Friday Featured Art: Dutch Landscapes

There's a new exhibit of Dutch Landscapes opening at Buckingham Palace today. The Royal Collection is pretty fabulous, and the exhibit includes these great pieces by van Ruisdael and Hobbema.

Thursday Text: Home Thoughts, from Abroad

I've been thinking of this Robert Browning poem lately: Home Thoughts, from Abroad.

O, to be in England
Now that April 's there,
And whoever wakes in England
Sees, some morning, unaware,
That the lowest boughs and the brushwood sheaf
Round the elm-tree bole are in tiny leaf,
While the chaffinch sings on the orchard bough
In England—now!

And after April, when May follows,
And the whitethroat builds, and all the swallows!
Hark, where my blossom'd pear-tree in the hedge
Leans to the field and scatters on the clover
Blossoms and dewdrops—at the bent spray's edge—
That 's the wise thrush; he sings each song twice over,
Lest you should think he never could recapture
The first fine careless rapture!
And though the fields look rough with hoary dew,
All will be gay when noontide wakes anew
The buttercups, the little children's dower
—Far brighter than this gaudy melon-flower!

Mirror Project

I found a fancy-looking mirror at TJ Maxx for $4, but I didn't like the finish. I should have taken a before picture - it was kind of a bronze-gold with black. So I bought a small can of gold spray paint and took it outside. I like how it turned out, and for a total cost of $7, that's not too bad!

Gwyneth Paltrow

Do you ever watch Who Do You Think You Are? on NBC? It's a great genealogy show. The stories are so fascinating. The latest episode had Gwyneth Paltrow tracing her roots. I was especially interested in her beautiful wedding ring. Here she is telling her mother, Blythe Danner, about what she discovered. (I borrowed the other picture from a Google search.)

Making soap

I tried my hand at soap making last week. I just used a clear glycerin base and added things from the kitchen. The first is honey and oatmeal. The second is an orange spice herbal tea - I also used a little food coloring to make it orange instead of brown. Then I used a cookie cutter to cut smaller pieces. The third one is blueberry - I used a little too much. I used the bottom of a soda bottle for the mold, which was interesting, but the recycle symbol and other numbers showed up... The last has bits of the peel of a clementine, and it smells really good.

Friday Featured Art: News from Nowhere

I've been reading News from Nowhere by William Morris. It's been interesting - it outlines Morris's political ideals in novel form. What I love about it, though, is the frontispiece from the original edition, printed by the Kelmscott Press. This woodcut depicts Morris's country home - Kelmscott Manor. We visited Kelmscott in 2009, and I bought a card with this design. It's so beautiful.

Thursday Text: Romans 12:2

There is a quote on the wall of the Divinity School at Duke University that comes from Romans 12:2. It says "be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind." We really liked that. Here's the full scripture:

And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.

Touch of Europe

Here's a great source from Martha: Touch of Europe. She used some of these great decoupage papers in an egg project. I love these butterflies - they go with the last post I made. And the bottom image is a fantastic map of London. They also sell vintage linens and all sorts of things. Check it out.

Butterfly House

We were in St. Louis this weekend, and we visited the Butterfly House for the first time. It's a part of the Missouri Botanical Garden, and it's fantastic. There is a conservatory that you can walk through with hundreds of butterflies fluttering about. It was very beautiful and summery.

Friday Featured Art: Wood Gatherer

I really love the Wood Gatherer painting by Jules Bastien-Lepage at the Milwaukee Art Museum. Of course it makes me think of my dad, who goes up into the foothills to gather firewood every fall. He also always has a daughter or granddaughter somewhere nearby. And I just like Bastien-Lepage.