sunday pieces

It's time for raspberries! Our crazy, overgrown patch of raspberry brambles is finally bearing fruit. They need some major pruning, but for this year we'll just enjoy what we've got.

Other highlights from today include fresh focaccia bread from Farm to Hearth, a trip to the library book sale, spotting a scarily large bug in the garden, and going to see Midnight in Paris. A day well spent.

solstice

We spent the summer solstice lazing about on the beach and then finished the day with homemade calzones and a card game. It was beautiful and warm and relaxing... I think if I could, I would follow summer all over the world.

sunday pieces

How was your Sunday? Around here it was beautiful, a perfect Father's Day. Deb is in town for a visit so we took her to the farmer's market yesterday morning and then ended to day over at my parent's house. We played a game of Would You Rather and I laughed harder than I can remember laughing in a very long time. So here are some of the sights I saw yesterday...

(I must point out that the lovely image above was taken by the boy. He's been taking some great shots with black & white polaroid film lately. It makes me want my own pack very badly.)

camera love

This is a rare Saturday post for the purpose of gushing over my new favorite camera.

A while back I finally got my hands on a Pentax K1000, a camera I'd been wanting to add to my collection for quite some time. I finally got my first two rolls from it developed and I'm definitely happy with the results. I feel like the colors pop a bit more than with my Minolta, and the focus is great. Most of all, it has my favorite quality in a camera, something unknowable and hard to describe. When I look at these pictures I see my framing work and choice of focus and subject, but it's like when I click the shutter the camera takes over and adds it's own special quality into the mix. It's a specific look or feel.... it's the sort of thing that happens with polaroids and makes me love them so much.

So yes, this is the camera I see myself carrying around this summer. I'm hoping to capture a lot of fun moments through this lens.

monday music: the irrepressibles

It's the end of a long day spent making strawberry jam, but I heard a song last week that gave me such shivers I had to share it this Monday.

In This Shirt is the first and only song I've heard so far from The Irrepressibles, but I'm eager to listen to more. It's slow and sweeping, carried along by beautiful orchestral instruments and haunting vocals. It reminds me quite a bit of Patrick Wolf at times. Perfectly angsty and dramatic... right up my alley.

wanderlust

I've been thinking about Paris a lot lately. Somehow I've ended up spending far too much time drooling over the apartments on this site, and reading this blog. For seemingly no reason at all, this city has been popping up in my thoughts consistently over the past few weeks. And then I realized.... it was six years ago this month that I went there for the first time. I only spent a week there on that visit, but every June I'm reminded of my time there and wanderlust strikes.

So for right now I am going to indulge in my dream return trip. It involves a little apartment with a sweet rooftop view.... croissants for breakfast every morning.... walking in the dusk that comes so late this time of year.... introducing my polaroid camera to Paris.... drinking hot chocolate at night while the eiffel tower glows.... showing the boy all these things and places for the first time.

Here are some pictures from favorite moments of past Paris trips.

daily food

Hello, pesto. Nice to see you again.

monday music: queen

Hello and happy Monday! I hope your weekend was beautiful. I had a wonderful Sunday that I captured on film, so expect to see some images from that soon.

Today's music post delves into classic rock. Most of the time I only listen to older rock on the radio while driving, but there are some exceptions and Queen is one of them. I've always been a fan, but I love their music even more since we started playing the greatest hits album at work. Something about Freddy Mercury's voice really breaks up the work day. It's become a bit of a tradition to throw this cd on when we close the store up on Saturday. I Want to Break Free is (fittingly) the last song on the album, and I couldn't resist posting the video for you today, plus another of my favorites, Don't Stop Me Now.

short short short

Sometimes, I think about chopping all my hair off again. Especially when I look at Emma Watson's new haircut. Then I remind myself that I am not Emma Watson, and when I cut my hair that short years ago it looked nothing like that. But still, when the days turn hot and my hair becomes a frizzy, uncooperative mass, I like to daydream about being a bit daring.

*Alas, these photos have been sitting in my inspiration folder and I have no sources, except for this last one, which is via Hooray's similarly themed post.