Photo of the Day (12.13.11)

Today's photo: Nothing says "Merry Christmas!" like a lovely family of Christmas carolers.  Just don't forget to lock your doors.

Are you ready for a close-up?

Now available at your local thrift store, exorcist not included.

Photo of the Day (12.12.11)

I can't believe that it is already December.  Christmas is almost here!  Are you ready?  I'm definitely not, but it is still my absolute favorite time of the year, so I'm happy. 

Last weekend was the lighted boat parade in Morro Bay.  It was hard to take pictures with so many people around.  But here's one as the sun was setting behind the rock, before the parade started. Just a little decorated kayak.

Photo of the Day (11.28.11)

Today's photo: It's been a little while since I posted on here, but I haven't given up.  It's that time of the year when there are a million things to do.  I've been busy working on some projects for Etsy.  Hopefully soon I will have actual "things" to share and a shop to open.

Photo of the Day (11.8.11)

Today's photo: The top view of the Devils Postpile National Monument in Mammoth.  Nature sure can do some crazy/beautiful things.

Photo of the Day (11.7.11)

Today's photo: Sky filled with little white puffy clouds on our drive up Highway 395 during our trip.

Photo of the Day (11.3.11)

Today's photo: Graham with his "pet" raven in Death Valley.  I think it makes him look like some sort of desert pirate with his raven on his shoulder.

Photo of the Day (11.2.11)

Today's photo: Here's a peek at our trip we took last week to Death Valley and Mammoth.  This is the Devil's Golf Course in Death Valley.  We had a really great time.  I took about 900 photos, so I have to figure out how to sort them out, and then they will go up here on the blog.

Photo of the Day (10.31.11)

Today's photo: This year's Halloween pumpkins.  We decided we didn't want to deal with the mess of carving our pumpkins this year, so we painted them instead.  I used some stencils on the white one, and Graham free-handed his raven and spooky letters.  It was fun and only took about 20 minutes.

Photo of the Day (10.20.11)

Today's photo: Fall centerpiece on the dining table made up of all the funky pumpkins/squash we got at Avila Valley Barn.  As well as the one pumpkin that I grew this year (that survived the backyard re-do).

Photo of the Day (10.18.11)

Today's photo: A sneak peek of what was done in the backyard.  This is one of the redwood trees that will make the basis of our woodland garden section of the yard.  It is so exciting to be able to use our yard, over the weekend we had a fire in our fire pit and ate dinner on the patio.

Photo of the Day (10.17.11)

Today's photo: I finally filled up my hummingbird feeders in our front yard.  And the hummingbirds are very happy.  This is the dominant one.  He sits on this little birdhouse hanging on our porch and waits for the others to approach the feeders.  Then he chases them off.  Doesn't he know there are 3 feeders and he can't possibly drink that much?

Photo of the Day (10.12.11)

Today's photo: Flowers at Avila Valley Barn from on visit there on Monday.

Photo of the Day (10.11.11)

Today's photo: Pumpkins at Avila Valley Barn.  Yesterday, Graham and I went to Avila Valley Barn to pick out some pumpkins for Halloween.  It was a wise move to go on a Monday and not on a weekend: less busy.  We enjoyed ice cream, farm animals, and a hay bale maze that made Graham sneeze.  But it was all fun, and now we have some pretty pumpkins to enjoy.

Photo of the Day (10.10.11)

Today's photo: A Snowy Plover at the beach.  Graham, my mom, and I went to Sebastian's in San Simeon for lunch yesterday and decided to make a stop at the beach on the way home.  I was patient and crouched in the sand and seaweed in order to get some pictures of them.  They are just so cute!

Photo of the Day (10.6.11)

Today's photo: Another one from when I was taking pictures of the sunset in Morro Bay the other day.  The rock had an interesting little ring of fog around it.

Work was started in our backyard today!  It already looks so much better.  I'll share lots of pictures soon.

Photo of the Day (10.5.11)

Today's photo: The stormy-ish weather we have had the past few days made for a beautiful sunset in Morro Bay last night.

Photo of the Day (10.4.11)

Today's photo: A steaming mug of apple cider was perfect for the cloudy and cool day we had today.  I'll probably have another one tomorrow since we're supposed to have a storm blow through in the morning.

Photo of the Day (10.3.11)

Yesterday's photo:  I forgot to post this last night.  Yesterday, we made quesadillas for lunch.  I was going through the fridge to see what we wanted to put in them, besides cheese.  I was naming things off, some a little weirder than others.  But Graham was intrigued by the artichoke hearts, I was a little unsure.  Well, they were really delicious.  Graham used habanero pepper jack cheese, which was really good, but really spicy.  I used a Mexican cheese blend for mine.  The flavors of the cheese and the marinated artichoke hearts blended really well together and made for really tasty quesadillas, served with a little sour cream.

Photo of the Day (9.30.11)

Today's photo: There was a small flock of Elegant Terns in with the seagulls on the beach in Seaside last weekend.  They were pretty cool and making all kinds of noises.

This weekend is Three Speckled Hens up in Paso Robles again.  I'm excited to see what treasures we find this time.

Photo of the Day (9.29.11)

Today's photo: Another one from my little series of architectural photos that I took over the weekend in downtown Salinas.  This one is of the Travelers Hotel.

Photo of the Day (9.28.11)

Today's photo: The old sign of the Greyhound bus station in downtown Salinas.  I love all of the cool signs and buildings; so much more character than our "downtown" of strip malls.

Photo of the Day (9.27.11)

Today's photo: Some cool buildings in downtown Salinas.

My mom's birthday was last week, so we went on an adventure with my brother and our kindergarten teacher to celebrate.  We went up to Salinas on Saturday morning and visited a fun antique store.  We also checked out the local farmer's market where we found a guy who sells birds;  he had some of the nicest looking, most beautiful finches.  I'm so excited to get some cute little finches once we get our aviary set up in the backyard.  Then we walked along the beach over in Seaside.  And finally we headed down the coast and had a wonderful, leisurely dinner at Nepenthe in Big Sur.  I'll be sharing some of the photos that I took on our fun little adventure.

Photo of the Day (9.26.11)

Today's photo: Young Heermann's Gull at the beach in Seaside on Saturday.  I will be sure to blog more about the adventures we had.

Photo of the Day (9.22.11)

Today's photo: A new little rabbit's foot fern keeping me company on my desk in the craft room.

Photo of the Day (9.21.11)

Today's photo: Graham got creative in the kitchen tonight.  For dessert we had sautéed pears and crumbled bacon over vanilla ice cream.  It was a very interesting and delicious combination.

Photo of the Day (9.20.11)

Today's photo: I'm a little behind on my blogging.  I had some camera issues and some laziness issues, but I'm back.  Here's the start of a little fabric bunting strand that I'm making to decorate the shelves in my craft room.

Photo of the Day (9.14.11)

Today's photo: A little butterfly shadowbox collage that I made for my craft room yesterday.  I have a thing for that color yellow spray paint.

Photo of the Day (9.13.11)

Today's photo: I got to play around in my craft-half-a-room today and it was awesome.  I really love my new desk and shelves and drawers and everything!  I started a project with some fabric, but all I have pictures of so far is the tiny scraps.  But they were pretty and looked like confetti.

Now that I have my new craft space I will be blogging more about what exciting stuff I'm working on, as well as getting my Etsy shop up and running.

Photo of the Day (9.12.11)

Today's photo: Here is a sneak preview of what we have been working on this past weekend in the craft room/office.  It is looking really awesome and I can't wait until I can work in it.  We still have some finishing work to do, but then I will take some pictures and tell all about it.

Photo of the Day (9.9.11)

Today's photo: Little succulent flower in one of my planters in the backyard.

Photo of the Day (9.8.11)

Today's photo: Tiny glow-in-the-dark dinosaur that we found while excavating the backyard.  I think we better call in a paleontologist.

Photo of the Day (9.7.11)

Today's photo: Monty was eyeing the snickerdoodles that I made today.  They were tasty and he really thought he wanted to try one.

Photo of the Day (9.6.11)

Today's photo: I'm also growing some tiny little apples, so I can bake a tiny apple pie!  I will be sure to take pictures of the pie too.

Photo of the Day (9.5.11)

Today's photo: I have a tiny pumpkin growing in our backyard.  So far it has survived all of the trench digging in the and will hopefully survive for Halloween.

Photo of the Day (9.1.11)

Today's photo: New Martha Stewart craft paints from Michaels.  I apparently like to get things in one of every color, but believe it or not, there are so many more colors of these that I still don't have.  These paints seem pretty awesome because you can use them on any type of surface, like wood or ceramic.  I've been playing around with them on wood and I plan to try them out on some plain ceramic plates soon.

Photo of the Day (8.31.11)

Today's photo: New boots from Target.  I've wanted some pretty brown boots for a while, but haven't wanted to spend a few hundred on a pair, so now I have pretty 35 dollar boots.  And just in time for fall to start.  I love fall.

Photo of the Day (8.30.11)

Today's photo: Nasturtiums growing at my parents' house.

Photo of the Day (8.29.11)

Today's photo: Super pretty sweet peas growing on my parents' balcony.

Photo of the Day (8.25.11)

Today's photo: One of the latest additions to my miniature chair collection.  This is one that my mom picked up recently.

Photo of the Day (8.24.11)

Today's photo: An ink bottle we found buried in the backyard over the weekend.  We've found many things in the backyard such as peanut butter jars, plastic bread bags, and shards of broken pottery, but this was a little more interesting.  This bottle has a sort of bubble in it that is a reservoir, the perfect size for the tip of your ink pen.  You would just invert the bottle and the reservoir would fill with ink for you to use.  The patent number is printed on the bottom, so I was able to look it up, and it was patented in 1930.  Pretty cool for old junk in our backyard.

Photo of the Day (8.23.11)

Today's photo: Here is a "before" picture of what our backyard looked like not too long ago.  Right now we are in the process of clearing the yard out and installing irrigation.  The landscape company is going to start work on phase one during the first week of October.  I'm going to take some more pictures of what it looks like now, because it looks like we have some sort of a giant gopher due to all of the trenches dug for the irrigation.

We've been spending all of our weekends working on the backyard, so I haven't had anything too exciting to take pictures of.  Hopefully soon we'll move on to working on our craft room/office.  It's all very exciting though!

Photo of the Day (8.19.11)

Today's photo: Monty is king of the pillow.  He loves the throw and pillow made out of the Vanna's Choice yarn, so I'm going to commission my friend April to make a cat bed out of the yarn too.

Photo of the Day (8.18.11)

Today's photo: Glasbake cameo casserole dish.  Awhile back my brother came to visit and brought me some Pyrex, as well as this piece of Glasbake.  I apparently never got around to showing any of the Pyrex I have acquired recently.  And even though this isn't Pyrex, she's just too pretty to pass up.

Photo of the Day (8.17.11)

Today's photo: I need to go on a photographic expedition because I'm pretty much out of interesting photos.  So here's a photo from our Big Sur trip.  The yellow hills of Big Sur.  The hills have been so much brighter in the past few years since the fire in 2008.

Wedding Wednesday: Woodland Wedding Inspiration

I think I've decided that I'm going to make the Wedding Wednesday feature a monthly feature instead of a weekly feature.  I figure since I've pretty much covered our own wedding, I'll work on some pretty inspiration posts once a month.  There are just so many pretty and inspiring weddings on the internet, I want to have a million more! (Always to Graham of course.)

This board was inspired by the beautiful photo of the summer camp ceremony in the redwoods.

1. Camp Campbell wedding in the Santa Cruz mountains.  2. Woodland bouquet by Françoise Weeks.  3.  DIY cutout wedding invitation.  4. Place setting via The Sweetest Occasion.

Photo of the Day (8.16.11)

Today's photo: Mason jar filled with old buttons that adorns one of the shelves in our living room.

Photo of the Day (8.15.11)

Today's photo: Over the weekend Monty's food bowls and storage container were attacked by ants.  We went out and bought a new container, since the old one was broken, hence the ants.  We let Monty eat out of it while we cleaned up his bowls and the aftermath of the ants.  Luckily, this container comes with a no ant symbol on the label.  He must have thought that he hit the food jackpot.

Photo of the Day (8.12.11)

Today's photos: Flowers on the dining room table.

Happy weekend!