monsbrick

What are you grateful for today?

Tell me something about your life or your day or the weather. I love random glimpses.

Thank you for rating me!

Please let me know if I send you a postage due item! I’m happy to make it up to you. My local post office has reduced hours still:(

Welcome to my profile! I am 54 years old and live in Alameda an island town in a suburb outside San Francisco, California.

A few of my favorite things: Free random things Surprises Pink, Blue, Brown, and all the exotic names for all the colors, I love all the colors of the rainbow and more colors that are in mind's eye but not in the real or material world Dreams Films Cooking channels Fixer Upper Glamping at home like a princess!

Handmade anything. Dabbling in drawing, doodling, some variation of zentangles, watercolor, gel plate printing, stamping, collage, acrylics, sewing, painting, coloring, knitting, and other fiber arts, beading, cooking, and more.

Penpal writing and journal writing are some of my favorite pastimes.

💜Bella Grace& Daphne’s Diary & Somerset Studio are magazines I read.

Here are some of the YouTube people I subscribe to: Maremi Smallarts, Nik the Booksmith, Mystele, Ana Bondu, Susanne Rose Art, The Paper Outpost, Creationsceecee, My Arty Heart, Lisa Oxley, Joie de fi, Gel Press, and Gelli Arts.

Postcards: Exploring ways I can save or share my collection. What do you do with your postcards? How do you share, save, or recycle? ♻️

Paper: I love stationery and all kinds of paper.

Junk journals, funky scrapbooks. I'm not that coordinated nor designed. My style is eclectic and messy and Bohemian. But I love to save all kinds of little bits and pieces. Ribbons, book pages, washi tape, wrapping paper, home made paper, yarn, tissue, packaging, even washi tape. I secretly love stickers though they seem not that popular. I've started a mini collection of recycled stickers, like people save used postage stamps. There should be a name for us like philatelist! But for stickers. It's a mini collection because it seems to be politically or socially incorrect to confess to this love here among "serious" arts and crafters. But then, I'm not good at being serious since I'm exceedingly serious at my day job.

Currently listening to the audiobook by Ursula Le Guin, The Unreal and the Real. Reading Breasts and Eggs by Mieko Kawamani

What are you reading or listening to? Would you recommend a book to me?

Black Lives Matter and even beyond that I have loved James Baldwin since I discovered him by wandering around my local library and picking up books. I love everything he has written from fiction like Another Country to non-fiction, Price of the Ticket. The latest tv show Lovecraft Country has a voice over excerpt of James Baldwin and I was jumping up and down in my living room screaming that's James Baldwin. He writes the kind of words that make me want to cry and laugh and dance. When he talks or writes about jazz it makes me want to play the piano or dance and sway like I can feel the drums beating. He became an ex-pat and moved to Paris and France and explored the Negro experience in that country, which has its own struggles and history different from ours here in the USA but I could gush and gush. There are times when I feel so raw and realize that is how I am, I come across to other people at times, deep and raw and oversharing. But it's epic. And beautiful and yet some things a person has to experience on their own. They can't just read about or hear about. They need to go out and walk the trail, or smell the rain, or watch the waves crash at the ocean. Not everything can come through a book, but it is nice to find an author or a book or movie/tv show that can convey some of the beauty.

Apocalyptic Fiction:

*Hugh Howey *Paolo Bacigalupi *John Joseph Adams

Cyber fiction:

*William Gibson *Neal Stephenson *Scott Sigler

Horror

*Anne Rice *Chuck Hogan *Guillermo del Toro *Scott Sigler *Edgar Allen Poe

Teen Fiction

*Annette Marie *Sarah Cameron

Travel Writing

*Paul Theroux *Henry Miller

General Fiction

*Jon Steele *Francesca Lia Block *Anais Nin *Jack Kerouac *Gabriel Garcia Marquez *Danielle Steel *George R.R. Martin *Haruki Murakami *Robert B. Parker *JD Salinger *Jim Harrison *Ursula LeGuin

General Non-Fiction

*Oliver Sacks *Jeffrey Toobin *Angela Duckworth *Malcolm Gladwell *Jack Kerouac *Esther Perel
*Gabrielle Bernstein *Eckhart Tolle *Jack Kornfield *Steven Levitt & Stephen Dubner *John McPhee

Naturalist

*John Muir *Henry David Thoreau

On writing, mostly I write for myself. I've kept a journal or diary since I was a kid. Today I've decided to try a writing group here at swap-bot. I feel nervous about sharing what I write but just look at this profile page...it is filled with words. It will be a challenge but I probably need to feel less possessive about my private writing and to share some of it with other people. Part of me is very excited to try a new creative writing group experience!

Swim, walk, run, and dance. I keep sanity by getting outside in nature and breathing fresh air.

Themes or Genres or things I like sooo many to list but including: Firefly Lord of the Rings Fairies, Gnomes Studio Ghibli Electric Dreams as in Do Robots Dream Electric Sheep? Blade Runner The Sixth Sense The Warrens Dune

Crystals & Rocks & Precious Metals: I used to think hippies were crazy for being into these things. I didn't get it. I still do not really understand the metaphysical aspects but I just love crystals and rocks and metals.

Here are a few of my favorite crystals: Rock crystal, rutilated quartz, amazonite, tourmaline, pyrite, mica, rose quartz, celetite, serpentine, selenite, jasper, azurite, obsidian, and many more.

I'm looking for homes for most of my beloved stones, rocks, minerals and crystals. Please message or write to me about types you are seeking. I am happy to gift some of my collection.

Artist Trading Cards or ATC and other arts and crafts creations. Recently I started really trading artist cards and that is super fun. I'm enjoying swapping these cards, other peoples' beautiful, fantastic, creations!

Love all kinds of music, all genres. I listen to electronica, opera, soundtracks. I download all kinds of podcasts and news on YouTube or other online sources. Spoken word.

I love to change my daily playlist with my 5000+ songs in my collection.

My husband and I have planted a small victory garden. We have had a garden for over 10 years. This year we planted with the intention of reducing our dependence on the grocery store.

Blooming this week are the cherry and plum and almond trees. Volunteer or return visitor mache (if you don't know what mache is think of butter lettuce but mini or microgreen). Green onions, various herbs, blackberries, strawberries. Scented flowers like jasmine and lavender and rose. Have you ever bathed in rose petals or rose hips? You can also bathe in lavender though I'm allergic to it so I watch it from a distance. I feel like a QUEEN when I bathe in rose petals!!

What about you? Do you grow anything?

How are you serving these pandemic times?