If I Were a Cat Person

(Which I am so not)

Source

I would have two, and I would name them Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.  Just in case I ever ran into my high school English teacher and she asked about my pets.  And in that moment, she would be comforted that all those years of teaching Shakespeare to us callow and unappreciative youths was worth it. 


This one's for you, Mrs. Sculley.

Sunday evening is...

+the creak of the porch swing in the warm breeze

+experimenting with filters and lens settings

+Spending some QT with a recently revived tomato plant

Sunday evening is renewing.

Tea and Twigs and Twilight (the time of day, not the vampires)

Today I attended the bridal shower for a friend whose wedding I will be photographing in September. It was such a beautiful afternoon. The bride's sister has a keen eye for detail and it made for a lovely party.  It was so good to relax, drink tea, and catch up with old friends.
My favorite parts:

Tiny collector tea spoons

Eclairs and mini jam-filled cheesecakes

Loving the natural and simple vibe: bamboo plates and decorative twigs.

I love watching people open gifts. :)

So good to see these two again!

Bud vases filled with neon blooms on every table.

I ended up staying on into the evening catching up with the family which made for a late drive back home but it was so worth it. And it was a gorgeous evening.   I took a different road home, that wound through the small sleepy towns of northern Indiana.

The sounds, smells, and sights only heightened the cozy feeling of a countryside settling down after a long day.  The kind of ending to a day in which the colors of the landscape bleed and run like a watercolor painting.  Outside the window, houses, trees and power lines rolled by, undisturbed by the sound of my wheels. The air was warm, a tired haze melting dusk into shades of deep purple. The moon grew bright and the landscape gave a final yawn and stretch before the inky black covered the horizon. When the lights of the city began to appear it was as though a celestial match struck against the sky. There was a pop and sizzle and then bright colors exploded above the streetlights in the distance.  The fireworks carried me all the way to my doorstep.

Happy sigh. Roll credits.

How Hipsters Make Bread: A Video

Twisted Bread | Volume 4 from Kinfolk on Vimeo.



A Viewer's Guide:


Step 1. Install a distressed wooden table in a dimly lit kitchen.
Step 2. Premeasure ingredients into vintage bowls and cups to make it look like you didn't have to measure anything at all.
Step 3. Get a waif-like woman with nice hands and long hair to mix the ingredients. 
Step 4. Make sure Bon Iver or some other appropriately folksy-but-not-too-hillbilly-band-with-a-banjo is playing in the background.
Step 5. Use two knives to knead the dough. (Using your bare hands is too bourgeois.)
Step 6. Wrap the bread dough on sticks.
Step 7. Gather a few of your closest attractive acquaintances around a campfire. (At least one person has to have a beard, gender optional)
Step 8. Let dough sticks cook for 2-4 hours over open flame.
Step 9. When the evening sky has reached optimal level of "dusk" for photographing your skin complexion, consume bread, but do not appear to enjoy it too much.

But seriously that would be super tasty while camping, wouldn't it? Fresh baked bread? I'm just making fun because I'm jealous that the hipsters thought of it first. And the woman in the video has such attractive hands. But she for real needs to tie back that hair. I don't care how funky your jewelry is, ain't nobody gonna like hair in their bread, lady.

Video by Tiger in a Jar for Kinfolk 

Strawberry Granitas and Other Things Happening in My Life

It's Friday night and in usual Ellie-fashion, I've got a one-way ticket to Party Town.

And by that, we all know I mean a one-way ticket to Finishing My Book and Tucking In Early Town.

But before it gets real crazy up in here, I thought I'd finally get around to posting on here again.

I know, major slack department. 

Well I can explain.

Cliff Notes: Left Texas, moved back to Indiana, got a job.

Longer version (includes better grammar): I love Texas. I really do. I had such a blast while I was down there. I fulfilled my dream of becoming roommates with the lovely and talented Jillian. We basically lived like two old ladies, reading books and watering our plants and it was beautiful. 

But I could not. find. a. job. In a perfect world, I think unemployment suits me. Baking, writing, crafting, knitting, shopping, reading....I'm basically Martha Stewart and I'm not ashamed to admit it. But in a perfect world, money wouldn't be an issue, I wouldn't have a massive case of writer's block, and I wouldn't struggle with anxiety. 

And since this is not a perfect world and those are all very real issues, employment is a necessary part of life.  And since no one was paying me to be Martha Stewart, it was not working out. I sent out resumes and applications and even resorted to cold calling, but nothing was panning out.

So I packed up and moved back to Indiana.  That was one month ago. Less than two weeks after moving back, I had an interview and then a job with a local electrical, plumbing, fabrication and HVAC contractor company. I'm now a plumbing specialist and a certified welder.

Kidding. What do I know about any of that? Nothing. Which is why I answer the phone, update the Facebook page, and do data entry for the purchasing and payroll departments. Occasionally I provide the management team with cupcakes in a blatant attempt to win friends and influence people.

Spoiler alert: it works.

As much as I enjoy feeling like a productive part of society again, it has totally sucked up all my time.  Which is rather inconsiderate, in my opinion. Basically I am gone for most of the daylight hours and when I finally get home, I want nothing more than dinner, a shower, and sleep.  

Which explains the lack of blogging, returning of emails, and general absence from contact with the outside world. 

Unless you happen to need a new water heater. Then I am all about connecting you to the service department. 

ANYWAY, I'm finally getting used to the routine and hopefully will be a bit more attentive to all other areas of life. Such as my blog.

In the meantime (I do have lots of posts planned, wedding stuff, photos from TX, etc), here are some shots of the strawberry granita I made this evening in celebration of it being Friday. 

There are real recipes for this tasty frozen treat, like this one. But my middle name is Victoria which is obviously German for 'lazy', so I just dumped some frozen strawberries and ice cubes in the blender with a bit of sugar and a couple tablespoons of lemon juice. No measuring involved.  I would have added mint, but my plant died due to lack of me remembering I had a mint plant. But you should add mint.

You're welcome. 

Yes, I dipped the rim of the glass in raw sugar purely for this photo. Sorry I'm not sorry.

Good night and Happy Friday, you lovelies.