You're here. Where am I?

I hate seeing my little blog seemingly abandoned. Unfortunatly she will be this way for a little while longer.  You see I've started a new job AND my home computer bit the dust. I'm using a little tablet to post this. I will be starting up the blog again after Christmas. By then we will have our new fancy computer where I can download pictures and and be in blog heaven :-) Until then I hope you are all having a wonderful holiday season!

Riverside, The Farnsley-Moremen Landing

The year,1837...That is the year this southern bell was built. She sits on the banks of the Ohio river and I adore her. She is one of my favorite places in Louisville. This is the Farnsley-Moremen House. You can tour the house and gardens as it's all part of the Riverside Park. Volunteers take care of the gardens and they are charming, peaceful, and when I walk through them I imagine that I'm wearing some sort of Tasha Tudor outfit! This place calls for a long skirt and apron.

This is the backside of the house. It seems like it should be the front as this is what you first see when you walk up, but back when the house was built it would have been first seen from the Ohio river. If you look to the right of the house in this photo you will see some low trees then some tall ones in the back, the tall ones are the Indiana side of the river, the low ones are the Kentucky side.

Here is the front of the home. Everytime we've been here it's been in the early morning or the late evening and the house is already closed up. I'm betting the views of the river from that second story are stunning.

You can see a bit of the water from the front lawn. It looks rather small here but trust me the Ohio is a mighty one! 

There are a few little spots where you can peek out and see the river. It's so peaceful in the early morning here, you really feel like you've gone back in time.

The volunteers have many of the plants marked. 

What is it about the nasturtium? I think maybe those beautiful round leaves. They look like tiny lilly pads! 

The summer kitchen. I can't even imagine the heat in the middle of a hot Kentucky July in this little building with the fire going. I'm sure it smelled delicious though! 

Here is the vegetable side of the garden. We were there in early summer and everything was just sprouting. I wonder what it looks like now! Maybe hubs and I can go back this fall for more photos when the trees have started to turn. I also need to get inside that beautiful house! Even though I do think the garden holds so much of the the charm for me.



I'm not sure the barn swallows cared for our visit! But they are so pretty and entertaining to watch.

I wonder what type of tree this is? It looks like has stories to tell. There was also a huge mulberry tree by the garden. I had to kick myself for not bringing a basket or bag for collecting some of the berries. They were so sweet and tasty...it made for a good snack while walking through the garden. It's a shame you can't find mulberries in the stores, but they just don't keep. If you've never tasted them you must, the darker they are the sweeter. I think they are superior to all other berries in flavor, well except strawberries. ;-)

If you would like to visit Riverside or learn more here is their webpage. http://www.riverside-landing.org/

I hope you are all enjoying your weekend. The weather here is amazing! Today was the Big UK UofL game so I'm sure most of our state was watching football. We certainly were, with a warm bowl of chili and the windows open. It was another sweater day! Yay for sweater days!

Portraits...

Let me first start off by saying that I really love this painting. It's a watercolor I did of a friend of mines little girl. I think it looks like her daughter (is she not so beautiful!) so that was a great surprise for me when I completed it because I find portraits really hard to do. First, I'm always nervous...like what if I insult the person and they think it's awful? They think I must think they look crazy? OR even worse they think I'm the worst artist to walk the face of the earth. What if they look too old? That is so easy to do...a little bit of shading can turn to crows feet faster than Judge Judy can quip about urine and her shoes. The other thing is getting paid for portraits. There is a lot of thought that goes into them since I'm not a "natural" at it. I put too much time into them for what I ask to be paid but on the flip side if they hate it they should'nt have to pay for it. But then I just put all this time into it for nothing. What am I going to do with a portrait of your neice Bethany? Over the years and with lots of practice I've found a few tricks that seem to help me. Especially when doing a portrait of a child. Many years ago I took a class called Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain. It was based on a book that I've found to be one of the greatest books around for new artists who are trying to teach themselves how to draw. The idea is that you turn the image upside down and it will change what your eye sees so that your brain does not register it as the literal object but more shapes and shadows. It REALLY works. Hopefully I'll get to do more portraits in the future. It seems like when Christmas gets close people start looking for unique things and ask about them. Maybe with more practice I won't have to worry so much about making a mistake. You know what they say about practice! :-)  

Ball Jar Painting

Thanks to my sister and her idea that we each paint a Ball jar. I think it came out really cute! I don't know if you've seen any of these in antique stores lately but I'm so shocked at how much money they bring. It seems like anywhere from a low $7 all the way up to $100! I don't know anything about vintage mason jars, but I'm sure there is something special about those high dollar ones. A friend of mine mentioned that Ball released the blue ones again this year. I was very excited about that as I have an entire box (22lbs) of pears to can. I went to pick up more jars but was when I saw the blue ones they didn't really look like the old ones. The blue was very bright. They are still pretty, but I decided to go with the clear. Do you think this painting needes something in the background? It seems a little drab even though I do really like the how the jar came out. Hope you are having weather as beautiful as we are! It's only 72 degrees out and the wind is blowing. I'm wearing a SWEATER!!!!! I love sweater weather.      

New Old Chairs

Check out my new old chairs on the side of the piano! I'm loving the pop of color. My wonderful talented mom came down from Indianapolis to work her magic and help recover them. Two days and a mess in the livingroom was all worth it.



While I was painting the legs on the chairs white I also decided to grab a small vanity that was my great grandmothers and give it a coat of paint as well. I'll show you more on that later.

I love green, but this was old and dirty. The chairs were a great find at a consignment store that my parents found. I had been wanting 2 chairs that I could put a little punch of color on to kick it up a notch in the dining room. I think they worked!





  



   

Has it really been almost a month!?

Where has summer gone?! Where have I been?! It really has been almost an entire month since my last post. Well the good news is that we've gotten alot of things/projects done around the house. The bad news is that I'm a neglectful blogger. With the weather changing I'm sure you will see me more. For some reason I just don't feel like sitting at the computer in the summer. I feel like doing things like this...eating strawberry shortcake.

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Looks yummy eh? Put that much whipped cream on anything and it will be yummy. I'm still watching what I eat during the week, trying to be healthy. But, the weekends are a complete free for all. I'm sort of like that magazine "Womens World". Have you ever noticed how the cover will have the latest greatest diet tricks AND a photo of the worlds most caloric desserts? That's me. I'm all diet with a large slice of carrot cake. It would be nice to be one of those people who don't think about what they eat and are just naturally slim, but that will never be me. It's not in my DNA. I will always be thinking about what I eat, I will always love food, I will always be trying to make a better choice. Sometimes I will, sometimes I will eat cake.

Just look at that Dr. OZ. Telling me how to loose 16 lbs in 5 days all while making me eat those cupcakes and chocolate cake.

Ok friends, have a great weekend! I'll be back next week as I'm pretty sure it will be way to hot to go outside. Lots of things planned and I may even get a painting done! :-) 

The Strawberry Patch

How about a little dose of strawberry madness? I love strawberries. To eat them, to grow them, to collect things with strawberry patterns on them. You name it, if it's got a strawberry on it I'm going to like it. I even have an entire board on Pinterest devoted to the strawberry. You can check it out here.  I thought a good way to add some cheer to the ol blog today would be to share some great pinterest finds featuring my favorite fruit. What a beautiful day it is today, I have all the windows open and it's nice and cool. Now if only I had some strawberries to nosh on.

http://www.rocknrollbride.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/reception8.jpg



http://fatquartershop.blogspot.com/








http://junglefrog-cooking.com/strawberry-tiramisu/





http://thekitchensinkrecipes.com/2009/06/15/fall-even-harder/

 



http://www.etsy.com/listing/67686854/strawberry-poster-watercolor-fruits-8x10

 

Thoughtful Eating

Had this for lunch, it was ok...I'd rather make my own.

I don’t know about you, and this may sound strange, but I’m very interesting in seeing what other people eat. Maybe it’s because I love to cook and eat and don’t even get me started on looking at foodgawker.com. The problem with looking at sites like food gawker or food on pinterest is that I always want to cook what I see and a lot of what I see is not so healthy. I’m 39 years old and I do think it’s time that I start taking my health seriously. I honestly have very bad eating habits. It’s the old fat, sugar, salt addiction. I will graze on junk food all day long and never really sit down to eat a proper healthy meal. I’ve decided that I’d like to devote at least 1 post a week to what I’m eating. I’ll be taking photos of everything I eat for the day. I think the idea is that I won’t want to record my mindless grazing and actually try “thoughtful eating”. Now, I’m not saying there will be no sweets or junk food, but if there are I will show it.  My biggest problem I think is really portion control. If my husband gets donuts on Sunday morning I don’t need to eat 2, I only need to eat 1. Not that donuts are a healthy choice, but you get the idea hopefully. I don’t want to live in a world where the food police are pecking around in my head. I still want a Danish and coffee on occasion! I’m on my second week of what I’m calling  “thoughtful eating” and I have to say I’m pretty proud of myself. I did have a slip up today and that’s why I decided to go ahead and kick start my thoughtful eating posts. I’ve been doing some grazing and skipped a proper lunch. Eating cheese puffs then an apple then a few caramels is not thoughtful eating! Here are the photos of the food I ate last week. I didn’t do photos this week because I was out of town and then had company, but I will start again monday. Weekends are excluded since our weekend scheduals are all over the place and often times we only get 2 meals in.  One thing I have noticed is that the act of taking the photo really promotes thoughtful eating! Who wants to eat junk, have a photo of it, and then beat yourself up for eating poorly? Also, if I am feeling like eating something that I should'nt I'm way to lazy to take a photo so I'd rather just skip it.   :-)

DAY 1



Breakfast: Stawberry mini wheats and almond milk



Lnch: Lean Cuisine salad editions and water

Snack: Vanilla yogurt and red grapes

Dinner: Tikka Masala with Jasmine rice and I ad loads of peas and carrots

Dessert: slice of German chocolate cake from the bakery

DAY 2                         

Breakfast: Honey Bunches of Almonds and half a bananna 



Lunch: Spring greens with egg, bacon, peas and homeade honey dijon dressing





Snack: Vanilla yogurt and red grapes...I love this stuff.



Dinner: Chicken Fajitas, grilled chicken with red peppers,
onion, lettuce, and some sour cream. Carb balance tortillas.

Dessert/Snack: A few coconut cookies and a decaf nescafe latte
 that I maked over ice. This is so good, you just meassure your nescafe
 into about 2 tablespoons HOT water to disolve then add cold milk or
 water and and ice.  







DAY 3

Breakfast: Strawberry mini wheats

Lunch: Tuna salad with spring greens on whole grain

Snack: Grapes with vanilla yogurt

Dinner: Boston Market Turkey Medallions

Snack: apple

Dessert: 1 scoop chocolate ice cream with whipped cream,
a cherry, and a cocnut cookie.



DAY 4



Breakfast: Honey Bunches of Almonds and half a banana





Lunch: Tuna salad with spring greens on whole grain bread

Snack: Dark Chocolate and peanut and almond granola bar

Dinner: Rigatoni with Arrabbiata Sauce, grated parmesan,
and half a whole grain focaccia roll with olive oil and balsamic drizzle.

Dessert: Oreos and a decaf latte (nescafe)



DAY 5





Breakfast: Lucky Charms with half a bananna.

Lunch: BLT

Snack: Big surprise, vanilla yogurt and red grapes

Dinner: Penn Station chicken teriyaki with mushrooms, and fries.