hello, november!
this is definitely my favourite time of year… even though it always shocks my system a little to do this whole daylight-savings-time thing… seriously, my sleep is jacked up for like 2 weeks after that happens.
c’est le vie, eh?!
at least it won’t be pitch black at 7 a.m. anymore…
anyway, here are a few of my favourite shake-it snaps from recent days. i hope you all had a fun, safe, and happy halloween!
—
sopris never gets old…
this is the time of year when they move the cattle down to graze in different pastures…
this kind of colour is pretty much totally gone, now…
but i made sure to soak it all in…
i just love it…
mmm, apple pie………….. soooo good!
i did a little dog-sitting last month… and our shadows were GIANTS! teeeheheeee….
i also did a little chicken-sitting… and had the freshest eggs i’ve ever eaten! like, 40 minutes old – fresh!
frost!
sopris… again.
i’ve been making and eating a ton of sauerkraut…
and making and taking a bunch of pointless selfies…
i dunno, this just looked cool…
so did this…
fall!
this time you couldn’t even see sopris…
fiery sunsets!
a rainbow over my tiny house!
i’m so in love with lense-flare.
oh yeah, one day i found these guys in a head of broccoli… they both took a poo on my hand – hysterical!
mmmmmmm, nothing like cozying up by a wood-fire!
an archery target! which i SOOOO want to use some day soon!
weird stuff you find on hikes…
… like the pumpkin graveyard… 😉
—
have a great weekend!
between farmer’s markets, my new job, and cool new people in my life – i’m one blessed {and grateful!} lady! ❤
i totally fell in love… with this great little town… paonia. i actually considered moving there before i moved to my little neck of the mountains… but i hadn’t yet visited and i’m super glad i had the opportunity to this week! i had heard that there were farms up in paonia where you could pick your own produce for a nominal fee… and obviously – i was all over that!
the season for peaches is almost over, but orchard valley farms still had plenty of trees to harvest from! i had never done anything like this, it was quite the experience! ❤
i left my camera at home, because this was sort of an impromptu trip… but i had the trusty iphone.
hehehee {not a real person, but totally fooled me!} 😛
entrance to the garden and grove… {those are “peach pickers”}
peach trees galore!
ladder to pick the really big ones at the top!
like this! 😀
sipping wine and picking peaches… what a day!
pumpkins! {no pickin’ pumpkins, though!}
no picking wine grapes either… but the merlot/cabernet blend from black ridge winery was just wonderful!
then i spotted this door on the way out… 🙂
enjoy the weekend!
i think it’s so cool that so many things grow wild up here… asparagus, morel mushrooms…
…and raspberries!
so, the tiny house movement is picking up some steam… and attention! i just discovered {thanks, marylala!} that the FYI channel {which i also just found out existed} recently introduced a new television show called “tiny house nation.” i hope i can find a way to stream it, since i don’t have TV.
we are going to try to convince them to come to the western slope 😉
here is an update on the tiny house project happening next door to me… see the complete foto-story here.
———
TH2 – tiny house project by legacy homes
making progress…
holy smokes – check out this awesome dual shower with all kinds of fancy looking features!
i can see my {tiny} house from here!
i think it’s so amazing and interesting – how our bodies speak to us.
i find it so interesting how our dietary needs can shift and change over the years, also. for example – i never liked eggs much when i was younger… and over the last 3-5 years i’ve just been love love loving them! i can’t seem to get enough eggs. luckily, i’m able to buy farm-fresh locally raised eggs which were fed a non-gmo organic diet – free of soy, too! afterall, you eat what your food eats. so i choose only organic dairy and meat products for this reason.
i’m so thankful i can purchase these {incredible, edible} eggs close to where i live!
——
they are just beautiful… don’t you agree?!
diversity is beautiful…
uniqueness is beautiful…
food is beautiful!!!
i am so blessed. i need to keep myself in check whenever i feel that i am anything otherwise.
i live in this amazing place where i have access to amazing locally grown and produced food – including quality, pasture-raised, grass-fed, fresh beef. now – some of you may be shaking your head at that word, reading it here on this ol’ blog – food and foto. you’re probably like, “wait a second -i thought she was like, vegan or something!? doesn’t she usually do meatless mondays?!” well, yes – yes i do. and yes, for about four months once – i was vegan.
but dude, i’m not anything – i’m everything. and right now i’m really enjoying eating lots of grass-fed beef, butter, cheese, and dairy. i can’t seem to get enough of it. i feel very blessed to have regular access to grass-fed beef products. have you ever had the pleasure of enjoying grass-fed beef?! it simply doesn’t compare… it is just amazing!
while at my personal favourite market, i picked up some grass-fed beef produced from a local ranch where i live and was inspired to create these adorable mini-sliders. nothing special about them, really – other than the fact that this meal is basically farm-to-table! i just wanted to share the pictures and rave about how happy and grateful i am that i live in a place that values the ethical treatment of animals and provides availability of these great quality products to an equally-compassionate and educated foodie like myself! 😀 Continue reading
i love waking up and seeing this…
sometimes i feel like i have more conversations with wildlife lately than i do with humans. i’m not complaining; i talk to anything that has life or energy – so, i pretty much talk to everything 😉
this family of elk live in my ‘hood and they have recently been grazing the grasses by where i walk home every day… sometimes i see them, sometimes i just see their poop.
but i do believe they are starting to recognize me!
sometimes they just stare back at me… i inch closer, snap another foto, and they just stare. i do believe they know who i am now, and they know who my camera is, as well. the little fawns i’ve been seeing are just heart-melting, too!
let’s all take time this weekend to unplug – connect with your true source, with nature. hug a tree, smell the roses, look for bumble bees, stare at the clouds. get lost in the beauty that is around all around you… ❤
so, i randomly and spontaneously my have potentially found my new favourite restaurant. the charming place is called town. and the period is part of the title, so don’t forget it. 😉 if the rumour that their menu changes up frequently is in fact accurate, i may make it official. in the meantime, here is what i had for lunch the other day with a friend.
maple-braised pork belly with caramelized onions, pear, and bacon bits on a bed of brussel sprout leaves… and my favourite thing we ordered — it was just heavenly!
rabbit tacos with some kind of amazing salsa and a creamy mild cheese… shredded carrots, pepitas, scallions, and some other deliciousness. and hey – don’t judge me.
shrimp po’ boy… done a little differently, but still good. shrimp was super tasty as well as the homemade sweet potato chips, and the perfectly dill/sweet combo pickles were also excellent.
i tell ya one thing – i cannot wait to go back for dinner!!!!!!! 😀
aaannnnd, i really want to take pictures of/for them!
i am way overdue for a tiny home update. i have had a lot of personal things going on lately, so i haven’t been taking as many fotos or blogging as much.
plus, the holidays kind of make me want to hibernate… and so does my adorable tiny house… especially when i come home one day and it has been surprisingly decorated… like this :
it’s like living in a snowglobe right now… for real. especially with this fun little wordpress snow falling all over the blog 😉
{and i have the coolest landlords/neighbours ever!}
my creative fee is $365 for 5 hours of FOOD or 5 hours of FOTO
contact me for more details! 🙂
hey friends!
how’s your week going so far? mine has been nice, the weather has been so beautiful up here!
i’m so excited to share some news with you! — a few weeks ago, i reached out to tinyhouseblog.com about doing a guest-post. i had been following tinyhouseblog for a while, since i knew i was going to be moving into this tiny home. i became somewhat obsessed with tiny living spaces… it’s so fascinating to me how many people live this lifestyle and it’s awesome to see what different people do with different living spaces.
i was so thrilled when kent agreed to let me write about my tiny home. i have been eagerly waiting to see it posted, and today is the magic day! i wanted to share the link, and share my pride a little 🙂 i will have another update on the tiny home very soon.. i’ve been making a few adjustments so it’s totally foto-ready!
thank you again for the opportunity, kent!
i had never seen anything like this and i was so happy to get immersed right in the middle of it!
remember last friday i wrote about the coolest cattle?! well, as i was fotographing them that day, i inadvertently got stuck behind the twice-a-year cattle round-up that takes place here in town. i was pretty much cracking-up the entire time and also felt so privileged to have witnessed this event, camera-in-hand.
it was the day of the eclipse, too… and the sunset was unbelievable!
i know they’re “just cows”, but i love them. and what i want to know is…
how the heck did they round up all these cows without me noticing? one can’t get off this road, so-to-speak, and i had just turned around to head back down the hill when i saw this… Continue reading
i almost didn’t share these fotos… simply because i felt like what i witnessed was so sacred and so divine… i really felt the connection and bond to these creatures as i was fotographing them a couple weeks ago… there was something very special about my moments behind the camera with this herd of cattle. i even get a little teary-eyed thinking of it now.
hundreds of these animals live not to far up the road from me, on a gorgeous ranch. most of these are dairy cows, however a few of them are angus cows.
now, i’m not necessarily a vegetarian {though i’ve had my stints}, but i limit my intake of meat in general, and only once in a great while do i eat red meat. but when i do, i am so very particular about where it comes from and how the animal was treated while raised. i am too educated not to make wise decisions about what i eat. {watch food, inc. or any other number of food documentaries and see what i mean} i feel like it’s my responsibility in a way… and i was so happy to know that i could find and purchase grass-fed meats locally here in my new town.
what made me feel really good about seeing the angus cows on this farm, was knowing what a happy life they had. they weren’t shoved into a cattle-lot and stepping over each other just to eat. they were out grazing… on the most beautiful pasture, surrounded by mount sopris, bein’ all cool…
just hanging out, like this :
“your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.” ~rumi
i love love love this quote!
as i was looking for a foto to post today, i thought about reflections… and how as individuals, we are all reflections – of each other. any time you like something in another person, you are really liking or honouring something within yourself – a quality you possess, albeit possibly dormant. and likewise, if there is something you do NOT like within another, it is often something you really don’t like within yourself… think about it.
so i say – let’s just try to focus on the things we love about ourselves and each other – since we are basically mirrors anyway, why not work to be the most benevolent mirror ever – so that when someone is in your presence, the only thing that will be reflected back to them…
…is LOVE.
🙂
animals {and all of nature} can teach us so much about awareness. they can teach us about patience, presence, process, and perfect magic.
animals behave from instinct, not from thought. i find it comforting when an animal crosses my path. i feel their energy offers us much insight into a greater cosmic awareness.
so, here are a few friends i made recently :
this was the “little caterpillar that could” – i watched him patiently inch across the street just in time before a big truck came rolling through…
this dog followed me all the way into town one day… and right after i took this foto, i looked up and a huge raven flew over my head. {talk about magic!}
lots of cattle surround these hills and they have so much room to play! Continue reading
food & foto 