Canon EOS 7D

May

03

Moving To The City

As Morn mentioned, on Saturday we helped our friends Bronwyn and her boyfriend Brendan (Tom and I affectionately call them B&B) move to Toronto. I didn’t take a lot of photos, because we were literally moving from 9:30am (which has us up at 6:30 to get there!) until 7:00pm (YIKES) and I was pretty tired afterward. I was so zapped that I didn’t really take any photos aside from a few people and pets upon arrival to the new apartment and then I took the celebratory first meal photos. Cider made herself right at home as you can see in the last photo, and the three of us were crammed in the bathroom because my prompt for the day was “bathroom”. We were lucky though, because it rained all week before the move and has been raining since, but as you can see there wasn’t a cloud in the sky on Saturday.

Apr

26

Our Simple Black Bean Burgers

Canon 35mm 1.4 / Canon EOS 7D / recipes Posted by Sara / 13 comments

Wow, these photos are so bright your eyeballs might explode. Sorry about that, I’m still getting used to my new lens and how it reacts to certain settings. Believe it or not, I just started snapping without looking, confident that I knew my kitchen window well enough to know what settings to use. Whoops! Seems like this lens is a taaad more sensitive. Anyway, per request, here is the black bean burger recipe Tom and I use (a lot), but before I go: Don’t mind my pajamas, I think it’s only fair that I’m allowed to refuse to get dressed on Sundays. And this is silly but I feel badly because I’m always posting photos of Tom in his tan sweater and I just want to mention he throws it on over everything and he does in fact own more clothes than just this sweater. AND people have asked me before what the garlic or ginger puree looks like, so here’s a photo of the jar we buy. All right, I think that’s it, so ENJOY!

What You Need

☑ 1 19oz/540ml can of organic black beans
☑ 1 teaspoon ginger puree
☑ 3 teaspoons garlic puree (or 1 teaspoon garlic powder)
☑ 1 teaspoon onion powder
☑ 1 teaspoon parsley
☑ 1 – 1 1/2 cups panko, bread crumbs, or crushed Vegetable Thins (or crushed gluten free crackers for you GFers!)

What You Do

1. Drain the can of beans and pour them and all other ingredients except the panko/breadcrumbs into a blender/food processor (or Magic Bullet) and mix until a slightly chunky puree is achieved.
2. Move the mixture to a bowl and hand stir in the Panko until the puree becomes dry and can easily make patties. You don’t want it to be too wet or it won’t stick together. Add more as needed, but don’t get carried away!
3. Use your hands to make burger sized patties. (It’s really a lot easier than I thought, they don’t fall apart hardly at all!)
4. Put some oil or in your pan and cook those suckers on medium heat for 3-4 minutes each side, or until medium to dark brown. (Time may vary depending on the thickness of your patties. Just go with your gut, you don’t have to worry about under cooking them and killing anyone by mistake. I’ve found 3-4 minutes to be perfect.)
Add whatever toppings (spinach!) & condiments you want and ENJOY!

Apr

25

A Celebratory Dinner

Canon 35mm 1.4 / Canon EOS 7D / dining out / family Posted by Sara / 9 comments

So our Easter was pretty swell. We made black bean burgers (so I can post the recipe on Wednesday), stayed in our pajamas all day, and you know, enjoyed each other’s company. We’d just gone out on Friday for a fancy and celebratory dinner with Jim and Sandy, and I even dressed up (please excuse the goofy cellphone pic, I was talking and didn’t realize Tom was photo-taking!), and had an Earth Day baking extravaganza, so all our festive energy was pretty much zapped. But of course I took photos of Friday’s fabulous dinner, so here we go! Tom was in charge of picking the restaurant, and he chose an award winning new-to-us place specializing in Asian food. And I mean really specializing! The menu was practically eight pages long full of Japanese, Korean, and Chinese entrées and even had a few Thai dishes and soups! It’s kind of crazy how much our family loves Asian food, especially Tom. (What’s that you say, we “were meant to be”? Funny you should say that, I was just thinking the same.) I hope you all had a fabulous holiday weekend, enjoyed some time off, and didn’t overdose from too much chocolate or other sweet assortments!

Apr

21

Lick’s Homeburgers & Ice Cream

Canon 35mm 1.4 / Canon EOS 7D / dining out Posted by Sara / 10 comments

This year marks the very first Veggielicious Festival in Toronto. To support the festival and local restaurants offering deals on vegetarian meals (or offering vegetarian meals at all) Tom and I decided to take a stab at one. We chose Lick’s Homeburgers & Ice Cream, because it’s kind of like a Wendy’s and Arby’s meets Subway kind of deal, and though I’d never been, it seemed like a good idea to support a chain to let them know this is a great thing to be doing. I thought I could handle it.

Guys. Seriously? OW. My tummy hurt so badly! But it’s not because of the food! Well, it IS because of the food, but it’s because of the food I eat on a daily basis, not this food. (Tom was fine.) We both thought our homemade bean burgers (which I will now post the recipe for soon) were 1000x better (and a quarter of the price), but we still had a good time. The chili fries were pretty good, I’m just accustomed to really healthy (and organic) food and I think to have almost greasy spoon style was not going over well.

But now I want my black bean burgers.

Apr

16

In Which Catnip Ruins Everything

Canon 35mm 1.4 / Canon EOS 7D / morn the cat Posted by Morn / 5 comments

Hello readers, it’s Morn here. Sara mentioned to me that someone actually requested I update my blog! I was so excited that I spent all week trying to think of ideas of what to share with you. At first I thought I would share photos that I’ve been taking recently, but then that seemed unfair. (It’s mostly experimental stuff anyway.) And THEN I thought I would do a tutorial on tips for self portraits, but Sara tells me she’s working on that series herself. Finally, this morning it hit me. While Tom and Sara are still sleeping, Pumpkin and I (with the help of Paddington) decided to share a few of our favorite things! Our secret hiding spots, our favorite toys… but then we accidentally brought out the catnip first. I thought I would just have a little lick, but… well, you know. I couldn’t help myself. And then we were rolling around in catnip, effectively ruining any chances we had of actually accomplishing what we set out to do. Oh well. I took some pretty awesome timer self portraits, though! (Ahem.)

The only downside to catnip is that it makes Pumpkin sleepy and me hyper so I have nobody to play with until Tom and Sara wake up.

Play with me?

Apr

15

Fresh Strawberries For Breakfast

Canon 35mm 1.4 / Canon EOS 7D / everyday life Posted by Sara / 6 comments

Happy Friday, everyone! A few days ago I finally picked up a 35mm lens! I’ll try to make this next geeky part quick for those of you just starting into photography: I have crop sensors in my cameras, so when I put on a 50mm (like the one I have) and look through the viewfinder, I see what someone using an old film camera or a digital full frame camera would see if they were using an 80mm. It’s fabulous, and I love it, but you may remember me mentioning it can be a little close at times. Usually I don’t mind but in restaurants or for group photos people have to back up to the max and sometimes it’s just impossible. (Not ideal conditions if you’re going to shoot someone’s wedding!) So after much debate over the 24mm or the 35mm, I took the plunge and went 35. And boy I’m glad I did! I am floored by the quality, speed, and how quiet the autofocus is. I’m totally in love. (And strangely I’ve been taking a lot of video with it as well! Perhaps I shall share some soon!) Have a great weekend, everyone. Enjoy the sun!

Photos 1-6 taken by Tom.

Apr

09

A Caramel Chai Caturday

actions / Canon 50mm 1.4 / Canon EOS 7D / the cats Posted by Sara / 6 comments

I’m about a week or two away from releasing the Colorful Morning action set, and then a few weeks later Morn will be turning seven. Which is crazy because for the past two years I’ve been saying he’s six. But now he’s actually six and turning seven! He’s growing up so fast!! Which reminds me: a reader requested that Morn (or Pumpkin) post another blog post soon, so I’ve told the boys they have next Caturday! As the Japanese would say, please look forward to it!
[narrowcolumn side="left"]
Morn
age: 6 (7 in May)
weight: 11 lbs
likes: eating, Tom, cuddling, laps,
bathing people he likes, chasing Pumpkin,
head butting, kissing (licking) noses, catnip
dislikes: waiting for food, not being fed, mean cats, when Tom is not home
favorite activities: hunting, eating, playing with feathered toys, taking walks outdoors
[/narrowcolumn]
[narrowcolumn side="right"]Pumpkin
age: 3 (4 in August)
weight: 9 lbs
likes: cuddling, air hugs,
cardboard boxes, plastic bags,
womb-like environments
dislikes: being left alone, sleeping alone, anything alone, the vacuum
favorite activities: cuddling, being held in
between two people hugging, exploring
[/narrowcolumn]

Photos 5-9 taken by Tom.
All processed with A Colorful Morning: Caramel Chai.

Apr

08

Tea Time At The Farm

Canon 50mm 1.4 / Canon EOS 7D / everyday life Posted by Sara / 8 comments

They don’t have “tea time” in the good ol’ USA, at least not that I know of. In fact, the only tea I’d ever had was herbal before coming to Canada (my fault, probably), and since I didn’t really enjoy herbal I assumed I didn’t really like tea. (Aside from green!) Every time we went over to family for visits it was, “Would you like some tea?” I’d politely decline, and Tom would say, “Oh, she doesn’t like tea. But I’m working on it.” And response was always a shocked, “You don’t like TEA?” Even after I’d been a few times, they’d offer, I’d decline, “Oh, that’s right. But how can you not like tea?” It may not be that way in all of Canada, though, because I should note Tom’s father’s side is from England and Tom’s mother’s side is of course Irish. (Also, just to clarify because I want to: this teasing was always playful, made me laugh, and never made me feel uncomfortable.)

But I digress, the tea is different here and a lot of it is really quite enjoyable! (Even the herbal!) And in Ireland it’s a WHOLE different ball game. It’s all black and it’s reaaallly good. And when you come over it’s never, “Would you like something to drink?” It’s, “Would you like some tea?”. In fact, we have a few boxes we brought back with us and I think I just might have to have some now. When my sister came back from living in Germany one of the things she mentioned missing was tea time (around 4:00pm) because it was a chance to just take a break from the day and relax. I asked Tom if he would like to start implementing a tea time in our daily lives and he enthusiastically agreed. Sometimes it’s important to just take a moment to pause. Try it sometime. (And photograph it!)

Apr

06

Explorers

Canon 50mm 1.4 / Canon EOS 7D / outdoor adventures Posted by Sara / 5 comments

I promise one of these days I will actually post a “Wordless Wednesday” without including any text. Today is not that day.

(coyote kill site)

Apr

05

A Taste of Spring

actions / Canon 24-70mm 2.8 / Canon 50mm 1.4 / Canon EOS 7D / outdoor adventures Posted by Sara / 17 comments

On Sunday we went to see Bronwyn for a spring nature expedition. We scouted animal tracks, discovered a fox den, rode in a canoe, stumbled upon a coyote kill spot, and made nests for the local wildlife. Hello, Spring. So nice to see you again.

5-7 taken by Bronwyn
8-11 taken by Tom
Photos all processed with unreleased Green Tea Raspberry action.

Mar

31

Feeling Sheepish

Canon 24-70mm 2.8 / Canon 50mm 1.4 / Canon EOS 7D / equipment / Ireland Posted by Sara / 6 comments

This is a post that was scheduled for, and automatically posted on, the 11th. I had already heard the news about Japan by that point so when I saw it pop up on FB, I felt terrible and of course took it down. (The title now holds extra meaning!) I figured it’s okay to re-share it now, as my Ireland posts are wrapping up. Sorry if you’ve seen this twice.

Mar

28

Yann Tiersen Live At Roisin Dubh

Canon 50mm 1.4 / Canon EOS 7D / events / Ireland Posted by Sara / 20 comments

One of our last stops on the honeymoon was Galway, to see Yann Tiersen live at the Róisín Dubh (The Black Rose). Now, I’ve always been too intimidated by band or concert photography to ever attempt my hand at it, but this was a special occasion. Yann Tiersen. Ireland. My honeymoon. Did I mention it was Yann Tiersen? Since I mostly listen to composers, I have very few people I would like to see live before I die. Tiersen was on that list. But not only did I see him live, but he shared a beer with us before the show, hugged me, and gave me a set list which he then autographed. And to top it all off, I’d like to think these photos aren’t half bad for a 50mm prime and a terrified-of-messing-this-moment-up photographer. I’m happy as a clam. My only “regret” is I wished he’d have played his actual accordion, and that he’d played La Noyee.