Thanks Day Thursday # 1

From A Year of Thanks

# 001

qb

Top 10 Tuesday #1!

Happy Tuesday, everyone!

No, really!
No? Oh, OK then.

Here's the first in the series of Top 10s on Top 10 Tuesday and I'm starting wiiiiiith...

TOP 10 TUNES by iTunes Plays (not counting Christmas!) -- complete with Spotify link where possible!

10. Ecuador | Sash --not sure why this has such a high play rating -- was a power-walk tune on the iPod for a while; that may be why?) No link
9. Sitting Down Here | Lene Marlin -- just a very cute ditty about being ignored by the one you're after. Sigh... Lene Marlin – Sitting Down Here (Original Version)
8. Each Day Gets Better | John Legend -- I can't hear the Once Again album without wanting to write a screenplay, just to feature this song on the soundtrack. Laid back, loose and romantic. John Legend – Each Day Gets Better
7. Rise | Gabrielle -- from the Rise album. Often cited as having an introduction inspired by Bob Dylan | Knockin' on Heaven's Door. Rather gorgeous. One of my all-time favourites. Fact. Gabrielle – Rise
6. Sunshine | Gabrielle -- yep, from the same album, which I played almost on a loop in the winter of 2000. Gabrielle – Sunshine
5. Dearest | Buddy Holly -- from the Juno soundtrack. Very stripped-back and innocent. And the film is great: good 'n' quirky. Buddy Holly – Dearest
4. Back to Black | Amy Winehouse -- arguably controversial (:-)), but musically, sound as a pound. Amy Winehouse – Back To Black
3. Diary | Alicia Keys -- just love the softness of this one. Also love the imagery. This before she went a little more crazy-hardcore with the Jay-Z collaborations. Alicia Keys featuring Tony! Toni! Toné! and Jermaine Paul – Diary
2.  Forever Autumn | Justin Hayward -- from the War of the Worlds (apparently). To me, this is an anthem of the late 60s, early 70s (yes, I expect I'm way off with the date!) and just evokes autumn. Played this continuously last season. Justin Hayward – Forever Autumn - Album Version featuring Justin Hayward from Jeff Wayne's Musical Version Of "The War Of The Worlds"
1. All I Want is You | Barry Louis Polisar -- another from the Juno soundtrack. Also from this Lotto advert which made me smile.  Barry Louis Polisar – All I Want Is You

Staring into space...

...is something I do less of these days because who has time? But with the new 'work year' (and subsequently, official blog entries) kicking off tomorrow, this QB has decided it's high time to update her inspiration board. (I <3 Bank Holidays!)

Here are just a few of the postcards currently gracing my pin- and magnetised boards at the moment:

 

From the top:

• Automat, Edward Hopper (1927)
• 'Camp' Coffee advertisement (date unknown but WWII era)
• Le Jugement de Paris, George Barbier (1923)
• Only Boring People Get Bored, Diane Bielik (unknown but picked up at university circa 1997!)
• Dusty Springfield at the BBC flyer from the 1960s? 1970s?

It's a slightly mixed bag but Hopper and Barbier are there to indulge my slight 1920s fetish at the moment, following my purchase of a little black cloche just before Christmas. It's the little things. The Camp Coffee ad just tickles me, and the Diane Bielik print keeps me in check if I'm ever prone to complain of boredom -- a rarity now but sometimes it happens...

And the Dusty Springfield flyer is just a bit retro cool. Managed to wangle this from my mother who couldn't quite understand why I wanted it in all its orange/sepia glory.

Last night I watched The September Issue on DVD and am now coveting the September 2007 Vogue itself to see first-hand Grace Coddington's gorgeous (albeit edited-down!) 1920s shoot, elements of which can be found here on the Swing Fashionista blog, and shot by Steven Meisel.

So... what to watch tonight for inspiration? Hmm...

Oh, by the way... Happy New Year! :)

qb

A New Year deserves a New Look!

...Gotta love the new Blogger templates!

Well, I had a little time over Christmas to assess what I wanted to do with this 'ere blog. Over recent months where time and inspiration have been prohibitive in equal measures, I have used the blog as a portal only, to view links from the blogs I've been following.

But this amateur eye is not yet ready to close, ohhhh no! Instead, I want to take a more refined look at the things that genuinely catch my eye and post only the photos I deem worthy from my own collection. I'm also hoping to run another blog in tandem, focusing on the things for which I'm thankful (very much inspired by Lindsey at a GreatFull day and Nikki and her girls' Month of Gratitude on WhiMSyLove. These blogs particularly inspired me to take stock of the everyday things I take for granted when I'm too busy griping about public transport and feeling neglected to realise that I'm lucky to have a job to travel to, and that I have friends in the first place. And so on.

So A Year of Thanks will hopefully run alongside Amateur Eye, and feature on here as well in part.

The weekly (manageable?) "agenda" for Amateur Eye will look like this:

Tuesday: Top 10... (could be the Top 10 of anything in my weird little mind -- songs listened to in August, typefaces, actors of the 1990s, websites... anything!)
Thursday: Thanks Day Thursday -- a direct link to A Year of Thanks
Friday: Photo Day -- either featuring a photo I admire by a fellow blogger or Flickr-er (!) or one of mine

Let's see how it goes...

A White Christmas!

The moon on the breast of the new-fallen snow
Gave the lustre of mid-day to objects below.

-- 'Twas the Night Before Christmas/A Visit from St. Nicholas (Clement C Moore)

Blush.

Yeah, it's been a while since I posted on here. A long while, dogged with a dying PC and too many photos to sift through (don't ya just hate it when that happens? ;-)!)

But … trying to get back on track with a fully functioning PC so please do come back soon!

qb xx

Not going to get preachy on ya but …

This is how I've been feeling lately (evidently mixed in with shedloads of self-pity, natch):

Image from the notebook doodles

This quote, paraphrased from my vicar's sermon on Trinity Sunday, struck a chord with me, too:

"We each feel lonely when someone in whom we had invested hope of love deserts us or lets us down. Loneliness comes from the gaps in our lives that people don’t seem to be able to fill.

Listen though to these words from an obscure mystic quoted by Henri Nouwen

Don’t surrender your loneliness so quickly

Let it cut more deep. Let it ferment and season you,

As few human or divine ingredients can,

Something missing in my heart tonight has made my eyes soft. My voice so tender.

It has made my need for God absolutely clear  (Shams al din Hafiz)"

This has little to do with photography or anything strictly amateur-eye-ish; it's just something that has been preying on my mind lately, and I thought maybe sharing it here would help me to get over it! Fr. Andrew also spoke about putting people on pedestals, which also helped me make a big decision that I'm now glad I made. A little cryptic, I know, but to cut a long story short, I nearly contacted someone I don't know (on Farcebook/Fakebook), on the basis of having spent my adolescence (and some adulthood!) misguidedly idolising them, or at least the person I thought they were.

Anyhoo. I'll be back soon… been editing wedding photos from my first-ever (maybe last-ever, who knows?) wedding! 830+ … It's taken some time!

qb xxx