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five on friday | princeton family photographer

1. It’s June and I’m just not ready for that at all. It means that summer is here, it means that the year is almost half way through, it means fresh local veggies all the time, it means HOT HOT HOT, it means vacations and family get togethers. This year is going to be a challenge on the last one because Anthony + I are not going to be in Oklahoma at the same time. Some work has come up that has me missing Anthony’s 10 year class reunion. Since he was class president we figured he should go without me this time around. I’m very sadden by this but there just was no way around it!

2. For the first time two weeks ago, Anthony + I shot our first event together at Princeton University’s chapel for the seminary’s commencement exercises. It was fun to have him there by my side, although I think he’d tell you differently. For a man who hasn’t really taken many photos with one of my cameras, he rocked it on semi-auto (aperture-priority mode that is)! You can view the majority of the photos here.

3. Last year some time my awesome mother-in-law Vicki learned to needlepoint. She has made pillows, foot stools, and I’m not even sure what else. Her Christmas present to us was going to be a pillow. She completed her part, dropped it off at the store to be mailed to the pillow-maker (you see where this is going???), and it turned up missing. The store owner couldn’t find it, the pillow-maker couldn’t find it. It was g.o.n.e., gone! The hours, the hard work, the thread, everything. Vicki, as sweet and kind as she is, forgave them all and began working diligently on another design for me. My birthday present – it’s absolutely beautiful!! When I get my own craft/office space, this pillow will proudly be displayed in there.

4. After watching Maria Menounos on The Nate Show a few weeks ago promoting her new book The Everygirl’s Guide to Life, I knew I wanted to glance at it (thank you public libraries for being AWESOME and having it!!). The first chapter is about organizing which I love to do myself! It then got me on this kick about purging stuff that I truly don’t need (which is pretty much 90% of our home…). This will be a work in progress, I’m giving myself until January which is most likely when we’ll be moving into the new seminary apartments, but getting rid of 3 huge bags of crap from our bedroom is totally freeing. And to give myself credit, I’ve been slowing giving away our stuff over the years to the Vietnam Vets (they come to your house and PICK it up for you!!!!!), but reading that book gave me that final kick. No more moving crap from place to place that I’ll never use/wear/etc. Spring cleaning at it’s finest!

5. While purging, I came across a handful of my CD collection. This lead me to copy them into my iTunes and now I’ve gotta figure out what to do with the actual CDs. I don’t want them anymore and I’m not even sure they are worth anything. Anthony thinks I’m crazy to want to get rid of them, which lead us to a conversation about backing up our online music collection and other documents/files/etc. on our computers. I realized that I do a lot of backing up of my stuff (hello client photos!!!!) but Anthony doesn’t really have a system. Time to get an external hard drive for him!!!

Leaving you all on a flower! Have a wonderful weekend!

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Libby - June 5, 2011 - 5:06 pm

I love that pillow from your mother-in-law…what a sweetheart to remake it for you guys!! I’m so excited summer is here, but dang, I could do without so much heat right now!

Becky Anderson - June 5, 2011 - 6:23 pm

Beautiful pillow! I have a box of CDs I don’t know what to do with either…

gardening update

I’ve been slacking on updating my gardening tales. Much has happened since our community day at the first of April. And truth be told, I took these photos a few weeks ago (I think it was right before it rained and was overcast for it seemed like forever!!) and everyone has grown even more! I try to get out there at least once a day, but there are times it just doesn’t happen. Thankfully as I’ve read in several books, seeds just want to grow. They will do what they can to grow, even if we humans neglect them a bit.

So far we have planted two different kinds of carrots, basil, rosemary, onions, bush beans, two tomato plants, okra, squash and lettuce. I also have two zucchini plants going in our neighbors front area (they don’t mind and we are sharing the farm share with them this year – I figured if it grows something they can have some too!!) along with some more onions and tomatillos. I just got in some organic heirloom potatoes that I am hoping to put into a trash barrel to maximize space and growth!

An AWESOME visual!!! (you can’t see the lettuce because I bought them from the farmer’s market and planted them after this photo!)

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Shey - May 31, 2011 - 8:48 pm

Love that you have a garden!!!! I am very jealous of your organization and planning – my garden is all over the place. Love the photos!

Jaidean - June 6, 2011 - 10:28 pm

Looks great! We had the worst hail/rain/thunderstorm last week and my plants didn’t seem to like that very much. I’m hoping they will come back!

sullivan | central jersey newborn photographer

At four days old, I believe Mr. Sullivan is my youngest newborn to date and he was a dream! It helped that the weather was warm (we were sweating like crazy!) + Shannon and Steve were some of the most relaxed new parents I’ve ever seen.

Gorgeous momma!

Someone was out hardcore with the mouth open and all!

My new favorite photo – Shannon + Steve did not find out the sex before Sullivan made his arrival into the world last Sunday so his nursery is a little incomplete. They decided to go with a fishing theme and I love that they had their canoe + kayak just waiting to get a photo with the little guy. This would be perfect blown up as art work for the nursery!

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mccarter theatre gala | princeton commercial photographer

There is nothing better than rockin’ and rollin’ at McCarter Theatre than their annual Gala on Saturday night!! It’s funny because I drive by the theatre pretty much every day as it’s basically across the street from the seminary and for the first two years we’ve lived here I wondered what that big tent on the lawn was for. I always assumed it was for Princeton University’s graduation. When Chrissy contacted me about photographing the Gala I immediately knew what the big white tent was finally for!!!

Mad props to Jimmy Duffy Catering for an incredibly delicious dinner and beautiful tent set up!

Some of the lovely guests including the Gala co-chairs (last photo).

 

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homemade cookies!!!

Last week I went on a huge baking spree as I hosted our final book club for the school year. Maybe I shouldn’t share my “secret” recipes…but they are below for you!

First up are the double chocolate chip cookies (first photo on the left) adapted from Real Simple. Looks like lots of people had mixed reviews on these, but I’ve never had issues with them. We end up baking them all and then putting them in a zip top bag in the freezer. Pull out one or two when you want a cookie, warm it up in the microwave for 15-20 seconds! I’m not sure how long you should keep in the freezer as they are typically gone within 2 weeks.

Ingredients
1/2 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 large egg
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup milk-chocolate chips

Directions
Cream the butter and both sugars in a large bowl with an electric mixer on high speed.
Lower to medium speed and add the egg and vanilla.
Sift together the flour, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder, and salt.
On low speed, add the dry mixture to the butter mixture. Beat until fully incorporated. Fold in the chocolate chips.

At this time, I put it in the refrigerator overnight to chill (cover). When I’m ready to bake in the morning, I pull container out of the frig, and turn oven to 350 degrees. The dough will be tough to manipulate, give yourself about 10 minutes before handling but not much longer.

Form the dough into approximately 1 1/2-inch balls. Place on parchment- or foil-lined baking sheets, 2 inches apart.
Bake until the centers are just set, about 12 minutes. Let cool on sheets for 5 minutes, then transfer to wire racks. (as you can see from my photo, mine do not spread much at all).

Download Recipe HERE

Homemade Oreos (or a version of Whoopie Pies) (second/third photo)

Adapted from Pen and Paper Flowers
I’ve stopped buying store-bought cake mixes, so coming up with a comparable mix recipe was a challenge on these (hence why they turned into more Whoopie Pie than Oreo!). I did a search for devil’s food cake recipes and took bits & pieces of them all. This will need more work on my end!

Lofthouse Frosted Cookie (last photo w/greenish frosting)

Adapted from Noshings on Tasty Kitchen
Another recipe that called for a store-bought cake mix. It didn’t turn out the way I would want, so I’m not going to share my exact recipe yet! You can visit the above link to get the recipe. I didn’t add shortening/Crisco to the frosting either and that was perfectly fine (I actually halved the frosting recipe as I knew I didn’t have enough cookies for a full batch so I did the full amount of butter and omitted shortening.). Overall they were yummy cookies!

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Jaidean - May 19, 2011 - 1:02 pm

YUMMMM!

macro | all things pretty

Lots of bloggers do a wordless (typically Wednesday!) blog post – I’m starting the tradition now, even though it’s a Friday morning!

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emily b - May 13, 2011 - 10:04 am

SO beautiful, Kim!

Brindes - May 13, 2011 - 10:19 pm

Great pic, so delicate.. and loved the effect!

Jaidean - May 16, 2011 - 11:22 am

That is beautiful! Love the texture on it!

Holly - May 16, 2011 - 9:44 pm

Very pretty! Love the colors here.

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