Chuck Berry and Blueberry Hill

Chuck Berry, rock and roll legend also known as "The Father of Rock and Roll", was born in St. Louis and still lives in a suburb of St. Louis today. He and the St. Louis landmark restaurant and music club, Blueberry Hill, have a strong connection going back many years.

Chuck Berry has been performing at Blueberry Hill for the past twelve years. He celebrated his 80th birthday there with a special standing-room only concert. And at the age of 83, he still performs a concert there one Wednesday a month. His concerts sell out, so buy tickets in advance.

Blueberry Hill is a perfect place to visit if you are a rock and roll fan. Located in the historic Delmar Loop area, there are shops and galleries to explore and the St. Louis "Walk of Fame" with stars of famous St. Louisans dotting the sidewalk. You can start your afternoon exploring the area and end off the evening with a casual dinner at Blueberry Hill.

When you enter the club, you are enveloped with rock and roll and pop-culture nostalgia. The walls are covered with memorabilia from Chuck Berry and Elvis Presley, pop-culture memorabilia, and vintage jukeboxes.

The food is casual, but delicious. Some of the Blueberry Hill specialties are the famous St. Louis Toasted Ravioli appetizers, chicken wings, and hamburgers. Waiters are friendly and can tell you about Chuck Berry's next concert date.

The next time you visit St. Louis, check out Blueberry Hill and the Delmar Loop.  If you are lucky, you can even catch a memorable Chuck Berry performance.  You can learn more about the Delmar Loop area here.

Pussman & Co. Sweet Teddy Giveaway

Danielle of Pussman & Co., Pussman Stuffies is giving away the sweetest hand-dyed teddy to celebrate her three-year blogging anniversary.  There are two more days to join - until March 23!

You can join the giveaway here:

http://pussman.blogspot.com/2010/02/3-year-blog-giveaway.html

Please check out her wonderful blogs and other sweet teddies, too. :)  Pussman & Co, and PussmanStuffies.

Three New Teddies in my Collection

In the last few months, I have gotten three new teddies for my teddy collection.  Most of my small collection is artist bears.

This teddy came from Japan and is by Rutsu.  She has small, wonderful mohair teddies with a vintage look.

This teddy came from Russia and is by Natalia Tolstykina.   She has a blog here that you can translate automatically into English.  The teddy is made of vintage rayon and is quite heavy.  I love the unique face and all the handwork on this bear.

The third teddy is by an internet teddy friend here in the U.S., Sharie Reetz.  Her website is here, and you will also find links to her blog there.  Her little mohair bears are brimming with character and are so endearing.

Here they are all together. :)

Memories of Paris

Paris - we visited Paris a few summers ago. It was like a surreal dream, ancient mingling with avant-garde, beauty everywhere. Some of my favorite memories are from that visit, and included a very special evening in which we visited my French penpal and her family and had dinner at her house. When you go to Paris, two must-sees are La Conciergerie and Giverny which is about forty-seven miles outside the city.

La Conciergerie, which dates back to Roman times, was built as a Roman fort, torn down and rebuilt as a castle around 1300 A.D., and was used as a prison to hold artistocrats and royalty during the French Revolution before they were guillotined. On the Conciergerie tour, we were able to walk through the prison up and down the ancient stone steps and view the prison cells. The cell where Marie Antoinette lived during her captivity has been recreated. The feeling of past history was overwhelming there.

Giverny, the beautiful home and garden of Monet is about forty-seven miles outside of Paris.

Giverny is a magical place, worthy of spending a full day exploring there. The best time to visit, of course, is the summer. In June or July, you can fully experience the magnificence of the garden. The garden is full of color, with flowers spilling out onto the paths. And across the road is Monet's famous water garden. The dream-like lusciousness is breathtaking.

Monet's simple, but exquisite house, has a pink exterior with green shutters. Ivy vines climb over the walls. His love of color extends from the garden to the house exterior and continues inside with each room painted a different striking color.

There is an lovely blog written by one of Giverny's guides that you may like to check out, Giverny Impression.

One World One Heart Giveaway

I am excited to be participating in the One World One Heart  Giveaway this year. This is the third year Lisa of "A Whimsicial Bohemian" is hosting this wonderful event started to bring bloggers from all over the world together.  You can read more about it and see the list of all the participants (over 1000 so far!) by clicking on the logo below.  There are so many wonderful blogs to visit!

To enter a chance to win my giveaway:

1. Leave a comment on this post by February 15, 5:00 P.M. Eastern Standard Time.

2. Please be sure your comment takes me back to you, if not, make sure to leave a email address where you can be reached.

3. You should have a blog to enter as this is a blog event.

The winner will be picked on February 15 and notified by email.

For my giveaway, I am offering Clio,  a miniature wool needlefelted dog with onyx eyes, a mohair tail, and a green wool felt collar.  She is about 1 1/4" tall by 1 1/2" long, 2 1/2" including her tail.  She comes with her own little purple needlefelted rug and pink ball.  (The rug shows up bluish in the photos but is actually purple.)

Our dog Chloe was the inspiration for Clio.

Next Time You Visit Bartlesville II- Price Tower

Price Tower is the tallest actualized skyscraper designed by Frank Lloyd Wright.  (He designed one other vertical structure, the S.C. Johnson Wax Research Tower.)   You will find it in the seemingly unlikely town of Bartlesville, Oklahoma.  However, a little digging into the history of Bartlesville shows that Bartlesville was a town that developed because of the oil industry in Oklahoma.  It was home to wealthy oil barons  and their wealth is reflected in the several examples of architecture by well-known architects.  Price Tower was  commissioned  by H. C. Price, founder of H. C. Price Company, an oil and gas pipeline company.

The design of Price Tower is based on a tree, but is a geometric, stylized design.  Frank Lloyd Wright himself called it, "the tree that escaped the crowded forest."  It has a center core with the actual floors, triangular shapes, coming out from the center like branches of a tree.  The outer color is pale beige concrete and green copper.  It has the appearance of a very stylized pine tree (squint your eyes and use your imagination) and is quite an amazing sight rising up from the town.

Price Tower is a fascinating place to visit.  Viewing the unique exterior is exciting in itself, but there are also interesting tours of the building that take you through some floors of the building where you visit  the office of H. C. Price and an apartment with original built-in furniture and wall designs.  During the tour you learn about  the design and history of the building.  You also learn biographical information on  H. C. Price, and Frank Lloyd Wright.  Frank Lloyd Wright's use of built-ins and wall and ceiling design including embossed wall panels in the  interior give the building a cohesive design.  The beautiful two-floor apartment has a very stylized look with built-in furniture and bas-relief designs on the walls.

You can see vintage photos of Price Tower including two photos of an original furnished apartment here.

Price Tower was conceived as a multipurpose building which would include corporate offices, retail space, and apartments.  In keeping  with the original purpose of the building, there is now a museum gallery  on the first floor.  When we visited Price Tower, the exhibit showing there was 3-logy Triennial 2008: Imaginative Qualities of Actual Things. The exhibit included work by international contemporary artists who used junk and found materials to create their art.  There were two  fascinating 3-dimensional mosaics that were large portraits.  When you walked up close to the portraits, the images faded and you saw old toys and pieces of junk attached to the canvas in an interesting design.  When you walked back and viewed the mosaics from a distance, you could see the portraits.  Another appealing work was a grouping of large jellyfish made from bubblewrap.  You can read more about the exhibit here.

Next time you are in the vacinity of Bartlesville, Oklahoma, I recommend visiting Price Tower for an interesting exploration of a unique Frank Lloyd Wright building and a wonderful museum gallery.

To see more on what to visit in Bartlesville, please check out the previous post, "Next Time You Visit Bartlesville I- Woolaroc".

Stuffed - New Stampington & Co. Magazine

Stuffed magazine published by Stampington and Co., pieces on front cover by Susan Mitchel (Sweet Pea of It's a Whimsical Life)

I just bought an issue of the new Stuffed magazine published by Stampington & Co. The publisher also publishes a variety of beautiful magazines such as Somerset Studio, Artful Blogging, Art Doll Quarterly, and Somerset Life.   Stuffed, like the other Stampington & Co. publications, is full of yummy eye-candy and lots of inspiration.

Stuffed includes articles by several talented artists including Pamela Overmeier of Kingfisher Farm, Q. D. Patooties,  and Susan Mitchel, Sweet Pea of It's a Whimsical Life.  In the articles, artists talk about their work and share their techniques.   Patterns are interspersed throughout the magazine.  There is also a fascinating article about www.theneedle.org, a group blog maintained by softie artists.

I first found the magazine mentioned on Sweet Pea's blog, It's a Whimsical Life.   In her January 17 post, she talks a little about the magazine.  Two of her pieces grace the cover of the magazine.    She has a shop on Etsy where she sells prints of her illustrations (as she is also a talented freelance children's book illustrator) and her softies.   Sweet Pea  is a very talented artist who makes endearing children's book illustrations and who also makes adorable, huggable softies.  Please check out her charming blog, too.

from Violet Pie - Look What Came in the Mail!

I ordered two little critters from the talented Violet Pie and was so excited to find them in the mail box a few days ago. 

The first one is a small, white mohair rabbit with needlefelted legs and tail. 

The second one is a  blue needle-felted elephant with orange ears.  His head and legs are jointed. 

They are both amazing -- sweet, whimsical, and beautifully crafted.  I am so happy with them.  Violet Pie is as nice as she is talented.  Please check out more of Violet Pie's wonderful work in her Etsy shop , Violet Pie - A Little Shop of Things, and on her blog, Violet Pie.