Hard Rock Hotel

I was on the "Prince" floor of the Hard Rock Hotel in Chicago.

The Bean

The bean beckons me from the conference room window.

The Bean

Everywhere I go in Chicago, there is the bean. From my hotel room...

Pet of the Week

A cute cat with a delicious sounding name. The two are unrelated.

Peaches & Cream #7488147

Peaches & Cream is a 5-year-old female cat who was brought to Lollypop Farm because her owner could no longer afford to care for a pet. She is a petite girl at 8.5 pounds. Peaches has lived with other cats and got along well with them. Peaches would be a wonderful companion and has lots of love to give. She is a beautiful cat, inside and out! - Lollypop Farm

Pug on Park

It was such a nice weekend we had dinner with Oscar on Park Ave. (And I had some fun with the Photogene iPhone photo editing app)

Frenchie on Park

There was a French Bulldog on one side.

Puggle on Park

There was a puggle on the other side.

Cayuga Wine and Herb Festival

Clearly they are working very hard.

Cayuga Lake Wine and Herb Festival

I like all the cats and dogs that work at the wineries.

Cayuga Lake Wine and Herb Festival

Today we went to the Cayuga Lake Wine and Herb Festival- although this is a tomato.

Wegman's reusable bag

We picked the tomato one.

Earth week at Wegmans

Today from 11 to 3 Wegmans is exchanging a bag full of plastic bags
for one of their reusable ones.

New Chair

I have always wanted an Eames chair and I found this rocker on overstock.com (thanks to a blog post from Lucky Olive)

It did take me awhile to get the chair out of the box though. Stewie sat on it and stared at me for a long time. "Oh, did you want to open this? What? This box here? This box under me?"

"Ahhh... here you go. Does that help? Open away." *stretch*

Pet of the Week

Lookit Mr. Perky! He is like a dog version of a polar bear!

Spike #7393108

Spike is a 1-year-old male shepherd/husky mix who is hoping to find a warm, loving home. He's a handsome, medium-sized guy, weighing 50 lbs. Spike must meet any kids or other dogs in the home before being adopted, and he needs to be enrolled in obedience classes. If you take the classes at Lollypop Farm, you'll get a discount! Spike would be happiest in a family without young children. Spike was seized due to lack of proper care, so he's really looking forward to being a valued member of the family. - Lollypop Farm

Peapod for Earth Day

I saw a link for Chrysler's Peapod last week and I have been waiting for today, Earth Day, for it to be unveiled. It's electric... no gas, no emissions and is the only thing that comes close to Aaron's Smart Car in cuteness. I mean really, it looks like it has a funky little smiley face on the front.

The peapod has a top speed of 25 mph, can run 30 miles on a charge, takes 6 hours to fully recharge, costs only 2 cents a mile to run and is made almost entirely of recycled materials! Oh yeah you can use your iPhone to turn it on!

I love the different versions you can get! Curious what I could haul in the back of a Utilitypod.

Tea Leaves

Aprille did me a favor and has been stalking Genesee Bakery to let me know when they have tea leaf pastries available. As soon as she tweeted me, I stopped by after work and picked up a few.

I don't know how to describe them... they are light and crispy and sweet. I have never had anything like them. I can't find out anything about them online either. Only on the Genesee Bakery website... tea leaves... $1.35.

Genesee Bakery also has a Facebook Fan Page! Now I can drool over their baked goods on Facebook too.

Pooch

Working hard at the pet shop.

Shopping in Boston

Doing some shopping while Aaron is working. Pet shop on Charles street.

Lobstah

Mmmm lobstah.

Tealuxe

Cuppa at Tealuxe - a must stop on Newbury Street

Jenny in Boston

Skipping around Boston

Aaron at Mike's Pastry

Aaron and I are in Boston for a couple days. We are stopping in at all
our favorite spots. Had to stop at Mike's Pastry for creme filled
lobster tails.

Concert

The All American Rejects were great. They sounded just like they do on
their album. The crowd went wild for the hits like Swing Swing and
Move Along.

Concert tees

Aaron and I had tickets to see All American Rejects this evening. They
had three opening bands, Vedera, Ace Enders and Shiny Toy Gun. They
were all good, played just the right amount of songs and switched the
stage fast.

Macarons recipe

Many people asked me what recipe I used for the French Macarons I made for Easter gifts. It was a recipe from this cookie book... and it worked well the first time I tried it.

If you would like to try it, here it is.

3 egg whites
3 tablespoons sugar
pink food coloring (mine didn't turn out pink tho)
1 1/4 cups powdered sugar
1 cup almond meal (found some in the gluten free section of natural foods)
3 tablespoons extra powdered sugar
3 1/2 white chocolate chopped coarsely
3 tablespoons heavy cream

1. Make a white chocolate ganache by melting white chocolate and cream together in a small pot over low heat until smooth. Move mixture to a small bowl, cover and put in the fridge.

2. Grease baking sheets, line with parchment paper

3. Beat egg whites in small bowl with mixer until soft peaks form. Add sugar and food coloring, beat until sugar dissolves. Move mixture to large bowl and fold in powdered sugar and almond meal, in two batches.

4. Spoon mixture into large piping bag with 1/2 inch plain tube. Pice thirty six 1 1/2 inch rounds, 3/4 inches apart onto baking sheets. Tap sheets on counter, dust with sifted extra powdered sugar and let stand for 15 minutes.

5. Pre heat oven to 300 degrees.

6. Bake macarons 20 minutes. Let stand 5 minutes, transfer to wire rack to cool.

7. Sandwich macarons with ganache.

Salty

I had been eyeballing these Sustainable Sourcing gift box sets of that showed up at Wegmans around the holidays. The sets of Pink Peppercorns and pink HimalaSalt Zen Cubes are pretty pricey, but they finally went on clearance.

Really, it was the HimalaSalt Zen Cube I was most interested in. I love salt! It's like a mini salt lick! You use the grater to create a super fine powder like powdered sugar. They suggest adding it to edamame, salads, watermelon and even sweets like ice cream and chocolate ganache!

Figs & Ginger Earth Day Giveaway

Figs & Ginger is one my favorite jewelry designers (see here and here), not just because of their adorable pieces but because of their commitment to the environment.

I try to be green by doing the big things, recycling, composter, rain barrel, gardening, CSA farm. There are little things you can do too, and by little I mean little like Figs & Ginger's wee little earrings. As a green business they use recycled metals, post consumer paper, bio- degradable supplies etc.

In honor of Earth and Arbor Day, Figs & Ginger are doing something amazing... their first annual Earth Day Giveaway. If you plant a tree and send them a picture of it, they will send the first 50 people a tree necklance and fawn earrings. After that the following 300 will get fawn earrings. (they can be used as tie tacks for the guys who plant!)

 

How. Cool. Is. That?! I love cute jewelry. I love trees. What's not to like? My parents are always planting trees around their house... dogwood, plum, apple. So Aaron and I planted a new little peach tree in our back yard.

I think we are going to have to put a small fence around it because Oscar has already tried to "water" it for us.

Be sure to check out the Figs & Ginger Earth Day Giveaway and plant a tree!

Cotton Candy

One of the goodies Aaron put in my Easter basket was this Cotton Candy cologne. I thought it was funny that it was from Prince Matchabelli, but wow... it really smells just like Cotton Candy. In fact, it's all I can do to not gnaw my own arm off.

Pet of the Week

I think I would have to call Dart, Mr. Pink Nose. The web site says he is very soft. He does have that look on his face "Go on... touch me... I'm soft."

Dart #7272173

Dart is a 4-year-old male cat who was found as a stray. He has a beautiful, soft coat and amber-colored eyes. We don’t know a lot about Dart’s history, but he is a very friendly cat. He loves being petted and getting head and chin scratches! Dart would make a wonderful companion and a loyal friend.

The hazards of blue egg dye

The hazards of of blue egg dye.

This year's Easter eggs

For this year's Easter eggs I tried this method using some blue dye I ordered online, small plants and stockings.

ljc on boston.com

I was so excited to hear that my speckled eggs on Craftster made it into boston.com's 8 Easter crafts for family fun. How awesome is that?

French Macarons

Tina has been going on and on about French Macarons (macaroons) lately, so I decided to make some as Easter treats.

They were much easier than I expected.

The recipe I was following used white chocolate ganache as the filling. I wanted to make the cookies pink...

The batter was pink, but they came out of the oven tan! I was impressed how they went from being little puddles of batter to puffy, crispy cookies.

I was thrilled that the cookies really looked like authentic French Macarons! (macaroons)

And they tasted pretty darn good too.

Spring Daisy Garland

I wanted to make some spring garlands for gifties. I decided to go with a daisy theme.

I was going to fill the ribbon with daisies, but they took longer than I thought so each garland got five flowers.

This year instead of Easter baskets for goodies like the daisy garlands, I got these really cute "green" bags at Target.