time for strawberries

tula mirth and i await strawberry season each year and we have now arrived in north carolina.  we made our first annual strawberry picking trip this week (tula wore her strawberry shorts in honor of the event) and we easily filled a flat with our excitement.  of course i need some new strawberry recipes now and i ran across this raw almond cookie and strawberry mousse recipe which is at the top of my list at the moment.

we've been able to gift many of the berries since there is no way the two of us can polish them off in the small window of time necessary to consume them.  there is something so very nice about arriving on the doorsteps of surprised friends with the first strawberries of the season.  

all photos by juli

outsider artist renaldo kuhler

renaldo in his apartment, by juli courtesy of newsobserver.com

part of what is so great about my job is meeting people.  one of my favorite raleigh people is outsider artist, renaldo kuhler, who has created a beautiful body of work over his years as a scientific illustrator.  renaldo started creating a make believe world called rocaterrania as a boy and has continued to create illustrations based in that world.  the pieces are brilliantly colored and are unique to renaldo's style.  a few years back, brett ingram made a great documentary about renaldo and his work.

rocaterrania, courtesy of renaldo kuhler

studio on fire

i just came across studio on fire via cmybacon.  lovely, lovely letterpress printing...

you cannot prevent the birds of sadness from passing over your head, but you can prevent their making a nest in your hair

golden rule.  hand-drawn by koen, age 6

mixtape wedding.  love it!

scenes from a life...

the beach in april.  never quite warm, never quite cold.  

new belgium brewing company



new belgium's own airstream trailer

yesterday, my co-worker and i visited the new belgium brewery in ft. collins, colorado.  (yes, I am still in denver on business.)  we took a tour of the brewery and sipped free (!) beer all along the way.  at the end, we drank the ranger ipa, which was time-stamped literally 10 minutes before!  fresh beer!


look at all those ranger ipa bottles


what an impressive company!  new belgium was started in 1991, after co-founder jeff lebesch trekked all over europe on his fat tire bicycle visiting breweries and gaining inspiration.  his wife, kim jordan, is now the ceo of this employee-owned business.  paid holidays include valentine's day and earth day!

sustainability is a major part of new belgium's business philosophy.  evaporative coolers air condition the 55,000 sq. ft. packaging hall.  the methane resulting from the brewing process is used to create electricity and heat for the brewery.  new belgium also created team wonder bike, a group dedicated to biking more than 14 million miles in the coming year.



from newbelgium.com

our tour guide said the company is looking to start a second brewery in the southeastern united states.  pick us!  pick us!

use the libation location to find new belgium beer near you! 


p.s.  this is our 100th post.  unbelievable!  i love sharing this art project with you, juli! 

thank you, readers, for being so sweet and supportive...

interesting civil war portraits

at the 150th anniversary of the civil war, there is a deluge of old and new photos being passed around.  civil war re-enactors are getting a lot of attention in particular as they are always a visually interesting group to spend some time with but many of the photos tend to be the same.  this portrait project published by time and shot by gregg segal is quite different than anything i have seen.  segal worked with the re-enactors to construct scenes at historic battle sites that have been compromised by modern development.  it is though-provoking project and worth some time.

your state motto

i am loving the grain edit blog, which features mid-century style (my favorite!) artists.  the blog led me to 50 and 50, an art project whereby 50 artists are invited to share their home state motto via illustration.


texas by curtis jinkins



south carolina by fuzzco



alabama by matt lane harris



north carolina by matt stevens



tennessee by matt lehman