Sunday, April 25, 2010

yummmmm

Being a girl who loves pretty packaging, I just could not resist a whole post on nothing but pretty package photos. Inspiration overhaul, no? Hmmm, maybe this will become a series..?
My oh my, they're all so lovely and pretty I could just eat them up...

- L

Tuesday, April 20, 2010

crimson and clover



life, i'm starting to live it more. it's something i took advangtage of. and i won't anymore. the lens and it's stunning reflectors of light have come into my hands again. i'm starting to really discover myself. who i want to be. where i want to be. how i want to live. the people in my atmosphere that matter most and are closest to my heart. road miles will not block them from me anymore. this season after spring will be amazing. even if i loose all energy after it's end. my ears will be filled with music so lovely. my eyes with images by friends, newfound and true-blue, that i won't need the visuals that have disturbed my sleep anymore. i will finally be free of this body that's encased me in self-doubt and work my way into who i truly am, from the inside out. the payment received will fly me to souls i miss and need. no one knows me like them. no more surrounding myself with no one. my life and heart will be mine. no one will make me feel guilty. i own my heart. i won't let it be led astray. time to start treating myself and the people that matter most with more love than ever. time to let go. let go of material things that weigh me down. the emotional ones will be tucked away for sharing of my future self. but they shall not burden my own soul anymore. it's time. time for life. time for love. time for the soul.
Love,
Lauren Nicole



Friday, April 16, 2010

hello, hello


^VIA tumblr.

Oh man...it's amazing how fast a whole week can fly by, isn't it? The other day I found myself at 5 o'clock and thought it was 1 o'clock, feeling as if I'd lost my mind. This week has been rather odd and off for me and that affects my posting, so I apologize for saying I would be posting more, then breaking my promise. Sometimes -as I mentioned- you don't even realize it's been a week and think you're loosing your mind, haha. But anyway, onto some friday goodness!

FILL IN THE BLANK FRIDAY

1. The first thing I do in the morning is look to see what time it is, brush my teeth, get dressed, do some laundry and possibly watch some morning news chat-tv (the view = biggest guilty pleasure of all time).

2. Every night before bed I usually watch 'Whose Line Is It Anyway?' or whatever I'm Netflixing that has a good ending, because it's better to watch happy, lovely things before you shut your eyes then all the crappy stuff that's on the news all the time.

3. My favorite thing to do when I'm having a bad day is buy a pint of expensive sorbet (rasperry, strawberry or mango, yummm), watch a movie that I love (You've Got Mail, Across The Universe, Julie & Julia) and/or take a nice long drive to nowhere. Driving helps clear my head, especially with my favorite oldies station.

4. Something that makes me cringe is BUGS. NAILS ON A CHALKBOARD. PROTESTERS (from the left or right. please don't ask me to honk my horn!). HITLER. PEOPLE GETTING MARRIED THAT SHOULDN'T BE (yep, I'm that girl). THE ASIAN/HISPANIC GUY FROM THE BLACK EYED PEAS (scary x1000000). UNDERCOOKED CHICKEN. CASSEROLES. THANKSGIVING DINNER (I was born on Thanksgiving and have never liked ANY of the food).

5. Social situations are fun if spent with fun, carefree people. Or sometimes by yourself. And a great excuse to try out new hairstyles and make-up.

6. I like to collect nothing anymore. I'm done collecting material things, and working on being completely free of all the junk I have. The only thing I want to have a lot of or 'collect' per say, is love.

7. Weekends are for being 100% lazy or 100% active. Pajama days or farmers market mornings? Breakfast at 1PM or a big Sunday breakfast. Semi-old movies on cable TV or people watching at your favorite watering hole.


There are A LOT of awesome giveaways going on right now. Here's three of my most coveted ones at the moment...


^BIANCA 'SPOON' is having a mini-giveaway of sorts of her first Etsy item ever, a pack of 5 gorgeous art cards! Wouldn't you die to see one of these in your mailbox? <3



^MICAELA DARLING is having an awesome giveaway in her little corner of the internet; look at all those awesome little gems! I have my eye on the postcard and coffee-cup, so adorable. <3



^RACHEL 'BLOOM' has an amazing giveaway going on right now; one polaroid camera! Oh my goodness lovelies, there are no words for how much I am anticipating the announcement of her winner! Polaroids = love. <3


MAIL CALL




^My second mail experiment (first one coming on another blog soon!) for my amazing friend Lauren. It's my last 'pretty things' bag and I wanted to send it to her, since her always saying 'pretty things' inspired them.



^Reply to Micaela, using one of my favorite magazine clippings.



^A reply to the wonderful Sheba in Canada.



^I found this old stamp I had when I was little, of my name, and have been using it on almost everything in sight lately, haha. This is my reply to Shona, using some more great magazine clippings.



^A reply to a reader; don't you just love that little doodle of a play on 'butterflies in your stomach'? So awesome and I think the recipient will really like it.


^Big envelope to the lovely Cari Polena, I just love this envelope, it was hard to part with it!



^Reply to one of my favorite correspondents, Chris in Georgia.


Well, that's it for me tonight lovelies! I'm whooped! But hope that you'll all be forgiving in the lack of my posts lately! And keep your fingers crossed that I won't have another odd and off week again in the near future. Talk about a freaky friday. :P
- L

Friday, April 9, 2010

my photography [part one]

Photography. It's my passion, my love, my hobby, my art and my number one career choice. For some reason I rarely talk about it anymore and that's about to change. I've taken an [unknown until now] break from it and am excited to start being passionate about my art again. Even though it's highly improbable, I do believe there are bits and pieces of film in my veins as my Mother's Father was and is a photographer and my Dad is and was as well. Constantly surrounded by inspiration, it's a wonder why I don't photograph SOMETHING every single day, considering how much of both my Grandfather and my Father's works are around me all the time. In later posts I will be posting some of my Grandpa's amazing black and white snapshots of himself and my [passed] Grandmother, for they are some of my greatest inspirations. But anyway...in these series of posts I'm going to showcase some of my work for you to see. It would be lovely if you'd comment with your thoughts...

PART ONE: warmth

These photographs are of some of my closest friends [& a few of family] and of my Summer '09 that I love. All the photos have really warm tones and coloring to them and I always smile whenever I come across one of these in my un-packing.
[Forgot to mention that I shoot mostly on film and all of the below are scans of film shots.]

- L
PS: you can view more of my photography HERE.

Monday, April 5, 2010

clap, clap, clap, clap, clap your hands


Cardboard city is starting to collapse fairly well now and I should have the time now to start posting more than just once a week, haha. I’m so happy to have tons more storage in this house, which really helps my creative space and floor space; it’s nice to have unpacked only 1/3 of your things and see floor while there’s still a lot of room in your cupboards and shelves. It’s definitely not my favorite house in the world, but pretty good for this time in my life. :]

Thank you so much to all the lovelies that sent me mail last week! On account of the address change and having to drive to the post-box every day or every other day, I know my mail count will be low, but I’m kind of thankful because now I can concentrate on some great replies to you all! Every missive is brilliant but a special thank you to Micaela for great surprise mail, Bianca for another crazy-beautiful missive that I literally cannot stop staring at, Cari for the awesome envelope that I wish I could’ve pulled out of my old mailbox myself and Kerri for the GORGEOUS envelope and letter, I wish you’d write more! <3


This is my all-time favorite youtube video. Posting it here for all you cat loving letter-writer lovelies...




Here are the Norma Jeane envelopes! Only half-ish of them are done and photographed as you see, so if anyone wants one, let me know! I cannot promise anything as I’m still trying to figure out envelope template placement on a lot of them because they’re HUGE photos off the calendar, (The back shows you can tear them out and frame them, larger than an 8x10.) but will do my best!



OUTGOING

^Micaela’s was the one that sparked the idea to turn as many as possible into envelopes; it was somewhat of an experiment to be honest, and I’m so happy with how it turned out. The ‘free t-shirt’ sticker came from an old issue of Nylon magazine, which I am now in regret of not making copies of as it’s a great little thing to stick on small envelopes, haha. And oh my goodness, I am seriously in love with these art stamps and it’s been hard to use anything but them. Vintage stamps, now’s as good a time as ever to apologize for cheating on you. But I can’t promise I’ll be faithful. *SHAME*

^Faces and quotes for marvelous Megan in Australia.


^A girl and her circles for Eric.


^My way overdue reply to the brilliant Carolee. One of the most labor-intensive envelopes I’ve made as I traced a template twice; once for thick paper that would hold up through the postal system and then one for some tissue paper with red swirls on it. I pasted the tissue on top of the paper and wa-la! Durable and safe envelope that’s also really pretty (if I do say so myself).


INCOMING

^The amazing missive from Bianca; I never photographed the inside contents, but they were brilliant: her letter of course, postcards, a few labels, stickers, mail-tag and one of her rainbow bracelets. :D


^Surprise mail from ‘Caela!! Her note was so nice and I plan to send a little response after I write a couple more replies. <3


^Eric writes some of the sweetest letters and am so thankful to have another great male pen-pal. Hard to believe I now have four male pen-pals! (For me anyway, it was unheard of men to write unless it was in a period film, so I am really astonished by this – granted, small – number of male writers.)

^The first non-blank-envelope from Zoraida! I was so thrilled and cannot wait to write to her how excited I was that she decorated an envelope, haha.

^Great little letter from Shona, I loved the collage-like-envelope and of course, those English-stamps just stop my heart. <3
^That fabulous envelope from Cari, oh my gosh, it was the only piece of mail Tuesday, but way exciting because of it being both b&w and being so animated. :]

^Little letter from a lovely pen pal in Germany whom is one of the sweetest and cutest international girls I know.

^A postcard from incredible Ilona; these vintage inspired little PC’s are some of my favorites that I’ve received lately.

^A lovely letter from Kerri. Isn’t it so, so, so pretty? Easy way to win my heart is by either lots of color, insane design or something very simplistic/Anthropologie looking, like the above. <3

- L