Random iPhone Photo Fun

I've been having fun with some iPhone camera apps lately. My friend Jodi introduced me to Hipstamatic which makes your photos look totally groovy. You can choose your lens and film type to produce different effects. Hipstamatic costs $1.99 from the iTumes store and you can also purchase additional lenses and film types for $0.99. Here are few that I took over the weekend.





Next up is Instagram (a free app) which allows you to view and save photos taken with your iPhone camera using different filters for various effects.



Finally, I couldn't resist spending the buck or two on IncrediBooth which simulates photo booth fun without the worry of who was going to sit on who's lap. You can choose between three different finishes including black and white. Super fun! The first strip is England's Glory, Mannaramma, and I hamming it up at Gallery Stroll and the other is Ryan and I goofing off before we tried to conquer level 20 of Angry Birds. Still no dice on that.

Rolling on the River

I'm an Aquarian, you know, the water-bearer, and as such, I adore the water. I love being in it, on it, or at the very least, near it. Oddly enough, I've never been river rafting. It isn't because I haven't had the opportunity though because I have. The fact of the matter is that I've been too afraid to give it a try.

When I first moved to Utah as a teen-ager we had neighbors, two Dads and their two children each, who went rafting in the spring in the creek not far from our house. I don't know exactly what went wrong that day but one Dad fell out of the raft, hit his head on a rock and went under. The other Dad managed to get the kids to edge of the creek safely but was unable to get himself out of the water. He drowned also. This left quite an impression on me.

So many of my friends grew up river rafting and tell me that they knew I would love it. This past weekend I had the opportunity to go on the spur of the moment and without much time to think about it I agreed to go. We met our friends in Vernal and floated nine miles down the Green River on Saturday. Floating the river was fantastic! The scenery was spectacular. We had a great time and after we got off the river we were treated to a dutch oven dinner. Yum! I hope we get invited again next June.

Sidewalk Bistro

One steamy night this past summer I had the most ridiculously wonderful dinner in New York City. As some of you know, my daughter moved to NYC in August to start graduate school. I traveled out there to make sure she got settled into her new apartment and provide some moral support. Actually, she didn't need the moral support, I did, but that's another story.

Ban made the trip east with me and since he'd never been to New York before I wanted to spend some time in the city, in addition to time on Long Island with family. We spent a glorious day walking, biking, and taking the subway all over Manhattan. I posted about our adventures here and here. But late that night, we ventured out on foot into the Hell's Kitchen area and walked around until we found somewhere that appealed. Being New York City, you can imagine how many delectable temptations faced us but one stuck out in particular.

It was a little French bistro with sidewalk seating. I can't remember the name. I even looked back through my credit card statements (Ban must have paid). But I do remember the steam coming up through the manhole cover, and the crisp, refreshing taste of the glass of champagne, and the creamy smooth texture of the mussels that we ate. I remember feeling simultaneously exhausted and exhilarated and promising one another that we'd be back for more explorations sooner rather than later.

Zumba Anyone?

I've been on leave of absence from roller derby since the beginning of October. I was experiencing foot pain and on the verge of derby burn out and needed the time off. It's been really, really nice to reclaim two weeknights per week. I've been able to read more, write more, and spend more time with family and friends.

On the downside, I've given up five hours of scheduled exercise time per week. I thought I would easily pick up the slack by trying some new classes at the gym, hiking more, and skating out-of-doors at Liberty Park on nice days. But in reality, I've just been a big slug (see above about more reading, writing and socializing). I'm embarrassed to admit it but it's true.

So, two months of leave finds me with pain-free feet but all my clothes fitting a bit more snug than I'd like. This week I hit the breaking point and decided that I need to get my butt in gear. I'm glad to report that I worked out all four days of the long weekend. This morning I met up with a friend for a spinning class. I haven't been to a spin class in weeks, maybe a month, yikes! The class was great and some new offerings at my gym have me inspired.

I think I'm going to try a Zumba class this week. Have you ever tried Zumba? Here is a youtube clip if you are unsure what Zumba class is. I think it looks ridiculously fun. Let me know if you want to join me!

Quinoa, Leek, & Cherry Stuffed Turkey Breast

Ban made a sensational stuffed turkey breast for dinner yesterday. There were only going to be five of us for Thanksgiving dinner this year so we didn't want to cook an entire turkey. He found the recipe on Dani Spies website. Here is a link to the quinoa, leek, and cherry stuffing.

We bought a turkey breast and for some reason, we were surprised when we got it home and found that it was basically a turkey with no legs or wings. I'm not sure what we were expecting, but nonetheless, we had to figure out how to debone the damn thing. Thank God, Ban is fearless and you can find instructional videos on how to do pretty much anything on youtube. I've included a link to the youtube video that we used if you are interested.

The process of deboning is a little gruesome if you are a meat-a-phobe like me, but as usual, Ban did an amazing job. After he skinned and deboned the turkey breast, he pounded it out flat. Then, he spread a layer of thinly sliced black forest ham over the breast. Next, he placed the quinoa, leek, and cherry stuffing over the ham.


Then, he rolled and trussed the bird. The deboned turkey breast cooks much more quickly than a whole bird so we were ready to roll after an hour and half in the oven.


The end product looked gorgeous and tasted delicious. The turkey was tender and juicy and the stuffing was light and flavorful. We'll definitely add this recipe into the holiday meal rotation.

Sunday Dinner with the New York Fam

I spent the weekend with my New York family. I went to the city, visited the Tenement Museum, and ate at some charming (read small) cafes. I spent a few nights with cousin on Long Island and had a great time with her ridiculously adorable daughter.

But one of the highlights was having Sunday dinner with my Grandmother, Aunt, Uncle, cousins, and the cousin's babies. We so rarely have the opportunity to share a meal together which is a shame because my Aunt Jo is an excellent cook.

Tonight, we started the meal with antipasto. Besides being visually stunning it tasted like salty, creamy deliciousness. Next up was my spaghetti with my Aunt's famous meatballs and tomato sauce. Heaven!

For dessert, we had the choice of chocolate cheesecake, crumb cake (my fave!), or chocolate covered pretzels and mugs of steaming coffee.

After dinner I headed back into the city to meet up with the girl child. We're having a sleep over at her place tonight which thus far has consisted of us camped out on her bed each with a laptop on our lap. It's been way too long since we've had a girls night like this.

Chris Isaak, Roller Derby and Gospel Music

I had an action-packed adventure weekend last weekend. On Friday night, Ban and I went to Red Butte Garden to see consummate showman Chris Isaak do his thing. Some rain dropped just as the gates opened but thankfully it did not last for long and the sun was shining again by the time he took the stage. Early in his set, he left the stage and meandered through the crowd of adoring fans. The first part of the set was pretty mellow with popular songs like Somebody's crying and Wicked Game but then he picked up the pace and brought the crowd to its feet. He really put on a terrific show and he's very personable with the audience. I would encourage you to check him out next time he is in town.

On Saturday night, the Leave it To Cleavers hit the track for the first time since June 6 with the hopes of ending the Death Dealers season and advancing ourselves to the championship bout to defend our title. The Cleavers played a great game but got into some penalty trouble in the second half. But the Dealers didn't have an answer to the Cleavers terrific jamming and strong blocking. Final Score: Cleavers 107 - Dealers 81. Check out this amazing photo by Mark Alston of the Cleaver bench. Championship game will be held on September 26 at the Salt Palace.


Finally, on Sunday we headed to Snowbird for the Tent Revival music festival. I'd won tickets to the festival earlier in the week from UtahFM. If you haven't checked out this online community radio station you should! I love the Wasatch Cocktail show on Wednesday afternoons, Women the Third Decade on Thursday mornings, and Funky Trunk on Thursday afternoons.

The Tent Revival was held under unseasonably cool, sunny skies. We brought a blanket up and stretched out on the grass for the afternoon listening to various artists. Some friends met us there and we enjoyed a very relaxing afternoon. I was a little bummed to have not won the Sunday Hat contest after showing up with this number on but the competition was stiff among the dozen or so women who'd sported their Sunday best.

Hello New Yorker, Here I Come

July 1, 2009 will dawn a new day in the life of drinkers in Utah. One of our many archaic liquor laws goes the way of the dodo today. No more private clubs with memberships!

What does this mean? Well, it means that if I want to go to the New Yorker in downtown Salt Lake City, I can just show up at the door and get in. Previously, I would have needed to purchase either an annual membership or if I did not want to commit to that, I could have purchased a temporary membership. Either way, it was ridiculous and many diners avoided certain establishments because they did not want to pay to get in. Here is the link to the Salt Lake Tribune's coverage of the law change.

City Weekly will be hosting a Scenic Bar Tour tonight to celebrate. You can get all the details here. Basically, over one dozen bars will be participating and City Weekly will be providing bus service to shuttle merry-makers around the valley. As an added bonus, there will be free cab rides provided for those who may over imbibe.
(Photo via LATimes)

Arts Festival 2009

I spent Sunday afternoon at the Arts Festival in downtown Salt Lake City. The weather was absolutely perfect. We met up with a bunch of friends who we haven't hung out with in a while. It was fabulous to catch up with them.


We wandered around looking at the art and a painting of a pair of high heels caught my attention. I went into the booth and saw painting of more shoes and boot, purses, cupcakes, cocktails and roller skates! It was like the artist knew me! I really wanted to the painting of the roller skates but sadly, it was a little bit out of my budget.

There were some funny metal works sculptures. I liked this guy. His ribs are bent crescent wrenches. Amazing!


There are plenty of good eats at the arts festival too. In fact, the number of choices can be a little overwhelming. I'd read an article in the Trib that there was a booth that was selling tapas so I held out while everyone else made their food selections in the food row hoping to find the tapas booth in the festival.

It took a while and was a little torturous waiting while everyone else was eating pizza, cheese steaks, and fish tacos but I eventually found the tapas! I ordered the diver scallops with creamed spinach. Delicious and quite fancy.

Whack-A-Kitty

You may or may not not know that I am the Wack-A-Mole champion of the world, although on my last trip to Lagoon Ban managed to squeak out a win. Fear not, there will be a rematch sometime this summer. I'm unwilling to let go of champion status that easily. But, in the meantime I hope you'll enjoy this ridiculously funny video clip.

My New Camera

Many of you who know me know the joke that if I were one of the X-Men that I would be Indeciso. I've always had a point and shoot camera and I've wanted to upgrade for quite some time now. After months of research I've FINALLY decided that I'm going to buy a Canon S5 IS . At first I had decided to get a Canon dSLR but after borrowing one for the weekend I came to the conclusion that it was just too much camera for me at this point. I know myself well enough to know that there is no way that I'd lug that big, heavy thing around with me regularly. So, the Canon S5 seemed like a good intermediate step.

I just got the camera and I'm very excited to start taking photos!