Something Yellow

I've been craving a sugary butter cookie for days so today I finally made Zuckerkager (Danish Sugar Drops) from The Great Scandinavian Baking Book by Beatrice Ojakangas. The cookies turned out thin and crisp and very sugary (in a good way) and I'm trying to not eat the whole batch in one sitting.

While I was baking I discovered the manual functions on my Canon PowerShot (and I almost let the first batch of cookies burn). Here's the same photo but in sepia tone (yeah, it doesn't take much to excite me):

These pictures aren't staged. I'm not into perfection (or twee-ness) but reality, even if there are some ugly elements, such as the black cord and the box of mac and cheese in the background. However, I do try to make the picture somewhat interesting......

Nancy Drew collection (yup, I've got 'em all).

"Jesus Pansies."  (they came back to life after appearing dead for several days).

My 3-year-old took this picture. Not bad, eh?

Looking Up/ Looking Down

I have a renewed interest in photography. I happened upon the Shutter Sisters website the other day, and for August there is a theme for each day, for their "Elevate the Everyday" photo project. I decided to try it with my little point-and-shoot camera.

Vintage postcards, hanging on a mobile in my piano studio.

Blue + Lines.

Dead tree in August.


I love these little Fluxus/ Keri Smith-type projects: the art of the everyday; simplicity over complexity; d.i.y.; anti-commercialism. I can handle these small, daily art projects in the spirit of John Cage (whose 100th birthday would have been September 5 of this year):

"[The residual purpose of art is] purposeless play. This play, however, is an affirmation of life-- not to bring order out of chaos or to suggest improvements in creation, but simply to wake up to the very life we're living, which is so excellent once one gets one's mind and one's desires out of its way and lets it act of its own accord."

and Paul Klee:


"It is a great difficulty and a great necessity to have to start with the smallest. I want to be as though new-born, knowing nothing, absolutely nothing, about Europe, ignoring poets and fashions, to be almost primitive. Then I want to do something very modest; to work out by myself a tiny formal motive, one that my pencil will be able to hold without technique. One favorable moment is enough. The little thing is easily and concisely set down. It's already done! It was a tiny, but real affair, and someday, through the repetition of such small, but original deeds, there will come one work upon which I can really build."

A three-year-old's tableau ("looking down").

Belly/feet/dog.


This project is coinciding nicely with my media fast (can't....take....any.....more.....ridiculous/sad/irritating....news....for....awhile......). I feel much more uplifted reading Hula Seventy's blog.

Hello.

Hello, it's been forever. But I'd like to start posting again.

The highlights of today:

*Homemade chicken noodle soup
*The smell of freshly-cut wood at Menards
*Taking a nap on the couch

It finally feels like winter, with the temps in the teens and a light covering of snow, and fine ice crystals making the sidewalks slippery. Winter is good, but I need some wintry projects to keep me from hibernating under my down comforter all day:

To-do's this week:

*Take pictures with new Blackbird twin lens camera!
*Make granola and granola bars
*Find a good book to read (in between novels right now)
*Letters, thank-you notes, postcards, etc.
*Learn some more folk songs on guitar for E., who turned 3 last week!