fourth of july wedding

{each photo links to its shop}

at least in the states you'd have fireworks and a day off for your anniversary...

see also last year's fourth of july post.

harlem renaissance wedding: dark plum, golden poppy, for karrie

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Juke Box Love Song

I could take the Harlem night
and wrap around you,
Take the neon lights and make a crown,
Take the Lenox Avenue busses,
Taxis, subways,
And for your love song tone their rumble down.
Take Harlem's heartbeat,
Make a drumbeat,
Put it on a record, let it whirl,
And while we listen to it play,
Dance with you till day--
Dance with you, my sweet brown Harlem girl.

---Langston Hughes


from The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes
more poems: randomhouse.com/knopf/authors/hughes/poem.html

karrie asked me (back in february!) to help with a color board for her october wedding:

colors are deep, dark plum and golden poppy. I would love to accent with an antique gold or something like that, but I have no idea what would work. We are such crazy people; the ceremony is in the Japanese botanical gardens, the reception is at this gorgeous garden restaurant (very rustic old worldy), and W. and I dressing very Harlem Renaissance (cream, grey, drapey satin, him in tiny pinstripe vest with rolled up oxford shirt)...how more far apart can we get in terms of these, you know? We have very old world, rustic, organic and warm sensibilities and would like to portray that somehow...

i'm no snippet&ink, and it has sadly taken me forever to post this because i don't quite feel it's finished --

dear readers, help karrie out: can you find something (etsy, inspiration board elsewhere, great idea) that fits this description?

plus -- *any* excuse to post this gorgeous poem.
happy friday, everyone!

when life gives you lemons: a lemonade sampler

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so i'm headed home tomorrow, and my beloved is on day five of a cleansing lemonade detox. color me puzzled. last week i got home from work one night and there were giant bags of lemons all over the kitchen. ?wha??... had never heard of such a thing, although it's evidently popular, and i refuse to link to it because it might just be a bit unhinged, and i fear for all of us. plus i didn't find him particularly toxed in the first place (visualize, if you will, little floating air hearts circling my head... yes, i have it bad).

all this kvetching to say: i plan to join him in this crazy venture tomorrow. and i really, reeeallly love to eat. i'd like to say i love adventuring with him *more* than 3 squares plus snacks... (and coffee... oh god, the coffee...)

prediction: by friday i will be posting food. all kinds of food.

(god, i'm such a wuss! i just get so *angry* when i'm hungry. hopefully i won't go on some wild-eyed lemon-cayenne jihad and hold up the ice cream parlor behind our apartment building.)

speaking of lemons/lemonade, please allow me to veer briefly into serious (and warning! Depressing) public-service-announcement turf. as always, please feel free to skip.

one of the many reasons i took time off from the blog was that my stepfather died unexpectedly just before christmas. he was 48, much younger than my mom;* this year would have been their 10th anniversary. have been trying to help her untangle a scalding hot mess of troubles since then, which is why i'm here in florida. so much i could tell you, it would break your heart -- it breaks mine.

will simply say this from my soapbox: one of the best ways you show you love each other, in any long-term relationship but most especially a legal one, is to make sure you have an up-to-date will, plus a living will with your health directives. i know, it's a downer. it sounds lame, or you're young, or it's expensive -- please, if you can plan a wedding you can do this. even if you don't own stuff or have/intend to have kids, but especially if you do. make a plan together for what would happen if you weren't there to help your people figure it out, and write it down. do it for love.

end soapbox! we will be ok, with some hard work. there are some big damn lemons life bowls you over with some days -- and still there's so much beautiful in the world. please take care of each other!

*my mom will absolutely kill me if she reads this part. good thing i have a will.