a Niki's-eye view

Sometimes we miss the most obvious things.
Often, when i upload pictures from my camera, it seems like the images don't look like my memories, especially the ones taken outside.
Well duh, Niki; you were wearing sunglasses when you took the pictures.
I realized that last week and decided to take a few shots though my lenses to capture what i was actually seeing.

always keep a quarter handy

 Driving through the neighborhood today i saw a lemonade stand.
A full-blown, plastic tablecloth over wood and cardboard, hand drawn sign, lemonade stand.
You never see those any more.
I love lemonade stands.
I love the sincerity of a kid on the corner who believes that they can make it in this world one quarter at a time.
I love that it smacks of summer.
Rea and I once decided that we were going to make a fortune with a lemonade stand. Until, alas, we realized that we had no lemonade. But belief in an idea is hard to quell at that age so we sold grape Kool-Aid instead.
When i see a lemonade stand i have to stop. I mean, when else in your life can you make someone really happy with 25 cents?
I drove around the block, pulled up alongside the stand, hit my hazards and jumped out with that precious quarter. He smiled and said thank you; his mom smiled and waved from the porch while i sat in my car and gleefully drank what had to be the worst lemonade ever made.
Best 25 cents i spent all week.

determination

I haven't changed my quote for quite a while because nothing jumped out and spoke to me when i flipped through my commonplace book.
{and, mayhaps i couldn't find my commonplace book for a goodly amount of time}
       Anyhoo, i've been doing a lot of cleaning and purging and rearranging as i prepare the studio to offer classes, running across pieces of my past that make me laugh, cry and feel bittersweet.
This evening i found a quote from Martha Washington that i'd scrawled on a receipt at some point which never got copied into the book. It captures how i feel at this moment:

I am determined to be cheerful and happy in whatever situation I may find myself. For I have learned that the greater part of our misery or unhappiness is determined not by our circumstance but by our disposition.

I will not claim that it is always easy to look for the silver lining or keep your eyes open to beauty when you are surrounded by bleakness or filled with doubt, but it is important to me to always at least try.

feeling thoughtful on a hike

defacing private property is wrong

...but sometimes downright cheerful.

the happiest paper towel holder in all of the public restrooms in the world

what's happening in the Nikiverse right this second?

In a lodge named Michigan outside of Gettysburg, Ron is improving a blues song inspired by me called, Stubby Fingers:

I got stubby fingers;
I bet you knew it from the start.
I got stubby fingers,
And I got them in your heart.

Really.
How could i possibly make that up?

from one nest to another

Oh hello there!

I am a girl about town right now, enjoying everyone else's vacations.

air conditioning... sigh

You're going away?

I will miss you terribly.

Can i have your keys?

sleeping with 2 blondes

Max and Zoe greeting me at the door

Go, baby, GO!

ummmmm... Go Ravens?

It was a wonderful studio weekend.
The weather was hot, but oddly un-humid so all the windows were thrown open.
Cards were made, jewelry was designed, pieces were inventoried and, of course, glitter was packaged.
Generally the process of getting my glittery present under control is going well, but there have been a few snafus, like the bag of extra chunky that ripped and sent a shower of teal all over the table and the bag of standard grade that i stepped on causing an eruption of green up my legs.
But the biggest problem so far has been the fine grade purple. A lovely color to be sure, but i didn't realize there was a crack in the container when i started to portion it out into crack bags.
A big crack.
A BIG crack.
Given the lovely weather i was working on the porch.
Good news: i was outside, so i didn't have to clean up the studio.
Bad news: i was outside, so this:

Well. That's... festive...
 I apologize in advance to everyone in the Greater Baltimore-Washington Metroplex who will most certainly find a speck of purple glitter in their water in about 5 years.

On the bright side,
at least it's purple, right?