2013: The Photoessay

Happy memories, things to be thankful for, and good friends.

Happy 2014! I hope you all have a good, safe, wonderful year. I don’t do resolutions; I think they’re silly. But, I do have some goals! Here is what I’m shooting for in 2014:

• More zines
• Putting out a digital recipe book
• Getting out of this trailer and into my house
• Adding lots of new lovelies to my Etsy shop – what would you like to see there? I’m open to considering all suggestions!

Ginger-Apple Smoothie

I made this tasty smoothie a while back. I haven’t posted a recipe in a while, so I’m going to share it, even though some people claim it’s Too Cold for Smoothies. (They are wrong, by the way. It is NEVER too cold for smoothies.)

In a blender, combine:
1 T flaxseed
1 apple (i used 2 tiny ones)
1/2 c vanilla soy milk
1 c frozen strawberries
1 c orange juice
1 tsp fresh grated ginger

And then slurp it down with delight.

Exiles of the Snow

First, business: One of the winners of the giveaway has never responded to my email, so I’ve chosen a second winner via Random.org: Panda With Cookie! You should be getting an email from me shortly!

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The view from the living room window of our friends’ house during the cold snap of doom

Now, on to other things. We had a cold, cold cold snap. Our woes began when the trickle of water we left running wasn’t enough of a trickle and our trailer pipes froze on GooGoo’s birthday. This wasn’t as bad as it might have been, since we do have a water storage tank in the trailer that we can fall back on. The problem with that is that when it’s empty and the trailer hose is frozen, refilling it involves a 5-gallon bucket being toted from the house where water *was* still running, a funnel, and four hands.

Spiders are creepy, but their webs are awesome.

With the weather forecast ominously predicting lows in the teens, we became exiles from our own abode on Friday the 6th. We headed with girls and cat in tow for the booming metropolis of Shedd where we found refuge with good friends until the snap passed.

We had all kinds of adventures with the their cat hating our cat and our cat being all passive-aggressive to their cat, a treacherous trip to Corvallis because Train Boy was going to just PERISH if he had to use Nucoa instead of Smart Balance just one more meal, and hearing Greensleeves practised a few times over the course of the week. I got quite a few felt ornaments made, though, and got in some music practise myself.

The girls being entertained by The Engineer

Well, the weather didn’t warm up on Tuesday as they had predicted. It was Friday before everything was sufficiently melted and our pipes were thawed out. So we ended up being away from home for eight days.

Pumpkitten knows there’s a heater right beneath him

We’re still getting things back in order around here and I have been afflicted with ridiculous fatigue I can’t explain. I have been lazing around hoping to regain my energy. I predict I’ll be back to normal tomorrow, but we’ll see.

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Bonus! Three photos of GooGoo’s birthday. How is she four already?

The tiger cake!

The pathetic picture of the inside of the birthday cake.

The sweet birthday girl. I love you, GooGoo!

 

 

Giveaway Results!

Kendy and Annabazoo are the winners of the zine/ornament! I’ve emailed you, so hope to hear back from you soon. Thanks to everyone who shared your moments and memories! I enjoyed reading them.

Giveaway Time!

This giveaway is now closed.

*drumroll*

I’ve wanted to do a giveaway for a long time. But, being too cheap for pine nuts (translation: too poor) I’ve also been limited financially as to what I could offer for a giveaway. However, I’ve come up with something inexpensive but fun that I’m going to do. I just printed my first zine with the hope of starting to raise money for kitchen cupboards in my unfinished house. (If you don’t want to wait for the giveaway to end, you can buy one here right now!)

The cover!

For my giveaway, I’m offering two people hand-coloured versions of my zine, along with a felt tree ornament. I don’t have pictures of the ornaments because I’m still in the process of making them, but I’ll update this post when I have them done.

All you need to do to enter is leave a comment telling me a favourite holiday memory.

I want do my best to get this to you by Christmas, so the window of opportunity is going to be pretty slim. I’ll leave comments open until Wednesday, the 18th, at noon PST, and announce the winners after I’ve randomly selected 2 names. Please make sure you leave some mode of contacting you so I can get in touch with you! Giveaway open to anyone anywhere.