Purple Duckling's Tale Feature Friday

This week, I wanted to focus on Purple Duckling's Tale - adorable Zel's blog! She goes to school in Nebraska and her blog is filled with photos of lovely settings, fun fashion and, sometimes FOOD! I was actually lucky enough to meet with her for breakfast when she came down to Florida a couple of weeks ago. She even brought me some gorgeous things from her home in Indonesia (I'll feature them when I do an outfit post sometime).

She is such a sweet and fun person and it comes through in her happy blog! Definitely add it to your must-read list!

Here is a pic of her visiting with my baby when she came down! That girl definitely knows how to pick cute accessories... ;o)

It Loves Me... It Loves Me Not...

Photo from here

So, I am lucky to have several fashionista blogger friends so I consider myself up (ish) on new trends. Although I tend to spend my money on new, um, food rather than new fashion, I still like to pretend-shop the newest looks.

Some things would look simply awful on me, while others are, well, more loving of my shape. My shape is definitely more flattered by the hourglass designs - too loose and I look a trifle dowdy - but I'm fascinated (and impressed) by bloggers who can wear pleated pants or blousy shirts or miniskirts and look gorgeous.

What about you? What styles love you or love you not?

P.S. Feel free to follow me! I promise only ever to lead you to bright, sunny places!

P.P.S. It appears that affection is the best way for my readers' hearts to be stolen! Who knew?

Crow and Canary

Cards and calendar pics from her blog. Delicious!

Stationery = Bliss, no? And a blogger who works as an agent for stationery artists? Blog = Bliss.

Now take that bliss and add giveaways and you get Crow and Canary blog. I met Carina during my famous Christmas Card Swap of 2010 and have been lucky enough to even win one of her many generous giveaways. If you are as much of a stationery addict as I am, you'll adore her blog. You must check her out. She even has an amazing giveaway RIGHT NOW of the calendar I pictured on my blog.

P.S. Feel free to follow me! I promise only ever to lead you to bright, sunny places!

A Small Break and a Large Thank You!

I will post up a Song Sketch next week - this week, I'm working double-time on brainstorming other ideas for working my music into a very profitable enterprise so I can stay home full-time with my new munchkin (who will be a boy, by the way!).

I have had truly marvelous suggestions from my readers and am overwhelmed by their generosity and imagination. Thank you, thank you all for your inspiring ideas.

If you haven't offered your brilliant idea of how I can:

a. Better publicize my albums and

b. Use my music otherwise to earn money

I'd truly welcome your ideas! You can see what other genius suggestions I've gotten here!

But so that you don't miss your Sunday song, I embedded a song from one of my favorites ever, Madeleine Peyroux!

Thank you all again for your help and support!

P.S. Feel free to follow me! I promise only ever to lead you to bright, sunny places!

P.P.S. I have a brand, new original album out! If youdownload it and loooooveit, please write a lovely review on the site from which you purchased it!

Kiki and Coco in Paris

I found this bit of happiness via the marvelous blog Design Mom. It is for everyone who loves Paris and happiness! I promise this adorable slideshow will make you smile.

P.S. Feel free to follow me! I promise only ever to lead you to bright, sunny places!

P.P.S. I have a brand, new original album out! If you download it and looooove it, please write a lovely review on the site from which you purchased it!

The Perfect Winter Package!

I was lucky enough to win several giveaways right at the end of 2009, one of them being a selection of marvelous prints from Diana's citylight photography shop! I had long admired her work (not the least of which because it contains three things I adore: Disney, cats and books) and was so excited to win!

Her package arrived in the most charming way and personable way (which really makes a difference to me) and the contents were wonderful!

The Disney prints are magical - oddly enough, just how I remember Disney being when I was a kid, sunny, a bit hazy, and with tons of bright colors.

This photo was on a new paper Diana told me she was trying out - metallic - which accentuated the gorgeous colors on it perfectly. To me the sheen gives it a bit of an edgier, almost retro-futuristic feel.

My very favorite photos were the book ones: I just loved the colors and patterns she used and as a vintage book geek, I am so excited to have photos with such great textures and old-fashioned typefaces!

She even topped it off with the cutest postcard, which I'm planning to send to a friend languishing in the north, waiting for summer.

Thank you so much, Diana, for this treasure chest of lovely photos!

Be sure to check out Diana's blog and her shop for these and other amazing photos.

Forget About Chestnuts, I'll Take Peppermint Bark, please!

One of my followers on Twitter (you can follow me too, by the way!) mentioned that my tweets heavily feature holiday foods. And here is why: I love holiday food.

A blog I've been visiting regularly for my holiday-food-fix is The Red Deer. I look at the pictures of Alicia's peppermint bark, her iced lemon cookies, her white rocky road... and sigh.

So enjoy her lovely food pics and recipes (and clever writing!).

Pure holiday-food-joy.

P.S Don't forget to enter my giveaway!

P.P.S. Feel free to follow me! I promise only ever to lead you to bright, sunny places!

Seven of a Million Things...

I hope everyone had a marvelous Thanksgiving in the States and a wonderful Thursday everywhere else!

I am very thankful for many things including (but not limited to):

1. My wonderful family

2. Being able to do what I love every day

3. Music: Sting to Cole Porter to Feist to...

4. Spice bread and tea

5. Sleeping in

6. Disney

7. And you, you wonderful readers/listeners/bloggers, for inspiring me in everything (style, music, food) and commenting and encouraging me - making being on the internet some of my favorite hours of the day.

Welcome Back!

Welcome to my new and improving blog! You will soon be privy to the marvelous inner-workings of my mind and, in return, I want to know the marvelous inner-workings of yours as well. Many people come up to me after shows (millions, perhaps) that say "I'm not a musician, I just love music."

To that I say, without music lovers (be they musicians or not) music is the proverbial tree in the forest- is it really music if it doesn't entertain/irritate/illumine/titillate?

So leave comments and feel free to email me if you have a specific question of something you want to know about songwriting, music, etc. Looking forward to hearing from you!