An Epic-ly Awesome, "Amrazing" Night

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An Epic-ly Awesome, "Amrazing" Night

On Friday night, I attended a stop on Jason Mraz's "Tour is a Four Letter Word" in my home state of New Jersey.

To clarify, I am not a concert person…I'm not particularly fond of crowds and there are not many artists that I feel strongly enough about that I would spend money to see them in person.

But for Jason, I broke all of those rules. My parents bought me tickets for my 22nd birthday this year and I was thrilled and overjoyed that I was going to get to see him live!

To make things even better, his "tour partner" was Christina Perri and I happen to really love her vocals and originality.

And I have to say, that I did succumb to "concert behavior"…somewhat…I screamed as loud as everyone else (with the result of a nice, sore throat the next day) and I sang along to every song, my voice getting lost along with his and everyone else's. (Thank God, because I really can't sing…hehe)

I brought my friend Heather along and we had a really great time eating churros before the show, quoting Psych and just generally goofing off (aka, being ourselves).

I loved every second of it.

To cap it all off, he played "Plane", which is an older song of his that I thought I had NO chance of hearing. It was a wonderful surprise to hear something I really wasn't expecting.

He was funny (see below), he did yoga (tree pose, see photo) during one of his songs; he inspired and captivated me all over again.

Soooo….get ready to be photo-bombed!! I took a ridiculous amount of pictures, so I picked out some of the best ones to show you…enjoy!

To start the night off, my dad rented an awesome Mustang to bring us to the concert!

Christina Perri Singing "Jar of Hearts"

I love this picture!

This one too!

Jason going into tree pose during "Make it Mine" :)

Awesome background effect for "Only Human"

Playing"I'm Coming Over/Hidden Track"…love this song….

His keys player also plays the accordion!! Cool!!

Some more of the awesome background graphics for "Butterfly"

"Butterfly"

"Butterfly"

"I'm Yours"

He sang Bob Marley!! "Three Little Birds"

Jason and Christina singing their duet, "Distance"

The band, taking a bow

Saying goodbye :(

While introducing the band (in the middle of a song) he continued to play his guitar, but then said, "I'm just playing some nonsense chords…I can't talk and play at the same time..weird right? If I was singing, it would all make sense."

Insert copious amounts of laughter here. :) …and a little bit of beautiful understanding…it does all make sense when he sings. I'm so glad I got to experience his music live, it was amrazingly magical!

Rag Rug: Project 2012

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Rag Rug: Project 2012

So a few days ago I stumbled upon this beautiful rag rug on Flickr:

and I happen to have this empty space in my room that could use a rug:

so, naturally, this happened:

I need more rags though!!

Stay tuned for pictures of the progress!

My Avocado Trees

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My Avocado Trees

I love avocados…I love making guacamole, and now I love growing avocado trees.

That's right, I'm growing trees! Cool right??

Anyway, I started growing the first seed a few weeks ago and it has since grown a shoot about six inches high! I'm so excited to be growing a tree, it's ridiculous. I drive my family crazy with all of the tree updates :) The other day I made guacamole and gained two more pits to grow.

Of course, it's entirely possible that they'll never bear fruit. If they do, it might take somewhere around 10 years for the first fruit to appear.

But I don't care, I just think it's awesome watching them grow :)

If you'd like to learn how to grow your own avocado tree, check out this article here.

If you'd like an awesome guacamole recipe, check out my post on my other blog, TheFoodXchange.

Jason Mraz Webisodes - A Day With Jason & Toca

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Jason Mraz Webisodes - A Day With Jason & Toca

"…after that, I start to forage…"

"…is it gonna be a whole salad, half a salad; half an enthusiastic salad…"

"…or I'll find a shower…"

"…I guess, if you wanted to…you could take a 7 hour shower…"

"...I'd hate to have to be the person that has to dust this place…"

Toca you're hilarious.

Jason Mraz: 3-18-2011; Journal Repost

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Jason Mraz: 3-18-2011; Journal Repost

Naturally, I subscribe to Jason Mraz's RSS feed. Sometimes there's updates about shows and appearances, but mostly it's journal entries from Jason. 


This particular entry really stuck with me. It was written right after the tsunamis and earthquakes in Japan. The way he writes is not only beautiful, but haunting.

Enjoy and check out his full feed at his website.


"There's about a 5 second delay from the time I switch gears to when the chain actually falls onto the next sprocket of my bike. Those 2 seconds feel like 20 and in that short amount of time I know all is about to get better in the world. Because I know that the difficulty level is about get easier, I mash-down harder on the pedals and make my whole body burn as I progress uphill. I never stop. I just get a little help from innovative technology. 


Since buying a bicycle I'm putting about 35 miles a week in the bike lane. I bought it to join others who ride, but it actually woke me up to how much money and fuel I'm saving besides getting tons of exercise.From my house to the grocery store is a little over 4 miles one way. From there I can merge onto a trail that's just a 7-mile jaunt to the beach. Once I'm on the coast, anything's possible. A round trip to Jitter's - my favorite coffee shop, is exactly "23" miles - another reason to love it. The doozie of every journey is always the last two miles home - of which I live near the top of 3 hills. But that climb is already getting less difficult thanks mostly to my enthusiasm to endure and again, some radical technology in my bike's gears. 


This morning I stood on the beach looking out at the wash of the surf, currents pulling the water in every direction, waves looking fun at the line-up, birds in large numbers feeding on something peculiar just outside the break. Something didn't sit right with me. Call it caution. Maybe it's paranoia. Maybe it's preparation. I felt called to head inland back to my house.Japan's story has been on my mind a lot. The quake/tsunami/nuclear disaster is a reminder that we do NOT live on a human's planet - but that we are a guest here. With man-made ports destroyed, Japan residents and workers do not have access to fuel therefore have little means to transport food to the hundreds of thousands in need. 


I was disappointed when Obama said Nuclear is an important part of our energy future. Besides the general pollution that oil and nuclear contribute, the past year has demonstrated just how bad it can get with the oil spill in the gulf and now the nuclear radiation being pumped into the atmosphere. 


Honda issued a statement that they won't be able to open many factories until May. Wow. Who gives a shit about new cars? I'd love to see the large governments and industry such as auto and military put JUST A YEAR into developing the green SUSTAINABLE technology that could power our homes and cars and help us gain access to fresh food and FRESH AIR. Clearly NUCLEAR is NOT sustainable. And while oil is cheap and seemingly plentiful, neither is it going to help us sustain and maintain a healthy life on the surface of the earth. 


Good bye fish. Good bye grandma. I live about 15 miles from the San Onofre Nuclear Power Plant. If the situation in Japan had happened here in California, my life would be no different from theirs. I am not above this disaster. I am only here today by circumstance. I'm sure converting everyone and everything to natural resources, wind and solar, etc might seem like a long climb uphill which many of us look at and say, why bother when we can just drive around the mountain? 


But I believe in the power of positive doing and I know once we start pedaling up that hill, our muscles will develop, we'll draft off each other, and we'll make it look so damn easy that it will be the normal thing to do in future generations. All we have to do is switch gears and go for it."


~Jason Mraz

Sugarcane Notepad.

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Sugarcane Notepad.

My Mom brought these awesome notepads home from Staples one day. They're called Sustainable Earth and Staples makes them.

When I read what they were made out of, I fell in love…

They're sugarcane!

I immediately tried to eat it.

I think that's the coolest thing you could ever make a notepad out of.