Carving our pumpkin 2009

Our annual pumpkin carving was last night.  We used to always carve a "T" into our pumpkins but this year decided to try to carve the checkerboard end zone into our pumpkin.  For those of you not familar with the checkerboard end zones:

Here is our project:

From Halloween 2009

Riley LOVES pumpkin.  The vet told us it was good for him because of the fiber:)  He also likes to chew on the stalk.

From Halloween 2009

From Halloween 2009

From Halloween 2009

Riley patiently waiting for any pumpkin scraps we threw his way

From Halloween 2009

Coolhaus

You know we have thousands of taco trucks in LA.  Sometimes you have to have a taco from that particular truck, so you race to the street corner where you know it is at that time of day to get your fix.  

With the popularity of Twitter it is now easier to find those trucks as most will advertise their location on twitter each day.  Other types of food trucks have been popping up in LA getting on the twitter bandwagon.  @BarbiesQ has pulled pork sandwiches, ribs and veggie burgers. @letsbefrank sells organic grass-fed beef hotdogs in trailers in LA and San Francisco.

Last night @coolhaus was parked in front of a restaurant across the street from our house.  It's a mobile Diddy Riese (SHANA!) except better!  They serve handmade ice cream sandwiches made from homemade ice cream and cookies.  I had mint ice cream with chocolate cookies and the ice cream had real mint leaves in it, not chemicals that make it taste like mint.  It was really good!

Labor Day Weekend 2009

Chris and I went to Tennessee for Labor Day weekend this year. We went to a Vols game and celebrated my mom and sisters birthdays.


A house on the UT campus that I've never really paid attention to but have walked past thousands of times

From Labory Day Weekend 2009--Tennessee

A sea of orange during the Vol Walk--our first sighting of Lane Kiffin!

From Labory Day Weekend 2009--Tennessee

The Pride!

From Labory Day Weekend 2009--Tennessee

From Labory Day Weekend 2009--Tennessee

From Labory Day Weekend 2009--Tennessee

My favorite thing in the world! Running through the T!

From Labory Day Weekend 2009--Tennessee

If you look closely you can see Smokey running across the end zone after a touchdown!

From Labory Day Weekend 2009--Tennessee

From Labory Day Weekend 2009--Tennessee

From Labory Day Weekend 2009--Tennessee

I never knew that UT had these beautiful gardens on the Ag campus...but of course I never had any reason to go over there, except to look for the body farm!

From Labory Day Weekend 2009--Tennessee

The Vol Navy

From Labory Day Weekend 2009--Tennessee

Celebrating mama and Tracy's birthday on Sunday

From Labory Day Weekend 2009--Tennessee

From Labory Day Weekend 2009--Tennessee

Look at this face

This is Ben. We are visiting his parents this weekend and he got a bath for our visit! Looks like he's saying "oh the things I go through for you"

More letterpress

I did some printing today and took pictures of some of the steps.  Here you can see my hands on the movable type that creates the impression on the paper.  I am adding "furniture" (the pieces of wood) around the type so that I can "lock it up" for printing.

From Letterpress

Putting the chase (the metal frame that holds the type) into the press

From Letterpress

Putting blue ink on the press

From Letterpress

Manually turning the flywheel to test out the press

From Letterpress

I mixed blue and black ink to make navy

From Letterpress

This is a close up of the type.  Each individual letter is a piece of lead.  I worked on the type for several nights this week.  It takes a lot of patience to set this type--this is how entire newspapers used to be printed!  I can also print from magnesium plates if I want to print something like a design for an invitation, etc. (that is much less time consuming, but more expensive)

From Letterpress

From Letterpress

The type in the press with the rollers with ink below it

From Letterpress

A video of me printing!