Friends, this is a semi-urgent matter.

I love, love the theme song to Deadwood.  Please recommend another band/group/genre I would like.  I simply refuse to be one of those people who listens to a TV theme song… although, I have thought about setting it as my cell phone ring tone.  Don’t judge– Deadwood is a great TV show.  It is truly Shakespearean, about order out of chaos, and is just beautiful to look at (the lighting alone makes me weep).  Yes, there is a lot of profanity but who gives a sh*t?

Happy Fourth of July everyone!

It’s a bit different than the usual Friday fare around here, but I think you’ll enjoy it.  Have a lovely, long weekend.

Since last week I posted about the oil spill, something outside the usual scope of this blog, I thought “why not keep the trend going?”  I hope you’ll all take a few minutes to read about the UN Foundation’s GirlUp! campaign.  A few summers ago I (like everyone else in the US) read Three Cups of Tea and have closely followed the work of Nick Kristof in the New York Times and the book he co-wrote with his partner, Half the Sky.  The more I read, the more I follow the work of NGOs and development professionals, the more convinced I am that gender equity is a good in and of itself, but that it also helps ensure economic development and political/democratic change.

The GirlUp campaign

Gives American girls the opportunity to channel their energy and compassion to raise awareness and funds for programs of the United Nations that help some of the world’s hardest-to-reach adolescent girls. Through Girl Up’s support, girls have the opportunity to become educated, healthy, safe, counted, and positioned to be the next generation of leaders.

I wanted to say “Hells yes” when I read their “Girlafesto.” Its thesis: “You see a girl.  We see the future.”

As promised, some images from this weekend’s “Pen Petting Zoo” at the National Postal Museum!  It was loads of nerdy, postal fun.  I have to say, I think I enjoyed the ink table more than the pens.  Not only were the bottles just beautiful (and I took a lot of photos of the bottles) but it was so much fun to actually see how vibrant the inks were even back in the first part of the 20th century.  For some reason I imagined that the really bright, colored inks were 1960s or so– that before then it was all blue and black.  Little did I know!

By the way, for loads more images and information about vintage ink bottles do take a look at the website “Vintage Inks.”  Its proprietor supplied all these bottles and test pens and inks.

In addition to the old ink bottles, I wrote a letter to “Any Soldier” using the same kind of pen that General MacArthur carried for years during World War II.  Nice, but very heavy.  Definitely a man’s pen I must admit.  The older gentleman who told me all about the pens is a member of the Pen Collectors of America.  We chatted for a while about how pens changed a great deal as plastics technology evolved.

There was also a booth with different kinds of paper for you to feel.  While at that table, a girl (maybe 7-years old?) spilled a bottle of ink.  Her mother was so apologetic and I didn’t know how to say “Look, having ink on my feet is generally a sign I’ve had a good day.  No, really!”

I ended my trip to the “Pen Petting Zoo” by making a collaged card at the crafts’ table.  They had a whole tray of old stamps you could use– obviously that formed the major element of my design.

It was at the crafts’ table that I had to confront the fact that all my hobbies are pretty much only popular with 8-year olds (crafts and cards at a museum) or 70-year old men (stamp collecting).  Almost nobody in-between.  Of course, that’s why I have my fellow mail bloggers… you all get it, don’t you?

Yep, last Thursday I got inked: a postage stamp with a mockingbird inside it. Much though I may hate to admit it at times, I’m a Texas girl.  Whenever we visit or even just fly through DFW my whole body relaxes a bit and I can just sense that I’m home.  I lived in TX longer than anywhere else (so far) and in so many ways it turned me into the person I am today.

Of course, the postage stamp is just because I a) adore the mail, b) am fascinated by the tiny works of art so many of us take for granted, and c) can now make jokes about a real “forever” stamp.

Lately, I’ve been feeling very calm, very settled.  I suspect it comes through on the pages of this blog too.  One year ago last Friday I graduated from Georgetown, last Thursday I got my first tattoo, and today I have this wonderful sense that I’m okay– deeply okay.  For the first time in my life I really like the person I am, I like the things I do and stand for, and feel confident that, whatever course my life takes, I’m going to do something I love.  It’s a strange but lovely feeling.

Getting a tattoo now felt right: I sense that a part of my life is over but I also sense another phase opening up– it’s not scary, it’s thrilling.  Maybe we all feel this way from time to time, but I wanted to carry this moment on my body.

Note: In my head this was much more poetic.  Clearly, all this peace and bliss has not made me a better writer… for poetry look here.

Scenes from our weekend in the VA country– taken by a film camera!

]]> http://www.bashfullydesigned.com/2010/02/25/the-wintery-bleak-beautiful-va/feed/ 0 http://www.bashfullydesigned.com/2010/02/08/sneaux-men/ http://www.bashfullydesigned.com/2010/02/08/sneaux-men/#comments Mon, 08 Feb 2010 12:43:44 +0000 ashleyb http://www.bashfullydesigned.com/?p=619

After we got over the sting of not making it to NOLA for the Super Bowl, the blizzard was something else.  We’re lucky, our apartment building didn’t loose power or heat.  However, there are 25 inches of snow on the ground.  TWENTY FIVE INCHES!  That’s more snow than I’ve ever seen in my life.  Ever.

So glad we don’t live on this side of the building any more…

Our Sneaux Man felt right at home, kept telling us it was just like Miami’s white sand beaches.  We still felt the Who Dat pride, even if we are 1000 miles away from NOLA.

Hope that wherever you are you’re safe, warm, and peaceful this week.

Al Pacino’s Inch by Inch Speech
from Any Given Sunday

I don’t know what to say really.
Three minutes
to the biggest battle of our professional lives
all comes down to today.
Either
we heal
as a team
or we are going to crumble.
Inch by inch
play by play
till we’re finished.
We are in hell right now, gentlemen
believe me
and
we can stay here
and get the shit kicked out of us
or
we can fight our way
back into the light.
We can climb out of hell.
One inch, at a time.

Now I can’t do it for you.
I’m too old.
I look around and I see these young faces
and I think
I mean
I made every wrong choice a middle age man could make.
I uh….
I pissed away all my money
believe it or not.
I chased off
anyone who has ever loved me.
And lately,
I can’t even stand the face I see in the mirror.

You know when you get old in life
things get taken from you.
That’s, that’s part of life.
But,
you only learn that when you start losing stuff.
You find out that life is just a game of inches.
So is football.
Because in either game
life or football
the margin for error is so small.
I mean
one half step too late or to early
you don’t quite make it.
One half second too slow or too fast
and you don’t quite catch it.
The inches we need are everywhere around us.
They are in ever break of the game
every minute, every second.

On this team, we fight for that inch
On this team, we tear ourselves, and everyone around us
to pieces for that inch.
We CLAW with our finger nails for that inch.
Cause we know
when we add up all those inches
that’s going to make the fucking difference
between WINNING and LOSING
between LIVING and DYING.

I’ll tell you this
in any fight
it is the guy who is willing to die
who is going to win that inch.
And I know
if I am going to have any life anymore
it is because, I am still willing to fight, and die for that inch
because that is what LIVING is.
The six inches in front of your face.

Now I can’t make you do it.
You gotta look at the guy next to you.
Look into his eyes.
Now I think you are going to see a guy who will go that inch with you.
You are going to see a guy
who will sacrifice himself for this team
because he knows when it comes down to it,
you are gonna do the same thing for him.

That’s a team, gentlemen
and either we heal now, as a team,
or we will die as individuals.
That’s football guys.
That’s all it is.
Now, whattaya gonna do?

]]> http://www.bashfullydesigned.com/2010/02/05/not-quite-poetry-friday-inch-by-inch/feed/ 0 http://www.bashfullydesigned.com/2009/12/29/already-memories/ http://www.bashfullydesigned.com/2009/12/29/already-memories/#comments Tue, 29 Dec 2009 12:13:04 +0000 ashleyb http://www.bashfullydesigned.com/?p=559

My goodness… that was fast.  It’s almost 2010?

Like SouleMama, one of my favorite crafty-lady bloggers, I’m a tree-out-the-door on the morning of the 26th kind of girl.  Or, in my case, folded up and put back into its box.  The glitter snowflakes are down and so is the garland.  The wreath will stay on the door until New Years’ but that’s all that’s left.  But, also like SouleMama, I like that I get to share (and see) some things that were happening behind the scenes for the last month or so.

Today, a few shots from our Christmas day.  Tomorrow, a few shots of some craft projects and a give away related to my holiday cards.

No-knead bread– this might be my best loaf yet!

That vintage glass decanter is from Jon… I am in love with old glass things right now.

Jon and I went to see Sherlock Holmes this weekend.  It’s a great film if, and only if, you are okay with it being not really anything like the books or the Jeremy Brett version.  Robert Downy Jr. and Jude Law are just too handsome to be Holmes and Watson really– and since when did Holmes fight in boxing matches?  I thought he was an opium addict.  Of course, I’m biased because a) I read many of the stories with my Mom and b) I watched almost all the A&E/Jeremy Brett episodes between the ages of 10 and 14– an impressionable age.  Anyway, Guy Richie made a great film about sleuthing in Victorian England and nobody, but nobody, can film a boxing scene like Ritchie.

Anyway, although I didn’t love the plot I loved the richness of all the sets.  I definitely understand the appeal of Steampunk (if I didn’t before when I was scouring the DC area for antique glassware).  It’s not quite my thing– I like my Steapunk diluted with a little 19th century history–probably because I want my very own Cabinet of Curiosities some day.  Herewith an incomplete list of some of my favorite quasi-Victorian objects:

Contemporary German Safety Goggles from Restoration Hardware.

Antique Sterling Silver Perfume, Smelling Salts Decanter, Bottle in Domed Original Leather Etui, Box via Rubylane.com

W. Watson & Sons Ltd., The Van Heurck No.1 model microscope, c. 1910, via Antique-Microscopes.com

Jasmine Ruffled Side-tie Panties from Espalore’s Etsy Shop.  I don’t think I could ever wear these because really I can’t take myself that seriously but, I like the way they look on other people.

5 Light Silver Plated Candelabra via FoodServiceWarehouse.com.  I think this would look just lovely covered in loads of dripped candle wax.

And the grand finale…

Brass cash register via Solvang Antique Center.

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