Folk Mother..

Oh man, I saw these sewn beauties by Folk Mother on Teenangster's blog over the weekend. I swear, I could just blog off of Alison's blog and just be content (and not to mention NUTS and unethical) she is just so good at finding the most amazing shit ever.

I was introduced to Folk Mother a few years ago by Alison and may or may not have blogged about her work. But regardless these hand sewn, found vintage photographs should be seen as much as one wants. I wish, oh I wish she would make more of these stunning, stitched hybrids.

Lian Li Preps TYR PC-X2000F Full Tower Case for Release

Lian Li Industrial Co. Ltd, well-known for their quality aluminum PCcases for enthusiasts, is preparing the TYR PC-X2000F full tower case for release .











Measuring 240 x 695 x 442mm and weighing 11.7kg, the tool-free aluminumcase has four 5.25” drive bays, seven 3.5” bays, eight expansion slots,2mm thick aluminum alloy side panels, holes for water cooling tubes, afan speed controller, support for graphic cards up to 340mm in length,and a top side I/O panel with one e-SATA, four USB 3.0 ports, and audioconnectors. It is fully compatible with all E-ATX/ ATX/ Mirco-ATXmotherboards and has support for up to six fans (comes pre-installedwith three 140mm fans (front) & two 140mm fans (rear)). Covered by atwo year warranty, the TYR PC-X2000F full tower case can be purchasedfrom major retailers, e-tailers and distributors at a MSRP of USD 529(price excludes tax) in end May.


Features:
Supports Extended ATX, ATX, and Micro-ATX motherboardsFour tool-less ODD bays placed either the right or left sideSeven tool-less HDD mounting racksMore cable storage space behind motherboard trayFan control-switch on the back panelFour USB 3.0 multimedia I/O ports & one e-SATA/HD audio portThree 140mm LED fans at front & two 140mm fans at rearAvailability: Arriving at local distributors end of MayMSRP : US$539+local VAT; only black color is available

News via [Techconnect]

free encouragement postcards..

Jeff of Booooooom! and Erin of Design for Mankind are seriously non-stop creative making machines, they never cease to amaze me with all the cool things they are working on. Awhile back they asked peeps to submit positive encouragement, the response was overwhelming. To celebrate what an awesome outpouring the received, they enlisted a bunch of great artists (one of my personal favs: Gemma Correll) and made two packs of limited edition post card sets. They are limited edition, so get yours soon!

New Work Kenji Nakayama.

Boston based stencil artist Kenji Nakayama sent over images of his latest work that's hanging in Woodward Gallery's latest show The Great Outdoors. Layer upon layer, Kenji always impresses me. I have some photos of his studio around here somewhere that I'll try and get up over the next couple of days. Kenji will be working on an outside installation this summer at Woodward, I'll post pictures as soon as it's up.

Steve Powers aka ESPO's Daily Metaltation..

I won't lie, I am a huge, huge fan of Steve Powers...and have obsessively stalked his website for years in the hopes that he would come around & update it with what he's been up to. Yep, no shame. I'm not sure when it happened but sometime at the end of last year my wish came true & he redid his site. Adding a whole bunch of goodness in there. Among my favorite (obviously) is his blog where he posts his 'Daily Metaltations'. So rad to see his brain at work and how he twists and turns words and phrases inside out. Here are some of my faves.

All images from ESPO's site.

when talking about the marriage bed

{image credit}I have this group of friends. They are some of the craziest, most amazing women I have ever met via the interwebs (although we have now all met in person). They are sassy and adventurous; they are all in differing places in life, but they all love Jesus. And there’s something else special about them.Have you ever been in a conversation with (other) women about sex? Is it just me, or is the tone more often than not a total downer? I feel like never once had I overheard or been part of a conversation like this without a general consensus being alluded to: us women could do without it. It’s almost as though we pretend to be above all that. Our silly husbands still have carnal desires, but us wives? We are further evolved. Jabs and underhanded comments are made about frequency and husbands’ “needs”. It is not a pretty picture and it is not edifying.But these women I was telling you about? They are the fresh wind of the Holy Spirit, even on this topic. Weird, you might think, that friends would be vulnerable about this with each other, but I don’t really think that it is. If I’m guilty of holding flippant conversations joking about the marriage bed, why shouldn’t I be regularly talking about it with those who would be encouraging and honest instead of bitter and stereotype perpetuating?And so we do. These women, we encourage each other. We talk about how life gets in the way, about the hurdles (O, man. Having babies: If ever married sex had a foe it were you. #irony) and yea, we talk about our strategies to avoid the hurdles. We brag. You hear that? We brag when things are going well. We also blush a lot. But it is so worth it.No, this isn’t the only thing we talk about (wouldn’t that be a weird friendship?) but it is an open conversation and I am so thankful for their perspective. They are the sisters I never had and their refreshing attitude is something I would wish for all women if not to have for themselves (yet), to have a sister friend who can speak it to them.

friendly friday our mailman

{photo credit}Because of potty training, OBoy spent a good portion of August nekkid from the waist down. Obviously we put pants on him to go out to stores, restaurants, church, etc., but we quickly became those parents. You know, the ones whose children run around in their yard half nekkid? Yup. Those ones.No shame.The weather was beautiful, our son was making fabulous progress in potty training, and well, he’s two. What little two year old boy doesn’t want to run around outside without pants on? Hello, OBoy’s dream come true. So like the klassy neighbors that we are, we embraced it.We live in the city, where lot sizes are a fairly uniform (and small) 40ftx120ft. This makes for some dense housing (as in if my neighbor and I both reached our arms out our living room windows we could almost high-five). Add to that the fact that our houses were built in the 1920s and 30s so they have built-in mail slots, and it means that our mail deliverers walk from house to house rather than drive to mailboxes along the street. (Isn’t that cute? I grew up in the Suburbia of Suburbias, USA and had never seen walking mailmen or women before college. True story.)Cut to DanO and OBoy drawing with sidewalk chalk on a sunny Saturday afternoon. Up walks our regular mailman. Now, I wasn’t there so I can’t be sure, but my guess is that it was either the green molded plastic toddler potty seat they had with them outside, or it was the fact that OBoy was, again, nekkid, that tipped the mailman off.“Potty training, huh?”DanO and he went on to talk about how our mailman’s grandsons were in the process of training, and how cheerios had become a family favorite for, uhm, aiming reinforcement.Later that week his delivery was timed just as I was leaving the house with the boys for the morning. This time, OBoy was fully dressed. Our mailman stopped to chat with him.“How’s potty training going, young man?”Like a scene straight out of Sesame Street, our neighborhood postman asked my son about going on the potty.What a sweet man. I imagine his is a somewhat thankless job, given that most of the people he affects aren’t even home at the time that he serves them. And please, I don’t even want to think about what his job looks like in the winter here in Minnesnowda.Since that interaction (which had me checking over my shoulder to see if Mr. Noodle was going to show up next or perhaps might the birds break out into the ABCs?) I had hoped to do something special for him, but hadn’t gotten around to it until last week. I made muffins on Wednesday morning, put a few in a box and wrote a simple card that told our mailman how grateful we are for his work and that we love seeing his face around the neighborhood.Then, I staked out by the front windows where I could see our walkway. In the early afternoon when both boys were napping (miracle upon miracles!) I heard the familiar metal clang of our mail slot. I darted to the door and caught him halfway to our neighbor’s house.“We made you some pumpkin muffins. Just wanted to thank you for being so friendly.”Not going to lie, it was awkward. (I imagine this kind of thing doesn’t happen to him everyday.) There was a moment of you shouldn’t have and then a sincere smile from both of us. Silly, probably, to think that some muffins and being a dork, keeping lookout and waiting by the window could make a difference, but I hope that it did. I hope that it gave him just a little glimpse of what he means to the community he serves.:: :: :: :: :: ::Did you step out and do a friendly act this week? I would love to read about it. Please link up here. Only rule is that you link to the post about your act of kindness, not just to your main blog url, that way if people are surfing through in the future, they’ll still find your post. Then, within your post, link back to this post so that others can come join in the giving and the sharing and the love.(Any links that don’t follow the rulesies will be deleted. Capiche?) So? Go ahead! Warm fuzzies all around! Link up below: