you are home, home where i wanted to go clocks - coldplay
After all the smack-talk and big-mouthing I got about how nothing compares to Oklahoma... I must say I'm very pleased to have successfully convinced two cowboys to join me in the "big city." My darling fiance' once again shares a room with his twin brother. In the "big city." Muhaha. ;)
Besides having family in town, the best part of these two being together is their incredible musical gifting and talent. Combined they have been playing music for 38 years, and it all began with teaching themselves piano. In an effort to really make a living by playing music, The Other Twin (aka: Daniel) has set up a nice little facebook page. Please don't like it "just because." Listen to them and see what you think. If you like - or dareisay love! - the sounds you hear, let them know! Share their video or like their page or even send them a message.
They are available and eager to teach lessons as well as play for weddings. In the "big city." ;)
(Caleb still hasn't heard "I'm Yours." But he can play it. They are freaks of nature. In the "big city.")
Maybe I have to give Oklahoma some credit for raising these tall, gorgeous, disciplined, creative men after all. Maybe they were right: maybe nothing compares to Oklahoma.
when will you learn that there isn't a word for everything?
nicole krauss
Originally I had intended to show you friends one of my all-time favorite date nights. I had recorded some video footage during the date and yesterday I set off to make those clips a brief and jolly moving memory.
Instead, however, I looked through nearly every video in my library. I believe in the power of a still, silent photograph, but the movement and sounds in a video... wow. It was very emotional!
So I changed my plans. This video is one to coincide with part four of my story "Oh My My My." If you haven't read it yet, you should catch up while it's still relatively short and then come back and watch the video ;)
If you have read up to part four, you'll enjoy 180 seconds of the green kitchen, the blue-gray house, the last few days before "the good-byes" and the official departures of both families. I had completely forgotten that I took videos of both their moves! It is almost uncanny to watch now knowing what has happened since then. God is great, life is good and people are crazy ;)
Thank you everyone for your care and kindness after the sad family news I posted about yesterday. You all are quite lovely and it sure makes a girl and her mama bear feel loved! On a much more enjoyable note, I've spent the morning decorating mama bear's hospital room! It's so cheerful now! Our nurses yesterday called her room the "Oh Suzanne Spa" (I was giving her a pedicure and manicure most of the afternoon) and today the nurse and tech just call her space "The Happy Room." That's what we like to hear! In continuing with the theme of happiness, here are some fun videos that'll make you smile:
(Who doesn't love sneaky books playing together? Come on. I think everyone in the entire world can agree that that is a happy little situation.)
My mom's FAVORITE place in the world is Disneyland. I actually mean FAVORITE. Not her favorite place to vacation, or her favorite childhood memory... no, no... Disneyland is her favorite PLACE. Her parents, who lived in Orange County at the time, visited Disneyland in it's first few months of being open, and they took my mom (who was born in 1958) as soon as possible. Some people don't seem to enjoy the "magic of Disney" the way my whole extended family does. To be honest, I probably wouldn't get it either if I hadn't been raised by a second Disney-loving generation ;) Disneyland is NOT a theme park, it "a whole new world." I love this little video because it shows how Disney has truly remained the same the last 60ish years, while at the same time growing exponentially! It takes great skill to keep the current Disney Parks as charming, sweet and imaginative as the original!
I never watch the weather (why would you when there is an app for that? Amen?!). But. If this quick-witted jokester was my weatherman, I just might have to tune in ;)
Feel free to recommend any happy and fun videos you particularly like! If mom needs something new to do I'll be sure to show her :D
"i spent the best two weeks of my life, thus far, with you. but i had to go back home." karen abad
Today I bring you not a collage with many photos, or a post with much to say. I bring you one photograph from my past week. It's one of my favorite pictures of he and I ever. It sums "us" up so well. My hair straightened (that's his favorite), he in a Patriots jersey (our new favorite team to cheer for thanks to the Shorey family of EGM), my new pink water bottle from Dre and Becca that I take with me EVERYwhere, little Jaxter trying to decide if he likes me (this little guy is the first baby among "my age" friends), snuggling on the couch, laptop in the background to sneak in a few minutes of work, that mistermister of mine falling asleep. I love it.
You should follow Elizabeth on instagram (she took this photo and is the handsome baby's momma!)
- She has a way of making plain little things so memorable and lovely.
- She has been married for just over a year and also just became a mommy! It's fun to look into her fun, happy, new world.
- She is very loved by me. So, spread the love!
When you have a spare four minutes, enjoy this sweet, quirky, and loveable couple. It's hard not to watch this and feel lighter and cheerful. Happiness is contagious.
Tell me you've seen this? Please please please watch this. Even if you've already seen it. It'll make you smile, and smiling is just delightful.
I've always been a bit of a Kristen Bell fan (her name is perfectly spelled). She is kind of my ideal blonde-haired, spunky, sweet, well-spoken, All-American girl. I liiiiiiiike to think I'm kind of like her. (Don't worry... I know I'm not. But it's just like how you know you don't look your doppleganger, but it still feels good that the computer thought you looked most like Angelina Jolie.)
Enjoy this awesome girl and her weird animal fetish and fantastic emotions.
"...where everything was discovered, and everything was possible.
A stick could be a sword, a pebble could be a diamond, a tree, a castle.
They made up a thousand games.
She was queen and he was king.
They collected the world in small handfuls,
and when the sky grew dark, and they parted with leaves in their hair."
nicole krauss
This beautiful quote written by Nicole Krauss has captured my "special attention" (any Pride and Prej fans out there?). The segment that starts this post is only a portion of her brief paragraph describing the love story between a little boy and a little girl. Her one sentence is my new tagline for this blog. A blog designed to collect the world in small handfuls. Consider each day, each post, each new paragraph, image and thought, a little clump of dirt in your hands, an especially smooth stone, an antsy inch worm or a bottle cap. Think of all the things you can do or try or imagine. Consider it fun, child-like, creative and happy. May you part with leaves in your hair.
While at Alt Summit, during one of the sessions, I had a mad-wild-furious-scribbling-beads-of-sweat moment of clarity. It all came together. And my blog changed in an instant. Within an hour I had taken new header photos, recorded the following video and made a blog calendar for the next month. Within 12 hours I had nearly all the content ready and formatted for this next month of blog posts.
I joyfully present to you: The Enjoy Project
Don't worry, I can't even stay focused on this video to watch it all the way through. I won't be offended if you don't. It's almost seven minutes long. WAY TOO LONG. If you want to skip ahead to the end I tell a pretty funny story about meeting Anya from Project Runway.
Here's a re-cap of what I said in the video. New blog schedule. All based on the "things" in life I most enjoy. Blog posts every single day. (EVERY DAY!)
> > SCHEDULE < <
[I Enjoy...] .Videos (On Sunday > These might be videos of myself + my life, they might be an awesome movie trailer I'm looking forward to seeing, perhaps a fun music video, inspiring vimeo find, slideshow or funny youtube clip. Videos.)
.People (On Monday > Here you will find new portraits or new friends. Either images of people or a guest blogger.)
.Making Things (On Tuesday > My love for all things "hands-on." Whether it be making food, paper crafts, home decor or Christmas ornaments ;) you will find how-to's from my world of making things.)
.Weddings (On Wednesday > I am committing to posting one full wedding a week! I have more then enough to show you lovely friends for ages.)
.Pinterest (On Thursday > I'm so exciting about this one! I'll explain in more detail this coming Thursday, but we're going to have fun searching, pinning and sharing as a group.)
.Writing (On Friday > I love to write. I have seemingly endless little unrelated blurbs from minutes of "ah-ha!" where I wrote and then did nothing with it. I've never had a consistent place to share these thoughts. So now they have a home named Friday.)
.Instagram (On Saturday > A re-cap of my week + maybe some suggestions of people for you to follow!)
Hello. I'm Kristen. Welcome to The Enjoy Project, "where everything can be discovered, and anything is possible."
Have you ever noticed that music is strange and fantastic emotional time-travel? Have you ever listened to just three seconds of a song and instead of driving on the highway to a meeting you are tan, talking to your best friend late at night, alive and well? Though in reality approaching an exit in your frosty, rusty Corolla in a grey day, you instead smell warm night, tacos and fruity deodorant. Instead you hear glowing laughter, you are having lingering conversation, you are with very specific people on a very specific night. And the verse to the song hasn't even started yet! Am I the only one who has ever experienced this phenomenon?
Of course not.
That is why the world loves music. I don't mean why "artists" and "musicians" and the "intellectually understanding" love music. It's why all of us - even us who aren't trained in the art - love it. Music makes us feel. Music and smells take you back in time. Music and friends get you through current times. Music and dreams excite you for future times. What an enjoyable gift God gave us in music!
"Come into my arms, where a dreamer can meet the Lullaby Lady from Hushabye Street." Hushabye Street was playing on a cassette tape my entire baby and childhood. I never remember not knowing that song. When I hear it I'm laying on my back in my wooden, bead-cut, crib staring up to the dark ceiling. Through cracks in the door I could hear the muffled voices of my parents and the dishwasher starting up. I could see a haloed glow. And night after night sleep was victorious with me "till evening greets morning on Hushabye Street."
18 months after I was born, my brother Timothy entered my world. The closest friendship he and I ever had was when we were homeschooled in middle school together. Our "tradition" for lunch was to make a box of pasta with red sauce, eat half of it, throw the rest away, leave the dirty dishes out and then head to the basement for hand-stand contests. Yup. We were often in our parents pajamas, too. (I have no idea why...) We would spend up to hours on end before basketball practices in the underbelly of a home on Boxberry Terrace trying to walk on our hands. Tim always swore he walked 10 times when I went to the bathroom or wasn't looking. I always blamed him for distracting me - "I have better balance then you! You just distract me!" - (like I didn't distract him ;) haha). We got into a habit of taking our blue $14.99 boombox down with us, and we'd gymnast it up to Tim McGraw duets or Steven Curtis Chapman. One particular day I grabbed a hairbrush and dramatically belted Faith Hill's portion of "Like We Never Loved At All." I handed Tim a water bottle to join in. He didn't accept my offer. He just stared and shook his head "You are so weird." I sang the chorus alone. But by Tim McGraw's part in the second verse my own Tim had joined in with me. And we weirdly sang the rest of the song together. It was quite excellent and breathtaking and probably perfectly in tune ;)
Maybe that's just your way of dealing with the pain/ Forgetting everything between our rise and fall / Like we never loved at all
Tim, if you ever read this, I love you and miss those times. I've never forgotten them and would love to have more of them. Just promise you won't push me over if I get to nine hand-steps?
Jason Reeves came into my life a-la Colbie Caillat. His songs were songs I loved before I felt. I thought they were pretty and kind of edgy (give me a break. They WERE edgy compared to Selah and WOW Worship CD's). I played his album on repeat for months. Little did I know how I feel them. This song doesn't take me back to one place like the previous song did. This song takes me backs to a watercolor smear of years. The first piano notes "dun dun, DUN DUN, duuundun" make me feel 14 and 20, confused and clear, empty and full. And I have poetry and drawings of my life when you weren't on my side and I didn't know /
The person who introduced me to Band of Horses is now my "house-mate." If you've followed the blog a bit you know that I live with my friends-turned-family, Dre and Becca. You also might know that they just had their first child, little Behr. Dre is obsessed with Band of Horses. When this song plays I think about driving around in their blue SUV looking at townhouses. I think about priming the walls with Dre will Becca sat on a cushion on the floor, trying to keep her pregnant self moderately comfortable. I think about coming into a house with music already playing because other people live there - I don't live alone. I think about cleaning their kitchen, waiting for them to come home from the hospital with Behr for the first time, scrubbing to "Dilly" and "Older." I think about how "after all, my plans they melt into the sand."
I think about how so many friends have dreamed with Dre and Becca about this little nugget of life. I think about the Pinterest boards for his nursery, additions to his walls and shelfs from friends near and far, and watching that bump grow and lower as we imagined and talked about and analyzed what he might look like, what he might be like. I think about the way Behr's neck smells. I think about how he smiled right at me today. I think about how someday I'll be strolling along in a store and Band of Horses will pop on the radio and I'll jump into the emotional time machine... I'll be taken back to August 2011 - January 2012ish. I'll smile and love the memory. If you find this post random at best, completely boring at worst, I do have a direction I'm going with it ;) No, these are not my favorite music recommendations for you. And if you listen to any of these songs you might think "Um. Okay?" I don't listen to these songs frequently at all. But when they appear, they stop me in my tracks. You have "those" songs too. Go find one of them today and listen to it and remember why that song affects your body. And then say "Oh, I see why Kristen posted those."
BUT. Someday on this blog I'd like to tell you folks a story. And I'd like to use songs in the story. In the next few weeks and months, as I plan on blogging more, if "random" music posts show-up, bear with me, and find some little thing to enjoy. And feel free to tell me about a song or two that takes you back in time. I'd truly love to hear. I'd love to know more about you. It would probably even make me feel less scared about letting you know more about me ;)
there's a quaint little town not a clock has been wound for over a century
buon natale | nat king cole
It turns out my 8mm appaddiction lasted longer then a week. As I was working on this little diddy last night, He suggested I make a "Sunday Series." "With a new episode each week!" He's smart, the Christmas Angel of mine. You can watch this now oooor watch it after you read the whole post. It might be a touch more amusing if you come back and watch after you read ;)
It's been about 10 days and our Christmas Activity Checklist is going strong! I just can't bring myself to miss a day when he gets such a kick out of it. It doesn't matter what we do - his little toes jingle all the way and his eyes sparkle like a silent night.
We made a classic garland for his tree. All we used was popcorn, cranberries, needle and thread!
We also bought His first real Christmas tree. He sat the tree in his lap and embraced it the whole way home. What a green, tree-hugger ;) ba-da-ching.
We turned on some tunes, and gave the little tree a merry makeover. It needed some bling.
When all was said and done, the decorations up, the stockings hung, He serenaded me with my favorite holiday carols. Precious Angel.
The only part of this experience that was really sad was the next day. He told me He had some "sad news." Uh-oh. "My Christmas tree fell down. I went in and it had crashed. Balls were on the floor. One ball broke. Someone ransacked Christmas." I tried not to laugh ;)
On a cheerier note! We went to a local Starbucks one night where some friends from church spent two hours singing carols! It was a happy memory to eat our chili and coffee-cake and watch the kiddos dance around.
Next up was the annual Remsnyder Christmas party with the ever intriguing Gift Exchange.
Christmas Angel took this very seriously.
He spent some time on his gift and ended up taking the present he brought home with him.
If you want to see what his gifts were check out the video
(one is cheap and weird, the other is expensive and... weird? ;) haha not weird. They are both fun!)
This morning I finished up last nights' craft: snow forest! This was another lovely Pinterest find.
SO stinking easy: bleach bottlebrush trees in a tub for 30 minutes, let dry over night, stick in glass jars and dump as much or as little sugar/salt over them as you'd like! I can't wait to see how these look with candles behind them :D
Only twenty days left and the fun has only just begun!
Hello. I'm Kristen. Welcome to The Enjoy Project, "where everything can be discovered, and anything is possible."
