word.

winter hike.

2012-01-12T22:04:00.000-08:00

Miles took me on a hike last weekend, up the Pratt Lake Trail. We definitely didn't make it to the lake, but we did get some nice views.

See the full set here. (I like this one. Hee.)

spinach-avocado dip.

2012-01-10T20:57:00.000-08:00

In an effort to clean up some of the piles of papers I have in my house, I recently went through an issue (yes, only one so far) of Martha Stewart Living and ripped out all of the things that I wanted to try: recipes, craft projects, inspiration, etc.

One of those recipes was this one for Spinach-Avocado Dip, in the "Healthy Living fit to eat" section. It uses avocado and nonfat Greek yogurt to make it creamy instead of mayonnaise and/or sour cream. The first time I made it I followed the recipe pretty closely, but a friend of mine is on a diet where he doesn't eat dairy, so I pulled out a quarter of the dip before adding the yogurt (and only added 6oz of yogurt). We taste-tested both (with/without yogurt), and they're both pretty good, but I think I actually like the no-yogurt version better, so that's what you see in the picture above. You should try both though -- it's easy enough to make twice! And definitely delicious enough, too.

Here's my version of the recipe with some tips I learned.

Ingredients
~1 tbls olive oil
1/2 cup finely chopped shallots (from 2 large shallots)
1 tbls minced garlic (from 3 cloves)
8-10 oz spinach
coarse salt and freshly ground pepper
2 medium ripe avocados, chilled
1 cup nonfat Greek yogurt
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
12 oz sugar snap peas
9 small slices pumpernickel bread, cut into triangles (or less healthy, tortilla chips)

Instructions
1) Heat oil in a large nonstick skillet over medium heat. Cook shallots and garlic, stirring often, until tender, about 4 minutes. Add spinach and about 1/2 teaspoon salt. Cook, covered, until the spinach is wilted, about 4 minutes. Uncover, cook until liquid evaporates. (Note: mine never really had much liquid -- maybe a little. I just cooked it for about another 4-5 minutes after uncovering, stirring a little to make sure everything was soft.)
2) Transfer mixture to a plate and place in fridge until cooled, about 25 minutes.
3) While shallot/spinach mixture is cooling, purée avocados, yogurt, lemon juice, and 1/4 teaspoon salt in a food processor (or if you're like me and don't own one, use whatever you have to mash the avocado -- I used a pastry blender in a metal mixing bowl -- and then fold in the rest of the ingredients with a spatula) until smooth. Season with pepper.
4) Remove shallot/spinach mixture from the fridge and transfer to a cutting board. Finely chop the mixture, and then stir into the avocado purée. Serve with snap peas and bread/tortilla chips.

Notes
I forgot to buy pumpernickel bread the first time I made it and the party I went to had a big bowl of tortilla chips, which this tasted fantastic on (it is basically just mashed avocado with some other veggies in it). The sugar snap peas tasted better with the no-yogurt version, I think because the yogurt plus the lemon juice made it a little too tangy for the peas. The has-yogurt version tasted REALLY good with the tortilla chips though, probably because of the extra salt. If you try it with the pumpernickel, let me know how it goes -- I'd be curious whether the flavor of the bread compliments the tanginess of the yogurt.

happy new year.

2012-01-07T17:07:00.000-08:00

Miles and I drove to Portland to celebrate the new year and took a hike around MacLeay Park with a few of our friends. It was a little muddy, but nice to get outside and a beautiful representation of the NW in winter. (Click the ferns to see the whole photo set.)

peppermint pretzels.

2011-12-13T22:36:00.000-08:00

I'm trying to be on top of things this year. I got my cards made (and half sent), I made gingersnaps yesterday (let's not talk about how I tried to make some on Sunday and mistook nutmeg for cloves), and today I made the peppermint pretzels you see above! It's tiny twists dipped in white chocolate and then into crushed candy canes. Super easy. Super fun. Pretty delicious. (I'm not big on candy canes, but the pretzels are a nice way to cut down on the sweetness.)

I tried using a double boiler to melt the white chocolate, but honestly, it didn't work great. I got about half of my pretzels dipped and wasted about half the chocolate as it hardened in the pan (despite the boiling water underneath it). What worked better was just putting about a half-cup of white chocolate chips into a ramekin and sticking that in the microwave for about a minute and a half. Seriously. I wasted almost no chocolate with the microwave method. It might be the type of chocolate I'm using (Ghirardelli), but I would suggest microwave on this one. Plus, then you can make these with a kid (or a clumsy adult like me) and no boiling water!

Mmm.

christmas card design - 2011.

2011-12-11T10:43:00.001-08:00

I'm having a little bit of trouble adjusting to Blogger's new interface, but one of the things I find really fascinating is all the Google Analytics information that they've started tracking for blogs. For instance, in the past week, the post I wrote last year with a christmas card inspiration gallery from flickr, has gotten 99 views. Helps explain why the gallery itself has over 900 views.

This year, my inspiration came from an advertisement that I got from Paper Zone. I realized I hadn't ever made a wreath card, and I was planning on using green card stock this year (not blue, because I always make blue winter holiday cards). I've sent a little over half of my cards (was trying to wait until I sent all of them before posting about them, but I just can't wait anymore!), and have a couple more to make.

Here's what I came up with:

I made a guide (stencil?) with a 3x5 note card and then used that to position the holes on the card. I had purchased some biopsy punches a year and a half ago at Urban Craft Uprising and I managed to dull all 4 of them by punching 20 holes each in about 20 cards. Add a little craft ribbon, and presto, you've got yourself a wreath!

I do love making cards with cutouts, will have to think about other things I can do, especially now that I've gotten myself this handy Martha Stewart "Screw" Punch.

And that's that! If you're interested in past years' card designs, you can take a look at: last year's penguins and the retrospective from 2004-2009. Looking through those, I think I probably need to go at least another year not using blue card stock, but we'll see. Maybe I should branch out and use red or something.

comfort food.

2011-11-07T20:37:00.000-08:00

Doesn't that look comforting?

Today, being the first work day after we're back on standard time, meant that I watched the sun set from my desk chair, and biked home in the dark. This time of year is tough in the northern hemisphere -- I have to say that it's pretty difficult to motivate myself to do anything when it's dark out *before* I get home from work. Especially things like stopping at the grocery store.

I'd settled on making a grilled cheese sandwich for dinner (because seriously, why wouldn't I make one), but was toying with the idea of making tomato soup. (And because, dear reader, you've already seen the picture, you know that I succeeded.) I'm not usually a huge fan of tomato soups; they're often too sweet for me. But as a dipper for a grilled cheese sandwich, I have a higher tolerance.

I figured there must be a recipe for tomato soup that calls for canned tomatoes (which I have), and various other ingredients that I could probably manage. Turns out, there are lots of recipes for tomato soup out of canned tomatoes. (Learn something every day!) I ended up making kind of a composite recipe from here, here, and here. Sorta. Here's what I ended up with:

Ingredients
half an onion, diced
2 cloves garlic, diced
1 tbsp olive oil
1 14.5oz can of crushed tomatoes
1 cup vegetable broth
salt, pepper, italian seasoning to taste
1/4 cup parmesean cheese (optional)
1 tbsp butter
1/2 cup milk

Instructions
1) Saute the onion and garlic in a saucepan with the olive oil. Once they're soft, add the tomatoes and broth.
2) Add salt/pepper/spices/butter. Stir until the butter's melted, add about half the cheese. Bring to a boil, stirring occasionally, lower heat and cover.
3) Cook 10-15 minutes or until the vegetables are soft. I cooked mine until I could cut one of the onion pieces in half with a rubber spatula. Add the milk.
4) Remove from heat. Use an immersion blender to blend the veggies.
5) Put pot back on the stove and add the rest of the cheese (if desired). Simmer and stir for another 5 minutes or so, stirring occasionally.

It still came out a little on the sweet side (hence the second dose of cheese), but like I said, as a dipper for a grilled cheese sandwich, it's still pretty tasty. If I had to do it over again, I would use plain basil instead of the italian seasoning (I should buy some, I think that for not having basil in my kitchen I should probably turn in my apron), because the italian seasoning kind of gives it a tomato sauce sort of flavor.

But yeah, homemade tomato soup is a win. Definitely better than canned soup, definitely better than a lonely grilled cheese sandwich, and relatively easy to boot.

stamps and bleach.

2011-10-02T23:17:00.000-07:00

I'm too tired to write up a real post (sorry, guys), but I did just upload a bunch of photos of the craft project that Miles and I did yesterday. You should click through to see more photos, cause they're a fun bunch.

Stamps:

Bleach Pens:

(This one has the story about the bleach pen project in the description.)

There are more photos at flickr of the projects and a fun link about spiders. Really, you should go look.

weekend cooki(e/ing) experiment.

2011-09-18T19:58:00.000-07:00

I was at my parents' house on Friday and saw that they had my July 2009 issue of Martha Stewart Living (I thought I'd recycled all of them when I moved last January!), and as I flipped through it, I found this recipe for Dark Chocolate Cookies:

Ingredients
FOR THE COOKIES
3/4 cup all purpose flour
1/3 cup unsweetened dutch-process cocoa powder
1/8 tsp salt
3 oz (6 tbsp) butter (unsalted)
3/4 cup confectioners' sugar
1 large egg
1/2 tsp vanilla extract

FOR THE FILLING
4 oz dark chocolate (chopped)
1/2 cup heavy cream
1/2 cup confectioners' sugar
1/4 tsp salt

Steps (paraphrased)
1) Preheat oven to 325°F. Make cookies: whisk together flour, cocoa, salt in a small bowl. In another bowl, cream butter and sugar until pale/fluffy. Beat in egg/vanilla. Gradually add flour mixture. Shape dough into 2 discs, wrap in plastic, freeze for 15-20 minutes.
2) With 1 disc at a time, roll to 1/8" thickness (lightly (or slightly more than lightly) floured). Using a 1.5" biscuit cutter, cut out rounds. Space rounds 1" apart on a parchment-lined cookie sheet. Freeze 15 minutes, brush off excess flour.
3) Bake cookies, rotating sheet once, 12-14 minutes (or until edges are firm). Transfer, on parchment, to wire rack to cool.
4) Make filling. Place chocolate in medium bowl. Heat cream, sugar, salt in a small saucepan (medium heat), pour over chocolate. Let stand for 10 minutes. Gently stir until smooth. Let stand until firm enough to spread (~15 minutes).
5) Spread 1.5 tsps filling onto cookies. Top with remaining cookies. (Assembled cookies can be refrigerated for up to 2 days).

Things I learned
1) Don't be afraid to over freeze. Seriously. The more freezing time you can spare, the better, because this dough is *sticky*.
2) You need to use a cookie cutter for this recipe; a glass (which you use for biscuits) will not work. At all.
3) Confectioners' sugar *is* the same as powdered sugar.
4) Don't overcook the cream/sugar mixture.
5) Refrigerating the cookies to make sure they stay assembled is perfectly acceptable.

All in all, I think it was a success. They're edible, and they only made me about 30 minutes late to the party I took them to.

ojai trip.

2011-09-06T22:29:00.000-07:00

I almost can't believe it myself, I'm posting photos from a trip I JUST got home from. (Let's forget for a moment that I haven't posted the photos from a trip I took last November.)

But here they are, photos from Labor Day Weekend in Ojai for Justin and Thuha's wedding.

A few favorites:
SV and G in the sunlight

SV and I at the wedding

Coco, the dog of honor

Miles at the beach

D and G at the beach

This last one is maybe my favorite photo of the whole bunch, but the whole trip was a lot of fun, and so glad that I got to go help celebrate the wedding!

last throes of summer.

2011-09-06T21:00:00.000-07:00

My parents gave me a couple of little zucchini they grew in their garden this summer. I sliced this one up and "battered and fried" it as a side dish tonight. And by "battered and fried" I mean that I mixed mayonnaise and parmesean cheese and coated the zucchini with that, dunked them in bread crumbs, and pan fried them.

The mayo/parm mixture is really handy if you're not battering a lot of food (in my case, one small zucchini), and you don't have to waste half an egg, since you can mix up only as much as you're planning on using. It's not quite the same taste, but it does in a pinch.

And boy was this pinch tasty.

stamps!

2011-08-28T22:05:00.000-07:00

For my birthday I got a book called Bend the Rules with Fabric, and I'd been wanting to try out some of the project ideas for a while (about 6 months ;). When Melissa was in town visiting, we tried out making foam stamps and stamped some onesies.

I made an octopus!

And a flower!

The best thing about stamps (as opposed to stencils) is that you can use them over and over again. In the flower onesie above, that's the same stamp three times. While I like stencils a lot (and freezer paper is much easier to cut than foam), I'm kind of in love with stamp making.

So, I did it again this week, only this time on paper:

You can see the three steps I took to make that card for Miles' birthday.

Oh yeah, and I bought a bike like 2 months ago and I love it. Bikes!

kin to stars.

2011-08-06T23:42:00.001-07:00

I went to the kin to stars debut show tonight (I work with Scott), and it was so much fun. Lots of funny banter (rhinos!) and good music. They've got one song recorded that you can listen to on their website (I recommend it, hence this post), and I'm looking forward to more shows!

I've been bad at posting lately (like the last 4 months), but I do have a crafty post forthcoming in about a week -- I need to give the present away first before writing about it, but hint: it involves making stamps and stamping on fabric. :)

Also, I made a homemade bolognese sauce today, and it was delicious. I should take 4-day weekends more often.

mishmash.

2011-04-10T21:32:00.000-07:00

If you're my friend on flickr, you've likely seen all of these already, but this is what I've been up to lately. Baking, carding, cat photographing. Oh, and work. Lots of work. Click through on the photos for more story.

scones:

cat:

tart:

cat again:

camera watercolor:

sunday baking club: cinnamon pull-apart bread.

2011-03-13T13:53:00.000-07:00

I am decidedly a baker, not a cook. Sure, I like cooking, and I try new things occasionally, but I'm not great at it, and I am not super motivated to become a better cook. Now *baking*, baking I love.

However, something that has been missing from my baking repertoire is bread. You may remember that I recently made my first baked good with yeast (it was pizza crust), but I haven't made anything else with yeast since then. Baking runs in my family; my dad has been baking bread for about 10 years now. Eventually I'll make a foray into real breads, but today I attempted a sugar dough: pull apart cinnamon sugar bread (via not martha).

There really is something intensely satisfying about letting the dough rise into a cute little poofy ball and then smushing and punching it back down (that I think you lose if you make the no-knead breads that are so popular these days -- they are definitely delicious, but kneading is actually kind of fun!).

And even though I have now ordered a rolling pin, it's not going to get here until Wednesday, so I improvised again. This week's makeshift rolling pin:

(As Marc discovered yesterday, Sigg should not be confused with Sig.)

Something else that I did for the first time today was brown butter, immediately after doing so, I looked it up online to make sure I was doing it right. Lo and behold, I was, and it smelled awesome.

Other notes about this recipe: I wasn't able to roll out the dough quite as big as recommended, which meant that I had a bit of extra browned butter that didn't seem possible to get onto the dough; also, I dumped the whole cup of sugar on the dough but since it wasn't as big, it was a LOT of sugar, and in the process of cutting and stacking, I lost a bunch. Oh well. Next time maybe I'll just cut back a little. And maybe put some raisins in. Ooh, or chocolate.

Really, what this all comes down to is that people should start inviting me over on Sunday evenings because I will bake things and bring them with me. (Or I'll invite myself over, bearing baked goods, like I did to SV and D today.)

see?

2011-03-12T11:56:00.000-08:00

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Business Cat lolz!

needed: cheer.

2011-03-07T19:56:00.000-08:00

Today was rough, so I bought myself some flowers on the way home. Fun fact: Gerber Daisies are non-toxic to cats, dogs, and horses, so if your pet is like mine and will eat anything resembling a flower, Gerbers are the way to go.

bye, february!

2011-02-28T20:04:00.000-08:00

February is notoriously my least favorite month. So what better way to see it off than to cook some delicious pasta?

I didn't know what I wanted to make, but I knew I wanted pasta tonight, so I raided my fridge for veggies. Came up with mushrooms, sugar snap peas, and onion, with spinach to top. Made a quick alfredo sauce with some pecorino and leftover cream (only used half a container for these tarts), and tossed everything with some campanelle pasta with a little more pecorino on top.

It did involve some two handed cooking (left hand stirs the sauce to make sure it doesn't boil, right hand sautes the veggies) which I'm not very skilled at, but in the end, pretty delicious.

oscars baking club: grapefruit curd tarts.

2011-02-27T23:12:00.000-08:00

I had a dream last night where I made fruit tarts for an Oscars party that I was going to, with all these awesome fruits that I happened to have in my house. When I woke up I realized that the only fruit I had was a bunch of grapes and two grapefruit. Turns out, you can actually make a pretty awesome curd tart with two grapefruit. Grapefruits? (Both, apparently.)

Unfortunately (as you can see in the upper left hand side of the picture), I didn't let the curd chill long enough and it kind of escaped on the drive over to the party. A little messy, but still pretty tasty.

Also, I threw away my ratty old rolling pin in my recent move, and realized this fact about 20 minutes before the dough needed to be rolled out. Makeshift rolling pin acquired!

did you know you can make biscuits without milk?

2011-02-21T20:02:00.000-08:00

I didn't. And I really wanted biscuits tonight (but my milk had gone bad over the course of the move to my new house), so I checked online, and lo and behold: no milk, no egg biscuits.

See?

I made a half recipe and took the advice of adding some grated cheese to the dough (because, duh, I always have cheese), and they turned out great! Not as good as my normal baking powder biscuits (with milk), but a viable substitute if I don't have milk (which is more often than I'd like to admit).

Serving suggestion: eat with soup. Especially good if you didn't make the soup yourself. Because, duh, even though I like baking, I'm also very lazy.

happy valentimes!*

2011-02-15T00:17:00.000-08:00

I made Valentines this year. Sorta. I had someone print a postcard of a photo I took, and I *sent* them as Valentines this year.

They looked like this:

It's a collection of rocks on a beach in NW New Zealand (the name of which I'm not sure I ever knew), where there were thousands of rocks with notes and pictures drawn on them (presumably with permanent marker). I think this set was created by a number of different people -- there were a lot of hearts that looked dissimilar enough that it looked like a collective collection.

As far as the postcards went, I decided to use Simplecard, which is a division of Modern Postcard. I had them do a one-sided print and left the back blank so that I could write a message on them.

They turned out pretty nicely (although it would appear that Simplecard assumes their customer is using their product for marketing, not crafting); the one thing I would have liked them to do (other than center the image vertically) is to have the option for matte print, or at least have the back of the postcard be matte so that it's easier to write on.

I had to write on them with a Sharpie(tm), as all my other (permanent) pen choices were smearing.

And I had these vellum envelopes leftover from like 3 years ago (and only first class letter stamps, no postcard ones(?)), so I used those. It was cute to have the image peeking through on the address side. Hopefully, the post office will think so too, and deliver these without a fuss.

All in all, a fun experiment; I think next time I decide to have postcards printed, I'm going to try moo, because it appears that they leave the backs unlaminated, for a whole $0.99 more (plus $5.00 shipping -- Simplecard was free!).

--
*Oh 30 Rock, how I love you.

things I've learned today.

2011-01-30T13:36:00.000-08:00

One. I have a high-efficiency washing machine.

Two. QFC is half a block closer than Safeway (and doesn't require crossing 15th and Market).

Three. I should really invest in a bike now that I live somewhere flat.

Four. It is not a good idea to walk seven blocks in the cold when one has a cold.

Five. Cough syrup cannot be purchased by persons under the age of 18.

Six. Sophie will spend the first two hours in the new house meowing and hiding behind the toilet.

Seven. Today is still a red letter day.

a is for awesome. like a hot dog.

2011-01-12T20:41:00.000-08:00

I started out my evening on the computer by trying to read this paper on the effect of submitting photos with resumes to job listings, which was circling to the women's affinity group email list at work. My interest was piqued because one person on the thread pulled out a comment from the paper that indicated that women who are considered "attractive" were actually penalized for submitting a photo with their resume over women who did not submit a photo or who were deemed "plain". I've read books about the psychological effect of beauty, and while I have never reviewed a resume with a photo attached to it, I've actually submitted a job application where a photo was required, and I didn't even think about it twice at the time. (I was offered that job, but in the end chose another.)

Needless to say, I got about 15 pages into that research paper and couldn't read any more. I'm not sure I even got to the comment that piqued my interest, I was just done with reading it. Interesting, sure, but not particularly fun to read.

Then, I went on to read some of my RSS feeds, like cat versus human. If you're a cat person, you should read her blog. It's pretty uncanny. It's also really easy to read. (I usually start my RSS feeds with the comics and silly cat photos, because while they can definitely be endearing and thought provoking, they're also usually short. And sometimes short is all I have patience for.)

After exhausting my comics, I moved on to some more substantial feeds like The Happiness Project. I've read Gretchen Rubin's book and enjoyed it, and I occasionally read her blog. I've noticed that she posts a video a week, and I decided to watch this week's (about holding yourself accountable for the resolutions you've set), which I'll admit, is a good idea, and I made it most of the way through the video before losing interest (or before I needed to change sitting positions because the arm propping me up was falling asleep).

Either way, the great thing about reading blogs is that even if you have the attention span of a squirrel like I do, you often get directed to really awesome things that you may not have found otherwise. Today, while reading a post on The Happiness Project, I found out about the 1000 Awesome Things blog. Even better, I watched the author of 1000 Awesome Things: Neil Pasricha's TED talk about the Three A's of Awesome.

When I got home from work today (prior to reading/watching all these things online), I got fed up with something and then needed to remind myself of happy things. I came up with a couple, some with the help of a friend.

It seems sort of fortuitous that I should learn about 1000 Awesome Things today.

And here, I'll make it really easy for you to watch Neil Pasricha's TED talk. It's a good use of 17 minutes and 33 seconds, even if he does start rhyming toward the end:

gumshoe? no! snowshoe!

2011-01-09T21:22:00.001-08:00

Last weekend I went snowshoeing for the first time ever, and it was fantastic. We hiked up around the Commonwealth Basin near Snoqualmie Summit, and the weather couldn't have been better. Cold, sunny, clear.

I did, however, forget to take my camera, and it was so cold out that my phone decided that it was better to turn off than die a horrible death, so I didn't take any photos, but Miles got a couple, and perhaps a few more from the group will surface soon.

Not being one for outdoor winter activities, I cobbled together a reasonable (but kind of dorky-looking) snow outfit: borrowing a waterproof coat and some mittens from my mom, a hat from my dad (that I made!), and some waterproof shell pants from Alexis, and digging up some old hiking boots that I'd bought back in high school (still fit!), along with the gaiters that my dad bought for me when we hiked up to Camp Muir with my brother (1998?). All in all, the outfit worked out great, and I was well-protected from the elements.

I was definitely the slow one of the group, but it was still a lot of fun, a really good workout, and a gorgeous way to enjoy the snow/mountains. For those of you who haven't been, it's not significantly more difficult than walking or hiking, but I did get a few bruises on the tops of my feet from coming back downhill (and having snowshoes strapped to me, stopping me from sliding down). Aside from that, I wasn't too sore, just good and tired.

Oh, and I froze my hair:

And then we all had a big snow fight, in the 2 feet of powder on top of the like 8 feet of snowpack: a good end to a great day.

um.

2011-01-04T22:45:00.000-08:00

merry christmas!

2010-12-25T21:00:00.000-08:00

Hope you had some delicious food and cookies today!

This one was my favorite, decorated by Emily:

It's wearing a pink sweater and matching shoes!

Like last year, we also had some homemade lemon drops (and finally finished off the bottle of Grey Goose I bought last year for Christmas Eve 2009), which made decorating cookies that much more fun.

christmas cards - penguin edition.

2010-12-23T19:54:00.000-08:00

Time to stop procrastinating!

Remember this post where I posted the little Darth Vader helmets that were part of my in-progress Christmas cards? Well, I finally got around to sending my cards, so here they are!

There are details about how I made them on this photo here.

This has been a bit of a penguin year -- the one thing that I told Lynn (trip planner extraordinaire) was that I wanted to see in New Zealand was penguins! And so we did. But they come in to nest at night so I don't have any photos of them. I do, however, have some photos from the Oamaru colony where we watched them come in to nest for the night, but I've been bad and haven't uploaded them yet. Maybe before the end of the year. In the meantime, you can see Lynn's photos of the Club IMDb trip to New Zealand here.

I think that's too big to be called a puddle.

2010-12-08T09:55:00.001-08:00

Oh Mercer, how I love you when it rains. It was pouring when I left the house this morning, and now, of course, as I'm posting this it's currently sunny and clear skies outside. Today's going to be interesting.

beware the dark side.

2010-12-06T21:28:00.000-08:00

I made holiday cards this weekend (pictures forthcoming, after I send a couple in the mail), but the black paper cutouts that I was using reminded me a lot of Darth Vader's helmet. A lot of helmets.

christmas card ideas.

2010-11-29T21:05:00.000-08:00

I haven't started on my Christmas cards yet (there's still one day left in November, so it's okay, right?), but I did put together a Flickr gallery yesterday when I was looking for ideas.

I think the cardinal:

christmas card design 07 by losabia, on Flickr.

and the book snowman:

a christmas card by shimmerjewels, on Flickr.

are my favorites.

But the others are fun too. Take a look!

goodbye uptown.

2010-11-28T23:02:00.000-08:00

So sad, the Uptown Theater is now closed. Today was the last day that they were open and I'm glad I got to see one last movie there. That's right, I finally watched The Social Network.

I have a lot of fond memories of the Uptown -- the first time I ever met the founder of IMDb was at a showing of Good Night, and Good Luck. I also once tried to go see The Fall with Lynn and her brother, walked all the way down the hill to get to the theater only to find out that the projector was malfunctioning. (I did finally end up watching it like 3 months later -- beautiful movie.) Other great films seen at the Uptown: The Hedgehog, Blade Runner (the final cut), Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter... and Spring.

I understand why it's closing (not that it makes it any easier) -- old theater, can't be updated with new technology without a lot of money, etc -- but I will be sad to see it go. There were a few people taking pictures of the Uptown tonight, the most memorable of which was an old man who had a sign that said "Goodbye Uptown, 84 years." (The theater has been there since 1926.)

Even if I didn't frequent it that often, it was always nice to have a little movie theater in Queen Anne, even if the seats weren't as nice or the sound wasn't top quality. I hope someone is able to buy it and keep showing movies there; it'll be a shame to see it sit vacant.

photo set - israel.

2010-11-14T22:34:00.000-08:00

In a recent burst of effort to be more organized, I'm going through old sets of photos and finally posting them. First up, my trip to Israel in March 2009.

Pictures!

Unfortunately, my camera battery died about halfway through the trip, so my photos stop in the desert before Masada. But Michelle has photos of the whole trip, including this typical one of me with my parasol at Masada. I think Fefe (her now husband) took this one of me at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre (the supposed location of Jesus' tomb), which I think he was quite proud of.

Michelle had the amazing opportunity to go work for a couple of years in Haifa, so Kelly (another friend from grade school) and I took a slightly smaller opportunity to visit Israel and stay with Michelle. I am not very adventurous on my own, but I am friends with quite a few people who are much more adventurous than I am, and I take advantage of them living in exotic places (New Zealand, next up, is another such trip, where friend Lynn was living for a year).

Kelly (another friend from grade school) and I took a quick trip to visit Michelle, and toured a good portion of the country in the few days that we were there. One day at the Sea of Galilee, with a stop in Nazareth on the way back; one day in Haifa; one day at Masada and the Dead Sea; one day in Jerusalem. I think I have an anecdote for each.

Galilee:
The first full day in Israel, Michelle drove us out to the Sea of Galilee. It was a windy* road for part of the way there and I got a little carsick. The fresh air at the Mount of Beatitudes really helped, it was really gorgeous there, and despite busloads of loud American tourists (it's amazing how easy it is to spot an American accent when you're abroad!) in the vicinity, there were some really pleasant sites in that area. I think my favorite was Tabgha, and not just because they have a catchy design:

Nazareth:
The Church of Annunciation is interesting in pretty in a modern sort of way. But a more interesting story from Nazareth is when we went to a non-kosher butcher and tried to buy a rack of lamb to cook for dinner. Michelle's Hebrew is actually pretty good, but she was having trouble describing exactly what it was that we wanted to buy and was making a motion at her ribcage to the butcher while saying the words for baby sheep (I think?). It was pretty funny. We did end up getting something that was probably a rack of lamb, but the butcher didn't realize we wanted to cook them as a whole and chopped them up individually, so we then spent the better part of an hour looking for skewers or twine to tie them back together. In the end, we still ended up with rack of lamb, stuffed mushrooms/tomatoes, and roasted potatoes for dinner. Delicious AND fun.

Haifa:
It's well-known that there is mandatory military service for all Israeli citizens, but what I didn't realize is that most of the cadets (is that the right word?) live at home because they're usually pretty close to their base that way. Definitely eye-opening for me to be in a place where there are always soldiers around with M-16s, but what surprised me the most was that even though they were in uniform, a lot of the time their appearance wasn't as clean-cut as I would have expected (I saw a girl in uniform, holding her M-16, with a side ponytail). Unrelated, I touched the Mediterranean Ocean here.

Masada/Dead Sea:
Masada and the desert surrounding it are incredible. We took the cable car up to the top of Masada, but opted to walk back down the 400 meters' worth of stairs. Did I mention I like stairs? Also, I got to float in Dead Sea water! It's pretty incredible how difficult it is to get your feet to stay down and to remain vertical in the water, and how oily it feels. Also, it stings a little.

Jerusalem:
I'd heard on NPR (I think) that when people write letters to God, they end up at the Israeli Postal Service, and every so often, an employee will take the letters to the Western Wall and place them in between the rocks. Despite being behind like three layers of security, it was really peaceful there. And I left a fortune cookie fortune between the rocks.

That's my trip to Israel in a nutshell! And it's only a year and a half late.

cooking as therapy.

2010-11-10T20:46:00.000-08:00

Howdy. Long time no see! Well, long time no write, anyway. It's been about a month since I last wrote, and while I am not going to make excuses, I will say that I've been going through a bit of a rough spot lately, so sorry for the lack of posts. The other thing that I'm not going to make an excuse for is the lack of photos for this post. I made myself a pretty decent dinner and I'm going to write about it, but I was so hungry when I finished cooking that I just sat down and ate it. No time for photos. Not even a little one.

Even though I don't do it as often as I'd like to, I find a lot of comfort in cooking for myself. (It's the same sort of satisfaction that I get out of crafting, I think.) However, the most I can commit to right now are things that I can make quickly and easily. Tonight I made Parmesan breaded (fake) chicken breast, mashed potatoes, and some stir-fried zucchini and onions.

May sound a little fancy, but it's really not; to bread the "chicken" I mixed mayonnaise and Parmesan cheese, coated the "meat", then rolled it in some breadcrumbs and tossed it into the oven for about 25 minutes at 350F. I got the recipe off of a mayo jar a few years back, and it's actually pretty good. (I love recipes with only three ingredients! So easy! And it was way simpler than the recipe for Parmesan breaded chicken that was on the Parmesan container.) Plus, I don't have to waste an entire egg for the breading since I'm only making one or two servings at a time.

Needless to say, I'm in a better mood now than I was earlier this evening. Accomplishing something (even if it's just mayo-breaded fake chicken) and satiating hunger (by my own doing!) do wonders for my psyche and well-being.

volcano pop-up card.

2010-10-10T21:37:00.000-07:00

I heard that my friend Sam was getting a volcano cake for his birthday, complete with twizzler lava on a bed of chocolate cupcakes (aren't moms awesome?), so I decided to try and make him a volcano card!

Here's what it looked like on the inside:

On the front it just said "So I hear you like volcanoes!"

I think it turned out great, although it was trumped by the Lego Star Wars kit that my brother (Sam's number one favorite person) brought. The Legos were pretty awesome, so I'm okay with that.

sesame street spoofs the old spice commercial.

2010-10-09T22:24:00.001-07:00

(via eonline.)

I love the muppets.

cats and crafts.

2010-10-01T22:40:00.000-07:00

I could probably title every one of my posts this way, but today I've got a bunch of photos of both!

To start:
I crocheted a baby blanket based on the "Sunny Spread" pattern from the Jan/Feb 08 issue of Crochet Today! magazine. (Pattern available for free at Ravelry.) I've made a similar baby blanket version before, but this time I kept all the squares facing up.

What I love about this pattern is that the squares are small, semi-fancy, and portable (you're not dragging the entire blanket around with you if you crochet on the go); what I hate about this pattern is how many ends there are to weave in at the end because not only do you have two ends per square, you also have the ends of the threads you used to sew the squares together (it's a lot).

However, I persevered and wove in all my ends, and when I went to go take a photo of the finished blanket, Sophie had already claimed a spot on it. It's a good thing SV and D have a cat and are well-versed in "everything I own has cat hair on it".

And when I pointed out that the blanket wasn't hers, she had a fantastic glare:

In addition to the blanket, I made a cutout card (also green), using the Android Logo* (and some touches of my own), since SV is such a fan:

The eyes and baby bottle are cut out and glued to the inside of the card; the body/head/arms are cut out of the front. I made it in stages throughout the day (printed/traced on the card earlier), cut out when I got home, then rushed over to the shower, so I had to take a picture of it after SV and D had opened up all their presents. Hence the background being my knees.

Also of note, I got a new camera today! The above photo (android card) was taken with my shiny new Canon Powershot G11.

I did some other test shots today (I really don't know how to use this camera yet) using the auto features, including this one of Sophie:

She's such a good sport when it comes to me shoving a camera in her face. (+1 at flickr.)

*I am required to say:
Portions of this page are modifications based on work created and shared by Google and used according to terms described in the Creative Commons 3.0 Attribution License.

friday night pizza.

2010-09-24T20:08:00.000-07:00

Prior to tonight, I have never once used yeast in a recipe. Hard to believe, I know, but the things that I bake use baking powder, baking soda, and/or eggs for their leavening agent. Today, that changed. I decided to try my hand at pizza dough, because pizza sounded good, and I already had the cheese and pepperoni in my fridge.

I used this recipe from Allrecipies.com. I read a few of the comments (gotta love those) ahead of time, so I reduced the water a bit, added in some Italian seasoning into the dough, baked it at 375F (instead of 350F), and it turned out great! Toppings are: Hormel Natural Choice Uncured Pepperoni, Kraft Italian Blend (Mozzarella/Parmesan), canned pineapple, crimini mushrooms, sliced black olives, and some sliced roma tomato.

It was definitely satisfying to see the dough rise as it sat covered for 30 minutes, and then to have it be so poofy and light when I rolled it out to crust size. And it might just be that it's past 8pm and I'm finally getting to eat dinner, but it is incredibly delicious, especially with the pineapple, which gives it a nice sweet taste to balance out the salty.

As you can see in the picture, I also made myself a Caesar salad, making a nice Friday night meal. At best* I'll be able to eat half of this pizza (probably only 3 slices), so hopefully it'll also make good leftovers. I'll have to report back on how well it keeps.

*And by best, I mean most.

summer bookend pies.

2010-09-06T13:39:00.001-07:00

Labor day seems to mark the end of summer (even though we officially still have a few weeks left), and like Memorial Day (the start of summer?), I'm taking a pie to a BBQ this afternoon. Unlike Memorial Day, today's pie is not cherry.

Please welcome Miss Peach!

This being my first time making a peach pie, I used the recipe in Mark Bittman's How To Cook Everything, and even followed the directions for how to easily peel the peaches by dropping them in boiling water for 10-30 seconds and then dunking them in ice water. While slightly complicated to set up my tiny kitchen counter in such a way that I could easily maneuver the peaches from a pan of boiling water into the ice water and then onto a surface where I could peel away their fuzzy skins, it was amazing how easily those skins came off, revealing the juicy, delicious peach flesh underneath. (That's a doozy of a sentence, maybe I'll come back to fix it later. Maybe not.)

But really, it was fantastic. The skins came away so easily that it was totally worth the setup.

And I could hardly stop myself from eating all six peaches that I'd just peeled, they looked so delicious!

boy beanie skull cap.

2010-09-04T11:30:00.000-07:00

It was my dad's birthday earlier this week, and earlier this year he'd asked if I'd make him a skull cap to wear this winter. Usually it takes me like a year and a half to make someone something that I agree to, but this time it was only a few months! Plus, now that it's September (gasp!) I am starting to get interested in crochet projects again since it feels like they'll be useful soon (although I am hanging on to the last bit of summer for as long as I can).

I need to emphasize that I like crocheting better than knitting simply because projects take about a quarter of the time (if not less). I have at least three knitting projects going right now (left over from last winter) that I haven't finished and probably will never finish, unless I frog them and turn them into crochet projects. This is not to say that I don't love the way that knitted projects feel and look, they just take me so dang long that the desire to finish is overcome by the desire to start something new.

That aside, here's me modeling the hat I made for my dad. Note that this hat was completed over the course of two evenings.

I hope it fits him, but if it doesn't, I will have no problem making him a new one and keeping this one for myself. :D

simon's cat needs to do one about toilet paper.

2010-08-21T14:20:00.001-07:00

But this box one (which everyone has probably already seen, but it's super cute anyway, so watch it again!), is pretty awesome. Cat owners unite!

i heart palindromes.

2010-08-20T21:07:00.000-07:00

Also, over 10,000!

what was that about goat cheese?

2010-08-11T23:05:00.000-07:00

Dinner tonight was at Poppy. I had the veggie thali with the goat cheese stuffed squash blossom (pictured above), and it was amazing. There was also a little corn soup in the back there (also delicious, but not the chowder that I still want to make despite it going to be over 80 degrees for the rest of the week), and some sort of carrot dish that I enjoyed. The pickle dish was a little too spicy for me, but all in all, a really nice meal.

We also had goat cheese in our dessert thali - goat cheese pudding with mint and fresh raspberries, and a fantastic fresh mint chocolate chip ice cream.

I like going to Poppy for dinner - it's fancy enough that it feels like a treat, but fresh enough that I don't feel bad about having gone out. Plus, they have some really nice seasonal dishes so I feel like I'm taking advantage of what's in season!

ten thousand steps.

2010-08-10T21:05:00.000-07:00

I got this pedometer a few weeks ago (mostly because I was curious), and in general the consensus seems that it's healthy to walk 10,000 steps a day.* I checked my stats and over the past week I averaged 10121 steps per day. Not bad, especially considering that I only walked about 3500 steps on Sunday. I think that a big part of it is that it's nice outside (for the most part), and also that I went out a lot last week (dinners, happy hours, baseball games, etc).

I noticed that today I was only at about 7000 steps, so I took advantage of the fact that it's still summer (despite some recent cooler weather), and walked out to Kerry Park.

I tried out this gimmick filter that Melissa bought last week that blurs the edges of the photo. It sort of worked, but it took some patience to get the camera to still focus on something (the first one I tried blurred the entire photo).

Also, you can't really see it, but Mt. Rainier was out there to the right of the Washington Mutual Tower.

I always enjoy the view from Kerry Park, and today was no exception. It was really pretty, but as usual, still really crowded. Lots of photographers, kids in pajamas, cute little puppies. I felt a little out of place, but still lingered a bit to watch the glow in the sky fade away.

*Fun fact: Erma told me that in Korea the word for "pedometer" is something along the lines of "10,000 step machine."

what's on your shopping list?

2010-08-09T21:49:00.000-07:00

Along with not writing ~~much~~ at all during the month of July, I also kind of skimped on reading any blogs.

Did a little catch-up tonight, and came across this: corn chowder recipe via what used to be 'Bitten' by Mark Bittman. It looks delicious, and I want to make it now. Not *right* now, because I already made vegetarian enchiladas tonight. But maybe tomorrow. Anybody want to partake of corn chowder? I can serve mine in martini glasses too! (But if I serve it in something that small, I'd need to make a main course too, and I don't know that I can commit to two dishes on a work night.)

shishkaberries, melissa and karin style.

2010-08-08T15:25:00.000-07:00

Last night Melissa and I went to a Mariner's game and after all these years, I finally broke down and bought a stick of chocolate-covered strawberries, otherwise known as a Shishkaberry. I've been wanting to try them for a while (read: years), and when I took my first bite I was woefully disappointed.

Cut to this afternoon, when Melissa and I decided to make our own chocolate covered strawberries! (Actually, we had already decided to make our own before I bought the ones yesterday, but if I leave that out the story flows better.)

We had a bit of difficulty getting started -- the instructions we looked at said you can either use a double boiler or just melt the chocolate in the microwave. However, the most *important* thing about melting the chocolate in the microwave is to melt it on half power. I'll repeat that: if you melt your chocolate chips in the microwave, make sure you set the power to 50%. Otherwise you risk overcooking the chocolate and it doesn't ever smooth out, you'll never get to dip your strawberries in it, and you'll be sad. And I don't want you to be sad.

However, we learned our lesson*, and persevered. I suppose it also helps that I have an abundance of chocolate in my house.

Here's the outcome:

The drizzled chocolate was achieved by piping the leftover melted chocolate out of folded wax paper. Originally, we tried to just drizzle it with a fork, but that totally didn't work, so let me know if you know of a better way.

We're waiting for the chocolate to harden, so fingers crossed they'll taste better than those ones on a stick.

*The other lesson I learned today is that "shiskaberry" (only one "h") is a variety of cannibis.

hampage!

2010-08-02T21:49:00.000-07:00

I don't talk about work much here; it's mostly about crafting and baking. But sometimes work and crafting go hand in hand!

One of the projects I've been working on for the past couple of months was a redesign of *insert massive movie website here*'s homepage. And during the development process, it got the nickname "hampage", because one of our task stickies was misspelled "hompage" and the "o" really did look like an "a". Endless hours of hilarity ensued (we were very amused with ourselves) and as the launch day approached, I tried to think of an appropriate baked good to celebrate with.

Of course, the answer was pig-shaped cookies. And lo and behold, Sur la table has nice pig-shaped cookie cutters, for the grand price of 1 dollar. They are mostly pig-shaped, but I was a little worried they wouldn't look like pigs once they baked up, so on a couple of them, I added curly tails:

Take those and add a little pink frosting:

(click through to see the awesome pig spatula that I had to buy.)

Throw in a few pineapples for good measure:

And you've got a launch celebration!

pencil sculptures gallery at telegraph.co.uk

2010-08-01T19:09:00.000-07:00

I like pencils. I also like miniatures. Came across this gallery via Boing Boing, and I thought I'd share it with you. Plus this is an easy way to get a blog post in, considering I kind of failed to write anything during the month of July. I blame it on work and family obligations like my brother getting married. :)

(see rest of the gallery at telegraph.co.uk)

weekend baking club: raspberry tart.

2010-06-26T23:40:00.000-07:00

While I can't compete with Julien's photography, I can add a cat to my composition:

I was hankering after a 9" raspberry tart after seeing Michelle and Julien's strawberry/raspberry one from last week, and had decided that I'd make one this weekend. Even though I'd made the resolution, I kind of forgot about it until Friday night when I went to Central Market and found that they had organic raspberries on sale! Raspberries purchased, tart eminent.

I was a little short on time today (was going to the Symphony!), so instead of opting for the creme patisserie (even though I did call Michelle et Julien to get their recipe), I chose to go a simpler route: mascarpone cream. I chalk it up to wanting to try something new, and that I'd found an awesome story at NPR with a recipe for it.

I have often felt the way the author does,

I have the means to fake a more perfect life. My secret summer weapon: fruit tarts. They are gorgeous and taste even better; they have the "wow" factor I want in an escapist dessert fantasy. And best of all, they're deceptively easy.

So here's my "wow" photo, and may I also emphasize that in addition to being "reasonably" easy, they're also delicious.

butterfly room: pacific science center.

2010-06-21T22:13:00.000-07:00

On Friday, I went to go see the Hubble 3D IMAX with a few friends and decided to take a quick tour around the rest of the science center, including the Butterfly Room!

Just after I got out my camera (phone) and turned off the flash, this guy decided that he'd hitch a ride on my forehead for a few minutes. What good timing! It tickled, a lot, but you're not supposed to touch the butterflies, so I couldn't try to move him. Maybe I still smelled like banana from earlier in the week -- these "owl" butterflies were going to town on some ripe bananas and oranges nearby.

midnight baking club: banana edition.

2010-06-15T22:58:00.000-07:00

I lied. Just a little though. When I said I ran out of pie crust for the 5th tart, it wasn't the whole truth. I ran out of the half that I was working with. I had an entire second pie crust that I was too lazy to roll out just for one tart's lattice.

So, since I had a second pie crust hanging out in my fridge, I needed to do something with it!

Which brings us to tonight. I have about 12 overripe bananas in my freezer, which I will eventually make into banana bread. I had this brilliant idea of using 2 of them to make banana cream pie with the leftover pie crust. But as it turns out, you're supposed to use ripe, raw bananas for the custard. I briefly considered trying it with the frozen ones, but chickened out at the thought of brown, watery custard.

I started with the epicurious Banana Cream Pie recipe (halved, and with just whole milk instead of whole milk and heavy cream), but then folded in the banana bits ala Martha Stewart's recipe.

To make them easily shareable, I decided to use the 1.5" tart tins, but it's difficult to do pre-baked crust with them (despite freezing and poking holes with a fork, they still puffed up a bunch).

It's tough to wait long enough for everything to cool properly, so after an hour or so, here's what one looks like:

Also, I just noticed that I forgot two tart tins in the freezer. Blast! No time to cook them tonight; maybe tomorrow. I have a lot of leftover banana custard, which I'll also probably freeze for later. We'll see if it works.

And before I go to bed, a little gem I found while researching recipes: The Reader's Digest Extraordinary Uses for Bananas.

cher-err-errr-errry bay-ay-beeeee.

2010-06-13T22:34:00.000-07:00

Cherry baby.*

Okay, so it was a cherry tart. But a really good friend of mine had a baby this weekend, so those are the two big things on my mind at the moment.

Here's the tart:

It's like the mini version of the pie I made a few weeks back for Memorial Day. It's definitely cherry season around here -- they're on sale in all of the grocery stories, and I really just can't help myself. I see them, I buy them.

I hadn't used my 4" tart tins in a while either, so that was fun. I figured out a way to get the bottom crust just about the right size (used the tin as a cookie cutter on slightly too thick rolled-out dough, and then flattened it a bit after I'd punched out a 4" round). Works great!

The lattice work wasn't perfect, and on the 5th tart, I ran out. Behold, the ugly tart. I was thinking that maybe with all my cooking projects I should make an ugly one that I can eat it guilt-free before taking pictures. But then I went and took a picture of the ugly one too.

I recently figured out how to upload photos to flickr directly from my phone, so I'll probably start being lazy and doing that instead of taking them with my dinky digital camera. Unfortunately, that means that I'll probably start skimping on the post-prod work, so the colors will be a little off (like in that Memorial Day photo).

Also, I watched 4 more episodes of Glee this weekend. Another disc comes from Netflix in the mail tomorrow, and that'll be another 4 down. Unfortunately, there's one episode in the middle that I haven't seen and it's the FIRST episode of the second volume, so it'll probably be a while before I get to see that one. Something else to look forward to in September, I suppose.

*Yes, I know it's Sherry Baby. But I didn't make anything with sherry this weekend.

this is a test.

2010-06-13T00:16:00.000-07:00

Hulu has this new feature where you can embed clips from their videos and select the start/end points, as well as the thumbnail. The first time I tried it, there was a problem and it was ignoring my start point and playing the video from the beginning (this was like 2 weeks ago), but it seems to be working now. They also appear to have figured out how to play pre-roll on the clips, so just be forewarned.

Can I also say how much I'm enjoying Glee?

I'll never be able to say "B to B" with a straight face again.

2010-06-08T22:15:00.000-07:00

Sounds like work.

And of course, it begs to be accompanied by this video:

cock a snook.

2010-06-05T12:48:00.001-07:00

Definition: here. (Complete with illustrative picture! Totally SFW.)

I came across this phrase in a book I'm reading: Queuing for Beginners (Joe Moran) that was reviewed (briefly) in: Shakespeare Wrote for Money (Nick Hornby). Queuing for Beginners is a rather humorous look at the minutae of British daily life, but so far (I'm four chapters in), most of the observations that Moran makes are applicable to American daily life, particularly those of an office worker.

One passage I was particularly tickled by was an excerpt from Sinclair Lewis's The Job, regarding an efficiency expert arranging for office boys to deliver glasses of water around 4 times a day:

Thitherto, the stenographers had wasted a great deal of time in trotting to the battery of water-coolers, actually being human and relaxed and gossipy for ten minutes a day. After the visitation of the expert, the girls were so efficient that they never for a second stopped their work - except when one of them would explode in hysteria and be hurried off to the rest-room.

The death of hot breakfasts (in favor of cereal or no breakfast at all), commuting on crowded buses/trains, the office workstation, office gossip/breaks -- I get to laugh because he's describing a day I know all too well. But I'm occasionally greeted with a phrase with which I'm unfamiliar (y'know, being American and all), and get to pause to look it up.

saturday interesting things.

2010-05-29T21:43:00.000-07:00

Brought a smile to my face: Apparently, if you put the words "note to self" into a tweet, the NoteRobot will pick it up and repost in their own feed. It's actually kind of fun to see what people are noting to themselves. (And how many there are!) Good advice.

Also fun: Improv Everywhere staged a Ghostbusters event at the NYC Public Library.

From the guy who brought you "I LEGO NY": The Haunted Household. My favorite is the remote-eating couch. (Forwarded to me by my dad. Aw! :)

New music: New Vampire Weekend song off of the Twilight Saga: Eclipse soundtrack.

More Twilight Nonsense: Robert Pattinson's handwriting is now a font. Twilight Poison (I am not making this up) created a font using images of autographs from Mr. RPattz. Next on the list? Jacob and Emmet.

Awesome Marketing: VIDEO: Bureau of Press changes its name. You don't even need the sound on the video (if you're at work, for instance), so you have no excuses not to watch it. (Forwarded to me by Erma Peel.)

that cat looks like it's telling the cabbie where to go.

2010-05-20T20:49:00.000-07:00

photo from iansomerhalder on twitter.com

I never particularly had a fondness for Ian Somerhalder, but seeing this picture -- man. A man with a cat. In a car. In a leather jacket. Looks pretty good to me. Well chosen photo, Mr. Somerhalder.

And I see that you're advocating for the Humane Society!

Maybe I'll watch Life as a House, or move The Rules of Engagement up on my Netflix queue, cause you've just moved up in my book.

I hope you're okay with me posting your awesome photo.

Thanks for making my job more fun,
Karin

linky linky.

2010-05-19T18:22:00.000-07:00

Here are some of the things that I looked at today. Maybe you'll find them interesting too!

cute: http://www.etsy.com/listing/47550372/blue-calico-love-bird-hoodie-charcoal

fun: http://www.etsy.com/listing/39240657/hamburger-scatter-cushions

omg so stupid: http://www.imdb.com/video/screenplay/vi198836505/

agreed: http://www.dharbin.com/strip/2010/05/diary-thursday-friday-april-21-22-2010-getting-better/

Also, I walked the entire way home from work today. Not on purpose, but there were a bunch of sketchy dudes waiting at the bus stop (presumably on their way to the free dinner that the Presbyterian Church nearby does on Wednesday nights), the bus was 15 minutes late, and I didn't want to stand around with them any longer. Felt pretty good to walk the whole way home (under normal circumstances, I think it'd take about 50 minutes), so I'm treating myself to pizza. Oh, and it was pouring, did I mention that? Yay Seattle.

book flower.

2010-05-11T22:37:00.000-07:00

While I was making this, I was thinking about what I'd title the post. I wanted to call it: whatever you can make in felt, I can make in paper. But it didn't turn out quite how I wanted. Still made a pretty picture though, and it was kind of fun to cut up a book (felt a little naughty!).

It's a paper adaptation of the felt dahlia that I made here. As much effort as these take to make (approximately 2.5 hours), I'm really liking these crafts that I can finish in an evening.

a couple more!

2010-05-10T23:04:00.000-07:00

Now I will swab Sophie's chin with antibiotics and she will hate me for a few minutes.

And so ends my Monday night.

felt dahlia.

2010-05-08T17:38:00.000-07:00

I know, it's been a long time since my last post. In my defense, I did a lot of traveling, one of my best friends got married, and then I had some issues to deal with at home that have been taking up most of my free time. At some point in the future, I hope to post some photos from New Zealand, but for now, I'm trying to get back into the habit of crafting and posting.

This afternoon, I tried my hand at Megan Reardon's Mother's Day Dahlia Brooch, using only supplies that I already had in my apartment. I'm sure it'll come as no surprise that my stash of craft supplies is threatening to take over my bedroom, so I'm game for any project that I can complete without purchasing anything new. (Hmm, this sounds like a challenge goal for the rest of the year. :)

At some point last year, I bought like 12 sheets of craft felt at Jo-Ann's (for a project that I can't exactly recall), and had only used about half a sheet to date. Internal monologue: "Perfect! A project that uses a supply I already have!"

I scanned the list of supplies needed and figured that I had usable equivalents for everything in there and started cutting felt. I'd gotten halfway through gluing the edges of the larger petals and letting them dry with clothespins to hold them tight, when I read on the label of my tacky glue that it was not intended for fabric. "Crap!" It might have worked, but probably not as well as I'd have liked, so I scoured my craft supplies for another option. I read that someone had good results with a hot glue gun, but I'm not that big a fan since it takes a while to heat up and it's messy. My other adhesives aren't meant for fabric either, so I dug out the yet-unused needle felting kit that I bought in Japan last summer.

What fun! Who knew? Obviously, I'm sure that my technique leaves something to be desired, but it seemed to work out pretty well:

(see the back at flickr. >)

The back has a little pocket for a note, so this'll be my card to my mom for Mother's Day tomorrow. :)

home cooking.

2010-03-23T20:38:00.000-07:00

I'm not big on eating meat, but sometimes I crave it.

Tonight was one of those nights.

I give you... the homemade hamburger:

I'm actually kind of surprised that it turned out okay. I'm notorious for not cooking meat all the way through (searing the outside too fast), but I did pretty well (medium well, that is). Plus, mushrooms* are delicious when cooked with beef. And those onion rings weren't bad either.

*The mushrooms are hiding under the top bun. In case you were wondering.

two days in a row? madness!

2010-03-22T22:29:00.000-07:00

This last week was really crafty though, so there's more to post today.

Specifically, Michelle and Julien's escort cards (they're like place cards):

Michelle has really pretty cursive; I do not. I have reasonably decent printed writing, so I did my best for the table names (but no photo of the backs).

What was funny was that we spent like and hour and a half on Saturday morning going to all the boutiques in my neighborhood looking for a third design of round seal (we had some tree seals that we were going to use for the vegetarian choice), but then finally decided to just use the gold star bursts for all of them (and differentiate the meal choice with colored ribbon, which I already had). All that walking and we didn't buy anything!

Ah well, cheaper that way, and we used up a bunch of ribbon that I've had for years. Very resourceful, and that means that I can buy more ribbon now, right?

stenciled four pack.

2010-03-21T23:15:00.000-07:00

Went to a baby shower on Saturday, so I spent most of my free time this week working on some stencil designs for a package of onesies that I got at Target.

The favorite was:

I drew it myself! The baby's nickname is Ninja, since apparently she kicks a lot -- pretty adorable, and made for a great personalized design.

Second in line was:

Also personalized; and inspired by a few of our office catch phrases -- the third one is courtesy of the baby's mother.

And the other two are pretty standard fare:

Erma pointed out that I should have made a donkey one instead of an elephant, unless Anishiya's baby was going to be a Republican -- oops. But elephants are so cute!

tell me this isn't adorable.

2010-03-15T23:59:00.000-07:00

Happy Birthday, Sophie. I love you to pieces.

Also, here are those cards I made the yesterday when I was supposed to be vacuuming:

(Smaller, so that I don't take away from Sophie's birthday.)

Okay, now I really need to get away from my computer (since I've been sitting in front of it for at *least* 12 hours today, if not more). More soon!

I think I have a cookie buying problem.

2010-03-14T12:15:00.000-07:00

I really do.

See?

(there are notes about the cookies at flickr.)

And I even forgot to include the Biscoff.

I'm reminded of college when I had a habit of eating a lot of candy while sitting at my desk. Once I realized that I was doing that, I was able to stop eating the candy, but not buying it (and ended up with a big pile of candy in my dorm room). I would say that is the case here, except that I don't think I can stop from eating these cookies.

lavender elephant.

2010-02-28T23:41:00.000-08:00

This weekend, I made this little guy:

and had to take a picture of the little butt too, because it's so cute:

(+1)

I would write more about it, but I'm too tired (had. to. finish. elephant.). For anyone who's interested, there are details about him on that first flickr photo.

G'night!

what I've been cooking.

2010-02-22T21:40:00.000-08:00

It's been a tough 2010 so far, but I haven't stopped cooking or crafting (except for a brief hiatus from crafting when I was sick for a week and a half).

Here's a sample of some of the things I've cooked in 2010, with a few christmas cookies thrown in for good measure. Each photo has slightly more info at flickr, so feel free to click through and read more story. :D

Christmas Cookies

I made the cookies the weekend before Christmas, but with all the holiday craziness, didn't get a chance to decorate them, so the first thing the entire family did on Christmas Eve was to frost and decorate cookies. It was a lot of fun. I especially like the zombie that my dad made. (What a surprise coming from him!)

Meat and Potatoes

One day in January, I really wanted to eat meat and potatoes. And lo and behold, filet mignon was on sale! Bought some yukon gold potatoes to go with it, and some mushrooms and asparagus. Overcooked the steak, but it tasted good to make it myself!

Homemade Pizza

So it's not as homemade as it could be -- it's just a Pillsbury (in a can) Crust. But I had trouble getting it out of the roll and it ended up with a big hole in the middle, which I decided to just leave. And I got to eat more mushrooms!

January Blueberry Pie

Remember National Pie Day? Here's my blueberry pie. D was good and wrote about the night back when it happened here; you should take a look at Thuters' quiche, if you haven't already. It was delicious! (And again, had mushrooms! I like them, but I'm surprised that they're showing up this often. I much prefer cheese. :P)

Gyoza!

On my way home one day, a few weeks ago, I stopped at the Chase branch inside Uwajimaya, and then had the impulse to make gyoza. I already had a head of cabbage, all I needed was some meat and some wrappers. So I bought them. And then made them. And then I didn't eat dinner until about 8:30pm, since it takes a while to make them. But it was worth it.

Tonight's Spaghetti

Since I haven't posted in a while, and I was advertising on my gchat status that tonight was "Monday Spaghetti", it was requested that I take a picture of my dinner. And of course, once I got this photo taken, I started aggregating and posting the other photos I'd taken over the past two months.

Which brings us to now. Oh delicious 2010.

curious.

2010-02-14T23:03:00.001-08:00

I know I haven't posted in a while, and this is not going to be a long entry by any means. (I'll make it up soon, I promise.)

Does it confuse anyone else that Amazon sells the Barnes & Noble Classic Series? I suppose if you join Barnes & Noble's membership program, it's cheaper on bn.com.

the classy kind of lemon drop (not a shot).

2010-01-20T23:09:00.000-08:00

I'm not a big drinker, but I do like me a lemon drop every now and then. It's probably because I like lemonade so much, and I like *strong* lemonade. I used to try and skimp on the water when making it from concentrate (2.5 cans vs the 3.5 that it calls for), and then no one else in the house would drink it without mixing in at least 1/2 cup more water.

This year, I decided to make lemon drops for my family on Christmas Eve (first time buying anything in a liquor store!), and then we had them again on New Year's Day.

Basic recipe, per cocktail:
2 oz grey goose vodka (1 oz for the lightweight that I am)
2 tbsp simple sugar syrup
2 tbsp lemon juice

Pour vodka, sugar, and lemon juice in shaker with ice. Shake shake shake, then strain into sugar-rimmed glass.

To rim the glasses with sugar, take a cut lemon and run it around the edge of the glass. Then, turn glass lemon-juice-side down into a plate of sugar.

Warning: I like my lemon drops sweet. Most of the recipes I found online called for less sugar (and less lemon juice, now that I think about it), but after some experimentation, I found that I (and the rest of my family) liked them with more sugar. Sugar makes it go down easier. (Either that or I wasn't shaking them long enough to get the sugar to dissolve fully into the vodka.)

Anyhow, they were delicious, and I still have at least half a bottle of vodka left (which will probably last me until next Winter).

what do you read, my lord?

2010-01-20T19:35:00.001-08:00

It's been a really busy 2010 so far, so there haven't been many updates (sorry).

However, as I told Erma earlier today, I've still been crafting/cooking (good), I just haven't had time to write about it (sad). For instance, yesterday I made a small lasagna instead of writing in my blog. And it was delicious.

In the meantime (since I'm obviously not going to write about my crafts now, I still need to eat dinner!), here are a few links that I stumbled upon while researching something.

Shakespeare's Hamlet: The Manga Edition (Note: This appears to be the best rated of the Shakespeare Manga series. There is also a Romeo and Juliet, a Macbeth, and a Julius Caesar.)

Hamlet : For Kids (Shakespeare Can Be Fun series) (Note: This edition contains letters from Hamlet (soliloquy?), written in kids' handwriting. It looks awesome.)

And last, but not least, The Klingon Hamlet. (From the Amazon.com review: "The Klingon translation, in all the glory of its iambic pentameter, has been lovingly constructed, and is well worth the effort of reading at least a few favorite passages aloud.")

It shouldn't surprise me that there are so many fantastic variations of Hamlet out there, but like most things, I never really thought about it (despite having rushed out to purchase Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead the week that it came out on DVD). Plus, there are probably a hundred just-as-awesome versions out there that I didn't find.

2009 in review, sort of.

2010-01-03T20:38:00.001-08:00

Last year I decided to try and keep a list of one thing a day that made me happy. Just for me, not for anyone else, (so as to not worry about the publish-ability of things) and while I didn't manage to write down something every day, it's nice to be able to go back and look at it and see some of the things that made me happy last year.

A handful that I like:

01/25/09
driving my car and at having the snow go over the roof instead of hitting the windshield.

01/29/09
searching "two and two" as in "putting two and two together" and getting back the first google result as 2 + 2 = 4.

02/02/09
punxsutawney. the word.

02/03/09
seeing little kids playing patty-cake with their dad by the parking garage.

02/04/09
surviving my first night of dodgeball -- and having the guy that beaned me in the head continue to apologize for it for the next hour.

02/09/09
chocolate cream puff.

02/14/09
while waiting at the light at the 124th street exit, the old ladies in the car next to me holding up a "happy valentine's day" sign.

03/05/09
the security guard in the bus tunnel making a wall-e joke when I was standing in the spot of sunlight.

05/12/09
the triumph of picking a good avocado.

05/18/09
be a beacon.

05/31/09
big-ass poppies.

I only really made it through to about July before I stopped writing them down in my .txt document. I have a few more scrawled in my Moleskine, but I never managed to get them onto the computer. I'm doing this exercise again this year -- I already have something written down for each of the first three days of the year. And it's okay if I don't write down something every day or I stop halfway through the year. It's just kind of nice to have a list of things to look back on that I was happy about during the year (and it makes it easier to not dwell on the difficult things that have happened).

Happy New Year, everyone.

january 23rd is national pie day!

2010-01-02T20:37:00.000-08:00

So says the American Pie Council.

pumpkin pie - thanksgiving 2009.

The 23rd is a Saturday this year, so I just might be able to make a pie. But should it be savory? Sweet? I am fond of cherry pie (apparently as was Queen Elizabeth I), but the thought of using canned cherries is kind of a turn off. I have some frozen blueberries that were fresh picked in August that I could use, but I've never been great at blueberry pies. And if I'm going to use frozen fruit, there are plenty of choices at the grocery store from local growers (yay Remlingers!) so I could do peach or apple (actually, I could use fresh apples as they're in season now).

The choices, the choices! Any thoughts or favorite recipes?

Maybe I'll get my act together and have a pie party.

cookie pride!

2010-01-02T20:01:00.000-08:00

I haven't been watching Colbert Report much since I downgraded my cable, but this one's pretty awesome, especially considering my love of cookies.

"Monkeys, you'll earn my respect when you use those opposable thumbs to make snicker doodles."

The Colbert Report

Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

Cookie Monster

www.colbertnation.com

Colbert Report Full Episodes

Political Humor

Economy

holiday card retrospective 2004-2009.

2009-12-20T17:38:00.000-08:00

Before I show you this year's cards (I've sent 10, and I have just finished writing 13 more that will go out tomorrow), let's take a little look down memory lane of past winter holiday cards.

2004 - brr snowman.

Very homemade. Not much to say about this one -- I remember having fun making them, but they're not particularly noteworthy (hah, get it?) or very impressive.

2005 - poinsettia.

This was the second design that I went through this year -- the first card I tried wrapping up like a present, but it came out looking really bad, so at the last minute I used a bunch of stuff that I already had (the lacy background paper was leftover from an envelope project that I never finished, and the poinsettia was made out of construction paper (fancy, right?)). I think the center of the flower is bits of ribbon. Crafty, crafty.

2006 - starlight mint.

In 2006 I really got into decorating things with starlight mints. I had planned on making starlight mint magnets in this style (and I did actually make a few) but then decided that they'd be too difficult to send, so I just wrapped up the painted discs and glued them to the card.

2007 - gingerbread man.

I think I like this one the best -- I made a stencil for the gingerbread man out of a 5x7 notecard and then used normal acrylic paint. My apartment had a bunch of these painted gingerbread men hanging up all over while I waited for them to dry. I had a stencil for the heart buttons too, but I think the most fun part was putting them in the vellum envelopes!

2008 - handcut snowflake.

You've seen this before (I was actually in the habit of taking pictures of crafts and posting them in this blog at this point last year) so I'll just link to last year's post.

And that brings us to this year's winter holiday card. I give you, "Let it snow":

And another view, lotsa cards:

After last year's cut out cards, I felt like I was skimping on the cardmaking this year since I wasn't spending 15 minutes per card, but in the end, I really like em. The "Let it sn_w" is a stamp that I got at Make an Impression in Bellevue Square, and the snowflake is a paper punch that I got at Paper Zone (Shoreline). The ink is a Colorcube that I probably bought in 1995 -- still good (and apparently worth the 6 bucks that I spent on it, even though it felt like a lot of money at the time)!

Hmm. Looking through these, it appears that I really like blue cardstock for winter, apparently.

christmas, christmas time is heeeere...

2009-12-18T20:35:00.000-08:00

I saw a car adorned with this today:

(image from amazon.com.)

It's the Reindeer Car Kit!

Is it embarrassing that I think it's kind of cute? I'm not saying that I'd buy one (no, really, I don't want one), but it made me smile when I saw a little Ford Focus driving down Boren Avenue with the antlers sticking out the top of the windows and the little red nose on the grill.

Other holiday news: I finished making my cards, but have only sent about half of them. I took pictures, but I want to do a holiday card retrospective first, so I need to take pictures of past year's cards before I can post this year's. But in the meantime, here's a teaser.

The design from last year was these hand-cut snowflakes:

crafternoon 2: the sequel.

2009-12-06T21:17:00.000-08:00

D hosted a crafternoon this weekend and showed me and Erma how to make earrings. D apparently used to work in a bead store (envious!) and learned a bunch of nifty techniques (she also has some very awesome tools and lots of beads/gemstones/etc.

The first style just has beads on a headpin, and then you use a pair of round needle nose pliers to make the loop at the top and wind it shut. The second (purple ones) technique that D taught us to do uses two of the headpins, but instead of attaching them directly to the earring base, you attach one at each end a small length of chain, and then attach the middle of the chain to the earring base. It looks a little more dainty, but it was slightly nervewracking to remember to attach the loop of the headpins onto the chain before winding them closed.

All in all, a very fun crafternoon -- and kind of a nice quick craft to do. I need to learn more quick-crafts (knitting is not a quick craft that you can finish a project in one afternoon) to make homemade gifts a more viable option for the holidays. I think the first pair will be a Christmas gift this year; the second pair I think I'll keep.

(Also, please ignore my neck fat; it's difficult to take a picture of your own ear.)

thanksgiving baking.

2009-12-06T21:07:00.000-08:00

For Thanksgiving, it was requested that I make both a pecan pie and a pumpkin pie. I only own one pie dish though, so I decided to make the pecan pie as a tart -- partially because I usually find pecan pies too sweet (too much corn syrup/sugar), and partially because of the pie pan situation.

For the pecan pie tart, I used this recipe, which calls for some espresso and grated chocolate. It was delicious the first day; not as good as leftovers.

(You may be able to see some of the espresso or chocolate specs on the largest version of this photo.)

For the pumpkin pie, I just used the normal libby's pumpkin pie recipe (from the back of the can). For the first time ever, I had the right amount of filling for one pie. Usually, I end up with too much filling, but this time it worked perfectly!

The pie tasted delicious a few days after Thanksgiving (much better than it did the first day, for some reason).

Both crusts are the Mark Bittman "How to Cook Everything" basic butter pie crust recipe and they turned out pretty well also. Really interesting to see how the crust worked as a pie crust and as a tart crust (not pre-baked vs. pre-baked). I think I like it better pre-baked (which is what he recommends in the book, so it's not surprising), but that's often a little too much effort for me.

Yay for successful Thanksgiving pies! (And my blog post is only like a week and a half late!)

corn chowder.

2009-11-24T20:19:00.000-08:00

A coworker of mine gave me a mini loaf of homemade bread today, and it was just calling out for some chowder. I looked around online for corn chowder recipes, all of which called for bacon (which I don't keep in my house), but I figured I could substitute some breakfast sausage for the bacon and call it good. I also didn't have enough milk (and I *did* have some leftover veggie broth), so I did half broth/half milk. It was a little watery (non-fat milk), so I added some flour and it thickened right up. You can make this vegetarian by using veggie sausage.

(Chowder thickened a bit after I took the picture.)
Makes 2 servings.

ingredients
2 links frozen breakfast sausage
1 tbsp butter
1/2 medium onion, cut into 1/2 in pieces.
1 clove garlic, chopped
1 carrot (or 5-6 baby carrots), cut into 1/4 in pieces
1 potato, cut into 1/2 in pieces.
1 cup frozen sweet corn
3/4 cup milk
3/4 cup veggie broth
1/4 tsp kosher salt
1/4 tsp black pepper (plus more for taste)

steps
1) Warm up breakfast sausage in microwave (1 min). Cut into small pieces, about 1/4 in thick.
2) While sausage is warming up, Heat up butter in a small sauce pan. Add onion and garlic to melted butter, cook until tender.
3) Add carrots and breakfast sausage. Cook for about 5 min, stirring occasionally.
4) Add potato, milk, veggie broth, salt, and pepper and let simmer for about 15 minutes.
5) Once potatoes are tender, add in the frozen corn. Let cook for about 10 more minutes uncovered.
Note: If the soup is too watery, take a few tablespoons of milk and dissolve a little bit of flour in it (a tsp or so) and add to soup. the soup will thicken as it stands.

Chowder tastes great garnished with some cheddar cheese, with some artisan bread to round out the meal.

sunday monkey.

2009-11-22T22:22:00.000-08:00

I crashed* a Practice Thanksgiving party this afternoon hosted by a friend of my brother. The host really likes monkeys, so in the hour before I left for the party I made him this:

front and back.

Unfortunately, I only had one shade of brown felt, and the other colors I had on hand didn't go well with it, so it's blue. (I usually have lots of blue and gray everything. Felt, yarn, clothes, yup.) There are a fair number of Google** results for blue monkey, because apparently there is one, so I feel pretty justified making mine blue today.

*Was strongly encouraged to join the party by another one of my brother's friends and his girlfriend who were also in attendance.
**This weekend I learned that in Chile, they pronounce it Goh-gleh.

crafternoon.

2009-11-15T22:43:00.001-08:00

Yesterday I had a few friends over to stencil lunch bags, and it was a great success! We had a few mishaps (like me forgetting to tell SV that he needed to add the fabric medium to his paint before applying it to the bag, and then me completely forgetting to add it to mine as well, even though we'd already discussed it with SV's bag), but all in all, it was a really fun craft project, and nice to have people over to my tiny apartment.

SV's Bag

D's Bag

Thuters' Bag

Erma's Bag

My Bag

I was really impressed with everyone's bags -- they are all really cute and fun, and they're things that I would never have thought to put on a bag. I like the primary colors on Erma's bag, and I'm super impressed with both D's and SV's bags (they took on islands like you wouldn't believe!). Thuters' bag is simple and elegant, and I want to put fleurs-de-lis* on everything now!

Thanks to everyone who participated in my craft afternoon (now dubbed crafternoon).

Plural like culs-de-sac. Also, Cul de Sac is a great comic.

autumn recipe hunting.

2009-11-08T15:32:00.001-08:00

Since the cold weather and rain (and oh how it rained) have hit Seattle, I'm hankering for some nice warm fall dishes to cook.

From Real Simple, here are a few that caught my eye. If I make any of them, I'll be sure to post pictures.

Butternut Squash Soup With Sage and Parmesan Croutons: My dad grew butternut squashes this year, and gave me a gorgeous one. We ate one of them yesterday roasted, with some butter and brown sugar, and it was delicious. I don't know why I didn't like squash as a kid.

Corn Chowder: I love soup. Chowder is especially good, but I've never tried making it myself.

Coconut, Shrimp, and Corn Chowder: Mmm. Chowder+Shrimp!

Chicken Pot Pie: And now that I own like 50 million ramekins, I'll be making plenty of pot pies this year.

Potato Chip Cookies: They kind of look like pecan sandies. I guess that means that the "sandy" part is the potato chips?

Caesar Potato Salad: I like caesar salad. I like potato salad. I guess the person who wrote the recipe does too. Put em together?

Rustic Apple Tart: Never done a tart like this, but I do love me some tarts.

Pumpkin-Leek Soup: Another option for that pretty pretty butternut squash. It's currently my table centerpiece (because Sophie won't eat it.)

Any other autumn recipes that you guys like making?

card shark.

2009-10-25T08:54:00.000-07:00

My mom plays this game called hand and foot (apparently it's kind of like canasta) that requires 5-6 decks of cards. Since her birthday was (ahem) yesterday, I decided to make her a bag to carry her cards around.

Isn't it cute?

I came up with the idea to use the black suits for the letter "a" in each word while I was taking a bath yesterday night (always have great ideas while I'm in the shower/bath), and then photo documented the process after I got the stencil made. There's a sequence of photos at flickr, starting here. And the part I'm particularly proud of is the island (aka whitespace) on the letter "d".

fall walk. (bonus, now with photos!)

2009-10-24T15:48:00.000-07:00

I went to brunch this morning at Portage Bay Cafe in South Lake Union. Since it's down by where the new Amazon offices are going to be (starting May 2010?), I figured that I'd see what the walk would be like.

And since it was really pretty out then, I took my camera with me for a little photo fun. Unfortunately, my camera battery decided to crap out on me after about 10 photos, so I only have about 5 that turned out well. Maybe I *do* need to purchase a new little point-and-shoot. Either that or a new battery for my little Olympus.

There are some additional notes on flickr about these photos, but not much. (Oh yeah, and I tried out the flickr map-it feature. Kinda cool, but at first glance, the user interface is a little buggy.)

I can't help feeling like there's a way to get the sky to still look blue in this one, even though it's so over exposed. I may try to play around with it more, but knowing how lazy I am, probably not.

Feels like there should be zombies walking out of this one. I also kicked around some of those leaves. That was fun.

This was around the time when my camera battery decided that it was "red and flashy", so I turned off the camera, and jostled it around to see if that'd help. I got three more photos out of it, two of which are below.

I think I've seen this tile of cement with the fish prints in it before, but when I stumbled (fall, get it?) across it this morning, it was a surprise all over again.

This was the photo I really wanted to take, but I didn't do a great job of it (also possibly that the camera wasn't trying very hard since the battery was nearly dead). It's a really pretty view of downtown as you round the corner on 5th Ave N that I get to see most mornings on my way to work (via Metro 3 or 4).

Photo walks are fun; I'll have to remember to take a few more while there are still some pretty colors out.

Also, I'm getting a kick out of the oxymoronic quality of the phrase "fall walk". Color me nerdy.

the happy hooker.

2009-10-20T19:41:00.001-07:00

The Scarf

Cast of Characters
Me: Me.
GSC: Grocery Store Clerk.

The Story
This is the exchange I just had at the grocery store.

GSC: That scarf is beautiful. Did you make it?
Me: Yes! It's crocheted.
GSC: It's very nice. Did you use a pattern from a book?
Me: Yes, it's on a pattern in a book called, uh...
(pause)
Me: The Happy Hooker.
(pause)
GSC looks slightly bewildered.
Me: It's from the people who do the Stitch and Bitch books.
(pause)
GSC looks even more bewildered.
GSC: Uh, okay.
GSC walks away.
Me: Oops.

Epilogue
I really should be ready to tell people that my scarf pattern is from a book called the Happy Hooker when they compliment it. Or rather, be ready for the reaction. Either that or just tell them how to make it (ch 204, two rows of dc and then 5-dc shell across 4 st) and leave out the fact that it's from the book with the sassy name (unless they look like they can handle it).

food, food, and more food.

2009-10-11T16:44:00.000-07:00

This looks delicious:
.

I did, however, have a perfectly delicious egg with bacon this morning, courtesy of Julien (Michelle's fiance). Michelle had a crepe with hers, I had wheat toast. I may have to rethink this no-bacon-in-my-house rule, because it really is quite delicious. And, at least bacon is recognizable as meat, whereas breakfast sausage is not necessarily.

Other bacon was also eaten this weekend: I tried the bacon maple bar at Voodoo Donut this weekend. And yes, it was delicious. A little too much for me (I had about 3 bites too many, and required a salad when we got back to Michelle/Julien's apartment), but still a very good mix of salty and sweet, and a little bit of crunchy to boot.

Julien photo-documented it as well, and I think that he and Michelle were happy to have an excuse (me) to go try them. I should note, Michelle told me to look grim in the photo he took of us (we'd been talking about zombies), but we really were quite happy to be there.

Also accomplished this weekend was an apple tasting at the Portland Nursery, where we got to try 67(!) varieties of apples, pears, and Asian pears.

Some of my favorites were: Ambrosia (for eating, may be a cross between a Red and Golden Delicious), Criterion (for pie), Empire (for eating, a cross between a McIntosh and a Delicious), Fuji (really, one of my all time favorites), Galer (would be good with cheese), Honey Crisp (apparently a cross between a Macoun and a Honeygold), Liberty (sweet, but browns quickly when cut - good for ciders), McIntosh (originated in Canada in the 1800s!), Melrose (a Jonathan crossed with a Delicious), Rome Beauty (for eating and baking), Rubinette (cross between a Golden Delicious and a Cox's Orange Pippen), and the Splendour (an Australian Golden Delicious, very sweet).

For the pears, I liked the Bosc and the Concord, but I think I would have liked some of the other ones had they sat out for a few days (they were too crisp). Of the Asian pears, I'm partial to the 20th Century Pears, but the Hosui were also quite good.

Yep. And that's only a sample of the ones we ate! Never knew I could eat so many types of apples all in one room. Could have used some cheese or something to go with them though. Cheese makes everything better. :)

all things cheese.

2009-09-15T11:25:00.000-07:00

A coworker of mine (who may or may not wish to remain anonymous) alerted me to a website called Cheese or Font, where they give you a name and ask you whether it's a cheese or a font, and then let you know which it is and how many people got the answer right/wrong. Fun! Difficult, but fun.

Also, I signed up for an icanhascheezburger account so that I could keep a list of my favorites. Yesterday, I found this one that I particularly like:

moar funny pictures.

If you're registered with ICHC, you can friend me here.

who are you writing for?

2009-09-11T20:11:00.000-07:00

I often have these thoughts that I can't get out of my head until I say them out loud. Does this happen to anyone else? Usually, they're things that I probably shouldn't say (since I've somehow managed to stop myself from blurting it out the moment it comes to mind), but I become so focused on it that I have to get it out one way or another.

Yesterday night I had one of those thoughts and it wasn't entirely appropriate to post as my facebook status (my first inclination), so instead I emailed it to a friend of mine. I think it was much better that way.

Tonight, I had another one of those thoughts, but it's vague enough that I'll post it here: Don't feel guilty.

The thing is, we do have to take into consideration the audience for whom we're writing.

In an article in this last month'sWIRED, Clive Thompson wrote an article titled Clive Thompson on the New Literacy that talks about whether recent generations have lost the ability to write coherently with the advent of microblogging and texting and the like. He interviewed a professor of writing at Stanford and she indicated that today's "young people" write way more than any other generation since we now use computers for a good portion of our socialization. In the past, people would graduate from high school or college, turn in their last research paper, and never write again.

The first thing she found is that young people today write far more than any generation before them. That's because so much socializing takes place online, and it almost always involves text. Of all the writing that the Stanford students did, a stunning 38 percent of it took place out of the classroom—life writing, as Lunsford calls it. Those Twitter updates and lists of 25 things about yourself add up.

It's almost hard to remember how big a paradigm shift this is. Before the Internet came along, most Americans never wrote anything, ever, that wasn't a school assignment. Unless they got a job that required producing text (like in law, advertising, or media), they'd leave school and virtually never construct a paragraph again.

In addition, the professor found that today's student/writers are good at "what rhetoricians call kairos—assessing their audience and adapting their tone and technique to best get their point across." Because of this, Thompson figures that students today have a different understanding of what "good writing" is.

It's possible that's true -- I chose to not write something to my facebook crowd, and instead sent it to a close friend. I'm not sure if that constitutes good writing though. I figure that there are a lot of people out there who are just writing into the vast junkyard of the internet (me included), where it's not entirely clear what or who your audience is. And, when I do have a defined audience, it's tough to censor myself. I know of people who censor their audience instead (ie, only allow non-work friends to see their status updates). Either way, I suppose we shouldn't feel too guilty about it. At least we're writing.

(BTW, here's an article from WIRED in 2006 where the author clearly dislikes what the kids these days are doing to language. Well, kids and business majors.)

iheart.

2009-09-07T23:12:00.000-07:00

I stenciled today!

(+1 at Flickr)

Isn't it cute?

I bought a bunch of cheap canvas bags at MUJI in Japan, and was planning on stenciling some flowers or something, and last night, when I couldn't fall asleep (I love jetlag, let me tell ya), I had this awesome idea. I was smart enough not to try stenciling at 1:30am and waited until this evening to play with knives.

Steps:
(1) Figure out what you want to stencil and print it out.
(2) Trace it onto the paper side of some freezer paper. (You can try printing directly onto the freezer paper, but I wasn't brave enough to put waxy paper inside my printer for fear that it would get stuck. Plus, freezer paper is transparent enough that it's reasonably easy to trace through it.)
(3) Use a sharp knife to cut the negative space out of your design on the freezer paper. I use one of these: retractable knives.
(4) After you've cut your design out of the freezer paper, iron it (waxy side down) onto the fabric you want the image on. It'll stick.
(5) Once you've got your stencil applied, place a piece of thin cardboard under where you're going to paint (in case the paint bleeds through).
(6) Mix equal parts fabric medium and acrylic paint, and apply to your fabric/stencil with a foam brush (or a sponge, or regular brushes, whatever you want).
(7) Gently lift fabric off of cardboard (to prevent sticking). Let fabric dry (with stencil still attached) for at least 4 hours. (The instructions on the fabric medium say to wait 24 hours, but I couldn't wait that long and my paint was dry. :P)
(8) Once the paint is really dry, gently peel stencil off of fabric. Bask in the glory of your stenciled image!
(9) After 24 hours, heat set the paint by placing a towel/sheet over painted image and ironing it. Your fabric/image are machine washable, but to be on the safe side, you should wash it inside out.

There are some helpful hints on stenciling at craftgrrl on livejournal that I'd read prior to trying this out on my own. Surprisingly easy though!

Next up, screen printing or needle felting (bought a kit at It's Demo - also in Japan).

smoothie!

2009-08-16T22:18:00.000-07:00

I had a peach that I'd let get over-ripe but I didn't want to throw it away. That meant either making a sauce with it, or blending it with some ice cream! And when it comes to a Sunday evening when I don't feel like doing much, blending it is.

I threw in a banana and some berries (did I mention that I went blueberry picking two weekends in a row? I have a TON of blueberries), and blended it together (as you see above). Recipe follows below.

Ingredients:
1 frozen banana, thawed.
1/2 over-ripe peach.
1/2 cup fresh blueberries.
6-7 fresh blackberries, plus a few more for garnish.
1/2 cup vanilla ice cream.

Combine fruit in a tall mixing cup (or dump 'em in a blender). Mush up slightly. Add ice cream on top, then use an immersion blender to mix until smooth. (If you used a normal blender, no mushing needed, just put the lid on and have at it.) Pour into serving cups, garnish with a few extra berries.

Makes two or three martini glass servings, or one large (normal sized?) smoothie.
--

It tasted pretty good, for a smoothie. I'm not big on them, and I think it's the banana. Also, if you have a whole peach, go ahead and put the whole thing in -- I couldn't tasted the peach in mine very well, the banana is a little overpowering. But definitely a good way to use that peach.

summer shakespeare.

2009-08-01T12:23:00.000-07:00

(click image to enlarge.)

How I used to adore Fox Trot. I need to remember to read these (although it appears that he's only drawing Sunday comics now).

first pigs, now monkeys.

2009-07-26T11:31:00.000-07:00

I'm sitting in Matt and Jen's apartment in Dubuque, IA while Jen cleans out her craft closet, reading blogs that I've been neglecting, and came across this handy video that shows how to open a banana like a monkey. (handy!)

(found via swissmiss.)

Jen and I are making lavender sachets today, once she finishes tidying up her office. I'll try to remember to post pictures of the finished products.

inspiration.

2009-07-24T12:42:00.000-07:00

I was reading an article someone at work had forwarded about building an everyday application and after further reading this guy's blog, I came across this article written about design, stolen from phrases written about writing. Hah, that's not confusing at all, is it? The original quotes about writing were taken from: JSCC English Comp 1 Writing Quotes.

I especially liked this one:

Look, look, look. Look at everything—blogs, corporate sites, good and bad, and see how they do it. Just like a carpenter who works as an apprentice and studies the master.

which was apparently adapted from Faulkner's:

Read, read, read. Read everything—trash, classics, good and bad, and see how they do it. Just like a carpenter who works as an apprentice and studies the master.

I often look at how other people have done things and then try things out for myself -- sometimes seeing how someone did something badly is better than seeing how someone did something well, so that I don't have to make the same mistakes.

The technique is good for work (I recently did a survey of signup pipelines to see how other people were doing it, even good ol' blogger here), and it's good for hobbies as well (like when I looked a bunch of people's card designs to see how they were making baby, graduation, or father's day cards).

putnam pig!

2009-07-09T18:05:00.000-07:00

I was reading the too beautiful to live blog earlier today, and came across this little ditty from Putnam Pig as a response to the world's recent obsession with swine flu:

I especially like the lawn sprinkler dance at the end.

And, as a response to the blame on monkeys (via the laboratories): a morning monkey.

Too bad they misspelled laboratory as labratory in the video.

let sit 3 hours.

2009-06-29T23:32:00.000-07:00

Today, I made this:

Total eclipse:

Started with the Martha Stewart Sweet Cherry Pie recipe -- and added some vanilla to it.

I'll have to report back tomorrow what it tastes like, since it's bedtime now.

obsession.

2009-06-29T22:57:00.000-07:00

Do you ever get so engrossed in a project that time just flies by? You forget to eat, you forget to go to the bathroom, you forget what day it is, etc. I had one of those days yesterday. I worked on a specific craft project for about 6 hours and then realized that I really needed to get out of my apartment and talk to real people and give both my hands and eyes a rest.

What kept my attention for such an extended period of time?

I give you:
Figurine - Lynn.

with lavender sachets:

and a view of the back:

As stated on the flickr photo: "This voodoo-style doll was commissioned by a coworker to be made in the image of a departing coworker who we're all going to miss a lot. Made from only supplies I already had in my house (fabric scraps, cotton batting, yarn, thread), since I really don't need to go buy any more craft supplies. Beer cap shown for size."

The lavender sachets are because I forgot to put lavender inside the doll--I was so excited to be done stuffing it that I just sewed it shut! (oops.)

It was kind of a fun project, but MAN my fingers hurt afterward (and of course, I decided to make a cherry pie tonight and hand-pit all of the cherries). I'm really not cut out for this hand-sewing thing. But I'm holding off on buying a sewing machine, because I seriously have enough yarn for 20 more knit/crochet projects, and I should probably focus on that. On the other hand (the one that doesn't hurt as much), I do still have like 5/8ths of a pound of lavender left, and obviously I'm going to need to sew some more sachets...

MoMA's just too smart for their own good.

2009-06-25T20:27:00.000-07:00

I want...

via cookie mag's daily find.

I wonder if they sell them at SAM's gift store.

moar pictures! moar cards!

2009-06-20T20:35:00.000-07:00

I made the father's day card today. The red cross one was last week, I think, along with the new house one. I was holding off on posting photos of them until I actually send them to their recipients, but that went out the window today, since I've been posting lots of photos and crafts and stuff. Maybe they won't notice.

The technique for these is to cut out the paper in simple-ish shapes, then use some double sided tape to tack it to the cardstock. Then, poke an even number of holes through both the paper and the cardstock, and then hand sew it with needle and thread. Fun, but takes a while.

cherry, cherry.

2009-06-20T15:27:00.000-07:00

Remember that cherry entry where I mangled some cherries? Even though I didn't take pictures of it that day (was late to the party, oops), I did manage to take a picture of a later serving of the sauce -- on top of ice cream. With cookies. It was delicious.

See?

no phones, no hats, pipes okay.

2009-06-20T15:19:00.000-07:00

I realize that it means "be quiet", but I really think it looks like a pipe.

Taken inside the Church of Annunciation in Nazareth -- finally getting around to my Israel pictures. They're on my computer now, at least, but not processed.

I think the guy in the hat did something bad.

2009-06-18T22:58:00.000-07:00

picture at IMDb.com.

Who else can't wait to see Public Enemies?

the internet is an amazing place.

2009-06-18T00:32:00.000-07:00

Today, I:

Bought 2 pounds of cherries for a party tonight to serve with brownies and whipped cream.

Found and made this recipe: fresh cherry sauce recipe.

Didn't have corn starch, so I used as a substitute: flour.

Also didn't have a cherry pitter, so instead, I used: a bobby pin.

By the way, in case you haven't tried it, pitting cherries is MESSY. I wore rubber gloves and had a big plastic shopping bag to catch the juice/pits -- by the time I was done, it looked as if I'd killed someone. But it was so delicious.