The Story Girl

A Year of Good Things

My friend Liza does a round up at the end of the year for movies, books and music. I’ve decided I want to do something similar. These aren’t things that necessarily came out this year but they are things I like. So the awards go to:

Books

Favorite Epic Novel of the Year: The Forgotten Garden by Kate Morton

Scary, Political Non-Fiction: Empire of Illusion: The end of literacy and the triumph of the spectacle by Chris Hedges

Beautiful Spanish Magical-Realism Mystery: Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon

Heart-wrenching mystery/thriller/lyrical work of lengthy fiction: Faithful Place by Tana French

Story of a boy growing from an old man into a child set in San Francisco with so much love to give: Confessions of Max Tivoli by Andrew Sean Greer

Book I will unashamedly not finish and instead watch the movie: The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets Nest

Music

Long Undiscovered (by me) Sufjan Stevens Christmas Album: Songs for Christmas

Favorite Local Band: Duover

Song I can’t listen to again for at least two years because I over-did it: No One’s Gonna Love You by Band of Horses

Food

Restaurant that never gets old and also has the tastiest tortilla chips: Por Que No?

Food Cart that is ALWAYS Good: Wolf & Bears

Fancy dining for a special occasion with excellent cocktails and friendly (gasp! in Portland?!) servers: June

Most Delicious Dessert in Portland for a Dedicated Chocolate Lover: The Queen of Sheba at Pix Patisserie

Yummy sandwich cookies that disappear too quickly: Pastrygirl

Jazz Saturday nights and delicious grilled salads and yummy cocktails during the summer: Branch Whiskey Bar

Movies

Spanish mystery thriller slow to start but punches you square in the gut at the end: The Secret in Their Eyes

Visually amazing, a beautiful and haunting story of a man dealing with life and death: A Single Man

Excellent book to movie adaption (warning: extremely violent/adult themes): The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

Businesses

Store I shopped at the most: a tie! Knittn Kitten and Mill End

Friendly yarn store where they don’t mind if I touch all the yarns: Yarn Garden

Web

A blog that made me see the way I live differently, causing me to question my actions and think about the way I affect the world: Zero Waste Home

Random

Best job of the year award goes to: Colette Patterns

Note worthy socks (haha, I’m a dork): Tune In Fair Isle Crews

The End. Next up: a new year with so many possibilities!

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Red & Green

I hope you all have had a wonderful holiday! The new year is quickly approaching. How can that be? There’s so much left to do, will all the years go as quickly as this?

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Ribbon Headband Tutorial!

Hey, look, it’s me! I wrote up this fun ribbon headband tutorial for Colette Patterns this week. It’s a very quick project and it’s a good excuse to use up your ribbons (or buy some pretty new ones). Check it out here.

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