paint chip art

Have you ever taken a good look at the names of paint chips? I mean, I know that there are hundreds of distinct colors, but the chip names can be anything from ridiculous to whimsical. Claire Teschel takes chips and using their names and paper pieces and magazine cut-outs creates little pieces of art. I love it.via d*s

travel journaling

Just back from Cambodia (oh, lucky her!), Anne at Prêt à Voyager has posted some pages from her travel journal. Man, am I impressed! I've only managed a successful travel journal once, and that was for a one week trip to Paris--her trip was twice as long, plus she took 2,000 photos! Take a peek!

She also includes some tips and links to a few inspirational sites.

Style

I'm sort of getting the feel for this blog now. It's still not 100% how I'd like it to look, but my friend Peter--who's a big-thinking jack-of-all-trades sort, recently built from scratch the website for the local professional theatre he's helping a mutual friend start--has offered to pitch in and help me. So perhaps things will get prettier in a little while. Until then, I've got a makeshift sidebar I'll point you to, specifically the links. Take a look at dooce.com.

Dooce is, to start with, a really freaking impressive site. It's designed and built entirely by Heather Armstrong, the woman whose blog it is. Now, if you can get beyond gaping at the pretty, I recommend checking out some of the photo archives. She has three categories of photo: Daily Photo (random artistic photos), Daily Chuck (photos of her dog), and the newest, Daily Style. Daily Style is the one I like best, mainly because this woman takes amazing photographs, but also because she has an awesome sense of style. Through her, I have made so many delicious discoveries.

I will enumerate:

• The Curiosity Shoppe, a San Francisco-based gallery of miscellany. I fell in love with this unique cell phone attachment, and desire it for my own nefarious ends:
• Green Chair Press, the Etsy store of artist Susan Angebranndt. Not only does she make fun, eclectic art, but she does it all on an 1890 platen press. She combines many things I love--handmade crafts, vintage methods, and bright primary color combinations. The example is entitled Flirtation no. 2.
• Petit Collage, which sells the original, handmade collages by artist Lorena Siminovich. In addition to the handmade and bright colors, I also love the incredible variety of papers which make their way into her largely animal-themed works.

Additionally, aside from the visual aspects, there's the writing. Heather has an incredible way of turning just about anything into the funniest thing you've ever read. This, for example, made me laugh so hard I cried. Which doesn't happen a lot.