CocoRosie

So it has been a million years (or 6 months?) since I have had a blog post. Silly me. CocoRosie is worth the time and effort though. So I saw CocoRosie last night (June 19th 2010) at the Barrymore theater in Madison Wisconsin. I was really dreading the idea of driving back to Milwaukee late at night (as I get sleepy and sleepy behind the wheel is not a good idea). I thought of camping near Madison, but there weren't any reservable spots left so I had to take my chances. Luckily I found one Saturday morning, set up camp, wrote a poem for CocoRosie (which I put on my poetry blog)and then knitted. I left the campground about 10 after 6pm assuming that they would open the doors at 7pm. When I got there, no one was waiting outside, but shortly after a group came in to get their tickets. We were told we needed to wait outside and told where to start the line outside. I was first and this group of young people were second. I got to talking to the one woman Jodi, who I found out was the mom of the younger girl and Jodi is closer to my age. Her daughter had a couple of friends there as well. It was her daughters 18th birthday that day. I hung out with them during the duration of the concert and Jodi and I plan on staying in touch and being friends. That was an unexpected and wonderful surprise.

Diane Cluck opened for CocoRosie. I had heard of her, but not heard her. I really loved her. She does folk music, but it is the kind of folk that I like (folk music can be really hit or miss for me). I got to meet her briefly after her performance and after the CocoRosie concert. Jodi and I managed to stand right by the stage right in front of where Bianca stands. It was amazing. Everyone loves Bianca. I just don't know what it is about her. Sierra was just so bright and energized. Almost all of my favorite songs were played. During the song "Hopscotch" they did the hand clap game all little girls do (pictured below). They have a beat box guy who did a solo performance that was nothing short of stunning. I don't know what details to go into, the whole night was amazing. I will say I was surprised to learn that Bianca plays so many wind instruments. Yep, I'm majorly in love.

Here are the pictures:






You can find all the pictures at Flickr.

And a video I made of them performing "Werewolf".

CocoRosie - Werewolf - Madison June 19 2010 from Jeanette Alred on Vimeo.

Ikea fun

There is still a bookcase I want at Ikea, but this is what I have so far. Most of it I got yesterday and one thing last month.

What I got last month was another pendant lamp to put overhead in my craft room. I already have one exactly like it in my dining area.


My new desk lamp that desperately needed. I spend most of my time at my desk on my laptop and crafting. The lighting in my craft room has been extremely poor. Really makes it hard to read or focus on what I am doing with knitting. I have a picture at night (before cleaning my desk) and next day in day light (after cleaning my desk).



My new TV stand, I have been wanting this for some time. Something to hold my TV, stereo and related components and still look beautiful. At some point I want to get an LCD TV. Aesthetically it will look better and the picture will be better.


My infamous new lamp shade:


Other small stuff. Salad spinner, mouse pads for work, lint roller, batteries. I know all exciting, not.


Some picture frames (with some gorgeous pictures I received in a swap). I need to measure all my artwork now and pick up more frames next time I am there.


I hope for one more trip after tax refund to get the bookcase I want. I will get the black/brown color.
This:
http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/50103086
or this:
http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/40047675

As for moving again, I keep on changing my mind. Stay tuned to see what happens, but if I do move, it will probably be next fall once gardening season is over. Of course if my alcoholic neighbor tries to be buddies with me again now that his girlfriend left him, I might move sooner. I have seen him once and it seems as if he will leave me alone. Nice guy with a bad problem. Too bad.

Otherwise, enjoying my last day of my 4 day weekend.

Christmas, Bill, Power Down

Silly Latisse commercial, I wouldn't pay one cent for some crap to make my eye lashes fuller and longer. Ok anyways....not what this blog is about.

Christmas was good this year. Always better than the cold and snow that accompanies it. I'm sure I am going to forget something, but here goes.

Family:
Parents: Knitting book
Sister: While you were Sleeping DVD (and there was something else I can't think of. Um....)
Nieces: Michaels gift cards and Michelle also gave me a beautiful ornament from a German shopping place in Chicago (unfortunately I forgot to take a picture, but I didn't get pictures of everything)
Aunt Sue and Phil: A beautiful ornament and the proceeds help reforest America.
Aunt Carol: $25 (pictured below will be a picture of what I bought).

Friends:
Paula: Fingerless gloves (you know how long I have been begging for some), cookies, and A Christmas Story Fudge (A Christmas Story was filmed in Cleveland and Paula lives near there and Cleveland has preserved the house and has a museum for the movies and Paula was able to get this for me). I feel like I'm missing something here. I hope not.
Bonnie: A $30 gift certificate for Paradise Fibers. The choices were endless so it was super hard to decide. I have pictures of what I got below.
Jillian: Well we will be exchanging music and poetry throughout the year. I do have something(s) in mind for an actual gift for Christmas and birthday, but I haven't gotten it yet.
Nicole: This girl is generous with me year round. I am not worthy. We haven't gotten together yet, but I am no where near close to doing all for her that I want to. I know one thing though, a carder. I got one half of a carder from my friend Sarah and Nicole miraculously found a matching half. When I get the second half and play with it, that will be a new blog post.

Pictures of stuff from Paula:




Pictures of what I got from Paradise Fibers, roving (to make yarn) and yarn:



The artwork I got with money from Aunt Carol (hopefully people don't mind seeing an artful nude)Art by Krystyna81:


My parents got themselves a new dog for Christmas. His name is Bill and we love him so much (and I'm not a dog person):


Power Down:
There is a power down movement starting where people are choosing every Saturday to live without TV, Computer, things electronic. The extent people want to do it is completely up to them. I really love this idea as I want to be earth friendly but I haven't done it for the last couple of weeks. It is challenging, I have a hard time living in silence. If I had people to hang out with in person I think it would make it much easier. I thought about learning instruments. I have a couple of guitars and I want a mandolin, but then I quickly realized I usually have a lot of crafting to do so I can't play an instrument and craft at the same time. I think this will be easier in the summertime when I can get out more. I really hate winter. Not really sure what to do for now. If anyone wants to come over and hang out on Saturdays and join me, let me know. I'll be happy to turn off the TV and/or computer and sit and chat, cook, craft. Need people.

Ok, I think that is it for now. Next weekend I have some fun things in store, so more about that afterwords. Yay!!!!

Winter/Christmas

Dear god it is here again....winter. All my Facebook friends are probably well sick of my hate of snow by now. I must have some form of SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder). Snow is pretty and all, but I enjoy it much more in pictures than in reality. So lets see...I don't really have any desire to live in Florida, southern California wouldn't be too bad though I'm not sure about earthquakes and wild fires but am sure about beaches and sun, Hawaii would be a dream but I would feel so isolated it would be hard to always want to come back and visit. Where I REALLY want to live is in New York City. Sure there is still cold and snow but I wouldn't need a car so I wouldn't have to drive in the snow. What New York City has going for it is cultural diversity and just all the offerings and activities of a big city. I had always considered myself a half city/half country girl. After living in Cedarburg for four years I realize I am probably 80 to 90% city and 10 to 20% country. The country part of me likes to drive country roads and go camping. Outside of that I really really want to be in the city. I am just not really able to justify the funds to move back to downtown Milwaukee or for that matter New York City. I think I should make a definite goal to visit New York since I have never been there to see what I think of it in person and the reality of living there. Not just be a tourist.

Christmas doesn't depress me so much (whereas winter really depresses me). The most exciting thing this winter will be my parents new greyhound dog, though he may not be there before Christmas (we can always hope). I am not a dog person by any means, but since my parents started researching greyhounds and I have learned more about them, they sound like really great dogs!!! Here is the link to their new dog.

I hope that by no later than this Friday or Saturday to get all my Christmas stuff out. Hopefully sooner. I'm not doing so good at being productive this weekend. I better get with it. :-)

The holidays

Well turkey day was interesting this year. It had been a couple of years since I cooked the turkey so I looked up cooking times to refresh my memory. I found a web site that said to cook at 325 degrees for 3 1/2 to 3 3/4 hours. WRONG!!! About 2 hours after that the turkey was ready. Rather than wait 2 more hours to eat we all decided we like turkey for leftovers better anyways and ate everything else. So a kind of turkeyless thanksgiving. I thought it was fun. I like all the other stuff (especially stuffing) better anyways. Then we watched A Christmas Story. My sister had to work during the day and nieces at night. So after my twin nieces went to work my sister came over and had dinner. By then the turkey was done so she did have some. She got most of the turkey leftovers and I got most of the stuffing leftovers. I thought it was a very good day. I don't have a picture of the turkey because of the issues we had. Here are a couple of other pictures:





Some more pictures of a morning commute. Try not to get too bored with my obsession. ;-)




This weekend will be going for a walk with my mom and then making my holiday CDs. Hopefully I will have them in the mail some time this week.

The night sky 11-16-09

I just want to post a couple of pictures I took tonight of the really cool sky.
See all the pictures here:
http://s147.photobucket.com/albums/r310/myklia/blog%20pics/night%20sky%2011-16-09/



You can barely see the star in the upper left hand corner:



Keep in mind that the only camera I have right now is my cell phone camera. I try to do what I can.

Weekend Novemer 14 and 15 2009

I had a pretty good weekend. I started off Saturday with a great haircut and then I went to a friend's house. We knew each other in high school and every so often in the last 5 years or so(?)we have run into each other, but never too much more than "hi, how are you" because I think it was usually crowded situations. They didn't lend themselves to really sitting and talking. I found her on Facebook and we have reconnected. I went to her house to pick up one carder and hung out for a while with her and her two children and had breakfast and great conversation. It was really wonderful.

After that I had ummm...girl business, but then after that I went to Zine Fest in the Riverwest neighborhood. Zines are like little homemade magazines. A lot of creativity and range of subjects. Really fantastic!!! I then went to Whole Foods and did some shopping there (I am not often in that part of town, so it is a treat for me). After that I went to Trader Joe's because they were selling pre-brined fresh turkeys. I picked one up for Thanksgiving. Should be good.

Yesterday I went to a bio poetics class about how science can influence poetry. It was really fun and we even had a biology student who also likes poetry attend the class so she had a different perspective to offer. I found out I am a syllable counting geek. I have always liked haiku's, but now have fallen in love with Fibonacci poems. There was much else discussed too.

Onto a couple of pictures. My haircut:

Zines I got at Zine Fest:


A Fabonacci is supposed to start with a zero, so a sigh will serve as my zero. Here is my poem:

*sigh*

I

One

Alone

Wanting you

You not wanting me

But I want to make you happy

You don't know me but I want you to give me a chance

You don't know that I am peace, calm, happiness, laughter, creative, hard working, and love

You are sunshine in a smile, beautiful eyes gleaming, great energy to light the world, a loving soul, warm as a summer day, I want you

************************************************************

Ok, I better go, still much to do before I leave work this morning.