miscellany

solstice

A very summery solstice today, with the kitten flop-o-meter already at a fairly flopsy flop.

Busy weekend, with my cousin’s beautiful wedding on Saturday. Photos are of the gargantuan floral arrangement we got sent home with, lots more photos on Flickr. I divided them up to put into vases and now the entire apartment is covered in flowers.

Discovered at said wedding that lots of my relatives read my blog. (Hi!)

Last night the boy & I went on a spontaneous date, first just for ice cream shakes at Sonic and then we decided to see if we could catch Toy Story 3 while we were out. We had perfect timing showtime-wise, though our theatre was full of teenagers who were having difficulty mastering that whole no talking thing.

Originally, I wasn’t that enthused about TS3 even though I love Pixar. But then the reviews were so good that I got curious, and I’m really glad we went. It’s wonderful. And the short that plays with it, Day & Night, is absolutely brilliant.

Back to the land of flopsy kittens and revising for the week. We’ll see how long the flowers last in the heat.

By erin, ago

weekend & kitten in a box

Had a weekend that include lots of reading and lots of food. Made blueberry pomegranate sangria. Got chocolate cayenne ice cream when we went out for dinner. Took a handful of photos on the way home, including the twilight church bell above with the fantastical purple sky.

Finished reading Ash & The Book Thief, so apparently the reading section of my brain is no longer broken. And today I have a new box of books, after shenanigans on Saturday with lying USPS tracking.

Am particularly excited because this box had this in it:

No, not Tessa. I’ve wanted to read Lisa Brackmann’s Rock Paper Tiger ever since Nathan Bransford posted the gorgeous cover on his blog ages ago, and that was before I realized I actually knew Lisa from Absolute Write, so needless to say I am extra special excited to finally have it, even if it’s already covered in kitty fuzz.

Tessa, of course, prefers the box.

Obviously.

By erin, ago

concord

I wanted to go on an excursion today, so we took a drive out to Concord.

It was a gorgeous day for it, sunny but not hot. We saw lots of adorable dogs and almost ran over a great many cyclists. Also, there were very loud geese.

We walked around the Old North Bridge area for awhile, and then went over to Sleepy Hollow Cemetery, so now I have my own photos of the graves from Author’s Ridge that are more or less exactly the same as the ones from the Wikipedia entry. (Apparently they forgot Hawthorne, just like I did.)

There are more photos on my Flickr photostream. And I have a new photo of me up on my about page, too, so that’s actually up-to-date for a change.

It’s an odd sort of day when you find yourself standing on Ralph Waldo Emerson’s grave. Good, but odd.

By erin, ago

cookies

So y’all know I have a thing for Etsy vintage. Remind me to post pictures of the boy’s new fedora.

Months ago, I stumbled upon vintage cookie cutters & couldn’t think of any good reason not to get them, so I did.

But I had no rolling pin, so I couldn’t really do anything with them.

They’re fun. There are five of them, in playing card suits (heart, diamond, spade, club) and there’s an extra bonus star.

I ended up getting a rolling pin about a week ago, you can see it in the background of the photo. It’s black! A nice gothic touch to baking time.

So today I finally baked sugar cookies.

I need to work on my rolling skills because they ended up rather uneven, but they taste good and they don’t look half bad, so I’m calling that a win. Especially considering it was my very first sugar cookie attempt.

Will eventually make a batch with black & red icing. Not feeling daring enough for that just yet.

By erin, ago

fountain pen number two

Remember back in March when I got my very first vintage fountain pen?

I’ve been trolling Etsy vintage for pens since then (well, pens & train cases & bowler hats,) but nothing’s really caught my eye & budget at the same time until this past week.

So now I have a second vintage fountain pen.  Except this one is a part of a set.

It’s a Sheaffer Snorkel Clipper Pen & Pencil set, complete with box & instructions. It has a really nifty filling mechanism that you can sort of see the instructions for in the photo & I kind of flailed around like a dork when I filled it this afternoon and the kittens thought I was weird. But that’s nothing new.

This set is from somewhere around 1955-59 or so, and both pen & pencil appear to have never been used.

I think this officially means I’m starting a collection.

By erin, ago