Stuff I love | Seeing my name on crap

That pretty much sums it up.  I love seeing my name on things, particularly my new and old last names, because they're more rare.  Go Wilkie!

Stuff I love | Lucky Straps

I was photographing some products for a friend and so decided to throw my absolute favorite camera accessory on the setup.  These are Lucky Straps, the product of an amazing little Etsy store (how much I love Etsy is a completely separate "stuff I love" post).  This is not a camera strap cover - it's an entirely new strap that adds an enormous amount of attitude to a camera.  The little jewely things you see there snap onto matching bits that you attach to the camera itself, allowing you to quickly remove the strap if you are doing portraits for, say, your conservative grandmother. Look at these owls!!  These are wrist straps.  I usually wrap my camera strap around my wrist anyway so wanted to try out these little guys.  I found there is too much strap between the wrist holder to make me feel really secure in holding the camera, but they might work great for you.  Plus, they are endlessly adorable. I told the lovely owner of the store that I would tell "everyone I know" about Lucky Straps and this is about the best I can do.  What happened is this: I received the pink strap up there as ordered.  But a day later, a new package arrived with a similar strap in black.  I wrote the shop owner asking what was up (after checking to make sure I wasn't charged for another strap!) - turns out she had accidentally shipped me someone else's custom order.  I stuck it back in the mail, and she reimbursed me for shipping and sent me not one but two new straps (the blue ones here).  During this short period of time, I ended up doing a couple "good will" things that might have been better for me not to do.  For instance, I found someone's wallet recently and returned it.  Lady ended up giving me some money and a really nice little card thanking me that "there are people in the world" like me.  Definitely worth some rewards cards. Anyway, I was completely thrilled with my experience with Lucky Straps and their products are adorable, well-constructed and generally make my photography experience much more stylish.  I highly recommend!

Stuff I Love | Fruits of our labor

This is my garden.  The perspective is totally skewed because I only had the 35mm on me (more like a 50 on my cropped sensor) and so had to resort to some Brenizer Method stitching to show your our little plot.  When we arrived on the scene yesterday, the entire left side of this area was just covered in weeds.  George and I pulled them and then we set to work planting my little babies that had been sitting on our windowsill. So far we've got: several kinds of peppers, three or four varieties of tomato, leeks (maybe - they look really bad), brussel sprouts, spinach, tatsoi, arugula, radishes, rutabaga, beets, carrots, strawberries, thyme, mint, rosemary and that big bushy thing in the front of the garden is my lavender plant.  I'm very proud of my little lavender. We spent maybe two hours yesterday workin' the land and were glad there was a thunderstorm headed our way to water our little garden.  They haven't turned on the water yet this year (much like the A/C in our apartment...).  But when the storm came, it brought quarter-size hail!  Our plants took a mighty beating last night and so who knows which of them will make it.  On the plus side, they got plenty of water. It's hard to say that I "love" our garden.  It's a lot more work than I thought it would be, and a lot of it is really awful pulling weeds.  The weeds are neverending, really.  You completely clear the garden one weekend and when you come back the next, there's a fresh crop.  But it is really cool to see things you started from seed grow into full-fledged plants and produce fruit.  And that first Cherokee Purple tomato... heaven.  Now that will make for a good "Stuff I Love" post.  I may be eating beef and bean soup for dinner tonight, but I'm dreaming of this: Soon enough, my friends, soon enough.