Life: Deciding to revamp this here blog... maybe

Life: Deciding to revamp this here blog... maybe

Salut! C'est moi Lauren! Haven't seen me in a awhile! Well here's my face again.

One thing I've missed over the past few years was this little blog. I had been a way to keep track of my life and something I still look back on frequently to remember outings, outfits, and where I was at in my life. So why not try again! I've come back to this post often, trying to re-write it.

Since last I wrote lot's have changed, but I can feel that I'm headed down the path to become my true self more and more.

1. The biggest visual change is I've adorned my body with some amazing tattoos. I'm at 12 right now, which isn't a huge number, but they are large and I have traveled for them. Since last blogging I've gotten a Magnolia on my back from a traveling artist named Ellen, I chose a magnolia because I have a beautiful tree outside my house in Oakland, I also got it when I became a manager of the design team at WU. After I got an amazing blackwork piece of acorns and oak leaves on my arm by the amazing Lawrence Edwards. Next I got a large thigh piece of my dog Tripp, while traveling with him on a road trip through the Pacific Northwest. It was a literal road trip I planned to get a trip tattoo of Tripp... say that three times fast. It was done by the ever so talented Shawn Hebrank, whom I can't wait to get more from. I went with my best friend Marlee before she moved to the UK to get tattoos from Regina in Oakland and I got a silver millennium crystal and time key on my sternum. Then I made my way to Europe for the first time alone and was able to snag a spot with the goddess of ink Kate Mackay-Gill and got a whimsical white squirrel circling my knee and interacting with my Tripp tattoo. I have a shoulder piece by Jessica Zed of a bouquet of flowers representing some women in my life, peonies for my mom, roses for my grandma, forget-me-nots for my alaskan family, and fireweed for in general the women who were there for me during my summer in Alaska years ago. I received a beautiful rib tattoo of blueberries and moth by the incredible Ella Coose, who is amazing and so young, she will become a major famous artist I can feel it. I got an amazing Pacific Dogwood and Coastal Redwood tattoo on my forearm by Annelise before she moved to Portland, OR. And started a huge floral back piece with Cecelia! Soon I will be covered in beautiful flowers and animals. Oh also I fulfilled a desire I've had since jr. high and got my septum pierced, and have icy purple hair.

2. Travel, I've done tons of travel and mostly alone. I never thought I'd like the solo travel aspect but I love it especially for road trips. You can stop anywhere, listen to anything, have your own schedule... I love it. I did two long roadtrips alone (well with Tripp dog of course) and stayed in so many places, met up with old friends and met some interesting people along the way. Last year I finally went to Europe, I spent a week in Scotland with my friend Marlee traipsing about the Orkney Islands and Edinburgh, then hopped over to Paris where I spent 5 days alone in a country where I didn't speak the language... It was fine! haha! I stayed in a hip hostel and made friends immediately. I can't wait to do more foreign travel! I also went on a girls trip to New Orleans!! I definitely want to go back there too.

My most recent solo trip was to India to see my dear friend Sonali get married! It was an overwhelming once in a lifetime trip and I saw so many amazing sites, and it was really really hot... Then went over to Amsterdam to see an old highschool friend from Brasil!
Pictures from India and Amsterdam. 

3. The most important thing... I've become an avid costumer and vintage/antique clothing collector. As anyone knows who knows me, I LOVE dressing up. I always have. I love vintage clothing. I love history. I was obsessed with American Girl dolls as a child, I loved history and dress. I remember telling my mom I wish Colonial Williamsburg forced the tourists to wear costumes because people in shorts and fanny packs among the history made me angry. I have made myself many costumes, and my mom taught me how to sew and care about authenticity when she went thru pains to make the American Doll clothes she made and sold accurate looking. Slowly and surely through art friends here I was exposed more an more to the costume community here. And that has lead me to now being on the board of the Greater Bay Area Costumers Guild, attending and attend Costume College, a costuming convention in LA, yearly. But most importantly I have made friends so deeply that I didn't know I'd have those type of friends after college. Everyone is so wonderful, helpful and supportive. What this has also taught me is how to mend clothes better and make clothes with less waste. Old techniques of creating clothes is fabulous to use in modern sewing and mending.
Here's some quick pics of the past 6 months of costume. 

4.  The biggest challenge in my life is I've started again to really concentrate on creating a lifestyle that I consume less and create more. Currently where I focus on for this challenge is my backyard garden, my food cycle, and also through my style. 80% of my closet is USA made, me-made or vintage/used. I've started preserving food again and only growing or buying from the farmers markets. My partner and I have built an amazing garden in the backyard and discuss when we will have a small homestead and live more off the land. I've started making another effort to cut plastic out of my life and reuse as much as I can. We also have two forms of composting, worms and a tumbler. My goals is practicing more different food creation and how to process it. François works at an urban farm in San Francisco so we get lot's of food to experiment with preserving and processing, currently as I type he's figuring out how to best hull his millet harvest. I'm really excited to learn more and more how to be self sustainable and also appreciate what I do consume and buy that I don't make.

 Flowers from my garden. Bells of Ireland, Yarrow, and Snapdragons.

What I've now found, I'm living what I loved as a child. Tattoos, dressing up like a real life American Girl doll, gardening, doing handicrafts, just making and solving the question, how was that dress made? And learning how to live fully on my own and grow and make everything.

GO: Flower Farm Ladies

GO: Flower Farm Ladies

Last weekend I had the amazing privilege of spending a creative, relaxing filled weekend with some of my best girlfriends. It was my neighbor and friend, Stephanie's birthday and we went to our friend's Aunt's house up in the Sierra foothills outside of Nevada City.






I arrived on Saturday a bit later than everyone else, I had painting class that day, and came upon the loveliest scene... beautiful house overflowing with plants and my ladies (and John, Stephanie's boy, he was a lady for the weekend) making flower crowns. We soon sat down to an amazing steak dinner with all the fixings. After the fill of dinner we got our sleeping bags all set up by the pond and under an arbor covered with vines, which would be our cover for the night.






After watching the amazing sunset dip below the hills we made our ways back to the house to make desserts and just relax. Stephanie and Lizzie played old folk music while we all sat around an sang along, we all had brought crafts and books to occupy our time whilst listening to old timey music being played. I luckily had some macrame projects and was able to work on them.



Filling up on music and relaxing we went back to our little hillside and hunkered down to get ready for sleep. First though we all laid out on the dock and watched the stars. The moon had set early in the evening so the night sky was filled with stars and the milky way with no other light hindering us seeing them. I don't know how many shooting stars I counted but I got in lot's of wishes. Soon we all were lured to bed by sleepiness and slept to the sounds of frogs and far off coyote calls.





The next day started bright and early with the hot sun pouring over us. I'm so used to the chilly bay I forgot that its warm in the mornings some places. Of course breakfast was amazing, and after a couple of hours lounging and exploring the grounds and barn, we packed up a car and piled in to go relax in the Yuba River.




We got there before noon and scored a prime spot on some rocks near some little waterfalls. This was absolutely amazing. I haven't done any summertime activity in so long because it's so chilly here in the summers you have to go far to get somewhere warm enough to even wear a swimsuit. This was perfect. Cold water, warm sun. We sat around a had drinks and floated and read magazines and talked and napped. Best thing too is I didn't get sunburnt, win! I did however slip on some mossy rocks and scraped my bum.







After relaxing and then getting annoyed at how many more people had come to the river we left and back at the house prepared an amazing dinner. There was kabobs, potatoes, bread, wine... ah so much good stuff.



Then just like that it was sunday evening and I was driving home watching the sunset over Mt Tam. Why can't every weekend be like this?