tinsel willows

tinsel and willows: two things that, incidentally, have always reminded me of each other.

I walked to Harvard Square today and visited beautiful Anthropologie. I love wandering around that store and looking at all the displays and gorgeous, unattainable clothing. While I was there, I found this really lovely copy of The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame and had to get it (justified by the fact that tomorrow is my birthday. It's a present for myself! yay)

Last night I put up my silver tinsel garland. I draped it over Cat Lady portrait.

Last night I started a holiday/winter themed portrait that I might make into post cards for Mass Market/the shop, so I'm off to go finish it and watch Marie Antoinette, which has a color palette very similar to that of my painting. :)

I hope you're all having a great Monday! Oh, and there's still time to enter my print giveaway at Fritzi Marie. Kat will announce the winner tonight!

xoxo

Amanda

way over yonder in the minor key

I can't stop listening to this lately.

thanksgiving, family birthday, and a grey dress

Firstly, I Have Cat, a great blog for cat/animal lovers, did a gift-buying feature on etsy sellers who have special listings that benefit animal related charities. Tiger and I are in it alongside many other creature-loving etsy sellers.

Yesterday I celebrated my birthday with my family since I'm home for Thanksgiving weekend (my real birthday isn't until tuesday).

My mom gave me this beautiful vintage photograph of a woman standing in front of an easter egg tree. It's such an incredible photo, and I think the woman looks like she belongs in a Hitchcock film.



My sister gave me this blackbird necklace and bird-printed blouse. She knows me so well!

 Every year, my mom makes a black forest cake for my birthday, and she always puts a picture of Tiger and I on top of it. :)

These are pictures from Thanksgiving itself. I love that we have a house full of animals again. We used to have 5 - Tiger, Spotty, Blacky (our three cats) and O'Malley & Gizmo (our pups). We lost Spotty, Blacky, O'Malley, and Gizmo all within the same two years, which was really hard.

I'm so grateful I still have my Tiger, and within the past few months we adopted Baby (above, loving the tredmill) and Jarret (below).

Thanksgiving always felt like the most animal-oriented holiday in our house (maybe because of the sharing of the turkey), so it felt really nice to have many animals with us again.

On Friday afternoon, my mom and I went to Viviana's Vintage in Clinton, which is, I think, my favorite vintage shop. It feels like a real clothing shop in that every time I go, I can find something I love in exactly my size (something that's usually tricky with vintage stores).

Oops.

This is the dress I came home with.

I hope you're all having a great Saturday! Keep warm.

xoxo

Amanda

Odette the Ornithologist

A new paper doll: Odette the Ornithologist.

She lives in London circa the 1940s and spends her time studying bird species. She's in the shop here.

Did you all have a wonderful thanksgiving? I had a really nice one at home with my family.

I just want to thank you all for the incredible kind comments you left on my post about Kat's giveaway. Everything you said means so much to me, and I'm so honored to have some new followers on here!!

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend!
xoxo

Amanda

It gets better (with love from pixar)

In the light of recent events, a string of wonderful "it gets better" videos have come out, but I think this one from the people at Pixar is my favorite. 

What I love about these videos is that they don't speak only to the gay community, but to anyone who is suffering some type of depression. Knowing that you're not alone and that things will get better is often times all that a person needs.

I found this video because some of my friends posted it on facebook, so now I'm posting it here and I hope some of you will share it with the people in your life. :)

xoxoxo

Amanda

a print giveaway (for the end of november)

My truly lovely friend Kat is hosting a giveaway on her blog. There are a few different ways to enter, and the winner can choose any print or paper doll from my etsy shop!

(Kat and her puppy, Bono Baby)

Kat's blog, Fritzi Marie, documents her vintage findings, family adventures with her poet husband and their dog, her love of art, and her beautiful outlook on life.

So to enter, head over to Fritzi Marie and read all about it. :)

Lots of love,

Amanda

Fox (Apple) Pie Recipe

We have a staff meeting at work tomorrow and we're all supposed to bring something. Kate gave me a fox-shaped cookie cutter a while ago. I love it so much but haven't gotten to use it yet. So tonight I decided to make a pie with foxes on top!
(Thanks to Rachel for company and help with the fox pie :)

To make a fox pie, you will need:

-Two traditional pie crust shells

-7 cortland apples

-cinnamon sugar

-baker's sugar

-apple pie spice

-a fox-shaped cookie cutter (or some other shape to make some other type of pie :)

-Pie dish

Use one crust shell to cover the bottom of your pie dish. 

Fold edges to create a ridge around the top of the dish. Mix chopped apples, 1 cup baker's sugar, and desired amount of cinnamon sugar and apple pie spice in a bowl. Pre-heat oven to 375. Fill pie shell with apples, and use the cookie cutter to make shapes from the second pie crust. Lay them across the top and sprinkle with cinnamon.  Bake in accordance with crust's timer instructions.

----

I hope you're all having a beautiful week! I'll have some new work on here soon.

xoxo

Amanda

I have loved the stars too well to fear the night.

Photos taken in my family's backyard on my last trip home.

I really love our backyard.

our own little black bear

This is the newest member of our family, Jarrett!

We are taking him for one of our relatives who had to move. I'm so excited to have a dog in my life again!

He has a cute old man muzzle and a baritone voice.

Since I was home for a couple of days, I got my hair cut (a lot). I've been going to the same place since my first haircut when I was 11. Salons are the kind of place a person can become sentimentally attached to (a person like me, anyway). I love that the people are still the same, and that they've kept the beautiful tiled ceiling from the early 1900s (it has pinecones on it). I like to think that this is where I will always get my hair cut.

I hope you all had a wonderful start to your  week!

xoxo

Amanda

Oh, P.S. - the post cards are now in the shop here.

nancy drew and the case of the lady on the ship

I visited the Boston Antiquarian book fair today to get inspired for book projects, and fell in love with this edition of White Fang by Jack London. I am so in love with pine trees.

 

I also saw many Virginia Woolf first editions with cover art by her sister, Vanessa Bell.

It was a lovely way to spend a Saturday afternoon. 

I hope you're all having a great weekend!

xo

Amanda

read in bed

I just finished reading Fifth Avenue, 5 A.M. by Sam Wasson. It's an imagined account of the making of Breakfast at Tiffany's based on pure fact. 

Breakfast at Tiffany's has been one of my favorite movies since I was 14. I loved the dialogue, though at the time I barely understood what any of it meant. That didn't stop me from writing entire passages from the script in my journal. They used beautiful and complicated words, and I actually kind of miss not understanding what their phrasing was alluding to.

I think anyone who loves the movie will love this book. 

It goes into great detail about things like "the party scene" (one of my favorites - the man in the fight who lifts up his eye patch to reveal a perfectly healthy eye!), the casting of each character from Doc to 2E, Audrey's fears about playing Holly, Blake Edwards' direction, etc, etc. I wanted to watch the movie the whole time I was reading it but made myself wait until I had finished the book. It will be kind of fun to watch it now with all the things I know now!

And now I am reading To Kill a Mockingbird, which I haven't read since high school.

What are you all reading lately?
p.s. - I just found out that Harper Lee based the character Dill in To Kill a Mockingbird on Truman Capote, who was her childhood friend. What a weird coincidence!

I don't seek; I find.

My favorite place to be in my room lately is my writing (aka laptop) desk under the fireplace mantel.

An old photo of my Nana and Grampa

stars, bovines, and birds

crystal-eyed cat (half of a salt and pepper shaker set)

My mom gave me these lamps for my birthday last year. They have small cutouts in the shape of stars all over them, and the light they give off is really warm and yellow.

I got this old photograph over the summer and finally hung it over the mantel. I love it so much - it's an old camp cabin named "The Hemlock." Hemlock is one of my favorite words (a lot of my favorite words are various names for trees in the conifer family), and I have a weird nostalgic sentiment for summer camps of the early to mid 1900s. 

I hope you're all enjoying the approaching winter! I think half the reason I've been loving this part of my room so much lately is the warm light. It's getting dark so early now!! 

I've been working on a few little things that should be finished and scanned soon.

I hope you all have a beautiful thursday!

Love,

Amanda