International Ladies

I've been working on a series of tags with international themes, and here are the first of them...

Snag Only:



Italy is called "il Belpaese" (Italian for beautiful country) by its inhabitants, due to the beauty and variety of its landscapes and for having the world's largest artistic patrimony...



The name France originates from the Franks, a Germanic tribe that once occupied the region... More precisely, the region around Paris, called Île-de-France, was the original French royal demesne...



The characters that make up Japan's name literally mean "Sun's Origin" (Nihon) - thus Japan is known as "The Land of the Rising Sun" a name that comes from the country's eastward position relative to China...



Africa is a land of many names and tribes, but one name has long fit all of them well - The Dark Continent... Dark for it's wild and impenetrable jungles, dark for it's lovely ebon peoples, and dark for all it's mysteries yet to be uncovered...

I'd like to make a few more of this series, but haven't decided on which countries... If you have suggestions, leave a comment...

Happy Independance Day!

I've been horribly remiss in updating here, and to be honest, I was just not in the mood to make any tags... I think I was just burned out... But I've gotten the bug again, and just in time for the 4th of July...! So here's a new tag (the first of many) and a bit about this American holiday I've come to enjoy:

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:

In the United States, Independence Day, also called the Fourth of July, is a Federal holiday celebrating the adoption of the Declaration of Independence on July 4th, 1776, declaring independence from the Kingdom of Great Britain.

Despite the genesis of Independence Day, it is largely uncommon for Americans to express anti-British sentiment on the day or to view it as a celebration of anti-colonialism. Indeed, most Americans today consider the United Kingdom their greatest ally. Rather than specifically as an opportunity to commemorate the end of British rule in the 18th century, contemporary Americans generally perceive the holiday as a celebration of the U.S.A. itself and the political values that motivated the United States Declaration of Independence, including explicit principles of Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness, and implicit ones of democracy, liberty, freedom, and equality under the law.

Independence Day is commonly associated with parades, barbecues, picnics, baseball games, and various other public and private events celebrating the history, government, and traditions of the U.S. Fireworks have been associated with the Fourth of July since 1777.

In 1777, British officers noted the firing of 13 guns, once at morning and again as evening fell, on July 4th in Bristol, Rhode Island. Philadelphia celebrated the first anniversary in a manner a modern American would find quite familiar: an official dinner for the Continental Congress, toasts, 13-gun salutes, speeches, prayers, music, parades, troop reviews and fireworks. Ships were decked with red, white and blue bunting.

And so the celebration continues...! I wish you all a very happy 4th and be careful out there - don't burn the house down with your partying...! (Except in the figurative sense...) God Bless America...!

This one is Snag Only:

Happy St. Valentine's Day!

Valentine's Day started in the time of the Roman Empire... In ancient Rome, February 14th was a holiday to honour Juno, Queen of the Olympian Gods... The Romans also knew her as the Goddess of women and marriage... The following day, February 15th, began the Feast of Lupercalia...

The lives of young boys and girls were strictly separate in ancient Rome... However, one of the customs of the young people was name drawing... On the eve of the festival of Lupercalia the names of Roman girls were written on slips of paper and placed into jars... Each young man would draw a girl's name from the jar and would then be partners with the girl he chose for the duration of the festival... Sometimes the pairing of the children lasted an entire year, and often, they would fall in love and would later marry...

Saint Valentine enters the picture under the rule of Emperor Claudius II... At this time, Rome was involved in many bloody and unpopular campaigns and Claudius was having a difficult time getting soldiers to join his milita... He believed the reason for this was that Roman men did not wish to leave their lovers or families... As a result, Claudius cancelled all marriages and forbid engagements in Rome... Saint Valentine and Saint Marius aided the Christian Romans and secretly married couples, and for this Saint Valentine was apprehended and dragged before the Prefect of Rome, who condemned him to be beaten to death with clubs and to have his head cut off... He suffered martyrdom on the 14th day of February, about the year 270...

Gradually, February 14 became the date for exchanging love messages and St. Valentine became the patron saint of lovers... The date was marked by sending poems and simple gifts such as flowers... There was often a social gathering or a ball...

In the United States, Miss Esther Howland is given credit for sending the first valentine cards... Commercial valentines were introduced in the 1800's and now the holiday is extremely commercialised... The town of Loveland, Colorado, does a large post office business around February 14... The tradition continues as valentines are sent out with sentimental verses and children exchange valentine cards at school... And though it is an over commericialised holiday, we should keep in mind the point of it all... To celebrate love and those we love, in the ways most meaningful to us...

And now here are some Valentine's Tags for you, only a few of which are taggable... The rest are snag only, and I hope you enjoy...

Snag Only:



Snaggable and Taggable:
(these can be requested with a single name or couples)



Tag requests in the comments section...
(Please remember to leave your e-mail address!)

Butterfly Light and Mother Nature

The first tag was created mainly as a symbol of my own rebirth to life and living - butterflies being a powerful symbol of that for millennia... The Greeks believed that a new human soul was born each time an adult butterfly emerged from its cocoon... Early Europeans believed that the human soul took the form of a butterfly also - consequently, the butterfly was viewed with great respect... Native American legends told that butterflies would carry wishes to the Great Spirit to be granted... The metamorphosis of butterflies and moths is one of the mysteries of Nature... They change from the crawling caterpillar to the fluttering, flying jewels we think are so lovely... It is a transformation that seemingly only magic could create... Many cultures around the world are so awe inspired by the metamorphosis that there are literally thousands of legends about them...



The second tag represents for me the Spirit of the Earth, and how we should try to live our lives each day... And while Mother Nature depicted here appears benevolent and gentle, I know She is not always this way... Nevertheless, Her motto holds true: no matter what She may throw at you, whether a day full of sunshine or a raging storm, there are lessons to be learned in it... And no matter how horrible the experience, every day you breathe is a day to be living... It is a gift, as Mother Nature, who is also "red of tooth and claw", is ever eager to remind us... You are promised only today, and never tomorrow... But hope of that tomorrow is also part of nature... It is what makes us strive and live to the best of our abilities... If more people were in tune with Gaea's many cycles and seasons, perhaps we would all live in natural harmony in this Savage Garden...



These are snaggable *and* taggable...
Tag requests in the comments section...

I Love The 80's!

Good music and memories

I stumbled over a very awesome net-radio site a few nights ago, SKY.fm ... It's broadcast live over the net from New York, and has an excellent selection of channels to choose from... I've spent today listening to their Best Of The 80's channel... This is where the memories part comes in...

I realise that today it's very uncool to admit that you loved *anything* about the 80's, but I am going to commit the grievous sin of saying I loved nearly everything about the 80's... I loved my big hair, my flavoured shimmer lipgloss, my jelly shoes (and bracelets), and my Walkman full of Madonna and New Wave cassettes... I loved the hot pink streaks in my hair and my Danskin Wear and legwarmers... I loved the excess, the decadence, and the materialism...

And listening to the songs of my younger days, so many memories came rushing back... The carefree days I spent with my clique powershopping, the nights spent dancing until my feet practically dropped off... We were so "awesome" and "radical" and "uber-cool" in those days... And in that world, it seemed like we'd live forever and nothing bad would ever happen... The Cold War was ending, and in our minds a "brave new world" was dawning... Everything glittered in ways that, looking back now, seem hard to imagine...

Were we hopelessly naive...? Yes, probably... But I miss that naivete... I miss that innocent hope for all good things I had then... I miss seeing the future as a landscape of unity and wonder... Today's future seems so grim compared to the idealism of the 80's... And I miss all the outrageousness of that decade... Nothing was ever too much, and you could build whatever extreme image you wanted... There was a freedom in the excess that everyone so condemns now... You could be whoever you wanted, whatever you were inside, no apologies... And if you were *really* unique, *you'd* start a trend...

So I'm nostalgic today... And as I sit here listening to Huey Lewis and The News sing about "The Power Of Love", I feel like crimping and teasing my hair, using half a can of Aqua Net hairspray, and finding my off the shoulder tops, my black lace pouf skirt, my stirrup leggings and legwarmers, and maybe even a pair of jelly shoes and having an impromptu 80's Retro Party downstairs...

This tag is a result of that nostalgia - it's loud, outrageous, and over the top - just like the 80's were... *smiles* This one is Snag Only... (But I promise to have Taggables up in a few days!)

Evanescence

This is one of my favourite bands... I highly recommend you check out their music and their site... I made these tags awhile back and just thought I'd share them with all of you...

All of these are Snag Only...

Friday the 13th

A Friday occurring on the 13th day of any month is considered to be a day of bad luck in many superstitions around the globe... The origin of the Friday the 13th superstition has been linked to the belief that there were 13 people at The Last Supper of Jesus, who was crucified on Good Friday, but it probably originated in medieval times... It has also been linked to the fact that a lunisolar calendar must have 13 months in some years, while the solar Gregorian calendar and lunar Islamic calendar always have 12 months in a year... Another suggestion is that the belief originated in a Norse myth about twelve gods having a feast in Valhalla... The mischievous Loki gate-crashed the party as an uninvited 13th guest and arranged for Hod, the blind god of darkness, to throw a branch of mistletoe at Balder, the god of joy and gladness... (The mistletoe plant was the only living thing that had not sworn never to harm Balder...) Balder was killed instantly and the Earth was plunged into darkness and mourning as a result... Both the first and last explanations, however, seem more relevant to the superstition linked to having 13 people at the same table during a meal... There is also another theory that Friday the 13th was the day that King John killed the former knights templar to get their money for the English treasury...

Strangely, there is evidence to suggest that Friday the 13th is actually unlucky for some... Psychologists have found that some people are especially likely to have accidents or fall ill on Friday the 13th... This has been attributed to such people feeling a heightened state of anxiety on that day... $800 or $900 million is lost in business each Friday the 13th because some people will not travel or go to work...

The date is also well-known in the motorcycle (biker) community: since 1981, motorcycle enthusiasts and vendors gather every Friday the 13th in Port Dover, Ontario, Canada... This tradition started on November 13, 1981 by Chris Simons as a gathering of approximately 25 friends... The event has grown substantially, with an estimated 100,000 people attending in August 2004, as well as music bands, vendors, a bike show, etc...

In the Spanish-speaking world, it is Tuesday the 13th (as well as Tuesdays in general) that brings bad luck... A proverb says, "En martes, ni te cases ni te embarques" (On Tuesday, neither get married nor start a journey)...

The fear of Friday the 13th is called paraskavedekatriaphobia, a specialized form of triskaidekaphobia, a phobia (fear) of the number thirteen...

This one is Snag Only: