Road Trip, Delicious Food and a Fab Recipe to Boot!

Saturday we left to visit our good friends Karen and Jason who live a couple of hours from us.  We made the plan while sitting on the beach drinking cold beers this summer and a good plan it was.

Surprisingly enough Holly wanted to come along as well as she's become interested in sewing her own clothes (yes, she now has my machine) and Karen teaches Fashion at at the high school where she lives. The weather called for rain all weekend (they are always wrong... what's going on Environment Canada?) but we left on a perfect fall day.  Holly hooked up her ipod to the car radio and slowly introduced us to rap hoping in some small way we may become converts.. ... no such luck.  She started off with Rihanna & Eminem's "Love The Way You Lie" cause I actually have that song on my ipod and like it but after that it all went down hill.  We both like Adele so we listened to her the rest of the way especially this song.  Her voices blows me away.

On the way we stopped for lunch here....

Friends introduced us to this restaurant years ago and I have never forgotten it.  Unbelievably fabulous food.

Such attention to detail....

Delicious scones.....

I had an incredible tomato vegetable soup....

and the mother of all salads ... I mean where have you ever seen a salad that's a work of art???  I almost hated to eat it.  The dressing was some sort of raspberry vinigrette but when I asked the waiter it sounded like the chef "wasn't in the mood for sharing"

That night we enjoyed dinner with our friends and a delicious Pad Thai and they were in the mood for sharing ....

So speaking of food and recipes, I made this awesome Fire Vegetable Broth Soup with Sausage last Thursday night.  It was from Karen at The Art of Doing Stuff .. she always has great recipes and she makes me laugh too...

Cheers to a  terrific Monday...

Jumping For Joy That Summer is Finally Here

Spent part of Sunday with Kelly who is possession of a new trampoline. She seems to be quite the expert while I just got on, jumped lightly and prayed I wouldn't fall off and no, I didn't take a picture of that. Afterward I was rewarded with a great salad and a cold drink. You gotta love Sundays and friends..............

There Were No Balloons or Cake at This Party (ok there was cake)

So yesterday when I was in my studio storing my art away I decided to have a little party for one.........a pity party. You know the "poor me" kind. Where you neglect to look at all the great things you have in your life and just concentrate on the crappy ones. The rain outside didn't help much as it has been a constant the last six days. So I'm organizing my art on shelves and thinking "why aren't I selling more?", why am I not the famous artist I think I am in my own mind?". Well all that pathetic whining does get tiresome after awhile so after getting some great advice and general cheering up from my "amazing" blog friend artists, I went and made some homemade chicken soup(really good) and then ate a big piece of banana cake (that wasn't so good, at least for the waistline).

I'm smart enough to realize the career path I've taken is not an easy one. Maybe I should have been a psychologist. I had seriously thought of that at one time but ruled it out in the middle of my Psych 101 class after I had drawn throughout my entire notebook as well as over some of my notes. Tracy said to me yesterday "Maybe you should just stop making art". I know what she was trying to do and I thank her for it. It made take a good hard, long look at what it would mean to "stop making art" and to realize that would not be a possibility. I'm driven to get into that studio everyday not because I think I'm going to get rich but because it is such an integral part of who I am. So...............I pick myself, dust myself off and get back at it. Then I started feeling really guilty about being so self absorbed when there are so many other tragic things going on in the world. I really am so very blessed. My life is a good one, a really good one and I'm grateful.

I've got this great guy who loves me (ok I know this is a line straight out of Jerry Maguire but it's still one of my fav movies. Long before Tom was jumping on couches and married "Free Me" Kate.) I've got great kids (granted they think I'm a little weird but hey, they are teenagers what do they know...in 20 years they'll think I'm cool but I won't hold my breath). I live in an "arts" supporting community and I do get to work in my studio every day.

Sometimes you just have to venture into the dark side for a short period of time to realize how bright everything truly is. May sound corny but it's true.