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How Love Can Heal
*Whatever you do, make sure you get down to the bottom of this post!*
OK, so a couple of years ago The Candyman and I were invited to a backyard wedding in East Nashville. This East side wedding was lovely, as all weddings are. The bride wore a lacey white top and a light colored long suede skirt and cowboy boots. The invites were paperless, as was the RSVP. A friend officiated. The couple requested that no gifts be brought. However, since people are insistent (and they are), they allowed guests to bring a bottle of their favorite wine for the reception (brilliant idea) or they could donate to Thistle Farms.
Uh. Wait a second. Donate WHERE? I looked it up online and their website was crap and I didn't understand it and so I opted to bring the wine.
Fast forward a year or so. The Candyman and I were engaged and one weekend I popped into The Frothy Monkey for a much needed latte and the line was just killer long. As I was waiting to order I was browsing some of the shop's items for purchase and l noticed some Thistle Farms product. I made the connection and did a little reading about the place. I was floored. And I knew RIGHT THEN that The Candyman and I needed to include Thistle Farms as part of our registry.
So that's what this introduction leads us to: ALTERNATIVE REGISTRIES and specifically, Thistle Farms.
Like I mentioned a few weeks ago, I went on a field trip. I buddied up with Tabitha and Ashley from Ashley's Bride Guide as well as Jonathon and Sharon from Jonathon Campbell Photography.
The ladies of Thistle Farms, Ashley's Bride Guide and The Thirty-Something Bride!
I had met Carolyn Snell, one of Thistle Farm's volunteers at the ABG Sex and the City party. We talked excitedly about how I had come to know them and I just KNEW I had to blog about this and tell everyone I possible could about this amazing place. So what is it? Here we go:
The Story of Magdalene and Thistle Farms
Magdalene is a two-year residential community founded in Nashville Tennessee in 1997 for women with a history of prostitution and drug addiction. Magdalene was founded not just to help a sub-culture of women, but to help change the culture itself. We stand in solidarity with women who are recovering from sexual abuse, violence, and life on the streets, and who have paid dearly for a culture that buys and sells women like commodities.
At no cost, we offer women a safe, disciplined, and compassionate community for two years, paid for by the gifts we receive from individuals and private grants. Magdalene stands as a witness to the truth that in the end, love is more powerful than all the forces that drive women to the streets.
What is Thistle Farms?
Thistle Farms is a non-profit business operated by the women of Magdalene. By hand, the women create natural bath and body products that are as kind to the environment as they are to the body. All sales proceeds go back into the program.
Through Thistle Farms, the women of Magdalene gain much needed job skills, and learn responsibility and cooperation. Into every product goes the belief that freedom starts with healing, and love can change lives. Our dream is that people will come to see Thistle Farms as a humble but powerful business synonymous with women's freedom.
Why Thistle?
Considered a weed, thistles grow on the streets and alleys where the women of Magdalene walked. But, thistles have a deep tap root that can shoot through thick concrete and survive drought. And in spite of their prickly appearance, their royal and soft purple center makes the thistle a mysterious and gorgeous flower.
Carolyn Snell, our wonderful Thistle Farms liason!
Our group was invited to tour Thistle Farms. At 9am, a large group of people circled a lighted candle and started the Daily Meditation. A woman read a passage from a book about secrets, the topic for the days' meditation. From there, we went around the circle and introduced ourselves, much like an AA meeting. Sometimes that's all that was said. Other women elaborated about who they were, the secrets they had kept in their lives and how it became toxic in both body and soul. It was one of those moments in life where I absolutely know for certain that I:
- Will never be the same.
- Recognize the courage it takes for a person to truly acknowledge themselves, faults and all.
- Are overwhelmed that places like this exist and were built to help.
There were a few comments made that rocked me hard and I wrote them down to share:
Freedom ain't free.
Turns out, the only person I was keeping secrets from was myself.
I'm not ashamed of my past, I'm proud of my future.
I learned early on that I don't have to dance with everybody, but I have to dance with somebody.
I am breaking the cycle of secrets.
When you put these statements into context – a long history of abuse, drug addiction, crime, broken families and lives – they MEAN something. Something big. It was truly an amazing experience.
Once the mediation time was over, they went into some general business and house-keeping issues: pick up your trash, make sure the back door is locked, thanks to the candle folks who worked overtime – just like any other staff meeting at any other business. There were clearly ladies ready to get to work, others who wanted to socialize – just like any office.
The "no nonsense" supervisor. As a graduate of the program, this lady knows what she's doing. I was impressed.
A Thistle Farm employee prepping bottle for labeling.
Happiness found in candle making!
We got a lovely tour of the work space, the packaging and shipping areas and I had the opportunity to stop and talk to two women. Neither of the women is considered a graduate yet, but I was moved to share their stories.
"Mary" is 32 years old and had been at Magdalene house and Thistle Farms for 9 months. She had been on probation for drug use, got caught using and the courts took her son away from her. In order to keep her son out of child services and with her mother, Mary entered the 2-year program at Thistle Farms. She got her GED and was just accepted into cosmetology school. Her number one motivation is her son.
Listening to Mary's story.
"Alice" is 39 years old and has been at Thistle Farms for 2 months. She started using crack cocaine at 13 years old. After 8 years of addiction, she was able to kick the crack habit, but switched to alcohol. This is her 5th program and she was order by a judge to Thistle Farms. The judge pulled her order, but Alice has decided to stay. It's her goal to "break the co-dependency cycle." Her big news? She's just gotten her driver's license back.
Inspired by Alice!
Thistle Farms creates a myriad of amazing products. They have yummy smelling candles, lip balms, shower gels (my personal fave), lotions, body balms and essential healing oils. The products are all natural, made by hand and smell and feel great. Honestly, they do. I was scared to try them because I have really sensitive skin – but they are glorious! They feel and smell so good! And you know what else? They have built partnerships with other women's groups in Rwanda and Uganda to import the little bags they sell their "Summer Survival Kit" in! So cool.
So what is the point of this blog post? You can help. Today. Right Now. For every comment, tweet, Facebook post or link to this article from your blog (either here with The Thirty-Something Bride or on ABG or BOTH!), Ashley and I will team up and donate a $1 to the women of Thistle Farms. That's right! Do what you gotta do – we're picking up the tab.
What I want to stress the most about this post is the fact that you CAN register for something other than stuff. You can link directly to Thistle Farms and donate on-line. I would love for you to choose Thistle Farms. But if you choose another, more personally meaningful charity, that's great too! While I was in love with the idea of Thistle Farms, we actually ended up choosing The American Cancer foundation. The Candyman's mom died of cancer and my aunt was unable to come to my wedding as she was undergoing chemo at the time (she's now in remission!). We made a tough personal choice on this one. Hopefully, your choice will be easier. And I can't tell you how happy we were to get cards from our friends and family who donated. It felt so wonderful and I encourage all brides to do the same.
Some other choices that Thistle Farms is offering:
In lieu of favors – framed signs and post cards for donations made in the names of your guests. Printed on handmade, thistle paper (natch).
Wedding Favors – Lip balms and postcards.
Gift Baskets - Perfect for your maids!
Bridal Showers – Thistle Farms employees will com come to you to share their personal stories of hope as well as samples of goodies to buy! You can also bring groups to Thistle Farms for tours, just like we did!
The easiest way to support Thistle Farms is to leave a comment and help spread the word! When you share today's post on Twitter or Facebook or as a link on your blog, The Thirty-Something Bride and ABG will donate $1 to Thistle Farms. Fan-fucking-tastic, right? So share and mention @T30SB and @thistlefarms and link to this article (http://bit.ly/cgFQAP). EASY-PEASY!
Celebrate your wedding day with products that truly say, "Love heals."
Thanks to everyone who commented and tweeted and Facebooked and emailed and shared this link with your friends and families. I've had to close the comments for now in order to add all of it up and find out the grand donation total! If you still want to take part, please go to Thistle Farms and buy their product or make a tax-free donation of your own! You won't regret it, I promise.
Designer, TruLu Couture
Blogger. Wife. Smart Ass.


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An important component of the wealth management process is identifying appropriate long-term investment solutions that will most likely meet your expectations of wealth accumulation. However, this is not an easy task as there are thousands of funds and strategies available in the market.
At Pioneer Wealth Managers we have a large team of experienced investment professionals who conduct exhaustive due diligences, on different funds and strategies both locally and globally in search of skill, consistent delivery of performance and alpha generation capability.
Our clients benefit from our houseview of selected funds that have undergone our rigorous due diligence process. These funds are directly accessible from us or through the many platforms that we are contracted to.
In truly understanding and fully exploiting the well documented benefits of diversification, Pioneer Wealth Managers remains abreast of global economic events and the impact of including international allocations within clients' investment portfolios. Understanding offshore investments as a strategy is increasingly relevant given South Africa's modest contribution of less than 1% to total global economic activity.
We possess the necessary tools to screen, analyse and due diligence the complete universe of South African registered unit trust funds across the risk and reward spectrum. This allows us to identify the most appropriate products for our clients in a highly regulated environment with clearly defined risk parameters.

subset: commoncrawl


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Links to our Local Church
Jesus said 'Let the children come to me'.
The Church has long sought to support and nurture children in the love of God and the many Church Schools around the country are a sign of this.
Bourn Primary Academy enjoys close links with the parish church of Bourn, St Helena and St Mary's and we are each enriched by the other.
The school pupils, staff and support staff are prayed for regularly in Bourn church and a number of the pupils and their families worship regularly in this church and in the churches of St Andrew in Caxton, All Saints and St Andrew in Kingston and St Mary the Virgin in Longstowe, as well as elsewhere.
One of the vicars of these parishes, Revd. Stephen Day leads an assembly in the school most weeks, often exploring a Bible story with the children in an interactive way.
When major festivals are celebrated throughout the Church Year, the whole school comes up to the church and we hold a service in which the children participate in word, action and song.
Throughout the year there are occasions when different classes will visit the church, perhaps for a fact-finding visit, perhaps to take part in an event which explores some of our rich Christian themes, such as 'Experience Easter', perhaps for a multi-disciplinary learning experience such as the Key Stage 1 'wedding day'.
The talented musicians of the school sometimes work in partnership with the church in events around the local community, such as Christmas carol singing for older members of the community and orchestral performances in the Church Summer Fete.
These links are continued out of school with twice-monthly children's services in Bourn, the Christingle at Longstowe for which all children are invited to raise money for The Children's Society, the Samaritan's Purse Christmas Shoebox Appeal and in the highly popular summer holiday club and the beautiful Christmas Nativity event on a local Bourn farm.
The Church also contributes to the good governance of the school through the provision of up to three Foundation Governors.
The Church supports the school in its aims of Nurturing, Enriching and Achieving with the prayer that each child will find a place to flourish with their God-given potential.


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Velvet and I have been busy getting my new mosaic studio in the Canton Arts District ready! He would say he did all the work, but I have to thank my sister who helped me paint and hang my artwork. I would still be second-guessing everything without her help.
I'll be opening for First Friday on April 1st. The theme is masquerade, so I've been making glitter masks to give away to kids. I'm new to the Arts District, and too late for Arts in Stark to get the word out, so if you're reading this and in the Canton area, please come, bring your kids and tell everyone you know!
Dyanne Williams Mosaics
514 5th Street NW Canton, Ohio 44703
I'll have regular gallery hours starting in mid-to-late April, most likely Wednesday & Friday 10am-6pm and Saturday 2-6pm.
I'm happy to find this location just in time to begin my new commission. It's four panels totaling 148 square feet for a shopping center in Westlake Village, CA. I'm waiting for final design approval from the city council, then I will start posting information about the project. I'm very excited to begin this mosaic. It's going to be huge and gorgeous!


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By Ross James and Jon Hargreaves
Amidst the turmoil on the southern Philippines island of Mindanao, following clashes between government forces and Islamic militants, a voice for peace continues to ring out. Radio Gandingan, an HCR-supported community-centred radio project, is providing critical information to residents and displaced people from Marawi city, where the fighting first broke out on 24th May. A number of people were killed and taken hostage by the militants who had reportedly occupied several government buildings in the city, torched others, including a church, a school and the city jail and took over a medical centre where they replaced the Philippines flag with a black, ISIS-style banner.
Meanwhile Radio Gandingan is helping provide critical information about the situation and the martial law rules that have been imposed by the government of President Rodrigo Duterte. Community volunteers are working around the clock to provide up-to-date information and the station's popular serial radio drama now includes the Marawi situation into its story-lines.
Since 2004 Radio Gandingan has been broadcasting in the primary language of the minority Magindanaon people, empowering them to voice their concerns and gain access to government officials and services to improve their quality of life. Preliminary results of an evaluation currently underway by HCR shows how the project has helped community cohesion by resolving family and community conflict, strengthened family bonds and relationships and improved understanding between community members and leaders. Radio Gandingan listeners have also expressed how the project has helped to improve health and develop livelihoods in their communities.


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Why some jeans look great yet others make you look 5kgs heavier? OR Why you can come home with bags of new clothes yet still have nothing to wear?
Find the answers to all your shopping, dressing and personal style questions with The Style Therapy Masterclass Workshop.
The workshop is held in a lovely sunny studio where, over a fun afternoon of trying on clothes, studying body shapes, talking about wardrobe organisation and sharing shopping tips you will discover how easy it really is to look effortlessly stylish everyday! This session runs for 6 hours. (We'll have lunch and coffee breaks of course!)
Wardrobe analysis and auditing
You probably only wear 20% of your clothes 80% of the time, you know something has to be thrown out but you just don't know where to start? Learn what to throw out, what to keep and how to organise your wardrobe so you can put an outfit together in no time - any time!
Understanding the Body Shape Rules
Are you an apple, a pear, an hourglass...you've heard the terminology but what does it really mean and how does it relate to you. We'll discuss all the different body shapes and how the rules apply to you. Shopping becomes a breeze once you understand what shapes to look for and what cuts to avoid.
Colour Therapy
Which colours work best as a top which work best as pants, which colours work for you? A mini colour analysis will determine whether you have warm or cool undertones and from there working out your best colours is easy!
Lifestyle Analysis
Learn how to match your wardrobe to your lifestyle by completing a lifestyle analysis chart. You'll soon discover exactly where you spend most of your time which will help you to determine where you should be directing most of your spending.
Layering Techniques
Layering your clothes helps you create many different outfits from the same pieces. Learn how to do it without looking bulky or messy.
Wardrobe Capsules
Learn about the concept of wardrobe capsules, what they are, how to create them and how they will change the way you think about clothes.
Core Pieces Versus Highlight Pieces
Learn how to create a balance between the core pieces of your wardrobe and the highlight pieces. Too many of one and not enough of the other often results in a wardrobe full of clothes with nothing to wear!
How To Know What To Buy
The 3 questions you should ask yourself before you buy anything!
The Wardrobe Essentials
A summary of the must have pieces for any wardrobe.
Create Your Own Wardrobe Capsule
Bring in your own clothes and accessories for a practical lesson on putting together great outfits from key items in your own wardrobe.
Shopping Tips
Learn when to shop to get the best service, how to get the cheapest prices, where to go for a great range of jeans, plus size underwear, size 44 shoes... and just about anything else!
Contact Leesa
for the next available course
As this is a very hands on workshop numbers are limited so please book early!


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The Language of Flowers
Being totally inspired by the book I recently read "The Language of Flowers" by Vanessa Diffenbaugh. A beautiful novel with reference to the hidden meaning of flowers from Victorian times.
I decided that a few very early mornings at the Flemington Flower Markets, 40 minutes drive away to look for inspiring roses to photograph could be fun.
5.30am start for me (Florists usually make their way earlier but I decided there should be enough flowers left for my 5.30 am arrival). Amazingly they were at the tail end of the busy period. Feeling a lot like a child in a lolly shop, I settled for some pink hybrid tea roses with a tinge of green on the outer petals and some little white spray roses. I badly wanted David Austin's but all sold out, so possibly a 5 am start next time.
A week later and half an hour earlier - no David Austins. How frustrating, my sister in Western Australia with ALL those David Austin Roses's. My first flowers I seriously photographed was Helen's (my incredibly talented garden designer neighbour in W.A.)amazing array of David Austin Roses. A tiny bit of that passion from Helen and my sister has rubbed off onto me, such a sensual rose I think. Anyway I had to settle for some purple hybrid tea rose's, I did love the colour.
Next Friday to try again for David Austins - I was in luck and by this stage my husband thinking I am a touch obsessive as he know's early rising for me if possible is not on my agenda. I now have settled to looking up catalogues to plant them, the results would be a success if 5% as good as Helen's and my sisters roses.
The resulting photo's I took over the 3 weeks of rose hunting. I have included the flower meaning from the novel "The Language of Flowers"
White Roses - a heart unacquainted with love
Purple Roses - enchantment
Pink Roses - grace
|These are the David Austins!
Thorns, no thorns. Annoyed by that point so thorns stayed.
Back to website www.lisaphoto.com.au


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Just in case you missed it, I thought I would post the photos from my recent art show. The show is taken down and I have officially graduated with my master's degree (hooray!). I had a couple of friends who requested the opportunity to view the show online since they couldn't make it (apparently Florida was too far away to come...whatever.)
First, my artist statement (Sidenote: you are not allowed to find any typos as this statement has been published in my official paper and was hanging up with the show for the last month. Thank you.):
If I could, I would eat, sleep, and breathe photography. I fell in love with the medium while taking a film photography class as a sophomore in college. The smell of the darkroom, the anticipation of waiting for a roll of film to develop to see my images for the first time, the magic of watching pictures appear on paper while soaking in developing chemicals: all of these things were exhilarating for me. As I was learning the process of film photography, digital technology was growing at a rapid pace. Before I graduated from college I was working primarily with digital cameras and editing in Photoshop, a new process that I found just as intoxicating.
Although my artistic interests span many subjects, photography is my true love. Through my business, Paper Lemon Photography, I am blessed with the opportunity to make images of people, my favorite subject. Whenever possible, I incorporate digital photography into my art classroom, teaching my students the technique of creating photographs. As an art education graduate student, I wanted the opportunity to sharpen my own photography skills and explore new possibilities of how to best teach my students.
Organic: a Photographer's Journey Through Documenting, Learning, and Teaching is the study I completed for my Master's thesis project. The project started as a way for me to take pictures of places and people outside of my normal photography realm of weddings, senior pictures, and family portraits, but it became much more. It reinvented my love for all aspects of photography and allowed me to re-think the essentials of teaching it to my students. The process challenged me to discover new ways to document moments in time in a meaningful, informative, and artistic way.
The farmers I met are passionate about their trade. I witnessed the long hours they put into their work: rising with the sun to plant, weed, and water. I observed the thoughtfulness that goes into planning the layout of vegetable beds, harvesting the best of their produce, and washing and packaging their goods with utmost care. From the beginning to the end of the season, they work with tenacious dedication and I was inspired to follow suit while I showcased their work through my photography. Above all, it is my hope that viewers of this project will see the beauty, devotion, joy, and downright hard work that goes into organic farming and walk away as a more informed citizen of our community and world.
And now the show:
And, because I know you're dying to read it, you can find my entire 60+ page paper online here. It's fascinating...really. You'll most likely see it on the New York Times best seller list soon.
Also, all of these photos are for sale if you're interested. I currently have about a dozen left waiting for a good home. They are 11"x14" prints in a 16"x20" black frame. $35 each...shipping included.


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Cyber Security has jumped to one of the top of executive priorities - from large enterprises to small businesses. Since the sales team handles sensitive customer and company information on a daily basis, they should be a high priority focus to help reduce and prevent cyber crime.
Here are 5 Top Sales Team Best Practices that are easy to implement this next quarter:
- Implement a Password Manager for all applications
Most sales reps still write passwords on yellow stickies and place them on or in their desks at the office and at home. They typically use a couple of poorly designed passwords on all their business and personal accounts. Password Managers are applications that create, store encrypted passwords and enter them for each employee. They also help your sales team create very strong passwords for each business application.
- Use WiFi Wireless VPN Technology
Sales professionals and managers use unsecured WiFi connections and are attacked every day. The free Starbucks, McDonalds, Conferences, Trade Shows, Customer password-free guest WiFi connections and the Airport WiFi systems can be used to break into your team's devices and your sales systems. You can now add low-cost VPN (virtual private network) wireless technology to laptops, smartphones and tablets. VPN encrypts all your employee WiFi internet connections to your business.
- Encrypt Data on all laptops (also on Smartphones and Tablets)
All your sales laptops disc drives should have their data encrypted. This is especially important if you store customer financial and credit card information. All Apple laptops and desktops have a built-in encryption option. You can also buy highly-rated encryption software for your Windows and Android products.
- Turn on 2-Factor Authentication (2FA) for Applications, if available
This is a newer security process for many cloud-based apps that is being used more and more to improve security. This technology reduces the risk of your account being compromised. For more details, go to 2FA in wikipedia.
- Cyber Security Mini-Workshops - minimum of 2 times per year
Most sales professionals are not aware of or forget top cyber security best practices. You should establish regular but brief cyber security training for all existing and new employees. Well trained sales teams are one of the least expensive and fastest way to help protect your company.
Please contact us if you have any questions and feel free to share your own cyber security best practices in the comments section below.
Photo credit: Ambro at freedigitalphotos


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Fun with Sculptures
Location: Borrego Springs, CA | Settings: F5.6, ISO 1600, 97 seconds
I've had this idea since last Spring, but never got a chance to carry out the series until last week.
Here are all three of my ideas on paper - it's good to sketch ideas out as soon as you have them, otherwise they disappear.
It's funny how the sketch is often the idealist version, then in reality things change a bit.
For instance, my skeleton looks like he doesn't know what the hell he is doing with a pink sword in his hand. More concerned with the surprising color of his weapon than the imminent threat in front of him.
For the next image, Battle Beasts (which I've posted before last May) - there are subtle nuances that make it different than the sketch.
For instance, the horse sculptures being much larger than I was expecting. I brought a step-ladder to the location, but it didn't do me much good as the soft sand swallowed about 10 inches off it's height.
The moral of this post is that life can and will throw you curveballs - so think on your feet and as Tim Gunn would say, 'Make it Work'.
To see the full collection of Light-Skeletons and wall-art options, check the print shop below:


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Jon Stewart says Mitt Romney's attempt to bet Rick Perry $10,000 during a Republican debate makes a little more sense now.
On Monday's "Daily Show," he used Romney's tax returns, which he released Tuesday, to calculate that Romney has earned roughly $57,000 a day, for the past two years, from investments.
That's the kind of money, Stewart said, that might inspire a man to make "stupidly extravagant, out-of-touch impulse bets."
But Stewart's real criticism of Romney isn't that he's rich — it's how little he pays in taxes. The former Massachussets governor has earned an estimated $42 million in the last two years, according to his returns, and paid about 14 percent in taxes.
Stewart notes that in 2007, Romney's company, Bain Capital, was among those that lobbied against a bill that would have raised the tax rate on taxpayers like Romney to the ordinary income tax rate of 35 percent.
Watch the video:


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Sarah Babbage is a fall 2010 intern at the Prospect.
David Bacon is a California writer and photojournalist; his latest book is In the Fields of the North / En los Campos del Norte (University of California / El Colegio de la Frontera Norte, 2017).
Gavin Bade is a Spring 2014 intern at the Prospect.
Kenneth S. Baer, former senior speechwriter for Vice President Al Gore, runs Baer Communications, a Democratic consulting firm.
Michael A. Bailey is the Colonel William J. Walsh Professor of American Government in the Georgetown University Department of Government and the Georgetown Public Policy Institute.
Thomas Bailey is the George and Abby O'Neill professor of economics and education and the director of the Community College Research Center and of the National Center for Postsecondary Research, both housed at Teachers College, Columbia University.
Sheila Bair is a senior adviser to the Pew Charitable Trusts and chairs the Systemic Risk Council. She chaired the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation from 2006 to 2011.
Brook K. Baker is a professor at the Northeastern University School of Law and a member of and a policy advisor for the Health Global Access Project.
Dean Baker senior economist at the Center for Economic and Policy Research in Washington, D.C.
New York-based Russ Baker is an award-winning journalist who covers politics and media.


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Timothy Green is the main protagonist of the 2012 live-action film, The Odd Life of Timothy Green.
Timothy is a kind and loving 10-year-old boy. He loves his family and making friends.
Joni Jerome
Joni is an older girl that Timothy likes. They met when Timothy was getting beat up by the school bullies. Later, they meet at the bullies' house where he tries to get a kiss from her. However, she rolls down his socks and sees his leaves. Timothy panics and kicks her in the head.
Community content is available under CC-BY-SA unless otherwise noted.


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The State of Florida's social marketing campaign for adopting children who were wards of the state was extremely successful, but also exposed serious challenges within the adoption system. Change by Design was hired to help.
The foster care and adoption system in Florida required a serious overhaul. This fact became painfully obvious when a successful marketing campaign led so many people interested in adopting children to overwhelm the capacity of the current system. Calls were not returned and hopes were dashed.
Enter Change by Design! After hearing the challenges, we knew this was a system-wide performance failure, not a training issue.
We believed the key was to take advantage of the combined understanding of stakeholders who represented every aspect of Florida's foster care and adoption system. This included adoptive parents, academicians, child welfare advocates, foster care workers, and many others.
After many anonymous stakeholder interviews, we came to understand the deep challenges of the system. Change by Design leveraged the power of this large knowledge community using its problem-solving training to solve the deep multi-faceted underlying issues.
In the end, Change by Design helped these passionate stakeholders identify six major areas contributing to the problems faced in the adoption of children in foster care. Working together, they developed a set of detailed recommendations that, when implemented, would solve the problem.


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My job is to take pictures. It's a dream job. Not only do I get to meet interesting people, often I am invited into their homes, which is a very private thing, and a unique way to get to know a person.
I appreciate design, I appreciate new points of view, and I know how lucky I am that I'm given the opportunity to do what I do. I also know that the world you see in the pages of magazines isn't always the world we actually live in.Representation isn't important for its own sake, its important because it validates who we are. When my kids look at the world around them, I want them to be able to recognize themselves in the faces they see
Like all of my work, Corner & Compass is about celebrating great design and interesting personalities; it's about showing off the world we all share.
David A. Land is a New York-based photographer and director. A native of California, he studied at the Art Center College of Design, earning a degree in photography in 1996. David's personal passion for design and architecture inform his careful compositions and unique ability to capture a strong sense of place.
His portraiture reflects his natural interest in his subjects - whether they're real people or models - and their environments. David lives in Brooklyn with his husband and his very favorite subjects, their sons Simon & Xavier.
To see more of David's work, please visit his portfolio site here.
Created by David A. Land
Photographer & Director
w. davidaland.com
e. email@example.com
c. 917-498-5575
Represented by Pat Bates
Thank you for taking the time to look & an extra special thank you to Nicole for her patience and graphic design help.


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This is another installment in a series about Claim Charts. Part 1, The Claim Chart: Origins of a Patent Litigation Tool, provides a brief history of the Claim Chart. Today we discuss the Patent Local Rules. The remainder of this series contains practice pointers to help you better create Claim Charts.
As mentioned in Part 1, among other things, Patent Local Rules (PLRs) require the submission of Claim Charts by the parties to support positions of infringement and invalidity. For example, Section 3-1(c) of the Rules for the Northern District of California require that a party claiming patent infringement serve, among other items, "a chart identifying specifically where each limitation of each asserted claim is found within each Accused Instrumentality." Continuing on, Section 3-3(c) of the Rules for the Northern District of California require that each party opposing a claim of patent infringement shall serve on all parties its "Invalidity Contentions" which must include "a chart identifying where specifically in each alleged claim of prior art each limitation of each asserted claim is found".
Over 30 jurisdictions, including the Northern District of California, have their own PLRs containing requirements like those above. A listing of those jurisdictions can be found on our Local Patent Rules reference section on our main site. The timing requirements, among others, can vary district to district, so it is important to observe the local rules that are typically implemented by Scheduling Order. For example, in the Northern District of California, the infringement Claim Chart is due not later than 14 days after the Initial Case Management Conference and the invalidity Claim Chart is due no later than 45 days after service of the Disclosure of Asserted Claims and Infringement Contention. In the District of New Hampshire, the Infringement Claim Chart is due not later than 45 days after service of the last filed answer and the Invalidity Claim Chart is due not later than 45 days after service of the Preliminary Infringement Contentions.
Another reason to read the PLRs is that some Districts are silent on Claim Chart requirements. For example, the Southern District of New York makes no mention of required Claim Charts in its Rules. Differences like those above are important to the prosecution of your case. A good resource highlighting these differences can be found here.
Those in districts without PLRs can still benefit from the usage and submission of Claim Charts. Claim Charts provide a way to present your case with clarity and specificity to a judge and the eventual jury.
Join us again for Part 3 in our series where we will discuss best practices for creating your Claim Charts.


text: what colour shoes do i like all my shoes need to be comfortable with no laces to get in the way. high heels would be cool. ccc3042 published on September 01, 20129 responses 2 3.0★ / 5 Questions in vertical order what kind of shoes do you like to wear? sandals high heels do you have a a pair of shoes for each outfit you have no yes do you like running shoes better than fancy shoes yes no would you make your dog wear shoes no yes did you like this quiz? yes no


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What can Sublitech do for you?
Over the years we have worked with some of the corporate world's biggest brands who provide designer uniforms for internationally renowned luxury companies.
We can work with you to colour match to corporate colours and develop samples for you to showcase to your client and then move into the production stage.
We print to all polyester based fabrics including (but not limited too) lycra, poly velvet, canvas, poly weave fabrics, felt, flag trilobal fabric and sports tech fabrics. Fabric must have a make up of at least 80% polyester. We have the capacity for over 8000m of printing per week. We use only the best, water-based, environmentally friendly inks and consumables and can promise you our quality is like no other.
We're here to help you every step of the way!
In Summary:
Artwork Set Up
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Helpful Links
Need some inspiration for design? Chat to one of our textile designers.
Want to send us a file for a free strike off?
Left to Right: Dallen, Dallen, Dina Corporate and Dina Corporate.
We have been working with Sublitech as our preferred digital printing supplier for about 10 years. The experienced team has always been very helpful with our projects large or small. Addition of sublimation prints to our offer has made lots of our customers very happy, providing originality and complimenting their high end uniforms we design.
- Dallen Corporate


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Grammy Award-winner Fantasia Barrino will star in the Broadway-bound After Midnight, a musical revue celebrating Duke Ellington's years at the famous Cotton Club nightclub in Harlem.
Producers said Thursday that Barrino, last seen on Broadway in The Color Purple, will be their first guest star in the show. Performances start Oct. 18, with an official opening night set for Nov. 3. Barrino ends her run Feb. 9.
Directed and choreographed by Warren Carlyle with musical direction by Wynton Marsalis, the show appeared off-Broadway last year at New York City Center under the name Cotton Club Parade. Songs include "Stormy Weather" and "I've Got the World on a String."
Barrino, who has released four albums, was the winner of the third season of American Idol.


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Register Now for Spring Youth Astronomy Class/
Astronomy 101: the Sun, the Moon, and the Stars!
Registration is now closed. Ever looked up into the night sky and wondered what's up? Experts from Rose City Astronomers will prepare you to explore the universe. Learn the fundamentals of observational astronomy, how to use binoculars and telescopes to explore the night sky, to observe planets, star clusters, nebula, galaxies. Learn about objects astronomers study, how and why our view of the night sky changes through the night, and with the seasons, how telescopes work and how to use them, and how to find your way in the night sky. We will finish with practical advice on how to prepare for a night exploring the universe. In addition to the classroom sessions, telescope observing opportunities under the night sky will be offered. Students and their families will be invited to a end optional star parties with Rose City Astronomers after this class.
Class Info
Four two-hour sessions, 10 am – noon Saturday, April 14, 21, 28, and May 5, 2018.
Saturday Academy - Beaverton, Suite 1100 NW Compton Drive, Beaverton, OR 97006.
Grade range: 5 - 9.
Register through Saturday Academy below.
Instructors: Michael McKeag, Katherine Kornei, Todd Duncan, Kenny Parton.
Star Party Option: We will also provide students and their parents with a schedule of Rose City Astronomers star parties scheduled for May and June 2018. An instructor will be available to serve as host and guide for students and their family if they choose to a end one of these events, telescopes provided.


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Friday, March 3, 2017
Underweight teens fix - Natural metabolism part 1/3 and More Mods by Candyd
This mod solves the issue related to teenage sims' weight, that causes them to lose too much weight sometimes to the point of being severely underweight.
How does the game behave by default ?
In the Sims 4, teenagers have their own metabolism : it has been set so that they'll gain only half as much weight as any older sim. This was intended to give teenage sims a higher metabolism and to prevent them from being overweight. Unfortunately, the way teenagers' metabolism works can sometimes cause them to become skinny to the point of being underweight.
What does this mod change to the game's behavior ?
Teenage sims' metabolism has been "fixed" to function exactly the same way as adult sims' metabolism. The mod will prevent them from being skinnier than adults. In return, teenage sims have now the same risk of being overweight as adult sims. The issue can be avoided with having the two other parts of the Natural metabolism mod installed.
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Greece Hotel Booking
Greece is popular for historical place. If you are planning for tour to Greece and searching for Greece hotel booking service then Acropolis Spirit Hotel is the best one. This hotel has 40 comfortable rooms, In the lobby of the hotel you will enjoy your breakfast and coffee in a modern and comfortable environment. In Acropolis Spirit Hotel all of the rooms are decorated in a special style and feature all the comforts of home, that will make Acropolis Spirit your ideal destination. So just visit our website www.acropolianspirithotel.com to get Greece Hotel Booking service.
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Michelle Bridges' amazing response to split claims
Fitness guru Michelle Bridges has had enough of incorrect insinuations that she's split from her partner, Steve 'The Commando' Willis.
Taking to her Instagram in the wake of the rumours, the star shared a recent picture of herself with Steve and baby Axel, captioned 'Ummm…whatever'.
The sassy response also included a cheeky selection of emojis to express her disdain for the claims.
The photo evidence of the family's ongoing unity comes as Steve yesterday rubbished the claims of a split. 'Put that aside,' he said. 'Michelle and I are still going strong'.
He added how the couple had gone bushwalking together the day prior - which may be the scene depicted in Michelle's photo.


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Will we ever get a summer??!!
I am getting very frustrated with the weather here! It's supposed to be just like Vancouver weather - a few days of rain followed by a week or 2 of sunshine, then maybe a bit of rain again, and if we're lucky a short heatwave and so on. But no, so far all we've had is rain, rain, rain!
Since the 1st of June we have had maybe 10 days that it has not rained at all, and never more than 2 in a row. I'ts just crazy!
The weather causes a huge problem with the laundry because even though it's raining, it's too warm to have the heating on. And since we don't have a dryer, we have to hang our clothes on the radiators or on the line to dry. But it's too wet to hang the clothes outside and too warm to dry them on the radiators. So I find myself only washing the things we run out of, like underwear and nappies, and on the occasional sunny day I do a bit of catching up.
Right now I have about 8 loads worth of clothes piled up in and around the laundry baskets cause I can only wash as much as I can dry. If we had a few nice hot days, the clothes would dry much faster and I could get several loads done - at least enough to get rid of the piles around the baskets! But no, it's going to rain again today. It's not raining yet, though, so I've hung out the latest load in hopes that it will dry before the downpour that is imminent.
I suppose I should be thankful that we are not among those affected by the flooding that is happening for the second time this summer all over the country. Will we ever get our summer? I hope so, for the sake of the flood victims as well as my laundry!


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All beads and Faux Tin are made-to-order, please allow 7-10 business days before they ship.
Click on the images to view details and add items to your cart.
Faux Tin Toggle - Vintage Flowers
A eye-catching clasp and bracelet focal in one! The toggle clasp features a vintage floral illustration.
What is Faux Tin? I created these to mimic recycled tins but they are actually images on stainless steel sheet metal. The image is permanently part of the metal, it will not scratch off and is water-resistant. The metal is light-weight but incredibly strong. All edges are satiny smooth.
Toggle measures 2" L x 1 1/4" W. Toggles include a jump ring and copper hammered toggle bar.
These items are made-to-order in small batches. Allow 5 business days before they ship out.


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Kutcher flaps around haplessly in 'Butterfly' / Interesting time-travel premise makes for decent entertainment
The Butterfly Effect: Science fiction thriller. Starring Ashton Kutcher and Amy Smart. Directed by Eric Bress and J. Mackye Gruber. (R. 110 minutes. At Bay Area theaters.)
In its own ridiculous way, "The Butterfly Effect" is an entertaining movie, despite mediocre acting, lackluster direction and a story that's sometimes frustrating. It has the integrity of camp, maintaining an odd earnestness in the face of its own absurdity. It pursues emotions that are entirely false, but its pursuit is sincere. It's trash, and yet there will always be a place for this kind of trash at the movies.
One thing "The Butterfly Effect" shows for sure is the way an arresting concept can overcome bland execution: Ashton Kutcher plays a young man who goes back in time to fix something in the past, but each time he returns to the present day, he finds that he has altered something for the worse -- so he keeps going back, and back, making things worse each time. This sounds like the premise for a comedy, about a hapless guy who can't get anything right no matter how many chances he gets. In fact, it's a dead-serious thriller, and a pretty harsh one too, with strong language, sex and a fair amount of violence.
Kutcher plays Evan, a college student who, as a child, used to black out during moments of peak stress. Now, at 20, he finds himself remembering what happened during those blackouts. In one case, a neighborhood man (a creepy Eric Stoltz) molests Evan and his own daughter. In another, an act of vandalism results in tragedy. Oh, yes, and then there's that painful incident in which a bully douses Evan's dog with gasoline -- but let's change the subject.
When the molested girl, Kayleigh (Amy Smart), Evan's childhood love, grows up and commits suicide, Evan decides to go back in time and change the event that marked her for life. Without it ever being quite explained to the audience, Evan has the insight that, by reading old journal passages, he can force his present consciousness into his past self and have that self alter history. The imaginative possibilities of this concept are made quite appealing when Evan awakens from his trance to find his life transformed: Kayleigh's alive. She's happy, and she's been his girlfriend for years. He wakes up in her bed at a sorority house.
There could be worse fates, it seems, but this reality presents its own set of problems. And so it goes: Evan keeps going back and back. As Kayleigh, Smart has the flashy role. In one reality, she's a downtrodden waitress. In another, she's a drug-addicted prostitute with bad skin and a facial scar. Kutcher, conversely, has the burden of taking it all seriously, but, frankly, it's hard to take him seriously. Each time he becomes forlorn at Kayleigh's latest miserable fate or scrambles to undo some seemingly irreversible disaster, he's unintentionally funny. "The Butterfly Effect" would have been better as a metaphysical comedy that took its premise seriously (like "Heaven Can Wait"), rather than what it is now -- a drama that doesn't take its premise seriously enough.
Still, as melodrama, "The Butterfly Effect" has its moments. Evan finds himself in prison. How will he get his journals, so he can concentrate himself out of there? Don't ask yourself why Evan didn't concentrate himself into a new reality before going to prison. Just enjoy it for what it is. Also enjoy the fabulous self-centeredness of the worldview, appropriate for a young person's movie: Evan keeps flying through different realities, while everyone else has to morph in response. Is he the only one who can do this? Is he more real than everyone else? And if others can do it, what does this mean? Does reality splinter into infinite parallels? Or is there one reality that keeps starting over every time someone changes something? If so, there's little hope of getting through a two-hour movie, much less a whole book.
Obviously, "The Butterfly Effect" is silliness, but it's amusing silliness. -- Advisory: This film contains sexual situations, sex talk, violence, child molestation and strong language.


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photo credit: itslegitx What a lovely tree house. Can I live there?
There's an idea in the general cultural atmosphere which I'm sick of. It goes something like this: if you live with your folks after your early 20s, if you're broke, if you're struggling to find meaningful and / or decently paying work, then there's something wrong with you.
This is a poisonous notion perpetuated by a society that's too cowardly to own up to the ways in which it has failed. I am someone who's deeply invested in the ideal of taking personal responsibility-- but this lie seeks to place responsibility on individuals where it absolutely does not belong.
We're in the middle of an economic collapse because the whole goal of our capitalist system-- infinite growth-- is actually impossible. Our economy is set up to stagnate and fail if it isn't constantly expanding. But we don't really need our economy to grow, we need it to function sustainably. And we don't really need more jobs. We need a way of distributing wealth which doesn't rely on a dysfunctional market.
In other words, we're losers all right-- in a game which was poorly designed to begin with.
I've seen the best minds of my generation shamed, depressed, demeaned-- blaming themselves for being unable to get ahead in this broken game. Growing up we were told that if we just worked hard, got good grades and went to college we'd be able to get a good job and be just fine.
Well, that turned out to be a giant lie-- now many of us-- even those of us who "played by the rules" and majored in theoretically sensible things like business administration and psychology are now saddled with loads of debt and no non-hellish job prospects.
This is not our fault. This is not because we failed. We are not failing. Our institutions, our systems, our whole mode of societal organization is failing. The kind of jobs that we're supposed to hustle for-- corporate gigs, office gigs, aren't exactly conducive to deep human fulfillment, so it's unsurprising that the wind would get knocked out of our hustling sails.
We need to shift our sense of self-worth so that it's not at all based on how we fare in this economy. We need to celebrate one another relentlessly, just as we are, with all our magic that doesn't fit into the boxes of hiring managers. We need to meet up in gift circles and potlucks and be a village.
We don't get to be yuppies any more; whether we like it or not, we get to be villagers: we can't afford fancy dinners and travel and shows all the time-- we have only ourselves for our entertainment and warmth. I love the motto of the Evolver Social Movement, of which I'm a part: "Find the others." Find the other people who are talented and stunning in ways our culture can hardly handle-- find the others who are struggling bravely-- see their gorgeousness which so vastly excels the hardship of their suffering. See their self-doubt, which is your own. Love and cherish them and in so doing love and cherish yourself.
We need to reorganize our whole society into a gift economy.
But that'll take awhile. In the meantime... how to make some cash?
Well, lately I'm a big proponent of digital entrepreneurship, i.e., selling downloadable products online. It's what I'm going to be doing in a few months with my eCourse. It's what I think a lot of us suffering and penniless geniuses should be focusing our efforts towards. I've been harassing all my friends about it. "You should be internet famous," I keep saying to the adorable, insanely smart people in my circumference. And why? Because it's true.
Jobs aren't a reliable source of income anymore. We need to dig deep, find what we have to offer, and offer it. Why sell yourself to an employer for an hourly wage? Why not create something out of your own vision which you can then sell-- and gradually free yourself from having your income tied to your time? Why grovel to match some boss' expectations of you when you could very loudly be yourself on the world wide web and attract supporters for it?
These are questions I'm asking myself. I'll probably go on more about this topic in the days and weeks to come. In the meantime, if you're interested in digital entrepreneurship as a means of getting on in this world, here are some resources to check out, some inspirational and some informational:
The Middle Finger Project - Ash Ambirge is a fine, sassy lady who offers a great free course in business when you sign up for her mailing list.
The Bootstrapper's Bible -- Seth Godin offers his thoughts about what it takes to do the whole entrepreneur-out-of-thin-air thing-- I still haven't quite forgiven him for the rather odd interpretation of gift economy he offered in Linchpin, but I'm working on it because he's generally useful.
Why You Should Never Get a Job - Steve Pavlina spells it out. I read this article a few years ago and it totally flipped my perspective on the matter.
Love! Carolyn


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Macky Sall
- Country: Senegal
- Title: President
- Education: Cheikh Anta Diop University, French Institute of Petroleum
- Awards: Peter Benchley Ocean Award (2013)
Since it gained independence from France in 1960, the West African country of Senegal has been a bastion of stability and democracy on a continent that has seen relatively little of either. During the presidency of Abdoulaye Wade (2000–2012), however, the Senegalese exception seemed under threat. The elderly Wade grew increasingly authoritarian and corrupt, and he managed to run for a third term even though the constitution prohibited him from doing so. But in March 2012, Senegalese voters dealt Wade a decisive defeat, electing the reformist candidate Macky Sall instead. Trained in France as a geological engineer, Sall had served in a number of government posts under Wade, including prime minister, before publicly breaking with him in 2007. In opposition, Sall created a new political party; served a second term as mayor of his hometown, Fatick; and organized an anti-Wade coalition. Sall spoke with Foreign Affairs senior editor Stuart Reid in Dakar in June, days before U.S. President Barack Obama's arrival in Senegal for a state visit.
Since independence, most African countries have suffered from coups and civil wars. But Senegal has enjoyed over five decades of stability and multiparty competition. What's your secret?
It stems from a long historical process. Senegal's first revolution came at the same time as America's. In 1776, there was a revolution in the north of Senegal -- what we call the Torodbe revolution -- that set out new guidelines for governance. There was colonization afterward. But even during the colonial era, beginning in 1848, people could vote for the colonial authorities. In 1914, we elected the first black member of the French National Assembly, Mr. Blaise Diagne, a Senegalese. So before independence, there was already electoral competition.
Another secret can be found in the Senegalese constitution. We have a semi-presidential regime, which means that the government is responsible not only to the president but also to the parliament. There is one chief executive, in contrast with some countries that have two -- something that creates tensions that
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Before I get to the actual point of this post, I have to share what a sweet night I had. Dessa and I came home from a fun dinner with cousins and she was exhausted. She chased the cat around the house a bit, nursed and then it was to the shower. Our bath tub is out of commission until we can get our plumbing fixed so we're all using the guest bathroom which is just a stand up stall (hate it). I admit that I'm too lazy to get in with her so I knelt next to her while she took her first solo shower! Kinda cool…hehehe…anyways back to the point of this tangent (is it a tangent if I haven't even started the original story? anyways). We get to bed and the poor thing is falling over she's so tired. She's using every ounce of energy to keep her eyes open as she flops around while I slip on her PJs. I turn the light off and cuddle up next to her. I turn into her and she into me…legs curled into my hips and she looks up at me…exasperated by the fatigue and places a soft hand on my cheek…she stares at me then slowly lets her eyes shut into slumber….ay que rico. I can't tell you how much that makes my day…my week really…I wish there was a way to capture moments like that…every day…unexpected…unplanned moments…and just bottle them…put them in a locket…in my wallet…just tote it around for those instances when life seems sucky.
Right, now onto how I'm feeling so old. First was earlier this week when I was watching the latest Real World/Road Rules Challenge "The Island". I've been loyal to these shows since Julie and Eric were making googly eyes at one another in the original NYC cast. I was convinced in my teen years that I would totally be on the RW. My BFF in college, Eric, and I even went to the open auditions they held at a local billiards. Eric was convinced I had no shot since there'd already been an mixed-race chick with issues about identity (forgot her name but the loud one with the short black hair from the New Orleans cast) that and the fact that he said I just didn't have enough drama in my life. Neither of us made it so he wasn't wrong. Anyways, I'm watching the show and realize that I barely recognize anyone. A couple of the girls look like they might still be in high school! Then I start to think – do moms with kids watch these pointless competitive reality dramas…shouldn't I be more consumed with more important…domestic…grown-up things? Like ER or Grey's Anatomy? I only thought it for a split second and enjoyed the rest of it feeling a bit old.
Here's the real kicker about me feeling old. Tonight I watched the last several minutes of Behind the Music: NKOTB!!!!!!!! Then I sat through a half our live broadcast of their Boston concert. I LOVED EVERY SECOND OF IT! I was a huge NKOTB fan form the original New Kids on the Block days before they went to just an acronym. I collected all their trading cards and arragend them all in a nifty little album. I had the two coolest t-shirts ever, I only remember one – the ones with the blocks and the pics of all the guys. I bought all their albums. I danced and rocked out every single time they came on the radio. I loved them! I'd never been and have yet to be as fanatical about anyone or any group since then. I brushed off their reunion when it firs started buzzing around the internet. Then I ignored their first reunion performance thinking that I couldn't possibly still care. But now, after stumbling upon their Behind the Music…oh how wrong I was…I still care…sigh. I'm a dork. But the thought even crossed my mind to get their new album. I almost lost it when they played Right Stuff and did the classic move where they kick their legs to the side – left, right then a little trick ball change action and back to the other side. Even though I loved it, seeing those guys, even Joey "the baby" look so damn grown was a bit of a shock. If they look that old then damn a lot of time has gone by!
Just some random observations….estoy vieja….sigh…


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Christine Klassen Gallery
Kevin Boyle | Rocio Graham
Exhibition dates: February 3 - March 17
Opening reception: Saturday, February 3rd, 1-4pm
KEVIN BOYLE: Lost Together
This highly anticipated follow up to Kevin Boyle's Alberta debut at CKG in 2016 will feature a curated selection of his evocative prairie "portraits".
Kevin Boyle is a Vancouver-based photographer who was born and raised in the Canadian Prairies. He is known for his unconventional and breathtaking take on prairie photography, specifically his long-exposure evening shots of dilapidated buildings from what were once thriving communities. Most recently, he's turned his lens to an often-overlooked muse: the HERD. Lost Together takes us on a journey across the prairie, through a series of large-scale photographs which capture the inexplicable magic of our land.
Introducing: ROCIO GRAHAM
CKG is pleased to welcome emerging photographer Rocio Graham to the gallery with the premiere exhibition of her When I Think of Home series.
Born in Mexico, Graham emigrated to Canada in 2002, studying art at Emily Carr University and the Alberta College of Art + Design, where she recently obtained a Bachelor of Design in Photography. Her poignant still lives are influenced by her cultural heritage, identity as a woman and mother, and reflections on daily life. Fittingly, her home and garden serve as her studio, where her elaborate compositions begin the moment she selects a seed to nurture. Influenced by classical portraiture and momento mori, Graham's large-scale photographs are lovingly crafted meditations on life cycles, labour, consumption, and the macroeconomic impacts of home. She admits it's a labour-intensive process which "allows [her] to explore time and nature as creative allies".
Gallery hours: Tuesdays - Saturdays 10-5
200 - 321 50 Ave SE
Calgary, AB T2G 2B3


text: A maternity session is a time when we can capture a fragment of family's life at one of the most sacred times. This is so special and now we can expect the magic to turn into a miracle. As we anticipate the arrival of Joni and Chris's first born child, we think you should check out this slide show.


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The "Parking" section of the Castro Theater's website says that there isn't any. Well, okay, it doesn't really. It actually says that parking is so limited that there might as well not be any, and instructs its prospective patrons to use public transportation. For people who, like me, live seventy miles to the north, this isn't helpful. I don't live near any public transportation that goes that far, and even if I did, a bus/train/whatever trip of that distance would most likely require me to endure two to four hours (each way) of waits, stops, transfers and fragrant transients. I drove anyway and hoped for the best.
It would not be an understatement to say that the "no parking" thing was freaking me out the whole way there. I was half-expecting to pay fifty bucks to park three miles away. Fortunately, my vehicle positioning-based paranoia ended up paying off. I arrived an hour and a half early, and managed to find a spot on the street just a block and a half from the theater. I fed the meter all my change, strolled down to the local Wells Fargo for more, and returned to push quarters into it until the "time remaining" readout stopped increasing. I guessed that this was when the space would stop being metered (a guess I later confirmed with an usher) and sauntered onward, confident that my earliness had earned my pick of spots in the theater.
I was right, sort of. I ended up about a hundred feet from the door in a line whose end very quickly curved and disappeared around a nearby street corner. For half an hour I stood pressed against a hairdresser's window, reading a novel while an usher came by every five minutes to make sure I was in the right line, and that I wasn't blocking the hairdresser's door. Eventually, the theater doors opened and we were admitted. I ran to the restroom while the crowd continued to flow in behind me. I was a little afraid that the seats would fill up while I was indisposed, but I shouldn't have worried. Turns out the Castro Theater is friggin' enormous, putting the Marines Memorial Theater (where I saw them last year) to shame both in terms of size and comfort. I settled into the second row, right in front of the organ. A few minutes later, an organist popped up from below the stage to play a continuous up tempo medley of showtunes, stopping only for a few seconds every fifteen minutes or so to allow applause and to catch his breath.
By the time the organist finished, the theater was all but full. Looking around, there couldn't have been more than a dozen or two empty seats out of 1,400. The audience looked a bit different than last time. There were people of all ages and dress codes, but it was mostly a uniquely Northern Californian group of casually but cleanly groomed pseudo-intellectuals from their late twenties to mid-thirties—a demographic that, by the way, includes me. I suspect that this performance's participation in the SF Sketchfest might have had something to do with this.
As this was the final night of the Sketchfest, co-founders Janet Varney, Cole Stratton and Some Other Guy Who Doesn't Do Rifftrax Presents Commentaries took the stage to thank the crew members, advertisers and venues that made the comedy festival possible. Mary Jo Pehl appeared with a very funny Wikipedia-based introduction for warm-up act Dave "Gruber" Allen.
A word about the stage: The organ sits atop a hydraulic platform that rises for the pre-show music and lowers for the feature presentation, leaving a rather large hole in the middle of the performing area. When a riffer needed to cross to the other side, he or she skirted it carefully. Not Gruber. He leaned over the edge, hopped across the corners and generally pretended it wasn't there. I spent much of the warm-up act making bets with myself about whether or not he'd fall in. He didn't, so I guess I lost.
The warm-up act was a pretty even mixture old material and new. Gruber gave his dentist office copy of Highlights Magazine a political spin. He repeated his beatnik haiku act with J. Elvis Weinstein on bass. J. Elvis noted the theater's archaic theater boxes and joked that they couldn't start until Lincoln arrived. (Someone in the audience shouted, "Too soon!") Frank Conniff came out to do a routine about J.D. Salinger's tweets. It started about how he was a big fan, and had read all his books. (When a few of us laughed, he said something like, "You think it's funny that I read books?" No, Frank. We thought it was funny because Salinger only ever wrote one.) Then he backed up J. Elvis's Lincoln bit with a whole sequence of Frontier Facebook jokes referencing presidents from the nineteenth century. He reprised the Convoluted Man song from last year.
This brought us to the main presentation. Joel came out looking very dapper in a suit and tie to introduce the movie. He had a bit of trouble summarizing the plot (with good reason, as it turned out) but did describe the monster as "The Michelin Man after a fire." He introduced all his fellow riffers, some of whom carefully skirted the hole in the middle of the stage to get to their seats, and tried to start the show. The show failed to start. The riffers bantered good naturedly about how they didn't write anything for the unanticipated silence, and then the movie started a couple of minutes later.
Danger on Tiki Island relates the tale of an elderly biologist, his young, hot and extremely libidinous wife, and the virtuous young Peace Corps worker who accompanies them to an unspecified South Pacific island. Peace Corps dude stays in the local village to dig ditches and woo the lovely native girl, while the biologist and his wife move into the estate of a wealthy half-Spaniard who cannot consistently pronounce his own name. Also included in the estate: a huge, abusive man who dresses like the genie from Aladdin, plus an entire tribe of pygmies. Also included in the village: a ritual of sacrificing nubile young ladies twice a day to the aforementioned post-fire Michelin Man, who appears whenever the local forest sprouts tentacles and the moth puppets turn vicious. So many naked young women get ripped limb from limb that I found myself wondering where they all came from. (What, before the rituals began, the village was eighty percent females between the ages of eighteen and twenty-two? You'd think a constituency that size would have voted down the "Young Girl Sacrifices" initiative.) Anyway, it turns out there's some sort of cyclical, nuclear-testing-based transformation going on, and somehow the genie man is to blame. Except that he isn't the monster, unpronounceable-name-man is. But he doesn't know about it. (Which "he" do I mean? Does it matter?) In the end, everyone (with a name) at the Spaniard's estate dies while everyone (with a name) in the village survives. The tentacle trees and demon moths vanish without explanation. Then the whole thing wraps up like every good beach party movie should—with vigorous make-outs all round.
The riffing was funny as always, but it wasn't as good as Blood of the Vampires or the live DVD version of East Meets Watts. Theater acoustics and sound levels may have had something to do with this. Movie sound quality wasn't great (of course) but it was up so loud that sounds and voices got hard to understand whenever the orchestra, the actors and the riffers all got going at once. Less bothersome was the picture quality, which was also horrid, but at least you could figure out what you were seeing most of the time. Aside from a few DVD glitches, the picture quality was pretty much the fault of the original filmmakers. I don't know about the sound problems. Possibly the volume of the movie relative to the riffers should have been adjusted. Possibly I would have been fine if I'd found a seat further back.
The show ended, and I pushed towards the bathroom again. It was a fifteen-minute wait to the urinal, after which I ran to the line to meet the riffers. In the lobby, however, it became apparent that the line started in the mezzanine, curved down the stairs across the entrances, then trailed back up the other stairs to the mezzanine with no end in sight. I'd brought a camera in the hopes of getting my picture taken with the Cinema Titans, but when I weighed this in balance with a) the book of signatures I already had from the last time they came, and b) the rapidly shifting atmospheric conditions of the Northern California winter working its magic on my sinuses, I decided it was time to go home. By some miracle, my route into the city that night had been entirely along two-way streets, so I easily found my way out and was home in less than ninety minutes.
Cinematic Titanic Live in San Francisco, February 2, 2010
The "Parking" section of the Castro Theater's website says that there isn't any. Well, okay, it doesn't really. It actually says that parking is so limited that there might as well not be any, and instructs its prospective patrons to use public transportation. For people who, like me, live seventy miles to the north, this isn't helpful. I don't live near any public transportation that goes that far, and even if I did, a bus/train/whatever trip of that distance would most likely require me to endure two to four hours (each way) of waits, stops, transfers and fragrant transients. I drove anyway and hoped for the best.


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- Page 1 Acer d150 Portable Navigator Review
- Page 2 Acer d150 Portable Navigator Review
- Page 3 Acer d150 Portable Navigator Review
I also don't like the way that the map only takes up the two thirds of the screen, with a border at the bottom and almost the whole of the right hand side of the screen covered in icons. The icons themselves are also really rather poor, looking like they've been knocked up in Windows Paint.
What I did like though was the clear way the directional information was presented on screen, with the next turn, the distance to it, and the street name very legible. It was especially clear when you view turn-by-turn instructions. The POI database also was comprehensive and many items were easier to find than on other devices I've tried.
When you're driving a clear icon also flashes up showing the type of turn that's coming up. The audio volume level from the unit was reasonable though it sounded strained at the highest setting.
When you plot a route the software gives you a choice of the fastest or the shortest routes, which is good. However it lacks many features that are present in the TomTom range such as route redirection, let alone more advanced features such as integrated Bluetooth and connection to a live traffic information service and a speed camera database. I use this feature on my TomTom One and though it's far from flawless by comparison the d150 was decidedly, well, dumb.
To get you from one location to another the d150 did its job well however, and didn't let me down during my time with it. However, it lacks the finesse and features of the equivalent TomTom. This wouldn't be so bad if it was a cheaper option but it's not. It's actually more expensive than the TomTom One, which you can pick up at Dixons online now for £240. Oh dear. On this basis I can see no reason to spend more to buy the Acer d150.
An effective sat nav device from Acer, but let down by its looks, its interface, its relative lack of features and its price. It does the job, but it fails to present any compelling reason not to buy a TomTom.
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As a part of its "sponsors of tomorrow" campaign, Intel is running a site-takeover on the NYTimes.com right now. It's a mockup of the newspaper from Friday, May 11, 2040.
It features a story about a star athlete testing "positive for Android," a US President talking to a dolphin and a weather forecast down to the minute. Cute!
But unless they were going for the really fantastic, shouldn't the banner read "Slim's New York Times"?
Click on the image below to expand it.
Get the latest Intel stock price here.


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I have been a Waldorf school parent since 1999 and an educator for 12 years prior to having children. For the last several years I have been teaching 3rd and 4th grade reading classes and coordinating the early grades reading curriculum at my daughters' school. In 2015 I completed the three-year Association for Healing Education (AHE) teacher training certificate in Extra Lesson. I tutor and coach Waldorf students in reading, handwriting, executive function skills, and provide remedial support, using a varied, multi-sensory approach. In the course of this work, I found that there were no executive function tools that met the needs of Waldorf students. I created student agendas and coordinated binder systems to support the development of executive functioning skills and time management in harmony with this unique and rich curriculum.
What makes these agendas different from all others out there?
They are specifically designed to reflect the students' journey through the Waldorf curriculum: age-appropriate subject headings such as main lesson, multiple foreign languages, beautiful student art work, inspiring quotes and clear, colorful spaces to record and track homework assignments and extracurricular activities. The colorful spaces also provide optimal organizational capability. The color-coding matches commercially available subject dividers, individual folders, and subject notebooks.
Green Meadow Waldorf School saw these Student Agenda/Binder Systems in use in 2008-2009 with my private tutoring clients and recognized that they addressed a challenge the school had faced for many years. GMWS began using them in 2009-2010 in grades 4 through 10, with positive feedback from students, teachers and parents, and has continued using ever since, expanding to include all students in grades 4 through 12. Several other Waldorf schools and individual students across the country began using the agendas in 2010-2011.
I offer these Z-Path Student Agendas to Waldorf schools throughout North America for use with whole classes, and to individual parents and students, to support the natural development of executive function skills (organization, planning & goal setting, time management, self-regulation, and accountability). These lifetime skills will help students in school and beyond.
In 2011-2012, Z-Path expanded the product line to better meet the needs of Waldorf school teachers by offering Waldorf Teacher Agenda, Planner, and Record books. Our books keep teachers organized and are infused with beauty, quotes, and flexible ways to capture information. Z-Path also introduced dry erase whiteboards for classroom use, coordinated with Lower School, Middle School, and High School agenda designs.
in 2015-2016 Z-Path began designing collegiate student agendas for Waldorf School alumnae.
Browse this website for more information or contact me to gain a deeper understanding of executive function skills in the Waldorf School setting, how these Z-Path tools support executive function skills, and how they could work as part of your school's curriculum. You will see why I am excited to share them with you and your students.
- Suzanne Lynn


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Channel V, ready to offer apparel
Star India's music offering Channel [V] is preparing to roll out branded mobile phones and apparel range as a part of its on-ground brand extension plans targeting youth of India.
The channel which had last year launched its first V Spot Cafe + Bar in Delhi has announced opening of the second one in Gurgaon, with plans to set up 30 such hangouts in the next five years.
"We are taking numerous initiatives to attract maximum attention of our core target group -- the college going youth. Last year we launched the [V] Spot Cafe + Bar concept.
Currently talks are on with 3-4 companies to roll out a range of V branded mobile phones and apparel," Channel [V] India Head Prem Kamath told PTI.
He, however, did not disclose more details of the plan. Commenting on the expansion of the cafe chain Kamath said: "In the next five years we want to open 30 such cafes in the country. Every business we get into will be a revenue generating model on a standalone basis," he said.
After Delhi and Gurgaon, the company has finalised locations such as Pune, Bangalore, Kolkata, Indore and Chandigarh in the next six months through a franchising model.
Though Kamath did not share targeted revenue from the cafe business, but according to industry sources, it is understood that one cafe would have an annual turnover of Rs 10 crore.
"We get a royalty share of the revenues earned by each cafe," Kamath said. The proposed products such as branded apparel and mobile phones will also be sold at the cafes.
Besides the cafe initiative and the proposed merchandise roll out plan, the company also organises other events to engage with the youth such the recently held Indiafest in Goa.
"The country's youth today spends only 20 per cent of time on TV and rest out side homes. So we have made a conscious effort to engage with them outdoor and even when they are not hooked on to TV sets," Kamath added. PTI


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Christmas Hot Cocoa
It's officially Christmas season!
You have no idea how happy I really am about this!
I rushed to make something that felt like Christmas as soon as the calendar said December.
Do you get like that?
Are you completely into the Christmas season or are you a Scrooge?
G is kind of a Scrooge, I have been excitedly preparing for Christmas and listening to Christmas music and he's just like 'bah humbug, it's too early.'
Do you think that Christmas comes too early every year?
I do think that it's kind of crazy to have Christmas things out before Thanksgiving, but once Thanksgiving is over all bets are off.
One of my favorite flavors of the season is peppermint or candy canes.
I used to steal the candy canes off of our Christmas tree and eat them, shh don't tell my mom. I'm pretty sure she already knew anyway.
I wanted to come up with an AfterDark drink that really brought together everything good about Christmas and winter.
It has to be warm, minty, chocolatey, and most of all it has to have booze, I mean it is AfterDark after all.
The combination that I came up with was an alcohol filled, minty, hot cocoa.
It's perfect for laying beside the fire, warming up, and trying to get into the holiday spirit.
Christmas Hot Cocoa
What's your favorite holiday drink?
Let me know on Instagram!
Here's what I used today!


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Perhaps you've recently been hit with a surprise: "Mom, I'm going vegetarian!", or maybe in your household you've always liked to keep meals veggie-friendly. Regardless, while a plant-based diet can certainly be beneficial to your health, there are still some things to consider in order to make a vegetarian lifestyle (for yourself or your little ones) as nutritious as possible.
Luckily, Karen Gilman from nutrilicious is here to help. Karen is a Registered Holistic Nutritionist (TM) and mom to two teenage (yikes!) girls, one vegetarian, one not. She realized there was a need to support and guide moms through the process of their children becoming (or already being) vegetarian, and decided to lend her expertise.
Karen came across our tool and liked what she saw - as a mom who loves cooking healthy meals from scratch her my family. Although she admits "sometimes they eat them, sometimes they don't".
So the question remains - what the heck do you feed your vegetarian daughter?! Here's what the expert had to say...
A good day starts with oatmeal which provides a good dose of protein and iron which is sometimes difficult for those on a plant-based diet. Add hemp or pumpkin seeds to up the iron content even more.
For lunch, quinoa and black beans are a good combination. Top with avocado slices to add some good fat.
What kid doesn't love pasta? Here is a good option with pesto and rapini. If your kids don't like rapini, spinach will also work well.
Vegetarian meals often require a little more time to plan and sometimes prepare. Meal Garden makes that process as efficient as possible - with lots of vegetarian and vegan recipes already in our system, you've got lots to choose from. Furthermore, tracking the nutritional content of your meals - arguably even more important when you're following a more restricted diet - is also easy:
"Meal Garden provides a tremendous tool by allowing you to track some key nutrient information by meal. This can help take some of the worry out of meal planning, now you just have to make sure they'll eat them!"
- Karen Gilman, Registered Holistic Nutritionist (TM) and founder of nutrilicious
For those of you who are looking for more tips and guidance around the topic of vegetarian living - particularly in regards to how to make it as healthy as possible for your kids, check out Karen's website, nutrilicious and get your FREE copy of her e-book Raising Vegetarian Girls! Join her Facebook community for on-going support www.facebook.com/veggiegirls2016.


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Playgrounds for Adults
The outdoor gym equipment installed in the park is painted in shades that differentiate it from brightly-colored playgrounds for kids, reports Hu:
"Though there are no swings or slides - these are essentially outdoor gyms - such playgrounds not only have the look of traditional children's play spaces, but they are also built in some cases by the same manufacturers.
The adult playground concept is borrowed from China and parts of Europe, where outdoor fitness areas for adults have become as routine as high-fiber diets or vitamin D supplements in preventive care, particularly for older people."
Hu says the trend is spreading across the U.S.


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We are loaded with these conversations tonight…..
My Husband, Chris: I can't sleep again… any suggestions?
Me: Why don't drink some hot tea and take a hot bath….
Chris: Already taken the hot bath..
Me: (referring to Leah's favorite calming tea) Well, then how about some "Night Night" Tea
Allison: Yeah, that would be what we call Benadryl…..


text: Winemaker Nicolas Idiart grew up with a passion for wine, and became the youngest graduate of the winemaking school Blanquefort in Bordeaux at 19 years old. Nicolas passion for Loire wines brought him to work in Chinon, Touraine, Muscadet but also in Australia and New Zealand. After several years travelling the world, he moved to the sales side of the wine business, mainly in North America. After 7 years in sales, he decided to go back to winemaking with an artisan approach: small batch, hand-crafted wines shaped by the mind and hands of a contemporary winemaker.


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So a friend of mine so politely suggested that maybe I should post more often. I like hearing suggestions from fellow readers and anyone really, so I figured I could start today. I've been asked this question fairly often, and this was actually her suggestion to me: What does your typical day look like as far as exercise and meals go? Well my dinner tonight isn't really typical - I'm expecting to eat as many wings and drink as much beer as I can handle on a "school night"- but the rest really is. On a typical weeknight for dinner I'll more than likely have some sort of meat (lean steak, chicken breast/thigh, salmon etc.) with salad, steam veg or similar.
Portion control isn't really my strong suit, so I try to eat before 6:30pm so I don't feel so full for the early morning workouts.
5:30am Workout: Glutes, Chest, Core (all superset)
Barbell Step-ups – 110lbs x 20, 17, 16 (these are the worst) Pec Fly Machine – 190lbs x 12, 12 ,12
Glute Kickback Machine – 170lbs x 12, 12, 12 each leg Incline Dumbbell Press – 2x70lbs x 10, 10, 9
Barbell Hip Thrust - 185lbs x 12, 12, 12 (looks so suggestive…) Cable Press - 110lbs x 12, 12, 12
Leg Raise with Dumbbell - 25lbs x 12, 12, 12 Torso Twist Machine - 190lbs x 15, 15, 15 each side
Horizontal Sit-up - 45lbs x 12, 12, 12 Sitting Oblique Twist (with Plate) - 25lbs x 25, 25, 25
Finished it off with a 5K run! Now I'm ready for Wing Night!
Before Workout (5:15am) – 5g BCAA, 1 scoop protein powder
Post Workout (7:00am) – 5g BCAA, 1 scoop protein powder
Breakfast (7:30am) – Overnight Oats
Snack (10am) – Broccoli & cauliflower
Lunch (12:30pm) – Pulled Chicken Lettuce Wraps (I made tons - I'm eating this all week)
Snack (2pm) – Hardboiled egg & Tandoori Masala Roasted Chickpeas
Dinner (6pm) – Wing night…. So wings and beer! (lots)


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Psy and Snoop's satirical Hangover soars online
Categories: Celebrities, Featured, Music, Social Media
Whether you appreciate his over-the-top satirical take on aspects of South Korean culture or just enjoy the ridiculousness of his music videos, Psy is back with another earworm racking up the online views.
The viral video kingpin and veteran K-pop star released his eye-popping latest — Hangover, featuring rap legend Snoop Dogg (seen above) — on Sunday and as of midday Tuesday, the video is already hovering around 25 million views on his "Official Psy" YouTube channel.
Where Gangnam Style mocked the excessive consumerism of the titular 'hood in Seoul, Hangover pokes fun at a culture of excessive drinking in contemporary Korean society.
The video fits right into the recent oeuvre Psy has established with his international hits Gangnam Style and Gentleman: it's full of outlandish behaviour in colourful settings, booty-popping performers and an incessantly driving (some might prefer the term "grating") dance beat.
Ever savvy with social media, Psy and Snoop also teamed up with fellow online video guru Jimmy Kimmel earlier this week for a promotional jaunt.
Yes, they discuss the new collaboration but, more importantly, the trio took to a Los Angeles karaoke bar where Psy gamely offered up a few lines of Snoop's Who Am I (What's My Name?) while Snoop returned the compliment with Gangnam Style. Not to be outdone, late night host Kimmel delighted on clarinet during the trio's performance of That's What Friends Are For.
Love 'em or hate 'em, these guys definitely know how to snag our attention (for a few minutes, anyway).
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Niomi Fawn : Wild Home
Niomi Fawn
54 1/2 E. San Francisco St. #7
August 4 - September 29, 2018
Opening Reception: Saturday, 8/4, 6-9 pm
Performance by Jessie Deluxe: Saturday, 9/1, 7 pm
Artist Talk: Wednesday, 9/26, 6:30 pm
Closing Reception: Saturday, 9/29, 6-9 pm
In Niomi Fawn's professional life, anywhere and everywhere could be an art venue. They're the owner of Curate Santa Fe, a company that injects challenging artwork into quotidian spaces across town. In a new solo exhibition at Strangers Collective's NO LAND art space, Fawn shifts focus from the public sphere to the most intimate context. Wild Home, a rare display of the curator and artist's own work, explores genderqueer identity, domesticity, and a return to a primordial, non-binary state of knowing and being. "It's a jungle in there," they say. The exhibition debuts at NO LAND on Saturday, August 4 from 6 to 9 pm. Fawn will host an event series over the course of the show, with an evening of performances by Jessie Deluxe and Niomi Fawn on September 1, 7 pm, and an artist talk on Wednesday, September 26 at 6:30 pm. Fawn will appear at a closing reception on September 29, 6 to 9 pm.
"Niomi is a force on Santa Fe's art scene. They're truly ubiquitous," says NO LAND co-director Jordan Eddy. Fawn spearheads the curatorial programs of Iconik Coffee Roasters and ART.i.factory Gallery, and has organized major exhibitions in spots like Santa Fe Community College and Freeform Art Space. They've even unleashed a show on the streets of Santa Fe consisting of sculptural bike hitches by local artists. "When the idea for this solo show came up, our whole dynamic shifted into these private moments," Eddy says. "We mostly planned the show on Niomi's front porch—in this zone between home and nature—which really connects with how they're going to transform NO LAND."
Wild Home is an art exhibition and an immersive installation, drawing the viewer into a fantastical setting that intertwines a domestic space with a lush forest. "I'm thinking about the time before time," says Fawn. "It's this question of, what was it like to be human and be connected before there was all this language that tried to homogenize us? What was it like to be in congress with nature?" Elements of the show include paper and wood sculptures dyed with a Japanese technique called suminagashi, aluminum plates bearing digitally distilled images of nature that Fawn calls "neo-pastiche" prints, and a large-scale, mixed-media sculpture that's both furnishing and altar.
"I want to make objects that feel like artifacts of a time gone by, or maybe like old bones that you'd find in the forest," says Fawn. "When you see something like that, you want to preserve and protect it, to bring it home." The artist sees a strong connection between nature and the domestic space: both are sanctuaries that allow us to shed rigid societal labels and embrace more complex conceptions of our identities. "For a lot of people, especially genderqueer people, you go out in the world and you're trapped in this filter and it's exhausting," Fawn says. "I get home and I get to be myself. I can kiss the person I love on the cheek and I'm not afraid that someone's going to harm me. If you're out in nature, it's the same way. No bear's going to say, 'I don't think so!'" Fawn hopes to inspire viewers to celebrate the unique and intimate relationship that humans and nature possess, and remember that it reflects our true rhythms.
Niomi Fawn is a queer artist currently living in Santa Fe, New Mexico. They grew up in California and Hawaii. The art of Niomi Fawn developed from a technique dubbed neo-pastiche, which brought digital tools and visions to traditional collage in an effort to recontextualize familiar images and, through creative juxtaposition, to create new statements from old concepts. Neo-pastiche is primarily a two-dimensional technique and, while it remains a vital component of Niomi Fawn's art, they have been applying the theories of the technique on a wider scale - moving into a third dimension and blurring the boundaries that too often separate art and audience. Their latest works involve the creation of objects, informed but not limited by neo-pastiche, which are placed in natural and constructed environments, gradually transforming the surroundings and fuzzing the lines between the artistic and non-artistic worlds. Niomi Fawn was part of the Meow Wolf art collective from 2010 through 2014. They have since left to form Curate Santa Fe. They also work with Victory Grrrls.