Friends Forever

I have a friend, Who many of you have met a few times. In fact, if you are reading my blog you see her legs right now! Katey, was the "bride" wearing the pink converse sneakers in the photo that makes up the back ground to my blog right as you read this! I've also put her in a swamp in that same wedding dress and well, she is a trooper.  I've known Katey since she was born and she has always unofficially been my little sister.  <3 You Kate. 

So, when I received a phone call the other day and she asked me for a favor.. how could I refuse?!?  One of her best friends, miss Anna was leaving for one year to live in Rome, Italy for school. First of all, how awesome is that?!? If ever you have the option to do something like that, ESPECIALLY if it scares you, make sure you do it. 

With Anna being gone for a year, Katey wanted to have pictures taken so that she could sit and stare at them, and cry. I mean, have nice memories. :)

I was unaware though, that I would have 2 supervisors on this photo session.......

and of course, our supervisors on the job...

 We couldn't leave them out of the shoot! 

I've known both these girls since they were born, which I'm grateful for because they have turned into wonderful beautiful and smart young ladies, but it makes me feel really old.  

So Anna, have an AWESOME time in Italy. I'm so jealous... and Katey, its just me and you left. haha (sorry)

*LOVE*

Cinnamon Sugar Donut questions ANSWERED!

Good Morning

I must admit, when I opened my email this morning and saw all the comments on my blog, I was a bit shocked and excited all at the same time!  My usual blog posts go from numbers in the 20's and 30's and today jumped to the thousands!  WHOA.  I'd love to know how all ya'll found me, If you wouldn't mind sharing.. leave me a comment! But more importantly, WELCOME!


As you may or may not know, I'm a photographer born and raised (and educated) Hallmark Institute of Photography Grad here, Hi I'm Karin :) I'm currently starting my own business in my home town in Connecticut and well, didn't I pick a great time to start a business??  ( WAIT, now that you know i'm crazy, don't leave! )  When I meet with people, I want them to feel comfortable and welcome, (not everyone is comfortable with meetings, Especially when they involve new people with cameras). So as a new business owner, I've been trying to come up with tons of new ideas. One of which involves.. home made donuts. :)

I wanted to have a plate of mini goodies and coffee for an early meeting with a client but, I had to try and make them first. I bake all the time and I haven't had too many complaints about my baking, however, I needed to test out my new ideas on my family, before offering them to the innocent public.

If you are reading my blog for the first time, and have no idea what I'm talking about.. check out the Cinnamon Sugar Blog Post. If you are one of my lovely readers looking for answers.. Here ya go :)

There is a store in the town next to mine that I try not to go into often, because they take all my money every time I go there.  I'm looking at you StoneWall Kitchen.  My new favorite is the Strawberry Peach Jam, Ooooh how delicious you are.   Seriously, thin spread of cream cheese on a ritz cracker with a dab of jam, Heart Melting. I'm not kidding, try it.

Sorry, I get carried away.

So, here it is, I cheated. I went with a Mix. *hiding my face in shame* I wanted to find a donut that I could bake, not fry.  I know, I know.. Donuts are donuts and not healthy no matter how you look at it, but baked is better than fried.. therefore its healthier than frying a donut. (i got this worked out people, trust me) :)    When I walked into this magical store and saw the donut pans... both mini and regular donut size. I fell in love right there. A mini baked donut?!?!?  EVEN HEALTHIER! Am I right?

I bought one of Stonewall's Donut Mix and went on my way.  Now, I do plan on trying my own completely from scratch recipes soon. So, naturally I'll be blogging more about those. But I have to say, the mix was pretty good! SUPER easy. I completely recommend them with kids! The recipe is super easy for kids to get involved with.  Eggs, Butter and Milk + mix, then stir it up. And its not SUPER thick so it would be easy for kids of any ages to stir the mixture together with a spoon.  Then you can use a spoon and pour it in the pan, or get fancy and use a pastry bag (or a sandwich baggie with a hole cut in the corner like myself).  When they are out of the oven, they pop out of the tin and you put them in the cinnamon sugar mixture. My family was NOT complaining, I can promise you that. In fact,  I was able to try one and only one.

I'm on the hunt for a delicious recipe that I can try from scratch, but so far, I haven't found any that I can use my pan for, all of the ones I've been finding need to be cut out and shaped.  So until then, I'll be sticking with Stonewall Mixes.  They have an Apple Cider Mix, that I'm ready to try next for the Fall.

By the way, I don't work there and I have no affiliation with the store. They just happen to be really yummy products.  :)

I hope that answered all your questions! I hope all of you visit our Facebook page  and "LIKE" us. Then you are guaranteed the first updates to new blog posts!  If not, thanks for stopping by <3

*LOVE*

I was in love with the whole world and all that lived in its rainy arms. --Louise Erdrich

As of right now, a ton of people in CT are out of power. I am VERY pleased to say that I am not one of those people!

Today started at 6am. thats early. 

You've all met my dog Tanner.  He isn't a fan of water........ or thunder. He does however like to eat things. 

EVERYTHING.  

We have an invincible fence system in the house so that he can't go passed the stairs and down the hallway towards the bedrooms because if that were the case, he would dig through garbage for dinner and snack on socks for dessert. 

back to the storm. 

This morning started at 6am, when Tanner was in my bed. I was just as confused as you are.  He risked being zapped (he doesn't wear the collar anymore because he knows where he can go so he wasn't zapped) but he didn't know that! He was scared by the storm. It wasn't thundering or lighting out, but he could tell something was up.  That is the beginning of this story.

For the rest of the day we played the ..."what is Tanner eating" game. 

His favorite thing to eat are the little paper inserts in magazines

And... then the actual magazines

Next up, the... "lady, whats with this camera always in my face" look.

He is after all.. the "man" of the house..

This Hurricane is no joke! It has done a lot of damage all the way up the east coast. It could have been a lot worse, so I'm thankful for that, But still.. there is going to be a lot of clean up!  Currently at my house, it is still raining and a little windy.  Nothing crazy though.  I went for a quick drive earlier to see what the damage was in my neighborhood. Not too bad.  Our yard is a pond though. Well.. more like a marsh. 

This is my back yard. 

Our pool. 

Draining the Pool.. 

For all these photos, I had some pretty fancy equipment.  I took a plastic bag from the grocery store, put my camera in it.. and cut a hole for the lens. Oh yeah. You are impressed ;)

By the time I felt it was safe enough to take a little drive, a lot of the water had drained a bit.  Lowes parking lot was pretty still a pretty good sized puddle. I live on the top of the hill.. and you saw my yard, so I didn't go too far around town. (i might be crazy, but i'm not looking to get hit by power lines or tree limbs.) 

All and All, we came out ok.  Its gonna be a couple days of clean up and hopefully people will get power back soon.  As I write this I got a text from my aunt who has no power and needed to know what was happening with the weather! 

Stay Safe People!

*LOVE*

Illuminating Sky

As I'm sure all of you have heard, the entire East Coast is being hit by a pretty crazy by a Hurricane.  CHELSEA, stay strong down there in NC!!

Up here in CT, If we do get hit with the storm, its expected to hit late tonight, early tomorrow.  As of right now, when you step outside you are instantly coated with a warm misty drizzle. Its no where close to refreshing, however its not a scary Hurricane sooooooo i'll take it!

To start this super exciting weekend, Friday night before the Hurricane starts we went to a hot air balloon festival! Its an all weekend event that Im sad I JUST found out about.  Its been going on for a few years now but this year is being cut short because of the storm :(  Friday night festivities however, went on as planned.  At dusk they light the balloons. They are tethered to the ground and then lit them up. It was BEAUTIFUL!  Today, they were supposed to set them off this morning at 6am and head off into the unknown, buuut i'm guessing hot air balloons with people + rain and wind = disaster.

Before they could start the fireworks display, they had to bring down all the balloons which I somehow became a part of.  Its not like they really send out warning, they just pull them down and run with it.  I may have been standing right under where the balloon was coming down.  so naturally rather than move, I just took pictures. Its a little blurry cause it was coming down fast. But I feel like it really captures the chaos.

Ok, that was cheesy. But I thought it was cool.  moving on..

FIREWORKS.. and no, i'm not talking Katy Perry here. These are real, in your face, VERY loud, Very Close, Ash falling all over you fireworks. They were pretty great! It was a very cool event, hopefully next year I can go and enjoy the whole festival! 

When all the fun was over we walked 30 miles back to our car.... then turned around and headed in the correct direction of our car.. found the car and headed home!

The sky was super clear and the stars were screaming my name.. So I snapped a few shots of the sky.  Not knowing what to expect for the next few days, I took advantage of the clear beautiful air!

If you or any of your family is in the path of the storm, Stay Safe.. and TRY and stay dry! <3

*LOVE*

Cinnamon Sugar Donuts

Happy Tuesday Peoples!

Today in CT the weather is perfect.  The temperature has hovered around 75 degrees all day with a cool breeze.  If the weather stayed this way all year long... Ahhh how lovely that would be.  We did have some excitement however.. There was an earth quake in Virginia.  I'm glad everyone is ok, a little shaken up (pun intended) but as far as I know, everyone is ok.  We felt it up here in CT though, which is weird.  The second time in a year that we've felt an earthquake.  I didn't feel it at the house, but I've been busy! My mom works about 40 minutes from home and the whole company evacuated because the buildings were shaking.. CRAZY! 

Here at home, KGP has been busy. With the help of my assistant (Andrew) we have made our first batch of home made Cinnamon Sugar Donuts! I have been trying new recipes lately and I figured, why not share with everyone? I'm just sorry you can't try them cause they were delicious!

I got the cutest mini donut pan thingy.. <-- technical term, it says it on the package, which made baking them really easy! 

 

After I mixed the dough and I put in in a little baggy, cut the corner and evenly squeezed it into the round tin.  Karin Goodwin and Betty Crocker.. practically the same person. :)

With the help from my lovely assistant.. Andrew... I was able to snap this photo while he coated a batch with the cinnamon sugar goodness 

and......

mmmmmmmmmmm.. good

To continue this cooking adventure, for dinner I took some plums and peaches that we had in the fridge, Cooked them on the store with some red wine vinegar and onion and simmered and mashed them into a marinade. Let that sit with the chicken all day and then through it on the grill. I wrapped the chicken in foil so that the chicken would cook in the juices and well.. so far so good! I have to say, between my cooking friends at Zach and Lou's BBQ and the Food Network. We have been more adventurous in our cooking.  Which I must say, Its fun!

Thats about it for now, I'm gonna follow the golden light tonight at sunset and try and make magic.  Stay tuned for more!

Today I leave you with a picture of 2 carrots that we pulled out of our garden. Aren't they the cutest darn carrots you've ever seen? Its not like we can get a huge meal out of them, but they are adorable, and a first step to a better garden! 

*LOVE*

Happy WORLD PHOTOGRAPHY DAY!!!!!!!!

Today, August 19th happens to be my brothers birthday. (i know he isn't reading my blog because he is 21 and he is busy, but... HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!!!!!!!!)

Ok, So.

I thought I was busy when I was at Hallmark but ooooh boy.  This last month I've been working and getting my business up and running which is VERY EXCITING!!! For Starters every Thursday night in the summer, my town has a Main Street Marketplace Street fair. Its Pretty cool! Different vendors participate and they have entertainment on the street, Its free and a very cool thing for the people in the area to get involved in!  Last night, KGP had their very first booth!

Because i'm AWESOME at photography, my camera was at home.. :) so I took this with my cell phone. But you get the picture! THANKS to everyone who came out to see us! We will be there again next week!

So.. along with the Marketplace, I will be participating in 2 of our local fairs this September which is HUGE!!  I'm SO excited.  If you live in the area, check us out at the Goshen and Bethlahem fair!!!

On top of all the excitement, this week I've been dog sitting! Two lovely ladies, Maddie and Sophie. (sophie is especially lovely when she barks at the wall at 2:30 am and freaks me out!) It has been fun though! We spent some time outside today taking pictures, because it is after all WORLD PHOTOGRAPHY DAY!!! Turns out, Sophie is a Ham and Maddie wanted NOTHING to do with my camera. That doesn't mean I gave up though.  Lets take a photo journey and meet the girls! 

First up, we have Sophie! She is a very spunky dog! 

annnnd then there is Maddie.  She thought she could hide from me... ;)

A little over the shoulder pose.. She knows what she is doing! Natural born model!

Every time I turn around, Sophie has something new in her mouth! hahaha

The Next picture is my favorite from our outdoor adventures today, because it makes me laugh every time I look at it. We were sitting in the back yard, Sophie was right in front of me and all of a sudden she TAKES OFF.  I honestly didn't think she could run that fast.  She ran into the fence and then leaped into the air. I didn't know what was going on, until I saw the squirrel jump for its life into the tree and then jump across the branches. Sophie wasn't giving up though and followed it across the yard. I managed to get this picture... TOO funny.  You know it makes you smile!

As I write this blog, Sophie and Maddie are sound asleep on the floor under my feet.  Modeling is hard work! Thanks Ladies :) Dont worry, me and my camera are going to be leaving soon. haha

The last picture I leave you with tonight is from the sky earlier this evening.  It looked like Voldemort had entered T-town and it wasn't looking too good.  I jumped outside and snapped off a few shots, but I wasn't staying long!  You can see why.. Not cool.

*LOVE*