P&P

You know Fate is calling when you walk into Value Village and you are presented with a pair of pink and purple eighties jumpsuits. Needless to say, message received.

Pinterest: we're about to blow up your style boards.

Growing sunshine.

This is, without a doubt, my absolute favorite time of year. If I could, I would make dandelions bloom all summer long. It must be the Leo in me. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: this is when the world looks happiest, all drenched in yellow.

Happy Spring, my fellow Midwesterners. It's finally here!

Prime time.

 Every year the theatre department has a big party to celebrate the season and the closing of a good year. The students and the faculty come together to eat dinner, watch some skits, and share in circle time. The circle is essentially a big puddle of tears as the underclassmen say goodbye to the seniors and the faculty offer some memories and bits of advice. I've cried all four years, which is really a testament to how special this place and its people really are. But this year, oh this year, I was a genuine mess. My heart overflowed and it came out my eyes.

Picnic on the Porch.

I didn't wear a coat yesterday, or today, and I feel like I'm on vacation. The sun and warm weather is a welcome reprieve from the clenching grasp of winter that just hasn't let go of the Midwest for the last couple months. But now the grass is turning green, seagulls have been swarming the roofs of buildings on the Marquette campus, and I've seen my first daffodils.

Even better, my most recent show opened this past Friday, meaning I don't have rehearsal in the evenings this week, and my time is once again my own. To celebrate, I made a nest for myself on the front porch and did my homework in the sunshine. It was a simple setup, but I felt great getting to spend some time outside. Some kids were roller skating on the playground across the street, and I had my little tea party while getting some of my necessary work finished.

Milwaukee Eats: Simple Cafe

 


Smoked trout and sweet potato benedict. Acorn squash chicken sausage strata. I'll admit up front: I don't know what strata is when I'm not talking about rocks, but it's these musical names that won me over when sitting down at Simple Cafe on Farwell Ave. on Milwaukee's East Side. The first time I walked in here, it was on a whim. I hadn't heard about it, but it looked as if it might have breakfast food, and my pal and I were hungry. I quickly fell into a deep, lasting love. I've been back a couple of times, and recently took my mom for her first. She felt similarly after her starter soup of a butternut squash, cinnamon concoction that tasted like it was a dessert, not a vegetable (or fruit, you biologists, you). I myself had a Korean BBQ bowl. I'm wussy about spice, but loved it despite the burn. What a pretty, savory mess for my mouth. Just look at me sassily grinning away with that broccoli.

So Simple Cafe makes really good food, that's a given. But even cooler is how they make it. They have a mission of sustainability and keeping local growers in business. I just went and read a little more about them on their website, and my own desire to support them continued to grow, above and beyond just wanting to try their pumpkin pancakes. I found this:

Easter Nests.

Happy Easter, Happy hunting! In my family, the tradition of hiding eggs goes farther afield than just the backyard. When my mom was little, my grandma started making little nests out of the field grass and hiding candy in stumps, crevices between rocks, out in the garden. And when I was born, my mom started hiding nests for me. This year Easter ended up being a holiday squashed between the unbearably busy days of my family's different lives, so we didn't do a lot of prep work and there weren't any pre-made nests. But on the day itself, my parents and I went walking in High Cliff state park and brought along some eggs to play with (and snack on, primarily).

What I'm Reading: Daily Rituals

Aha! The first post in a series I've been meaning to start for quite a while. I love books. I love reading. And even though school keeps me pretty much glued to books for class, once in a while I get to read what I want. Whatever I want. Freedom!

One of the books I've been working through lately is Daily Rituals, by Mason Curry. It's a compilation of the routines and habits from famous creatives over the last several centuries. And it's a wonderful bite size book, meaning you can easily start or end the day with a few pages and feel a little smarter in the process. It's kind of become my daily ritual to wake up in the morning, eat my cereal and crack open this book for the few minutes I have.