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Are you guys excited about the Royal Wedding?  I'm bursting at the seams! When I was a girl growing up in Canada Princess Diana was such a fave of mine. We still pledge allegiance to the Queen and all that stuff so Charles and Di was a big day. I remember getting up and watching with my mom who had stacks of magazines on Diana, and everything the day entailed. It was like my favorite cousin was getting married and we had a front row seat...in front of the television.

Flash forward and here we are again with William and Kate. I just love her (and can't believe I'm waxing on like a cuckoo bird about this). She seems so down to earth and like a girlfriend any of us could have. I came across these pictures this morning and have officially turned into my mother: I got all choked up and needed a kleenex. Stay tuned for me getting up by the light of the silvery moon to watch the wedding...I'm getting mini eclairs, brewing some tea and probably tossing back a margarita just for fun all at  3 or 4am. Go Wills and Kate!!

I can't help but think about how happy Princess Diana would be to see these two together.  *sniffle*


Thus ends my gushing nerd alert over the Royal Wedding although I can't promise there won't be a barrage of tweets in the early morning.  Are you guys watching??

Oh how I wish our wonderpup, Chet Baker, Boston terrier, could be trained to find morel mushrooms using his highly sensitive nose. That would make him truly useful in ways that transcend his utility as a companion animal and terror to the bunnehs.

I LOVE all of spring's wondrous bounty: the returning songbirds, the hillsides bursting with blossoms, the greening of the landscape, the warmer weather, the almost vastly improved Pittsburgh Pirates...but right up there in my top five or so spring things is the ephemeral appearance of edible fungi.

We'll be eating morels most nights this week thanks to the wet spring and warming temps of recent sunny days. It's good to be alive.

Photo by Julie "Don't Say Anything Mean About Chet Baker" Zickefoose.

I had approximately zero intentions of doing a post tonight, but seeing as the neighbor came home from work and decided to begin slamming the doors and moving furniture at oh, 11:30pm, I decided to whip up chorizo spaghetti sauce and fling together some current thoughts swirling in my head.  It's hard to believe I've been living in my new space for over 2 weeks.  It still looks like a small twister went off and I am lamenting the loss of the walk-in closet the Chef built out for my birthday last year.  To be honest I have to stop talking about it or I feel physically ill wondering where I'm going to put all my clothes.  Tough problem to have (she says dripping with sarcasm), but still a problem none the less.

Even though it was a small move in distance, I still feel like it's a new day - Uh hello?  I have a dishwasher now!  - and want to make some changes in the new place.  For some reason I've been captivated by the thought of using bright color which is so not me.  My old space had dark wood floors, white white walls, and a mix of  white, black, jute, grey and varying shades of navy.  Kind of nautical meets Asian old world, if you will.  Suddenly I'm feeling a need to recreate some sort of twist/combo of these:
And I find myself oddly attracted to bright pink.  Wha?  Here's some of the things I've got strewn about that I'd like to incorporate in...

As much as this blog is supposed to be about clothing and shoes and all that good stuff it's time to come clean...this thing has turned into an occasional play by play of my crazies.  I just can't help but share - it seems so much more interesting than just showing 14 things I like and then describing how I'd wear them.  I mean does anyone really want to read that from me every single day?  Anyone?  Anyone?

I've got posts backed up for a week based sheerly on things like piles of laundry I keep tripping over, the new neighbor who refuses to angle park his big *ss mountain climber SUV so I have to keep pounding on the door asking him to move in order to get into my garage (get the hint much there neighbor?), the Chef's cat attacking his dad's leg leaving a big ol' bloody bite after he left her out in the rain for too long...don't mess, and oh so much more.  Hopefully I'll get to a weekend recap before the weekend but until then let us begin with a momentary deviation so I can clear this image from my mind.

Pardon me while I also add that I am failing at the 30 Day Shred.  I've had a migraine for 5 days running and can't do squat for fear of aneurysm.  All but 2 women on my dad's side passed away from aneurysm...it's in the fam and I'm not taking chances.  That being said I am moderately intrigued at the idea of jumping around at midnight to see what the new neighbors do.

Hmmmmmmmmm

Just tonight I was wreaking havoc on my own body eating a piece of Chocolove's dark chocolate salted almond goodness when Kelly Ripa had to appear on tv with her Ripa for Ryka sneaker commercial flaunting her skinny arms and legs, waving them around in my face.  Fine Kelly. FINE. I get the point already!!  (prolly friends with jillian michaels anyway)  Wait a second...is that carpet scratching I hear?

I toad you we weren't done with the Bill of the Birds Caption Contests! Here's the latest. Send in your clever caption for this photograph (keeping your cleverness on the clean side of the NC-17 line). Our panel of ninja-like judges will select a winner and that winner will receive a coupon code good for $20 in the BWD Online Nature Shop. Deadline for your caption that trumps all captions is Thursday, April 28.

Good luck! Gentlepeople start your captions!

So here's the thing about living along the coast - at least in Southern California - you can potentially sit in overcast/foggy weather for hours not realizing that 5 minutes up the street the sun is beaming bright as can be.  Similarly sometimes you leave the house and it's toasty and fabulous only to return to brisk winds and grey skies.  Enter Sunday afternoon...there I was fresh off my flea market finds, all was well in the world.  I swear it was hot outside when we left the house.  Not so much upon return.  Enter breeze, clouds, and even fog.  Thankfully I had my bag to light the way.  Is it summer yet?

This adult male lesser prairie chicken spent our morning together dancing in his lek on the Selman Ranch, near Buffalo, Oklahoma.

I didn't want you to think I didn't get any good photos! I'll tell the whole story in the days ahead.

On Sunday afternoon I peeled over to the local Flea Market late in the day to see if I could find any treasures for my new abode.  Truth be told I was all kinds of hoping to find that psychedelic Austin Powers-ish type jersey dress I left behind last time...no dice.  Talk about a lesson learned.  Sigh

While wandering the aisles I came across a vendor whose wares immediately caught my eye:  rag rugs, aprons, and homemade pillow cases.  My grandmas both used to whip up some rag rugs that would make your eyes water from the sheer beauty of the colors they intermingled - and I still have handmade pillow cases in my cupboard.  Just last week I had been chatting it up with my mom about making a massive one of my own when low and behold there they were!  As I zipped in closer I noticed the person had turned the rug into a nifty little handbag that had a flour sack pocket on the outside and the best polka dot lining inside...so many pieces of my childhood all rolled into one.


As it turns out Michael Wells is the owner/operator of Cattle Headquarters, a graphic design company that makes hand-printed t-shirts, flour sack towels, pillowcases, aprons and other items featuring retro-cool Western-inspired images. As we got to talking I learned that his great-grandparents had made heirloom quilts from flour sacks - they, too, had the "re-use philosophy" down pat.

I ended up buying the cheeriest bag and wanted to give you a peek at it.  It's perfect for casual days, store runs and trips to the beach - totally something you would find in Anthropologie.  I hope you enjoy...if you're interested in picking up one of your own visit Cattle Headquarters here.  Lots of great stuff to choose from and eco-friendly, too.

In my dreams I have seen you there, dancing.
Dew-kissed little bluestem your stage set.
Grunting bison and whistling meadowlarks your only audience, save for me.

Many's the time I thought to come find you, but life snatched my plans from me as the prairie wind tugs at my words. Getting to the middle of nowhere requires more than good intentions.

Now sitting hunkered down, as if to imitate your own pre-dance posture, I wait, breathless, for your show to begin. I hear you hoot and whinny, gurgle and cluck. I am beside myself with anticipation.
All of us are waiting for the sun to tell us when this show can begin. As it has for thousands of years, the sun rules this natural phenomenon. No one will blink the house lights to alert us. We must be here, poised, prepared to leap and court. Or in my case, prepared to gasp with utter amazement.

I'd like to thank you gentlemen for letting me watch your prairie ballet. And, lest we forget, thanks also to the ladies for making these dudes dance.

Those rather poor photos represent my two latest life birds: the black-capped vireo and the lesser prairie chicken. I got both of them while attending The Woodward Lesser Prairie Chicken Festival in Woodward, Oklahoma. This small-sized birding fest is a keeper. And the birds are stupid ossum.

I'm going back for better chicken photos tomorrow, if the weather gods comply. Got great looks at both species, though, and that counts most of all for me. Just love being out here in the land of the big sky—it does one's heart some good.

Okay am I the only one out there who is so glad it's Friday they wanna marry it?  This week went by in a blur of boxes piled everywhere, hectic days at work, the car locked in the garage, and yesterday morning a gas leak.  Yes friends I said gas leak.  Just what I need:  to kick off in the confines of my own home without one last swig of Don Julio on a Friday night.

Seriously though:  gas leak = no bueno

Thankfully it's all fixed, however the car is still in the garage.  One thing at a time, Carrie - this has become my mantra.  I do believe the Chef and I are chanting it in our various locales throughout the day.  He's up to his eyeballs in renos and building codes and inspectors, so it's been a wild one.  Here's to a light at the end of the tunnel for each of us.  In the meantime here are a few pictures of what's going on.  This was very early in the week and I kinda got wound up in the artifacts so this is less progress and more me making a mental note of things I wanna cart out of the place.  Is there such a thing as Asian boho chic when discussing interiors?

Do you ever just feel like you're going on about your day...do de do de do de do when wham! (not george michael) you get hit between the eyes by the sheer incompetence of those around you?  I often find myself wondering how on earth it is that people are employed.

Take for example my recent run-in with Verizon.  I have what they call the Triple Bundle:  phone, internet and television.  One would think that when you transfer service all 3 pieces of that TRIPLE BUNDLE package would automatically be activated at the new residence, no?  Oh it transferred all right.  For 2 days until someone over there in Verizonland decided to change the status of my order from 'complete' to 'pending' causing only the phone service to go dead.  Why?  No one knows - isn't that interesting?  Three hours and five different departments later, apparently no one over there is 'authorized' to change that one little word back to its appropriate status - COMPLETE.  Someone took the authority to eff it up, but no one wants to man up and take the authority to make it right.  At least not for 24 to 48 hours.  Why?  Who knows?  No one - that's who.  So in the meantime I'm trying to recruit without a phone.  Effective, isn't it? It's like being at a standstill in the dark.  Everyone knows where the switch is, but no one who can reach it will turn the bloody thing on.  Good grief.


Speaking of dark:  the electric company decided it would be a good idea to go ahead and just kill the power to my old apartment rather than transferring it back into the owner's name as has been done since, oh, the dawn of electricity. Oh no that would be too much like, say, proper procedure.  Instead I am now without wheels and a prisoner in my own home due to the fact that my car is parked in the garage that can't be opened because the garage door opener is, you guessed it, electric and on the same account as the one they gloriously (dripping with sarcasm) turned off!  Even better?  There is apparently a rash of electric company switch turn-ons this week so they can't get the account reactivated - and my car out of the garage - until...wait for it...MONDAY.  Pardon me while I spontaneously combust.


Can someone please turn the lights back on?  I'm just trying to keep moving forward and avoid lingering in my former, well put together and much loved abode where everything had its home, was organized and wonderfully decorated.  A place where I could get in and out of the garage with ease.  Those were the days.

Yes these birds are in silhouette (sorry) and yes they represent four separate (bird) species.

The first person who can correctly identify these four species AND write a separate (and proper) haiku about one of them, wins a copy of my new book Hummingbirds and Butterflies (which I wrote with co-author Connie Toops).

Deadline for entries is Saturday, April 16, 2011. May the best birder/poet emerge victorious!

I've come to the conclusion that moving is a cathartic experience - and that I have become someone who no longer likes change.  In my 20's I was a leap off the edge, risk taker, change seeking kinda gal - moving far away, taking chances, moving even further away, oftentimes not even looking before I leapt.  Over the weekend I realized I don't think I'm that person anymore.

On Saturday a friend came over in the morning to help with the move.  He and his wife are relo'ing to Texas this weekend and throughout the course of conversation he said something that stuck with me all day, "sometimes you need to shake things up."  Later in the day a couple more close friends rolled in to assist with organizing and along the way one of them asked how long I'd lived in my other place.  When I responded saying six years - he looked at me and said, "it was time for you to make a change."  I laughed saying, "oh yeah big change I moved upstairs," but he stuck with it saying he really felt I had needed some sort of change to keep moving forward.  Even though I didn't say anything in response, I've been thinking about it ever since.

On Sunday it donned on me, as I walked through my old apartment, that this is the longest I've lived anywhere in 20 years.  And then the strangest thing happened - I got really sad and had to swallow a sizable lump in my throat.