inspiration overload.

hydrangeas in my front yard. not sure if this spring is brighter, sunnier, more colorful than usual, or if i'm just paying more attention. but the past three weeks have been simply beautiful here. i know it's a tough season for many - our pollen count is usually off the charts (you can feel it on your teeth when you're outside) and allergies are awful. but sara and i are lucky and aren't bothered by it. so we can really enjoy the flowers and seeing everything turn green. edited 4-1-07 - marc says these aren't hydrangeas (who knew?)...any idea what they are?

sorry no posts since monday - busy week: 17 hour day traveling to houston (and back), sara's last tennis match (she won again - yay!), 100 fruit kebabs, annual doctor visit (clean bill of health but some not-looking-forward-to follow-ups), dinner out with sara and marc, lunch with liz at brio, getting ready for a week off work/school, fridge breakdown....

so - today is the first official day of our spring break. we both got haircuts and pedicures. then a trip to best buy for a portable dvd player (sara felt this was a must-have for the plane trip and the hotel). here we are:

shorter cut for me - yes, mom, i now voluntary get that pixie cut i absolutely hated growing up. and long-armed sara with her newly straightened hair and side part and cool white tee topped by gap argyle vest (that katie and i have both worn, too - i love that!)

each week, i try to find a few new inspirations on-line. spending a few hours wandering from site to site...seeing many new places, ideas, photos and meeting new people. when i find a site or a blog that i think i'd like to link into a post here, i put it in a favorites folder - this week was a recordbreaker - i added 15 new links - hence the current inspiration overload!

*the cool art journal pages in this rediscovered daily read
*fun clothing comments (found from how about orange) - love love the macrame and fond memories of the 70's, but thank goodness the fashion has improved - mom, i hate for you that you were my age in that fashion backward decade!
*a link from katie for a yarn store in ny that reminded me about this very cool felted bag from cathy zielske and made me think i might make this my chicago plane project
*another audrey fan (who would think about a scrapbook page celebrating our favorite screen idol - just too cool!)
*a new blog that i found visiting comments for this daily read...i'm in the general affection stage, i think
*another artistic blog - linked from ali - and i think i spent at least an hour going through her weekly art, loving this one with poppies...and i purchased pencil crayons this morning with my michaels 40% off coupon. looking forward to using them with my journal
*played around with this build your own radio website, called pandora...currently playing my very own billy joel radio and i know it's too cool because when i'm logged into the hewitt network, it's a blocked site - so only to enjoy on my 'not work' time :-)
*montmarte's sketchbook and candace meyer and simplyphoto (thanks to mav at port2port)
*more interesting web connections - the sisters who wrote visual chronicles (that's the book that gave me the idea about days and 'things' having colors) have a brother who's an author...he wrote the mr monk books that sara loves
*comparing the yarn harlot's trip to new york with katie's (beware, many many photos, but what a love story with a city!)
*helping sara get ready for her learner's permit test on tuesday
*plain ol' fun and photo inspiration...
*and my flickr site (patience, just getting started :-)

so - now i need to weed through it all, clean up and organize - thank goodness i have tomorrow and no plans other than a nice long run, the carwash and maybe some scrapbooking. sara will be busy studying for tuesday's test...

finally - hello to karen, jillian, polly and roy who are in st augustine for a long weekend and safe travels to my brother steve and his family who are visiting my parents later in the week.