I is for...

innocence

To see a world in a grain of sand, And a heaven in a wild flower: Hold infinity in the palm of your hand, And eternity in an hour. ~William Blake

MySpace Music Playlist at MixPod.com

here's to holding onto innocence. to dream impossible things and imagine unseen beauty. to have all the time of the world at your fingertips. to love without reason and to see perfection in simplicity.

click on the images for the source!

I hope you see innocence today!
♥emma

These make me happy!

These make me happy for no particular reason. They just do.

1)found via Make it Easy by Nicholas Haggard
2)tsumori via Windy Days via Make it Easy
3)is by the ever so talented Whitney (Darling Dexter )
4 & 5)found via Wild Keiki photos from Abless' Flickr stream
5)via Darling Dexter from Dace
Have a very happy night! Be back here in the morning! love, emma

Sunday Reads

I have not shared a book review in a very long while. So I thought I would tell you about two of my recent favorites. The first is Little Bee by Chris Cleave. I really, really enjoyed this book! I have never heard a peep about it and while browsing in the book store I could not help but be drawn to this amazing cover! And then you open the cover to read the jacket and you are met with this...

"We don't want to tell you too much about this book. It is truly special story and we don't want to spoil it. Nevertheless, you need to know something, so we will just say this: This is the story of two women. Their lives collide one fateful day, and one of them has to make a terrible choice. Two years later, they meet again. The story starts there. Once you have read it you'll want to tell everyone about it. When you do, please don't tell them what happens. The magic is in how it unfolds."

Now tell me you would have been able to put that down! And so I will not say much since the jacket pleads with me not to. I will say the two women are from very different worlds. Everything from their country, culture, age, everything is different from one another and the author does an amazing job of alternating back and forth between the two ladies narrating the tale. You are perfectly aware of who is telling a specific piece of the story. Cleave is wonderfully descriptive and unfolds the story in a beautiful and painful way. There are nice touches of humor and plenty of moments that will catch your breath.
The one thing I didn't like is hard to explain and not a deal breaker by any means. Every once in a while in Cleaves efforts to be descriptive or touching or whatever, he becomes obvious or silly in what he is trying to achieve. I don't know if that makes any sense and like I said it does not happen enough to even think about putting the book down!
I give it ♥♥♥♥ out of 5

The second one which I just finished a few days ago is absolutely stunning! You sit down, read the first few lines and the pages start to fly by. Yours eyes gliding over Cormac McCarthy's masterful prose and captivating story-telling! It is beautiful and terrifying! The back of the book reads, "A father and his young son walk alone through burned America, heading slowly for the coast. Nothing moves in the ravaged landscape save the ash on the wind. They have nothing but a pistol to defend themselves against the men who stalk the road, the clothes they are wearing, a cart of scavenged food - and each other."
There is no sun because ash hovers over everything, they walk around with masks and run into terrifying situations that will have you quivering with the thought of actually being there. There are strong biblical themes throughout the book which added a deeper meaning and more interest.
The conversations between the nameless man and son are short, perfect, and poetic. The formation of words used to describe the bleak landscape, horrific encounters, or the moments of luck and hope shared between father and son are gripping and emotionally wrenching. Making you wonder if you could ever exist in this post-apocalyptic world! One review that I read so accurately described, "the word choice and imagery is classic McCarthy yet is leaner and more honed, tighter and in turn more intense. The whole book follows this pattern. No word, not a single one, is extraneous." This last sentence is so true and perfect, because each word is used on purpose!
Some lines I fell in love with...
"The blackness he woke to on those nights was sightless and impenetrable. A blackness to hurt your ears with listening. Often he had to get up. No sound but the wind in the bare blackened trees. He rose and stood tottering in that cold autistic dark with his arms outheld for balance while the vestibular calculations in his skull cranked out their reckonings. An old chronicle."
"By day the banished sun circles the earth like a grieving mother with a lamp."
" He pulled the boy closer.
Just remember that the things you put into your head are there forever, he said. You might want to think about that.
You forget some things, don't you?
Yes. You forget what you want to remember and you remember what you want to forget."

"If he is not the word of God God never spoke." father, about his son
There were so many more but these were shorter so...
And I give this one ♥♥♥♥♥

I also wanted to apologize if my posts have been bombarding your blogroll! I am trying to organize my tags so that I can have them in the sidebar for easy access to posts. I don't know of any other way to do this except to go in and change the tags and republish the post. I would love a tag cloud but I can't seem to find a place where I can create one for blogger. Any suggestions? I hope you all have a fantastic Sunday and maybe get a little reading done!

H is for...

Heart♥

How can this one organ make so many choices for us? It does not think, it does not calculate, or reason. And yet many of our decisions are based on what our heart is feeling. A squeeze or a flutter. The feeling of your blood pumping quickly from it's center. It can make you walk away or it can convince you to stay. Your heart can pull tears down your face or lifts your lips in a smile. In this one muscle it provides you with passion and pain.
It can make you
sick,
sore, or
broken.
It can make you
soft,
light, or
warm
Wild hearted or faint of heart

The heart has reasons which the reason cannot understand. ~Blaise Plascal

where the heart is
from the bottom of my heart
shot through the heart
hearts on fire
my heart hurts
deep down in your heart
oh, my heart be still
i (heart) you
my heart will go on
the heart wants what the heart wants
(click on the photo for it's source)

Sorry I have been so absent! Work has been very, very busy! But in a good way!
I miss being here though and seeing all the amazing things that people have to post on their own blogs! I am happy that it is now the weekend and I can browse!
A few people asked if I wrote the last post and I did. So thanks so much for the kind comments! I get nervous posting those types of things because they come from a real place and it is hard to put even little things like that out there.

I have been meaning to share two wonderful things I received in the mail recently.
First, I received this beautiful necklace in the mail a few weeks ago and I LOVE it! Cindy Hoo is so talented and makes amazing jewelry with a rustic touch! Her package was so adorable and perfect I almost didn't want to open it! But come, knowing this was inside? I opened! Her is site Here and Etsy Here!

And I was so thrilled to learn that I had won this t-shirt (the cute yellow sun! it says kiss below the sun!)from April at Secondsister Suaviloquy. It is a Ando and Friends shirt and it is so adorable! She is so sweet and has a really fun and touching blog. She also has an Etsy shop where she sells fun and lovely jewelry. I like this one a lot...
Well that is all for now my lovely bloggers. I hope to run into you around the internet this weekend!
♥Emma

A Memory

Our small hands pressed the brown-grey shells together until our knuckles turned white and the hard covering split open between our palms. We pulled out the divided pecan meat while we laughed at the events of the afternoon. Although the soft nuts did not fill our stomachs as a hearty meal would we were satisfied. We could have cracked through an entire bumpy carpet of thick oval shells that lay under their trees and return tomorrow to be greeted by newly laid ground coverings. It seemed as if the mossy trees could have held no more nutty shells yet everyday the ones we had emptied the day before were replaced there on the dirt and grass.
While we laughed and cracked and ate it rained. Only an afternoon shower, light. But long and steady enough to filter it's drops down through the mothering trees, sliding down leaves and gliding around the lush curls of grey moss. We did not move. We stayed and cracked and ate and listened to the wet slip from leaf to leaf to head. The rain trickled through our hair and we tasted the cool drink when we were able to catch some on our flat toungues.
Soon, the clouds drifted past, finding new trees to cover and new upturned mouths to fill. Maybe this time it would see a wood full of pine trees. It's droplets would not struggle through curls and leaves but effortlessly slide down thin needles to a soft bed of fallen brown.
Our hair stuck wet to our necks. Our clothes clung to our backs, our chest, our sides. We felt a chill in the once gracious shade of the trees and decided to move to the space between their overhang where the sun had room to warm the wet ground and our bodies. There in the weedy green, with satisfied bellies and wet tongues, with the sounds of nut shell falling on nut shell, our clothes dried in the sun.

Photos found on Guayayaba. She is pretty Great!

I hope you weekend is full of memory making moments!
♥Emma

Flower News

I'm super busy right moving all my pictures and music over to a new computer along with setting up all my bookmarks (the blogs are endless). So for tonight I will leave you with happy news!

Ban. do is having a 25% off sale on their lovely flower headbands for the month of May! I want one of each pretty please!
I hope your night is full of pretty!
♥emma

Oh, if only my afternoon looked like this...

find it here. found via El beso

My mom is states away and I miss her. She is precious to me! Has always been, will always be! Happy Mother's Day!
♥Emma

Showing Off!

Biggest apologies for falling off the face of the Earth for a few days! Everyone's comments have been just so unbelievably kind and flattering! You guys really make me so giddy! I especially enjoyed the stories of animal friends that were shared. I was so shocked by some of them! Everything from baby bears to elephants and rabbits, I loved them all! Thank you!
Okay, so where was I? I flew down to Macon, GA (about an hour and a half, maybe) south of Atlanta, GA to watch my 'mazing mother show in the Region 12 Arabian Horse Show. This was a big deal for her and only her second show cantering! She did a beautiful job and we had such a fun time! I love being around a horse show. Plus! There was a dog show (obedience and whatever the other is called. "best of breed" stuff) on the same grounds and my mom used to show golden retrievers so she showed me around and explained what was going on. Anyways, I am back and will have much to post this weekend and next week. Have a lovely Friday night!

mom and Godiva

♥ Emma

A few Lovelies from last week...

1)I want this scarf! Thanks to Blue Moss!
2) SeaUnicorn has such romantic and whimsical jewelry!
3)Just so pure and beautiful! Via Green Wedding Shoes
4) sophisticated/pretty dress with a bit of fun! by Maisy Brown
5)This wedding is so perfectly pretty! Not to mention the bride is gorgeous! via The Wedding Cabaret Photograghy by Dana + Jeremy Photography
6)This is just too sweet to eat! via The Wedding Cabaret
7)The umbrellas are a perfect touch! I love the shapes of these! via
8) And of course 100 Layer Cake put together a color board that just swept me away!