#ArchiTalks 16: "new year, new _____"
new year, new ________”
but first a public service announcement:
The participants of this ArchiTalks blog post series are asking you to help a friend of ours who is dealing with a family tragedy. Rusty Long is an Architect based out of Portsmouth, Virginia, whose son Matthew is fighting for his life. Here is Matthew’s story, as told by his Dad, Rusty:
Matthew Long was born May 29th, 2013, happy, and seemingly healthy. Less than two days later his mother and I found ourselves in an neonatal intensive care unit waiting room, listening to a rushed intensive care doctor explain how our son needed immediate dialysis to save his life. The disease, he briefly explained, was one of a group of disorders called Urea Cycle Disorders, which impact the way the body breaks down protein. We later discovered that Matthew's particular variant is called OTC Deficiency, a particularly severe form of it in fact, which results in a rapid rise of ammonia in the blood, called hyperammonemia, resulting in devastating neurological damage. This form of OTC is so severe, Matthew has virtually no peers who have survived it. Once the immediate crisis was arrested, we came to find out more about the disease and the impact of this initial event.
The disease is inherited, and the damage is permanent. Treatment consists of a combination of medications, low protein medical diet, and ultimately a liver transplant. Matthew was fortunate to experience no additional hyperammonemic events in the following fifteen months of life, and had a liver transplant on August 24th, 2014. The cure for the disease, a transplant, isn't so much a cure as trading one condition for another. While we will never risk the chance of another ammonia spike, Matthew is on a half a dozen or more medications at any given time to avoid rejection. Despite these challenges, intensive daily therapy for cerebral palsy (a result of the initial damage), limited motor function, and various other challenges along the way, our son is remarkably happy and has changed all our lives for the better. He's taught us to be stronger than we ever thought possible, to have faith beyond human understanding, and the immeasurable value of life.
The #ArchiTalks community is hoping to raise $5,500 to help Architect Rusty Long and his family reach their financial goal on HelpHopeLive.org. If each reader of this post contributes a small amount, our impact will be massive and we can make a difference for Matthew’s family. Click here now and donate $2.00.
and we’re back!
new year, new plans
i’m already wondering how many other #archttalks contributors will say the same thing. I mean, it is so predictable, right? an architect, a plan…
and it is like a new year’s resolution, and like many of the other new year’s resolutions, one of many that i start, but don’t succeed past the first month:
“this is the year I am going to get organized”
However, this past year, I did do something that I had started a few years ago, but had not accomplished anything past creating the site on Blogger, “i never met a woman architect before...: I have decided to blog about my life... , the trials and tribulations, as one could say, of being a woman, a mother, a wife, a volunteer, a public servant, and last but not least, an architect. on January 16, 2012,
and that is where it lay
for three years
until I made some comment about women in architecture on “Life of an Architect” and here i am. My first #architalks post was February 2014, “a few of my favorite things”
it got me blogging because of the monthly prompt and a schedule and a deadline and just some good architects who i have gotten to “know” via #architalks.
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| image from Sound of Music |
which i had a photo of julie andrews in that favorite things song scene but when i posted it, most of the time the image of the sculpture from the Musee’ d’Orsay came up and that (along with it being linked to everyone else’s at the last minute because the blog link thing made me realize i was even less tech savvy than i thought (thanks to the other #architalks people to help me out) was probably why it got any hits at all. And I am pretty sure that most #architects were like, “she’s an architect and she actually rewrote the lyrics of the song for her blog???”
which also made me start “tweeting”, because I had one of those accounts that i never used too...
so, my three plans for this year are:
new year, new plan one is:
to have one blog per month with a few more when i feel like i really need to say something or create something.
#architalks 5-16, “i never met a woman architect before…”
new year, new plan two is:
to draw or paint something every week
I have a friend who is an artist #leepuffer and she did a painting a day for 100 days straight. she posted them on Instagram every day and that was pretty cool.
I do not think i can do a drawing or painting every day for 100 days but i am going to attempt to do one for every week I do not want to include my work projects in those because I want it to be something for me, but it might include something of the following.
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| Image by Lee Puffer |
new year, new plan three is:
new plans
Quite literally, new plans that i am working on for myself. I get so caught up in doing plans for others, that I have neglected the plans that I need to do for myself. I have not been designing any projects that are just that, “projects”. People will ask me, “Oh, you are an architect, I bet you designed your own house! “
Doing primarily custom residential addition and remodels for other people’s homes and rarely getting to design from the ground up with all new construction, I have not designed my own house. I did have a spec house this last year that was all new construction (and it will be finished in about six months if anyone is interested)
But the house I live in was not designed by me (see #ArchiTalks 6: “Architecture in the Real World”)
http://inmawomanarchitect.blogspot.com/2015/02/architecture-in-real-world-architalk-6.html
and I have had some plans for adding on to this house but mostly renovations have been limited to the kids’ bathroom which started when a few tiles fell off the wall and i just started knocking all of them off the wall (hey, I have a husband who is also an architect, three kids and they were young and maybe i was trying to impose some control over my seemingly out of control life) so that the kids were taking showers in the master bath for three years til a friend and i decided we would do the work ourselves and after knocking out the vanity (which could have easily protected me while a tornado ripped through the house if we ever had one in La Mesa, California). And the sledgehammer got in the way of the toilet (old school but still in great shape) we ended up replacing the that too.
So this will be the year when I finally do the projects that would probably get the “the cobbler’s children have no shoes” award including: the master bath gets the new vanity and tiled with the tile that was purchased two years ago and sits in boxes on the back patio covered by a tarp for El Nino. And i hope that this is the year that I start on the kitchen before IKEA changes their cabinet system again. (The salesperson said that I have about 10 years)
And this was supposed to be “the five year house”....
Yes, this is the year, I start to design the house that I want to design, the house that I want to live in, the house that i want to build, the house everyone will be happy about once they get their input….
and of course my new year, new plans also includes a lot of organizing, that will tend to get overlooked when i get into all of my new plans that are much more fun!!!
have a happy new year, new plans!!!
All of the images and text above are the property of Michele Grace Hottel and as such are subject to copyright.
If you are interested in know what the other #ArchiTalks Architects are doing new this year, please follow the links below
| Enoch Sears - Business of Architecture (@businessofarch) New Year, New Community on Business of Architecture |
| Bob Borson - Life of An Architect (@bobborson) http://www.lifeofanarchitect.com/new-year-new-adventures-that-might-kill-me/ |
| Matthew Stanfield - FiELD9: architecture (@FiELD9arch) New Year, New CAD |
| Marica McKeel - Studio MM (@ArchitectMM) New Year, New Adventures |
| Jeff Echols - Architect Of The Internet (@Jeff_Echols) |
| Lee Calisti, AIA - Think Architect (@LeeCalisti) new race new year new start |
| Mark R. LePage - Entrepreneur Architect (@EntreArchitect) New Year. New Budget. |
| Evan Troxel - Archispeak Podcast / TRXL (@etroxel) |
| Lora Teagarden - L² Design, LLC (@L2DesignLLC) New Year, New Goals |
| Collier Ward - One More Story (@BuildingContent) New Year, New Business |
| Cormac Phalen - Cormac Phalen (@archy_type) |
| Nicholas Renard - dig Architecture (@dig-arch) New Year, A New Hope |
| Andrew Hawkins, AIA - Hawkins Architecture, Inc. (@hawkinsarch) |
| Jeremiah Russell, AIA - ROGUE Architecture (@rogue_architect) |
| Jes Stafford - Modus Operandi Design (@modarchitect) New Year. New Gear. |
| Cindy Black - Rick & Cindy Black Architects (*) New Year, New Casita |
| Eric T. Faulkner - Rock Talk (@wishingrockhome) New Year, New Underwear |
| Rosa Sheng - Equity by Design (@EquityxDesign) New Year, New Era |
| Michele Grace Hottel - Michele Grace Hottel, Architect (@mghottel) "new year, new _____" |
| Meghana Joshi - IRA Consultants, LLC (@MeghanaIRA) New Year, New Plan |
| Amy Kalar - ArchiMom (@AmyKalar) New Year, New Adventures |
| Michael Riscica - Young Architect (@YoungArchitxPDX) New Year, New Life! |
| Stephen Ramos - BUILDINGS ARE COOL (@sramos_BAC) New Year, New Home |
| brady ernst - Soapbox Architect (@bradyernstAIA) New Year, New·ly Adult Architect |
| Brian Paletz - The Emerging Architect (@bpaletz) A Little Premature |
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| Jonathan Brown - Proto-Architecture (@mondo_tiki_man) |
| Eric Wittman - intern[life] (@rico_w) new year, new [engagement] |
| Sharon George - Architecture By George (@sharonraigeorge) New Year, New Business |
| Brinn Miracle - Architangent (@simplybrinn) New Year, New Perspective |
| David Molinaro - Relax2dmax (@relax2dmax) |
| Emily Grandstaff-Rice - Emily Grandstaff-Rice AIA (@egraia) The New New |
| Daniel Beck - The Architect's Checklist (@archchecklist) |
| Jarod Hall - di'velept (@divelept) New Year New Reality |
| Anthony Richardson - That Architecture Student (@anth_rich) New Year New Desk |
| Lindsey Rhoden - SPARC Design (@sparcdesignpc) |
| Drew Paul Bell - Drew Paul Bell (@DrewPaulBell) New Year, New Appreciation |
| Greg Croft - Sage Leaf Group (@croft_gregory) New Year, New Goals |
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| Courtney Casburn Brett - Casburn Brett (@CasburnBrett) |
| Jeffrey A Pelletier - Board & Vellum (@boardandvellum) New Year New Office |
| Aaron Bowman - Product & Process (@PP_Podcast) New Year, More Change |
| Samantha Raburn - The Aspiring Architect (@TheAspiringArch) |
| Kyu Young Kim - Palo Alto Design Studio (@sokokyu) New Year, New Office Space |
| Nisha Kandiah - TCDS (@SKRIBBLES_INC) |
| Karen E. Williams - (@karenewilliams) |
| Jared W. Smith - Architect OWL (@ArchitectOWL) New Year, New Reflection |
| Rusty Long - Rusty Long, Architect (@rustylong) New Year, New Direction |
Please contact me via my website below for more information on the firm and sponsorship of the blog and podcast.
Love the tile choices! Can't wait to see the renovation.
ReplyDeletethank you lora! i wish i had just done it 2 years ago!!!
DeleteDo it! Do it! Do it! :-)
ReplyDeletethanks meghana!!!
ReplyDeleteclick here
ReplyDelete