cupcake love

The morning after the Cupcake Truck's wedding appearance there were a few leftovers enjoyed by the little ones attending the waterfront brunch at Compo Beach. The flower girl eyed me very suspiciously while she ate her sweet treat. As you may have noticed, her red shirt already notes that she's "daddy's little cupcake."

This week I discovered the IHeartFaces blog and I adore browsing at this mix of amateur and professional photography. They run a weekly contest, so dig up a photo, get a blog post going and enter one of your best faces.

follow that cupcake II

Want to see guests get really excited at a wedding? Pull up to the curb in a food truck and let everyone's inner child order up their own frosting/topping combo on a cupcake. I've been patiently waiting for months to check New Haven's Cupcake truck in action and you simply can't underestimate the power that marshmallow frosting and even afew multi-colored sprinkles can have...





































These two cupcake truck owners are trying to make some dough from a baking obsession, but they must also enjoy making people deliriously happy.

http://www.followthatcupcake.com/
Daily parking locations: http://twitter.com/cupcaketruck

ica boston

I spent a wet and rainy Sunday afternoon at the ICA. It's in a newly developed waterfront area in the Boston and was the first Diller Scofidio + Renfro building built in the United States. Unfortunately it was so generally miserable out that I thought I was going to blow away when I tried to spend time along the waterfront exterior of the building.

The Shep Fairey: Supply & Demand exhibit is showing through mid-August. This post starts with a photo from his book Obey, as photography was forbidden in the galleries. You may not recognize the name, but he is the artist behind the famous Obama poster in 2008.

Institute of Contemporary Art
100 Northern Avenue
Boston, MA
http://www.icaboston.org/

at home in boston

I haven't been inside Louis of Boston in 15 years or more? I love their beautiful selection of home wares on the first floor.























The first time I stepped inside Bliss Home in Boston it was a fiercely cold and blustery day on Newbury Street.


















That year, the Alessi Michael Graves tea kettle (2 shelves above the champagne/ice bucket) was my Valentine's Day gift. There's a wonderful 20% off Alessi sale going on now at Bliss. I bought the matching creamer to go with my sugar bowl.


Louis Boston
234 Berkeley St
Boston, MA 02116-3186
http://www.louisboston.com/

Bliss Home
225 Newbury St
Boston, MA 02116-2522
http://www.blisshome.com/

return to the golden lamb

The Golden Lamb Buttery is a unique dining experience in Brooklyn, CT and we celebrated my birthday here a few years ago. While there was a hayride accompanied by strumming and singing musicians before dinner, I really enjoyed our recent 1 pm lunch on the farm. We practically had the entire deck (and sweeping vista to the lake) all to ourselves. You'll want to have a reservation, but chances are you aren't wandering through this area by accident...






















The Golden Lamb Buttery
499 Wolf Den Road
Brooklyn, CT 06234
(860) 774-4423
http://www.thegoldenlamb.com/

strawberry delight

I've been waiting for the first strawberries of the season and apparently we were the first paying customers at this farmstand in beautiful Pomfret, Connecticut.

Lapsley Orchard
403 Orchard Hill Road (Route 169)
Pomfret Center, CT 06259
(860) 928-9186

No. 9

What can I say? I hated my metronome my entire childhood, but this brings me back to all those days in youth orchestra. Enjoy

a martha moment

I'll admit to recently wandering around the craft store and later scrubbing spray mount from my hands and wondering, how did I get here?

I'm no Martha Stewart, but I needed bridal shower favors.

I simply hate useless gifts, so just around Earth Day we bought reusable bags in the hopes they will remind the guests of the happy couple next time they are shopping green.

Check out baggubag.com's rainbow of options and start a colorful collection of your own.

Need some inspiration? Start here.

the plaza

We celebrated anniversary #3 a few weeks early this year. Everything in our room at Plaza was gleaming white and gold... which you cannot tell from my dark and poorly snapped photos. It was a huge room, close to 500 sq feet which is palatial by NYC standards. One of my favorite things about this hotel was the silence. You can't hear any outside traffic or hallway noise. It's a peaceful oasis in a loud and chaotic place. It gave me dreamy flashback to our honeymoon arrival at The Oriental.

kyo ya

We read about Kyo Ya in Tasting Table and the New Yorker and decided to check it out last week. When D called for reservations, they answered in Japanese! We decided not to do the kaiseki and just wander our way through the menu on our own. For our first sashimi course (pictured above) we had striped jack and salmon trout. My favorite was the pressed sushi with eel, but we also are pretty curious about the most expensive thing on the dinner menu, $40 seasonal kamadaki rice dish cooked for an hour in a clay pot. Our server assured us it was delicious. Maybe next time! The only other serious Japanese restaurant I've tried in NYC is Kai above the Ito En tea shop on the Upper East Side. I found this hidden spot a little less intimidating. It's small and filled with Japanese nationals and has jazz standards tinkling quietly in the background. You'll definitely need a reservation.

After finishing dinner, we fell in love with the soba tea. In fact we heard you can purchase it at Sunrise Mart on 3rd Ave and St Marks. We will be hunting this down the next time we are in the East Village, it has a wonderful nutty taste and aroma.

Kyo Ya
94 E. Seventh St., downstairs (1st Ave.)
NY, NY 10003
(212) 982-4140

No diet Coke, no skim milk, no decaf coffee—Just good food

Usually there's no time for breakfast when I'm inside Grand Central, but that's about to change now that I found a place with good coffee and good eats on the lower level of the station. Give yourself an extra 15 min and you sit at the counter and have toast with nutella or eggs with proscuitto or spinach. It's all cooked to order and served quickly so you can dash off to your train or to your next destination in Manhattan.

Caffe Pepe Rosso
lower concourse
Grand Central Terminal
New York, NY

the best blueberry pancakes

A friend on FB asked about the best blueberry pancakes in CT and my vote goes to Little Lasse's on Naugatuck Ave in Milford CT. Phil makes the best pancakes, they are slightly crispy on the edges and the only other ones that come close in my book are at Downeyflake in Nantucket, MA.

We also to happen to like the scrambled eggs and diced ham.

Little Lasse's
268 Naugatuck Ave.
Milford, CT 06460
203-878-7577

Gamera of little pond

This weekend I tried to catch up with the weeds that are sprouting everywhere. Our garden is only a little 10'x10' fenced plot for some veggies. Sunday morning we were pretty surprised to see this surly fellow in among our celery and lettuce! We ushered him back to the swampy area behind the paper road in our wheelbarrow. He's a snapper and had sharp claws and a long tail. I know he's a fellow Little Pond resident, but I hope never to see him again.






























D named our visitor after the movie star Gamera featured here:



I also find this video the "Safety Dance Gamera" really funny...

bada bing

Not sure i'm ready to give up Google for Microsoft's new replacement for Live Search...but I sure do love looking at these lovely hot air balloons over Cappadoccia, Turkey! It's like a nice little travel fantasy before searching the task at hand.