This weekend was filled to the brim with activity, most of it with the scoobs up in Boston. So much activity, in fact, that I am dragging and tired on this sunny Monday morning, and feeling slightly congested like I might get a cold at any moment. But it was worth it, because I had so much fun! It almost makes up for having to attend nine solid hours of classes while everyone else enjoys their Columbus Day.

First, I received two very important packages in the mail on Friday: both my Spoonflower order and my Ponoko order! Great excitement. I haven't photographed the fabric, but I went a little nutso over my fancy yellow stars:

On Friday I headed up to Boston and, among other things, had lunch with the ladies of the scooby clan:

Then on Saturday Matt, Lizzi, and Julie came into town to see Waterfire and get a taste of the RISD atmosphere. I was running around a little crazed for a portion of it, but eventually got all my to-do items checked off, and we enjoyed a delicious dinner at the Red Fez before walking over to Waterfire. I even managed to get us all onto the roof of the Design Center so that we could see the whole thing! Very cool, and we only had to climb out of one window to do it!

And then on Sunday I drove back up to Boston to attend Charlotte's first birthday party. She started taking her first steps just this week, so of course there had to be repeat performances for all the grandparents. And a huge pink piggie cake to be smushed and consumed. Lottie didn't really know what to make of all of it, but she was pretty cute anyways! I drove home and went immediately to bed, I was so exhausted. Birthday parties take a lot out of you!

You know you're in grad school when your professors start saying things like, "Let's hold class an hour later. Class at 8am is uncivilized." Or, "Next week, we will meet at the beach. But first I would like to take you all out to breakfast." Its a strange transition from being a student to being a peer, and we're in the early stages of finding out how to relate to our faculty in this new way.

Luckily for me, the professors leading our thesis studio are fans of beachy locales, and so this past Wednesday we did, in fact, meet at the beach. But first we piled into a caravan of cars and headed to breakfast in Little Compton, RI. We sampled native Rhody fare of Johnny Cakes at the The Commons Lunch, and then proceeded on to Tiverton, RI, to the Goosewing Beach and Nature Preserve.

I brought a trunk full of stuff to play with, but ultimately ended up wandering around tidal pools and tall brush in my new rainboots, taking pictures and exploring the area.

Since my thesis is about reconciling old and new image-making methods, I decided to only use analog methods during this beach trip. Which means I am waiting for several rolls of 35mm and 120mm film to come back from the processor. Score one point for new technology.

I did break down towards the end and snap a few pics with my digital camera after I ran out of fim.. I also toyed around with some letterforms that I cast in concrete last semester, tossing them into the surf at various spots and seeing what happened. At one point I overdid it a bit:

I also misjudged just how strong this stream was when I threw the "ow" brick into the current. I had to dash into the surf to rescue it before it got washed out to sea!

A friend of mine was getting rid of this little beauty before she moved to a new apartment, and I offered to give it a new home.

I am currently packing up my car to drive out to Cape Cod tomorrow morning to spend the Fourth of July with the Scoobies, and I couldn't be more excited! I have books and I have cameras to entertain myself while hanging out on the beach, and I am compiling a mix cd to play while driving tomorrow. I hope to have lots of good pictures to post when I get back on Sunday...

Despite being completely mired in schoolwork this past semester, I somehow managed to start two small flats of seeds and keep them alive until they turned into cute little herbs! I think it had something to do with running to Home Depot every two days for supplies for this project, and I just kept walking past the seed starting supplies. Whats a girl to do?

I started basil, dill, and mint. The dill isn't doing so hot, but the basil is rocking out. I'm very lucky to have three huge south-facing windows, which might have something to do with it. I've been giving away seedlings to fellow classmates, but of course keeping the best ones for my kitchen. :)

So its my dad's birthday. Notice I don't say "today," or "yesterday," or "tomorrow" even, because he's in Singapore and the whole time thing gets a little tricky. By the time it was his birthday here, it was already over there, and this has been a source of great confusion for all of us. So I'll just say Happy Birthday, Dad. I love you!

I am including one of my favorite recently-located childhood pictures, taken at a State Fair photo booth (1979? 1980?). My parents were doing everything in their power to get me to smile, but apparently I was having none of it then. 29 years later, though, it is definitely working. :)

Since I finished my Intro to B&W Photography class this past Wintersession, I have been slowly but surely scanning in all of the negatives that I didn't have a chance to print for the class (the ones I did print for class are here). I can see a real difference in the quality of both my exposures and my film developing as I get into some of the later stuff, but its still very helpful to have Photoshop on my side to fix small issues.

Despite a wealth of things to do and see in this region of the country, I haven't really tired of taking pictures of Providence itself, and I wanted to share a few of my favorites. Its such an interesting place, with elements of the old colony butted up against today's modern city. The state itself has a long history of lawlessness — this hasn't changed much mdash; and so there are all sorts of alternative narratives running beneath the surface of the pristinely preserved historic buildings and squares.

Walking along S Main St:

Walking along Canal St:

(coincidentally, that building in the upper left is where I'm staying this week while I take care of Eve.)

My weekend, in a nutshell:

I finally managed to locate a window of time when the photography department offices were actually open (a tougher challenge than one might hope) and retrieve my final portfolio from Wintersession. And THEN I managed to find a window of time to actually sit down and scan them in! Miracles do happen.

Enjoy:

To the great horror of all my relatives, who were all convinced that their little baby would end up strangled in a ditch somewhere, this winter I decided to take a road trip from Dallas back to Providence. It was kind of a spur-of-the-moment decision, rationalized by my desire to bring a lovely set of mid-century modern dining furniture [thanks, Gramma!] to my apartment. I started out a few days after Christmas, and took two days to wind my way through the South before joining up with the Blue Ridge parkway to head north towards New England. I don't really have a fully-functioning digital camera at the moment, so most of the pictures I took were with my new cell phone, which has a surprisingly decent resolution.

Anyways, here were some of my favorite parts:

• The sendoff. In proper Harris fashion, any road trip must begin with a proper breakfast, and this time was no different. We packed up my rented mid-size SUV and made a small caravan for some down-home good eatin' at Cindi's. Once my car was no longer double-parked by a 16-wheeler Coca-Cola truck, I was on the road!


• The music. In addition to "an indie infinitie" (the awesome mix my brother made me) and three CDs of Gillian Welch from my friend Elana, I burned a sizable collection of my own music for the road. At each hotel I stopped at, I would burn more for the following day. My favorites were the Lost in Translation soundtrack (particularly excellent for misty Tennessee mornings), the Something's Gotta Give soundtrack (surprisingly appropriate for Arkansas), and tons and tons of public radio podcasts like Marketplace, This American Life, Hidden Kitchens, and RadioLab.


• The hotels. I stayed at hotels in Jackson, TN, Roanoke, VA, and Bethlehem, PA. While the first wasn't much to speak of, my second two hotels were excellent finds! The Hotel Roanoke was a restored train depot in the heart of old town Roanoke, complete with smoky pub and swanky restaurant. They gave me a warmed chocolate cookie upon checkin (its a standard DoubleTree thing, I believe). My hotel in Pennsylvania could have been a distaster - my original reservation in Allentown boasted room service from Red Robin - if I hadn't quickly asked for a refund and booked a night at the Hotel Bethlehem a few miles away. Located at the heart of the old Moravian settlement that started the town (on Christmas Eve, mind you), my room at this hotel overlooked a snowy street bustling with shoppers heading to the Christkindle markets. At night I could hear horse-drawn carriages clopping by. It was pretty much tailor made for me.


• The scenery. Driving camera-less through the country was a real blessing for me, because it allowed me to explore without feeling the need to document. My favorite thing to do was get up really early, grab some strong coffee from a local Starbucks, and get on the road in time to see the landscape as the sun was just up. Tennessee was mindblowing - a cold front had blown through the night before, so every body of water I passed by was steaming heavily, and the steam was rising into isolated patches of fog hugging the highway.
  Ok, I lied, I did try and take a few pictures:
  

Total miles driven: 1,931
Average miles per day: 483
States visited: Texas, Arkansas, Tennessee, Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York, Connecticut, Rhode Island

Update: If my own mother has trouble figuring out where I am in this photo, I assume it might be difficult for a few others! I am in the second row, just up and to the left of George McFly (the guy in the dress shirt). :)

Remember, remember the Fifth of November,
The Gunpowder Treason and Plot,
I know of no reason
Why Gunpowder Treason
Should ever be forgot.
Guy Fawkes, Guy Fawkes, t'was his intent
To blow up King and Parliament.
Three-score barrels of powder below
To prove old England's overthrow;
By God's providence he was catch'd
With a dark lantern and burning match.
Holloa boys, holloa boys, let the bells ring.
Holloa boys, holloa boys, God save the King!

(I'm trying this new widget that displays images from my flickr account - let me know if you have issues seeing them!)

The Halloween Extravaganza was last week, and it was a hit! There were the inevitable glitches, but overall the students had a good time and the audience enjoyed the show. I had the privilege of wandering around taking pictures of everyone as they worked. By far the most ideal job I could think of for the day.. :)

One of the most surprisingly pleasant parts of having a studio in downtown Providence is that Grace Church is two blocks away. They have a set of 16 bells in a lovely gothic tower, and on Sundays at 10am they play a carillon that I can hear from my desk. This morning I was out getting a cup of coffee when it started, so I walked over to see if there was a real person in there, or if they were being rung with some sort of machine. I couldn't tell, but it was lovely to just stand and listen.

Their website contains a neat history of each of the bells:

Tower Bells of Grace Church in Providence

The chiming of Grace Church's tower bells is a tradition nearly as old as the Church itself. Each of the sixteen bells has its own unique history and sound, and the beautiful music they make has come to be a regular and essential feature in the life of the City.

Erected in two decks in the tower, the bells were cast by Henry N. Hooper and Company of Boston in 1861 and were used for the first time on Easter Sunday of that year. The bells' aggregate weight is more than 8 tons, and their original cost was approximately $6,000. The bells have an unusual character in that they were founded on the proportion of the Spanish bell, which is longer in the waist and gives the minor third in the harmonics instead of the major third that is commonly used.

The largest bell, the D, is the Bishop's Bell. The second bell, the E, is known as the Rector's Bell. The third bell, tuned to F-sharp, is the Brown University Bell, which was presented by John Carter Brown of the University's Class of 1816. A member of Brown's Corporation for 46 years, John Carter Brown was a direct descendent of Nicholas Brown of the Class of 1786, whose benefactions led to the naming of the University for his family. This bell was presented on the condition that the chimes would be rung on the morning and afternoon of every Commencement Day. Thus far, the bells have played the Brown “ Alma Mater” each year for well over 100 years.

The next bell sounds the note of G. This was a gift of Alexander Duncan, a public-spirited citizen remembered for his benefaction to Butler Hospital, among other services to the community.

The G-sharp bell carries an inclusive and egalitarian inscription, “from the Citizens of Providence.”

Dedicated to “the Constitution and the Union,” the A bell was the gift of the Providence Marine Company of Artillery, chartered in 1801.

Another military organization, the Providence First Light Infantry, contributed the A-sharp bell, dedicated to “Liberty Protected by Law.” This bell, like the Brown University Bell, has a special date of its own. It was requested to be rung each year on the 10th of September, “forever in memory of Oliver Hazard Perry of Rhode Island, the Victor of Lake Erie, 1813.”

The B bell was contributed by members of the Rhode Island Bar Association.

The next bell, a C, came from A.D. and J.Y. Smith and Company.

The C-sharp bell is inscribed “from the Physicians of Providence.”

In tribute to the wonderful tradition of music in Grace Church, the D bell was given by the Church's choir.

Three individuals, Thomas Burgess, Elizabeth H. Burgess, and Frederic B. Burgess, Jr., gave the D-sharp bell.

The E bell was contributed by the Sunday School of Grace Church.

The F bell was given by the personal staff of William Sprague, Governor of Rhode Island in 1860.

The F-sharp bell was given by Walter S. Burgess, Attorney General of Rhode Island in 1860 and later Judge. His grandson was the distinguished Senator Theodore Francis Green.

The last of the 16 bells, the G, was given by George M. Richmond, Frank E. Richmond, and Walter Richmond of Woonasquatucket Print Works .

While serving Grace Church, the bells recall industry, education, government, the professions, patriotism, and the vocation of the devout. In over 100 years, their pealing was interrupted only once, in 1940, when some of them were recast and retuned through the generosity of Rose Anne Grosvenor, who provided their endowment. Grace Church observed the Centennial of the chiming of the bells at morning service on Sunday, April 14, 1961, when their history was recalled and each bell was singled out for identification. The bells were turned and the housing restored in 1989.

This photo was taken by my friend Jen, who kindly helped me document my process for a sculpture I'm building this week. Its for my Exhibit Design class, which I am really loving. I am, however, really quite sick of pink builders foam.

Providence is enjoying a long and lazy fall season, with perfectly crisp temperatures and sunny days ever since school started. I have even been able to walk to school most days, which has kept me from feeling sluggish at my studio desk. I am planning on taking the pinhole camera I made this summer out one of these days and documenting all the foliage!

Last weekend I drove down to Warwick to attend the much-anticipated baby shower for Cris, and enjoyed cake and burgers and zillions of cute toddlers. It was a short break in what is already a completely busy work schedule for me. I have all three of my classes condensed into two days (including ten solid hours with the same professor on Fridays), which leaves me with five day weekends. In theory. What really ends up happening is that I am so anxious about finishing everything in time for Thursday that I do schoolwork all five of those days and haven't really had a weekend since school began. Hopefully I can settle back a bit and carve out a day of rest in there somewhere!

My cousin Alison firmly cemented her status as Favorite Harris Grandchild two years ago by giving the family its first baby to play with in a long time, and early this morning she lapped the rest of us yet again! Happy zero-eth birthday to Easton Rex Willard, who arrived a couple weeks early, but is otherwise doing great.

The name Rex comes from my grandfather on my dad's side. The observation has been made, however, that once Easton gets a little older it might be more fitting to spell it Wrecks, since there's hasn't been a boy toddler at the Homestead in, oh, 25 years. :)

Update: Easton with his great-grandmother. Yay for cameraphones!

Its not often you get to play tourist in your own (temporary) hometown, but thats exactly what I got to do last week while my family was here visiting. We took tours, went on drives, tried out restuarants, and ogled at countless home, buildings, and churches along the way. And I craned my neck and snapped my camera enough to make even the most shameless of tourists proud. Here are a few of my favorites:

We explored a sculpture installation on the Brown quad:

And walked around the canal area before Waterfire:

We saw lots of fire, intentional or otherwise:

There was a pilgrimage to see the Corbu:

And a burning desire to eat seafood by an actual body of salt water:

We took a road trip along some amazing, time-forgotten highways:

And stayed in a Revolutionary War-era inn:

There was a lovely state park:

With spectacularly picturesque ruins:

We ate at an equally photogenic diner:

My parents capped it all off with a stay at the Renaissance Hotel Providence. Their view was also not too shabby:

View the whole collection on flickr.

My parents recently spent a few days on vacation in Door County, Wisconsin. They insist that they had a lovely, relaxing time, but I'm not so sure.

When I visited Dallas over Easter, my family made our traditional pilgrimage to the Dallas Arboretum for fun and photographic frolicking. It just also happened to be the weekend of Dallas Blooms, and a gorgeous sunny day in the mid-70s. Between the four of us we got some pretty cool pictures.

I also found another Dallas Blooms photoset on Flickr!

I'm playing around with a new online photo site called flickr. This is my first attempt at remote blogging via the flickr interface. This particular photo is from a day spent at the Dallas Arboretum with my family.