I talk a lot about Icing and the marvelous master mind behind it Gala Darling. I love this girl, this website & everything that comes out of it! She’s one of my favorite girl superheroes and she fills me with joy & inspiration on a regular basis! In all areas of life she aligns herself with beauty, greatness & magic and makes it easy or almost inevitable for you to do the same!! If you want 2009 to be a hell of a lot more sparkly, go to Icing as often as I did in 2008! Everyday!
Emily Martin is the girl behind A Black Apple, a wonderful Etsy shop. I find Emily to be the perfect example of a modern successful multimedia independent artist. She amazes me time and time again with her sweetness+ cuteness,productivity levels,skillfulness, dedication & wonderful creations! Her blog has been one of my great inspirations this year.
Nubby is an incredibly gorgeous woman with a ass·kicking style and great marketing, business & design tips. She is adorable, and she takes great pictures. She’s also a successful & matter·of·fact sort of girlie that makes you feel excited to get to work!!
Sometimes it gets quite hard to stay raw and eat the foods I really want to eat. Running out of ideas & feeling unmotivated is something I have a cure for now though, and that’s Heathy’s blog. She’s not only a cutie pie, she also makes amazing raw pies & everything else imaginable. She makes me want to be raw. And she makes me realize it’s not only possible but easy, exciting & fun! Even in the cold snowy lands of Canada!
The self-described “warm and nurturing environment to share and learn about
raw foods, health, growth, alternative parenting, green living and more” is the perfect place for anyone wanting to learn more about the raw & living foods lifestyle. With tons of recipes, tips & advice is a great resource for beginners and seasoned raw foodies alike. The community is wonderful and always open to any sort of questions!
In January 2008 Jamie Lee Rosa started interviewing artists for the
LiveJournal community
AddMyArtJournal, a community of artists promoting other artists. In her interviews she always kept the same format and questions, focusing on the artist’s background, inspiration & creative methods. I loved the concept & became an instant fan. So inspirational to read about your favorite artist’s ways & histories. By May 2008 she had outgrown the Livejournal community and started her own website/magazine. “An Online Magazine By Artists, For Artists. Carmine Magazine’s purpose is to be a place for artists and fans of art to find information. Everything from interviews with artists, tips on making better art, business advice for your art business, art news, featured artists, featured web stores, and product reviews.”
It all started when last March Oprah organized a 10 week online seminar with Eckhart Tolle on his book “A New Earth:Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose”. Each week for a 90 minutes they discussed a chapter of the book & took in calls from people all over the world through Skype to answer questions. I had already read the book (recommended to me by my mother) and loved it very much, so it was a great experience. When it was done Oprah started posting on her website recordings of her XM Radio Show
Soul Series. “Each week on her XM Radio show, Oprah sits down with leading spiritual thinkers, teachers and authors to talk about matters of the soul, and shares insights into her own life. Plus, she invites listeners to reflect on their own spiritual journeys.”
I love Paulo Coelho. He is such a magical man. I’ve loved every book I’ve read by him & as I’ve grown older and have developed my spiritual side I’ve found a new depth to his writing that I wasn’t able to perceive before. His blog is great, specially if you’re a fan.He writes about everything, from his everyday life, his views, insights & ideas, to answering reader’s questions about his books. He even posts the occasional podcast!
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Hope you enjoy them as much as I have been!
·Peace, Love & Stardust·
.Image by Thomas Rockstar.
Today I thought I’d share with you five of my favorite websites that I visit everyday. They make my life easier and/or better ! If you don’t know about them already I think you will love them as much as I do:
Current is a news and information network.
It’s unique because it pioneered the television industry’s leading model of interactive viewer created content (VC2). Comprising roughly one-third of Current’s on-air broadcast, this content is submitted via short-form, non-fiction video “pods”.
They are submitted to Current.com , their online home, where people get to vote on whether the pod is ready for TV by giving it a green or red light. Actually users can vote on practically everything on the website from photos to YouTube videos to stories posted from elsewhere on the web.
That way members of their online community contribute links to news stories, blog posts, videos, and other influential content they find on the Internet. Through their contributions and votes, VC2 uploads, and Viewer Created Ad Messages (VCAMs), the community plays an influential role helping Current determine what gets aired on TV.
It is worth mentioning that both Viewer Created Ad Messages (VCAMs) and “pods” (VC2s) are paid.
I first came upon Current TV a few years ago when I actually had cable.( You can find out if you get it here ). For a while, it was the only reason we even kept our TV & cable provider. When we moved to Madison a couple of years ago, we decided to finally throw away our television but thankfully now you can also watch their regular TV programming on their website here.
Current’s programming ranges from daily pop culture coverage to political satire, music journalism and unique insights into global stories through Vanguard and Citizen Journalism.
This is subject to a whole ‘nother post but, for a long time now, with Time magazine they are my only source of news.
Pandora is a music discovery service designed to help you enjoy music you already know, and to help you discover new music you’ll love.
It’s sort of like a free online radio only you create the radio stations and you choose what kind of music gets played.
It’s powered by what they call “the most comprehensive analysis of music ever undertaken, the Music Genome Project: a crazy project started back in early 2000 to capture the complex musical DNA of songs using a large team of highly-trained musicians.”
You start by signing up and then telling them one of your favorite songs or artists. They’ll launch a streaming station playing music that is similar to the one you told them. You can create as many radio stations as you want, and add as many artists or songs to each station as you like. Whenever a song is playing you can give it a thumbs up or a thumbs down to let them know how you feel about that song playing in that particular station. This way, and with the collaboration of the excellent Music Genome Project soon enough you are listening to amazing music all of the time from all the artists you’ve always loved and new ones that you wonder how you ever went without!
This website is a true gem & makes my life a whole lot lovelier everyday!
Did I mention you can listen to Pandora on the Web, on your cell phone or even in your TV at home ?
Sidereel is an entertainment guide and community site for television and film enthusiasts where you can find links to over 25,000 streaming TV shows, movies and more. Each show, film or actor has its own user created and edited page including information, links to watch, and sections for news, reviews and discussions.
SideReel is free to use. Most of the links on SideReel point to free videos. Some links point to content that you have to pay for, such as video from Amazon and iTunes.
Their motto : “Finding quality entertainment online or offline shouldn’t be difficult - our job is to make it easy.”
Their pages are entirely user editable, so all users can click “edit” on any page and add or change information to keep the page up to date and also to add more information about the show, movie, person, character, or video. If you don’t find a show,movie or actor you think should be there you can create a new page from scratch. You can also add new links, write a review or even start a discussion on an existing page.
To watch a video, just go to the show’s page like Heroes or search by title in the search box on the top right of the site. On every page there’s a link box that’s categorized by season and episode. The current season of a show will always be at the top.
Click on the episode you want to watch & that link will open up to show the different links available for that episode.
SideReel indexes links to video. They do not host the actual videos. Videos are hosted by different sites, which SideReel does not control. If you are within the U.S., you should be able to watch videos from sites like ABC, NBC, CBS, Hulu and others.
As I mentioned above I do not own a television, but thanks to SideReel it doesn’t mean I don’t watch my favorite shows every week as they come out, sometimes as early as a few hours after they’ve aired!
The quality of the video links (specially in the popular shows) has been getting better and better and now you can easily find most videos in HD.
It’s awesome! No commercials & you can watch as many episodes as you like 
iGoogle offers the ability to create a personalized page that gives you at-a-glance access to information from Google and across the web. On this self-designed page, you can choose and organize content with Google Gadgets.
You can either personalize an iGoogle page associated with your Google Account or personalize one that’s not associated with any account. Signing in to your Google Account before personalizing your page lets you keep your settings across computers or on a shared computer. Certain gadgets, such as Gmail, Bookmarks, and Search History, are not available unless you’re signed in to a Google Account that uses these services.
There seems to be gadgets for everything imaginable from Kitten of the Day pictures to World Sunlight Maps.
For example, on my iGoogle I’ve got the following gadgets: Gmail inbox, weather forecasts for Madison, WI & Madrid, Spain (in both Fahrenheit & Celsius), digital clock, calendar (from which I can see events & holidays in my area), moon phase calendar, my bookmarks, My RSS feeds, YouTube search & a To-Do List gadget.
As you can see, just by having this highly customizable page with thousands of gadgets to choose from, opened in my browser I can easily and quickly access most of the information I need. It definitely helps to keep the general craziness of my desktop under control.
It’s easy to personalize your own iGoogle but keep in mind that if you aren’t signed in a Google Account your personalized iGoogle page is only available on your current computer. If you happen to delete your browser’s cookies, your personalized settings will be removed.
With iGoogle, users can also select unique themes for their Google homepages. Some of the themes are animated depending on weather conditions, the time in your area and so on. Other features include skies that lighten or darken throughout the day or the ability to add color-changing lady bugs, butterflies, or bubbles that float across the screen. Now there’s even a selection of themes by professional artists from Betsy Johnson to Bob Dylan.
Live Journal is what really got me (and a lot of other people) into the internet. Even though now there’s tons of social networking sites &blogging platforms, I still find Live Journal to be awesome in its own ways.
LiveJournal is a virtual community and online journal service with an emphasis on user interaction. A basic account is free and paid accounts receive access to extra features. Currently LiveJournal has five account levels all with different privileges & features.
Each journal entry has its own web page, which includes the comments left by other users. In addition, each user has a journal page showing his or her most recent journal entries.
The most distinctive feature of LiveJournal is the “friends list”. Each user has a friends page, which collects the most recent journal entries of the people on his or her friends list , which makes it easier to keep up with your favorite journals.
In the social networking aspect, LJ is unique because of the many levels of connection between one user and another. Two users can have no relationship, they can list each other as friends mutually, or either can “friend” the other without reciprocation.
Generally, “friending” allows the friends of a user to read protected entries and causes the friends’ entries to appear on the user’s “friends page.” Friends can also be grouped together in “friends groups”.
You can write entries in your personal journal and use different security levels to restrict their visibility,ranging from Public entries which any site visitor can read to Private entries which are only visible to you to Friends Only entries which are only visible to your “friends”.
You can also restrict & control comments, or even ban specific users from commenting on your journal.
LiveJournal allows users to customize their accounts in several ways. Users can modify their own journal templates & themes ,upload graphical avatars or “userpics,” to identify themselves along with their username.
Each user also has a “User Info” page, which contains contact information, a biography, images and lists of friends, interests, communities and schools which the user has attended in the past or is currently attending.
LiveJournal also allows “voice posts” to their paid and sponsored users, where one can call into the system and record an entry.
My favorite part about Livejournal is the communities, which are group journals in which multiple users can post entries centered on a similar theme, topic or interest. Number of members can range from thousands to a few.
Users who are interested in a particular subject can find or create a community for this subject. For example, when I decided I was going to dye my hair pink, I searched for pink hair communities and found that there were a few & one that I particularly fell in love with and through which I’ve found quite a few amazing pink haired ladies from over the world.
After you find and join and community that interest you, you can post comments or entries to the communities. You can also remain just a “watcher”, but each community has different security levels. Some only allow members to see most entries
A community always has at least one maintainer. Maintainers use their own user accounts to supervise a community, control its settings and Community Info, and perform other administrative functions. They also usually have moderators if the community has moderated posting. Usually the moderator has to approve your entry before being posted.
I find that LiveJournal allows for information to flow between people better than any other social networking site I know.
When it comes to so many subjects, it is the place where you can get the most information & user reviews & experiences on any given topic. Many communities, like the pink hair one I mentioned above, also serve as sort of market research data banks. With so many people talking about their personal experiences with different products, techniques or methods on doing something.
It’s a very effective and fun way to find like minded people and connect with others based on things that interest you.
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·Peace, Love & Stardust·
El Rastro· Photo by markeveleigh
I love shopping at Flea Markets. It is something I’ve been doing all of my life. I got it from my parents who have always been into flea market shopping of all kinds. At one point in their twenties they even had their own stand at Madrid’s Rastro where they sold American vinyl music!
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A flea market is an outdoor bazaar where all sorts of inexpensive goods are sold or bartered. It depends a lot on which one you go to. In big European cities like Madrid, London or Paris you can find anything from inexpensive trendy clothes & accessories, handmade and artesian goods, antiques, secondhand items and even pets! It’s also worth mentioning that nowadays flea markets have become infamous as outlets for bootlegged movies and music or knockoff brand clothing, accessories, or fragrances.
Shopping at a flea market is a very different experience than going to the shops or a mall.
First there is the atmosphere, crowds, smells, noise, people yelling out their bargains…it all takes you back to the bazaar feeling of the marketplace, where the experience is a transaction between individuals which makes the lines of negotiation blurrier and the excitement greater. Shopping at a flea market gives you a sense of freedom, adventure and thrill that is missing in modern day style shopping.
Another reason why it’s great to shop at flea markets is because is one of those places where you can find truly unique stuff. They are traditionally places where the things for sale are items not available in shops or malls, such as antiques, rarities, curiosities,handmade goods, artesian jewelery or local indie designers clothes.
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Because of our love for flea markets when my family and I went to Paris recently we made a point of visiting the legendary and rumored to be the original flea market the Marche aux puces (”market with fleas” in French) of Saint-Ouen, in the northern suburbs.
Visiting a town or city’s flea markets is a great idea as a traveler as it allows you to experience the culture, people, fashion, style and trends and overall personality of the place from a different, more real perspective.
It gives you a reality check in terms of the cost of living of the town. I was very surprised to find that Paris’ Les Puces de saint-Ouen’s prices were extremely low in comparison to what I expected judging from the cost of food and drinks at restaurants and brasseries.
Les Puces is a large, long-established outdoor bazaar, one of four in Paris. From the late 17th century, the makeshift open-air market in the town of Saint-Ouen began as temporary stalls and benches among the fields and market gardens where rag pickers exchanged their findings for a small sum.
We spent several hours walking around, there was so much to see! From really nice clothes and shoes for great bargains(thanks in great part to my dad’s awesome negotiating skills!) to all kinds of bizarre antiques!. It was really fun and an interesting contrast to Madrid’s Rastro, where vendors aren’t usually as open to bargaining as they seemed to be in Paris, and which lasts only until 3pm vs. Les Puces which lasts all day. This allows for very different atmospheres through out the day, depending on the time and place.
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I also paid a visit to El Rastro,(which means “the trail”) the following weekend. They say the market probably owes its name to the tanneries that were once located in Ribera de Curtidores (’riverside of tanners’). Close by, on the bank of the river Manzanares, there was an abattoir. Transporting the slaughtered cattle from the abattoir to the tannery left a trail (rastro) of blood along the street. An alternative etymology suggests el Rastro once meant “outside”, referring to the fact el Rastro was once outside the jurisdiction of the mayor’s court.
I rather stick with the alternative version since the original it’s a bit gore.
El Rastro takes place every Sunday and public holiday of the year, from 9 am to 3 or 4pm in the barrio de Embajadores (’Ambassadors’ s neighbourhood’) in the Central District of Madrid.
As I said before I have been going there all my life. As a child I went with my parents and I would always get some kind of neat little treasure. And as I grew up I started going there with friends to shop for cool alternative clothes, jewelry, shoes and accessories. It was also a place to get all kinds of alternative political propaganda as a rebellious teen!
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Certain streets or areas within El Rastro are associated, either by tradition or by the gathering of specialist stalls, with particular wares…
* There is “Calle de los Pajar¡tos” (’street of the birds’) where their permanent stalls sell domestic animals, birds and their supplies.
* “Calle de los Pintores” (’street of the Painters’), as its permanent stalls sell paintings and drawings and art supplies.
* Stalls around calle Rodas and the Plaza de General Vara del Rey and Plaza de Campillo del Mundo Nuevo specialise in buying and selling magazines, trading cards and stamps. A frequent sight in this area is young children swapping and trading with each other.
* Calle Carnero and calle Carlos Arniches are where bouquinistas sell old, rare and collectible books.
* The Plaza de Cascorro specialises in selling funky clothing and accessories.
* Calle Mira el Sol is for the movie enthusiast. You can find all kinds of odds and rarities.
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These are examples of big city legendary flea markets that sell a wide variety of things and that have been going on for hundreds of years. But there’s many types of flea markets. In the USA most towns hold a weekly farmer’s market, where farmers can sell produce to the public. Farmers’ markets often feature produce grown naturally or organically, meats that are raised humanely on pasture, handmade farmstead cheeses, eggs and poultry from free-range fowl, as well as heirloom produce and heritage breeds of meat and fowl. Farmers’ markets are a traditional way of selling agricultural and home manufactured products. A weekly market day is a part of normal life in villages and town squares throughout the world. In Madrid we have different ones in different neighborhoods and we call them “mercadillos” (little markets). It’s a similar concept as the farmer’s market and there is produce available but it isn’t so much farmer and food oriented as it is a general market with all kinds of things, from clothes and shoes to small appliances!
There’s endless types of flea markets all around the world. I’ve seen summer flea markets that seem to go 24/7 during the summer months (these are usually found on coastal tourist towns), permanent artesinian markets downtown big cities (like“Los Hippies de Goya” in Madrid) or in high crowded areas like subway & train stations, or niche ones like “La cuesta de moyano in madrid that features old and used books all year round or “El Mercado de Navidad” (the Christmas Market) in La Plaza Mayor in Madrid during the months surrounding the Holidays.
If you’ve never been to a flea market search for one around you http://www.findafleamarket.com/usmap.html and have a great time doing your holiday shopping!
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Experts’ Tips &Tricks:
♥ Bring a big purse or tote bag (preferably one that closes) so you can keep your acqusitions together & under control. This way you can also refuse all those little plastic bags and carry that much needed while crowd surfing bottle of water.
♥ Bring as much cash as you are willing to spend. No more, no less. And bring it in small bits (mix ‘em up though, you don’t want a hundred $1 bills).
♥ If you go with other people (and don’t have neon colored hair) make sure to wear some kind of colorful or unique hat, scarf or hair-do. This will greatly help in keeping track of eachother.
♥ When going to a huge flea market like el Rastro o Les Puces determine an itinerary,distance or areas to cover before going so you don’t just go where the crowd takes you and suddenly realize you have no clue where you’re at or where the nearest subway station is at.
♥ Whenever possible, take public transportation and make the station your meeting point when going with people in case anyone gets lost. And if you choose to take your car, try to car pool and park far away from the actual market to avoid traffic jams,crowds, being double parked or towed.
♥ Keep your bag on your shoulder, under your armpit. It is in these kind of crowded, loud,distracting situations that cellphone and wallet snatches happen!so beware!
♥ Don’t wait for people to let you go through, make space for you to look at something or ask you if they can help you with anything. Though these things can all happen depending on the market and its business, when shopping at a flea market is good to maintain a certain level of assertiveness and confidence if you want to get what you want. When you need to know how much something is, don’t be afraid to ask it out loud while swinging it in the air!
♥Usually the further you go into the “heart” of the market the cheaper the prices will get.
♥ Even though you might find the most unique or exciting thing in the first few stands, know that there will be other vendors further down with the same or similar product and it is usually worth waiting to check out all of your options & then go back and buy only those things that really stuck with you.
♥ Some places are up for bargaining and if you know how to do it (I don’t) it can be quite fun, but other places are absolutely closed to it. The best way to determine whether bargaining is acceptable is to just go ahead and try it at a couple of stands. If one or two do it, usually all do, and viceversa.
♥ It depends a lot on the style, location and personality of the flea market.
♥ It is usually safe to assume that if bargaining is going to occur it will happen in stands with vendors rather than in permanent stalls or shops.
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Do you shop at flea markets? * Is there many around where you live?* What kinds of things do you buy there?
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·Love,Peace & Stardust·
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