"Truth is such a rare thing" -Emily Dickinson

For the past 3 years, the vast majority of words spilled into this space have been about my daughter, my family, and myself. But today am focusing on the work of another photographer whose work is...

"When dealing with people, remember you are not dealing with creatures of logic, but creatures of emotion." -Dale Carnegie

What is it about birthdays that makes us reevaluate everything? We get older everyday but the tangibility of an actual birthday is more concrete than the monotony of every day. Yesterday was my...

?Gratitude is the fairest blossom which springs from the soul.? -Henry Ward Beecher

While I'm not quite ready to share my thesis outside of the protective sphere of my academic bubble, I would like to share my greatest thanks page. So many people and places and factors have come...

Hope begins in the dark, the stubborn hope that if you just show up and try to do the right thing, the dawn will come. ~Anne Lamott

Harper, You still shock me. That you live and breathe and laugh and cry startles me. Soon I will be finished with my master's degree and I will have to get a job. I know it is for the best; I want...

"There are two lasting bequests we can give our children. One is roots. The other is wings." -Hodding Carter, Jr.

Dear Harper,Today you are two years old. Most of the time you look more like a kid than a baby, but every once in a while, you fall asleep in my arms and I can remember the way your slight weight...

“Geeky people often have. . . . a mind with its own heartbeat.” ― Garret Freymann-Weyr

Comic Con was once again amazing. I am always happy to be among my people. We weren't sure we were going to get to go this year but Warner pulled some strings at the very last minute so we were...

“Sometimes, you read a book and it fills you with this weird evangelical zeal, and you become convinced that the shattered world will never be put back together unless and until all living humans read the book." -Hazel Grace Lancaster

On Saturday, I finished my fortieth book of the year. My husband and the guppy took Old Man Coop and headed out of town. I had the house to myself, except for Sadie and Scout. Its so much a rarity...

"I'm not an environmentalist. I'm an Earth warrior." -Darryl Cherney

One of the greatest things about San Diego, besides year round beach weather, is the fact there are so many ways to spend a Saturday. After living here for 7 years, I have slowly built a stockpile...

“I cry a lot because I miss people. They die and I can’t stop them. They leave me and I love them more.”-Maurice Sendak

Today I find myself pulled backed to this space because I have an inherent need to celebrate two authors that really made me want to write and to understand writing as both a need and an indulgence...

"How old would you be if you didnt know how old you were?" Satchel Paige

My 25th birthday is in less than two weeks and thus I must post the obligatory birthday wish list post. I got my big wish which is to spend it abroad and pretty much everyone I know came together...

If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need." -Cicero

Its National Library Week and in honor of that I paid off my library fines. All $21.50 of them. Yes, you read that right, it is not a typo. Yes, I know this is incriminating evidence that I should...

When a woman tells the truth she is creating the possibility for more truth around her." -Adrienne Rich

Ive been in the fog of finals the last few weeks. It is rare that I pop my head up from behind my laptop or textbooks to do, read, or watch anything, but I heard today that a great American poet,...

"Let me take you down, cause Im going to Strawberry Fields, nothing is real." -The Beatles

My girls trip to New York was in January and since then I have been frantically searching for the memory card from my Canon 7D without avail, until yesterday! Can you tell Im still ecstatic? So,...

"Research tells us fourteen out of any ten individuals likes chocolate." Sandra Boynton

Sunday, we had planned to spend the day at Birch Aquarium but when Harper woke up it was obvious that she wasnt up to much more than Pedialyte, a big blanket and Curious George marathon. Guy and I...

"Music is an outburst of the soul." -Frederick Delius

My house is well, a hot mess. Dont tell the fire marshal we have 4 people and 3 dogs living in a 2 bedroom house and for some reason Harpers toys have been breeding like rabbits thanks in part to...

"I keep coming back to you in my head, but you couldnt know that, and I have no carbons." -Adrienne Rich

I have returned to the blogland of the living. My absence, well, its sort of a long story that involves a 2 year old who was continually driving a bigwheel into our Jeep, his cute Skater dad and my...

"Beauty is skin deep. A tattoo goes all the way to the bone" -Vince Hemingson

This isnt the super best picture of it because I was sitting at an odd angle, but for now itll do. I finally got my tattoo done in October and I love it. It encompasses the literature geek in me....

"Go in the direction of your dreams! Live the life youve imagined." -Thoreau

I think of my grandmother sometimes, about how shes been in the same house for 50 years, almost, ivy crawling , weaving half a century into a blanket to keep each brick warm. How every single...

" There are three hundred and sixty-four days when you might get un-birthday presents...and only one for birthday presents, you know." -Lewis Carroll

A couple of weeks ago Harper celebrated her half birthday. This semester my dear baby brother Spencer has been graced with two class free weekdays and so we decided to venture out into whats left...

"You are the music while the music lasts." -T.S. Eliot

This is 2011 summed up in the best way possible, with someone elses words. We Are Young by Fun.Wont Turn Back by needtobreatheAll Good Things by The WeepiesHuman by Charlene KayeYouve Got a Friend...

"Wine is sunlight, held together by water." -Galileo

We are the Ikea poster children. When Le Hubs moved to San Diego, we raided the place and surprisingly the vast majority of it has survived 2 moves since then (minus one coffee table that Scout...

"Wherever you go, go with all your heart." -Confucius

credit: just so much fluff

"Grown dont mean nothing to a mother...They get bigger,older,but grown? Whats that suppose to mean? In my heart it dont mean a thing."Toni Morrison

"I think Im going to have it,"I said, joking between pains.The midwife rolled competentsleeves over corpulent milky arms."Dear, you never have it, we deliver it."A judgment years proved...

"One resolution I have made, and try always to keep, is this: To rise above the little things." John Burroughs

1)What did you do this year that youd never done before?Quit my job.2) Did you keep your new years resolutions, and will you make more for next year?I didn’t keep any of my new year’s resolutions...

Theres something like a line of gold thread running through a mans words when he talks to his daughter, and gradually over the years...

...gets to be long enough for you to pick up in your hands and weave into a cloth that feels like love itself. -John Gregory Brown June 13, 2009: the Father Daughter dance at my weddingToday is my...

"Forever, for what you have tamed." - The Little Prince

There is music playing behind a closed door. I know some of the words and it makes me wonder how much brain capacity I use remembering lyrics to songs I used to love but have forgotten about.I...

"I will honor Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year." -Charles Dickens

Harper,Yesterday, I woke up covered in books, with you leaning into my side, reading me How the Grinch Stole Christmas, dressed in your dinosaur footie pajamas acting as if youve been the one...

"You anchor me back down" - Mindy Gledhill

"I read your blog". Four words, thirteen letters, a single flash of realization. I am a selfish person. Not in the stingy sort of way, where I hoard material items or dont want to pay taxes or give...

"I wish you bluebirds in the spring, to give your heart a song to sing And then a kiss, but more than this I wish you love" -Rachel Yamagata

"The stars died so you could be here today." -Lawrence Krauss

Lately Ive been up, so many late nights where its just me and some music and the sounds of my own thoughts bouncing against my thick skull. The baby is sleeping although she isnt really a baby...