Wednesday/Thursday

 

I feel like I'm finishing up a great weekend, but no! It's only Thursday, and I'm loving it. One thing I am really, really grateful for is the freedom being a stay at home mama gives me. I'm able to kind of do as a please, and come down to Phoenix to see friends and family whenever I want. It's the best. And speaking of, this week something incredibly exciting happened for my darling Sarah...she got engaged! I am just beyond happy for her and Andy. Sarah has been one of my closest friends for a long, long time now, and we have one of those relationships that has grown and changed so much over time, and luckily, through all of it we are still here, together. It's amazing to see her so happy, and their wedding is going to be one for the books! So of course I had to come down and celebrate, and that's exactly what we did! We ended up going to Pita Jungle for dinner and spent a couple of hours talking and talking as usual. We talked wedding plans, engagement stories, future hopes and dreams...there were happy tears and it was just an all around amazing night. We got so wrapped up in conversation (and the good food!) that I forgot to snap photos of us, but I did manage one of our delicious dinner. Sar got the Macro platter (one of my all-time favorite dishes) and I got the Mediterranean salad. Now comes all the fun wedding planning, and I am so excited to be a part of it. Between my sister, Shirley, and now Sarah, my bridesmaid's card is full for 2011! So no one else go and get hitched! ;)

and here's a photo of the future Mr. and Mrs. Leubner just because I love them! Aren't they a gorgeous couple? Their babies are going to be beautiful.

Then this morning Henry and I woke up and headed over to the Phoenix Children's Museum to meet our sweet friends Anita and Natalie and their little ones, Lola Birdie and Victor. I'd driven by the museum before and had always been curious about what was inside...and now I know!  I absolutely loved it and can't wait to go again, hopefully when Hank can make it because I know he'd love it too. There were so many different rooms, things to climb on, interactive tools, art everywhere, both to admire and create...in one word: awesome! It's a total kid's paradise and I can only imagine how much Henry will love it when he's a bit bigger. Even now though, at 3 months he was perfectly content to walk around and take it all in with wide, wide eyes. It was adorable. It was also great to have some good chats with Natalie and Anita, and I foresee more fun playdates in our future. Love it.

Here are some photos from our morning:

 

A Bright Spot in December: A Phoenix and a Pin-Up

As one would expect, inkspotting is tough during December. Here we are at the end of the month, and I have only interviewed three people since the 1st. There were a few times over the summer when I interviewed three contributors during my lunch hour!

The last person whose work I photographed was Megan, who I found upstairs at the Penn Plaza Borders store.

Megan has seventeen tattoos, but it was this one that caught my eye:

This is a phoenix, of course, but fewer people may recognize it as Fawkes, the phoenix of Professor Albus Dumbledore, in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.

The artwork is based on the illustration by Jason Cockcroft on the cover of the UK edition of the aforementioned book.

The tattooist Jamie Nichols at Gargoyle Tattoo in Aberdeen, Washington, completed this piece in about eight hours over two sittings.

Megan also has this pinup on her upper left arm:

The use of negative space for the bombs is pretty cool.

Marcus was the artist at Gargoyle that Megan credited for creating this piece..

Thanks to Megan for taking the time to speak to me about her cool tattoos!

Amanda's Phoenix

Amanda has two tattoos, one of which she shared with me at the end of August in the Penn Plaza Borders store.

This is the tattoo she designed:

Amanda was inspired by the "compelling mythology of phoenixes" and had Bobby at Modern Age Tattoo in Nanuet, New York, translate the design into the final product.

The quote, in Latin, "post tenebras lux" means "After darkness, light". This mirrors the life cycle of the mythological phoenix who dies, bound in flame, only to be reborn from the ashes. Clicking here will display the vast array of phoenixes that have appeared on Tattoosday previously.

In other words, even when things appear their darkest, affirmation is just within reach.

Thanks to Amanda for sharing this cool tattoo with us here on Tattoosday!

Melanie's Phoenix Helps Her Rise Above

I met Melanie in Penn Station and had to stop her to ask about this colorful phoenix on her back:

She originally had just the Yin and Yang tattoo, but expanded the work to include the legendary bird rising through the ashes. To Melanie, this represents being "better and stronger" after picking up the pieces from life's challenges, overcoming difficulties and rising above everything.

The tattoo was inked by Rick Schreck at House of 1000 Tattoos in Middlesex, New Jersey.

Thanks to Melanie for sharing her cool phoenix tattoo with us here on Tattoosday!

Gina's Phoenix

In late June, I ran into Gina in Penn Station and complimented her on a tattoo she had on her back. At the time, she was wearing something with straps that covered part of the design. I gave her a flier and she remarked that she had just recently discovered the site through this post on the tattoo of Julie Powell.

Alas, like so many folks to whom I give fliers, I didn't receive any emails or photos. But a month passed and one day I was pleasantly surprised to see an email from Gina, with the following photos of her phoenix tattoo:

I'll let her explain the rest:

"... I had completely forgotten [about sending in the photo] until I found the picture I took for you on my camera... This was done by Junii at the Diamond Club in San Francisco. [Bill Salmon, Junii's husband, is the studio owner]. She does amazing line work.  She's also incredibly conscientious about design and her clients.  For both my tattoos, she spend a lot of time talking with me, looking at the 20 pictures I had brought in of bits or aspects of what I wanted, then went off and did her own research, always coming back with exactly the right drawing.

This one - I got it after a really, really difficult year. So, obviously, not the deepest symbolism - just wanted to remind myself of the possibility of renewal."

Thanks to Gina for sharing her tattoo with us here on Tattoosday!

Phoenix Foretells Phoenix

I met Ryan one afternoon while passing through Penn Station.

He has nine tattoos and has been getting inked since he was seventeen years old.

Here is the largest of his tattoos, which he shared with us here at Tattoosday:

Ryan went to the artist Scott Bramble, who works out of Mercury Tattoo Studio in Glenside, Pennsylvania. He says he let Scott "do what he wanted and he ran with it". The end result was stunning.

I particularly like the detail on the tail feathers.

Ryan remarked that, at the time he had this done, he was married and going through a "horrible" divorce. Now that is in the past and he is happily involved with a girl from Phoenix, Arizona, which he acknowledges is a "weird coincidence".

Thanks to Ryan for sharing this amazing tattoo with us here on Tattoosday!

Yesterday, Thursday

Last night Hank and I decided to drive down to Phoenix for a little impromptu date night. We left right when I got off work, and drove straight to Green for a delicious dinner. If you live in Arizona, and haven't been to Green yet, I highly recommend it- it's one of our favorite restaurants and we've been going since it opened. I usually get the Green burger, but this time I got the Spicy mock chicken sandwich (on an Ezekial bun), with a side of pasta salad. Hank got some sort of ginger tofu bowl and both choices were delicious. If you're curious about the restaurant, click here to visit their website and definitely try it out as soon as you can! We there, we spoke with one of the counter-workers about a vegan restaurant in Sedona that we will hopefully we trying out soon. The name of it is escaping me at the moment, but once we try it I will be sure to post a review.

After dinner I had Hank stop by Yogurtland so I could try the new Red Velvet flavor. I wasn't a huge fan, but it wasn't bad by any means. I always think I am going to branch out, but usually end up with plain tart and a lot of fruit. Either way, I love that place. After I got my yogurt fix, we headed over to ASU to listen to Johnny Cupcakes speak. I didn't know very much about the guy, besides the fact that he once put Hank and the dudes up while on tour, we know some of the same people, and he runs a highly successful tee shirt business. To be honest, I was slightly apprehensive- I didn't know what to expect and I wasn't in the mood to sit in a lecture hall and listen to some guy speak about how he became inspired to put cupcakes on tee shirts. But...once we got into the room and Johnny began speaking, I found myself truly enjoying my time. His story is inspirational, he's an extremely "real" guy, and I liked that he was so personal and forthcoming while sharing with all of us. By the end of the night, I was a total convert, and now consider myself a fan of him, and his brand. Super cool dude, awesome story, and his lecture was extremely entertaining (all four hours of it). I definitely recommend checking him out if his lecture tour comes to a university near you.

I also have to add that while we were standing in line to get in, a blog reader/friend of mine came over and introduced herself! The lovely Chelsea and her boyfriend John Scott were just adorable, and it was really neat to meet yet another blog friend in real life. Two in two weeks is two more than I've met in my entire life, so I'm wondering who I will meet next week! ;) But really, it was wonderful to meet both of them, and Hank and John had a lot to talk about. Chelsea put it best in her blog about it, "It seriously made me so happy about how easy conversation came, and I really believe that it was due to already feeling that we knew one another (thank you blogs, flickr, and twitter!)." :)

After the lecture we headed home to Prescott. One of my most favorite things to do with Hank is go on drives, go on road trips, really just go anywhere with him. We always have the best conversations, listen to great music, and have have such a good time. Sometimes it's little moments like last night that kind of snap me into reality, and remind me just how good I have it. I written about this before, but I think people are blessed with different things in their lives. I would say one of my main "blessings" is this love in my life. I'm very grateful.

When we got home it was past 2am, and I wasn't feeling very well, so I decided to call in to work today. I've spent most of the morning in bed, and it's about 1:30pm right now, and I'm feeling much better. Sleep did me well, and I'm glad I stayed home. Later tonight Hank is playing a show at Sundance's which should be fun.

What are your weekend plans? Are you experiencing nice weather wherever you are? Whatever you do, I hope it's amazing!

I'll leave you with some photos from yesterday...

top: J. Crew
skirt: Leifsdottir (you can find this brand at Anthro or Nordstrom)
shoes: Target







on the drive down


Hank, me and Chelsea :)

Friday night- birthday fun

Last night was such a great night. Two of my closest friends, Alana and Erin, celebrated their birthdays. The night began in downtown Phoenix, at the First Friday Art Walk, continued at a couple of bars- including Lost Leaf, my favorite...and ended at Hanny's, for a late night birthday dinner. The older I get, the more I appreciate birthdays. I'm not one to get sad about them at all- I think it's so awesome to have "made it" another year, and the whole idea of the celebration is fantastic! YES! Let's celebrate you and your life, and this past year, and let's toast to the next year. Birthdays are my favorite days, and this is even more so when they are the birthdays of people I love.

I've been friends with Erin since our freshman year in college, when we lived in the same dorm, and we both ended up rushing Pi Phi. We've been close ever since, spending birthdays and holiday parties, nights out, girl's trips and vacations across the country together. She's a really special person to me, so her birthday is a special day to me too, since I'm so happy she was born...as weird as it sounds! haha. And my sweet Alana- I met her my sophomore year of college and immediately fell in friend love with her. We've been the same kind of close ever since- spending those same girl's nights, trips, etc. Alana is one of my all-time favorite people, and to know her is to love her forever. Our group of girl friends has been close for a long time, and once you get to the point where you've all been friends for close to a decade, it's really just a big family. We're all so incredibly different, and it's so neat that over the years we've remained so close. Weddings, babies, up and downs...we've all been there for one another.

Last night was no different! It was super fun, and a night to remember for sure. Here are some photos from the evening-

downtown Art Walk


the birthday girls and me


my cute little besties and me


the gorgeous sisters


Erin, Kyle and Jeff (this was one of the few photos I took with my D60- you can totally tell the picture quality!)



Erin and me


sisters!


same shirt, kinda...


Alana, Em and me- these ladies are the best.


Pi Phis ;)


The Kolbes


Shirls and Sarah


Leah and Alana


Shirley and Nate, aren't they the cutest couple?!


walking downtown to Hanny's


birthday table one!


birthday table two! (still missing a couple of people)


Happy birthday Alana!


dinner


The Barnas...good people :)


me


Kati! I love this photo so much.


annnd, one of the lovely birthday girls! So pretty.


I hope all of you had a wonderful Friday night, whatever you did! I slept in super late this morning, and now I'm off for a day at the salon with Rhonda. Have a great day. :)