Randomness and links

I'm really enjoying reading blogs again and having time to explore new websites, spend a little bit more time on Twitter, read interesting articles... It really is amazing, this online world of ours, so full of inspiration and information. Of course what makes this possible is all the wonderful people who share their knowledge, all the artists and creative bloggers who are very generous with their own inspiration and processes. The Internet has only made this sharing easier, but could you imagine living in a world without it?

I was recently thinking about inspiration and how ideas spread while watching this fascinating video on "influencers" (or "trendsetters").


INFLUENCERS FULL VERSION from R+I creative on Vimeo.

Of course we all suffer from information and connection overload from time to time. Or worse, from a sense of not being enough or not doing enough after reading how many creative people are living their dream lifes. I have been there, but I do think that it had more to do with how I was feeling in other areas of my life than with what I was reading online. However, it's always a good idea to have a digital detox from time to time, don't you think? If you feel the need to do this right now, Susannah has plenty of advice on her blog.

If on the contrary you're looking for new blogs to visit, you should go and see  Paris vs New York. It's such a beautiful collection of illustrations about the differences between these two cities... It just makes me want to visit both! Which I'll probably do next year, if everything goes according to plan! These are my favourites from the blog:

There is so much beauty online, that perhaps sometimes we forget to transfer all that inspiration to our offline world.  I'm definitely guilty of this, sometimes I spend most my time working and when it's time to relax I sit in front of my laptop to read some blogs. The Tour de Word (see video below) is just one way of taking something that started as an online adventure and develop it into something to do face to face. Our Blog camps are another example of how you can take relationships and friendships developed on the blogosphere to the offline world. I haven't been to a Blog Camp in a while, but if there is one next year, you can bet I'll be there!

I can feel the quietness out there. More importantly I can feel the quietness inside me.
After the craziness of wedding planning,
after the magic of the day itself,
after moving house,
after some traumatic events that  I'll tell you about another day,

... everything is back to normal. And this is a good thing. For now.

I'm enjoying autumn, quiet evenings. The peace, the stillness. Soon I'll be restless again. I can't stay still for too long. And I'm already looking forward to the madness of Christmas, the excitement and possibilities of the New Year. But for now, this peace is all I need.

Mr & Mrs

We did it! We got married! The day was perfect in all the important ways. We had an amazing time, we shared a beautiful and important moment with our friends and family and we didn't care about the fact that we forgot to display some of the flower decorations.

The honeymoon in beautiful Santorini was relaxing and suitably romantic and we now want to go back to the island every year! 

We're back in our new flat and we still don't have an Internet conection so I'd be missing from the blogospehere for a little bit longer, but here are some of the photos that our friends took on the day. More photos and details to follow...

Off to get married...

Before I disappear to get married (Yay!) I thought I'd leave you with some of the inspiration pages from the wedding booklet I've created this year.

First the inspiration for the big event, when we'll be getting married in Spain on 18th September...

We've also organized a picnic brunch the next day for a more relaxing catch up with our friends...

Then we'll go on honeymoon to Santorini, Greece, and then to Barcelona for a friend's wedding (She's getting married two weeks after me)

On our return, we've organized a stylish (I hope!) champagne and cakes party in Oxford for some of our friends who couldn't make it to Spain...

I'll be back with photos and stories (but not too many) of all these events at some point in early October...

More bloggy weddings.

We're moving!!

We thought it would be nice to come back to our own place after the wedding. Living in a shared house was supposed to be a temporary measure after we came back from South America, but somehow we stayed in this house for almost two years! I think it was meant to be as it means that we'll start our married life in a completely new place that will be only ours. Of course, and despite everything we have to do, I couldn't resist starting looking for inspiration on decorating the new place. These are some of my Flickr favourites. I'm going for a relaxed vibe and I seem to be drawn to white, blue and yellow (of course yellow!)

1. IKEA_Armoire_Cleaning_Closet, 2. Hip Home Offices, 3. Butterfly Bathroom-Elle Decor So Chic, 4. Hip Home Offices, 5. Hip Home Offices, 6. Strawberry Tart on Tray, 7. Living Room, 8. Silver Leaf Lamp, 9. Blackberry Sorbet, 10. HUGE soap dispenser!, 11. main guest room , 12. Jen's Corner, 13. mom's pillowcases - finished, 14. breakfast, 15. Corner of my home, 16. Kitchen shelves, 17. IMG_2569, 18. Untitled, 19. IMG_2616, 20. my redecorated entryway, 21. New corner, 22. muted metallic, 23. Spring Cure 2010: kitchen inspiration, 24. inspiration, 25. books on stairs

Randomness and links

So, yep, I'm posting links, but hey, at least I'm posting! First a quick update: I'm stressing about work and stressing about the wedding... from time to time I get to talk to people about non-wedding or non-work related things, but not often.

When it all gets too much, reading your blogs helps. So I have been reading blogs, just not writing much. And I've been collecting inspiring images on my Tumblr. And I've been dreaming of going back to writing and taking photos, and reading, and crafting...  I'm really, really excited about our wedding day and the honeymoon, but I also can't wait to have my life back afterwards!

And with that, I'll give you the randomness and the links:

Best writing advice ever.

If you're a blogger who value your blog and your time, you need to read this.

It's never too late to realize your dreams. 

I found this article about model photographers interesting. I'm still thinking lots about what I like about photography and dying to go back to experimenting with my camera. I have On Photography, by Susan Sontag, on my bedside table but I haven't started it yet as I want to have the mental space to be able to enjoy and think about it 

I'm loving the Inspiring Women series on Ill Seen, Ill Said which includes, of course, Lee Miller. I saw an exhibition about her somewhere in London a couple of years ago and I've been fascinated by her life and fearless attitude to trying new things ever since. Her biography is also on my bedside table...

A very articulate post on artists' right to earn money on side jobs. It's not selling out it's being responsible! I've always thought this and have never been able to put it into words as well as Amanda Craig.

There is no link for this one, but I found this quote by William Burroughs, on inspiration, that really got me thinking about this inspiring blog world of ours: 

“Out of the closets and into the museums, libraries, architectural monuments, concert halls, bookstores, recording studios and film studios of the world. Everything belongs to the inspired and dedicated thief…. Words, colors, light, sounds, stone, wood, bronze belong to the living artist. They belong to anyone who can use them. Loot the Louvre! A bas l’originalité, the sterile and assertive ego that imprisons us as it creates. Vive le sol—pure, shameless, total. We are not responsible. Steal anything in sight.”

I'll be back soon... Some of my favourite bloggy people have  disappeared from the blogosphere so I hope they come back soon too :)

Simple things... for a happy birthday

It's Christina's birthday today and we are giving her simple things as a present. Here are some of mine...

* A day off in the middle of the week

* Going on a date with my fiance: some wine, a fun French movie... just the two of us in the middle of wedding planning craziness.

* Beautiful simple posts by friends

* Dreaming about travelling

* Discovering details of New York through Kristina's camera

* A coffee date with a good friend

* A text message just to say "I'm thinking of you"

* Rain in the evening after a very hot day

* ... And (I had to mention it) Spain winning the World Cup!! I'm still smiling! This couldn't have happened at a better time for Spain, we really needed a reason to celebrate. I celebrated in Oxford with my Spanish friends but here's an account from a Brit in Madrid.

More simple things here and here.

Summer

Remember when summer was a time for fun and rest? Remember when you were a child and summer days felt so long that you didn't know what to do with them?

I can't remember the last time that I allowed myself to do nothing, but this weekend I'm trying to bring back a bit of that summer feeling and I'm doing nothing but watching movies, meeting friends, and resting (and of course I'll watch the Spain-Holland game tomorrow!). I'll leave you with a beautiful video (via the lovely Frolic blog) that will hopefully inspire you to slow down and play as well...

Coeur de Pirate || Comme des enfants from Dare To Care Records on Vimeo.

PS. After watching (and loving) Heartbreaker and listening to Coeur de Pirate, I'm regretting not having paid more attention to my French lessons at school and am dreaming about moving to France soon...

Our wedding invitations

I've been dying to show you our wedding invitations, and now that most of our guests have seen them, here they are! If you remember, the stationery was one of those things that we decided from the beginning were very important to us. J is a designer so we always knew he'd design something for the occasion. I was in charge of the text and of course there were several discussions during the process on whether words or design are more important!

We started with the colour red and the idea to reflect the wedding venue. As we're getting married in a beautiful old castle we used the medieval theme throughout the invitations, with the stamp on the envelopes or the icon of a knight proposing to his lady (probably not very historically accurate, I know!). We also wanted the invitations to be fun and hopefully reflect that we want our day to be relaxed and not too formal.

We included a card with the basic details (what, who, when, where) and  another one with information on getting there and accommodation. We also designed single postcards for our RSVPs. Finding a printers was the most difficult part. There isn't really that much out there for those who want to design everything from scratch and not use a template or buy designed ones, but luckily we found a good printers in Oxford that did the whole thing for us.

We are really happy by how they've turned out and it's been really good fun giving them to people. And that's one thing ticked off the list!

No longer 30...

Remember my 12 months of being 30 series?  A year has passed since I started it and I turned 31 last week! I'm obviously getting used to being in my 30s, as I didn't feel the need to talk about my birthday incessantly this time. I had a great day but definitely more low key than last year's. I wonder if this is what being mature is like?

I didn't manage to write 12 posts for the series, but I guess that's also a sign of what this year was like for me. Busy and full of new challenges. I started a new job that has proven interesting but challenging, I got a flat in my home town in Spain, I attended three Blog Camps and met blog campers that soon turned into friends. I did more creative things that I can even remember doing, including art journaling, jewlery making, collaging, and sewing, and I enjoyed writing and taking photos.

And of course I got engaged and started organizing a wedding! 

It has been a wonderful year in many respects but it has also been difficult at times, and very, very tiring. I had to take a blog break because it was all becoming too much, but I'm slowly getting back and things seem to be slowing down in most fronts. At the moment, I'm trying to prepare myself for the madness that is surely about to start in the wedding front.

But in the meantime, I'm dreaming of beautiful and long summer days filled with books, photographs, flowers and walks in the beach. And plenty of time to think, to see, to love.

1. Print laundry I, 2. Larkspur Blues, 3. mini books, 4. Untitled, 5. ., 6. pale tulips, 7. Pretty days, 8. Untitled, 9. A la orilla del mar, 10. Colors, 11. rainy Tuesday (7), 12. *, 13. Love is in the air, 14. Always in my dreams, 15. Weekend is for rest, 16. Semana 3. Palabras/ Week 3. Words