Sunrise at the station

Not so good: I frequently take the 7:09am train. ::yawn::

Good: this morning, the sunrise was absolutely stunning.

Sunset, 4 locations.

Sunset 1: Stowmarket station, evening of departure.

Sunset 2: Over the St Laurence River, near Cherry Island, in the Thousand Islands, NY. (Note: while the sunsets and the wedding were beautiful, a region whose most famous export is salad dressing made from ketchup and mayonnaise may have some disappointing food experiences).

Sunset 3: from the Lobster Pot restaurant in Bristol, RI, over Narragansett Bay.

Sunset 4: Manhattan island, as seen from a car on the Whitestone Bridge, en route to Kennedy Airport for the red-eye to the UK.

Light and dark

When my mom was here for a visit, we had dinner in Ipswich one evening and then went for a walk along the docks just before sunset. 

We also brought the camera along on a very sunny (but cool) afternoon at Helmingham Hall.

Favorite picture of 2012

My favorite picture of 2012:

Taken on the day we went to sea (just a little bit). I love the composition and I REALLY love what it represents. Here's to fair winds and blue skies in 2013!

Golden hour in Lavenham

We had a break between our rehearsal and the concert last weekend in Lavenham, and decided to go for a walk. When we stepped outside the church, the light was gorgeous - the nice thing (!) about dark English winters is that you get the Golden Hour in the middle of the afternoon and you don't have to stay up. Also, it seems to last forever, since the sun is so low to begin with.

The concert was lovely, by the way. Among other things, we sang Morton Lauridsen's O Magnum Mysterium, which is now one of my favourite pieces. Go have a listen!

We also took advantage of the light to properly show off my snawheid:

Kate Davies posted on her blog this week that there will be a pattern for snawpaws (aka matching mittens) along shortly. I have one other project I need to make and then they will find themselves on my needles.

(Photo by Sarah Mansfield - thanks, Sarah!)

Blue sky in Rhode Island

Paralympic flame at EAST

We had the Paralympic flame at EAST on Saturday - no rain (despite the forecast) and a great turnout!

The family who sails together...

...drys their sailing gloves together. Also, check out that BLUE SKY! And it was WARM today! SUMMER!

We "pushed the boat out" yesterday with EAST for the RYA's Sail For Gold day, and sailed with the EAST fleet all the way (almost) to the Orwell Bridge. Apart from the wind dying in the middle of the day for about 45 minutes, it was an excellent sail.

Then, today, we raced Kanga with the EAST-ies on the (very busy) Orwell. It was our first time sailing her with 3, and James' first time afloat on Kanga. She behaved very well, and only resisted a little bit when it came to bringing her back to the dock. We need to work on that part. Wet sailing gloves all round.

We took a short walk to Stowmarket, and I brought my camera (much to the teenager's embarrassment) and proceded to take golden-hour pictures of weeds. SO embarrassing (but worth it for the light flare).

Happy Father's Day, Dad!

My dad gave me a love of sailing (which we have been doing all weekend - hello, RYA keelboat level 2!)

And a love of photography. The sunset in Stowmarket on Friday night as we were walking home:

Thanks, Dad!!

The right tools

After my last post, my friend Lesley (hi, Lesley!) sent me a text to ask if I wanted to borrow her wool winder. Um, yes, please.

Useful and beautiful. Sign me up.

Silken kilometer, now fully wound.

British Larder and Aldeburgh

After reading that Cambridge blogger Lazy Giraffe drives an hour and a half all the way to Woodbridge from Cambridge to eat at The British Larder, it was added to my must-try list.

When my Mom (whose birthday is today - HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM!) suggested a trip to the coast, I suggested this as an optimal lunch spot on the way. I was a little worried that it would be super-crowded on a Saturday lunchtime, but it was merely reasonably busy.

I ordered the pork tasting platter, below. Pork terrine, a pork & pickle salad thingy (in the little pot), homemade coleslaw, homemade piccalilli, the Best Scotch Egg Ever, a sausage roll, a mini-meatloaf, some exceedingly delicious bread, and a spring-greens salad. The scotch egg and the butter both had cracked pepper and just the right amount of sea salt on them. The whole thing was rather unbelievably delicious. I washed it down with some Broadside, obviously.

My mom had the ploughmans' lunch, which had cheese twists, homemade pickle, a boiled egg, really excellent ham, and a wedge of cheese, along with a sausage roll, bread, piccalilli, and salad like mine.

We really enjoyed ourselves and will be going back. If you're in the neighborhood (or even if you're not), I highly recommend it.

On our way to Aldeburgh, we stopped at Snape Maltings. The sky was rather dramatic (it had stopped raining, briefly)

We found out later that John had been sailing in the mega-rainstorm in this picture. Boy, was he wet:

A yellow tractor on Aldeburgh beach:

And a good rock.

Conversation before reaching this particular rock, as follows.

Kate (walking on Aldeburgh beach, home to about 100 zillion rocks) : Mom, keep your eye out and let me know if you find a good rock.

Mom: Um, what?!

Five minutes later

Kate: Aha! This is a great rock! (Crouches down to photograph above rock)

Mom: (Shakes head)

C'mon, you can't say that isn't a great rock!

Urban decay

I thought this building was really interesting - they've boarded up some windows but cinder-blocked out the others.

Things I made recently

When we were in Holland, I picked up the parts for a camera necklace (arranged neatly, below). Green leather cord (it's more of a forest green in real life), and a little camera charm. LOVE.

This fabric had been sitting in my "make it already!" pile since I bought it back in September in Rhode Island (at Joann's, of all places). They were destined to be napkins. So now there are 6. And they're cute. They may need a little ironing.

And then I went a little nuts with the Muckle Mitts Ravelry pattern and customised it. I like it better than the "real" pattern. The only irritating thing has been unwinding through the rest of the Mochi ball to find where the purple starts again so the mittens "match." Because I'm way too OCD to have unmatched mittens.

Ravelled, here.

Christmas photo shoot: outtake

We were trying to jump. You know, to all be in the air at the same time like floating hipsters. 

Except we got this instead. Apparently the little flashy lights on the camera do not make it clear when the picture is actually going to be taken.

Must try harder. (Teenager looks exceptionally embarrassed. Can't think why.)

Autumn Weekend

We went to Norwich on Saturday, so James could have a long-anticipated burger at Captain America's. I'd give it a 7 out of 10. The burger was reasonable, the American cheese was excellent, and our fries had mega potential but were slightly under-cooked. 10 out of 10 for the sign out front, though!

We went sailing this morning at Levington with EAST - we were supposed to be racing but the light wind died completely right as we left the harbour. It picked up when we got back into the harbour (after much paddling), and so we went back out for another half hour's sailing. While we were drifting about, I decided I was hot, so I took off my shoes and socks and rolled up my jeans and stuck my feet in the water. My goodness, is the North Sea cold in October!

Before we went out, I took some pics (we had to drop James off at his school's rugby festival at 8:30 so we were rather early to Levington...)

I can't decide which of these two I like better. Votes?

James gave me The Primrose Bakery Book for my birthday (John was miffed - he had bought me a copy and put it away as a Christmas present!), so after poring over it, we decided to make Lemon Meringue Cupcakes.

Amazing. Best cupcakes I've ever tasted. And yes, they have meringue hats instead of normal icing (there's also a hidden blob of lemon curd in the middle).

Here's one of the James' Nazgul, diving in for a cupcake...

I had never made meringues before, but we blobbed the leftovers onto my silicone baking mat thingy and put them in the oven for an hour. Excellent. Only problem...what does one do with 5 egg yolks?