What I've been up to in the absence of blog posts

I've been a little lax in my blogging, but there are very good reasons for that. (See below.) I will be back on a more "regular" schedule now that Carnaval is over. This is the Carioca's greatest excuse. "Can't do that...Carnaval is coming..." or
"I'm so swamped. Carnaval is right around the corner..." It's true that little gets done in the city until after the big party. Unfortunately for us this year, Carnaval didn't happen until MARCH. A quarter of the year gone already and nothing to show for it! Now I'm trying to get back on track with my resolutions and goals for the year, and I'm having a pretty good go at it, if I do say so myself. Here are some of the things on (or checked off of) my to-do list for the week:


1) Planning my (late) birthday party: shopping, baking, food experiments, and papel picado, sort of like the photo above. I wish I'd kept my woodcarving tools, as they would have been ideal for making the banners...

2) Starting back with Demand Studios. It's a great way to earn a little cash from the serenity of an air-conditioned apartment.

3) Organizing. I kind of like it when my life is less chaotic! I'm taking five to ten minutes every day to focus on a project, and things are getting orderly faster than I ever dreamed possible.

4) Deciding on what fountain pen ink colors I want to use this year in correspondence. Mr. Bugigangas and I are really kind of color nerds, and we've spent an embarrassing amount of time comparing the merits of two shades...but with a new dip pen and several nibs, plain black and blue inks just aren't cutting it! Pink seems to be my "it" color this year, so I settled on these two:

Diamine Graphite, with photo from Goulet Pen's website:


Rouge Bourgogne from J. Herbin (photo from the Ink Nouveau website):


5) 4) Finding inspiration for a future home/apartment and satisfying my creative juices with a lot of OneNote tabs filled with photographs, visual prompts and DIY ideas. Here's one of my boards. Click to make it bigger:


(random selection of things from Anthropologie, Kate Spade, MOMA store and various blogs)

6) Meeting new people, making time for old friends, visiting my "grandma," working out, editing poetry, volunteer translating and playing Spider Solitaire!