Happy Birthday, Elizabeth!!!

When I last heard from Liz her vessel was somewhere near Nunivak Island (google it) on the way back from a stint working in the Arctic Circle. But today is her birthday, and since I can't call her up to say how proud I am of everything she's accomplished in the last year, I'm saying it here. Happy birthday, Liz! You are one inspiring woman.

A Ridiculous Cake

The last time I made a ridiculous carrot cake Elizabeth was somewhere off at sea, no doubt suffering from a diet rich in overly cooked frozen vegetables and generously salted commodity meats. Not surprisingly, she felt her loss sharply. Luckily, last week saw the happy confluence of Liz back in Napa, her birthday, the second summer fig crop (laaa!), and some fantastically blown open leftover spray roses. Obviously a ridiculous carrot (and fig) cake was going to happen.

A Honey Inspired Photo Shoot With Elizabeth

 A visit from Liz wouldn't really feel complete without a little photo shoot, so luckily we just barely squeezed one in before she headed back up to to Seattle ( to FINISH her last stretch of sea time and school before testing for her first mate's license!!!). Here she is all gussied up for a honey inspired affair, complete with amber glassware, gold edged plates, and a pale yellow silk dress from Community Projects in Napa (that place is a treasure trove), tiny candles of pure beeswax from Napa Valley Apothecary in Napa, honey drenched baklava from a bakery Petaluma which shall remain nameless due to its somewhat lackluster product (if you want good baklava you can go to Small World Restaurant in Napa, but you'll have to get there earlier than we did or it will all be gone!), lunaria seedpods from Napa, scabiosa seedpods from Watsonville, and the stars of the show, roses from Garden Valley Ranch and Neve Brother Roses in Petaluma.

Liz Plots the Course and Takes the Helm

When Liz is not working on tugboats, she is in school at Pacific Maritime Institute. The night I arrived in Seattle she diligently pored over her rolls of sea charts, plotting her course in preparation for a solo navigation of the Shetland Islands in a tugboat simulator, which concluded the term. After rocking that task the next day, Liz put on her flowers to wear and took the helm of her trusty land boat Land Cruiser (which doubles as a mobile home base and storage unit during her nomadic stints on shore), and drove us home to California.

The Clash

Liz has noted that the blog's new header clashes with most posts. Of course she is right, so I have rendered it in sepia. Is that better?

Road Trip!

Usually I don't get out of Napa and Sonoma counties too much. But when an extremely nice gal I met at the summer farmers' market asked if I could make a few holiday deliveries about the Bay (above), how could I refuse? Liz and I needed a little mini road trip, anyhow. Here are a few of the things we brought along:

Above is Liz trying out one of the hand-tied centerpieces as a bouquet, and below taking in a welcome dose of fresh sea air at Pacifica. Note the Carhartt gear and ribbon. I think Liz is the only person I know who could pull off that ensemble (or would even think to try it).

O Tannenbaum

Liz is back in town, just in time to keep me company in the chilly studio while I decorated a little tree in natural, nostalgic Christmas goodness including home-dried orange slices, popcorn, wood bead, pine cone, and liquidambar garlands, and acorn, walnut, and vintage glass ball ornaments. The custom stand was wrapped in burlap for a just-dug-up look. We delivered the decked out little guy to a lovely new client in Liz's larger-than-Buck-the-Subaru vehicle, which was quite convenient.