Mission San Luis Rey

The first three photos are in the gardens of the Self Realization Fellowship in Encinitas. Don’t worry, we didn’t have to join in order to see the gardens. The rest are at the historic mission in Oceanside. Really, really cool.

In France, they just call it “bread”

I am all about baking bread lately. Check out these lovely baguettes I made last night. Nice and crusty and very good. Once again, The Joy of Cooking comes through, although their breads have been a little salty. I’ll remember that next time and cut the salt in half. There’s something about baking bread that really satisfies. The process involves this almost baffling alchemy of rising and kneading, and then surprise, it’s bread! It’s like the Calvin and Hobbes strip where they try to figure out why bread goes into the toaster and toast comes out. Where does the bread go? It’s kinda like that.

Three Years? Wow.

Holla’ for Challah!

Holy crap, I made challah and it doesn’t suck. Thank you Joy of Cooking! The fork is for scale. This thing turned out way bigger than I thought it would. Recipe says to bake 30-35 mins., but it could have been taken out after 20 mins. since our oven tends to be a bit hot. Maybe I’ll finally learn that now. But it’s good, and it sure looks nice, doesn’t it? Not bad for a first go.

More Thrifty Fun

Look at this DIY embroidery stand we just made! Materials include an IKEA lamp we’ve had forever and which was sort of broken anyway (and from which we extracted the still-functional electrical components), a 7/8″ dowel, a nifty clamp from the hardware store, and two zip ties. We’ll trim the zip ties and finish the dowel with some stain and varnish so it looks a bit more civilized. Total cost in new materials (things we bought specifically for this project) was about $15. They sell things like this for between $250 and $275 new. How great is that!?

The tomato thief identified

He only got one this year. So far.

The Lesser Works, Series I

Or, making a crappy, blurry photograph of a pigeon look artsy and deep with digital chicanery. Or, the death of photographic craftsmanship.

Now they make you stop going

Woot! I’m a Ph.D., it’s official. Had a great time in Chicago with friends and family and we really lucked-out on the weather with rain and wind the day before and the day after the ceremony, but beautiful blue sky and sun on the day of. I wasn’t expecting to be so affected by the ceremony, but I have to admit I was pretty darn proud to be there. Thanks everybody who was there and helped coordinate family and events during a very busy weekend.

 

Lobelia in the Garden

Watcha’ doin’ raccoon?

We found our local raccoon assiduously removing the rocks and shells from one of our neighbors’ planter pots late last night. This was the scene this morning.