oh baby joshua

We gotta believe it will all be alright in the end. If it's not alright yet, it's just because it's not the end yet. Don't sweat it.

miracle of miracles.

In February I applied for an "assistantship" at the Guldagergaard, an International Ceramic Research Center. I wanted to work for the summer in Denmark, assisting the artists who attend the center. However as the summer approached, I called and emailed the director and I found out they already had the positions filled for the summer, but that there might be a spot for the fall and I was the first on the waiting list. So I decided to take the fall semester off, just in case. I figured this opportunity was once in a lifetime.
Good news is that on June 30th they wrote me and told me there was a spot for Aug 1-31st. They understood it was late notice, but invited me. So that week I bought an airplane ticket and planned to travel around for a month after the assistantship because I had already taken the semester off.
However, I also emailed the director and asked if there was any way I could stay for longer. On July 15th she replied that she had rearranged the schedule and asked if I could stay for THREE MONTHS! I feel like my dreams are coming true!!!
Although I was so excited for this opportunity, I realized that none of my loans are coming through until the end of August and I have no money to be traveling around the world. I prayed and fasted and payed my tithing. I was constantly thinking about how I could work for the money I needed to make this trip happen, when it came to me to ask my professor. I have never asked for money from her before, but I called her and nervously asked if she could try and find some extra funds lying around the visual arts department at BYU.
A week later, she had found an internship fund!!! and they reimbursed the entire cost of my airplane ticket. I can't believe what a miracle it was. I am so blessed and I feel so lucky.
This week I am packing up and learning Danish. I'll be gone til November, I'll be gone til November, January, February, March, April, May, I see you crying but girl I can't stay.
thank you. Tak.

Cookie Heist

yesterday, feeling a little bit of a cookie hankering, I started pulling ingredients out of my cupboard. I don't have any good cookie recipes so I just decided to try to make one up. If it was possible to create a good cookie without measuring ANY ingredients and just throwing stuff into the mixing bowl, I would have pulled off the greatest cookie heist of all time.
I put in a couple scoops of butter, poured the rest of the brown sugar and some white sugar in and mixed. Then added some eggs and vanilla. I mixed together some pinches of baking soda and salt with a bowlful of flour and poured it into the wet mixture a little at a time, watching the consistency and adding oat bran and oatmeal and cinnamon. Then put in the chocolate chips. I put four down onto the cookie sheet and cooked them until they turned golden on the bottom.
They turned out to be the best cookies I have EVER made... using a secret recipe that even I will never figure out.

We'll always have pears.

Wowwee! Today was amazing. Emily and I both received monetary awards for our arts. We were planning on having a fun party up in Salt Lake at Kilby with two bands that we wanted to get to know, but it was canceled because of a snow storm in Wyoming that delayed their coming.
That can't get us down.
We went out for frozen yogurt and then to Emily's sister's house. We swam in the heated pool, casting shadows on the wall from the pool light. Then sitting in the hot tub we had so many good jokes and conversations and it turned into a wonderful evening. Then we went to Damien's and hung out with him and his roommates and made more good jokes and conversation.
Driving back, we were dancing and singing and feeling hungry so we stopped at In N Out and got a cheeseburger-split in two. Emily remembered that A Crowd of Small Adventures was opening for Camera Obscura in Las Vegas sometime soon and when we got home we found out it is the very same weekend we were planning on being in Vegas!! and the tickets are only $12!!! So we bought tickets!!
Then I tried calling Denmark again and finally got a hold of someone! PHEW. It was such a relief and a great end to the night.
I am grateful the universe looks out for me.

right!! a letter to myself.

I've been thinking a lot these past few days about my future. I have a lot of options, but I'm not sure what will make me the happiest. Two nights ago I was searching my inbox for an old email Susan sent me with an art jobs link and stumbled upon an old email I had written three years ago to an ex-boyfriend. I found a whole string of emails we had written to keep in touch and it was so fun to go through and read about the lives we led back then in 2007. I didn't even remember writing those emails, but they recounted my past and I loved reliving it.
As I read this particular email I was astounded by my own grace, wisdom and counsel. It shocked me because lately I have been feeling the exact same emotions and needed to hear those same words I expressed to him. Wow! I never would have imagined that my 25 year old self would be telling my 28 year old self how to change, trust, live and love. I was proud of myself back then, a little disappointed in my lack of faith now.
I didn't mean to write a letter to myself, but I'm glad it worked out that way.

jettisoning myself into youthdom/irresonsibility.

i went back in time last week. i dropped all my responsibilities and drove to austin, texas with 7 other people, all younger than me, all barely acquaintances. i may regret this on wednesday, when i have to give the single most difficult presentation i have ever prepared, but what has been done has been done. i was young and carefree. we drove 24 hours there and 24 back. we lounged, we laughed, swam and saw shows. nevermind, i don't think i will ever regret it. austin was amazing.

happy birthdays

I love receiving/sending packages for birthdays. I think my favorite part of receiving is when you pull the present out of the mail envelope and the once carefully curled ribbon has been smushed up against the present. There is something about that crushed curled ribbon, stuck in its place, kind of like a picture, frozen in time, saying, "This is exactly the way I looked when so-and-so placed me inside this envelope for you. And here's a hug."

you caved my karma in.

this has to be the most beautiful song in the whole world. I may or may not have listened to this one million times...with the potential for more.
Why do I love this?
no one knows.

poetry relief

In my quest to appreciate, understand and love the wind I wrote an haiku and dedicate it to that moving force:

Wind's Curling Breath
it swishes past me
lifting my skirts and spirits
changing old for new






photo courtesy of this blog

Patriotism.

If you fill your life with enough olympics you will never be sad that your two best friends are on the other side of the world.
Because the olympics brings pillow fights, banana pancake cookies, blueberries, impromptu dance parties, art, dog piles and the spirit of Mardi Gras.
go.U.S.A.
(let's pretend that that's what my shirt really says.)

Accordion-oh-no? oh yes.

probably the single best thing that has happened to me since yesterday.

To everything there is a season.

This week, when needing to console a grieving friend, I found this poem by Emily Dickinson that said exactly the right words, in just the right way. I love this. I love Emilys.

"Our share of night to bear,
Our share of morning,
Our blank in bliss to fill,
Our blank in scorning.

Here a star, and there a star,
Some lose their way.
Here a mist, and there a mist,
Afterwards—day!"

I'm Excited

My show opens on Friday! It's a collection of my R.E.C.E.N.T. Works (Rachel's Emotional Comical Electronic Nostalgic Things). They are all over the gallery, ready for blast off and good conversation.

thank you.

yesterday in the art class that I teach at the Scera, I had a new student. She is 11 and adorable. We were talking about Christmas and she asked me what I did for Christmas. I told her my parents were gone and I was the only one not married so I spent it at my sister's house. She looked up and sincerely said, "Well your pretty enough to be married..." Thanks! That really made my day. I am pretty enough to be married.

Tonight tonight

I just arrived at my parents house. They are studying Romanian and listening to the radio station on the TV. When a good song comes on they stop and dance for the song and then back to the books.
Right after I came in the door, Could I Have This Dance by Anne Murray came on. They started waltzing around the living room and I almost cried thinking about how that song reminds me of the relationship I have seen them have my whole life. When we were little we would play that Anne Murray album and my parents would always hold each other and dance to that song. It typifies their love for one another and will forever remind me of them.
I love that song. And I sing along to all of the words.



I'll always remember the song they were playin',
The first time we danced and I knew,
As we swayed to the music and held to each other,
I fell in love with you.

Could I have this dance for the rest of my life?
Would you be my partner every night?
When we're together, it feels so right.
Could I have this dance for the rest of my life?

I'll always remember that magic moment,
When I held you close to me.
'Cause we moved together, I knew forever,
You're all I'll ever need

Could I have this dance for the rest of my life?
Would you be my partner every night?
When we're together, it feels so right.
Could I have this dance for the rest of my life?

recent works and sentiments

maybe nothing will make you happy
but to give
and give
and give
voids filled
with try
and try
and try
once bitten
twice shy.

Haircut Hiatus

This week six people asked me to cut their hair!!! I stressed about juggling all the appointments, contemplated buying a Blackberry to help me organize my hair schedule, looked at hydraulic salon chairs on craigslist, reveled in the newly found source of cash flow, but decided I need to make some decisions.
It was probably one of the worst weeks, because I didn't spend a lot of time working in my studio! With all the outside appointments and jobs, I am getting behind in my artwork. This can't happen again. I am taking a haircut hiatus!!!

someone once said....

"by embracing the diversity of human beings you find a way to true happiness"

and I agree.

planet earth

Looks like it's more than mother nature.

art shmart

my piece got accepted to the Statewide Annual Competition!!! it will be on display at the Rio Gallery in Salt Lake all month. The opening reception is tonight. and I am pretty excited about art.