how i was driven to spain

long about the last time i blogged, i was having drinks with some friends one evening. i believe i was drinking manhattans, in case you're interested. they came in a really cool glass, and a makers mark manhattan was only $5. i love the brick. carlo was talking about his upcoming trip to italy and i was getting mighty jealous. my daughter robin had been talking endlessly about her upcoming entire-summer-long trip to most of europe and i was already jealous of that. all my life i've wanted to spend lots of time traveling, but what with not being so footloose and fancy free, i've always said no to that. you know, kids to raise, mortgage to pay, greeting cards to design, corporate egos to stroke. (i was terrible at that last one.) anyway, you know, one excuse after the other.

robin would be meeting up with friends in every country she was visiting except spain, so eventually with the help of those manhattans and the encouragement of my friends, a fairly subversive seed was planted. why not go to spain? with my eldest daughter. who speaks spanish.

to make a long story short, that's exactly what i did. at first robin may have been a little uneasy with the suggestion, but she came around. her hesitation was understandable. just for starters she thinks 3:00 a.m. is a reasonable time to go to bed and noon is a reasonable time to get up. plus, we had never traveled together, or even spent two entire weeks just the two of us. as it turns out, we're pretty great traveling buddies, and the spanish way of life pretty much dictated that i get into the late night/late morning schedule. (one morning we tried to get an earlyish-start and found that, except at the bus station, there was no place to have our cafe con leche until 9:30 or 10:00.) during the whole trip there was only one "moment," and that turned out to be a good thing.

so we went to barcelona, granada, gibraltar, tangier, cadiz and jerez de la frontera, with a couple of side trips. i could have stayed another two or three weeks or years, especially in southern spain. it reminded me of back home in california. i guess it's time for me to learn spanish.

here are a few snaps from barcelona:

surreal flowers and rock wall, parc guell

mosaic and stone wall in parc guelle

pipes and stickers at a bus stop

graffiti on stairs in sagrada famillia

flowers and wall at montjuic

i can't believe it's been 5 months since i blogged

well, just a quick update on the last post:

1. sold

2. sold

3. sold

4. two left

5. sold

6. i'm keeping this one

7. in use

8. can't for the life of me remember where i put it, but i scored some even cooler l.p.s which i can't name since they're christmas presents for someone who might read this, beanie...

9. in the kitchen, waiting to be useful, but also reminding me of when i was in school. i also used press on type for my projects. yes. i'm that old.

10. sold

welcome back!

10 favorite finds o' the day...

...in no particular order.

1. huge framed map of the major roads in and around kansas city.

2. 2 framed, signed hammerpress posters.

3. 1 framed letterpress poster commemorating patsy cline's election into the country music hall of fame.

4. several unframed letterpress posters from various concerts.

5. a bunch of seashells.

6. 1 letterpress hatch show print poster featuring lots of chickens.

7. about 8 rolls of scotch tape for 25 cents a piece.

8. a vinyl l.p. of u2's 1983 album "war."

9. a proportion wheel.

10.complete set of vintage tupperware canisters.

long time gone

my handful of fans have been asking me why i've been neglecting my blog. the answer is easy. i've acquired a serious junking habit. to the point that my junking buddy and i have promised to call each other when the urge is overwhelming. junkers anonymous, anyone? however, i cheated today so here's a blog entry to atone.

it transpired innocently enough. at breakfast this morning, some friends and i were discussing venues for scoring the best junk. they shared some of their favorite spots, and mentioned they occasionally get some good deals on craig's list. i regularly hit the thrift stores, plus since it's spring, lots of estate sales and garage sales. occasionally i'll hop in the car and explore other cities. but i never thought craig's list would have things at a price cheap enough to buy for resale. when i got home, and since today is gray and gloomy and i didn't feel like doing much, i thought, what the hey, i'll see what craig's list has to offer.

well, by damn! there were some pretty cute little end tables for a pretty great price. so, off i drove to lenexa for a look-see.

man. a. live. the guy's house turned out to be mid-century heaven. a gorgeous red wood a-frame crammed--and i mean crammed--with treasures i never even knew existed. he's a mid-century maniac. in his spare time. his real job is doing some kind of weird scientific research at k.u. med center. i didn't dare ask for potentially frightening details. his house is not only furnished top to bottom with mid-century stuff he's acquired through all the usual sources plus ebay, his "office" is really more of a store room for even more couches, chairs, lamps (with to-die-for lamp shades), mushroom shaped stools, tables, desks, wall art, light fixtures, and the like that he intends on selling or using for barter. the garage is more of the same. he was rattling off designer names at a rate i couldn't begin to keep up with. of course, i'm standing there salivating and calculating and feeling like the rank amateur i am.

it was so great talking shop with the guy. turns out he bought two heywood-wakefield end tables i saw at an estate sale a couple of weeks ago, not for the original (outrageous) price of $900/pair but a much more reasonable $300-ish. the junking world apparently is small. and awesomely fun.

so, in addition to the end tables, i ended up buying a couple of other things from him to sell at the mine. was the cheating worth it? you betcha.

here are the tables:

sweet, no? they'll be at urban mining the weekend of june 4!

a treatise on the use of umbrellas as garnish

from faraway california, i received this photo from my sister-in-law and friend corby. the luscious face in the background is my daughter, beanie. and i think the umbrellas are completely cute. i don't know what's in the "eastertini" but i suspect it's tequila since that's corby's liquor of choice.

so, the umbrellas. i seriously think in the day and age of "mad men" they need to make a comeback as a drink garnish. of course not for the mad men themselves, but for their furious women! with a little valium on the side.

not much of a treatise, and i think i might have been swayed by all sorts of love and gushiness, but my next drink will feature an umbrella.

p.s. yes, beanie is of drinking age.

a fancier vodka & lemonade

my friend katherine posted the other day that she was looking forward to her favorite summer drink, vodka and lemonade. the mad mixologist took that as a challenge to develop something just a bit fancier for her since she's graduated from some pretty fancy schools. so, i promptly went to my kitchen, got distracted and mixed up something with pomegranate instead. so, just a day or so later, here's kat scratch fever (name thanks to the venerable katherine bontrager houlehan).

1.0 oz freshly squeezed lemon juice, strained

1/2 oz simple syrup

1.0 oz vodka

1/2 oz cointreau

sparkling water

lemon wedge

add first four ingredients to a shaker half-filled with ice. shake vigorously until icy. strain into pint glass half-filled with fresh ice. top with cold sparkling water and give it a gentle stir. rim glass with lemon wedge and drop into drink.

now, katherine. drink a couple of these and then challenge me to another game of scrabble.

the antioxidantini

as all of us baby boomers know, antioxidants are really good for us. they fight off those pesky free radicals, although i thought freeing radicals was part and parcel of our baby boomer identity. okay, really? not one of you chuckled? i still can't get past the moniker, but if you can, go here for some pretty good information on the subject. please email me your summary and maybe the right side of my brain, which apparently is the only side that works, can digest the info and use it accordingly.

in the meantime, here's a drink that uses all pomegranate-based ingredients, except the garnish.

2 oz pama pomegranate liqueur

1 oz pearl pomegranate vodka

2 oz unsweetened pomegranate juice

long narrow strip of orange peel

pour ingredients into shaker half-filled with ice. shake vigorously until icy. strain into chilled cocktail glass. squeeze orange peel over top of drink, drop it in or use to decorate the rim of the glass, and serve.

pomegranates have more antioxidants than green tea and red wine. i actually tried mixing some green tea into a pomegranate concoction but it was nasty. go here for an npr article which includes some yummy-looking recipes.

the junketeer

i've gotten pretty much out of focus the past couple of weeks, and it's not from the mixology bucket of my portfolio career. i think i'm getting a bit addicted to the hunt. on tuesday, i took a little road trip to topeka with a couple of friends to check out thrift stores there, wednesday i spent going to my favorite thrift stores in kansas city (in one instance, a couple of times after i googled up some answers i needed), and on friday, i hit the t.n.t. sale at st. theresa's, two estate sales, two garage sales (if two card tables and a stack of sheets counts as a garage sale--otherwise, just one garage sale), then back to one of the finer local thrift stores. where i found out that on sundays, everything with a certain color tag is sold for 25 cents. furniture included. not that i'm looking for furniture. but i am looking for the goods to make aprons for my etsy store. so, even though sunday is this week, not last week, i'm going to count my sunday trip there within in this week's junkets. get it, junkets. crap. see. i'm not altogether capable. it's starting to worry me, actually. because junket really means 1. a dish of sweetened and flavored curds of milk, often served with fruit, and 2. informal, an extravagant trip or celebration, in particular one enjoyed by a government official at public expense. and a junketeer, by extension, is not someone who junks for a living, but one who enjoys the benefits of a junket. i actually wouldn't mind an extravagant trip or celebration right about now.

in the meantime, here's some stuff for you to identify. send me your pricing strategy for each, and we can talk about being partners.

how to celebrate spring in kansas city

a tip of my hat to fresher than fresh snowcones, and a wag of my finger to old man winter who just won't leave us alone!

five users HEART me!

i finally have my etsy shop up and running, or at least up. i think it's running, although i have no orders as of yet to confirm that. do you think i'm a little anxious? after all, it hasn't even been 24 hours since i posted my first item. and lord only knows how this whole paypal thing works. money is supposed to be automatically transferred into my bank account when a customer buys something. really? i feel like i've set myself up as an easy target for identity theft by sending all this information out into cyberspace.

i have to say, the process has been fun. it's such a different approach to a life, and although i haven't started to rake in the do-re-mi, i'm hopeful i'll be able to squeak out an income. i keep going back in and refining images and terminology and shipping prices. i really don't want to undercharge for shipping, but it feels somehow unright to charge more for shipping than for the item itself. i suppose as a shop girl, i'll eventually circle in on the right combination of factors to make some money and also make my customers happy.

do you want to be my first customer? i'll throw in a little something extra if you do!

http://www.etsy.com/shop/studioduceyvintage

here are a few more pretty pieces to entice you into my shop. if you want to see what kind of bargain you're getting from me, go here. don't get me wrong, i love p.o.s.h., and they were pretty much inspirational for me. next time you're in chicago check them out.

etsy preview

my wonderful friend kim came over today to help me with the photography for my initial offering on etsy. i am so excited to be so close to actually opening my little online shop. in the meantime, here are a few things that will be for sale. hopefully by this weekend i'll be up and running.

does mozart make you smarter?

something else i love? my friends. the other night i was gifted a bottle of lillet, a french aperitif i've been wanting to try. i haven't opened it yet because one, i want to share it, and two, the bottle just sits there looking so gorgeous that i don't want to disturb it. the packaging on some of these liquor products is so beautiful and classic. you know how you're not supposed to judge a book by it's cover? well, sometimes i do. most of the time the covers i respond to visually have great stories underneath them. like new york trilogy, a book i picked up at the strand when i was in nyc. i suppose i should i have, but i didn't know who the author, paul auster, was, but i loved that artwork. it turned out to be this crazy existential thriller that i absolutely loved as well. so, i've found myself doing the same with liquor bottles. look at these, for instance:

aren't they pretty? all the shapes and sizes and labels. i have to say i was a bit disappointed in the godiva chocolate liqueur, left front. too creamy for my taste. i much prefer the mozart black, right front. that domaine de canton in the back? i tasted it because the bottle reminded me of a noguchi lamp. it's a ginger liqueur. for me, as the flavor travels from the front of my mouth to the back, the ginger really blossoms. i don't know how all that applies to the debunked tongue map or how you'll taste it, but it's a favorite of mine.

this combines the canton and the mozart.

1.0 oz mozart black liqueur

0.5 oz domaine de canton

0.5 oz vodka

dash of bitters

3 very thin slices of fresh ginger

in shaker filled with ice, combine the first four ingredients and two of the slices of ginger which have been slightly crushed to release flavor. shake vigorously until icy. strain into chilled cocktail glass. float remaining ginger slice on top and serve.

don't drink this before 11 in the morning. it won't make you smarter.

reduce, reuse, send e-cards

another platform i worked on in socially aware connecting, the department where product (RED) resided, was "green." ironic as it may sound, the world's largest greeting card company has made some honest environmental efforts. the inks used to print most of the cards are non-solvent based, and much of the paper used contains at least some recycled content. the green platform was created to explore formats, paper and processes for potential application throughout the company. these cards were part of a group manufactured for the world's largest retailer, and were printed on stock made of 100% post-consumer fiber. the embossed process is also greenish in that it does not prevent the card from being recyclable.

all cards copyright hallmark cards, inc.

the dude abides

i LOVE the academy awards, cheesiness and all. last night's award ceremony was replete with the kind of breathiness and sincerity that made cynical, snarky comments especially easy for my guests and me. we thought we were quite hilarious, at any rate. maybe you had to be there. steve martin and alec baldwin were so on top of their game, though, that even if we weren't being hilarious, there would have been plenty to laugh at. or with.

of course the laughing part was helped along by (you guessed it) cocktails! misha said i made pretty stiff drinks, but actually the one i served only contains 1.5 oz of liquor. it is my variation on something called the washoe peel.

1.0 oz bourbon

0.5 oz cointreau

0.5 oz freshly squeezed blood orange juice

lemon twist

combine first three ingredients in a pint glass or shaker filled with ice. stir until slightly diluted and very cold. strain into chilled rocks glass. squeeze lemon twist over top of drink and drop into the glass.

when i was doing research on bourbon-based drinks (the russian doesn't like vodka, but that's a whole other story), i found it amusing that these booze websites require you to input your birthdate before you enter. wow. what an ironclad system. i wonder if there are similar safeguards on bomb-building websites or pot-growing websites. i wonder if i should have something like that in place to prohibit juveniles from accessing this blog. if i weren't such a risk-taker, i'd call my lawyer to find out.

p.s. i love you, jeff bridges!

what color is your greeting card?

my final assignment at the world's largest greeting card company was for mahogany and tree of life. it wasn't the first time i had the privilege of designing for these lines. the first time was ten or so year ago, and while the mission was the same, pretty much everything else was different. there were all those crazy reorganizations for one thing. (which really never reorganized so much as moved people and cubicles around and renamed things. large corporations, sigh. but i mean, really?) anyway. i loved the color and the soul and the intent of these card lines. the team, diverse in every way, was tight and happy. one of the last things i did as a member of that team was to organize a trip to chicago to gain inspiration for both card lines. i know the inspiration i gained in chicago will be put to good use!

here are some of the cards i designed for mahogany.

i hope you like them!

all cards copyright hallmark cards, inc.

oh, and the one on the upper right? a shout out to uncle sam. yes, that's a dollar bill in there to show there's a die cut on the cover. the purchaser inserts a bill into the card before sending it on to the lucky recipient. probably a larger denomination than a one dollar bill. since the card costs more than that. if someone downloads this and can find a way to create spendable money, i take full responsibility.

and remember, i can help you with your design needs! and take full responsibility for them. e-mail me (go to my profile) or post a comment.