Filed under: Family, Friends, Holiday, Photography, Sewing, Silliness by ramune

Kasabian – Secret Alphabets

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I hope your Thanksgiving weekend was as delicious and fun as mine was. It’s taken me a while to go through all of my photos from Thanksgiving weekend (and actually I am still not completely done) . . . but here are some of my favorites from the silliness I was up to with the family. When in doubt, go to Carderock.

Sidenote: No one was hurt in the making of these photos . . . except for a few missing limbs by the cleaver (that my great uncle made).

Filed under: Friends, Photography, Silliness by ramune

You might be wondering why I call this blog “every.seven” when it’s more like “every.whenever I get around to it” but I do have good intentions and hope to get better about posting when I say I am going to post. Have faith in me.

Anyway . . . the other weekend I went up to Connecticut for my friend’s wedding v2.0. Her husband’s family wanted to have a second reception so they could include more family/friends. We have now decided to take this show on the road and will be coming to a city near you.

After the reception, while hanging out outside the restaurant when the sun went down, I introduced my friends to a little game that has no name yet, so I just call it “1 . . . 2 . . . 3 . . . POSE!” Years back when I was living in Louisiana, a friend taught a group of us this game and it has been a big hit ever since (Thanks Julie!). The idea is very simple: you get a group (or just one other person) ready, setup your camera, say “1 . . . 2 . . . 3 . . . ” and shout an animal (popular ones tend to be alligator, bear, shark . . .), then the group poses quickly and you take the photo. It’s a lot of fun and people get really into it (I don’t care for the term “ice breaker,” but it works well as one). We continued the game into the night and took well over 100 photos that ranged from animals (alligator, octopus, toucan . . .) to people and actions like superhero, lead guitarist, blind ballerina and giving birth. Good times were had by all.

I did a search on my computer for songs titled “Alligator” and found this little ditty by Grizzly Bear . . . enjoy.

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Filed under: Design, Favorites, Friends, Paper by ramune

A few weeks ago my friend Vaiva and I dropped by Philly for a night to visit our friend Rasa and help with any wedding planning/decompressing/relaxing. One of the things we did that day was help come up with themes for the tables at the wedding. After a few duds it was decided that the theme would be different kinds of leaves. I volunteered to make the leaves and the seating chart for the wedding and I am pretty excited with the results. At one point I sent Rasa a text message with a photo of the first two leaves I had cut and she asked if they were real.

The green leaves were for all of the guest tables and the gold leaves were for the head table.

In total I hand cut 39 leaves out of card stock. It was fun and completely worth it even if my wrist was screaming a few times during those spiky leaves.

Two of my favorite (and most difficult/time consuming) leaves to cut were the sycamore and chestnut leaves. Please excuse the distracting blur used to protect the innocent (and not so innocent).

I am not sure who suggested it or if it was a joke at first, but the leaf chosen for the head table was an Ent leaf. This posed a challenge because there is no one Ent leaf (well, there is no such thing as an Ent either . . . or is there?) and I didn’t want to make it too cheesy.

Len the Oak Ent

Rasa the Maple Ent

The seating charts were posted on a column in front of the garage (the reception was in a tent in the driveway and the food was served from a nicely disguised garage).

The centerpieces came together quite well I think. The wood bases were made by Aistis (a fellow friend of the family) and the Krupnikas (Lithuanian honey liquor in the little bottles) was made by my friends Vaiva and Aleksa earlier this summer when we were in Philly.

Since I was in the wedding I didn’t take too many photos, but I managed to get a few here and there. It all came together so well considering all the stress involved. Rasa planned the entire wedding herself with help from family and friends. The ceremony and reception were both at her parents’ house and her catering company catered the event. Those of us who were there before the wedding, from the locals to those who came a week to a few hours before, all helped out in the kitchen, setting up and doing pretty much anything else that needed to get done. All in all, it was a fantastic time!

Filed under: Family, Friends, Photography by ramune

Farmers Market Cherries

Note: I am cheating a bit with this post as these photos are from several weeks ago, but I wanted to get them up here since the blog had been in a state of neglect for a bit.

The other week my friend and I exchanged lenses because he wanted to try my 100mm macro lens and I wanted to try his 10-22mm wide angle lens (the joys of have friends who are fellow Canon users). Here are a few shots I took with the wide angle lens. It does some crazy warping to faces if you get too close to someone, which can be fun.

Perusing through records

My sister at the Farmers Market

Filed under: Favorites, Friends, Holiday, Photography, Silliness by ramune

Happy 2009! Here is my friend “Silly Bob” on New Year’s Eve. She was attempting to do the ol’ push the nose up and pull the cheeks down face. I really love how this fisheye (or as my brother calls “fishbowl”) shot came out. The sparkly shirt with a little bit of blue background all surrounded in a thick blackness just makes the shot for me . . . not to mention her silly face.

All the best to everyone in 2009. If you made resolutions I hope you can stick to them (at least for the first month or so). Other than the usual things I am always trying to improve, I would like to not mull so much. My mother claims that this is just a trait of Aquarians and that’s just the way I am . . . I guess that means I have to work a bit harder at it.

Other than resolutions, these are my hopes for 2009:

1. Get a full-time job that I love (or at least gives me the time and energy needed to work on point 2)
2. Get fig.ments going, have a place where I can house a kiln and sell my goods.
3. Move . . . somewhere, anywhere (well maybe not anywhere, but I am open)
4. Travel overseas. I have made it a point to leave the country every year and fully intend to do so this year. Last year’s destination was Canada, which is somewhat cheating but it was way the heck up there so I think that counts. I would like to visit “Silly Bob” in Shanghai before she leaves, so that might be in the cards. Maybe not this year, but Argentina, Chile and Antarctica are at the top of my list for sometime in the next . . . 5 years?
5. This is about to turn into a list of things I want to do before I die, so I will stop here.

Filed under: Friends, Photography by ramune

Last weekend my friend Kathy flew out to visit me from San Jose, CA. We spent the first couple days in the DC area and then went to New York for less than two full days. She had never been to DC or VA before so I had to show her the touristy things, like all the monuments and memorials, and then I tried to balance that out with a day of Virginia wineries (I know . . . she’s from California, but at least she’s not from France). It has been a while since I last wandered around the monuments and memorials so it was nice to go again and show Kathy (even if it was 75 F in November). I am not normally one for touristy DC photos but I like how a few came out so I am posting them below. All are from DC except the last one which is from our last breakfast in NYC. More photos from Kathy’s visit can be seen on my Flickr site.

The Lincoln Memorial and Reflecting Pool

Yellow foliage near the Reflecting Pool

Kathy and her delicious warm buttered apple cider with rum

On a side note: Friday night we saw Cirque du Soleil’s Kooza by the National Harbor. If you haven’t been to the National Harbor, don’t go. It is so plasticy and they stole away my favorite sculpture, The Awakening (it used to be at Hain’s Point). I would say go just to see The Awakening, but it’s not the same at the National Harbor. When I went the stairs were blocked off so you could not walk up to it, you could only stand above it. At Hain’s Point it actually looked like a man coming out of the Earth with his knee and arm towering above you. Somehow seeing it from above just does not have the same effect. Sadness.

Filed under: Baby, Favorites, Friends, Gift, Knitting by ramune

Zarina and the baby blanket I knit (covering her very pregnant belly)

As I had mentioned before I had a few project that were a little more time consuming than the rest. Finally I can post this one because I just went to my friend Zarina’s baby shower this weekend.

Zarina and I have been friends since 4th grade and she is my first friend (my age) to have a baby, so I was pretty excited and wanted to knit a few things for the little nugget. I started off with two super soft wool winter hats (that should look different on a baby’s head than they do on a mini pumpkin) and then moved onto a slightly more complicated wavy baby blanket.

Below are a few photos of the items and a couple more are on my Flickr site.

Hat #1 keeping a pumpkin warm

Hat #2 keeping a pumpkin warm

Detail of the baby blanket

Filed under: Costumes, Favorites, Friends, Holiday, Photography, Self-portrait by ramune

“A is for Amy who fell down the stairs”
Amazing cut out of Amy falling down the stairs by Karissa

This past weekend was one of the best weekends of 2008 (so far). My great friend Rasa has a catering company in Philly that does a variety of tasting parties. This weekend’s was an Edward Gorey themed tasting party (kicking myself for not having thought of that one sooner!). The invite went like this:

Edward Gorey has been one of my greatest inspirations/influences since I was a wee tot (maybe I wasn’t that wee . . . but still young) and my sister introduced me to The Gashlycrumb Tinies. She even got me a personally addressed and signed copy of one of his last books The Haunted Tea-Cosy: A Dispirited and Distasteful Diversion for Christmas. Two years later he died on the day of my senior prom (not really relevant, but still). All of this is to say that I was ecstatic when I received the invite in my email. I pulled together a few black and white options, got the ol’ bowler hat I bought some five or six years ago out of the closet (and fancied it up) and managed to convince our other great friend, Vaiva, to come down for less than 24 hours from NYC.

Rasa’s team did an amazing job with decorations, food and a great game of Murder. I happened to pick the piece of paper with an “X” on it for the first round, and thus was the chosen murderer. Unfortunately I only managed to kill maybe four or five of the ten people I intended to kill (you don’t hear that every day). It is an interesting exercise to intentionally make eye contact with complete strangers and wink at them without them thinking you are hitting on them or feeling rather creepy yourself. Several people definitely looked at me like I was being weird when I winked at them with my twitchy Gorey eyes.

The second round was much more exciting since there were two killers and they were on a spree! I was one of the victims and managed to win the prize for best death. I am convinced that it was rigged so that the guest staying at the house the longest would win and share the chocolate (and M&M) covered pretzels with everyone else.

The party was a great success and I think I got a few good photos from it. Below are some of my favorites from the night. As usual, the rest can be seen here on my Flickr site.

“They Got Themselves Up Killingly”

Rasa, before the guests arrived

All Gorey’d Up (without hat)

Vaiva and me all Gorey’d up (with hat). Photo by Adrienne R.

Adrienne was my first victim and she managed to die without spilling any wine!

Gintautas (Rasa’s brother) modeling one of many hats that evening

Filed under: Friends, Photography by ramune

Welcome to the last of the marathon projects. Below are a few shots from this past weekend at the Chicago Marathon. I was hoping to get some better action shots but apparently I need a bit more work on that. More photos are on my Flickr site.

My brother “holding” the Packet Pick-up sign

Wheelchair racers

Part of our large support crew (wearing the shirts!)

Running by us at around mile 17.5, grabbing a bottle of water and a banana

After cooling down we went to Healthy Food Lithuanian Restaurant . . . where they had this sign on the door “We have the ‘Breakfast of Champions’ for the Chicago Marathon . . . or anytime . . .”

Filed under: Favorites, Friends, Ice Cream, taste by ramune

Six years ago my mother was given a little fig sprig that her friend’s grandmother brought back from a fig tree in Italy. Today this fig tree is 12 feet tall and produces hundreds of figs each year.

The image many people have of a fig is a dried-up shriveled nugget of fiber that is consumed by the geriatric community to get things “moving”. My view of figs has completely changed since I have spent some quality time with the fig tree. When you cut open a fresh fig it is one of the most beautiful fruits out there (in my opinion). It is not brown and shriveled at all. To the contrary it has a vibrant red center full of little blobules (spellchecker says this is not a word, but I think it should be) surrounded by a pale green and aubergine skin.

It’s amazing how many people have never had a fresh fig before (I am sure the exorbitant price doesn’t help). If you are one of these people I suggest you remedy it immediately. I don’t want to get your hopes up but it is a very different experience than eating a dried fig (which I still like).

With dozens of ripe figs waiting to be picked each day it’s hard to keep up with eating them all (if you did it might get things “moving” a little faster than you’d like), so I decided to make ice cream. I also needed to make a dessert for my friend Scott’s housewarming party so this was the perfect solution. After my last disaster with a horrible ice cream recipe I thought it would be a good idea to get it from a reputable source. In my search I kept reading wonderful reviews about the fresh fig ice cream found in the book A Perfect Scoop by David Lebovitz. Unfortunately it was sold out at every bookstore within 10 miles of me, so I drove out to the one store that had it (before some other ice cream lover could get it . . . sorry if that was you.

The recipe was easy and and the process was delicious. In fact, when I tasted the figgy jam part of the recipe I was in heaven. If you know me, you know I am a serious foodie and I get pretty excited about it (there is always something to look forward to!). This was a different level of excitement altogether. The best way I can describe it is like someone meeting their soul mate and never being able to live without them . . . but maybe not on such a dramatic scale. I now feel the need to have a fig tree wherever I live for the rest of my life (because buying fresh figs all the time is quite an investment). As if the figgy jam part wasn’t good enough the ice cream came out even better. I was nervous that it would be too hard (homemade ice cream has a way of doing that) but I think it came out a perfect consistency. Now I am not trying to toot my own horn here (I hope it isn’t coming off that way), I am tooting the figs’ horn and A Perfect Scoop’s horn. Toot! Toot!

This was initially going to be two posts (since I am still behind by two) because after the ice cream I made a flourless chocolate-hazelnut cake (my friend Maya has a gluten allergy). Unfortunately I was in a bit of a rush to get it done and did not take enough time to get good photos of the process. The cake came out well though and I have included a photo below. I don’t think anyone else had the “soul mate” experience I had, but I think it was well received and I didn’t see any leftovers in anyone’s plate, so that’s always a good sign.