Make Your Mark

Dip your hands in colors
while the young night flutters in on you and
finger paint me pictures of all you see.
No matter what they say, you'll always be
faithfully dangerous, lost and lovely,
so beautiful to me.
I'm not too blind to see.

-Over the Rhine

"Faithfully Dangerous"

                                               roz stendahl

Kick off your 2011 with color and make your mark!  Here are some wonderfully crafty resources for inspiration!

Make yourself a visual journal to keep track of the special moments in your year.  I took a class from Roz Stendahl, a fantastic artist in Minneapolis at the MN Book Arts center.  Her visual journals are just stunning and offer so much inspiration on how to capture a moment that means something to you in a visual and creative way.  She gives a little inside look at one of her stunning books in the video below:

Some other favorite visual journalists are Sabrina Ward Harrison and John Copeland.  Wonderful mixed-media works and neither are afraid to get messy... both visually and emotionally.

sabrina ward harrison

                                                                john copeland

Seasons of Love

Five hundred twenty-five thousand
Six hundred minutes
How do you measure, measure a year?

In daylights, in sunsets, in midnights
In cups of coffee
In inches, in miles, in laughter, in strife.

-Rent

I am sure there have been some spectacular moments in your 2010.  Think about it... How many sunrises have come your way, snowfalls you've felt, bird songs you've woken to, kisses and hugs you've shared...  The smells, tastes, colors of each season.  I live in a small town that quietly naps through the fall and winter and then takes a big yawn in the spring.  And, our town's a wonderful hostess of summer's pleasures.  I like the change of pace from the life I once led in the city... the seasons change slowly when you have time to be present and still.  Looking forward to a new year and what awaits us...  
    .ryn

2010 moments in pictures:

Question

"Have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves... live everything. Live the question now. Perhaps then, some day far in the future,

you will gradually without even noticing it,

live your way into the answer."

-Rainer Maria Rilke

Find the poetry in your deepest questions today...
    .ryn

from Pablo Neruda's The Book of Questions

III.

Tell me, is the rose naked
or is that her only dress?

Why do trees conceal
the splendor of their roots?

Who hears the regrets
of the thieving automobile?

Is there anything in the world sadder
than a train standing in the rain?

12.12

"You are not too old
and it is not too late
to dive into your increasing depths
where life calmly gives out
it's own secret."
-Rainer Maria Rilke

It is my birthday this Sunday the 12th and I am so happy to have the best birthday present of all... my parents in town!  This beautiful blessing for a birthday, by John O'Donohue, reminds me of how special it is to be here... and how so many special people have stepped into my life and have touched it in some way.  I am blessed.
    .ryn 

For Your Birthday
By John O'Donohue (taken from "To Bless the Space Between Us")


Blessed be the mind that dreamed the day
the blueprint of your life
would begin to glow on earth,
illuminating all the faces and voices
that would arrive to invite
your soul to growth.

John

All you need is love.
-John Lennon

Music with Personality

If you're like me and are a lover of great stop-motion animation and music with lots of personality, you're in for a delicious treat tonight.  Sergei Prokofiev’s musical tale, “Peter and the Wolf,” (remember listening to that is elementary school?) is reimagined in a jaw-droppingly gorgeous and rawly emotional stop-motion film.  It took home the 2008 Oscar for Best Animated Short Film.  Do you need any more convincing to watch this?  And, thanks to my sister Annie, we now have our very own TV!  Thanks Annie!  It's on PBS tonight at 8 (but check your local listings).  Don't want to miss it!
    .ryn    

More info about the "Peter and the Wolf" animated short here

Blue

Strings of lights above the bed
Curtains drawn and a glass of red
All I ever get for Christmas is blue


"All I Ever Get for Christmas is Blue"
Over the Rhine

Outside In

"From December to March, there are for many of us three gardens -
the garden outdoors,
the garden of pots and bowls in the house,
and the garden of the mind's eye."
-   Katherine S. White

Hello to you!  And, happy December!  I am planning on bringing the outdoors in this Christmas.  This means many brisk hikes to forage for treasures in the woods... pine boughs, twigs, pinecones, berries that can add the texture, smells, color and peacefulness of the Christmas season.  These finds combined with some candlelight and mulled wine, and we're set!  Enjoy the season's coziness!     .ryn
Some inspirations... 

You're An Answer Why

Enjoy this time with family and friends.  Here is some inspiration from one of my alltime favorite groups, Storyhill.  Perfect message before a day of Thanksgiving...
    .ryn

What's this new air you breathe from within?
It's telling you there's a new place
To begin again -- with the morning's light
You wake up smiling, you wake up feeling all right

'Cuz you're hunting like the hawk that circles higher
You're the rising smoke from a dyin' campfire
You're a thermal beneath the wing, you're cirrus in the sky
You're a reason for, you're an answer why

Your arms are strong when you fly through the air
Over streets and buildings and the people below you stare
They can't believe, 'cuz they've never seen
Someone who dared fly outside their dreams

-Storyhill "Steady On"

Thankful...

"If the only prayer you said in your whole life was, "thank you," that would suffice."
-Meister Eckhart

Thankful...

                                                                                   photo credit: ryn

 ...for fresh local produce

  ...for summer storms

 ...for sunsets on Pig Lake

 ...for freedom

 ...for innocent eyes and unconditional love

 ...for the most unconditional of love of all

Owl Moon



Northern Saw-whet Owl

It was a beautiful night in the woods last night.  The moon was so bright that we didn't even need to turn our headlamps on when going down for our hourly net-checks.  The trees cast tall shadows across the leaf-covered forest floor, and the stars twinkled overhead in the chilly night sky. The moon was too bright for the Saw-whets, however, who were most-likely hiding from their predators, the larger owls that we could hear calling somewhere deep in the the forest.  We did have one little owl come to us last night, and it was at the eleventh hour... literally.  We were so happy to have one last owl for the season, to add to a grand total of 487 owls.  It is always a thrill to be so close to such a delicate and beautiful bird.  Here are some photos from this banding season that illustrate the owl-banding process.  Enjoy!

    .ryn                                                                                                        photo credits: ryn

The owls are attracted to the mp3's of Saw-whet calls we play over loud-speakers in the woods.  Four nets are set up around the speakers that will catch birds that fly into them.  When we find owls in the nets, we carefully remove them from the pockets in the nets and place them in drawstring sacks that we then bring up to the banding cabin.



Carefully taking the owl out of the bag

Banding and measurement tools  

Fall Song

Fall Song

Another year gone, leaving everywhere
its rich spiced residues: vines, leaves,

the uneaten fruits crumbling damply
in the shadows, unmattering back

from the particular island
of this summer, this NOW, that now is nowhere

except underfoot, moldering
in that black subterranean castle

of unobservable mysteries – roots and sealed seeds
and the wanderings of water. This

I try to remember when time’s measure
painfully chafes, for instance when autumn

flares out at the last, boisterous and like us longing
to stay – how everything lives, shifting

from one bright vision to another, forever

in these momentary pastures.

~ Mary Oliver ~

Monday Video Inspiration: PS22 "LISZTOMANIA"

The PS22 Chorus does it again with an inspiring rendition of Phoenix's ""LISZTOMANIA."  LOVE these kids!  Hope your Monday was swell.  Ciao for now!
    .ryn  

Tomato Toe-Mahto

"I live on good soup, not on fine words."
-Moliere

I pulled out my dead, frost-bitten tomato plant yesterday.  It was time.  Although, the withered plant surprisingly was still bearing fruit... tiny green tomatoes hanging off of the vines that have spread like tentacles across our yard.  In honor of the glorious harvest she has provided us with late in the summer (I reminisce of the sun-warmed fruit that we ate like apples), I made a homemade tomato soup.   

Warm up your honey's tummy with a bowl of 33 Birch Tomato Soup.  It's the perfect ending to a day of raking, bench-painting, and plant-pulling... 
Enjoy! Your honey will request you make this again ASAP before they even finish their first bowl, guaranteed!   
 .ryn                                                                                                                 photos: ryn

Vine-ripened tomatoes

Sugar & spice

33 Birch Tomato
Adapted from the Barefoot Contessa tomato soup recipe

Ingredients

• 3 tablespoons good olive oil
• 1 1/2 cups chopped red onions (2 onions)
• 2 carrots, unpeeled and chopped
• 1 tablespoon minced garlic (3 cloves)
• 4 pounds vine-ripened tomatoes, coarsely chopped (5 large)
• 1 1/2 teaspoons sugar
• 1 tablespoon tomato paste
• 1/4 cup packed chopped fresh basil leaves, plus julienned basil leaves, for garnish
• 3 cups chicken stock, preferably homemade
• 1 tablespoon kosher salt 
• 2 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper
• 3/4 cup heavy cream
• Croutons, for garnish
• secret ingredient: a pinch of crushed red pepepr flakes

Directions

Heat the olive oil in a large, heavy-bottomed pot over medium-low heat. Add the onions and carrots and saute for about 10 minutes, until very tender. Add the garlic and cook for 1 minute. Add the tomatoes, sugar, tomato paste, basil, chicken stock, salt, and pepper and stir well. Bring the soup to a boil, lower the heat, and simmer, uncovered, for 30 to 40 minutes, until the tomatoes are very tender.

Add the cream to the soup and process it in a food processor. Reheat the soup over low heat just until hot and serve with julienned basil leaves and big buttery garlicy cheesy croutons.

Eat. Repeat.

Flock of Colors

"A person should always offer a prayer of graciousness for the love that has awakened in them. When you feel love for your beloved and his or her love for you, now and again you should offer the warmth of your love as a blessing for those who are damaged and unloved. Send that love out into the world to people who are desperate; to those who are starving; to those who are trapped in prison; in hospitals and all the brutal terrains of bleak and tormented lives. When you send that love out from the bountifulness of your own love, it reaches other people. This love is the deepest power of prayer."
— John O’Donohue, Anam Cara “The Wounded Gift”

                                                                                                              photo credit: ryn

I would have loved to known the Irish poet and philosopher John O'Donohue when he was alive.  He left this earth far too soon but left behind a very big imprint on the hearts of many people.  And he left behind stories and thoughts and beautiful prayers.  I think he would have made a fantastic friend... he understood the light and dark of the heart, he listened to the earth, he laughed. 
Take a quiet moment to listen to John himself reading one of his prayers in his own voice.  This is such a beautiful prayer and it means even more to me actually hearing his soft Irish voice. 
I hope your weekend is filled with a flock of color.
    .ryn

                                          photo credit: ryn

Brave

11.11.10
Veteran's Day

"You have enemies? Good. That means you’ve stood up for something, sometime in your life."
-Winston Churchill
                                                                                                                                                    photo credit: ryn

I was out to lunch yesterday with a co-worker.  We were standing in line to order tacos and behind me was a female soldier in uniform.  There is a base closeby.  The woman behind her, a stranger, said to the woman in uniform, "Thank you for all that you do for me.  I want to buy your lunch.  Have a happy Veteran's Day."  Wow.  That is a clear reminder of what these people do for me and each of us.  They are brave and put their lives on the line for our freedom.  Let's be thankful and grateful today for everyone who has and is serving us. 
    .ryn

WITF has an online collection of some war stories that are very worth checking out. 

I Heart...

I HEART:

                                                                                  photo credit: jenny

Sisters

Peonies

Constellations

Mossy paths

TTV Photography

Cuddle Doon

Mom

Boggle

Jump Cut

"Good editing makes a director look good.  Great editing makes a film look like it wasn't directed at all."  -Victor Fleming

                                                     photo: banksy

One of the reasons I love video editing so much is the fact that there is infinite potential in telling one story.  At a post-house I used to work at, we were given a challenge: to take the same footage and edit a one-munite film for a party we were having.  It was truly thrilling to see each editor's take on the footage they were given.  The challenge was a great reminder that editing is an art form and that each person brings their own unique aesthetic to a piece. 
Editor extraordinaire, Walter Murch, says "Life is like one continuous dolly shot.  How life and motion pictures comes together is a mystery.  The paradox is that images are coming together to tell a seamless story, even though our life is not like this at all.  The way we put films together is a challenge.  A film editor must encourage this challenge."
Enjoy!
    .ryn

These hilarious re-cut movie trailers illustrate how a story can take a completely different turn.





AND, if you haven't had enough, here is another jaw-dropping piece of editing by one of my inspirations, pogo.

Old-School Color

Just a couple more colorful bits I had to share... old-school style. 
    .ryn

Color Your World

I need a little color to brighten this gray and rainy November day.  These dreamy watercolor's by Stina Persson do the trick... sugary sweet eye candy.  And below is Breakbot's "Baby I'm Yours" music video, an amazing feat of watercolor genius... merely 2,000 consecutive watercolors that create the glamourous and very-retro feel of the video.  Wonderful!  A sugar-free treat for your afternoon... enjoy. 

    .ryn 

Family

"What greater thing is there for human souls than to feel that they are joined for life - to be with each other in silent unspeakable memories."

  ~George Eliot

A fall visit home to Minnesota for family, puppy, leaves, pie, warmth, love...

    .ryn

                                                                                                                             photo credit: ryn