• Creative,  Crochet

    Almost-Instant Creative Satisfaction

    If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed by email! Thanks for visiting! The awkward mirror self portrait. Followed by the faux day dreaming self portrait. I brought out Big Bertha to work with this yarn. The yarn was a skein of Lang Maxima I received from my mother in law for Christmas. I chose the yarn to work with because I knew it would be fast and get results (creative satisfaction) in the manner I needed. The problem was the thickness. I was going for a cowl initially but there wasn’t enough yarn for that, so I went for skinny scarf instead. After I…

  • Wildflowers

    Texas Wildflowers | Erythronium albidum, Trout Lily

    Trout lilies are wonderful and beautiful native wildflowers, blooming early in the spring, really late winter. The last two years we’ve ventured out to Tandy Hills to check them out. The first year we found many blooms, but last year not so much. This year I ventured out with with my brother to show him where a small population of them were; he’d never seen them. When we arrived I didn’t think there were any blooms yet. I’d thought there would be with the warmer winter we’ve had this year. But it took looking a little closer to find the flowers. Most were just budding but one was fully open.…

  • Creative

    The Creative Process

    The other day I was lamenting that it is incredibly frustrating that I have my best creative moments in the middle of the work day. Those moments where I think, ‘Man, I wish I was at home because I could really get some writing/art/whatever done right now.’ So, in those moments, in the middle of the day I get excited for my creative energy and inspiration and then, what happens? I go home. And what happens when I go home? I’m hit with being tired, lack of motivation and an overall brain drain from working on projects for clients instead of my own works. I thought about this as I…

  • Family

    Weekending with the Whitlocks

    Last weekend I went up to DFW to visit my family and to see one of my good friends who had recently had her first baby. I was excited to be going up there because my niece and nephew were going to be staying at my parents house for the night on Friday. Slumber party!!!!! You can see Zoe above making ‘poop and pee panckes’. Yep. That’s right! Her imagination runs wild! And yes, I had to ‘eat’ a few of them too. Zoe crashed in my bed and boy, definitely not your best sleep. But, that’s ok because I got to snuggle with her as we fell asleep to…

  • Food

    The Final Product| Sauerkraut

    Last week, about a month into the fermentation of the sauerkraut, I skimmed off the last bits of mold that had formed on the surface water and jarred up the sauerkraut. I gave it a taste beforehand and it tasted pretty good. Still crunchy and there was no mold growing on the actual cabbage itself. Will I make sauerkraut again? Maybe. I know we will have more cabbage in the garden in the future and it is hard to eat it all so I may end up doing this again. I might try the jar method next time. I only put the sauerkraut in the jars and stuck them in…

  • Food

    The Great Sprout Experiment

    A few weeks ago I was at a local garden center, The Arbor Gate, and they had some seeds on clearance. I found a package of broccoli sprouts and jumped at the chance to try them out. I thought it would be fun to see how it worked but also to have sprouts on hand, and a specific amount of sprouts at that. Of course it takes a few days to have sprouts ready, but if you were planning a meal for a few days out that involved sprouts, it would be easy to start. I always feel bad when I waste sprouts bought at the store because it is…

  • Nature in the City

    Nature in the City | George Mitchell Nature Preserve

    Last weekend I was coming down with a bit of nature deficit and needed to get outside a bit. Weeks and weekends have been going by in a blur lately and with Chris in the field we haven’t been camping much. It has made me realize how much I miss being outside. I had an errand to run over in The Woodlands so I decided to drop by the George Mitchell Nature Preserve. The Preserve is located smack-dab in the middle of suburbia and if you aren’t careful you will drive right past the sign for the turn into the parking area. I did and had to turn around. The…

  • Crochet

    Creativity Comes in Many Forms

    A couple weekends ago we finally broke down and bought new phones and upgraded our cell phone plan to include texting. We could text before but we paid by the text not by an unlimited amount a month. We’d eliminated that when we were jobless in order to save some money. Anyway, our cell phones were also from 2004…well we had multiple incarnations of the same phone. Any time our phones would die, Chris would go on Ebay and find a refurbished or cheap one from overseas somewhere. So, I hadn’t had it but a week and it was starting to get scratched. I know you can get screen protectors…

  • Hiking

    Thru-Hiker Deliciousness

    I’ve been thinking about this post for a few days, mostly because I am waxing nostalgic on the Appalachian Trail since March is around the corner, peak time for thru-hikers to start. And it will be 2 years since we left Georgia for Maine. Seriously, where did the time go? Food is important on the trail and if we aren’t thinking about it, we’re talking about it. While I have been eating fairly healthy (with nice doses of cheese at restaurants) and mostly vegetarian for almost a year, my mind does wander to the junk food and not so healthy items that only people burning 5K+ calories a day can…

  • Thoughts

    Monday Favorites

    Things that have caught my eye this last week or last month: +Yoga by Equinox video. I first read about it on Huffington Post in regards to it being potentially offensive or objectifying women. If that were the case why aren’t we talking about the beach volleyball players who wear bikinis to play their games? The beauty of the whole video is not what she is wearing or that she is only in her skivvies, but that she is freakin’ strong and the amazing lines that the body forms as she performs the routine. If only I were that strong! +And then I read about the dangers of yoga because…