Pretty In Pink

Aren't these adorable? A lady from my work creates these wonderful little packages for our art department. Friday we held a baby shower for one of the staff and Diane took care of all the details. The large one in back I got for winning a shower game, (and I never win those). It's a gourmet chocolate bar wrapped in a pearlized paper sleeve and tied with a super-cute ribbon. Great idea, huh! The small package in front carried a Hershey Nugget candy that sat on the middle of our plates. The heart package was a Valentine treat and held a small zip-bag filled with pink and brown m&m's. What great ideas. She is amazing.

Weekend Recipe Tests

Back with some pics from Friday's food blog post. Thought I'd spread these out over the weekend, but I got a little to into it and made everything this afternoon...and they were all delish! All three recipes pass the hubby test, too. I have yet to figure out how to get a smooth chocolate layer on anything, but it tastes the same nonetheless! Oh, and on the chocolate bars...very, very sweet. Make this when you have a party, or need to bring a dessert to the holidays, and cut them small. The base layer of these bars is so yummy, that you could simply top it with a layer of vanilla icecream, or fresh whip cream and be good to go!

Now back to sulking that the US Open Women's Semi-Finals are not on. Not sure why, but that's what I get for having the TV on mute!

Food Blogs to Follow

If you consider yourself a foodie (I'm becoming more of one everyday) you'll want to check out/follow these two sites I stumbled upon this week: Smitten Kitchen and Closet Cooking.

From the Closet Cooking blog, I will be making the Zucchini and Feta Ricotta Tart, Creamy Dilled Cucumber Salad and the Nanaimo Bars...this weekend! Oooh, wait, the 7 Layer dip looks delish as well. Oh, how I love dips. Goodness, this could be dangerous. I'll let you know how it goes.

Oh, So Quiet.

Hubby and I have this "thing" with cemeteries. It sounds morbid, I know, but it's really not that at all. Back in college we would visit cemeteries to take pictures of the sculptures, but it turned into something more than an art hunt. It's so quiet, and humbling, and historical. It had been years since we'd photographed a cemetery, until Saturday. We had breakfast downtown and then drove to Grand Rapids' oldest resting place at 801 Fulton Street.

It was a gorgeous morning and not a cloud in the sky. You could hear all the sounds of nature...squirrels playing, acorns dropping and the birds chirping, even though it borders a busy downtown street. We walked slowly and carefully trying to respect the resting places. What is so amazing to me is that some of these headstones are so old the engravings are virtually impossible to read yet others, equally as old, are so crisp and clear. And, some are simply being swallowed by the earth.

We shot about 40 images without disturbing a single leaf. When we got home and looked at the images there was not one that I wanted to go back in to crop (and I'm a cropper!), nor one that needed color correction. Each image was as honest and beautiful as I remembered.

Hmmm.

Sign of the Times

Known for their witty signs...I laughed out loud when I saw this one!