Monday, April 30, 2007

CJ Fest

Our friend CJ threw a big party for herself for her 40th birthday. 6 bands and almost 300 people all gathered in beautiful Trout Lake, Washington.

On the way I started knitting my second camera sock. This one is a gift for Mario and Erica, who are letting us store our stuff in their garage.

Ziegy is wearing his VW bus shirt standing next to his VW bus. Our friend J looks on, excited for the weekend. Ziegy and I slept up in the pop-top. It was freezing at night!! I slept with gloves, a hat, socks, long underwear, a longsleeve shirt, a hoodie, a fleece vest, and a fleece jacket on. I could barely move, but I was warm!

I did some jamming with Billy, Heather and some other friends. I've been playing mandolin a lot lately. It's been fun. See that big mountain back there?! That's Mt. Adams. Another fun thing happened this weekend was that I ran into some other friends, Derek and Jen, who are friend's of John and Sarette's. I didn't know they were connected to this group and I love it when that happens.

Check out the cake decorations! A clarinet and everything.... Jeanne, who cut the cake, tried to tell me to take the fiddle... I'm glad I didn't or I would've had a big sugary mess in my pocket by the end of the night.

CJ has been planning this for party for over a year. Here is her plan of action, sketched out.

She knows how to celebrate herself. Yeah CJ!

Wednesday, April 25, 2007

Oh to be 2....

For the past few months I've spent my mornings with my 2-year-old friend, Emmett. Yesterday was my last day with him (sniff). Emmett is very verbal and has delighted me with excellent words of wisdom. He said a cute thing the other day. I was enjoying our time eating lunch on my rooftop patio and I said to him "Emmett, you're such a fun kid!" His response to me was "I'm so proud of you!" Precious. He was saying to me what people say to him that makes him feel good.

For my last day, his mom gave me this charming picture of him and his big brother. I love it!

Tuesday, April 24, 2007

Sticking Around

I'm starting to get used to Seattle. We are going to be here for awhile longer before moving to Portland, at least through the summer. It's just the way the ball is rolling!


Tuesday, April 17, 2007

What's Yer Name Again? Oh.

A few months back I went to a party where my friend made these little name pins for all of the attendees. When she arrived with this stimulating hurrah, my camera smothered her with great excitement. It was like a tray of fresh cookies out of the oven, but even better.

Aren't they succulent and juicy? And it made the party way more fun. Everyone is more relaxed at a party when we all have a name tag on. AND everyone left with a souvenier.

The clever crafter is the lovely Jeanne of Denver, CO. She used little wood pieces from Michael's, a metallic marker, little cheapy pins, and a hot glue gun. I won't give away her secret for giving them color, but I will tell you that they are way easier to make than they look.

Now, I would bet that these are awfully fun to make. I'm going to a similar, well-planned music party next weekend and I'm itching to see Jeanne Pins on people again. I think I am going to rally for this, even though I hear there will be 200 people there.

Monday, April 16, 2007

Darol Anger is my Hero


...well, at least one of them. :) We went to two Yonder Mountain String Band shows this weekend, one in Seattle and one in Portland. The lovely Darol Anger played fiddle with them, as he does for the special shows. We've become friends, since he now lives in Portland. He's a super nice guy and with an endless abundance of inspiration for any fiddle player.

In the past week, I've seen a lot of awesome fiddle players. Not only Darol, but also Tania from The Duhks and a guy who plays a rockin electric violin in a pop band from Ireland called The Frames. The more I see, the more I realize it's totally okay for me to have my own Ellie style of playing.

Although last night was a really late night, I have extra zest today. I think it's cause I'm still on the Yonder high. I absolutely love a Yonder show! The people, the music, the friends, the dancing... Their shows are so happy.

Wednesday, April 11, 2007

How's THIS for Cheerful?

Everyday when Ziegy comes home from work, he tears off his stuffy work clothes and puts on something more relaxing. Today, he pulled out the butterfly t-shirt! I hardly ever see the butterfly. In fact, I forgot about it. How fun! It's a special day here. It's pretty hard not to love a guy who is wearing that.

Sunday, April 8, 2007

Totally Pictureless

So, with the recent sadness that has unfolded on my blog, I've been feeling some pressure to quickly post something cheerful. Ah screw it. I have nothing cheerful to share at the moment. But that sourness is not related to my sad week. It's related to something else that I'll tell you about in a moment.

First of all, thanks to everyone for their kind thoughts related to the sad news about my friend. Luckily, I was able to spend some time with them over the weekend. I played some pretty violin music for them at Owen's small memorial service by the river near their house. It was a really beautiful. A happy-sad day. I care about them so much and it helped to be a part of his memorial.

Second of all, I have no picture for you tonight because of a ridiculous discovery that keeps me from posting the picture I had in mind. Ziegy and I had a really fun, leisurely bikeride on Friday to Seattle's brand new Olympic Sculpture Park. Since it's brand spanking new, it's all futuristic and new-agey looking. Cutting edge environmental design, really. While I was there I was thinking "This is awesome!! Why didn't I bring the camera?" It was one of those moments. But then, it was okay because I have a fancy new "camera phone." Ziegy took the coolest picture of me and my bike inside a sculpture. How can I explain it... well, it's basically made up of several massive-sized oozy-looking metal walls that you can walk through. The scale of it is simply fascinating and the picture showed it well.

I was going to upload the picture to my computer like I've done in the past. But guess what. Now, you have to buy the pictures off the Sprint site to do anything with them. What's up with that? Some camera phone. There's no way to do anything with the pictures without putting them in a "cart". I often snatch pictures off the internet by doing a fancy trick, but they've even blocked me from doing that. So try to imagine a cheerful picture of me with this sculpture, cause I have no picture.

A camera phone is really nothing more than a toy for when you're drunk with your friends and need simple amusement. It leaves me wondering if before we ever count on something do we always need to ask "does this cost any money?" Gosh I hope not!

Well, that post was a little cheerful I guess. Well, not really. HHMMMPPPPHHHH.

Tuesday, April 3, 2007

Baby Owen


I'm so sad to say that the story below doesn't have a happy ending. My friend Sarette's baby, Owen, died shortly after his birth from an umbilical chord accident. I've been dealing with this for the past 3 days and having it on my mind nonstop.

Ziegy and I have been trying to understand why this happened to our wonderful friends, John and Sarette. I guess there is no answer to that. Thankfully, they had a few hours to be alone with Owen, hold him, and bond with him. Their supportive families have flown in to be with them. I'm sure that is what is getting them through this. There is a beautiful picture of Owen on their blog. I'm amazed at how content he looks and at how he looked just like his parents.

We love you, little Owen!