Blogs to Fancy: Kinfolk Video

One of my favorite independent magazines is Kinfolk, a Guide for Small Gatherings. You can buy it at you local Anthropologie or at their online shop! They recently posted this beautiful video on their website on making bread, it's not too long and inspired me to make some bread of my own!

Five Cheese Farms in Vermont

Here's a cool video I stumbled upon yesterday. It's random, but really lovely and I've already watched it three times! If you have a few minutes to spare watch the video below, where photographer, Christopher Baker captures the stories of five cheese farms in Vermont.

Five Cheese Farms Vermont from Christopher Baker on Vimeo.

Christoffers Holiday Catalog

Hello Everyone! It's been a busy month at Christoffers and we are proud to bring you the first Holiday Catalog giving you a taste of some of the giftware that we carry at the store! Take a look below!

                         Open publication - Free publishing - More catalog

Ariana's Pick: Sloane Ranger

Hello all! I've decided to start a new section of the blog, where I share my favorite things currently in at Christoffers. To start off I thought I'd talk about the new company Sloane Ranger. I met the creator at this past summer's Gift Show in Atlanta. It was such a pleasure and I was so excited for this line to arrive! They have a great selection of bags, wallets, cell phone cases, socks and more! Below is a video from their website which I encourage you to look at! And below the video you'll find photos of my favorite Sloane Ranger items we carry.

Not sure what a Sloane Ranger is exactly?
The term Sloane Ranger (often shortened to Sloane or less frequently Sloanie) refers to a stereotype in the UK of young, upper class or upper-middle-class women, or men who share distinctive and common lifestyle traits. 

Lifestyle: Living in the Catskills

In an age where we as a society are shunning all things natural for all things touchscreen it was refreshing to read this NYTimes Home & Garden article on Jared Handelsman and Portia Munson, a couple of artists building, (sometimes growing) their home into the land of their 83 acre plot in the Catskills. I'm supremely jealous of their treehouse turned camera-obscura and their bathroom covered in reclaimed birch bark not to mention the beautiful blue and yellow tiles covering their kitchen. Below are some of the images of their home and land, you can click here for the full article and set of images!

Lifestyle: Movie to see this week

Today the film Diana Vreeland: The Eye has to Travel has been released in NY and LA. If you are lucky enough to be in the area do try and see this vibrant documentary on the woman who shaped fashion as we know it today.

Here are some of my favorite Diana Vreeland quotes

"The only real elegance is in the mind;

If you've got that, the rest really comes from it"

"The best thing about London is Paris"

"Never fear being vulgar, just boring"

"I'm a great believer in vulgarity - if it's got vitality.  A little bad taste is like a nice splash of paprika.  We all need a splash of bad taste - it's hearty it's healthy, it's physical.  I think we could use more of it.  NO taste is what I'm against"

Weekend Inspiration

Found this while on the net the other day and I thought that I'd share it with you folks, hope you enjoy it as much as do!

Lifestyle: Happy Memorial Day!

Hello everyone, hope you had a lovely Memorial weekend. The sky gods were extra kind to us, giving Mountainside glorious weather all three days! We didn't waste it at my house this weekend, taking advantage, we drove over to Dreyer's Farms and bought up a bunch of plants and grasses to fill our garden for the season! Take a look below!

This has to be some of my favorite ground covering in the backyard, it's actually a weed but I love the vibrant hues of green and yellow! 

After a day of hard work in the garden we had a great spread of produce we purchased at the Farmer's Market! We also had some fingerling potatoes left over from our family BBQ yesterday, so today we used a simple  herb seasoning of rosemary, oregano and thyme freshly picked from the garden! 

For the main course we had lamb chops seasoned with garlic cloves, rosemary and salt & pepper and olive oil!

These pigs in the blanket from Trader Joe's are great, they even have a parmesan crust which is extra yummy! 

As I said in one of my previous posts music is a very important part of our everyday life, here is a link to some of the songs we were listening to this weekend, hope you groove out to some (if not all) of these tunes!

Lifestyle: Sunday Dinner!

 It's so lovely to finally have nice weather where we can be outside all day! This weekend was the first of the farmers market season (it actually started last week but I was unaware!) On the menu tonight was homemade Ceasar Salad (with locally grown romaine lettuce!), steamed asparagus, steamed broccoli, avocado salad, turkey burgers with an Indian Onion Chutney (courtesy of Star of India in Kenilworth) and munster cheese, lobster tails and to finish off the meal we had Rhubarb Pie with fresh whipped cream and home grown strawberries! It was one of our better family meals to say the least!

If you're wondering what exactly an Avocado Salad is, its basically what you put in guacamole, but instead of mashing all the ingredients together you slice up the avacado and sprinkle the spices, tomatoes, onions and lemon juice on top! Yumm!

The pup had a good evening too, finishing off some of the strawberries for us!

Like food, music is also a big part of our life, so wether we're working out in the yard or cooking up a storm in the kitchen, we have some of our favorite tunes playing! Click here to visit Bamboo & Fern's new YouTube page where we will be sharing our family favs and playlists! Here is a link to the playlist we were listening to today! Or check out one of the videos below!