Shades of summer ...

If you're a regular visitor to my blog, you'll have noticed that there's been a color overhaul. And the masthead is different. Some of the fonts and font colors, too.

I've gone popsicle colored, for summer! I needed something tropical and bright. After the weeks of dreary rain (which is fine in small doses but not for weeks, heavens no!) my soul craved some serious color saturation. Like that Canteloupe Kool-Aid background.

And those birds -- caiques painted by Catherine Klein -- aren't they something? I am a big fan of birds, probably because they're one of the only forms of wildlife you see living in the city. Not caiques, of course (at least not in my city), but the more garden variety types. Which are also a form of Nature's showing off, if you ask me.

I live right next to a major highway, but after dark when there are long stretches between the big trucks booming their way through the night on the empty road I can sometimes hear the birds in the tall trees. Talking with one another. Sometimes plaintive, usually cheerful, always interesting. I wonder what they are saying.

Whatever it is, if you listen very closely you can tell that they have a hundred different ways of saying it.

New gadget!

I finally bought myself a digital camera. Nothing fancy, but I need one for my trip to Seattle in August. Those disposable cameras just don't cut it anymore. How behind the curve am I on that one, huh?

Anyhow ... thanks to Wal-Mart.com, I will soon have this thing in my hot little hands:

It's about as little as I could pay without getting a brand name I didn't recognize at all. And apparently I'm going to need to get myself a memory card, as this has limited storage. Oh well ... I am at entry level with this stuff. All I know right now is that I'm going to be taking pictures!


I did mention that it was pink, didn't I? (In case you hadn't noticed. ;) Can you take serious pictures with a pink camera? I don't know, but then again I'm not looking for serious.

Let's go!

And the rain came down ...

There's some pale sunshine outside my window this morning. Cloud cover is tissue thin, and the light pops through, on and off. The birds have decided it's decent enough out there to bother showing up (yay!)

New England has been absolutely dreary for what seems like weeks on end. Folks are wondering where our summer weather went. (Florida, maybe?) Yesterday was 63. That's 63 on July first! God, are you up there? We've got our picnic baskets ready.

blog happy: My Art's Desire

Sue at My Art's Desire has such a great eye for things, and an envible hand with mixed media crafts.

She makes these tender little books covered in fabric, embellished with small posies and a silken ribbon closure. Meant to encourage and uplift, they are the best sort of gift I can imagine. So wonderfully full of grace and delicacy.

Her work extends to pieces like this as well:

I admire her eye for detail, as with these humble little weed-blossoms:

And her gifts obviously translate to the care she takes in decorating her home:

Thanks, Sue for the photo permissions. I hope to see you blogging up a storm again real soon!

The Fabulous World of Ruby Montana!

I was lucky enough to live in Seattle for most of the 1990's. Having lived most of my life in Massachusetts, at the ripe old (or so I thought at the time) age of 27, my gypsy blood sent me all the way across the country to the Emerald City. The year? 1993. No, I'd never been there before. Yes, I bought a plane ticket and just went. Brave or foolish? Sage or silly? All of the above! But I never regretted it. In those days, one of the kitschest shops in town was Ruby Montana's Pinto Pony:

How great was that storefront, huh? It was a place as colorful and outgoing as Ruby herself, a kind of bon vivant whose name was on the lips of all the funky peeps.

Fast forward sixteen (?!) years later, and I'm planning a vacation to Seattle, my first since I moved back to New England in 2001. I'm excited to visit with the good friends I've maintained contact with, and I'm eager to revisit many of the sights of my old "stomping grounds". One thing I've just realized, however, is that I won't find is Ruby's store. Seems she closed it and mosied on down to Palm Springs. As in Cali-forn-I-aY! Now she is proprietress of Ruby Montana's Coral Sands Inn, a mid-century gem circa 1952.

(Whoa, I just felt a warm breeze coming off the screen. It's 63 degrees and rainy here in Boston, so this is great. More than great).

The hotel is coral-y pink (remember, this was 1952!) The doors are aqua. It has seven guest rooms, all of which are themed. Among them: The Poodle Room and The Dale Evans & Roy Rogers Suite. Apparently, all guest rooms face the kidney-shaped pool:

Which also looks very fetching after the sun goes down:

Look at the pink lights dancing on the surface of the water! Pink and aqua, so very 1950's.

Now THIS is California living.

Mama Deerest

As seen at Field & Stream, a mule deer and her two newborns, featured in the story "Muley Fawns Too Cute For Field & Stream"?

I don't think there's actually any such thing as "too cute". Too cute for words maybe, but nothing is TOO cute. Do you see that there are two little ones underneath mama's belly? They are magnificent.

Cover stories

I am intrigued by book covers, and quite honestly some of the best books I've come by are ones which attracted me with their cover art, interrupting my lazy bookshelf browsing. I guess all this means is that the cover artist did their job well, but still ... I can't help but think that there is some connection, something kismet, somehow indefinable, about this apparently haphazard way of selecting a book for a second look.

One of my favorite titles in recent years is Hens Dancing by English novelist Raffaella Barker. A little research shows that cover art has varied over the years, but the images have remained consistently great.

As for the inside? Maggie O'Connell writes: "I love [Raffaella Barker's] books - so funny and acerbic; a very good thing in a woman." I can only agree.

Here is the cover from the June '99 U.K. release (hardback):





From the 2001 U.S. hardcover:



The large print 2005 hardcover U.K. release:




April 2002 U.S. paperback: (I must admit to being partial to this one, since the cover art first drew me to the book in the paperback fiction section of the Seattle Public Library).




The June, 2000 U.K. paperback:

The sequel to Hens Dancing is Summertime, an effort which falls slightly short only because the fresh excitement of meeting the characters for the first time isn't there. It's still a favorite read of mine.

The U.K. paperback, April 2002:

The U.S. hardback, summer 2002:

And finally, the 2003 U.S. paperback:

I've seen slight variations on the cover of the 2002 edition, but I like this one best. The 2003 cover is delovely! I would love to have a full-sized print of the image, to grace a wall in my home.

All images are copyrighted property of the publishers.