Archive for April, 2011
My little city of Overland Park has an amazing Farmer’s Market on Saturday. I went today, still April, curious what is growing locally. Turns out not a whole lot. Mostly flowers for planting, some packaged goods like pastas, soaps, honey. But the thing that really had me interested was herbs. I always see people on the cooking channel just cutting up plants from their window sills and using them to season food. I want to do that. My only problem was that there were like 15 vendors all with fresh herbs about the same price. I don’t know how to discern good herbs from okay/bad herbs. So I just picked the lady that looked the nicest. But I just can’t help but feel guilty that I couldn’t buy from everyone. They are all staring at me (it was early and not too many folks around). What my herbs aren’t good enough for you? I know that’s what they are thinking. That is what I would think, after all. I got some cilantro, parsley, and mint and decided to high tail it out of there. On the way I saw something so great – so beautiful…I just wanted to jump inside and swim in it… Read more
I am so proud of each and every one of my students. I wish I could honor everyone for their hard work in art class. And I hope I make them work hard. Art is fun but there is a lot to think about before you just go all crazy with glue and crayons. You can’t quite see how amazing their work is in this sad photo of my display board for the district show. But these artworks are just a few examples of the things we do in class. We paint, print, draw, write, arrange, cut, and overall just try to express ourselves in our work. I hope they had fun and I am excited and hopeful for the coming school year. Yep – I am thinking ahead to fall – already!
If you live in Kansas City or are visiting the area before the end of summer you better make sure you get into the Nelson Atkins Museum to see Monet’s three wall size panels of waterlily paintings. They are perhaps the prettiest paintings ever painted. It’s pretty on top of pretty with a side of pretty. That’s all I am going to say, just go already!
Of course that’s not all I will say; What I loved about the exhibit is that there is video of him working! I always thought of Claude as someone who lived in the magical time before film. But not so! Here you can see him painting in the gardens…the real gardens!
I feel like the caveman who invented fire, here folks. I made bread and I want to shout it from the mountain tops. Okay, my bread wasn’t terribly successful. I wouldn’t feed it to company. But I like it. Not gonna stop me from tearing off pieces and slathering them with jam or honey…or whatever. And by whatever I mean nutella. Anyway, I was browsing around The Amatuer Gourmet blog and found this post that had me all fired up. And I had the 24 hours it requires to devote to such a bread making undertaking. I used whole wheat flour mixed with 12-gr
ain flour yeast, water, a whole lotta time, and since I don’t have a dutch oven I used a pyrex bowl with a partially functional glass lid that I sealed with foil. Heavy duty. The anticipation alone is almost too much to handle. My home smelled amazing. The bread was okay – but still…I made my own bread! That’s so not typical me. Or maybe it’s the new typical me.
There’s been a lot of hub-bub lately about getting away from a diet mentality and more towards a life-style overhaul way of eating that would not only make you thinner but also feel great and make you less likely to get sick (and bonus help the earth not completely implode and kill us all with toxicity!) Luckily there’s the adorable Jamie Oliver to assist us with his prime time TV Food Revolution. But I don’t want to talk about Jamie. I do think he’s adorable though and am dying to make some Sexy Swedish Buns of my own.
Anyway….Bittman. Mark Bittman isn’t bad looking and writes a convincing book about why and how we can be modifying our food choices to make a healthier body and planet. Food Matters is the book I decided to read first among several food books I picked up while scrounging around my local chain book store that has gone bankrupt and is selling everything from the books to old coffee pots from the cafe. (Yes, I did buy some fixtures – such an attractive price on shelving!) My heart is all a-flutter because Mark (I call him Mark now) is giving me new hope and inspiration to keep thinking about food and learning to cook it. Read more
- Bring May Flowers; Original Watercolor by Lauren Alexander
I can’t believe it is almost May! That means it will be summer soon…I haven’t written my summer art class lesson plans yet. Argh! Doing some work with nature and a garden theme due to the Monet Waterlily exhibit. If you are in Kansas City between now and the end of summer you HAVE to go see the three waterlily paintings together for the first time in 30 years. It’s a must do. A no-brainer. Just do it. You’ll thank me later.
It’s my first Easter morning with my daughter. The eggs are hidden, the basket is filled. I get up early to make a delicious special breakfast. Last night I laid out the ingredients for a maple oatmeal muffin recipe I wanted to try (with a few alterations to make them slightly more healthful). Making them “healthful” combined with my inability to discern a tablespoon from a teaspoon resulted in perhaps the most ugly muffin in the world. Pretty they are not – my daughter determined, “Well, you shouldn’t put these in a magazine!” But the taste was delightful however the texture a bit crumbly. Read more
Just finished the traditional dyeing of the eggs. Aren’t they gorgeous? For some reason the pink dye was really crummy and failed to produce bright enough color. No worries – I may not have food coloring but I do have watercolor pigment! I will solve this problem in no time….
I doesn’t really work. Kind of makes the eggs come out blotchy. And probably poisoned from the paint. Luckily there’s a few that did not get watercolor all over. Looking forward to sprinkling some hard boiled (non-toxic) eggs on my salad tomorrow 
Did you dye eggs this year? Kind of fun, huh?
Little Runaway; 8"x10" original watercolor painting 4-22-11
Here’s a new painting I just finished. I know, it’s kind of weird. Cute bird, alien flower. It’s not for everyone. But I like it. What do you think?
I have never thought about what it would feel like to be pepper-sprayed. Until I accidentally pepper-sprayed my home. I did it about two minutes after I failed to properly remove the cork from the bottle of wine you see to the left.
Also before I poisoned the air in my own home I managed (like an idiot) to spray red wine all over my white cabinets and my eyeballs (but seriously – the cabinets, argh!) Just fyi; if the cork breaks don’t stick anything into the cork and think you can poke it out. You can’t. So back to the pepper spray- Read more
