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For awhile I was making lots of cookies, but I seem to have now moved onto cupcakes. After seeing this recipe for carrot cupcakes with maple cream cheese frosting on Design Sponge, I decided I needed to try it. 
I'm not all that skilled with the icing, but I think they don't look half bad. More importantly, they were delicious. I brought most of them to my friend's house for her birthday, hence the white box they are inside, which I tied with red and white baker's twine to look festive.
So, I of course had the dilemma of needing to use up more eggs, so I combed the blogs for another recipe that caught my eye, and saw this one for black and white cupcakes (modeled after the famous black and white cookie).
These were even trickier to ice, what with the two different kinds of icing covering one half of the tops. It was made all that much harder by the fact that the white icing was really runny, even after sitting for awhile to thicken (or so the recipe says). I don't know if I missed something in the translation or if the icing is naturally that runny, but it was dripping down the sides like crazy, which made for some messy-looking cupcakes. No matter, though, they are quite tasty.Still one egg left--maybe back to cookies, which happily do not require icing.
I realized I hadn't done a house tour post in awhile, so here is the kitchen. 
It's another one of those rooms that we obviously don't have much control over, being that we don't own the place. I'm not such a fan of the tile, the cabinets, that peach wall color, and so on. But there are a few cool things in there nonetheless.
For instance, this silkscreened poster we bought a few years ago at the John Waters Dusk-till-Dawn marathon in Baltimore that was part of the Alamo Drafthouse Rolling Road Show. There are so many great details from each of the four films in the marathon (I just hope that my mom never looks that closely at it--she might question the awesomeness of the singing asshole).
A few things on top of the fridge. Not sure where the teapot came from (my mom had it for awhile), but the pig (which is really a pitcher but the last few people who have owned it have used it as a utensil holder) has a pretty good story behind it. Allegedly, it belonged to a neighbor of my grandparents when they lived in Jersey City in the 60s. The neighbor died, and her daughter was convinced that the apartment was haunted by the ghost of her mother and refused to set foot inside. I'm not sure how this leads to my grandparents ending up with the pig, but it's a pretty good story, I think (more interesting than the stories of most kitchen items).
Map of Paris monuments in the short hallway between the kitchen and the bathroom.
Further down the hallway is this castiron bird coat rack, which I bought at a nearby antique store.
On the counter we have some knives, Stonehouse California olive oil, a little white bowl of garlic, and a wire basket of onions. The basket was the first thing I bought at the Elephant's Trunk flea market, for $1(!). It was purchased within minutes of entering the place, which definitely got me excited for more scavenging.
The window above the sink, with my new succulents, and a few empty soda bottles (the sill had previously been filled with the bottles, but I think this looks better).
There is a shelf above the sink that is perfect for displaying items, such as these salt and pepper shakers and ceramic pitchers.
More pitchers and shakers.
I've had the table and chairs for about 9 years. I kind of want to update them, but I'm still a little attached.
My new 1962 calendar tea towel hanging on the basement door. I have a habit of not actually using pretty towels for fear of ruining them with food stains (see the one hanging above the window).
A few objects on the table.
We put this bookcase in the kitchen simply because we didn't have room for it anywhere else. It contains most of Dave's books and his broken camera collection.Now just one room left for the house tour: the craft room.
After the Renegade Fair on Saturday we stopped by the nearby Sprout Home, an amazing garden supply store.
It was quite the successful trip. We picked up a pair of succulents and a little bitty cactus (it's cute, but it'll still prick you if you're not careful!), as well as two ceramic planters.
The rounded one on the left is an Echeveria and the spikier one on the right is a Haworthia.
Not sure about the cactus, as it's not labeled, but after trying to identify it online (it seems there are quite a few species of cactus!), I think I may have figured it out: gymnocalcium monvillei. Eh?
And, of course, we did not forget about a planter for the flower--this EcoForm pot and saucer does the trick quite nicely. I finally remembered to check the name of the flower, and it is a sunsatia cranberry. It seems that in full bloom it will be quite colorful.
It was such a nice day on Sunday that I decided we needed to have dinner out on the patio. These table and chairs belong to the landlord (I am so tempted to just buy some that we like, but it seems like not the best idea since we will be moving in November and may not have use for them in the next place). In addition to being kind of ugly, the table is covered in wax from when a citronella candle spilled over, so I went out and picked up a vinyl tablecloth.
Anyway, the point of that whole story is that the flower made a lovely centerpiece.
This weekend was the Brooklyn Renegade Craft Fair, the second one I've gone to. Last year it was in the McCarren Park Pool, but now that it's undergoing construction to actually become a pool again, the fair was held inside the actual park--which I think might have been a little nicer (not that I necessarily minded the pool). It was also an interesting experience to be shopping alongside people running around the track and stretching and performing various other exercises.There was an overwhelming amount of cool stuff contained within a not-so-large space, so I found myself having to suppress the urge to spend all my money up front, passing up some really cool but perhaps not quite so functional items from Something's Hiding in Here (paint by number USA!) and Miniature Rhino (in hindsight, I really wish I'd bought the constellation embroidery). Even so, I spent a little more $$$ than I'd planned. Oh well, it only comes but once a year.
Onto what I did buy: this scissors necklace from Ach Ach Liebling. It not only opens and closes, but actually cuts paper!
In addition to the cool jewelry, the packaging was great too (I'm a sucker for the stamped brown paper bag--so simple yet so appealing).
Leaf necklace from Loyalty and Blood.
I've lately been into ships, so I picked up this letterpress card from Enormous Champion.
I guess I've also been into ampersands. Here's a pretty cool T-shirt from Lil Hop. I also really like the subtle gray stripes on the shirt itself.
And speaking of cool T-shirts, I bought one from Super Maggie for the second year in a row. Again, I not only love the design, but the actual shirt it is printed on.
A closeup of the design.
Dave picked up a little something for himself too: this silkscreened poster of the 1985 New York Yankees lineup (which was the lineup that was playing when he first got into baseball...ah, nostalgia) from Magick Outlaw*.
*Note: this seller is from Philly, so clearly the Yankees and Mets prints must have been made specifically for us New Yorkers (or so I'd think). Astute marketing skills, friends.
I used this baren to push down on the linoleum to get an even print.
The first one came out a bit too light, so over the next few I tried adding more ink, putting more weight on the baren, and holding it down longer.
Here are the last two prints. While not totally perfect, there is marked improvement--and I don't think this method will ever yield perfectly smooth lines, as any fabric has a texture.
Here's the final piece. While it has its imperfections, I nonetheless have some (somewhat) grand plans for it.
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