Home Sweet Home

For my first big cooked meal home, my Mum and I made a huge pot of our favourite vegetarian minestrone soup. This is a staple wintertime recipe in our household, and we alter it continually depending on what's in season and whether or not we want meat. Neither of us can remember where we found the basic recipe, but perhaps it was the newspaper? Anyhow, here are some shots of the lovely heap of produce we put into this pot:

This is why, despite what I say, I love California. Look at these bee-YOO-tee-ful veggies!Clockwise from top left: zucchini, mushrooms, cabbage, carrots, curly kale, string beans, celery, and spinach.
Even our compost pile is pretty!

The pot filling up with spinach...


Here's our recipe (for this pot--sometimes we add ground hamburger or different veggies)

Minestrone Soup

Chop and add to pot the following:
1 cup onions
1 cup celery
2 cups carrots
2 cups cabbage
1 cup kale
1 cup spinach
1 cup zucchini
1 cup mushrooms
5 cloves garlic
1 cup green beans
Add:
1 28-oz can tomatoes
1 49 1/2-oz can vegetable broth
1 15-oz can white beans
4 cups water
1/2 tsp. red chili flakes
1 1/2 tsp. Italian Seasoning
s&p to taste
Simmer 2-3 hours and serve with a dash of grated Parmesan cheese (or not, if you're vegan!)
And, due to our late start at getting this pot on the stove, we staved off our hunger with a little appetizer of kalamata olive bread and smoked Gouda from our local farmer's market, and a beautiful Cameo apple:

At JFK--Again.

I am at JFK airport, waiting in the terminal for my flight back home to California to board. If there is one thing in particular that I am rather thankful for right now, it is free WiFi in the jetBlue terminal. Makes my life soooo much happier before a long flight.

I had the lovely fortune today to share a train ride from Bronxville to Grand Central Station with my biggest friend-crush (don't you just love that phrase, "friend-crush"? It's so accurate at a place like Sarah Lawrence where you see all these neat people you wish were your friends) on campus, Emma. We had a wonderful conversation about crafting and cold weather, and played a bout of cat's cradle with the twine wound round my wrist, which delighted me to no end. I though Kevyn and I were the only two people our age who still know how to play cat's cradle! Not the case, to my happy surprise. Anyhow, Emma, if you're out there in the blogosphere, thank you for your company--it was a pleasure.

Still have near an hour before my flight boards, so I'll go dig into my dinner of cranberry Stilton with wheat crackers, radishes and snap peas, and pumpkin seeds. I'm so happy that my cute little reusable snack bags came out so well. The little sailboat print is darling, I think, and they've held up well to washings. Not to mention they're so much more sustainable than Ziploc baggies. Remind me to post pictures sometime...

Happy Christmas, New York!

Two days from now, I leave New York for 2009. With conference work over with, all my papers and projects turned in, library books returned, and (most of) my household chores finished before I leave, I am just about jumping out of my skin ready to get home for a month of zero obligation. Jamie and I celebrated our holiday together with a "romantic" night out in the city. Here are some photographs of the lovely lights that we saw last night:

Some big fat lights near Rockefeller Square

The Bryant Park Tree... which I may like even more than the Rockefeller one.

The tree at Rockefeller (came from my home Sierras)

Radio City Music Hall...

Saks lights and a bus--

Creepy Saks window display--don't know what they were going for in this ridiculously sparkly animated snowflake tripped-out star thing. WTF mate.

Pretty fresh cuttings on a storefront near St. Patrick's--I love the smell of holiday season. :)

Voted "Best Roof in New York City, 2009" by Jamie. See, she can be mindful--about...roofs...?

I took many pictures of these lovely, colour-changing stars in the mall at Columbus Circle--they are better seen in rapid succession, so that you can see the different colour combinations--but this picture captures it fairly well, I think.

Well, I did my best to record the magic of NYC at Christmas. I hope everyone is "going home" for the holidays soon, and enjoying it as much as I will be. Happy Winter!

Shameless Plug...

So, I must inform all of my readers that my lovely gentleman friend has likewise started a blog, which will eventually have pictures and information about his art, as well as about his life. I've added him to my blogroll--he's under On Clocks and Transience. There are no pictures or anything yet. but there will be shortly enough. Unfortunately, he has limited internet access where he lives, so they may be a little time in coming. In any case, please check it out once it gets up and running for good. If you like me, you will like him. :) Back to conference work now, but I thought I'd let everyone know.

New Owl Boots!

I got these in the mail when I got back to the city, and I couldn't be happier with them! Fossil brand owl rain-boots:

They look equally cute with tights and a skirt as they do with jeans, even on my skinny chicken legs.

Snow Angels

The tyrannical sun has nearly melted the two inches of snow we received last night. I've never been so disappointed to see nice weather in my life.

Last night, with the snow as deep and as pretty as it was, I met up with a few friends and acquaintances for snow-angel-making and a bit of a snowball fight. I love winter so very much. When I come back to New York after break, all will be whited out. I can hardly wait.

I'm off the brunch with Jamie now, while my camera charges for some more pictures of the snow. Happy winter, all...

Nothing Short of Magic

I was blissfully surprised by the first snowfall of the season this afternoon, while I was bundled up in my room, reading for my conference work. I've seen snow. I've seen it snow. I've even lived in now for short periods of time. But I've never seen a first snow. Nothing on Earth could have kept me from putting on my wool coat and Wellies to take a walk. I put on my big headphones and pumped Amiina's songs "Hilli" and "Sexfaldur" through them as a pretty soundtrack to the season's first bit of white.

It was really difficult to get any of the action on camera, but here's a try:


Here's the view out of my window.

Tomorrow morning there should be a pretty blanket of snow on the big Tudors across the street from my window--I can hardly wait.

The Trees Speak Riddles

Just wanted to let all my faithful readers (ahem) out there know that I've begun a new blog. Frustration with all of the disgustingly sparkly animated ads on my Livejournal account has persuaded me to post all my poetry on a Blogger site. The site is called "The Trees Speak Riddles" and you can reach it through my profile or by clicking the link. Hope it works out for the better. All my final draughts are posted there, and I hope to keep it fairly reasonably updated. Enjoy!

And the Dreaded Conference Weeks Begin...

Stopped in for a quick lunch between conferences and its coziness on this blustery day felt worthy of a picture:


This is some organic butternut quash soup from my cute little local health food store, a slice of thick wheat bread, and some chunked-up provolone. Those are my cute little s&p shakers there on my laptop.

Almost done with my poetry conference project, a series of poems on quiet things called Tree Songs and a Second Winter, a title I'm raw-ther happy with at this point. All the poetry I've written this semester has finally been put up on my stubborn Livejournal, so please take a gander? Tree Songs isn't up yet, but expect it sometime next week.

Well, must be off to work on my History of Photography conference paper. Twenty pages, due next Friday. Eep. Prayers, zats (and ducks, if Amina is reading this) are all welcome, if anyone has any to spare!