The Cement Barrier Incident

Yesterday I tried to open an etsy shop. Epic fail.

The idea was to try and sell some of the images from Project 365. Unfortunately, they don't crop into an 8x10 size very well - particularly those images which would be appealing to the widest variety of buyers. My other strategy is to start drawing more little pictures and try selling those in the shop. It's just finding the time that's difficult. I'm contemplating submitting some photography to istockphoto.com which could be lucrative... but I have some more research to do first.

True Story : The other night we were out on a mission to get Mitchell's ice cream. When we discovered that it was almost $9 a quart we decided to opt for a less expensive brand. So while were trying to decide whether to go to Target or Giant Eagle, Tim pulled into a parking lot across the street in order to keep the car moving (Jack's preference). At one point he started driving towards some parking spots that were divided by a pretty substantial cement barrier. This is when the cogs in my brain started turning rapidly, and a mental conversation went as follows: "What is he doing? Why is he driving towards that cement barrier? He must just be planning on parking here.... but he's not slowing down! Surely he sees this huge cement thing! Nope.... he's totally about to drive right over it!" And that's when I yelled out "Whoa whoa whoa! What are you doing?!?!" and BANG! The front end of the car - which is little by the way, so there's not a lot of room between the ground and the bottom of the car - was over the median and there we sat, straddling the cement wall. Jack, startled by either me yelling or the huge bump (or both), starts screaming and Tim (confused) sits in shock for a moment and then does the logical thing and drives the rest of the car over the median. He still insists he didn't see the barrier. Needless to say I laughed about it the rest of the night. But maybe you had to be there....

Later on, we ate our Archer Farms Target brand ice cream to the tune of a dozen youtube videos with Cameron and Ellie. That is also when I became acquainted with Improv Everywhere and the wonderful concept of flash mobs. Here is my favorite example by far - it's strangely moving:

Ways That I'm Lazy

Ways that I'm lazy:

• I'll let my laptop battery get down to "reserve power" before getting up to plug it in (even if the cord is within reach). Sometimes I'll just stop using it because I'm that adverse to reaching forward to plug it in.
• With any kind of bags + shopping carts, I try to time it so that I'm the last one putting a bag in the car so Tim (or my mom, before I was married) would have to bring the cart back to the store or push it into the parking lot cart areas. I hate having to push it to where it belongs.
• I'll drive around a parking lot for a while until I find a close spot so I don't have to walk too far.
• In the time it would take me to stand up and go get something in another room, I'll sit there for a few minutes contemplating how much I need it vs. how much I'd rather stay seated.
• If I need something at a meal, I'll wait till someone else gets up to go into the kitchen so I can say "Can you get me ________ "
• If I throw something into a garbage can and miss, it's very unlikely that I'll bend down and pick it up, even if I'm standing right next to it.
• I'll ask Tim to go get me various things that I don't feel like getting myself. This one I try not to do to much because that's unfair - even though he's a sweetheart and will do it without complaining.
• If I see something out of place, like a hair tie laying around, instead of putting it away I'll just take a mental picture of where it is so I'll know where to find it when I need it.

I"m sure there are many other ways that I'm lazy, but these are the first that come to mind.

The Cool People.

My new header was created with images from this etsy shop. Amazing. That is what I aspire to. It is also why I don't think I can ever consider myself a good photographer - there are just too many people out there with photos more enchanting than mine.

We have new friends who are way cooler than us. If they weren't so humble, I'd call them hipsters. They have cool clothes, and good hair and just ooze coffee-shop, indie-band swagger. They're also a few years younger than us and in a much different stage in life. But for some reason they've chosen to adopt us. I'd like to think they find we possess a certain amount of similar coolness (?) but am more inclined to believe we were just the first nice people they met, since they're kind of new to the area. In any case, we're excited about our new connection - and a little puzzled over their excitement of us. Maybe we're cooler than we think.**

** all said of course with tongue in cheek, since an eternal perspective leaves no room for concern of one's cool-factor but only an awareness of the need to be humble and Christ-like.

What's Cookin', Good Lookin'?

Tonight has been wrought with mishaps. Well, maybe that's a bit of an exaggeration. But when a glass bottle filled with tiny little sesame seeds smashes all over your slate floor and you possess neither a broom nor a dustpan to sweep them up, it feels like a huge disaster. Try vacuuming them up you say? Good suggestion unless your vacuum is like ours which tends to only work on carpeting and instead just sends sesame seeds flicking painfully against your legs (and in many other directions) as you run over them with the wheels. So an hour later we are halfway done with clean-up and still without the proper equipment to get all the little seeds disposed of.

On a lighter note, I've been meaning to blog some of the yummy dinners we've been making the past few months but I tend only think of it once they've been devoured and I can no longer take a photo of the final product. I'm a firm believer that if you want me to try my hand at a recipe, it needs to come with a picture. Otherwise I will skip right over it. So here is the dinner Tim made tonight (complete with picture!) It was delish and it seemed pretty easy to make - unless you break a bottle of sesame seeds on the floor part-way to completion. Then again, the recipe doesn't call for sesame seeds, so you should be alright:

Wild Silver Brite Salmon with Honey Mustard Pan Sauce

and a side of Sautéed Zucchini & Yellow Squash

Salmon with Honey Mustard Sauce:

2 Tbsp olive oil

2 Tbsp unsalted butter

2 Tbsp Trader Joe's Whole Grain Dijon Mustard

a few grinds of black pepper

1 lb boneless, skinless wild silver brite salmon

1 Tbsp honey

1/8 c water

Add olive oil and butter to 12" skillet and cook over med. heat to melt butter. Add mustard, stir to combine and cook for 1-2 minutes to toast mustard seeds. Add fish to pan, sprinkle with pepper and saute until lightly browned, about 3 mins per side for defrosted or 6 mins per side for frozen. Turn fish, mix in honey and cover with a lid to complete the cooking. Fish should be opaque but don't overcook. Remove fish, add water to deglaze pan and heat over high heat reduce the sauce by about half. Pour over fish.

Sautéed Zucchini and Yellow Squash:

2 small zucchini (try to buy locally grown produce)

2 small yellow squash (ditto on the local produce!)

2 Tbsp olive oil

Italian seasoning to taste

Grated Parmesan cheese

Chop the squash and zucchini into crescent shaped pieces and put in a medium frying pan. Pour olive oil over top and stir on med-high heat until coated. Sprinkle with Italian seasoning and parmesan cheese. Continue to saute until pieces are slightly golden and soft - do not overcook or they'll get mushy.

We served this with rice, and poured some of the honey mustard sauce over top.

Our Weekend.

Why do burns hurt sooo stinkin bad? The sting... I tell ya. It's persistent, that's for sure.

This past weekend was a busy one. Now let me try and remember all that happened.... Friday, hmmm. Tim, what did we do Friday? "Andrea and Dave came over" - Nope, we went to the Bradfords. Awesome, edifying time with a great couple. Such good conversation... always meaty, never surface level.

Saturday Tim spent the day (mostly) with his brother who drove all the way up from Florida to sell his car to Tim's parents for his little sister. They watched football and drank beer - because that's what boys do. I went into work to help Rebekah with some stuff - we ate Chipotle and giggled a lot because that's what girls do. Then we went to my parents to celebrate my dad's b-day followed by spur-of-the-moment late night cookie making with the Kerneys. Oatmeal raisin over coffee and cards while the babies all slept soundly = Lovely jubbly.

And Sunday was pretty stressful because Jack was a miserable, miserable little thing who we suspect is not only going through a growth spurt but is also teething. This means lots of crying, not a whole lot of sleeping, and just... bleck. Not fun for anyone. But thankfully he was in a jovial mood for a small part of the BBQ we were at - and then quickly reached his limit and just wanted a bath and his bed. Don't we all Jack, don't we all....

Finally home & fast asleep, wearing my favorite pjs.

Busy, Again.

Life, as always, feels like a whirlwind these days. At the same time it can feel like a well-rehearsed, cyclical series of events that we move through day after day in the same pattern. The backdrop to it all moves in slight, subtle cycles as well - there are definitely hints of fall in these summer mornings, where the white balance outside is more stark gray than golden.

The faces change too - the baby, of course, is an ever-evolving testament of transformation and growth. How I covet the little cuddles that I stole today in the quiet moments of morning before we were stirred from the bed by the hands of time, shuffling us quickly along into the dizziness of our daily routine.

But other faces, new faces, are also beginning to come into focus and with their appearance comes the blurring of the old as they make room for the next season of fellowship. Such busy lives only have time and space for a few, close companions - all others must coordinate their dance with partners of a similar schedule.

So here we are - here am I, sitting in a quiet apartment with procrastination on my side to keep the new day at bay. Once it takes off, there's no turing back and the next stop is far down the tracks into this evening.

The truth of it all is that this whirlwind routine, though wearisome at times, has caught up in it all that I hold dear and I'd rather walk the same path on repeat with those I love than walk a different one alone.

"I remember one morning getting up at dawn, there was such a sense of possibility. You know, that feeling? And I remember thinking to myself this is the beginning of happiness. This is where it starts. And of course there will always be more. It never occurred to me it wasn't the beginning. It was happiness. It was the moment. Right then." - The Hours

The Sniffles.

Tim and I both have seasonal allergies - so it seems - and are completely miserable, snotty messes. Tim taught me the trick of shoving a piece of tissue up each nostril when faced with a runny nose, so we're both in bed with these attractive shreds of mucus-drenched tissue hanging out of our noses. Lovely.

Last night, during a spur-of-the-moment get together with the Kerneys, we ordered some hot wings from Dominos. Now if you order online you can watch the progress of your order in real time. Who knew watching a Dominos order being filled could be so exciting, haha. Apparently "Jim" not only processed the order and baked our wings, he quality tested them (for quite a while) though I'm curious what's entailed with the quality testing..... Jim, surprisingly enough, was also the person that delivered the wings to our door. Crazy!

So yesterday's picture is definitely one of my favorites - the colors are so...1950s vintage. Looveeesss it!

No. 26 - The Lonely Donut

Mishaps.

We keep hearing about the "Scott Pilgrim" movie with Michael Cera (I think) and so badly want to see it. But when you're a Netflix user it's so much more appealing (cheaper) to wait for it come out on DVD. So that's the end of that dilemma.

I set my laptop on the very teeny tiny edge of the bathroom sink this morning, and BAM it crashed down onto the tile floor and now there is a mangled corner in my pretty little Mac. Those sort of aesthetic deformities always gnaw away at my need for things to look right so I'm hoping my trip to the "Genius Bar" at the Mac store will result in a magically repaired shell/frame.

I'm so tempted to tell the story of me excitedly buying a hair diffuser in hopes of havin

g shining curls and instead ending up with a volumized ball of frizz and split ends.... but that's pretty much all there is to tell - other than the fact that the disappointment was one of a crippling kind* (*added for dramatic effect). On a side note - if any of you know how to actually use a diffuser, please disclose directions, in video form if possible ... I went on the advice of a drawn out diagram the first time but with the aforementioned results to follow.

Is it still only Wednesday? Yeeesh, this week is a slow one. However, its good for work because I've got a lot to get done before the end of the week. At this very moment there is a brochure only partially dressed and begging for the rest of its design. So I best attend to its needs.

In closing, I'd like to pay homage to Emily who is flying away to the West Coast today with this picture in hand as a token of my affections (but mostly because she requested it.)