Strawberry Salad

Let me introduce you to...The Strawberry Salad!  Or, "The only salad I'm going to make ever again for the rest of my life." 

   It all started with a simple mistake, as most great things do.  I had come home from working an eight hour shift on only two hours of sleep; I was starving to death but far, far too tired to do any cooking. 

My boyfriend wisely pointed out that we do not have the money to get fast food, and it would only make me feel worse in the long run anyway.  On nights like these, I make one of two dishes for us to eat: canned soup and sandwiches, or a great big salad eaten out of a shared bowl.  Tonight I chose the latter.

 
    Usually when I make a quick salad, it's not the kind of salad that has a recipe.  Lettuce, tomatoes, cheese, canned dressing; that's it.  It's fast, filling, foolproof.  But tonight it was not to be.

An agonized cry escaped me; we were out of tomatoes, the second most important ingredient.  I won't describe my long, tiring day at work, but I assure you it was hellish, and Morgan had had a long day too.  Neither of us was going out to get more tomatoes feeling the way we did, it was simply out of the question.

"Why not just use strawberries?"  my burgeoning-chef boyfriend asked as I blinked back frustrated tears.  It never would have occurred to me to do this on my own; maybe for a baby-spinach, hard-cooked egg and strawberry salad with bacon but certainly not for an ordinary garbage salad with Kraft dressing.  However, I was too miserable and too tired to care: I chunked up the strawberries and threw them in, prepared to choke down a disgusting meal and go sleep for seventeen hours. 

   Now, maybe everybody already knows this and I am just reporting stale news.  But guys, fresh strawberries in a garbage salad is the single most delicious thing I have ever tasted in my entire life.  They are better than the caribou steak I tried when my dad took me to dinner; they are better than candy.  They are incredible.  They pop up in your bites of lettuce and cucumber and cheese as little tasty bites of sweet and sour goodness, juicy and fresh, fruity and foreign.  And delicious.

The best part was, every dressing we had complimented them gorgeously.  When applying dressing, I was still expecting it to taste bad and was trying to decide which of the three kinds of dressing we had in the house would be the least awful.  I set aside a few bites on a plate and tried them with zesty italian, creamy ceasar and three-cheese ranch - and they were all fantastic. 

The italian vinaigrette really brought out the strawberries' tartness - it made them seem like little bites of sour-sweet sprinkled throughout the greens.

The ceasar made the whole salad seem like a dessert - everything became sweet and smooth and comforting, perfect for a really hot summer evening.

The three-cheese ranch turned the entire salad somehow meaty and filling, though, so that was the one I chose for this particular time.  It made it taste like there was bacon in the salad even though there wasn't, it made the greens and cheeses seem somehow bigger and more filling - and it made the strawberries POP!  as delicious fruity sweet bits in this heavy cheesy salad.  So lovely.

 

     So yes - I cannot recommend strawberries instead of (or as well as!)  tomatoes in your salads enough.   Tomorrow I'm going to make another with avocados and almonds and we'll see how that goes. 

   As an aside, this is the second time in two weeks that Morgan has followed an instinct in the kitchen that I never would have done on my own, and both times it has yielded absolutely amazing results.  I think he might secretly be a genius in the kitchen - I have to finish teaching him to cook so I can harness this goodness for myself! Haha!

I hope you all are having a great day, and that you get to eat something delicious today.  

Thanks for reading!

Love, Emily.

My Workspace

Hello!

Today I am going to talk about where I do most of my arts and crafts...not that I expect anyone to care.  But sometimes taking a look at all the materials and things I own makes me feel so glad to have them, and springboards so many ideas for things I could be doing with them! 

So, this is my workspace:

 

     It's pretty small, as my apartment is pretty small.  My boyfriend and I have the couch right in the middle of the living room area, so as to divide the room into two rooms.  In front of the couch is the TV, coffee table, and shelf full of dvds and magazines.  That's our "livingroom."  Behind the couch, on either side of one of our big deep windows, we have our desks.  That's our "office."  Maybe it's dorky to pretend like we have office space, but those desks needed to go somewhere!

His space is on the left side of the window you see in the picture.  His desk is covered with his computer and untold wires and gadgets (I don't know what half of them are for!)  and that's where he does his writing, video editing and a lot of his musical work.   (Not to mention internetting!)  It's nice when we are right next to each other at our respective desks,   both working on something important to us.

But this post is about MY side SO:  for the one person out there (me) who cares, the right side of the window is my art space.

1) The window doesn't face the path of the sun, so it really doesn't bring in much natural light.  But, if I am working during the day the view of my pretty little street is just lovely.  I can't wait till the tree outside puts out its leaves!

2) My lamp, for when I am working at night.  (Which is almost always, since I work nights at my job and because I like to sleep during the day.)  It used to be my bedside lamp, but I found a new lamp in the street and it graduated to my art desk lamp.  It's really more suited to the bedside table, it's so elegant and pretty (and the bird silhouettes I added yesterday really make it cozy) but unfortunately the new lamp is just too big to go in the windowsill!  Oh well.  Someday I will have the money for a proper artist's lamp with fluorescent and incandescent bulbs and a swivel head, and I can use the pretty lamp elsewhere.

3) My bag of pretty miscellaneous fabrics, papers and stickers that I might end up using for something.  I save all my old calendars for their glossy paper and pretty pictures, old wrapping paper, gift bags, scrapbooking papers...anything pretty that I might find a use for.  As for fabrics, only "real" fabrics that I have bought or have had given to me go in here.  My scrap fabric from old t-shirts and things like that is in a bag in my linen closet.

4) My pretty mirror, right above my workspace.  It was given to me by my boyfriend's aunt and actually has a matching twin on the other side of my bookcase.  But I love that it's right above my desk because first and foremost when it comes to artsy things, I am a cartoonist, and it is nice to have a mirror right there if I need to research facial expressions.

5 - 9) Things I have made in the past that I am either very proud of or that inspire me to create.  They pretty up my whole space and remind me of things I have accomplished in the past.  In more detail they are:

     5 - a string of paper stars made from magazine paper

     6 - two watercolour sketches I made of "Christmas in Vancouver" which remind me why I am living here and what I want to do with my life

     7 - a sequined Star Trek combadge my friend Hannah made me, to remind me of her, that I am loved, and also that I should be as nerdy as possible

     8 - a pony-bead gecko I made with my friend Krystal, to remind me of her, of childhood, and also that making things with my hands is the most gratifying thing I know

     9 - two more paintings I have done in the past

10) My book shelf.  This holds almost all the books the two of us own, and it's nice to have them right there should I need to look something up.  (I don't allow myself to use the internet when I'm doing art unless I absolutely have to, because I get sucked into the facebook trap too easily.)

11) My desk!!!  I found this on the street last October, just sitting there covered with grass clippings and rain waiting to be adopted!  It's made of particle board and weighs about two pounds.  I seriously would have been able to carry it the four blocks home myself, but Morgan was with me and was nice enough to help.  Someday I would love to have an adjustable cartoonist's drafting table, but for now this is just fine.  I like that it has ugly black paint because I'm not afraid to get it dirty.

12) The aforementioned Krystal gave me this pretty box that used to contain all her incense; now I keep my cartooning markers, favourite pencil and scraps of paper with ideas and character designs on them in it.  And it smells so good!

13) My craft bin.  Any craft supplies I have go in here, seperate from the "art" supplies because I am a snob.  But it's also probably the most opened box that I have.

14) This drawer hold all my cartooning supplies not held in the incense box: my rulers, pencils, pens, erasers, markers, pencil sharpener, india ink, best brushes and notebooks full of ideas

15) This drawer holds all my miscellaneous art supplies: paints, paintbrushes, oil pastels, and small canvases.

16) This drawer holds printer paper, lined paper, a big box of pencil crayons (too big to fit in the cartooning drawer) wax crayons (too bulky for the craft bin) extra notebooks and sketchbooks, construction and other coloured papers.

17) I stuff things that have no other place or that I am in the middle of working on under my desk, because I am a bad housekeeper.

18) My chair.  It came with our apartment, and when we move I will have to leave it behind.  Again, I would love to have a fancy, rolling computer chair with back support and all that, but I have no complaints about this one.

And that's it!  That's where the magic happens if I don't decide I would rather do art on the couch or in bed or in the bathroom.  I'm sorry if I bored the few of you who read this to tears, but it was really good for me to go through all this stuff like this: it made me totally inspired for tomorrow night when I'll come home from work and create something more exciting to share!

Have a great day, and thanks for reading!  

~Love, Emily.

  Tonight I made a quick little craft project to prettify the little area in my apartment where I do my art.

This is my lamp:

It sits in the windowsill above my desk, very useful for Arting at night after the sun has gone down and no more beautiful sunlight comes in the window. 

Tonight, I was craving a crafty, simple cut-and-paste project that would also allow me to beautify my space and muck up my furniture. 

Behold!

I traced some bird silhouettes from the internet, using my laptop screen as a lightbox because I take good care of my things.  I transferred these to some thick, dark paper I had lying around (it was actually an old calendar page - I save all my calendars for pretty scrap paper) and cut them out.

Then I glued them to the inside of the shade with tacky glue and voila! 

I liked the effect a lot, and since my lampshade is four-sided I made more for each side so I can turn them around when I get bored.  

      I left one side blank, because it was my last one and I couldn't decide whether or not to leave it blank, or add another bird.  I'm thinking I kind of want a blue jay - those have always been favourites of mine.  What do you think??

I thought about moving this lamp into my bedroom and putting my bedside lamp by my desk - the look is just so cozy and relaxing!  But I think it's going to stay where it is for now; it's yet another beautiful thing I have made to decorate my workspace.

 

      And that's it for now!  I hope you are all having a fantastic Easter weekend!  

Thanks for reading, 

    Love Emily.

I drew a warm-up sketch of my friend Hannah tonight and I was really proud of the way I managed to get across the different light spots on her tights.  I love hatching and cross-hatching patterns and I am always trying to get them to look more realistic and get different effects with them, and I am proud of the way things turned out here.

Also my friend is a total babe.

Nail Art Interlude - Perfect Polka Dots

Please excuse the terrible flash; I only got this one picture before the paint was completely ruined at work.

Let's not even pretend that I am good at keeping a blog, but I am good at making pretty nails sometimes and that is what's important.  Even though this was intended to be a blog of my artistic excursions.  Oh well!

This was incredibly easy - everyone loves pretty polka dot nails, probably because they are so versatile.  You can use pretty much any two colours you have and they always look cute and whimsical.

I used to use toothpicks to get a polka dot effect, but I was always dissatisfied with the result: they always made more of a large blob than a polka dot, and often they smudged while drying because blobs of paint take forever to dry!

The other day though, I figured out a fantastic way to get perfect dots of uniform size - or smaller if you prefer and have a steady hand.  Are you ready?

Simply push a straightpin into a pencil eraser and voila - the perfect dot making tool!  Pushing the pin in far enough to stay is painful on the fingertips so I suggest using something else to jam it in there.

Not your teeth, or they will chip.  Not that I would know anything about that or anything.

Then dip the flat end of the pin into a drop of nail polish and dot away!

And that's it!  A fun way to spend a half hour instead of doing the dishes.

Have a great weekend and, if you celebrate it, a Happy Easter!

Thanks for reading!

Love, Emily.

Pumpkin Spice Cupcakes.

I love making cakes from boxed mixes. 

Some people don't think they taste as good as home-made from scratch cakes, and yeah, they're probably right...but hey, they're so fast!  There's absolutely no shame in making cakes from boxes.

Especially when they're so easy to play around with and add things to!  The basic batter comes together in two seconds, leaving plenty of time for experimentation and playfulness.  That said...Pumpkin Spice Cupcakes.

 You Will Need:

-one boxed cake mix of a relatively neutral flavour.  I used white but vanilla or something like that would work too.  Spice cake would probably be phenomenal.
-The ingredients needed to prepare mix - see back of whatever box you chose.
-one can of pumpkin puree - NOT pumpkin pie filling (pie filling will make your cake turn out all soupy.)
-brown sugar and white sugar
-ginger, cinnamon (and nutmeg and allspice...I didn't have these on hand and the cakes turned out delicious without them, but if you want the TRUE pumpkin pie flavours better add them.)
-extra sugar and flour.

I started by preparing the white cake mix according to the directions on the package. 

 My biggest complaint about boxed cake mixes is that the cake always seems to turn out WAY too soft and crumbly, which is especially troublesome for cupcakes.  If you like your cake like that go ahead and leave it as is, but I have found that a very simple solution to this problem is to add to your mix about three quarters of a cup of flour:

...and about the same amount of sugar.  Otherwise the flour thickens up the cake just fine, but makes it taste floury.

  Once you've got your cake mix to the consistency you like, it's time to add the pumpkin!

Harry Potter would be proud.  Add about half of the can and mix well.  The batter will go pretty orange very quickly.

It will also taste absolutely disgusting, unless you like the flavour of stewed vegetables in your dessert mixes, so at this point I added another half cup of white sugar and an entire cup of brown sugar.

For those of you saying, "But Emily! That's SO much sugar!!!"
Why yes, yes it is.
So, now our cake tastes like cake again and not like squash - time to add the flavours that have made grandma and starbucks alike absolutely famous around thanksgiving - pumpkin spice.

So many people buy pumpkin spice blend and that is perfectly ok, but buying the spices seperately means you now have four different spices to work into other recepies and not just one spice that only works in pumpkin pie.  It's a cost-effectiveness thing, and not a food-snobbery thing, for me. 

Most pumpkin spice blends are just a very simple mixture of four familiar and friendly spices: cinnamon, ginger, allspice and nutmeg.  I have found blends that have cloves in them too, but those four are the sacred foursome of pumpkin spice. 

Go ahead and dump a little of each into your cake batter.  When I cook things, I hardly ever measure anything so I didn't think to take measurements, but if you are the sort of person who measures I am going to say about a teaspoon and a half of each.

 

  If you want to at this point, you could add a splash (or a teaspoon) of vanilla.  I completely forgot to, but if you want to you absolutely should - vanilla is like the salt of the baking world; it enhances and brightens all other flavours in a dish while adding a tiny, secret hint of itself to the dish as well.  Vanilla is every sweet thing's friend.

Batter batter batter batter.  Do the all-important taste test, and see if you think it's lacking in anything.  Add a little more of something if you want to.

Pour into muffin cups.  I didn't have any cupcake liners but if you do I cannot reccomend them enough, unless you want a big pile of failure cupcakes like I had with the first batch.

It's very important to add a decorative sprig of rosemary so that everyone knows you are a fancy professional baker.

Bake the cupcakes in an oven of the temperature reccomended by the all-knowing box, for as long as the box says to.  Mine was 350 degrees for twenty two minutes.

While they were in there, in between batches of failure cupcakes, I whipped up a quick cream-cheese frosting made of half a cup of cream cheese, a quarter cup of margerine, a teaspoon of milk, and like an entire bag of icing sugar.  The recipie called for a cup but you know what mixing frosting is like: a lie.  A terrible, wasteful lie.  But the frosting was delicious.
I added some pumpkin spice to it as well.

I chose cream cheese icing because it is my favourite and I thought it would go well with pumpkin.  It really, really does, and if you like cream cheese icing absolutely try it!  But if you prefer your cakes to be iced with something a little less heavy, you could also top them with whipped cream, which was my second choice.  Nothing goes with pumpkin pie like whipped cream.

Once the cakes are baked and THOROUGHLY COOLED, frost those suckers!

I also dusted mine with a little more cinnamon - just to look pretty really but it tastes fine.  The icing is sweet enough to keep the cinnamon from being too spicy.

And enjoy those sweet babies!  Because pumpkin flavoured desserts should be for all year round, not just at thanksgiving!!!

(Man, there's that rosemary again...who keeps putting it there?)

Have an amazing weekend full of fun times and sweet things! 

Thanks for reading!

Love, Emily.

Nail Art Interlude - Love Letter Nails

Whew!  So, that "I'm going to post something at least every other week and take my new blog seriously" thing went pretty well, yes? 

Okay, once more with feeling!

Valentines day is coming up, and usually I am pretty "meh" towards this particular holiday.  I don't despise it like a lot of people do, but I don't particularly care to observe it either...most years, my boyfriend and I just watch some movies (or one year the Daytona 500...haha!) and hang out together. 

And unlike christmas, I don't even really like the decorations for Valentines day...I never was much of a fan of pinks, reds or hearts, so that kinda explains that.  This year however, for some reason, I am just loving all the pinks and reds and hearts showing up at work and in stores.  So, tonight I sat down with my nail polishes and made myself some Valentines-day themed "love letter" nails, and I'm sharing how I did it with you!

You Will Need:
Nail polishes in white, blue, red, and clear (or any colours you like.)
A very fine paintbrush you don't mind dipping in nail polish
A black fine-tip Sharpie or other pen
A toothpick or other small poking device

1) Start by painting all your nails, except one, white.  You can use another pale colour, (I think pale pink would be pretty) or leave them plain if you want to.

2) Paint your remaining nail blue, or another dark colour that will contrast very obviously against white.  I chose my middle nail for this because it has the most surface area - this will be important! - but is more visible than the thumb.

3) On one of your white nails, make a small red dot.

4) Use your toothpick to pull it down towards your skin, into a teardrop shape.  Work quickly, before the paint dries!

5) Do the same thing on the other side of your nail.  Tada; you've just made a cute little heart!

Mine turned out kind of pinkish, and since I decided I was not into doing a second coat at that scale, I decided I was okay with it.  However, if you want your hearts to be red, I reccomend doing it with a red polish you know and trust to be RED and not need a second coat to look that way.

6) Repeat for all white nails, and once dry (very important!) add a coat of clear to seal.

I very strongly suggest doing this with a friend - do not be like me and try to do your non-dominant hand by yourself!  You will be screaming by the time you are done.  Besides, nail-painting with a friend is a fantastic way to get some Valentines love!

7) Now it's time for the blue nail.  Take your very fine paintbrush and dip it into the white paint:

8) Veeerrrrrry carefully, make a white rectangle (or as close to a rectangle as you can) in the middle of your blue nail.  Let it dry, and clearcoat it.

9) Drip a drop or two of your red paint onto some scrap paper, and use your toothpick to make a tiny heart on top of the rectangle.  At this size, it does not have to be a true heart: a "V" will do.  It will look like a heart no problem.  Let dry, clearcoat.

10) Using your black finetip pen, draw very carefully around the little heart and around the square, adding two diagonal lines from the heart tops to the corners to make it look like an envelope.  Now you have an envelope sealed with a heart on your nail!

Enjoy those love letters!!!

And remember: Valentines Day isn't just about love between romantic partners; it's a day to show your love for ALL the people dear to you.  So if you are feeling left out this Valentine's Day, arrange a friend date and have some cookies and nail art!

Have a fantastic day!

Love, Emily.