image via

adieu, mrs. bourgeois

i was quite saddened this morning to hear of the death of louise bourgeois at 98 years old.

though her work went unnoticed until she was 70 years old, today bourgeois is recognized as one of the most influential woman and feminist artists of the twentieth century.

stumbling across her work when i was 18 years old forever changed my thoughts about art and its power to change the world. in a way that was playful, yet charged, bourgeois made emotional topics of pain, fear, loss, death, gender and sexuality her subject matter during an era that clearly favored the masculine and the non-subjective.

she always challenged the status quo and spoke out about the male dominated art world in a manner that was brave and momentous.

bravo, mrs. bourgeois, you'll be missed.

(photo of bourgeois by robert mapplethorpe.)