Sunday, June 24, 2007

the week in pictures...

Kara trying the orange almond polenta cake I made in the blender. (too bad you can't see the fabulous cake!)

A loud noise, sirens, choppers hovering over the scene- not at all an uncommon experience in Baltimore. Only Tuesday morning, it was right behind our house. Someone had driven a car back behind Barclay Elementary and lit it on fire. I stood on my porch and watched it all go down at 7:30 in the morning. Crazy.

Happy Baltimore row houses in the early morning sunshine, on my way to work and stuck in traffic on 29th.

June 21- after 9:00pm. summer solstice. Across the street, one apartment has this tacky light get up on their porch - a palm tree and flamingo. Its just kind of an intriguing sight to me.

Baltimore A-rabbers. Thats what they're called- no kidding. (may not be how its spelled, but thats how it sounds- "A-Rabbers...") Guys who have horses with bells that jingle and carts filled with fresh vegetables and fruit; they clop through the streets of Baltimore calling out for people to come buy their wares. This fellow comes down our street every afternoon... I'm going to have to work on a better photo of him.

And today- another exciting jaunt to Harpers Ferry and a float down the Potomac River in Butts Tubes...

After which, we decided to try and find a nice little picnic spot off the beaten path a bit... but the road kept going and going with no place to pull over for our picnic, or promise of one coming up any time soon... so we just stopped and had our picnic on the side of the road. None too exciting, and LOTS of bugs... We finished up got back into the car and just around the next corner... a beautiful little clearing right by the river. Figures. (Kinda like the time we stopped in the Mara... and after a nice lunch, got back in the car and happened upon a huge pride of lions two minutes down the road... ha! Only not quite)

I see you...

...and of course, our customary Harpers Ferry shot at the end of a spectacularly beautiful day.

(we're now home, tending to our crispy sunburns... fun fun)

Sunday, June 17, 2007

Community garden...

While I'm at it... here are some photos of our very exciting plot in the community gardens... I don't know how many people have plots... maybe 30? Hmmm...


We were late comers to the garden this year so were relegated to the far corner, which is mostly in shade- not super great for growing... but we're giving it a go! This is looking back at the rest of the garden, the gate where you come in is in the far left hand corner. The mulch, manure and compost piles are all just outside the front gate... lucky for us. AND because we have so much shade, we get a bigger plot- which just means MORE mulch to haul up! Burn baby burn!


Kara happily plodding along in her own little world...


Can you see the zinnias blooming?


My freshly planted little basils, see them lined up on the left? And our sunflowers... ALSO blooming. (Dude, what can I say? we got mad skills...!)


PS- Our persnickity passion plant also decided to bust out her fancy blooms this week too...

Strawberries out the wazoo!


Enough of graduation already... so here we are strawberry picking at a farm west of DC...



Its a lot more labor intensive than say, apple picking...




...mmmmm.... should have gotten a photo of the millions of strawberries we ended up with... we've been eating all things strawberry for the last week... strawberry smoothies, strawberries straight up, strawberries with ice cream, strawberries in oatmeal, strawberry salads, and today I think I'm going to have to finally bake something with some of the half million that are frozen in the freezer. Anyone want to come over for strawberry daiquiris?