soeurs du jour

glass

kath and i were talking about her wasp nest photo yesterday and she mentioned that she has trouble focussing.  is it because we started our affairs with our cameras in auto mode?  is it because we are old and our eyesight is not so good?  do we just not know what we are doing? even when i am using the tripod, as i did with these photos, i have trouble.  not to mention that our hands aren't as steady as they could be.

i have a thing about glass.  i love the word, it has so much class! 

i especially love coloured glass. 

little bottles, old ashtrays, chunks of coloured glass.

the above photo had a big black shadow down the side, i cropped it out.

 and it's too blue. 

why is that?

this one, i am not so unhappy with but it's dark.

this one i like, but the blur, what the heck?

same problem kath's wasp nest had.

this i kind of like.  

you should know, i took 293 photos yesterday.

250 were blurry, lousy, out of focus, too dark, too light 

but that's okay.  i'm learning.

xo margie

Macro Monday - W

Today's Macro Monday is brought to you by the letter W.

Wasp Nest

Wine Corks

Willow Knots

Be sure to look at things closely today, after all it is Macro Monday.

xo

Kath

lights out

notwithstanding that i am still sick with the flu, we have been entertaining like a house on fire.  

friday night, good friends for a long evening of eating and wine tasting. 

our friend is a wine seller and he loves to teach us about his wines.

last night different friends for dinner, 

with the lights out in observance of earth hour.

before dinner the most beautiful light was coming in our living room window.

tonight, it is lights out early for me.

xo margie

feeling qwoozy

Hi, there's a bottle of Purell over there, you might want to use it.  Apparently you can catch the flu over the internet.    I'm down with the stomach qwoozies.   Not as sick as Marg was and because I knew what was coming, I headed home from work as soon as I started to feel sick, stopped at the drugstore to get Gravol and came home to bed 

I get crabby when I'm sick, I feel like I've done something wrong and that's why I'm sick.  If I had only eaten better, exercised more, not done this or that, I would be fine. So I get angry with myself because now everything is "caked in ruin", I've failed at being healthy.    When things aren't right, I tend to fly into a flap that the house is "caked" in dirt and a small disappointment has me thinking that everything is "ruined". Barry calls it being "caked in ruin" which at first I didn't think was funny, because I also don't have much of a sense of humour when I'm sick but over time I've come to see that it is a ridiculous way to feel.   Now, if I could only stop feeling that way!

These crocuses are so strong they've pushed through about 6 inches of leaf mulch to find the sun.  

And then there was this one, she's being delicate, growing sideways looking for an easy way out

I can't decide which crocus I am today, the strong one pushing through, or the delicate one, growing sideways.

Be well. 

Please remember to observe earth hour this evening.

turn your lights off and sit in the candle light.

xo

Kath

in the bed

it's my turn to post.  i inadvertently hijacked love thursday yesterday!  i left a comment on pioneer woman that my meatball recipe was better than hers.  holy crap.  the soeurs were inundated with requests for the recipe.  i crawled out of the sick bed, posted the recipe and a picture.  these meatballs are delicious.  they are a lot of work but worth every ounce of it. 

as i lay in the bed i wondered, what the heck will i post tomorrow.  

remember that song, i fought the flu and the flu won!  

this is our bedroom and it is where i am now, in the bed.

what do you do when you are sick?  kath and i talked about this today.  she feels guilty.  i think i am faking and get up and clean the house and then get really good and sick.  kath's advice to me today was have a shower, put on clean pj's, make a pot of tea and get back into bed with the remote, the computer, my books, my magazines and a tylenol.   i did all of that and i changed the sheets.

what is it with women?  that we can't just lie down and shut up when we are sick? 

why the guilt?  why the doubt?  

nice chair, huh?  i thought i would throw some florida pics into this post.  

for your viewing pleasure.

does this house not scream florida?   i should be in that house, 

my new la senza nightgown is pink.

today i watched my house in umbria with maggie smith.  she plays a very tipsy elderly romance writer with a great house in umbria.  i lay in bed thinking that i could easily be a tipsy not so old romance writer with a pink house in florida.  

everyone out there, feel better.

xo margie

Love Thursday - Old School & a Meatball Recipe too!

Back when margie and I discovered Love Thursday we would post just one picture. Usually a heart.   Every week I still look for hearts because Love Thursday is always in the back of my mind.   I love that we've never missed acknowledging Love Thursday, now we have a habit of seeing love all week long.  So today, I'm going old school, one heart, one picture of a neglected doorway frame that someone has decided to show some love to.

Happy Love Thursday

xo

Kath

Edited:  There's that synchronicity in blogging thing again!  Karen who hosts Chookooloonks talks about when she started Love Thursday today.  

 I wrote this last night before her post was up.  

 

Edited Edited: Some of you have popped by looking for Margie's meatball recipe.   I wish I had it to put up for you.   Yes, that's true, I don't even have it, I've never even tasted them.  This is a new recipe she's found since I moved from Ottawa.  But I tell you what, leave us a comment and I will personally email you as soon as she posts the recipe.  She is sick in bed with the flu, we'll have to be patient waiting for the patient to recover.  Then we'll have a big meatball fest!

FINAL EDIT:  Here's the thing, you cannot keep my sister down.  She refuses to rest when she is sick.  So here she is ....

Margie's Meatballs

okay okay, i am up.  i can't do a whole post, i feel like such crap, but here goes with the recipe.

 

The sauce:

1 white onion diced

1 small tablespoon anchovy paste

½ tsp chili paste or hot sauce

1 T olive oil

2 garlic cloves crushed

2 shallots chopped fine

1 C chianti wine  ( I used other wine, but chianti is the best)

oven roasted tomatoes (if you have, I usually use the half spoiling tomatoes I have lying around, if you don't have don't worry) 

plus can of diced tomatoes plus one can of tomato paste

2 cups of beef broth  (use trusty old campbells)

1 T ground fennel seeds

1 bunch of basil

kosher or sea salt

make sauce,

sauté onions, anchovy, garlic, shallots, in olive oil

add wine, add tomatoes, add beef broth, fennel seeds and salt

let it bubble away at a low temp

 

The meatballs:

1 C cremini mushrooms chopped very fine

1 cooking onion diced fine

2 garlic cloves crushed

1 T Dijon mustard

1 C bread crumbs

11/2 - 2 lbs medium ground beef

1 or two sprigs of chopped rosemary

extra bread crumbs

sauté mushrooms/onion/garlic   

add Dijon and bread crumbs, mix and brown slightly

add this mixture to raw meat

make meatballs the size of  a Canadian toonie or a small golf ball

roll meatballs in breadcrumbs

fry in olive oil

this part is a pain but you need to do it.  Fry them in olive oil until cooked and crispyish, as they are done, add them to the sauce.   they should make their own oil but add if you need, you will end up with a crusty bottom on the pan, when you are all done, drain the oil and deglaze the pan with some wine.   Add the bits to the sauce.

Season to taste with fresh basil, you can serve with parmesan grated on top.   Delicious.    Very earthy taste to the sauce and the meatballs.

charley - the update

kath sent me an email today saying "i know what is wrong with my life! 

i need a dose of charley."

charley sleeps on my camera bag.  

her way of guaranteeing that i won't be able to sneak out of the house alone.

or, she sits in the afternoon sun on the white chair in my bedroom

and i practice apertures and f-stops and the like.  

i take hundreds of photos of her, hundreds of which never see the light of day.

my charley doesn't take the best photo but she is patient and quiet for me.

sometimes too quiet.

and then....the walk.  the long awaited walk.

she cuts loose and runs non stop.

she is my sweetest friend.

always beside me, always checking on me.

and her best quality, how she is with the babies.

don't tell charley, but the babies are coming.

charley loves the babies.

oh yeah.  the babies are coming.  

that's gonna be one happy puppy.

xo margie

Drive By Photography, a Day Trip to Toronto

Sunday is the only day off that Barry and I share and that's going to change in a few weeks when he switches to Monday off, so right now we're making the best of Sunday. 

After bacon & eggs at the local diner, we hit the road for a day trip to Toronto.  When we stopped for gas, I grabbed this shot. I'll admit that I was momentarily baffled as to why there were such big cups on the gas pumps and then I realized they were paper funnels.   I think I should have had more coffee with breakfast.  

I love taking photos at stop lights.  It's a bit of a pressure cooker assignment, can I set the camera, focus, snap before the light changes?

I'm developing a bit of a habit of drive by photography.  

 All of these photos were taken from the car window.

It was a gorgeous day and the corner shops had their flowers outside.

This gentleman was playing the most beautiful classical music.

We had a great day, stopping and browsing in galleries and antique stores.  

I am always so happy when we use our day off wisely and enjoy every minute of it.  

Kind of like a mini vacation.

xo

Kath

macro monday - pick and choose at the last minute.

A. and i spent all day saturday, me with a vicious sore throat and fever, picking knobs, handles, cupboards, floors, tiles, counters, etc., for our new condo.  we are moving april 14, 2010.  does that sound ridiculous to you because it does to me.  i just don't usually plan so far in advance.  i like to do things last minute.  

if you come over at 5:00 i can whip you up a fabulous dinner.  i like last minute.  i don't like a year from now.  life changes on a dime, as i well know, and a year from now makes me nervous.  i like now so much better.  i am not a worrier, don't get me wrong, i know that worrying is a huge waste of valuable time.  i am the beshert type, meant to be.  make the best of it right now and hope for the best in the future.

i did remember that macro monday was coming up and

i chose to take advantage of the moment and take some photos.

xo margie

Always Hope

Here is something positive you can do.  Just do some clicking (both with your camera and on the net).

Two of our Shutter Sisters are embarking on a journey of hope, at this stage they are hoping that they will be chosen to win a dream assignment.   Please help them out.

When you click over to the dream assignment site, you'll be asked to create an account, once you do, you can click back into the Shutter Sister's link, sign in and vote in the top left corner.

Add your link to your image of hope at the Shutter Sisters site.

"Here's how it works: This amazing community will generate the most powerful images of hope we can find. From those images we'll create tangible hope notes for Jen and Stephanie to take with them wherever they travel to tell the world we're listening. At each destination, Jen and Stephanie will introduce the world to a new story of hope while the Shutter Sisters at home show us all the ways hope flourishes in the hidden everyday spaces. From these images and stories, together we'll generate a visual catalog of hope--images that that can be transformed into practical print resources and literacy tools for the hopeful people we've met from around the world.  People who know and embody the essence of hope in spite of war, poverty, loss or the threat of despair."

And one other little thing, could you share this with others?  Thanks.

Now, didn't that feel good?

xo

Kath