Thrifty #1

I found a old school projector at value village last week. Its a School Master 300 series with remote, that about all I know about it. I could not find to much info online about it. Everything still works great and it even came with its own storage box. You have to load each slide individually, this is not a carousel slide projector. Also you can load a film strip and with each press of the button it pulls the film through to the next slide. I'm not sure you can even order slide film this way anymore. I put some of my slides and film strips through and it works quite well. I love old machines like this, there is something about the simplicity of design and also the quality of its construction. I doubt any slide projector built today will last as long as this one has. I'm going to try and come up with some creative ideas I can use this for. I think it was a great find for only $11.99

You can see some more photos of this find here.

Post about Posts

I have decided to create themed posts for each day of the week. I got the idea of this from other blogs I’ve seen. I think it will keep me blogging more often by setting a format for each day on just what I am going to blog about. I sometimes find it hard to figure out just what to blog about, what to share and what not to. I would like to post something every day if I could so hopefully this format will keep me in check. So, I have a few ideas for the days of the week and hopefully I will be able to fill the rest.

Sundays - not sure yet.

Mondays - Uwajimystery Monday. This will be about mystery items I find at Uwajimaya. Items that have no English on them or ones that you just can’t tell what it is or you just wander why it would exist at all. I not sure I will be able to do this every week because I will not always get a chance to go to Uwajimaya all the time.

Tuesdays - Talkie Tuesdays. I will borrow this from a friend’s blog rumination reading room, she use to do this every week. I will share moves I have watched or movies I want to watch.

Wednesdays - What I’m up to Wednesdays. I will share what I’m up to either with my own work or work I am doing for other artist.

Thursdays - Thrifty Thursdays. I share items I have found in thrift shops. I love going to the goodwill or value village at least once a week. I always seem to find some amazing things. I will post pictures of what I found and how much they were.

Fridays – Featured Friday. I will feature an artist, etsy shop, video, site or any other amazing thing I might find throughout the week.

Saturdays – Hmmm, any ideas?

Currently Reading

I'm currently reading "Last Child in the Woods" by Richard Louv. Here is a short blurb about it from the internets.

"In this influential work about the staggering divide between children and the outdoors, child-advocacy expert Richard Louv directly links the lack of nature in the lives of today’s wired generation—he calls it nature-deficit disorder—to some of the most disturbing childhood trends, including the rises in obesity, attention disorders, and depression." - the internets.

I love how this book is written. It's not done in a text book fashion just listing data after data, it includes stories from interviews he did from people all over the country. It was interesting to hear a wide range of stories and memories from people young and old about growing up around and in nature. Its also interesting to hear the interviews he did of school children and how they feel about nature. Some of my favorite parts were when someone stated that if a kid back a few decades ago never left his house to play outside was considered the weird kid. Nowadays a kid is most likely considered weird if he wants to go outside and play rather then play video games. My favorite quote from the book is by a fourth-grader that says, “I like to play indoors better ‘cause that’s where all the electrical outlets are.” I haven't finished this book yet but it has already opened my eyes to just how far we have distanced ourselves from nature. I need to go hiking more.

I Wish This Was My American Life

I loved the episode of This American Life this week the one about the house on loon lake. I would love to discover something like that. I would love to explore and figure out a mystery like that. There are probably not many abandoned places like that anymore. I love forgotten places and things. I love discovering something that has been overlooked and left behind.

Its true that someones trash is another mans treasure. Some people only care about the new the next thing, they easily discard perfectly good things. I love collecting those old things that might be old, but they still work well and will probably last longer then anything made today. Things today are made to be replaced, there are not many things that are built to last.

Anyway, I'm getting off topic. I loved the mystery of this episode. I love radio stories like this. Its so much better to just hear the sound and create your own image then just watching something unravel on a screen. Its so much more interesting unraveling in my own mind. I wish there were more radio programs like this, but I know its a dying medium, which is sad.

Here are some pictures of the things they found in the house.

Vintage Salt and Pepper Ducks

I set up Google Analytics for my etsy shop, it’s actually a pretty amazing program. With it I receive info on how many visitor I have to my shop, where they are from, what they’re looking at and for how long. It also lets me know how people are finding my stuff whether it be through etsy or a referral through another site or a search engine. Also it lets me know what keywords searches through search engines bring people to my stuff, but for some reason my top keywords don’t seem to relevant to my stuff.

Here are my Top 6 keywords.

1. Irish chainmail
2. Mobiles kids
3. Quarter bracelet + etsy
4. Seattle shop chainmail
5. Stud iphone case
6. Vintage salt and pepper ducks

Some of these just don’t make sense, vintage salt and pepper ducks? Why the hell would any of my stuff come up in that search?

Greatest Opening Ever

This is what I consider to be the greatest opening to any movie ever of all time.



When I first discovered this move it was one of those that I had no idea what it was about and I had never heard of it before. I think I was hooked within the first second, and it only got better.

Perfect Timing

So I spent the weekend up on Whidbey Island in a little beach house on Mutiny Bay. Sarah and Jay had rented this place when the final signing on their house was delayed for a few days when they already had everything they owned packed up. This was kind of perfect timing for me because it had been awhile since I had spent time away from the city and it was starting to get to me. So the whole weekend was pretty much spent lounging around eating and drinking watching the water, putting together a puzzle, watching a few movies, and just enjoying the quietness and slow pace of that area. I remember sitting on the deck and just listening to the quietest quiet I had heard in a long time.

We also took a little trip to Fort Casey and explored around a bit. They had refinished the concrete on one side of the fort, it looked almost new but I like the look of the aged concrete and rust and decay. I love the textures that the decay and time create. They also seemed to have more opened up and there were a few things I had never seen before so that was pretty cool. It had been over a year since I had been up to Casey which I think I need to make a point of getting up there more often, I love it there.

Later in the night I was playing around with some glow sticks I had found earlier at the drug store in Freeland. It was too light out to get some real dramatic affects plus I was a little drunk to set things up perfectly but I still got some great shots.

Anyway it was an awesome weekend and I think it was just what I needed, perfect timing.