LIFE
Miles Davis and no-knead bread
Hi everyone! Sorry my blog wasn’t accessible almost all afternoon today. The server was down and I had to wait for my provider to fix the problem.
Anyway, I hope you had a great weekend! I did despite the rainy weather.
I went to the Miles Davis exhibition (held at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts – last day is August 29. More info here). It was great, lots of good stuff, beautifully done. Since it was a rainy Sunday afternoon, the exhibition was packed so I didn’t get to enjoy it as much as I wanted, but I had a great time nonetheless.
I also made bread. Yes, real bread. It’s so easy a child could do it. And it’s seriously as good as what you’d buy at an upscale bakery. It took less than 5 mn to prepare the dough (then you’ll need to let it rest for at least 12 hours). I didn’t have wheat bran so I coated the dough with just a bit of flour (which I like better anyway). And I was afraid our Le Creuset French oven would be too small, but it’s actually the perfect size (I’m not sure what size it is… maybe 2L or 3.3L). I love quick, simple recipes that make me feel like I can actually cook!
The whole process is explained in the video: (there’s a slightly different version of the recipe here)
Movies!
If you have nothing special planned for this weekend, I have a few movie suggestions. Most are rentals, the last one is still in theaters. Enjoy! And have a great weekend!
THE JONESES
It isn’t Oscar-material but it’s actually better than I expected. I was going to say it will speak to most minimalists and aspiring minimalists but I guess it would be preaching to the choir. Still interesting to watch.
MARY AND MAX
I love, love, love stopmotion animation, and Mary and Max is my absolute favourite. You’ll laugh and cry. Sometimes both at the same time. It reminded me of my relationship with my friend Guillaume, whom I met on a trip to Ireland when we were teenagers. He and I became best friends from day one and maintained our long distance friendship for years thanks to regular 10 to 20 page letters. (We didn’t use email back then, kids.)
HALF NELSON
I watched this movie several times and never get tired of it. Shareeka Epps and Ryan Gosling (hello total cuteness) are both amazing. Some may find it boring but I find it powerful.
500 DAYS OF SUMMER
One of the only “romandic comedies” (beside Love Actually and a few others) I can watch without rolling my eyes every 5 seconds.
SHOPGIRL
It’s a simple little movie that isn’t mind-blowing but I feel connected to Claire Dane’s character.
INCEPTION
If you’re into visual arts, this movie will be a nice treat. It takes imagination to a new level.
Special Friday
Today was a special day. I got to spend the day with my parents (who visited us from France and left tonight), my brother-in-law and his girlfriend (who visited us for the day all the way from the US), and my boyfriend (who took the day off for the occasion).
We had a late lunch together, which was really nice. I dressed up the table with flowers from the garden and my boyfriend fixed a simple yet amazing meal.
I’m not much of a cook but I love making things pretty. Everything feels more special when you take the time to live thoughtfully and beautifully.
Have a great weekend!
Life as a blogger and a minimalist
So apparently my previous post hit home with several people. So much so that some of my friends thought I was talking about them. I want to reassure you I am not that sneaky. :)
Regardless of who was involved in my story (and again I apologize for any misunderstanding), this is what I wanted to say: with the internet today, and all the house and lifestyle blogs we have access to (not to mention the tv shows), it’s very easy to get sucked in and to forget our own reality. It’s very easy to create a blog and collect hundreds, if not thousands, of pictures and fantasize for hours about the possibilities – while our living environment in real life remains uncared for.
I know because I used to be like that. Like I explained to a blog friend recently, a few years ago, I was an avid Apartment Therapy reader and couldn’t get enough of the House Tours. I also watched a lot of decoration and design shows back when I watched tv. At some point, I realized I had to stop envying people and living vicariously through blogs and tv shows, and just do what I had to do to live the life I wanted. So I stopped reading AT and watching tv, and started designing my life. That’s basically when my minimalist adventure started.
And that’s where my point comes in. As a minimalist, maybe you spend hours theorizing on minimalism, reading blogs and books on minimalism and planning out your ideal minimalist life, but maybe you get so sucked in you don’t realize you aren’t doing anything to actually live your ideal minimalist life; your home is still cluttered and full of knicknacks, you still spend all your free time shopping, and you generally haven’t applied any of the minimalist principles to your life. That’s why I said “stop theorizing and start living your ideal life”.
I guess the moral of the story is, inspiration from other blogs is always nice, but we should spend more time doing and less time fantasizing. I don’t want to sound like some kind of minimalist guru (and frankly I have no ambition of becoming one) but here’s the thing: we’ve only got one shot at this life. When it’s over, it’s over. So let’s make the most out of it. :)
Dreaming your life vs. living your dream life
I got the idea of writing this post after reading a new (to me) house blog where the blogger posts pictures of gorgeous house interiors (from magazines and websites) every week. Clearly, I thought, she has great style. Plus she writes her posts in a way that shows she has a real passion for design and decorating. But then I saw some pictures of her own place, and I was surprised at how different her place was from the kind of pictures she posts on her blog (as well as the inspiring tone of her posts). There seemed to be such a gap between her “ideal style” and the decoration of her own place that I couldn’t help but be surprised. Obviously, there are things I don’t know about her (like the amount of time and money she can allocate to decoration) – plus she’s free to do whatever she wants, but my question is, if she loves decorating so much, why does she spend so much time and energy talking about it and posting hundreds of pictures of other people’s interiors (believe me, it’s a very time-consuming process) instead of investing more time in her own home sweet home and creating the ideal home that she obviously aspires to through the images she posts on her blog?
I don’t know… maybe nowadays it’s easy to live vicariously through blogs and other mediums, and we no longer feel the need to act on our dreams?
My point is: Don’t spend so much time theorizing about minimalism, and planning out your ideal minimalist life, and reading books and blogs on minimalism (and decluttering) that you forget to actually live your ideal life.
It’s like reading travel guides and magazines, and never actually travelling.
Or reading tons of health magazines when you have yet to eat your first healthy meal.
Or reading lots of self-help book, and not making any changes to your life.
You will just acquire a lot of useless information.
I say, stop dreaming and theorizing, and start living your ideal life. Minimalism is simply about getting rid of the “noise” (anything that’s not essential, from stuff to activities) to focus on what’s truly important to you. That’s all you need to know. The rest is just, well, noise.
Edit : To avoid any misunderstanding, I was not talking about a friend or blog friend. I was talking about a random blog I recently came across while perusing the internet.
