Free Birthday Photobooth!

free photobooth!, a photo by dejvicka on Flickr.

There is nothing better than a free photobooth on your birthday.

Birthday!

Today is Dave's birthday. I'll let him tell you how old he's turning :) He is still sleeping and doesn't know it yet, but I woke up an hour early to bake him cupcakes - for breakfast. Because I think every birthday should start with blueberry cupcakes with maple syrup cream cheese frosting (with turquoise coloring!)  We had only been dating for a month or so when Dave celebrated his birthday last year. I made these same cupcakes for him then and left them on the doorstep to his work as a birthday surprise. He loved them so much I decided to surprise him with them again this year. An annual tradition in the making, perhaps?

To the sx to my 70, Happy Birthday.

Words to Shoot By: Down

For awhile now, we both have been participants of the great blog project, Words to Shoot By. Curated by Steph Parke, the editor of Light Leaks Magazine, every couple of weeks we are given a word and instructed to take three photos of our interpretation of that word. It is a fun (and sometimes nerve racking) experience for us both to really think about how photography relates to specific words and ideas, and it forces us to slow down and be a bit more conscious of how, and of what, we shoot. 

Go check out Dave's submission of this week's word, Down at Words to Shoot By. Enjoy!

Elle Girl Korea

On Monday I got an extra awesome piece of mail - the April issue of Elle Girl Korea that has three of my polaroids in it. The feature, "Days of Blossom", also includes polaroids by my friends Amanda and Azuree. It's great to be include with such lovely ladies!

Weekend Snippets

 

 

Things we did this weekend:
-Went to opening day of the Portland Farmers' Market, where we bought Swiss chard, daffodils and French breakfast radishes. Dave also stuffed his face on that delicious sausage above - you know, that thing hiding under the peppers and onions.
-Ran into our new friend Allison, who we met last week in "real life" after being friends on Twitter for the last several months.
-Ate a late lunch at Circa 33. A fried chicken sandwich with apple smoked bacon and Swiss for Dave, a Bourbon pulled pork sandwich with coleslaw for me.
-Watched the MLS debut of the Portland Timbers, while throwing back a few cocktails with some friends at Beulahland. Unfortunately, the Timbers lost 3-1.
-We were asked to provide a "Top 10" for a blog we really enjoy, Orange Juice, ETC. You can check out our list here. And be sure to check out their photography over on Flickr.
-I also shot my first roll with my Lubitel 166. Hopefully the roll I pick up tomorrow at Pro Photo Supply won't be entire blank and blurry.  I'm aiming for 1 out of 12 shots. That's doable, right?

Overall, it was a wonderful weekend. We hope yours was too!

March 16th, 2010

A year ago today.

Words To Shoot By: Turquoise... The Outtakes

Dave and I both participate in the Words To Shoot By project. Every other week we are given a word and instructed to take three photographs of our interpretation of that word. This week's word was "turquoise." My photos are on the top and Dave's are below. Lots of times we end up with photos that don't quite make the cut. Out of focus shots, photos that don't completely go together, bad lighting, images that you look at the next day and think "really, what was I thinking?" Below are the outtakes from this week's Words To Shoot By.

My shots, taken with a Pentax k1000 with Ektar 100 film:

Dave's images, taken Olympus XA2 with Fuji Superia 400:

Tom Kha Gai: Homemade Thai Soup

During these cold winter months, Whitney really likes soup. Me, I don't really like soup. It's just, you know, eh. Except the Thai classic, Tom Kha Gai. This soup is amazing. Not even a soup, it's more like a flavor explosion. And if you add the Thai chilies the recipe calls for, explosion is the key word. Like face melting explosion. (I even burned my eye balls taking out my contacts hours later. Had to wear my glasses for two days. Yikes.)  Anyway, I came across this recipe in one of the dozens of daily foodie newsletters that somehow get delivered to my email inbox every morning. It popped out. I love this soup. And knowing Whitney likes soup, I decided that Sunday was the perfect day for homemade Tom Kah Gai. Plus, she had never had it before! Which is a bonus as she had no idea what it really tastes like in case I screwed it up. So off to Fubon Asian Supermarket we went to procure supplies. Lemongrass, galangal, fish sauce (nam pla), kaffir lime leaves and coconut milk, mmmmm. All the ingredients home and 20 minutes later we had amazing soup! (Ok, ok, Whitney would like to point out here that I had a couple beers while chopping up the ingredients and studying the recipe before actually making it. Details, details.) But the point is, it can be made in 20 minutes. Super easy too! 

I hope you all give it a whirl. It's awesome and delicious. Finding the ingredients might be the hardest part, but tracking them down is half the fun! We also made a delicious cucumber salad with rice wine vinegar, cilantro and a touch of sugar that thankfully cooled down our palates from the spicy chilies. 

Here's the recipe I found from Fine Cooking. Enjoy! Or as they say in Thailand, เพลิดเพลิน!

Bubbles.

Meet our new friend. He's a red ryukin goldfish we call Bubbles - named after one of our favorite characters on The Wire.

The plant is real. Only the finest for our Bubbles.