Dearest Dad,

I am sorry you lost your job. We knew this might be coming but I hoped it would not really come.
I know you will survive and there are other jobs out there. I know you will always take care of us.
But what a disapointment!
I wish I could help more, you have always taken care of me, I want to take care of you.
As you know, I have no money, but I will help in any way I can.
And I know you are only joking, but if we do all have to move into one house, it will be okay. You are not that annoying to live with.
It is a scary time, but I know we can make it. I am sure once it is known that you are a free man, job offers will be coming left and right, I mean, come on, look at that face!: Dad - Age 9 and soooo handsome!

Dad and Me - 1983

Dad- the basketball champ!!!! - Forest Grove High 1973

Dad with Grandpa and Grandma (nice hair!)

Dad and Carin
Dad - working at Grandma's house ( i love your hat.)

Keep on truckin'!

Love Always,
Your Daughter

Da Vinci

Patrick and I went to see the Da Vinci exhibit at OMSI (Oregon Museum of Science and Industry) AKA the coolest place ever, especially if you are a kid, for his birthday, (hooray for you! birthday!). That's Patrick (above) posing as Mona Lisa.

The exhibit was AMAZING. The first floor was mostly about his journals and inventions. Some where in Italy a group recreated his inventions using his journals. It was crazy to see how many things he came up with, scuba gear, the bike, tanks, helicopters, cars that move on their own, clocks etc. Most of the stuff you couldn't touch but there was quite a few things you could, and then you could see the things he invented in action.

There was a few videos throughout. One about a horse sculpture he made that was destroyed, one on his theory of the golden ratio and the Vitruvian Man (boggeled my mind man), one on Mona Lisa etc.

The second floor was mainly his art and a ton on Mona Lisa. You find out all these things about her and the painting that no one ever teaches you in art history that are really fascinating. Like that she hung in a bathroom for a long time, someone threw a rock at her, and that yes, she did have eyebrows and eye lashes, among a million other details.

So this guy created a camera that could photograph all the different layers of the painting and see in all these hard to see colors (it's really more intense than this but I don't really understand it). After photographing the painting and finding out all this stuff, he can tell us all these cool facts PLUS show us what the Mona Lisa actually looked like when Da Vinci was looking at her.

When you see the mock ups of what she actually looked like, it's stunning. She looked nothing like today. She was rosy and flush and the background was a really beautiful, inviting place. Not the scary dark place behind her now. Actually she looked like she might have come from the Rococo fad. Leo would probably kill me for saying that. But really, the colors reminded me of The Swing, by Fragonard.

I have taken a ton of art history classes and all of my professors failed to mention these details. I have even stood in front of the Mona Lisa myself, and I feel like if I would have known what the OMSI exhibit told me before I went to Paris I would have been so much more interested in her when I stood there, and probably not thinking about all the sweaty people crushed around me.
I am not going to give away all of her secrets. You must go and find those yourself. I will leave you with two amazing quotes I learned from Da Vinci though:
"Art is never finished only abandoned." and "There are those who see, those who see when shown and those who do not see."


Leo, you rock my world.

LDM

The Nest

Dear Newlywed's,

Buy this:The Nest: Newlywed Handbook by Carley Roney

It's been so helpful. That's all I'm gonna say.


Love always,
LDM

Jodi Picoult

I know, she's like EVERYWHERE now. And I totally have the "I knew of her way back when" syndrome. Like when you've been listening to a band forever, thinking they were totally the coolest shit around, and then suddenly said band are all over the radio and you see people wearing said band's t-shirts and riding around with said band's bumper stickers on their car. It sucks. I'm sorry, I wanna share but not with the WHOLE WORLD! And then I get afraid that that horrible thing will happen where said band becomes really cliche and starts writing really crappy "pop" music even if said band did NOT PLAY POP!

This is how I feel about Jodi Picoult. Except she hasn't started to suck....thank the Lord!

Like when Bob Dylan changed his sound and added a band behind him, but all his First Fans thought it sucked and he was a sell out and the Brits boo-ed him. Jodi is kinda like Bob. I still like both their first work and their current work. That is a good thing, cause you know, I'm a First Fan.

I have been reading Jodi since 1998. I walked into a bookstore when I was in the 8th grade, looking for a new book to read. I was totally stumped and lost, I had just finished reading everything John Saul had out at the time and was looking for something fresh. (I have this habit of being totally committed to one author at a time and devouring everything they have published, even if it's only a hundred word tidbit in some obscure magazine when they were fifteen. I'm working on branching out, it's been hard.) So I asked an employee what she would recommend and she handed me The Pact. I bought it on faith, took it home and had it read (I'm serious) that night. The next day I went back to the bookstore and bought as many of her books as I could afford with my allowance.

She soon became my favorite author. I went to her book signing in a little bookstore in Multnomah Village called Annie Blooms Books. I begged my father to go with me. As an aspiring writer himself, it was not hard. I was the youngest in the room. The only girl I would say, all the other people there were definitely women. I was so nervous, but loved every moment of the reading. And at the end, I got in line and she signed my books. I have gone back every year she has come to Portland. She even remembered my name at one signing. I was totally star struck. I asked her a question one time about the ending to her book Salem Falls, it's hard to explain her answer but the way she talked to me was like a real friend. It was wonderful. I even started emailing her if I had questions about certain parts of her stories. She always responded and was always kind.

My favorite book of hers is definitely Harvesting the Heart. I have read it so many times I have lost count. The cover is all faded and worn, about to fall off. It sits by my bed on my nightstand, always. I can't really describe that book, it just always made me feel so normal about having doubts in my life, and that somehow I would find a way, even if I had to run away to find it. It is one of her firsts. On the copy I have her hair is very short and she looks totally different from the picture with her family above.

Tomorrow her new book comes out, Handle With Care. I will buy it tomorrow, even if I have to use all my pennies. Every year I do, it's like an introduction to spring. I am proud of Jodi for being so successful. And like Bob I'm sure the fame won't go to her head, or at least she will keep writing good books.

I hope this book is just as good, if not better, than the last.
Congrats Jodi!

LDM