harvest hospitality

Finally going to have a little gathering in my new home. Not an official housewarming because that would seem indulgent after the recent one at Blue Elm. Instead, Friday is Troy Night Out and so we will be gathering first to eat and then on to galleries and then back to eat. Why not have a progressive evening of food?! There are such yummy choices out there this time of year.

Over at the Chicken, I picked up a recipe for Iced Pumpkin Cookies. I also found a new local bakery to check out, just outside of the city on Route 7, don't you love the format? Seems to exude warm tastiness. Hopefully they can supply me with a selection of additional dessert choices since my other activities this week, the job, have moved in on my baking. We will also be serving warm cider and some autumnal wines selected by the boyfriend (who did a fantastic job helping me clean the apartment, especially consoling me when one of the pictures I had just hung crashed to the floor in an explosion of glass--and then cleaning up the mess himself even though it was my own fault for trusting some new hanging devices that weren't supposed to damage plaster. Guess again).

Now if I can just sew more of the curtains tonight, I will be all set. Oh, and after the cleaning last night we started reading The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (aloud--one of my favorite pastimes to share!). The story will be a film this Christmas with one of the best actresses working right now, Cate Blanchett. Oh yeah, and Brad Pitt is in it ;)

gift giving season

The season is nearly upon us! I have a number of my gifts made, purchased, in the works, but if you don't, check out these two upcoming events to support local artisans. The first one is local to Rochester, Second Storie Indie Market, to be held at the Visual Studies Workshop in late November. I attended one in February and really enjoyed it. Delightful work by some seriously talented men and women. The second, in Albany and Troy, is GiveHANDMADE and I will be selling Five40B items there the first weekend in December. I am less familiar with this event, but it seems to be shaping up to be a nice way to get into the local market.

Last night I stayed up late setting up the studio. It is aching for a few more projects. GiveHANDMADE should be just the thing to get that going! Of course, my knitting will take a hit, but oh well. I am also working on a family gift project based on our trip to London, more soon!

windowless cave free form poetry on a monday afternoon

coffee.

chocolate.

writing.

acres of trees slaughtered for my paper pages.

silence.

one door opens. closes with a creak.

red pens. blue pens.

binders.

more spreadsheets.

achy joints, stuck at this chair.

no windows. no passage of time.

some office chatter.

four more hours to go.

wishing for sunshine.

hoping these words, figures, charts, tables will mean something to someone after i am through.

race report

Few posts last week because of a busy travel schedule for work and then my mini-vacation day on Friday.

Saturday it poured for hours, making the race trail a muddy mess for the team that was running from Rochester and Albany. Despite the mess, the guys won the team race for the half-marathon, doing an amazing job navigating the flooded creeks and mire. My only task was supporting the team, although it did get me psyched to consider training for the 6 mile version next year. Don't hold me to that though. It could have been the perfect race day weather and the team camaraderie that had me thinking crazy! My brother came out too and cooked a delicious lunch for the runners and family members.









The boyfriend placed 39th out of 250+. So proud!

signs and symbols

This book Signs and Symbols came out in April, but I have not come across it until now over at Elle Decoration, a blog written by Heather Moore of Skinny LaMinx. I've posted here about my love for typography, and signs/symbols are not far behind. Symbols are particularly salient for me, explaining part of my attraction to orthodox religious traditions and my ongoing captivation with iconography.

I'm headed to NYC on Friday for some relaxation and a bit of my own research. One of my appointments is near Strand, of the 18 miles of books fame. Populating a list of books I want, need, should have in my collection before making my way over there. A friend recommended Andre Dubus who wrote House of Sand and Fog as well as We Don't Live Here Anymore, that was also turned into a disturbing but excellent film adaptation.

death and taxes

Super Saturday was a mild success. Some great projects completed, others stalled for lack of supplies or the expertise or some other obstacle. For example, I made a rather involved Martha molasses spice cake to hold that yummy sounding frosting, only to have my hand mixer die in use. On the first of three mixing stages--sugar and butter, eggs and molasses, flour and spices. I dumped everything into the food processor and started again, but with only modest results. The meringue frosting required mixing in a bowl over a simmering pot of water so that frosting option had to be rejected for a simple glaze. Which, all things considered, turned out better than the cake. I invented a cider reduction glaze that basically goes as follows:

1 cup cider -- boiled and reduced to 1/3 cup
1 cup brown sugar
4 tablespoons butter
1/4 t salt

Boil until thick and pour over cake

The cake went over well at the party, although I wasn't thrilled with the density of the cake, should have been lighter and airier, a feature I'm blaming on the dead mixer.

Sunday dawned bright and early with preparation for my religious education class. The Gospel reading for the day was from the book of Matthew regarding paying to Caesar what is Caesar and to God what is God's. Imagine a lesson on taxes and tithing for the Kindergarten and First Grade set. The little group of nine four to seven year olds are a joy to work with, even if their energy can seem overwhelming on a weekend morning. The contrast between the morning's liveliness and an afternoon spent in my windowless office at work couldn't have been more stark. Not to mention breaking the Sabbath. Big week this week requires more than the usual effort to be invested--thankfully I am on vacation Friday and will be spending it in NYC.

super saturday

I am lazy.

Plain old, curl up under blankets and watch television on the internet lazy. While knitting. Maybe not straight up lazy after a 12 hour work day or with the knitting. But ugh nonetheless. Even with that extra day last week, I only managed to straighten up my closet, run errands, and do laundry.

I have curtain material cut out and the sewing machine ready, yet it sits. I have all the contents of my studio, from fabric to paint to paper scraps, in the room, but in piles upon piles needing to be put away. I have two gorgeous colors of paint and rollers and tape sitting in the kitchen poised to jump onto my accent walls. Still nothing.

That all changes tomorrow. (Changes always start tomorrow don't they? Something about the new day thing.) I have six days to get my apartment in shape before visitors arrive for the race weekend and then a work gathering the next. Saturday will see me painting, sewing, setting up, and arranging--not getting sucked into watching those programs I missed this week while putting in long work days.

I'll also be going to an autumn party tomorrow evening for which I plan to make an apple cake with this frosting cut in half, because who really needs 5 cups of Brown-Sugar Swiss Meringue Buttercream? Super Saturday here I come...after a few more hours of data crunching and analysis.

Be well and happy weekend.