The Brew

I know that when you long to travel to far off places, it’s hard to get excited about your day to day. So I created this series,
called Local Adventure, to help inspire you to find some of those same adventures in your own backyard.

In your foreign travels you might have stopped into a local winery, distillery, or brewery along the way. And these are great places to experience the local culture and to get a feel for their heritage.

These tours usually take a half-day or so, and you might find yourself wandering the grounds of a beautiful landscape or listening to a fascinating story on the origin of the brew. But these experiences aren’t exclusive to far off places – we have just as much heritage in this arena. So why not find one in your backyard and turn it into your own local adventure?

Colorado is considered a western state and there’s nothing more western than whiskey. Stranahan’s Colorado Whiskey in Denver is a local micro-distillery that focuses on straight whiskey made with 100% Rocky Mountain barley and water.

Rachel, Rus and I decided to take a free tour on a Saturday which included a full facility tour, a tasting, and all with a personable guide throughout. It was the perfect choice for our local adventure.

More after the jump…

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Spring Resolutions

I’m lucky enough to live in a place where seasons have an obvious transition from one to the next. Winter is on it’s way out and spring is slowly emerging. With the time change, I now wake up to a sunny window, and have even heard baby birds chirping in the tree outside my bedroom.

And with the winter on it’s way out, I like to daydream about the small things I want to accomplish in spring. I like knowing at the end that I’ve gotten the most out of what this season has to offer.

more after the jump…

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Souvenirs

Souvenirs, mementos, keepsakes, trinkets. Whatever you call them, most of us collect them. When I was a little girl my best friend used to collect spoons from all the places her parents took her. She had a little German wooden spoon collector case. Yup, that exists. Her grandparents would buys spoons on their trips and send them to her as well.

I admired her collection. How each one was the same but completely different. Some were silver, others some alloy. One had a miniature picture of a bear another had Mount Rushmore carved into the handle. You used to be able to find tokens like these in little gift shops or gas stations sometimes.

I admired her collection so much that I decided I was going to collect something too. I started with thimbles – I have no idea why, I don’t even know how to sew. Then my fascination shifted onto rocks and later, cliche t-shirts. But as I grew older these items had no function, took up too much room or became harder and harder to find, so I stopped collecting any of just one particular thing.

Then, one day when I was looking through some old souvenirs, I found a deck of cards I had bought in Paris. It sparked the idea to start collection playing cards instead. They were functional, cheap, and each have different artwork and designs.

So over the last few years, I’ve grabbed a deck of cards at some place or another along the way. I am actually surprised at how relatively easy it is to find them. But my favorite deck by far is my Guinness playing cards from Dublin. There’s a great story behind that trip, and I’m a sucker for the very cute and cheeky old time Guinness ads – which are on every face card.

I’m also quite fond of Alcatraz‘s inmate slang deck which has prison terms on the cards, and the Santorini one just because of the sunsets that cover them - sigh. I obviously don’t always get to pick up these souvenirs when I go somewhere ( cough Palm Springs & Moab cough) but maybe that’s because I sort of forgot about them.

But we recently played a card game, and it reminded me how much I loved hunting these down and the memories they invoked. So this year I promise to bring them back. I might even order some of places I missed (is that allowed?) But I’m heading of to Seattle in a couple weeks, and you can trust me I’ll keep my eyes peeled.

*Also, I’ve been testing out my new lens with these close ups! I still have a lot to learn, but I’m loving these short field of depth shots. Any tips?

DIY Home Decor

diy geometric wreath by vintage revival | diy ladder by a merry mishap | diy marble tray by almost makes perfect |
galaxy face art via a beautiful mess | diy ikea hack stickwood headboard by sugar & cloth | diy copper wall hanging by smitten studio | diy rope coil baskets by the red thread | diy metal base coffee table by almost makes perfect |
diy giant marquee letter sign by vintage revival

Are you the crafty type? I used to be. If I wasn’t painting, drawing, or photographing something, I was usually building something out of scissors, glue and paper. I loved collaging clippings from magazines or newspapers together to make something total different. Those were my original moodboards. I would also try my hand at necklaces, bracelets, trinkets, or photo frames. I even went on a ceramic painting kick, ha! So 70′s.

But as I grew older, the common representation of crafting became too cutesy, had over-the-top graphics, or was completely useless. So I’ve been loving this new cleaner, more functional, trend in crafts and DIY lately. Heck I even made my own clean and modern inspired diy gold geometric mobile once.

And even though the tour of my home made my home look complete, I still feel like it’s a work in progress. So I’ve been gathering some DIY home decor that fits my taste. I’d love to put little plants in these rope coil baskets, make this coffee table with Rus, or hang this amazing diy copper wall hanging by smitten studio in my living room. So I wanna know, are you crafty too?

Part V : Slow Down

My last piece of advice about living abroad comes from a saying I heard everywhere in Spain. Mañana‎, mañana‎. It literally translates to “tomorrow, tomorrow.”  You would use it if you had a paper to write and your friends wanted to go out instead, you could just say, “Ah, mañana‎, mañana‎ – I’ll do it tomorrow.”  It’s a really great way to procrastinate something you don’t want to do.

But it’s really more than that at the same time.

More after the break…

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