sweet potato soup

This soup is one of the best things to touch my lips.  I've always thought of sweet potatoes as, well, sweet.  Like how you have them at Thanksgiving with marshmallows melted on top, or baked with butter and cinnamon sugar.  Or sweet potato pie, which I've never had, but have heard about in country songs.  But when I saw Emma's spicy chipotle sweet potato soup, my gears started turning, especially since we had three little sweet potatoes in our kitchen begging to be eaten.  I've been on a sriracha kick lately, so I decided to make a sweet potato soup that was also a smidge spicy (really it only has a nice kick to it, though you could for sure add more sriracha and give it more spice if you like!), but has more of a Thai vibe to it.  It almost reminds me of Curry, which is one of my favorite things in the world.


(adapted from Simply Recipes and A Beautiful Mess)

INGREDIENTS:

3 small sweet potatoes, chopped

1/4 c butter

2-3 cloves garlic, minced

3/4 yellow onion, chopped

20 oz veggie broth

1 tsp  sriracha

1/4 tsp nutmeg

1 tbsp maple syrup

1.  Mince the garlic cloves and chop the onion and sweet potatoes up.

2.  In a medium pot, melt the butter and then saute your chopped onion and minced garlic for a few minutes and then add in the sweet potatoes.

3. Add the broth, nutmeg, maple syrup, and sriracha and then cook on medium/low for about 30 minutes, or until the potatoes are soft.

4.  Add salt + pepper to taste (if you like), and then puree everything in a blender.  Makes about 3-4 servings.

Enjoy!  This tastes delicious with some crusty bread to soak up the soup and scrape up the last bits that you'll won't want to let go to waste.

And if anyone's wondering, it goes great with that Harvester Brewing Experiment Ale.

the remix archives // fifties floral

I bought this dress from the boutique I worked at in Anchorage back in 2009.  It caught my eye immediately and I knew I had to get it.  I liked it so much that I had it hanging on my wall for months instead of having it hidden in my closet.  The floral print is too pretty to be stuck in a dark closet, unseen.  I haven't worn this dress in too many different ways.  I'd like to try some new things with it and really explore its potential!

local adventures

On Sunday we were going to go on a hiking trip with some friends, but Dan got off work super late, so we decided to sleep in and go on our own adventure.  We ended up taking the ferry up to Vashon Island and exploring a little bit.  For all the ferries around the Puget Sound, Dan & I have never been on one together.  The ferry from Tacoma to Vashon doesn't take very long, but still, I really love riding ferries.  They're kind of a tiny bit magical.  In my head I think it'd be fun to live somewhere and have to ferry commute to work.  Of course, that'd probably be pretty spendy, but how peaceful to spend that time before work sailing across the puget sound, instead of stuck in traffic on I-5? Before we hopped on the ferry we grabbed lunch from the Antique Sandwich Co. up in Ruston.  I've driven past it many times and had heard good things about them, but neither of us had ever been there.  Mmm, it was so good.  A great sandwich is hard to beat. I had a Turkey Avocado sandwich on Rye.  Because a sandwich without avocado is scarcely a sandwich at all. We visited two beaches and ended up finding a lighthouse!  I had never thought much about it before, but I bet there are a bunch of lighthouses scattered around the Puget Sound.  We haven't done a ton of local exploring, but I'd like to start seeing the local sites.  I'd love to take a trip around the Olympic Peninsula.  I went on a little RV trip around the Olympic Peninsula with my family back in 2009 and thought it was incredibly gorgeous. This area is full of such great places to explore.  I like that after leaving Alaska, I ended up in a place that is still so outdoorsy and beautiful.
dress/tj maxx :: blazer + boots/courtesy of modcloth :: scarf/h&m tights/fred meyer :: photos of me by Dan I'd visited Vashon Island many many years ago as a kid with my parents, but I remember nothing of it.  It's really quite lovely.  It's kind of cool to hop on the ferry and suddenly be in a very rural setting.  My new mission is to get my parents to move to Vashon so a) they will be close to us, and b) we'll have an excuse to get over to Vashon.  Looking up from the beach at the houses perched up in the trees reminded me of being a kid visiting my grandparents in Juneau.  Their house was right on the beach, nestled up amongst huge trees.  I remember walking down from their house to the beach, making arrowheads from the shale rock fragments, being fascinated with the tide pools, and looking at the petroglyphs left on rocks by natives ages ago.

natural selection

You GUIZE. I totally forgot about lipstick basically all summer long.  But don't worry!  We're going to renew our vows and totally give this thing another go.  Not that you care whether I wear lipstick or not.  I'm just saying, I want to incorporate it into my style again, and I'm glad that we're recommitting to one another.  I think maybe the heat of summer made lipstick seem too heavy of a cosmetic to be applying.  Once all of Western Washington goes grey for winter, a bright, fun lipstick will be a nice injection of color into an otherwise somewhat colorless environment. dress/cosette :: jacket/courtesy of asianicandy :: scarf/h&m shoes/courtesy of blowfish :: belt/thrifted :: photos by Dan
A cropped leather motorcycle jacket is one of those style staples, in my mind.  It goes with almost anything, has the ability to dress some things up and other things down, adds a bit of edge to an outfit, and is a great layer.  I haven't had one in a long time, well, the one I used to have was from Wet Seal and didn't fit me super well.  When I saw this one at AsianiCandy, it looked like it would be the perfect jacket to fill the motorcycle-jacket shaped hole in my heart, and I was right!  I'm glad I got it now, because we're probably going to be inseparable when it starts to get chilly.  Perfect timing! This dress is from 2009, but it's one of those pieces I can't let go of, even if I don't wear it super frequently anymore.  Plus, I like seeing how my style can evolve around a certain piece.  I've worn this dress in multiple ways since 2009, and even though my style has changed over the years, I like making something old work within my changing style.  Sometimes a piece will feel too outdated or irrelevant and I'll let it go, but pieces like this dress I like to hold on to, just to see how it becomes incorporated into my evolving aesthetic.

Primary Colors

The days have been great lately.  Lots of future planning, being productive in the here & now, and enjoying the last days of summery weather.  I keep trying to wear jackets and scarves, but I get all hot and sweaty and realize it's still not quite cool enough for such things.  Back in Anchorage they woke up to snow yesterday!  There are crunchy leaves on the ground, though, so I know I'm not too ahead of the  game.
I was looking through old photos on Facebook the other day and feeling so much more "grown up" than just a year ago.  I'm not sure what it is, I don't really look all that different.  My hair is shorter, I suppose.  Whatever it is, I like it.  I don't feel like, "oh, so I guess I'm a grown up now,"  more just that continual process of becoming oneself that happens in ones twenties.  I just hadn't really thought about it until it struck me looking at those photos.  Maybe "grown up" is the wrong term to use.  Perhaps, "coming into my own" or feeling independent and confident is more accurate.  Not that I haven't felt independent and confident in the past, I've always been quite independent and usually pretty confident. Perhaps it's been the process of making a new home and family with Dan.  It's like... we used to be these subheadings of our respective families, as our parents' children.  But now we're the headings, and someday we'll have subheadings of our own.  We're like a whole new entity, separate from our parents.  A whole new node on a family tree that goes back forever.  Anyway, I know that's not the entire reason for my recent feelings, but I'm sure it's a contributing factor and is interesting to ponder.
dress + cardigan/courtesy of modcloth :: shoes/courtesy of blowfish :: belt/target
This outfit doesn't feel special or amazing or anything.  Just basic.  Basic is good though.  Simple.  I think I'm getting the "simple outfit" thing out of my system because fall is on its way and layering doesn't necessary lend itself to simplicity.  As a natural maximalist, though, it'll be fun to have more to work with.  Scarves, mittens, hats, jackets, tights, boots... come to me!