everything you want

I recently got back in touch with an old DJ friend, Steve Lambert. We were DJ's at KZSU over ten years ago. Steve had seen me in the zine documentary and contacted me. He was about 20 the last time I saw him and since then has been very busy making art and making headlines - literally.

He was a co-creator of the fake NY Times paper that came out around election time last year. You can still see it online here.

His most recent show, Everything You Want, Right Now! is currently in L.A. and you have another couple of weeks to see it. If you are in the area I hope you will go.

It has been nice to reconnect to Steve and so very cool to see all the great stuff he has been up to. Please visit his website to see more, to find out about his show and to learn more about his artwork. I find this kind of art really inspiring. Here are a couple of my favorite images:

A fella's birthday

Last weekend was Steve's birthday. I made a cake very much like the one I made last year, per his request, complete with the same great cake decorations from Bake it Pretty.



I also gave him the most adorable card that you can see here. I think I found it on Etsy, unused. I just love it.

His choice for whatever dinner he wanted was dinner at home of warm German Potato Salad & Tofurky Kielbasa Sausages. We also had brussels sprouts and rolls.

Have you had real warm German Potato Salad? I never had before Steve introduced it to me. Usually it is served with bacon crumbled in it, but since I am a pescatarian, I passed that up. But, I have found this vegetarian Bacon Salt at the local German Store and it is very good. I recommend it. (Wow, I just found out, when looking for that link that this stuff is made in Portland and can be found all over. They have lots of options, too. Neat.)

Anyway, I have tried a few different German Potato Salad recipes for the crock-pot and have made some tweaks to it. Now, I am pretty happy with my recipe. German Potato salad is vegan (if you don't add the bacon, of course) and is basically just potatoes and vinegar. It is much better than it sounds or looks. It is a great thing to make when you have lots of potatoes.

I am sure it can be made without a crock pot, but I have only made it this way.

Here is my version of Crock Pot Warm German Potato Salad:

5 to 6 cups sliced potatoes, about 1.5 to 2 pounds
3/4 cups chopped onions
1/2 cup sliced celery (optional, you could take the onions down a 1/4 cup if you do the celery)
1/2 cup vinegar ( apple cider vinegar is good. I also use a german one with herbs in it, but any would work)
1/4 cup oil
1 teaspoon sugar (use more if you like more sweetness)
Chopped parsely (optional. I seldom have any, so I don't use it)
Slice bacon, cooked and crumbled (optional)

Combine all ingredients except parsley and bacon

Add salt and pepper to taste

Stir and cook on low for 5 - 7 hours in crockpot (sometimes I do it for 3 hours on high)
Garnish with bacon and parsely.

bolting

My kale plant bolted, as they say, a while ago. Although I cannot eat the lovely kale anymore, I can still marvel at how fast it grew - a month ago it was a fifth this size, and I can appreciate the pretty yellow flowers. I am going to cut some off this weekend though, it is so tall it is leaning over the box.


Here is my lettuce. I tried growing lettuce before and it didn't work. This was taken after I had already picked one head of lettuce for my salad Thursday night.

Things have been very busy for me since my vacation last week, actually, my vacation was kind of busy, too. Work has been crazy and I have worked late every night this week. I hear it is going to be sunny in Portland this weekend. I want to do some work in the garden, but mostly I think I will be inside, cleaning and getting caught up.

Hope you all have a wonderful weekend.

day trip

Hello all, This week I am on vacation. Tomorrow I am heading to Seattle for a couple days. Yesterday I went on a day trip with a friend. We drove up to the Maryhill Museum in Washington. It was a beautiful drive and I got to see some country I have never seen before.

Here are some highlights of some of the things we saw; some very aggressive squirrels who seemed ready to jump on us if we indicated we were carrying (food), huge wind turbines we got very close to, lush green land, big buttes, vineyards, a replica of Stonehenge (perhaps not to scale, but close), a darling old lady who gave us directions in a very small town we drove through, gorgeous views of the Columbia Gorge and a museum filled with a very strange mix of exhibits. We ended it all with a late lunch at Tad's Chicken and Dumplings on the old Columbia Highway.

Here are a couple images. A few more here. Hope you are all having a good week!

note to self:

remember to plant more bulbs next fall.

This amazing tulip brought to you by Jane Brocket's garden. I love this one, especially!

if you're bored, you're boring

yanked from Walyou, found while looking for something esle.

shadow project by Color Me Katie

Do you follow the blog Color Me Katie? It is one of my new favorite blogs. Katie is an artist and photographer living in Brooklyn and she does some of the best projects. Stuff that looks simple, but really isn't as simple as it seems and all of it never fails to put a smile on your face.

Her most recent project is making shadows for people from paper and then taking photos as people pass by them at the right time, so that they are lined up to be their shadows.

Perfection. I wish I lived in Brooklyn so I could run into these around town. More here.

vintage sewing cards - free downloads

I know these have made a bit of the blog rounds, but I wanted to point them out to you in case you missed it. doe-c-doe made some adjustments to vintage button and trim packages and then made them free for you to download and use on your packages.

Such a great idea and so cute, especially for a sewing theme present!

yesterday and today

• Yesterday I stayed up too late pouring over the new Harney and Sons Tea catalog that I got in the mail. I love their tea and the catalog has some interesting information.

Lots of new stuff I want to try, some incredible and expensive rare teas, too. Someone I know in the internet world says he loves the white vanilla grapefruit tea. I may have to try that next.

This mid-summers peach tea is great with a bit of sweetener. I wonder how it will be in an iced tea. I think I may find out soon.

• Yesterday it was sunny and warm here. After work I went by one of my new favorite places, the frozen yogurt shop. I got blackberry and coconut. I then came home and sat in my backyard (which sadly is really just a driveway with some plants around) and let the sun soak in. I closed my eyes and the breeze came and the warmth covered me and I ate some great blackberry and coconut frozen yogurt.
  

I have been missing Whidbey Island pretty much since I left there last summer. It was just the best. Lately I have also been craving this amazing huckelberry ice cream I had there. It occurred to me yesterday that sitting in the sun here at home, the breeze blowing, frozen berry treat in hand - it all felt very similar to the island. And although I don't have the great view I had there, my mood is still elevated and I still feel a bit of that vaction feel. A good thing for me to remember - it isn't all about where you are, but about what you take the time to do.

• Yesterday I put some of my new lovely finds on The Cedar Chest. More to come.

• Today I did some cool things at work. I love that smart people out there create great websites that can help me create html pages and functions without coding.

• Today is Earth Day. To the Earth, I say, "Thanks for being such a great host. Your home is lovely. I am sorry we haven't been the best guests.

• Today is almost over. I started this entry many hours ago.
  

so close

I am excited that the local strawberry harvest is right around the corner. I am expecting to want to eat strawberries all the time for a while. Oregon berries are pretty great.

Seeing this post about Strawberry and Vanilla Charlottes on the beautiful food blog Tartlett only made me less patient. Take a gander. Recipe here.

I love it when desserts have names like Charlotte and Madeline and Fool.