Happy New Year!

Ring out the old, ring in the new,

Ring, happy bells, across the snow:

The year is going, let him go;

Ring out the false, ring in the true.

- In Memoriam, Alfred, Lord Tennyson

LISTEN: Lissie

She's pretty cool.

GIFT: Flensted Mobile

Even if you're not a little babe, looking at a Flensted Mobile
can calm your day.

So many designs to choose from, I do believe it makes the perfect gift :)

And one helluva decor piece in your home ... so modern, so chic.

PHOTOGRAPHER: Ruth Orkin

Ruth Orkin was an award-winning photojournalist and filmmaker. Daughter of a silent film actress, she grew up in Hollywood in the heyday of the 1920s and 1930s. At 17 years old she took a monumental bicycle trip across the United States from Los Angeles to New York City to see the 1939 World’s Fair, and she photographed along the way. While living in New York, Orkin worked at a nightclub photographer and a baby photographer by day. In 1951, LIFE sent Orkin to Israel. From there she traveled to Florence, Italy where she shot her most famous photograph, "American Girl in Italy," part of a series "Don't Be Afraid to Travel Alone." Orkin's model for the series was Nina Lee Craig, a student Orkin met while traveling.

Read more about Ruth Orkin and her other photographic series and films here.

LOST ART: Bookplate

You can get fancy and use the Latin ex-libris, but a bookplate is pretty much just a lovely way to let folks know that they've stolen your book.

And sometimes people used a little rhyme to make a would-be thief think twice:

If this book you steal away,

What will you say 

On Judgment Day? 

Bring back this tradition by getting a custom bookplate here

SISTER ACT: The Kim Sisters

K-Pop before there was K-Pop.  The Kim Sisters took America by storm in the 60s singing American pop and country-and-western tunes.  You could say, they sang Seoul music.

POEM: Annabel Lee

On October 3, 1849, a delirious Edgar Allan Poe was found in a Baltimore ditch.  He died four days later in a hospital, but never became coherent enough to explain how he came to be in his condition.
Annabel Lee, published posthumously, was probably the last poem Poe wrote.