Monday, January 18, 2010

Road Trip, Photography and My Kitchen


I know I've mentioned this before, but Dave and I love taking mini weekend road trips. Longer vacations are fantastic, but are made complicated by the need to find people to care for our animals. So whenever we have a free day or a free couple of days, we try and get out and do a bit of driving and sightseeing in Northern California. This weekend we drove around the Sierra foothills, also know as Gold Country since this is the area of the gold boom in the 1800s. It's a really beautiful area to drive through, especially in the winter when everything is vibrant and green.

This weekend the weather was very uncooperative since it rained almost nonstop, and was quite windy and cold. Still, such bad weather gave me a chance to get creative with my photography, something I don't spend enough time working on. In fact, I've been neglecting my flickr account and flickr friends for such a long time I feel incredibly guilty. I also got to try out some night photography as unfortunately it gets dark by about 5:15 here.

Notice in the above photo that Dave is nice and warm, and dry, sitting in the car. He's munching away at his bag of Fritos and bean dip. I, on the other hand, was outside in the dark, rain, and wind, up to my ankles in mud, taking photos. Of course, we'd neglected to bring umbrellas or rain jackets, so I ended up getting drenched since I used my jacket to try and keep my camera dry. Fun times!

Even with the weather it was a lovely drive and we found some neat places that we want to go back to on a non-rainy/cold day.











It is citrus season here and fruit is just falling off the trees. These two trees are in the yard of our back neighbor, and they hang over into our space so we have the opportunity to pick fresh grapefruits and oranges as they ripen. I have several citrus trees of my own but they are still too young to have fruit.


Someone asked me the other day if I have a really big kitchen. I think that they were assuming that I had lots of space to work in since I do so much baking and cooking. Actually, our kitchen is super tiny. Our house was built in the 70s and maybe back then kitchens weren't a priority? The rest of the rooms in the house are very spacious, but the kitchen is studio size. I think it's about 8 feet long and 5 feet wide at one end and about 2.5 feet wide at the other end. But I do love it, even though I have to get creative when I need counter space. I love that it's open on three sides so I can interact with people even when I'm cooking away.


8 comments:

  1. Your photos are really nice! Bad weather can make for nice photographs.

    I can't even imagine having citrus fruit straight off the tree. I'm happy when I pick up a nice bag of oranges at the grocery store. Unfortunately, I am now craving Fritos and bean dip!

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  2. You took some great photos...love the cemetary ones. Neat to see photos of your kitchen as well. Thanks for sharing.

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  3. Great photos, Michelle! Small kitchens are very productive, in my opinion, because everything is right within reach.

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  4. Oh Michele! I love this entry---your photos are wonderful--- :)

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  5. Your photos are great Michele. You have always been an amazing photographer, as well as an artist. We have two great oil paintings you have done hanging in our office. :) You have amazing talent!!

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  6. Michele.
    Really impressive. Thank you so much for sharing.

    I like the stones and the fruit.

    I am always curious to have a nosy round peoples kitchens, my favourite room - so thanks for letting us take a peek.

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  7. Great photos, Michele; nice of you to share your trip with us.
    And I love peeking into your kitchen. You don't need a big kitchen to cook up big things, like you do!

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