Count Down To Greatness

I have been practicing some new things with my camera today. Here is one of the only photos that turned out. I'm finally getting the hang of the SS-400 flash, white balance, and manual modes.
Today has been exhausting. I have done barely anything and yet I am ready for bed. Maybe that's a good thing, since I am leaving for San Diego at 5 tomorrow morning. But I am so excited for it! So here is my top 5 of great things that are happening this week.

5. It is Spring Break! Whatever that means. I sort of feel like I'm on spring break all the time, but this is cool! This is fun. Spring Break. Yes.
4. I am driving down to San Diego with one of my best friends. I don't get to see Miles very often, so it will be a good chance to catch up with him.
3. In the process of driving down, Miles and I are having a Coheedathon, where we will listen to Coheed and Cambria's albums from beginning to end. I am so excited for one through four. And I can't wait for album number 5 coming on the 13th!
2. On the way home, I am going to drive Miles home to Santa Cruz, and then I will be driving to Walnut Creek to see Stina for a night! I have never visited her at this house before, so it'll be fun seeing how she's living and what her life is like in Walnut Creek!
1. Last but certainly not least, because he's sorta my number one and the reason why I'm going down to San Diego, I get to see Andy!! We are going to have adventures, and make good food, and be wise with our money, and go on a hot date! Basically the usual, being cute and all. I can't wait.

This week is going to be great. Now I am off, to do tons of laundry, pack, clean my room, and eat those delicious cookies Bella just made.

Question of the blog:
What are you doing for your spring break?

All Four

Spring is here. I finally see it! I am so glad I live in a place with four seasons. I always want to live in a place that holds all of them.

(All images from WeHeartIt)

I love the changes of the seasons. It's so beautiful to see how the earth weaves in this pattern, from hot to cold, dark and light. The thing I enjoy most about spring is the smells. Trees that carry a smell of pretty little blossoms. Flowers that fill a room with joy and fragrance.


I like summer for its power. The sun beats down and I drive to the river to bask in its heat. I like the jolt of cold when you first jump in the Yuba. The sunsets make me feel full at the end of the day, like today was an accomplishment in itself.


I like autumn for its colors. Autumn is sort of a lonesome stage of the seasons. The colors turn so incredibly vibrant as the days grow colder. I love seeing little animals collecting their food for the winter, especially squirrels with cheeks full of nuts. I like the dry feeling of Autumn.


I like that winter forces you in or out. I love the preparation that goes in to staying warm, and the surprise of new snow on the ground when you wake up. Winter is gentle, but cold.I like traveling up in elevation and seeing how the snow has laid itself on the mountains.

Question of the blog:
I like Autumn the most. What is your favorite season? Do you live in a place with all four seasons?

Life And Times

Hello friends. This is sort of a color-coded blog. I guess I just have some catching up and explaining to do. So we'll start with this. The other day was a turquoise day. I love when I get in my car, and the sun is shining ever so perfectly that my clothes sort of light up the inside of my car.

A lot of my days are spent solo. I've learned to like it that way. It's a peaceful solitude that gives me time to think, for now. I have a lot of things to think about right now. But sometimes, I just need a friend right next to me. When I can't have that, I just want to just scream red! But it's teaching me patience. So I go to the fairgrounds, and take my box of fried rice, and I read on my own. I'm learning to be on my own.

Something that has always been incredibly important to me, is capturing moments. I'm a forgetful person. God built this beautiful person that I have come to love as myself, but I'm a bit broken. I am forgetful, and I lose sight of what once was. I love looking back at silly photos and just chuckle at my life. Welly has been doing this thing where he will sneak up on me while I'm on my computer. My bed is right behind, so while I'm at my desk, he hops up onto my shoulder and rests half his body on me. It is so cute, and brings a little sunshiney yellow to my days.

There is someone very close to me whose spiritual life completely changed mine in high school. I have always struggled with the expectations of what a priest's daughter should do, and in a sense I took those expectations and felt very discouraged by them. When I met Jillian, I introduced her to the Christian life, and the other day she reminded me of the importance I was to her in that time. I don't think she will ever know what an impact she made in my life at that time, and how much she inspired me to learn and grow in my faith, so that I could properly minister to other people. Her clay stained hands have molded me into a better person, that I am proud of today.

Today, I bought glasses. They are for times where I am studying, or reading, or on computers. They are a pretty brown/light blue/teal combo, and I like them. While I was at the optometrists, I was taking photos of the glasses, and of my dad and I. A man asked me if I was a photographer.
Am I a photographer?
I don't know, really. I mean maybe. Wikipedia defines me as a photographer. But more importantly, do I consider myself one? I have yet to decide. It's a browned down type of passion. Not one I want to flaunt, just something I want to share with the world.

That's why I'm writing to you, for you. I want to share my life, my times, with you. Whether it's black and white, or I'm living my life in technicolor, I hope you and I can share that together. Am I a photographer? Maybe. But let's go on that journey together, and we'll figure some things about all of us on the way.
Thank you for coming along with me!

Dot On A Map

(Photo found on WeHeartIt)

This will be my map one day.
I want to conquer nothing. Just experience everything.

Alexandra's Wreck Journal: Part 5

Woohoo! Look what I got in the mail yesterday!


Andy filled out a few pages, and sent my Wreck Journal right on back to me. I'll be honest, I was going through withdrawals (more Andy withdrawals than Wreck Journal).


1. Tape This Journal Closed. Mail It To Yourself. Andy did the honors, and mailed it home in this fashion. I hope this made a few people smile on the way.
2. Scribble Wildly, Violently, With Reckless Abandon. I am positive Andy used one of his precious pens to scribble on this page. He is one of the few people I know who have this obsession with owning a million of only one model of pen. I'm the type of person that as long as it's black or red ink, and it works, I'll use it.
3. Tear Out. Crumple. I like the journal entries that have dimension to them, because when I close my Wreck Journal and look at the edges, it looks worn.


Thank you Andy, for helping me destroy my journal a little more! See you in less than 6.

Question of the blog:
Tonight, I made a quick detour to Save Mart and bought some M&M cookies, which are the best. What is your favorite type of cookie?

Ice Cream Pie!

Spring is here!
It's getting warmer, and I'm starting to uncover those shorts and skirts I haven't seen in months. The other day, it was about 75 degrees here, and everyone around town was in flip flops and buying ice cream.
During this (short) glimpse of warm weather, I decided to make an ice cream pie with Heath bars in it. Ice cream pies are super easy to make, and are a great treat on a warm day like the ones we've been having.


All you'll need for your Heath Bar ice cream pie is
1 Ready Crust chocolate pie crust
5 Heath bars
Enough vanilla ice cream to fill a pie pan.. So not that much. I bought 1.75 quarts of vanilla ice cream, and didn't even use 1/4 of it.
1 freezer.. For freezing, duh.


1. Set up a place to make your Heath bar ice cream pie. Leave the ice cream out to soften.
2. Cut up 3 of your Heath bars into small little pieces. These are the pieces that will go inside your pie, so make sure they're small. You don't want a huge Heath piece to be the death of a friend you are hoping to woo with this delicious treat.


3. Once the ice cream has softened enough to easily scoop with a spoon, lay down a layer of ice cream in your chocolate pie crust. Pack the ice cream as gently as possible, so you don't crush your crust.


4. Next, throw a layer of Heath bar on top of your layer of ice cream. You can put as little or as much as you would like, but make sure there you can see some ice cream through the Heath, so the two layers of ice cream can settle together. How romantic.


5. Once you are satisfied with your level of Heath bars, cover it up with the vanilla ice cream. I chose to only make one layer of Heath bar, but if you're feeling saucy, try putting two layers in, with three layers of ice cream. Just make sure to cover the Heath chunks completely.
6. Smooth over the top of your pie, and put it in the freezer for 45 minutes, or until the ice cream is frozen again. You don't want to eat Heath bar soup.


7. While your pie is freezing, break your last two Heath bars into big thick pieces for the topping. Another way of doing the topping is crushing the Heath bars, so your pie is more of a crumble pie on the top.
8. Take out your frozen ice cream pie, and start decorating! I did more of a Flinstone/mosaic top, but I encourage you to decorate to your own satisfaction. As you decorate, push the Heath bar pieces into the ice cream, so that they aren't easily moved when the ice cream starts melting.


9. Put your Heath bar ice cream pie into the freezer for another 45 minutes so that all of the ice cream in the pie is frozen.
10. Invite your friends over, and slice your pie open to reveal a delicious, chocolatey inside.


One great thing about this recipe, is that you can substitute Heath bars for any candy you want (maybe not any candy..but most). Next time I make this ice cream pie, I would love to try Snickers, Milky Way, Reese's, or York peppermint patties. Have FUN with your creation!

Question of the blog:
In all recipes, I prefer instructions that are clear, but with some vague parts that leave room for me to be creative. In my recipes that I post on here, would you prefer to hear straightforward, meticulous instructions, or more of a relaxed view to cooking?

Lock and Key

Yesterday I had a photoshoot with my friend Alix. She and I had a great time driving around and shooting around Nevada City.


I rarely shoot with people who have tattoos, so it was really fun shooting with Alix and capturing hers. She has a beautiful lock tattoo over her heart, and her younger sister has a key over hers.




Alix and I both shoot with the Nikon D60, so it was great being able to share what we know and how we both prefer to photograph things.


We had an awesome day, and Alix and I are going to shoot again some time soon. It was especially fun to shoot with Alix because I rarely photograph people who are have experience modeling and have a similar style as her.

Question of the blog:
Alix just dyed her hair a couple of days ago from brown to Ariel mermaid red. If you could dye your hair any color, what color would it be?

One Way Street

I live at the end of a one way street. Below us, it a creek that trickles in some places, and white waters in others. In the winter time, all you hear is rushing river. In the summer, I listen to frogs all night long. They put me to sleep, as I open my windows and leave them like that all night.
A big group of frogs just started up, and I can hear them from the creek. Summer is coming.

Daphne

Changing shapes,
explosions in the sky
blurred lines,
I wipe my eyes.

Patterns move,
we rearrange the light.
Your song,
it stays the same.

And Daphne sings her melody,
it's soft and true,
from black to white.
Lyrics whispered in your ears,
Daphne comes,
and rests on you.


Shifting shadows,
colors pass between us.
Sweet smile,
like coming home.

The surrender,
You and I, we drop it all.
Time change,
blossoms show.

As Daphne sings her melody,
it's right and well,
from black to white.
It resonates within your soul,
Daphne comes,
and rests on you.

Days Past

Septum piercings, squinty eyes. Signs of the days of high school graduation.

After almost a year of being in sparse contact with one of my favorite people in this world, I finally found my Canadian missionary friend's email. That last part doesn't make sense. My friend Brian Preece is a missionary up in Canada, and I didn't have his email until now.
Moving on. In his email, he asked to send a few photos of adventures from the summer of 2008, known as the best summer ever. After looking at all of this and being filled with nostalgia, among other emotions, I decided I might as well share some with you. And here we go!

Oh, Disneyland. This was the first trip for all of us that really signified our independence. Somehow, all of our parents agreed we could drive to LA for 4 days and play in Disneyland. It was awesome. Definitely a great last Hooray for our choir group.

Oh Brian, always causing some commotion. I don't know how he obtained this, but Annie's children are to be Brian's slaves in the future. Doesn't make sense to me either. This was on the way to Disneyland.

Senior ball 2008. Annie and I got ready together, and after Facebooking and watching movies too long, we realized we had NO time to get ready for ball, so we both went overboard on our makeup and didn't have time to fix it. And then I went with Galen Fraser, who wore a white tux. And it was my birthday. What a night.

Ah, the many days of clay class, where Jacob Moultrie and I would hang out, make ugly clay masks that resembled pigs and mythical animals with tusks. This was the last day of clay, where Mr. Slavonic the clay teacher gave me one last speed walking lesson. He's professional.. But I mean that.

Practicing for graduation. There was WAY too much drama going into this line of people, and where we would sit, and such as. In the end, we had smiles on our faces (most of us) and proceeded to graduate without too much more angst (except for reactions to my septum) and then spent all night dancing and having fun at Grad Night.

It's been a while since I looked at these. When I looked at these photos a year after them being taken, I thought, this feels like yesterday. To be honest, it doesn't anymore. It's crazy to think that none of us are the same. That's not a bad thing at all! The way life plays out is just funny though. I do miss each and every one of the people that were part of my life the summer of graduation. Despite not being where we all were back then, it's beautiful to see each person growing up individually. It'll be crazy to reunite with everyone at our reunions..

Superkitty

Isn't Hamilton the cutest kitty ever? Wait, I take that back. Addie is still my favorite. But look at that middle photo. One day, I'm going to be lurking around the internets, and I will run across that photo as the new LOLcats photo. Just you wait!

The Great Rainbow Cake: The Next Generation

Good evening, friends! As you might know, Andy and I made a great rainbow cake a few days ago. To see a few photos and the recipe itself, go to my original post here. My wonderful long-distance friend, Symone, saw my post and tried out the recipe herself. Here was her result!


I'm glad to hear that my recipe instructions worked out well for another person. I encourage you to try making a rainbow cake yourself! And if you do, please send me some of your photos so we can smile together!

Question of the blog:
This one is a question I would REALLY love for you to answer. After this fun baking adventure, I have had this excitement for working in the kitchen and trying new things. So here is my question: Would you like me to start posting a series of fun recipes, with photos and such? I think it would be a fun little series of blogs. I don't know, let me know. You're the ones reading this thing.

Alexandra's Wreck Journal: Part 4

These last couple pages were pretty fun. I chose some cool projects before doing the latest page.. Come see!

A page for four-letter words. I spent so long doing this page! I got about half way done with the list, but then had to start opening bible pages and homework lectures to see if I could find any more words with four letters. I'll be honest, when I went to bed later that night, I could not stop thinking of four letter words! haha!

Tear strips. Rip it up! This one was fun, until it was ripped, and then all of the strips were curled up and the page wouldn't close. So I thought, I haven't weaved in a while.. You see, I used to weave pages all the time. I would make cards for people out of weaved papers, and then I moved onto cranes, and now I'm sort of not doing either. So I decided to weave this page after ripping up strips of it.

Make a sudden, destructive, unpredictable movement with the journal. At first I was thinking, I'm sitting at my desk. I could just throw it at my bookshelf to the left of me.. But then I realized that I have frames over there, and that's too predictable. So, I stuffed it into a little going away package for Andy, and told him to fill out a few pages and send it back. Sounds sudden, destructive, and unpredictable enough for me!
See you soon, little journal. We could call you Journey the Journal!

If any of you are new here, and have no clue what this is, head on over to my first journal posting.

Question of the blog:
Tell me the first four four-letter words you think of.

Color My World: RAINBOW EDITION!

Andy and I love to have food adventures when we are together, and this visit definitely included a few of the top food adventures yet. One night, we had delicious homemade vegetable omelets with hashbrowns for dinner. Yum! Okay, that was great, but it was nothing compared to our food adventure we had yesterday. May I present to you, The Great Rainbow Cake!

Isn't it amazing?? So, for your viewing pleasure, and possible future pleasure for your own tastebuds, I'm going to give you a quick image slideshow on how to make this, and then send you over to the full recipe where we learned how to make this rainbow cake!

Andy and I made this cake with these ingredients:
1 package Betty Crocker Super Moist white cake
3 eggs
Some water.. You can measure it yourself
1 package of food coloring (food color gel works better)
1 box of vanilla frosting
2 baking pans

1. After preparing the Betty Crocker cake mix as directed on the box, we split the mix equally into 6 bowls.
2. Andy and I then added the food dye to each (red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple). Our food dye worked great for a couple of the colors, but for the red and purple especially, it was much too pastel colored for our liking.
3. We then took half of each color cake mix, and dropped it in the center of the pan. The bottom color (purple, for example) will spread out as you add the top layers (blue, green, and so on).
4. In your other pan, you can do the same thing, or switch the colors so the color on the top of the other cake is the bottom of this one (for example, we went p-b-g-y-o-r and then r-o-y-g-b-p on our two cakes.)
5. Bake cakes in oven as instructed on the cake box.

As the cakes are baking, take pictures of all of the fun colors on your spoons. Make sure to bake this cake midday so you get the best lighting. I wish mine had turned out better!

Then, after approximately what your Betty Crocker box says, take those suckers out and let them cool. I suggest oohing and aahing for your beautiful rainbow cakes. Our cakes didn't look too pretty on the outside once we were cooked, but not to fear, because nobody sees the outside anyways when you have psychedelic frosting on top!
But before that! After cooling your naked rainbow cakes until they are room temperature, add a sealer to the top of one, and then stack the two. Andy and I used vanilla pudding (which we dyed orange, just for funsies), and it worked great in sticking the two together. It also tasted awesome. Just use a thin layer, or if you're feeling saucy, do whatever the heck you want!

1. Just like you split your cake batter into 6 bowls, split your frosting into 6 cups.
2. Add food dye into each cup to create red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple. Again, our purple really wasn't that fab.
3. You can really do this however you would like it, but we decorated our frosting in a bullseye fashion, with each color frosting on its matching color of cake. The purple part of the cake was in the center, so we started there, and rainbowed outwards.

4. Once you are finished making your cake into an acid trip bullseye, take a fork or knife, and starting at the center of the cake, pull the frosting outwards so it creates a marble effect.
5. After setting for a while, the fork marks will go away and you will have the most over the top cake you have ever seen.
6. Complete with sprinkles of your liking.

After an hour or so, and lots of dirty dishes covered in crazy colors, you will have a rainbow cake that is out of this freakin' world. Like the Easter bunny barfed up its existence and then put it on a platter. It's that good.

Andy and I, with the completed rainbow cake. What a fun adventure to share with someone. And and I had a good laugh over the commentary from the recipe where we got this, so be sure to go over to Omnomicon and look at her fun rainbow cake and sassy reasons why you want to make this cake. She used gel food dye and her cake colors turned out incredible vibrant and fun. Or if you're just looking for a great photographer, you should look there too. Omnomicon is the full package, complete with cute name.

All in all, the rainbow cake was a complete success. It not only filled our adventurous appetite, but our tastebud ones too! I have been asked by a few people about date ideas for couples, and I would definitely recommend this as one of them. It gives you a chance to work together as a team, while gaining kitchen skills and having fun together. It also teaches boys that they can be creative! Yes, boys, you too can be creative!

I encourage you to try new fun food adventures, whether it's with your boyfriend, girlfriend, mama, or just on your own. The end result is just so satisfying.

Happy cooking! xoxo