Food

Charlie's coffee at Quince

When I'm at a restaurant, the only thing I like more than eating dessert is taking pictures of all the food and drinks that are served to my table. Here's my most recent collection.

 Beer foam at Pizza Inferno

 Aftermath of bruschetta from Pizza Inferno

 French fries from Barney's

 Gin and tonic from the A.C.T. Theatre, downstairs bar

 Black bean veggie burgers from my very own kitchen

Kittens!

I couldn't leave Connecticut empty handed, could I? So, when my little brother and his wife said they needed homes for some of their kittens, I figured I could help out and take two home with me. 

The little dude with the white around his neck is Livingston, as in 'Dr. Livingston, I presume?' Because he was the first to start exploring and eating solid food and such. The other guy is Bingley, after Mr. Bingley in Pride and Prejudice. 
They've been home for not quite a week and it's amazing how much they've grown! This evening they even conquered going up and down the stairs in the apartment. I have to admit, I'm very proud!
Please, enjoy these photos, and tomorrow, I promise, I'll take a step back from excessive cuteness.

Making Summary

I had to make a last minute trip back to Connecticut earlier this month and so I haven't been able to blog for a while. Before I left, I took 2 classes on bookmaking. Here's a brief summary of what I did.

First, I took a short course from Jennie Hinchcliff of Red Letter Day Zine on basic bookmaking, so I could brush up on my zine making skills. 

There was shredded money, Michigan map and bingo card paper, so we broke out the stamps and made some single sheet books.

Next, I took an altered board books class with Courtney Cerruti. We started out with regular old children's board books and, with the handy help of gesso, acrylic paint, rubber stamps, washi tape, words and glue, turned them into books of our own creation.

Ice Cream Sundae

I slept in on Saturday, which is what you're supposed to do, right? Well, despite the joy of sleeping in, I was feeling super sleepy in the afternoon so I decided some sugar was just what I needed. I went into Chocolatier Blue on 4th Street in Berkeley expecting to come away with some tasty candy but instead I found out they make ice cream sundaes. How could I resist a s'mores sundae with milk and dark chocolate ice cream, graham crackers that taste an awful lot like graham cracker short bread (which means they are delicious), and marshmallows toasted with blow torch? I managed a few photos before I devoured it.

Homemade Lemonade

Lately I've been thinking a lot about how much I loved being a server and bartender and how nice and stress free it would be to just make people drinks all day. But before I get serious about a career as an amateur mixologist, I figured I should try my hand at a really simple homemade summer classic- lemonade.

This first batch was sweetened with cane sugar simple syrup. I attempted to infuse the simple syrup with lavender to imitate my favorite drink (yup, you guessed it, lavender lemonade) from The Grove in San Francisco but there's not an inch of lavender flavor in my version. I'll have try a different tactic on the next go-round. I didn't use any special lemons this time either, just cheap store bought ones because I just wanted to conquer the basics first. And, if I do say so myself, this lemonade is not too shabby.