As we get ready to leap into the new year, I thought it would be fun to look at some highlights from 2011, because it was a lovely albeit busy twelve months.
Whenever we travel I feel a huge pull between recording what we're doing in our travel book, taking pictures, and just enjoying our travel time. I want to capture the best and funniest parts of our trip, but the capturing aspect takes away time from the trip. It's a balancing act, and I suppose more practice is in order!
So here's some great interwebs for you guys to mull over until we start expounding on the amazing that is Italy.
For anyone who likes the free books offered by Amazon for the Kindle, there's now an RSS feed to follow the highest downloaded ones. This is fantastic, and I've already found several new books to read with absolutely no additional work. (You can also read us with an RSS feed, just click here or the Posts link in the sidebar.)
These streamers from Jordan Ferney are beautiful. I wanted to make them last week, but vacation and school got in the way. I'm pretty sure I'm going to find a way to make these the new apartment decor because perhaps it's time the Valentine's hearts come down.
Jersey knit bracelets from Vanessa also look like a really quick and fun craft, but alas I'm not sure where I'd find some jersey knit in KSA. Maybe, just maybe I'll browse around in Florence the next few days to see if I can find a bit.
And, here's another adorable craft just in time for Easter, plush peep bunnies. Perhaps there's someone back home willing to make me one of these super cute little bunnies. Our Easter will not so sadly be peep free, but please don't think that's a bad thing; the only good part about peeps is sticking them in the microwave.
Finally, we may not be making our way to Rome, but you should go check out this gorgeous photo of the Colosseum by Andrei Olariu.
As always there is a lot of great and interesting articles out there on the tubes if you know where to look, so I thought I'd share some of my favorites.
The author of Everything Everywhere had an interesting piece in The Atlantic about the myth of the authentic travel experience. I especially enjoyed his comparison to a cultural zoo. It's fascinating to learn about new cultures and different people, but we shouldn't be so surprised when they happen to be a lot like us.
Do Mi's post about how having One Thing wasn't enough blew me away. In many ways I can relate to this. There are so many activities I've started and never stuck with such as scrapbooking, sewing, knitting to some extent, and the eight different instruments I played between the ages of 9 and 18.
As an adult (or someone nearing an adult) it's easy to discount children's books as childish and silly, but Jonathan Fields has a great list of seven children's books with important life lessons. We all should have paid more attention to these, and I'm definitely going to check the library on campus to see about re-reading them.
This next article Steve found and it absolutely cracked me up. Go read about how scientists are searching for life on Earth by looking at photographs! Yup, the European Space Agency is now searching for life on Earth. In reality, if we can figure out a way to know if there's life on Earth when it takes up less than 1 pixel, then we can do that for other planets.
Finally, a link to a youtube video (or two). Steve first introduced me to Molly Lewis's music when he sent me a link to her cover of Poker Face, which I promptly fell in love with because it rocks and Poker Face quickly became our spring break anthem as we drove out to Arches and Canyonlands National Parks. Several years later, she wrote a serenade to Stephen Fry and nary a week later ended up performing at his Harvard lifetime achievement award celebration.
So go feast on the glory that is the internet, because seriously when in our lives have we ever had so much greatness at such easy reach?
There is so much to read out there on the internet and since I'm sick in bed (or on the couch) today, I figured I'd share some of it with you!
Bridget talks about the Eternal Sunshine of Sharjah, UAE and this is one of those posts that just makes me shake my head in agreement about every stinkin sentence. It's spot on how I feel about the weather here in Saudi lately. I love this blog, because the head nodding in agreement happens all the time, and it's nice to have someone else with similar experiences.
J.D. just got back from a three week trip to Africa, and does a brilliant job talking about both wealth and poverty that he saw on his trip. Our trip to Egypt brought about many of the same feelings for me.
Allie made chocolate frogs (and a good grade), which makes me all kinds of jealous, because those are just too cute!
This is the kind of crafting I want to be doing these days courtesy of Make it and Love it. Sadly that won't happen until I get all of my lovely craft equipment back.
On an even sadder note, the Easy Bake Oven is on it's way out, those dastardly politicians legislating for a better environment *shakes fist*!
There's a lot of interesting internet out there and sometimes it's nice to go check that out instead.
Being out of the US sometimes it's hard to stay in touch with what's going on back home, but reading articles about TSA security (@au news) bordering on the inappropriate (@gizmodo) is just saddening. I know we all need to stay safe, but can we keep our dignity too?
Unclutterer had a really interesting look at pack rats in "Through the Looking Glass." I read "Alice in Wonderland" recently and have "Through the Looking Glass" on my list of upcoming reads. It makes me wonder if there might be similar characters out there in other works of fiction.
And finally, for some news from Saudi, go check out the latest post from Susie about an illegal women's sporting event that was held earlier in December. Even though it wasn't legal, I'm so glad that events like this take place. So many things that happen or don't happen make living here feel so dramatically different than the US, and stories like these bring me at least a small amount of hope.
I don't spend a lot of time following the news here; it isn't something I did back home, and now the fact that most news isn't in English here makes it even less likely for me to know what's going on off campus. But then I found this blog, and she does a great job highlighting issues and news primarily out of Jeddah.
Reading posts like this really makes me question being here. But hearing about these twoevents makes me think sometimes that improvement is possible and somehow through small changes over a long period of time, it might get better here.
In other news, I found this post at Make It and Love It, which links to an offer for a free 8x10 canvas print. I'm thinking about getting one of our wedding pictures printed.
Finally, go to Hyperbole and a Half and read about the God of Cake, I was dying of laughter all the way through, and so will you!
