“You must give up the life you planned in order to have the life that is waiting for you.” ~ Joseph Campbell

This is why I miss Austria!! Read the rest of this entry »

On our recent trip to Austria we had the great pleasure of eating at the Landhaus Keller, the restaurant where my husband’s father did his apprenticeship when he was just starting out on his journey to become a chef.

The food was delicious and the service was excellent!

We sat out on the patio in the sunshine and enjoyed 3 courses of Austrian-styled dishes.

I started out with a mixed spring salad with asparagus, goat cheese and pumpkin seed oil. YUM!

My husband enjoyed beef carpaccio with asparagus.

Even though it was not the special of the day, the owner had the chef make up the vegetable strudel for me which was really nice and delicious!

My husband enjoyed a braised leg of Styrian lamb.

As you can tell asparagus was in season and wonderful! Everything was so flavorful and it was nice to be eating food fresh from the Austrian countryside.

The dessert was a real treat – pumpkinseed oil creme brulee and Styrian layered strudel with vanilla sauce.

If you are in Graz I would highly recommend this amazing restaurant!

I loved how my Golden Half magnolia photos turned out…here are my favs!

When we were in Austria I brought along my Golden Half (my go-to travel toy camera these days) and took some photos in the Austrian hills and in Graz and Vienna.

One great spot for food is the Landhaus Keller in Graz. My husband’s father worked there for 3 years when he was an apprentice chef. The food is great and the service is excellent. I will post more information on the Landhaus Keller in a separate entry.

When we were in Graz their soccer team had just won the championship and were preparing for a huge street party. Lots of people were already out on the patios when we arrived in the morning.

They were setting up the stage and beer stations.

Locks of Love

Vienna – my favorite European city. The Dom Cathedral in the ring.

Vienna is always current with interactive street art and other cultural events going on, like Lang Nacht der Kirches (long night of churches) similar to Long Night of the Museums that we attended 2 years ago.

A sculpture near the Albertina

There were lots of horse and carriages out the weekend we were there. I’ve never done a ride but they do look like fun!

Everyday we drive by these beautiful magnolia trees. They are very large and have beautiful blossoms. We stopped one day to photograph it with digital and film cameras. Here are 2 of the digital ones. Can’t wait to see how the film turns out…

This past weekend I went to visit Niagara Falls with some of my family and my Golden Half. I haven’t gotten my film images back but here are a few digital ones. I’m very interested to see a comparison between the digital and film images.

I am also planning a Cape Breton themed 65th birthday cake so I will keep you posted on that too!

So I’ve been pretty busy on the cupcake front. A few weeks ago I did some fun peanut butter and chocolate cupcakes.

More recently trying a new lemon-cranberry recipe (using fresh lemon and cranberries) which were pretty yummy I think.

I have also opened an Etsy shop, mainly because I’ve been making homemade lip balms, tote bags etc…which I want to sell but I thought I would start with a series of photographs to raise money for the relief efforts in Japan. So far I’ve raised over $100 and I’m hoping that selling more photos will bring me closer to raising much more money for the Red Cross.

http://www.etsy.com/shop/em102?ref=pr_shop_more

How do you write a love letter to a country? It’s hard to believe this beautiful country, that I visited this past November, is now being effected by this major natural disaster.

When I was in Japan I quickly fell in love with it’s beauty, the people and culture. People were friendly and helpful and the atmosphere exquisite.

I will never forget the friendly deer on Miyajima Island, fulfilling my dream of being up close to my spirit animal.

Visiting the iconic Tokyo Tower and seeing Tokyo for miles on that beautiful day. It’s hard to imagine that many of the sights we saw from the tower have been serious damaged by the earthquake.

Seeing the Golden Temple, visited by thousands every year. I met many fabulous people there and really enjoyed the beauty of the surrounding parks and learning about their spiritual practices.

Seeing children dressed in their traditional clothing celebrating the 7-5-3 festival.

So thank you Japan for what was a life changing experience for me and giving me 3 weeks of happiness and joy – taking photos, meeting people and experiencing the food, culture and traditions.

Please consider support the relief efforts for the Japan earthquake and Asia Pacific tsunami. Currently I’m aware of the Red Cross’ work in Japan but if I discover other good charities I will post them. You can give to the Red Cross here.

I think blackberry and iphone/pod users a like are enjoying the many options available for toying around with your camera. I’ve got 3 that are my favorites.

First up, Hipstamatic – probably one of the most popular apps I’ve come across. With many lens options, most must be purchased separately, this camera app is pretty fun. It gives your photos a unique look and old brownie style charm.

I really like the softness of the images and the great slightly off color quality. This is definitely high on my list of favorite apps.

The next app is called Pocketbooth which functions like an old photobooth. This takes 4 shots just like a photobooth and then brings that up to admire. It’s a pretty fun app, especially to use with friends or at a party. I do find the images are sometimes dark when the light quality is poor but it’s still lots of fun.

I love the texture of the images – it’s a really fun app.

Finally, I am a huge Hello Kitty fan and this next app was right up my ally. Kitty Camera is a Hello Kitty app that let’s you add random Hello Kitty-ness to new or already taken photos. Definitely more of a novelty app – I do have a lot of fun decorating my images.

So those are my top favorite photo apps – happy ids of March!