Part of the fun of having houseguests is that you have a handy excuse to play tourist in your natural habitat–to appreciate anew its beauty, and to revisit all the local attractions. And so it was I headed up PCH yesterday to tour Getty Villa with my friend Margaret.
Nestled into a narrow canyon on the coast of Malibu, Getty Villa is home to the J. Paul Getty Museum’s collection of Greek, Roman, and Etruscan antiquities. The last time I visited, my kids were attending grade school in nearby Calabasas. The grounds were beautiful, but the museum itself was characterized by dark passageways and crowded display cases, none of which showed off the ancient artifacts to best advantage. In fact, my older son proclaimed it “more boring than church.”
In the interim since my last visit, the Villa has undergone a major facelift. Re-envisioned as Villa dei Papiria, a first-century Roman country home in Herculaneum that was buried by the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius, the buildings and grounds are brighter, airier, and more inviting.
I’ll give you an informal tour in another post, but for now I want to show you just one artifact. It’s about the size of a small juice glass, a single piece in a vast collection of glassware. Insignificant, maybe, when viewed alongside the more ornate pieces at Getty Villa.
But when I read the display card beneath it, my heart did cartwheels. And seeing as how I’ve just now transferred my Joyful Noise blog over from its LiveJournal home to WordPress, I thought it apropos to share it with you today.
All that to say: Welcome to my newly remodeled blog! I hope you’ll make yourself at home here, and that you’ll enjoy repeated visits. We’ve got lots of adventures ahead of us, and so much beauty to explore…
Welcome to WordPress. And I LOVE the banner photo!
Thanks for stopping by, Becky! I hope you’ll visit often. (The banner comes of a field trip to the Claremont Lavender Fields in Los Olivos.)
Yes, what Becky said. love the glass and inscription!
Hi Jeannine! It feels more like home, now that you’re here. I’d love to serve you iced tea from a drinking glass like that!
The glass and inscription are wonderful. Once again, welcome to WordPress, Melodye! xo
I’m glad for your company, Amy, and for your encouragement/guidance as I made the shift from LJ to WordPress. Moves are never easy, so I’m glad to be settled, at long last, into my new nest. Now to do some decorating… 🙂
*clinks glasses*
Cheers to that!
It wouldn’t feel like home without a visit from you. Come back soon, won’t you, Jenn? I’ll put on the teakettle…
Happy to see you here on WP, Melodye! What a lovely new blog home. Perfect inscription on that glass, and green is my favorite color :).
Amazing what the ancients were able to do with modern technology, isn’t it? Good luck with your new blog home, Melodye!
Hahaha, exactly! Thanks for the well wishes on my new blog home, PL. I’m revamping my entire website, and navigating everything from LJ over to WordPress was an important first step.
Sorry I didn’t respond to your comment before now, by the way–the moderate-this prompt somehow landed in my spam folder. 🙁
Melodye, I’m so glad I found you here at your new home! What a lovely and welcoming design. I spent some time getting to know you and reading past posts and I am looking forward to the stories you will tell. Your blog title says so much about you and your outlook on life – yes!
Hi Donna! First of all, I’m so sorry I was slow to welcome you here. A handful of comments somehow landed in my spam folder, and I just now discovered that.
I’m happy to think that we’ll be friends in yet another forum. I’ve followed your blog with admiration and no small sense of adventure for a long while now, and so it feels natural that we’d connect here, too. What better gift, than to sit around the cyber campfire with other storytellers?