Happy Second Weekend in September!

 We're still chillin' and thrillin'

in L.A.

Hope you are too.  Wherever you are.

Sorry For the Radio-Silence These Last Two Weeks

I managed to smash my screen and had to send the computer

for a bit of a rest cure.

I must say, I was happy to be reunited with my pics.

Nice to be back with you all too.  Hope you are enjoying lazy, sweet, final summer days.  More soon.

UNTIL THEN - have a very  HAPPY WEEKEND!

My Wish for the Weekend

(via Seventeen Doors)

Bon Weekend - Happy Memorial Day!

Had some proper Petit Beurre in the house this week.

Decided to make ice cream sandwiches.

Has anyone else ever done this?  (Yes!  I'm sure!)  Soooooo Yummy!  Where have I been all my life?!

HAPPY WEEKEND!!!!

The Ludlow Hunt - Here's a Little Soupcon

The Paradis family is split

between the vegetarian faction who boycott the hunt and can mount vigorous arguments against this

age old, cruel and primitive "entertainment" and those of us who love looking at dogs and horses so

much that it is an unmiss-able thrill for us to stand alongside such magnificent creatures if only for an hour or so in the cold on the day after Christmas.  Which side would you be on?

More of the Ludlow Hunt next week.  Until then, have yourselves a 

LOVELY JANUARY WEEKEND!

Crystal Cove Bonus Pics - This is How Life Should Be

For the weekend.

Oh these should be joyful pictures.  But I don't feel joy right now.  The most neutral way to described it is discouraged. But I'm sure you can imagine what I and others are feeling after another awful two weeks in America and in our world.  I'm sure you feel it too.

See you Monday.  Hold your loved ones close.  Make something beautiful.  Find somewhere beautiful like this to spend the day with them.

I send you all my best wishes and love.  Our world deserves better.  We all do.

Happy Halloween Weekend to All!

Hope you've got some

(not my pic)

grrrrrrrrreat plans!

Weekend Wishes

Oh dear.  Not very clever.

I updated my operating system and it's made my photo files go all wonky!  It could take me days to figure it all out again.  Erggggghhhhhh.  (What photo software do you use?  I should probably switch to Lightroom and hopefully avoid all this again........)

So please just enjoy this foto of a mad Gaudi building on the Rambla in Barcelona in the rain!  Courtesy of Mr. Paradis and his I-phone.   Can you believe I did not charge my camera before going to Barcelona?  (JETLAG!)

I'll be back next week on firmer ground I hope.  Have a WONDERFUL WEEKEND!

Merijn Hos for the Weekend

I found these via Famille Summerbelle.

The artist is Merijn Hos, from the Netherlands.

They're like a cross-between David Hockney stage sets and Alexander Girard Dolls.

Both of which I adore.  Giving me ideas for that pile of leftover wood in my yard!

Have a fan-tab-u-lous weekend all!

Busy Week Back

It was somebody's birthday so a little cake was made and some celebrating done.

I had a bit of a campaign to extricate myself from jury duty.  That took up two days!  (Don't ask.)

Some planting was done.  Doctor visits.  And I'm still a little pooped from leftover jetlag.

I haven't forgotten you.  Just wanted to let you know.  I'll be back next week.  Till then,


HAVE YOURSELVES a great WEEKEND!

Florence Henri - Musee du Jeu de Paume, Paris through 17 May 2015

What are you doing this weekend?

It's supposed to rain in L.A. so we are thinking of going to a museum.

If we were in Paris, we would definitely go to this:

"Florence Henri (New York 1893 – Compiègne (France) 1982) was a multi-faceted artist, who was first known for her paintings before making a name for herself as a major figure in avant-garde photography between the end of the 1920s and the beginning of the 1940s........

The Jeu de Paume is presenting a vast panorama of Florence Henri’s photographic production 

from 1927 to 1940, including her self-portraits, abstract compositions, portraits of artists, nudes, photomontages, photocollages, as well as documentary photos taken in Rome, Paris and Brittany."  (From the Jeu de Paume website.)

I had never heard of her before.  Had you?  

Have a wonderful week end!

Where Did I Find These? Un Peu Partout

For the weekend.......

A little of the whimsical

and the wacky for you.

It was Mardi Gras - or Carnival this week.

And with the lousy weather in some parts of the world.

Some of us are getting a little bit of cabin fever.  (Did you read about the Boston mayor having to admonish people not to jump randomly out of the windows of their houses into the epic snow drifts they are having?)

And feeling like they have to express themselves in outlandish ways.  Dressed or not.

Of course in L.A., "outlandish" has always been BUSINESS AS USUAL.

And this probably will never change.  I hope not, at least.

HAPPY WEEKEND EVERYBODY!

(pics via the newspapers and the blog-u-verse)

Blue Skies, via Hula Seventy

via Hula Seventy

Hope you find some this weekend!  Have A good ONE!

(oh, and happy valentine's day too!)

Waiting for.....

What are you waiting for?  Spring?

and what will you do with yourself in these doldrum days until it arrives?  Maybe this?

Or head over to this:  John Singer Sargent from the Tate Gallery in London and probably shortly to appear at the National Portrait Gallery.  More about that here.  (Kind of exciting I think.)

And could this video inspire you to take off in quite another direction altogether?  The pleating technology is so low tech but amazing...it's the kind of thing that makes France great, no?  

Oh, and the colors are wonderful, no?  What could you do with a thousand hand tinted ribbons?

Happy February!

Someday, Spring. Meanwhile, David Hockney

Don't you wish you could do this???????

O.K. maybe some of you wouldn't.  Especially since it's very cold and snowy at the moment where you might be.  I would only want to do it as he does - with lots of assistants about, or in waiting in some nearby pub - to help with the setting up and taking down, to grab hold of the wet canvases in just the right way before a stiff wind can blow them right off across the countryside.  To tidy up the paints afterwards.

But what I meant to post about is spring.  It's on its way.  It might not seem like it now.  But soon it will arrive.  Even here in L.A., I dream about it.

Maybe you'll get a little soupçon of it, a bit of a thaw.......some little moment soon.

I'm so glad that David Hockney has moved back to L.A.  Even though I never run into him.  

But you never know, I just might.  One has to be hopeful......no?  Don't ask me what I would say to him.

Meanwhile.  HAVE A GOOD WEEKEND.  

What will you be doing???????

You Have A Voice - What Are You Going to Do With It?

Is it a good thing or a bad thing?  Most of these pictures

(New York anti-police violence march, via USUncut)

 (L.A. Garner/Brown/Racism protests)

are from the LA Times  (I wish it was easier to go back and find the link for these things but no....)

 (India - Bhopal protest)

"Week in Pictures"

 (Hong Kong - Democracy protesters)

They come from all around the Globe.

 (Grand Central Station, NYC - Garner/Brown/Racism protests)

Depending on which side of an issue you are on

 (Mexican protests - Missing students)

these are people exercising their human and civil rights.  To others, they are "Enemies of the State".

 (U.S.: Garner/Brown/Racism/Police Brutality protests)

It's hard to say that any of these people have achieved gains by their actions.  So far.

 (Hong Kong Democracy protests)

Should they continue to bother?

 (France - Anti-Development protest)

What would you go out into the streets to defend?

(London - Loss of Affordable Housing Protest)

 (NYC - Garner/Brown/Racism/Police Brutality Protests also below)

What would be your slogan?

A very loved cousin un-friended me on Facebook last weekend.  He also doesn't want to talk to me anymore.  Ever.  He says that I obviously hate everything that he stands for.  If what people believe or endorse is diametrically opposed to what you believe, does that make you enemies for life?  Should you stay silent about your beliefs because you don't want to offend people you love?

I don't think so.  Life is messy, isn't it?  At what point does disagreement become war?  I don't want to know.  But more and more people are finding out.  It's a terrible truth.

It's nearly Christmas.  Wishing you a peaceful Holiday Season.  xoxoxo