Three Things

#1

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My aunt gave me the most beautiful journal for Christmas, and I've only filled one page.  I feel as if most of the words that come to me aren't worthy of its pages, then end up not writing at all.  Then I came across this pin today, and decided the beautiful journal will be filled with daily gratitudes and maybe a few collages.  

#2

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English doesn't actually have a future tense, but this still made me laugh.

#3

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These are some good words.

I have a fun surprise for tomorrow!  

Three Things

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I am rather obsessed with Downton Abbey.  It's so good!  Best part?  PBS has the episodes available online right away.  I'm also rather in love with the music...and the characters, and the suspense, and the time period (1912-1918, so far), and the wardrobe, and everything.  It's so emotional to watch, and the most recent episode had the most joyful scenes, in spite of being set during World War I.  Go watch it.  Now.

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Since hearing an interview with Erin Morgenstern on NPR, then reading Brandi's post about The Night Circus a few weeks later, I've been trying to get my hands on a copy.  This week, I stumbled across it at a used bookstore and picked it up immediately.  I've only read a few chapters, but I plan to devote tomorrow to the rest.  It is enchanting thus far.

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My hair is still too short for a lot of these styles (it hits the top of my shoulders), but I've been braiding it almost daily.  As soon as it grows a few more inches, I'll try the fishtail and the five-strand braids.  I'm trying to break out of my ponytail habit, especially because I need to look a bit more professional and a bit less college student nowadays.

Three Things

The list of books I want to read after the semester ends grows almost daily.  I actually picked up a book this week and read it, even though I really should have been working on an annotated bibliography.

I probably can't afford to do that much more, but if I again read a book as a procrastinating tool, it'd be one of these three...

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After hearing an interview with the author on NPR a few weeks ago and then reading Brandi's recommendation, I'm convinced I'd love The Night Circus.  I tried to get my hands on this one at the library earlier this week when I had two hours between classes and forgot to bring homework for the next day with me, but apparently it's good enough that it's checked out of the university library and the four public library locations that have it.

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I pretty much missed all the hype for Everything is Illuminated, but then, I rarely read anything that's popular while it's popular.  I'm just frequently behind the times like that.  My sister got me a copy of this and Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close for my birthday, so I'll be taking them both on over Christmas break.

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I've read mixed reviews of The Marriage Plot, particularly from readers who loved Middlesex (which I thought was brilliant) and The Virgin Suicides (which I haven't read).  It seems it's good, but not as good as his previous work.  But then, how do you follow up a Pulitzer Prize?

So, what are you reading?  And what would you like to read?  

Three Things

I am grateful for...

...little terriers who just can't bear to be alone when it thunders (and stopping at my parents' house just long enough to keep her company during the storm)...

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...discovering that if you click the "history" category on Pinterest, it's basically a collection of nineties memories (with a healthy dose of eighties nostalgia, but I'm a bit young for most of it).  It's too bad that I'm too old for Book It!, because I got a lot of pizza as a kid, especially during my chapter-book-a-day phase...

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...and I am grateful for (and really enjoying) apple pie for breakfast.  It's a tiny indulgence and a tiny slice, but oh so tasty with hot coffee to accompany it.  

But even more than these little things, I have something a bit bigger to be grateful for: my grandfather took his first steps with a prosthesis yesterday, and he will be bringing it home and start learning to walk again next week!  This is the biggest move towards finally being independent since the accident he was in over two years ago (which I briefly wrote about this summer).  

So what is making you smile today?  What are you grateful for?  

Three Things

Lately, I've been practicing gratitude more consciously.  I'll tell you more about it next week.  Today, I'm going to share three things that I am grateful for, rather than three things I'd love to have. 

I love...

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...crisp fall mornings and hot coffee...

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...light tumbling over buildings and color-changing trees...

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...and remembering this daily task. 

Have a lovely weekend!

Three Things

It's all about the blue.  Occasionally I have little deviations to yellow or green, but I always come back to blue.  I blame my mother and the blues that have always filled my family's home--cobalt glasses, a blue and ivory kitchen, and a collection of blue-splattered stoneware.

Last time I wrote about the color blue and my little love for it (and aqua hues, too), I got some really cool comments.  I especially liked the thought Kim shared: blue is a reliable and trustworthy color.  It's friendly, it's comfortable, and it's calm.  I've recently discovered a love for navy that has finally returned four years after I work an unflattering box-pleated navy skirt with a polo for the last time.  Navy has everything I love about blues in general, but adds a little bit more class.

I think I need a blue dress...no, actually, I think I need another blue dress, a pair of navy tights, and the right short of shoes (but I don't know what that would be.  Thoughts?).

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Thanks for stopping by, and enjoy your weekend!  My husband is getting home tomorrow night and we're spending the weekend house/dog sitting for my parents...and studying.  I have fall break on Monday and Tuesday and Cory is heading out of town for job training, so you might actually hear from me. 

Three Things

If you read Design*Sponge, then you probably saw these already.  If so, bear with me.  I'm a little bit in love, as always happens when I see good lit and good design come together.

I have a hard time explaining how I feel about the Romantics and the Transcendentalists.  I refer to them for inspiration.  I really like their style and the emotion and the energy in Keats and Wordsworth and Shelley...

...but at the same time, I realize that their emotional zeal and feeling-based approach to both poetry and life can be overdone to some destructive ends (emotions are good, but not if they control us).  I love their passion but think it should be taken with a dose of practicality.

Still, my mixed feelings aside, I really, really, really, love these new editions set to come out from Faber & Faber.  I want them all, but these are my top three.  D*S is also hosting a giveaway that ends tomorrow night at ten eastern time.

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Source: faber.co.uk via Katie on Pinterest

Source: faber.co.uk via Katie on Pinterest

Three Things

The chilly weather is continuing.  It's only sixty-one degrees outside!  This is an early cold spell, especially for Louisville, and it happened overnight this weekend.  You'd think I would be used to the frequent and rapid changes to weather in this state by now, but if I haven't gotten used to it after twelve years, I'll probably never adjust.  We've had a good bit of rain, too, and I realized that I neglected to waterproof the backpack I made this summer.  So the theme of my three things today pulls from the surprisingly swift changes in Kentucky weather and my need to adapt better: an umbrella, a waterproof backpack, and a cute and warm coat.

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Three Things

This might be a new series.  I'm not sure.  I'm not very good at keeping up with series, but I'm working on it.  I'd show three things I've found and liked, some affordable, others not--just things that make me happy and would be rather nice to own rather than just admire.

Anyway, these are three things I'd like to own.

#1.  This print.  I think it would actually be quite useful for me in addition to being pretty.  I'm getting a better grip on intertextuality in spite of my scattered and slightly messy undergraduate education, but a visual aid that's this pretty would be helpful and fun!

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#2: Dottie Angel's book is so pretty.  It's so fun.  I think it would make me smile and grin and laugh.  I almost bought it the other day, but after spending over two hundred dollars on school books (why must I need new editions?), I couldn't do it.

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#3: I really want a new yellow sweater.  I managed to stain the sleeve of my current one--an Ann Taylor cardigan that I bought for $2.50 at Goodwill--and shrink it in the wash, but I still wear it sometimes.  I'm picky about sweaters, though, as I'm allergic to wool and don't care for acrylics.  Silk and cotton blends are my favorite, and this one from Land's End would do perfectly.  I just need to get over to the Sears store and see if they have it and what size is right.

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