baking hits and misses.

i usually use blueberries or mixed berries when baking muffins. so i thought it would be a welcome change to make cranberry muffins. why not. also, i thought it would be just fine to use my old standby muffin recipe and just substitute the blueberries for cranberries. but i quickly realized, after sampling one of the cranberries that they were incredibly tarty. yikes. i knew cranberries were tarty, but these were scrunch your face tart.
plan B: i simmered the cranberries on a little bit of maple and water mixture to lessen the tart factor. unfortunately, i already had the rest of the muffin ingredients mixed and ready to go so i couldn't simmer the cranberries for very long.
result: cranberry muffins that are still too tarty for my liking. to add insult to the injury, i hate throwing away food, so it was a couple of weeks of trying to finish these muffins, my face scrunching each time i had one!
lesson learned: know your cranberries.

the upside: i baked these chocolatiest chocolate chip cookies today and they're oozing with chocolate goodness.

sunday collection #13

empties.
just a few of the empties that had been temporarily collected.
we usually give our empties to Wayne. He calls himself the Governor of Georgetown and is the most dedicated bottle collector and recycler in the neighbourhood.

blue house by the sea.

i love this little blue house.
it has the most incredible view.



also, another successful birthday party for little k. part 2. this time, with kids her own age.

life outside our windows.

it's rainy and drizzly tonight. i thought it's apropos to post a picture of this bird, shot through our rain soaked window. it suits the mood.
these two photos were taken over three weeks ago, the same time i took these.

not to get down on our seemingly endless greyish and cloudy spring, we do occasionally get a burst of sunny days here and there. we've had a bit more sunshine in the last week than what we've been having on average in the last couple of months. the little buds on this tree outside our window had remained tightly shut for what seemed like forever.
but look! five days of warmish weather, where the sun would poke its head for a little longer visit than usual, and this is what happens.
nature is pretty awe inspiring, don't you think?

birthday!

it was little k's 3rd birthday today.

m drew the cutest card for her. it's an Echidna! little k is super into this spiny creature and it's the closest we could get to actually giving her one.
one of the two hamsies she got as a gift.
sparklers!
blowing out candles is serious business. she loved her carrot-pineapple cake, but she loved the creamcheese icing even more.
the little triangle paper banners were a hit.

happiest birthday little k! you're pretty amazing.

take a picture

Sometimes you just have to take a picture, no matter what the subject is.

Golden hour was especially golden yesterday, but I am lazy. So I shot this out our window.

sunday collection #12

yarn.




we're off for a Sunday dinner at my sister's house soon. i'm sure there's going to be lots of tasty food there. too bad i'm still stuffed from half of the egg sandwich we just ate.

are you serious?

m's truly and ever so serious indeed.

slow as molasses.

a couple of weeks ago, a friend's mom made a rather observant comment. she said that Newfoundland has the longest spring. i agree with her. we really do. just look at the buds on these trees outside our kitchen window. they sure are taking their own sweet time.

April 24
April 29
May 14
May 15, okay, this is just a day after the one above.
today, May 18.

see? hardly anything has changed in almost a month!

sunday collection #11

radiators.


these pictures were taken at Powers Surplus & Salvage sometime last week. it seems fitting after hearing Mr. Burtynsky's presentation.

we went to see Edward Burtynsky's talk this afternoon at The Rooms. his photography mostly deals with how humans transform the landscape through over-consumption of natural resources such as ore, gold and oil. it was a sobering talk.

Burtynsky's Oil exhibit opened at The Rooms the other day and will be showing until sometime in August. that's plenty of time and we highly recommend that you go see it.

Also, watch the documentary Manufactured Landscapes if you haven't seen it yet. the opening shot is 8 1/2 minutes. amazing.

making a craft out of it.

it feels like it's been forever since i've made or created anything. i'd either been too busy, way too tired or just plain lazy/uninspired. terrible really. well, today i finally made something pretty awesome (i think!). it's a gift for someone. i'll post pictures of it later.

now, if only i can keep the momentum!

(more) clouds!

This time looking east(ish) on the same day.

Click on the image if you didn't notice the tiny bird. : )

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To show some of the hidden colours in the sky I hit an auto-levels in Photoshop. It's not representative of what my eyes saw, but I think it's kinda cool.

clouds!

Looking north(ish) from our deck.

More to come.

sunday collection #10

twigs.

a collection of pretty blossoms
and a collection of sprouting mesclun
to all you lovely and amazing mothers and would be mamas in every corner of the world, especially to our own mothers.

happy 50th!

it's not a happy 50th birthday or a happy 50th anniversary, but it is our 50th post. not a super momentous occasion by any stretch of imagination, but it is worth jumping up for!


another reason for jumping: Ritche was interviewed for an article on the current edition of thescope [local, free and awesome independent little paper that could]. the whole fam even made it on the cover!

last and most important reason for jumping: it's fun! plus, i will actually have my weekends back once again. no more weekend shifts for a little while.

two minus one.

these two birds were photographed from another window, same part of our home but different corner. it was raining quite a bit that day, as you can see. i thought this pair looked so sweet, getting soaked in the rain together while their tails touched -- their outline forming a heart shape.
more saccharine moment.
but wait, someone ruffled someone's feathers.
i wonder what happened...

it's been awesome posting a little series of the winged and feathered family this past few days. i wanna post more but maybe a little break from it would be a welcome change.