Pump It Up! Pump-Kin Up!

21 September 2013

Sorry for the single blog post this week.  It has been a jam-packed and busy week with little time to do my side projects.  As it stands now I am 6 days away from leaving and one week from today I will be in York, England settling in to my new living quarters and exploring the town, albeit extremely jet-lagged.  And even though I am leaving in only a short week I have yet to actually get my bags packed.  They lie there in my closet, taunting me with their emptiness.  For whatever reason I have yet to build the proper motivation for packing, that in addition to a sudden and large influx of freelance writing with quick turnaround times and attempting to see all my friends at least once more and the time just flies away.

Old Castle in York

And then there is the four legs of travel to commence my adventure in York.  Not at all a thrilling time, it should prove to be an interesting post for my next turn at posting. 

But enough about that, let’s talk about something crafty, or really bake-y.  A week or two ago Kellie and I got together to make our signature baked good: Mini Pumpkin Loaves.  They never disappoint and really are not that difficult to make at all.  This is especially true because Kellie and I often have to be resourceful with our ingredients as well as our kitchen equipment.  This time around we had the ingredients as we needed them, but not kitchen equipment we had intended.  Regardless they turned out great.

This doesn't include the softened butter
and also has white sugar, which you don't need

 First off gather the ingredients…

1 (15 ounce) can pumpkin puree

4 eggs

1 cup vegetable oil

2/3 cup water

3 cups brown sugar (we originally had it at a straight half and half with regular sugar and brown sugar, but later we decided that all brown sugar would be better)

3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons baking soda

1 1/2 teaspoons salt

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1/2 teaspoon ground cloves

1/4 teaspoon ground ginger

1/4 teaspoon allspice

1/2 cup of softened butter

After gathering the ingredients preheat your oven to 350 degrees F or 175 degrees C.  Start by combining, in a large bowl (or pot if you don’t have a large bowl…) the pumpkin puree, eggs, oil, water and sugar until it is well blended.  You can do this with a fancy blender, or if you don’t have one of those (like we didn’t) you can simple stir it with a sturdy spoon.  Don’t worry if there are lumps of sugar, all will be well in the end. 

Now if you have the bowls to spare you can mix the dry ingredients together, otherwise you can just add it to the wet mixture in one go (as we did).  So add together the flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, ginger and allspice, either in a bowl or straight into the pumpkin mixture.  Mix as well as you can, again there might be lumps depending on if you use a blender or not.

The greasing and flouring of the loaf pans can either be done before, after or during the mixing of the batter.  You use the softened butter and a paper towel to rub the butter into the crevices and edges of the loaf pans.  It is important that you get it as lubed up as possible.  Then, using a little extra flour you move the pan around until the entire inside is covered in a light dusting of flour.  Dump out or reserve the excess flour and set aside.

In progress

All greased and floured up

Then you must fill the loaf pans, about 2/3 to 3/4 of the way full.  Try not to spill any on the edges like I did.

In progress

All filled up

Then throw them in the oven and bake them for about 45-50 minutes.  Inserting a toothpick or butter knife in the center and if it comes out clean you are good to go.  Let them sit a little while in their pans before taking a knife to cut around the outside to dislodge the loaves then turning them out onto some paper towels for further cooling. 

Cool in pans for about 5-10 mins

Cool on paper towels until just warm to the touch

From here you can eat right away or wrap in plastic wrap while still slightly warm to preserve them best.  Optional delight might include spreading butter on them or enjoying with a cup of coffee.  Either way you can’t go wrong eating or sharing (if you can stand to give them away) these little loaves of wonder.

Until next time!

Brittani

Freelance Writing and Personal Projects

7 September 2013

I’m a rather poor soon-to-be graduate student.  I need ways to make some money while I am studying besides the hope that I will have a job in England.  Without knowing the job market and availability of jobs in York I have had to look into other ways to earn some cash.  One of the first things I looked into, while poor and trying to put food on the table in Spain was freelancing.

I know Kellie and I have mentioned it in passing that we looked into and eventually starting working on freelance writing to help cover expenses while living abroad.  Since coming back to the States I have continued to look for work and have had mild success at it.

The website that I primarily use is oDesk.  It has a much easier to use interface and setting up a profile is simple and straightforward.  Kellie and I did look into Freelancer and Elance but found their set ups to be difficult to use and understand.  Additionally I feel that the community on oDesk is smaller and thus much it easier to land a job.

The way freelancing works is you scour through the posted jobs (once you have set up your profile, that is) and open a few postings that look like something you are interested and capable of doing.  Usually I check out the price first and whether or not someone has already been hired for the position.  If things check out there I read through the description in order to confirm whether or not I actually want to do such as job.  If I do I apply. 

When applying you set your price, your expected time frame and write a cover letter explaining why you should be hired.  Including any information that is specifically requested in the job posting, then you send it off and hope to be invited to interview.  In reality you have to apply to several jobs before you are hired for a few.

In the past I have written on so many different topics that range from food articles, history ebooks, romance stories, science fiction short stories, product descriptions and book reviews, to name a few.  But behind all of the freelancing work is a desire to create and publish my own material.  I love to write and of course I would love to be paid to write my own stories.  But that it’s in the works at the moment.

Though on the line-up of personal projects to start I have an epic space novel that I am very excited about as well as a few shorter stories for competitions, all in the science-fiction/fantasy genre.  I am always looking for feedback and criticism.   Up next in personal work is a short short story for a Writer’s Digest competition.  The story must be less than 1,500 words.  That is not easy to do.  But alas I shall try!  And always I am searching for additional freelance writing.  The search will never be over.

Next time I hope to have a progress report for the scarf.  Needless to say it hasn't progressed as quickly as I would have liked, but it progresses nonetheless.

Until next time!

Oh and I can't leave you without a picture, so here is one of my dogs, Ebony, being cute and judging you at the same time.

She can be adorable and crabby at the same time.

-Brittani

Doll Clothes and Dinner!

So, I'm a bit late getting this post out this week.  I mean, it's already Saturday evening.  The truth is, the college semester started two weeks ago and despite not being a serious student, I'm taking a full load of classes.  In addition, I'm trying to have some sort of social life.  This semester, I'm taking mostly boring classes- Microeconomics, Bookkeeping, a business class, and a sewing class.  The sewing class is really more of a lab, giving me access to some gorgeous Bernina sewing machines and four hours every Monday to devote to sewing.  Yay!

Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures of the projects I'm working on, but the circle skirt may get some attention this weekend.  I've been quibbling over how to do the zipper and if I wanted to add pockets because I was afraid it was a bit too plain.  I love the fabric though, so I didn't want to muck with the print too much.  Last night it hit me- you'll just have to wait to see it!

Last weekend however I whipped up a little something to make sure my machine and serger were still in good working order and to remind myself how rusty my skills are.  Thus, a doll shirt.  To say I collect Asian Ball-Jointed dolls might be stretching it.  I only have one, my handsome Sabik by the Korean company Soom.  His name is Carousel.  

Well, this makes it obvious I've been out of the sewing loop for a while.  For a three hour project from pattern drafting to finishing I'm pretty happy with it.  He provides some special fitting issues in that a) he isn't squshy and b) he has extremely wide shoulders but a pretty trim waist.  I wanted something I could pull over his head, but didn't have any stretch fabric so there was some compromise between fit and ease of dressing with this.  And for an added bonus, some pattern matching fail.  I only have two or three yards of this gorgeous navy and brown japanese cotton.  I didn't want to use too much of it because I have other plans for it.  So I only made a minimal effort at matching patterns.  My thread and notions stash is also woefully understocked and I just used whatever thread was in the machine.  In this case, an ivory/natural color that I think work fine.  All in all, I'm happier with this shirt than the last few I sewed for him over a year and a half ago.  I also made his pants oh... two years ago but have since lost the pattern I drafted for them.  A shame too, because they fit really well.

Bonus: 

Doesn't that look delicious?  I'll give you a hint- it was.  Bell peppers, sugar snap peas, onions, garlic, and (frozen) gnocchi all sauteed up with whatever seasonings I had on hand.  I love gnocchi done this way.  Brittani gave me some dirty looks for using frozen gnocchi after our fun gnocchi making weekends in Spain but really it isn't any fun to do it alone. 

Circle Skirt- The Cut

The middle two weeks of the month are always pretty hectic for me.  Most of my deadlines as a freelance writer are either mid-month or end of the month, so I've been chipping away at my projects a little at a time.  Thankfully last week Brittani came over and we were able to get some work done on the circle skirt.  I didn't bother to draft a pattern piece for it, simply using a bit of math and a tape measure to mark the curve.  That's a picture of the main fabric- inside out, though, so you can't see the pretty floral pattern!

The lining and waistband are also cut out at this point, but I still need to pick up a zipper for this an then actually put it together.  I'm hoping to have it done by the end of next week!

For the sake of complete honesty, I can't say that I've worked on this skirt in all my spare time.  The truth is, I've been way too busy gaming and painting models.  Upon arriving back from Spain I was itching to get back into tabletop roleplaying.  What I didn't anticipate was my partner having a Battletech starter box.  Turns out, Battletech is pretty awesome.

That is a Bombardier and a Sagittaire, two Battletech miniatures.  I painted them myself, and have a bunch more to be painting.  There's a convention here in October that I may be running some tabletop games at including a demo of Battletech we're providing the miniatures for so between my partner and I, we have a lot of painting to do!

-Kellie

Endings and Beginnings

 5 August 2013

Amazing how times flies when you are having fun.  These past few years have been a wild ride and now that I am back in the States it feels just like before I went to university.  I am enjoying seeing my family that I haven’t seen in over a year and revealing in the conveniences of American living.  But my wandering feet are about to take over again.

Ruins of a castle in York

Small street in York

My name is Brittani and I have followed the tried and true way of education for my whole life.  I went to school solidly, every year from Pre-School through my Bachelor’s degree without missing a beat.  Throughout my school years I was an Honors Student and for the most part excelled in learning.  But I didn’t always have a plan for what I wanted to do ‘when I grew up’.  As a matter of fact the major I chose to start at Arizona State University with was one that I had chosen randomly from the list.  It also started with an ‘A’ so I didn’t have to mire through too much to make a quick decision.

Anthropology was my haphazardly chosen field of study.  The cultural subsection didn’t really grab my attention in the first semester and so I was starting to doubt my choice.  But then came along the Archaeology class that would change my life.  It was brutally hard but incredibly rewarding.  To this day it is the class that I remember most.  Buried Cities and Lost Tribes, taught by the amazing Dr. Laura Popova. 

Graduation from Arizona State University

So hop, skip and jump to nowadays I am about to embark on a journey to get my Master’s degree in Bioarchaeology at the University of York.  A lot of time and difficulty went into making this decision to attend York instead of Cambridge, but in the end I am more than happy about my choice.

But what has been truly amazing about this past year in Spain has been that it prepared me for this next phase of my life, living aboard without any friends, family or really anyone that I know.  Additionally, spending a year in Spain has opened a lot of doors into my creative side that I wasn’t sure I would ever be able to reach again, let alone make money with it.

In a desperate attempt to stay afloat in a foreign country Kellie and I employed our writing skills through a freelance website called oDesk.  We wandered through a few websites to arrive at this one and for us it has the best fit for what we do.  And now, facing down the real looming black cloud of student loan debt I am expanding my creative skills again in search of sustainable income while studying.

So it's London and not York. St Paul's Cathedral

I have a lot of ideas about several different projects that I want to start and work on.  The biggest one is perhaps learning how to crochet.  I will be investing a small amount of money into the start-up materials but from there I hope to be able to utilize the internet and my cute little books to create wonderful things.  Though a scarf is the obvious first project.

That is a normal fashion choice in Spain.
We are in the gardens of the Alhambra and Kellie
just had to photobomb my picture.

From there I also want to delve deeper into my love of photography and hopefully get something set up for that as well as work on to get the best shots.  Soap making, candle making, weaved bracelets, T-shirt design, cooking , baking…I have a lot of different idea and projects that I want to explore.  Join me as I explore and investigate and maybe you too will have a few new hobbies and projects of your own!

Brittani

Fresh Starts, New Projects

It's a bit strange, coming back to the United States after living and teaching in Spain for a year.  For both of us it's a whole new chapter in our lives.  In fact, this is the first time in three years that we aren't living together.  We've been through a lot together, half our lives.

My name's Kellie, and I have never been able to take the easy road.  I've been a student on and off again ever since leaving high school, but getting a degree just never seemed that important.  After spending a lot of time at dead-end jobs in call centers and financial aid offices, I decided I'd had enough.  It was right about then that Brittani was finishing her bachelor's degree and we both needed a change.  My parents had attended a TEFL course in Spain and after much deliberation we decided to follow in their footsteps.  Not only did we go for the course but we committed to staying and teaching for a year.

In the beginning it was pretty rough.  Being thrown out of our comfort zones allowed us to jump into other pursuits that had always been put off in favor of 'real' work or school.  Namely, writing.  Fast-forward to now.  We've been back in the States for a month.  Writing is going well but I'm itching to do something else.  One of the things I found I missed most while I was away was my sewing machine.  Writing is a wonderful creative outlet and allows me to make a living doing something I love but it doesn't have quite the same reward as creating something tangible.  I've revitalized my Etsy shop and gone fabric shopping.  Freelance writing may pay the bills, but there's no reason my other hobbies can't help!

Forgive the abysmal artwork.

My first project is a full skirted, boat neck dress.  The top will be this gorgeous ivory linen/cotton blend, with the grey floral as the skirt and an underskirt/lining of ivory crepon sheer.  Once the pattern is done and I've made the sample, I'll offer it made-to-measure in my shop.  I'm so excited to get started!

-Kellie