west coast wedding nostalgia

Posted in advantageous adventures, Travels by ElaineMarie

i’m missing my west coast friends this weekend so i thought i’d do a visual venture back a few weeks to one of the most enchanting wedding weekends i’ve ever had the pleasure of partaking.

my five day stay in the bay city was FRANTASTIC.
a visit to the haight, a drive down the PCH, and a weekend stay at the holly farm were all part of the getaway.

my only regret is that i didn’t take more photos to reminisce!

missing you tons left coast friends. lots of love vibes to you.

1. reunited 2. sourdough! 3. sf style 4. fireside chat by the ocean 5. new friends 6. miner’s cup 7. wall-to-wall music 8. wedding pretty 9. i love these faces 10. officially the raddest couple

15Aug2012

maine two

Posted in advantageous adventures, Momma Needs a minute..., Travels by ElaineMarie

and now for the more relaxing portion of our vacay:

this was the part i needed: these morning views, long walks and talks with cousinfriends, explorations in the woods, naps, family meals, cool night breezes, anne morrow lindbergh. we don’t take relaxation vacations enough. our travels always seem to be packed around some central activity, i.e. music festival, and i’ve been reminded that we need to slow it down every once in a while. at least i do. i would love a long weekend in the woods. or a few do-nothing days by the sea. it seemed to be good for darla, too. i forget that she gets shuffled around to lots of daily activities and maybe she just needs some time to be fluid.

thank you for being good to me for so many years, maine. we hope to visit you again in the near future.

13Aug2012

maine one

Posted in advantageous adventures, Travels by ElaineMarie

what do i want to share about our weekend in maine? well, i have two main MAINE points:

1. my family is awesome.

2. GO TO PORTLAND. IT IS COOL.

that is all.

in all seriousness, i’ve rewritten this post numerous times. i have been having trouble figuring out what i want to say. i want to say that the weekend was wonderous and beautiful. i want to say it was a blast because my family is comprised of all-around stellar human beings. i want to say the trip was filled with lots of exciting new experiences for darla and i felt very lucky, once again, to be able to witness her intake of all the newness. i want to say that one very special person was missed through it all.

most of all i want to say thank you. thank you to my family, my parents, my husband, my daughter and the universe for allowing me to be a part of last weekend. the whole experience was exactly what i needed. it was where i needed to be when i needed to be.

thank you.

and once again, congratulations to erin & dave bartoletti. may you find happiness in all your years to come!

ps. and thank you to yeasayer for being in portland while i was. BONUS!

20Jul2012

how do you say that?

Posted in advantageous adventures, i dig music, Travels by ElaineMarie

people of forecastle, you need to know something: it’s pronounced “folksoul” not fore-castle. it’s tricky but you gotta get it corrected by next year.

it’s on the website, but no one reads that i guess.

anyway…here’s how the jam went down:

just another weekend that went by too quickly. forecastle really stole my heart. the setting was beautiful and things were FUNKY. in a good way. i’m using that as a good word in this scenario. just the right amount of quirky was applied to the whole entire place. my favorite set was deer tick. beach house sounded pretty good and my favorite new discovery of the weekend was JEFF the brotherhood.

but the whole dang festival really that would have meant nothing without our friends. these reunion weekends serve as reminders that we’ve met some pretty amazing people along the way. no matter if we see them everyday, once a season or once a year our friends leave me humbled.

i’m lucky to share such good times with you, friends. i love you all dearly. even down to the littlest one of ya!

speaking of the little ones, i’ve gotta give props to them too. they did pretty ok. i hope darla will appreciate this music festival weekends when she’s older and not resent us for schlepping her to all these different destinations. she’ll probably rebel in some weird and strange way when she’s older. and that’ll be ok. until then we’re going to fest it up.

folk soul

this is a picture, albeit a not very clear one, of darla last year at pitchfork. she was running wild during tv on the radio getting as messy as could be with a yellow bandana tied around her cape-style.

i don’t know if it gets any better than that. i really don’t. it’s one of my favorite memories of her life thus far. i’m happy we’ve been able to provide her with such carefree moments.

we’re heading to forecastle this year instead of pitchfork. it’s a foray into new territory. i’m a little apprehensive that it won’t be able to compare with our previous experiences.

there’s only one way to find out!

we’ll miss chicago this year, maybe next year we’ll return. but we’ll be surrounded by our friends and good tunes in louisville so i’m sure the weekend will be tops.

at the very least it will be fun taking in a new festival. Pics and updates will be shared along the way. With that, I bid you adieu.

Louisville or bust.

9Jul2012

Back track

Posted in Travels by ElaineMarie

we’re on our way back to ohio for a few days then it’s on to louisville for forecastle! woo woo.

treehousez

mike’s parents took us to cheekwood botanical gardens this afternoon to romp around their literary treehouses exhibit.

they were extraordinary and worth braving the 100 degree weather to explore.

tree houses are the coolest! i was always envious of my peers who had treehouses growing up for i was sure there was some kind of enchanted happenings going on to which i wasn’t privy. i wish we could build some kind of magical structure for darla in the backyard. i guess you never know what will happen in the future. for now we’ve gotten our fix at cheekwood.

6Jul2012

slow southern style

Posted in advantageous adventures, love and happiness, Travels by ElaineMarie

we woke up in franklin, tennessee this morning.

i wish i could blame portals or teleportation, however, the truth is we made the drive down yesterday.

my man knows me and suggested the franklin mercantile for breakfast. it’s one of my all time favorite munching spots.

see how adorbs the place is. how could i not love it? plus the food is pretty stellar. please take note of my fruit tea pictured above. it seems to be a combination of a peach juice & iced tea. i will be attempting a recipe when i get home and let you know on here if i succeed. if i fail, well, i’ll never mention it again and this post will fall away into obscurity. easy enough.

we spent the sweltering afternoon escaping the heat – 102 or 103 i think – at a screening of The Wizard of Oz at the franklin theater. i loved seeing it on the big screen. i catch more hilariously brilliant writing and dialogue every time i see it. the theater was beautiful AND i was able to get a yazoo hefeweizen and popcorn for $7. win win win.

i think i like this slow southern style. it serves us well during these hotsie totsie summer days. that and fruit tea.

animals + rides + food + fun

equals the fair!

last weekend we squeezed in a short trip to the marion county fair. the set-up couldn’t have been more ideal: wonderful weather, barely populated fairgrounds, grumpy three-year-old.

whatevs. she came around.

oh, i love the fair! i inevitably hear templeton from charlotte’s web singing “the fair is a veritable smorgasbord, orgasbord!” anytime i just think about it.

indiana, you do you some good fairs:

i saved this photo for last because darla said she liked the extreme jump the best of all the rides. can’t say i blame her.

“good-bye charlotte, you old schemer.”

p.s. the franklin county fair is july 14-21 in hilliard, oh. will i see any of you there?

28Jun2012

yeasayer

Posted in i dig music, Travels by ElaineMarie

yeasayer is my favorite band. i love them. i have been waiting in anticipation for their third album for a long time.

i took the sequins vintage skirt i found on saturday as a sign from the universe that sunday’s concert was going to be AMAZING.

my sequins skirt tells no lies – except maybe the fact that it says it’s a size 4. i am not a size 4 – yeasayer sounded great. i’m excited to hear the new material in album form. it was slower than i had expected, a bit more trancier and synthier, but i liked it.

b/c it was still grooveable, shakeable and moveable. that’s pretty much all i care about in life.

i have a confession, in my search for the highly coveted parking spots, i almost ran over anand. and then when i was entering the venue i was pushing on the door while he was pulling and the door swung open pretty fast, almost taking him out. i am devastated that this man probably now thinks his biggest fan is trying to assassinate him ninja style. (my tactics were quite ninja-like, agreed? yes?)

so if my boys are reading this – thanks for a great show last sunday night. anand, i am NOT trying to kill you. i love you too much and i have too many future ticket investments for your shows to do a thing like that.

sorry.