Some Kinda Update.

Yo. It's almost spring.... so even though it's a very confusing 72 degrees in Illinois and a stingy, brisk 35 degrees in New Mexico I still am allowing myself to hope for some sort of weather induced euphoria to grip me any day now. Come on Weather.... I know you can do it.  Just give me a couple 75 degree days with no pollen and a bunch of fluffy, jolly ass looking clouds kicking around up in the sky! It should be relatively easy, no? No. The Weather says.... "Nope."

Jerk.

What else is new? I re-opened my Etsy shop. Road Trip Journal. I am slowly but surely loading it back up with good stuff. I have a few pieces listed that are personal favorites. Things that I agonize over actually selling. I am not a rational person when it comes to this particular topic. I will hold on to a dress that know I will never, ever have the occasion to wear or it looks stupid on me for years just because I think some day by some magic trick it will all make sense. I will grow 4 inches taller, my waist will shrink to a circumference of 24 and I will be on my way to a black tie affair that has a 70's theme. What? Right.

Anyway.... check these out. The first one is a 60's mod shift dress with penguins in the print. I have been selfishly clinging to this dress for like 4 years. I have never worn it. I just keep it stashed away. I'm a sort of hoarder I guess. In the mildest hoard sort of way. I look like a middle aged albino stewardess in the thing so it's time to let it waddle it's way into the heart of a new owner somewhere out in the world. A girl who has a tan. And isn't 40. Go girl.

This next one is the hardest to possibly part with. It's a 1970's Koos Van Den Akker masterpiece. His designs are curated at The Met.... he's the Cosby sweater designer of the 80's. He's one hell of a groovy designer with such a unique vision and style.

I grabbed a few images off the web to fill out the visual. Remember these sweaters? If you watched the Cosby Show in the 80's the sweaters were almost like an actual character on the show as much as the people were.

I know I have passed up a few of these sweaters over the years while I was out thrifting and I wish I hadn't. At the time I did not picture them coming back into popularity and I did not yet have an appreciation for the artful fabric collage work Koos does/did enough to start collecting him yet. I love this dress (and shawl that accompanies it) and if it does not sell I am more than happy to keep it in my personal collection. I have seen his vintage dresses selling for anywhere from $800 to $1100 online and have mine priced at $600. If some bohemian goddess comes along and snatches it up at least I will have a decent chunk of change to fill the empty space in my closet (and heart) for a little while. Thanks Koos.

I bought this dress about ten years ago in NYC and have had it squirreled away too.  It's a 50's era day dress. Sort of an upper crusty one. Day into evening wear perhaps? Anyway... it's awesome. It's a silk fabric with a beautiful texture and sheen to it. It's so totally Betty Draper. Perfect for a Mad Men theme party or if that is just the way you roll in 2012.... looking like it's 1957. It's too big for me... and I guess I can't rationalize gaining 15 pounds so that it will fit. Can I? Hmmmmmm.... So into the shop it finally goes.

So, yup. That's what I have been up to. Shooting photos and writing up Etsy listings. Researching pieces and hunting for new stuff. Billy is painting like crazy and we are still working out our plans for spring and summer. He has 4 shows lined up.... one on Nantucket, his two week show here at El Zaguan, the show we are doing together here at El Z come August and then he is going to show at a local coffee house in September. It's a lot of painting to get done but if you know Billy... he can do it. He is a painting powerhouse. The kid can't stop. He paints. He eats. He sleeps. He watches bad movies. He has sock fights with Rudy. That's it. No time for anything else.

Time to grab a coconut popsicle outta the freezer and break away from the net for awhile. Happy first week of spring (almost!) to you wherever you may be.

Freedom

This past week was my first in a long while that was totally my own... to sleep when I want to, read, walk, shoot photos, cook or just sit on the couch with my mouth hanging open and breath whenever I feel like it. All day... every day. It took my almost the full week to ease into it. I still have had trouble sleeping at night. I had a few donut dreams which was icky. Lots of dreams that I was flying too high.... and was sure to fall. Long about Friday I started to get my groove on and feel right again. It takes awhile to decompress.... to let the problems you take on at a job wash away and let your mind come back around to being your own. I think about how many people live the majority of their lives without having their mind and heart cleared of other people's troubles or bearing a good portion of the weight of responsibility for other people's financial endeavors and it's pretty crappy really.... that we all slave away under the umbrella of another entity, for it's benefit more so than our own, and for pay that keeps you barely afloat. It's a way of living that stunts happiness, creativity and creates really bad energy over time (unless of course you are the rare example of a person who absolutely loves their job.) It's amazing that things evolved in this way. That exploitation of one anothers' time and energy is the standard. I have no idea how long we will be able to sustain our lifestyle with me not going in to a regular job, but I am so glad for this time I have right now to let my mind flourish with ideas and to let myself rest and replenish my well of sanity... because listen up yo, it was coming fairly close to running dry these past few months.

All that heavy stuff aside. We had a great weekend. We went to a two year old's birthday party... which I made the cake for. It was my first ever "cake in the shape of a thing." And the thing was a robot.

We were celebrating Wyatt Hogan Mickelson's 2nd trip around the sun and the kid is doin just fine so far..... he has grown from a wee pea pod of a little guy to a juice guzzling party animal in what seems like no time at all.

I'm not sure what this cake really meant to him in the moment. I think it was mostly a "I see candy on this big hunk of whatever in front of my face" situation. The gumdrops were the first thing to go....

The cake was pretty ridiculous. I made it while on copious amounts of allergy meds and after about three nights in a row of not sleeping. Does it show? The robot looks like he may be suffering the consequences of insomnia too.

Saturday morning I got up and baked bread which is something I have not felt like doing at home in a long time. I made a fig cardamom sweet bread from a William's Sonoma cookbook. I don't generally love their recipes, too plain jane, and this one proved to fall into that same category. If I made it again I would jazz it up with some orange zest and vanilla to give more complex flavor. It would make a great french toast as it had a texture similar to brioche inside. It's definitely a recipe to play around with and jazz up and make your own.

We spent the past few days cleaning and reorganizing our tiny little apartment here at El Zaguan and getting ready for the first artist's meeting to plan the coming 2012 season of shows at our gallery here. We hosted the meeting here at our place and had a really successful brainstorming session. We will have the same crew of artists this coming summer that were here last season so I think we all have a good bead on what we need to do better or differently this coming year to increase our visibility in the Santa Fe art market and have a better turn out for our shows.

I made a zucchini galette which I snagged the recipe for off Smitten Kitchen's site and I  highly recommend it. The recipe is simple and the results are fabulous.

The chocolate cake in the background was a hit too. I found it on the Divine Baking blog. Again, it's simple but delicious. It's flourless so is a great option if someone is gluten free or trying to go easy on the carbs and it packs a serious wallop of chocolate. Hook it up with some fresh fruit on the side and whipped cream and you may pass out from the joy it brings.

Our little living room gets maxed out even with just 5 people trying to hang out in it. It's cozy. We need more chairs. But where would we put them?

I spent some time out shooting pics around the property today. We got snow the past two nights and then the sun came out and it warmed up significantly this afternoon so there was a lot of melting ice and snow everywhere. It gets pretty messy and muddy in Santa Fe and in our yard in particular this time of the year. I can't wait for April when the plants start to wake up and the world is thinking of turning a bit green again. It is nice to hear the water running off the awnings and see moisture on the ground though. I have had enough of dust, dust and more dust.

This week I have a few social dates to look forward to with friends old and new which is another thing I have not had the chance to indulge in for a long time due to the wacky schedule I was on for work. What plans do you have heading in to spring? Anything exciting going on out there?

Spring Cleaning

Good Morning everyone. It's 7:04 a.m. as I type this and I have been up about an hour. This means I slept in more than 3 hours past my normal wake up time over these last 6 months. This. Is. A. Good. Thing.

Yesterday was my last day at the donut shop. *Insert huge heaving sigh of relief right here* My coworkers sent me off with such a funny and spirited last day.... I love you guys! Ryan, Rachel and Miles in particular and Abraham too.... it was seriously memorable. A few of our loyal customers stopped in to say adios as well which was sweet. I had made a special for the weekend that went over gangbusters which was a bananas foster cream filled donut. People were feeling it. It was a "deep thoughts" provoking sort of item. Reach deep within your soul.... behold the final donut special..... this donut loves you.

I also did a fresh strawberry version with the berries tossed in rose water, vanilla and apricot preserves. My friend Jeff told me while eating one that it was so good it was weird. This is the sort of compliment I hold dear. The weirder the better.... as long as it's good weird. 

Abraham is a guy who works the overnight shift from midnight til 8 doing the raised yeast dough. He does not speak English and I do not speak Spanish. Somehow over these past months we developed a comfort level with one another in our inability to communicate in a normal every day fashion. We had a translation book that was utterly worthless that we would refer to at least a few times a night only to find the words we were searching for didn't exist in the book. So then it was our own goofy version of sign language and a sort of guessing game with a lot of head shaking and laughing involved. At least 30% of the time the moment would end in a big shoulder shrug and just plain giving up on what one or the other of us was trying to tell the other one. I had asked Abraham a while back to write down his recipe for making Mexican mole sauce for me. The confused conversation that ensued went on for over a month. The mole recipe was elusive and I had sort of given up on the thing. Yesterday Abraham showed up with grocery bags full of stuff, tied on his apron and proceeded to show me how to make the mole in person. He whipped up a complete meal. I now understand why he did not write it down because there are quite a lot of steps and weird little nuances that would have been really hard to describe. It was delicious and he is so sweet for having done this. The dude is a good egg and it's proof that friendship does not require speaking the same language. 

We brought home enough mole sauce to last us for the next 3 months. It is going to have to go in to the freezer there is so much. Awesome. 

I cannot say that I will miss making donuts. It was too specific. Too fried. I am glad I had the experience but I am most certainly done with it. It feels good to shed my donut hat and know that I am moving on to whatever comes next. Today that mostly means laundry and organizing our little apartment which has been in steady decline due to my weird schedule and constant zombie like state of being. We are meeting with the other artists here at El Zaguan this week to plan the coming season and schedule our show dates. Billy and I have a road trip in the Airstream planned for April. I am super excited to get to work on my photography and plan my work for shows here this summer. It already feels like we are off on a good path for a creative and satisfying season. 

Last Monday we hiked the Atalaya trail which is near our house leading up into the foothills of the Sangres. It was still pretty snowy and icy up there but we made it up and the view is always so cool from the top of that little mountain. 

The weather is just now starting to shape up here. We will be in the low 60's for a good part of this week. This is bad news for my allergies but so welcome in every other way. We also start our third session of boot camp today. We just came from a week off and are anxious to get rolling again. Let the pain and suffering begin! Now... off to sort through the piles of mail, magazines, books and general mess that has been silently waiting for me all these weeks. Spring cleaning I suppose. 

Little Cabin in the Big Woods

Okkkaaayyyy! So I have returned from Big Sur... ummm about a week ago. I needed a minute upon my return to get my head screwed on straight. Or at least partially so... I guess I am never completely and properly put together. I had a pretty good trip.... it definitely had it's highs and lows. I very much felt like I was dreaming the whole thing for about 95% of the time I was there. I flew into Monterey where my old pal Gordon picked me up. We popped down to Carmel for a few hours to grab a bite and visit for a bit. After that it was straight down Hwy 1 to Big Sur. We arrived at the bakery mid afternoon and I was promptly given a tour of the kitchen by Matt the manager. The kitchen was one of those things you have to see to understand.... it has evolved over the years as the place has grown and changed and is a place wholly unique. While I was getting to look around there were a couple of guys huddled in a cobblestone corner, a sort of indoor/outdoor area boiling crabs in a huge pot.... the bakery is separate from the main kitchen and is a very small room but efficiently laid out. Soon the chef/owner arrived and he brought us up to the little cabin I was to stay in a few minutes walk from the bakery. The place was as cute as a button. I thought I was going to be housed in a room in someone's home and then all the sudden I had this sweet cabin to myself. I was pretty stoked. Thanks Chef Phil for setting me up with such a comfortable place to hang out while I was visiting.

I started my stage the very next night. I woke at around 3 a.m. and got ready. The chef had left a little Coleman lantern for me to carry on my walk down through the wooded path and along a brief section of Hwy 1 to the restaurant. I am a total chicken about walking in the woods at night. I can turn a short walk into a long one in my mind. There was an owl hooting in a redwood across the highway and I felt like he was telling every man eating beast or rabid raccoon within ear shot that there was a lone red head on the loose and up for grabs if any one was hungry or just wanted to mess with her for sport. Anyway, I made it to the back door of the bakery for the 4:30 start time unharmed. I met Matt #2 (there are three Matts who work at the bakery) and he got us rolling on the production for the night. The place makes an amazing array of baked goods each day ranging from several different croissants, muffins, cookies, donuts and scones to baking their own hamburger buns, pizza dough for the hearth stone oven and two different beautiful hearth fired breads made from a sourdough starter. There are also several plated desserts for the evening dinner service. It's a busy, busy bakery kitchen. We baked off the mornings fare and I worked on prepping some apples for galettes and strawberries for danish. Matt showed me the process over the next three mornings for laminating the croissant dough, making the doughs for the sourdough breads, pizza dough, the buns and a few other special treats. He is a super cool guy and really knows his stuff. I very much enjoyed working with him and getting to chat about our travels and hopes for the future. In my off time I pretty much hung out at the cabin with Mamma Kitty... the big fatty cat who lives there. She was good company other than her bouts of lust in the small  hours of the night when she was prone to ravishing me with her furry little paws and purring like a lawn mower. Sadly I don't have any photos of the stuff I made and saw made while I was working at the bakery. It just did not feel right to drag my camera in to the scene for some reason. I regret it now... but at the time it seemed too flakey to be trying to snap pictures while Matt was busting his ass trying to get the job done for the day.

I did take a walk through the redwoods into state park land across the highway from the bakery. I had to overcome feeling very small and very alone while on my little hike but I had to go see the trees and get a good dose of woods before heading home to the dry ass southwest.  I shot these pics with that new little Canon Elph I bought just for the trip.

This was the view I had out the front windows of my cabin...

I did not get many good coastal view shots... but I do like this one. 

Gordon came back down on Sunday afternoon to pick me up and we shot straight back up the coast where we had a drink at The Mission Ranch (owned by Clint Eastwood!!) We stayed in Monterey that night and hit the hay pretty early. Our hotel was swathed in Burgandy from head to toe... it was like sleeping inside a raspberry bath robe. That makes no sense... but let's go with it anyway. The next morning we took Hwy 1 all the way up to San Fran and then cut over to Napa so we could lunch at Bouchon. God Bless you Cappy for driving my dumb ass all the way up there. We had a beer across the street while waiting for a table to open up at Bouchon.

People. I busted out and ordered the steak frites. WTF, right? I KNOW! It's the first time in my LIFE that I have ordered red meat in a restaurant. Hell it's the second time in my entire adult life that I have eaten red meat, period. This is an awful photo... but here it is. My huge steak.  It had caramelized shallots and herbed butter on top of it. I managed to eat maybe half of it. Crazy. It was a little too fatty for me to really be able to dig in wholeheartedly... but seriously, for those who really know me.... this was big time nutty.

We split a dessert of blueberry tart with lemon ice cream. It was beautifully done.

The next morning we drove into San Francisco to Tartine for breakfast. I was so excited to get to see this bakery in person! The kitchen is very open so I got a good view of the scene back there. Very cool place and their baked goods are gorgeous. I had a pain au chocolat as well as their muesli with a huge latte in a bowl. This was the best croissant I have seen maybe ever. The muesli fell a little shy of being great but the latte was awesome. I wish I could have tried a bite of everything in that case. I do have to say the price y'all at Tartine are charging for your tote bags is falling into the category of highway robbery.  I came close to developing an acute case of turrets when I heard my total charges waft over the din of the crowd at the cash register. Knock her down by about twenty bucks and the world will be a better place to live in.

We found a great little gourmand grocery a block or so down the street and wandered through it oohing and ahhhing over all the fancy treats they had to offer. I found an item I have been trying to get my hands on for a few years now... a Mast Brothers chocolate bar. They do not carry these very many places in the U.S. and I have been dying to try one ever since I first heard of their place out in Brooklyn a few years back. All their bars are hand wrapped in these great printed papers and at $8.99 a bar you are really investing a bundle in what you hope will be a bad ass piece of chocolate heaven.

I grabbed one of the straight 73% bars and passed on the fancier stuff with sea salts or maple syrup and walnuts because I wanted to see what their signature blend of cocoa tastes like. Let me tell ya people... it's freaking fabulous. I have to give these guys huge props for not only seeming like the coolest chocolatiers in the states but having some hella good chocolate to boot.

I flew home that afternoon with my head swimming from the confusion over what to do.... move to Big Sur? Stay in NM? I was too tired to think straight and decided to just let my brain chill until I could get home and have a proper discussion with Billy and Rudy about what we should do.

Long story cut short... it would seem that the best choice for now is to stay put in Santa Fe. The logistics of moving to Big Sur are pretty daunting. The only place we could find to live would require a 40 mile round trip drive for me daily to and from work. Getting up at 2:30 a.m. and then driving twenty miles to work is not high on my list of favorite ideas. Let alone the $400 or so it would cost in gas per month. Yuck. We are still planning to head to the coast some time in the next year.... maybe even this fall. It all depends on what this summer brings here in New Mexico.... the winds of change are definitely blowing. I gave notice at the donut shop and this weekend will be my last making the donuts. Billy and I have a few trips planned this spring to areas south of here and in AZ for me to shoot photos and for him to do paintings for our coming art shows here this summer.  We are excited to be on the brink of another season here at El Zaguan and hopeful that it will be a bountiful one. As for my future in baking there is a big ole question mark hanging in the air above my head at the moment. We are talking through a few ideas and I will post about any new developments as they roll in.

Thanks again to the folks at The Big Sur Bakery for hosting me and I hope that someday I will get to let the flour fly in your little back room of that crazy kitchen. And thanks to Gordon for being my chaperone for the trip. I could never have done it without ya Cap! Love you!