Birthday Adventures

Joe took off work yesterday so we could head on some birthday adventures.

We began the day at the Central Library in downtown Minneapolis where we checked out a pass to the Bell Natural History Museum (our next stop), checked out some knitting books and saw What's New? Phase 2: 32 x 4, a photography exhibit about the people who inhabit local neighborhoods. Four photographers with varying techniques and obsessions displayed images meant to encapsulate the twin cities. There were also historical photos on display that added a richness to the exhibit, reminding me that though a lot of these images were quite contemporary, someday they'd be historic.

In the library:




It was finally a warm day for my birthday. It hit at least 40. As a result, window washers were out in full force at the library:




I thought this font was very cool:



Then we ate lunch at Pagoda, which offers a variety of Asian dishes, in Dinkytown. We had the Kung Pao shrimp and it was pretty good. Not excellent, not bad and a very good portion for the price.




Next we headed to another photography exhibit at the Bell Museum of Natural History, which is located on the University of Minnesota campus in downtown Minneapolis. Life: A Journey Through Time displays photographer Frans Lanting's attempts to represent the entirety of the evolution of life in images captured from around the world. The original project is also compiled in a book with a similar title and the exhibit includes a lot of textual information to supplement the images. I would highly recommend checking it out. And, if you head to a metro library, even if you have an out-of-metro library card, you can "check out" 4 free adult admissions to the museum for free.

There's a "Touch and See" area of the museum where kids can get up close and personal with antlers, bones, bugs and even a bear:




Look, a family portrait:

(In college, when I was Editor in Chief of the school newspaper, I once coined the phrase "mad like a rhino." Then our web editor made a giant rhino for me out of cardboard and we hang it up near my desk at the paper. Since, it's become something of my power animal.)




A freaky white squirrel on exhibit, just for my sister-in-law Kellie, who is a affectionately afraid:





They had this giant tortoise shell displayed in the Life exhibit area. I didn't realize that turtle spines where fused to their shells, but we learned in the exhibit that turtles began as land mammals who traveled back to the sea. Their shells grew out of their expanded rib cages. Whereas frogs are water animals that evolved to grow on land, yet must return to water to breed, turtles are land animals that evolved to live in the water, yet must return to land to breed. Cool, huh?







We ended our day at Chez Daniel, a French restaurant located in the Embassy Suites "Just east of France" (Avenue, that is) along the 494 corridor. ProTip (as Joe would say) If you purchase an Entertainment book, you can use your card to receive buy one get one free discounts as many times as you like. We went there especially for the dessert—creme puffs, or profiteroles for the French, stuffed with ice cream instead of custard, with a fudge sauce.

Truman created a little savings account of food just below his chin:






At 24 I now realized how truly amazing your birthday is, only because I have now birthed a child myself. It feels very special to be celebrated on your birthday once you realize what it takes to be born. Thank you for all the "happy birthdays," this was a great one.

And, of course, the 5 cards my mom sent telling me how wonderful I am didn't hurt, either.

Happy Birthday To Ya

Music Playlist at MixPod.com

We're headed into the city for some birthday adventures, but I wanted to continue my tradition of birthday multimedia treats with this snazzy play list. I started it off with the Beatles, because my mom has been singing it to me for the last few days.

By the way, how's the memorization of last year's song going?

Also, for your amusement, a slice of life vignette from last night:

I had read that Montessori believed your brain continues developing through your 23rd year. We were heading upstairs at 11:55 last night.

Brooke: My brain still has five minutes to develop.
Joe: That's the funniest thing I've heard all year.
Brooke: The year is still young yet.

Elegant Troll Hat

I finished my first cabled hat (well, my first cabled anything) last night. The pattern called for Bulky weight yarn, but I found some really cool Super Bulky weight yarn and figured, "how much bigger can it end up being?"

It turned out a little big, but absolutely beautiful and warmer than it would have been in lighter weight yarn. Joe thinks it looks like something a big forest troll would wear, but the cables make it elegant. It's the Elegant Troll Hat.







I believe this hat's destiny is to live on the head of Marian, my mother-in-law, if she so desires. It is extremely cozy and should be able to keep her head nice and toasty.

Darkness, You Have Met Your Match

I'll start off by saying I love natural light. I would love to shoot in natural light all the live long day and night, but the reality is there just isn't enough light for that. While I've been filled with lighting ideas for some time, I haven't had the equipment to execute them. That changes now.

I begin the year with equipment that's going to help me give darkness a run for its money. I added a second flash to my arsenal, pocket wizards and two Gary Fong Lightspheres, as well as a less exciting, but just as useful, light stand and tripod. I also got my hands on a much longer pc cord, which doesn't sound exciting, but trust me, it is.

I haven't had much time to play with them until last night. I turned off all the lights and lit some portraits of Truman using just my two flashes off-camera using camera settings for broad daylight (ISO 100) — one placed behind him and one coming down from above to the right of the camera.

I sat him on one of his new chairs. He doesn't understand how to get down from them, so sitting him there is like holding him hostage. But he put up with it for a few minutes.








I suppose I'd also like to brag that I knitting him that hat. I'm a little addicted to orange and blue, what can I say?

Children's Letters to Obama

This American Life ran an inauguration week show that included letters to Obama from children in the online addition. Some of them are quite poignant and remind me that many children, even at the age of 10 or 12, have adult ideas. But some of them are just hilarious.

I wanted to share the funny ones.

Twelve-year-old Weslie Jackson's account of what life would be like if he were president is a must-hear. Among other things, he'd like to give everyone a piece of Reese's candy.

Perhaps you've wondered what ten things Obama would do first once he got to the White House, well Chandler Brown (12) has his own suggestions at the end of his clip. I especially like that one of the ten is "enjoy moment."

Last, but certainly not least, is little Alexis Feliciano who is very concerned about inflation's effect on the price of whipped cream. This clip is short and sweet.

The whole show can be streamed here.

Happy New Year, Suckers!

Love,

Joe's XBox

Joe's XBox decided to red-ring today, which is the death-cry of the game-world. Strangely, it started working again about a half hour later. We're still planning on sending it in. Joe says they call the box you send it back in a "coffin."

Overheard in the Walsh Home

Joe, after picking up the remote control: "Oh my God I just hit previous channel and it was another Tournament of Roses Parade!"

Brooke: "I know, I was watching two of them. That way when the commercials came on I could flip to the other one."

Later, as I am blogging.

Brooke: "Is it called the 'Tournament of Roses' or the 'Tournament of Rose Bowl?'"

Joe: "I dunno, what are you doing, getting a live feed?!"

When my knitting needles arrive on Saturday I think I will officially become an old lady.

Nickle and Dimed

Most of our junk mail heads to the recycle bin without a second glance. But every once and a while something like this comes along:



Yes, this is a letter from a charitable organization containing a real nickle. A nickle it's own envelope is telling me can help save these children:



So then why, Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, did you give me a nickle, then pay postage to send that nickle to me?

Giving away money seems like a strange way to raise money, but maybe that's just me.

Merry Christmas From Us!

I wish everyone a wonderful holiday season! Enjoy our eco-friendly Christmas card:

Color Smart

How well can you descriminate between similarly hued colors? Test your color I.Q. to find out.

They give you a score from 0-100, with zero being a perfect score. I knew this was one of my strengths, so I was happy with my score of 6.

If only color differentiation were part of the SAT ...

Mmm ... delicious Eiffle Tower

One could almost call the TV battles between Joe and I epic. Tonight I was watching Top Chef and we had this conversation in which Joe explains why he hates top chef.

Joe: "They take the food way too seriously. Food is one of the few things in the life that is not confrontational and they make food confrontational."
Me: ...
Joe: "Food doesn't have to taste like the Eiffel Tower."
Me: "I think the Eiffel tower would taste pretty crappy, literally."
Joe: "I didn't mean taste like the Eiffel tower tastes, I meant taste like the Eiffel tower looks."

Here's to hoping your next meal tastes like the Eiffel tower looks.

Daleks!!! Tasty?

If when I say I'm a huge fan of Battle Star Galactica and Dr. Who you think of this or this, you should do yourself a favor and check out the modern incarnations of these shows.

We actually started watching Dr. Who because it came on SciFi right before Battle Star Galactica; so they're kind of a pair in my mind.

If you're already a fan, then you'll understand this post. Over on Cake Wrecks they posted pictures of some terribly constructed Dalek-shaped cakes.

Too bad the Daleks aren't made of cake in the show, then maybe we wouldn't have to watch them invade twice a season.

Ludovician Bait

We spend our lives trying to make sense of an infiltration of information. From birth, we're assaulted with sounds, sights, smells, tastes and emotions. Then later, thoughts, theories, stories and complex explanations. A big chunk of what makes us who we are is how we put together these pieces, creating our outlook of the world and the way in which we reverberate back what we see.

This reverberation is an artist's work. Some concepts can be manifested simply — love, laughter, friendship, marriage, joy, the kinds of ideas that bind us together on a basic emotional level — through symbolic images or even simple phrases. We can do this with everyday language both verbal and non-verbal. Doing so allows us to create order among the chaos of bombardment.

But there are tons of ideas that bombard us that can't be ordered using conventional methods. It's these ideas — and a longing inside myself to find a way to order them — that drive me to create. And I think that is why art exists — to create an order to the pieces of our lives that seem impossible to order using conventional methods.

Both Joe and I are heavily engrossed in The Raw Shark Texts , which fits right between magical realism and science fiction along a book shelf organized by genre. It's a sort of text-obsessed psychological thriller that evolves by unraveling the mystery of the main character's identity, which was lost along with his memories and personal contacts before the book begins.

The book seems heavily engrossed in trying to create order from the fragments of reality that exist outside of order. It spurred these thoughts in me and is inspiring me to write more.

Black and Whites

I've been growing increasingly fond of black and whites recently. I love vibrant color so much that I am always looking for it when I take photographs. In that way, I'm usually shooting to produce color images. But I love the way black and whites turn the focus of the photograph back to how it is lit. And, in cases where the lighting is nearly divine there is something much more beautiful about black and white photograhs. They look almost instantly classic.

Part of me thinks this is just a trick our minds play on us because old photographs have no choice but to be in black and white. Therefore, a black and white image is "classic." But I think there is something more to the medium that forces the modern photographer, with all the technology in the world at their fingertips, to pause and take notice of the fact that sometimes it's not technology, or even color, that improves an image. Black and white photography takes you back to the basics — back to lighting, back to focusing on the moment.

Although I posted this photograph of my son and his aunt in color on my baby blog, I couldn't resist sharing it in black and white, as well.

Iceland Day 1: Reykjavik . Geysir . Gullfoss . Storinupur

This is the first in a series of blog posts about our Aug. 2007 trip to Iceland. All posts can be found by typing "Iceland" in the search bar.

I figured it was about time I blogged about Iceland.

We tried to sleep on the flight to Iceland because we knew when we arrived it would be morning and several hours off of our schedule of when morning was, so we wanted to be as rested as possible. But, honestly, it was hard to sleep beyond all the normal reasons it's hard to sleep on a plane. I was excited.







We picked up our rental car at the airport and headed to Reykjavik, where we had breakfast. It was the most expensive meal of our entire trip and consisted of what we'd consider a pretty normal breakfast buffet of eggs, sausage, potatoes, breads, jams, butter, milk, juice, cereal and apples and oranges. Iceland, you have a beautiful country, but your food, frankly, stinks. It isn't really your fault, though, because only 1% of your land is tillable soil and you're far away from everything else.







As we left Reykjavik we wandered down a long street that bordered the bleak sea, dark rocks and road made from those dark rocks separated us from the sea. We realized we weren't going the right way and Joe stopped to ask this woman walking her dog for directions. They chatted for quite some time. I think because she really didn't know which way to tell us to go.




We headed out but quickly grew tired, so pulled onto a large gravel parking area and took a nap in the car. Finally, we headed to Geysir, the geyser after which all others are named. Now elderly, Geysir erupts only about twice a day and sits watching over the much more regular, Strokkur.


(view large for full effect)







Then, with little sun left to light our way we headed to Gullfoss, a large nearby waterfall.










There was a long path to a visitor center where we found this diagram that explains how the falls was made:






We used the final shards of sunlight to find Storinupur, the farm where we were staying. Though it was only one family's farm it had its own road sign, just like larger towns. There was also a church nestled into the short hillside with it.



We ate something, pushed our twin beds together and went to sleep.

Spellbound Web

The photography website is now up and running at www.spellboundjungle.com. Enjoy!

I suppose this means my maternity leave has official ended.

Self Portrait

Believe it or not, this was not staged. Truman simply wanted to nurse and there I was in front of the dairy barn at the State Fair. It seemed intensely appropriate, so I asked Joe to take this picture.

Clocky, I Am Your Father

This is a continuation of the saga of Clocky, the mascot of the newspaper I used to work for. If it sounds crazy, try reading the first post.

When two mascots fall in love they sometimes create a baby mascot. That baby is Clocky. Today, I met Clocky's father, Mr. Minuteman in St. Cloud. He was casual, as usual:




He was representing an extremely small copy shop (there were only two copiers in the place) and leaning against the M in the shop's sign as if to say:

"Oh, Clocky, what have you gotten yourself into now?"

You see, he let me in on a little secret. Clocky is a little slow.

Oddly enough, Mr. Minuteman has a tag line as awkward as Clocky's:




I guess the gear doesn't fall very far from the clockface.

Teenage Mutan Ninja Turtle Savers

My mom was in town visiting the last few weeks. While we were out checking out a garage sale in the country I spotted what looked like a turtle on the edge of the road about 1/4 mile from a small lake.

My mom with the little guy:




So we turned around and picked him up and released him back near the lake.






Is there such a thing as a turtle saving badge? If there is, I think I've earned one.

Wildflowers

I took these in the Sherburne National Wildlife Refuge in Zimmerman today. All of them were taken along the side of the road on the Wildlife Drive. It's amazing how many things you notice when you take a nice slow drive down a road of prairie. To get the full effect, click on the images to view a larger version.














This strange grass flower stood atop a long stem: