Blueberries and Sunshine

Posted on July 22, 2015 by bsome under Food, Kids, Summer

Last week my phone fell to it’s death. On it’s way down I tried to catch it and instead, slammed it down to the floor even harder. I’ve never claimed to be graceful. I murdered my phone; an open and close case of phoneslaughter. Since then, I’ve taken more photos with my camera. My real camera. While I’m no stranger to lugging that thing around, it’s just not always practical. But last Friday morning, it was beautiful outside, the kids and I were heading back to Ratliff’s Blueberry Farm and the combination of those two things just sounded too cute to leave my camera at home. This was our second attempt at blueberry picking. The first time we tried, they were all picked out before I finished my morning coffee! We woke up early enough to get there before the masses and we weren’t the only early (wise) birds. Our goal was to get enough to make a big batch of blueberry pancakes for Sunday brunch for our friends. With buckets hanging around their necks, the kids moved from bush to bush, picking the bluest ones they could find. At the checkout tent, we transferred our berries to the jars we brought along and the kind ladies told me the blueberries would taste best if I set them out on the counter for a couple of days. I trusted them and they were right. Those pancakes were the best I’ve ever made…and I’ve made a lot of pancakes. Go pick for yourself…soon they’ll all be gone and you’ll be heading home with a Christmas tree instead (same farm, different season).

This was the last shot I took before the pancakes were made and soon after – gobbled right up. Ah well.

took a hike, took a camera: Bearfence Mountain

Posted on June 2, 2015 by bsome under Kids, Spring, took a hike took a camera, Uncategorized

One time when I was a little girl, living with my Nanny, she made a quick run to the grocery store. Nanny left me home alone watching He-Man and She-Ra, coloring innocently at the coffee table. She walked out the door and a beacon of light shined down onto a bowl filled with mini Snickers, placed just out of my reach, on top of the microwave. I tossed my crayon and tugged a chair across the thick carpet. Wobbly legs and tippy-toes. The dog, Fluffy, gave me a sideways stare. That bowl was mine. I tore into those Snickers like a boss. I probably threw back 15 of those suckers! One after another into my little tummy. I heard Nanny’s car pull up so I quickly put the bowl back (empty wrappers and all), returned the chair and resumed my coloring. Within the hour I was in full regret mode. I felt gross….then, I yakked. And if you’ve ever yakked a candy bar, you know exactly the terrifying alienesque blob that was staring back at me from the toilet. I didn’t eat a Snickers bar for 10 years after that day.

Ben and I woke up one Sunday a couple of weeks ago and realized that, for the first time in a long time, we were kid-free and obligation-free onthesameday! A beacon of light shined on our day and we were eager to get out. I was so pumped I skipped a shower and threw my hair up in a tangled knot, put on some week old shorts and grabbed my backpack. We decided to hit a trail that a co-worker had recently told me about with beautiful 360 views called Bearfence on Skyline Drive. The trail was rugged and included some rock scrambling that will put your ego in check. As promised, the views were amazing. The layered gray clouds hovering over layered blue mountains were perfect. The kind of perfect you see in magazines and wish you could visit one day. I showed off a yoga pose (which is really dang hard to do when you’re on top of the world!), Ben ate a bagel, we took some selfies and then we hiked back to the car. We filled the rest of our day with a stop at two vineyards: Kilaurwen where we got to go on a property hike and Moss where we watched a rainband move in over several sets of hills before heading home to watch a movie.

When I was a little girl, that day of over-indulging in mini Snickers taught me a very valuable lesson. Mainly: the good things in life are best when savored, not indulged. There aren’t many free hours in my life these days and that makes those rare gems of unplanned days better than any candy bar, mini or deluxe, that I can imagine. I truly savored our time on the mountain and every drop of wine that followed….and I did not yak up an alien blob of remorse that day.

Cell phone summary:

took a hike, took a camera: Doyles River Falls

Posted on May 26, 2015 by bsome under Kids, Spring, took a hike took a camera

I was the first one awake on Mother’s Day morning. My son returned home after midnight the previous night because of a band trip to Busch Garden’s. He was exhausted and my daughter likes to savor the morning so the house was quiet that Sunday at 7:15am. I filled a small pot with water and scooped some rich grounds into my french press, hearing the grounds hit the glass for maybe the first time ever. Light poured in the window as my coffee steeped, the house still and quiet. I tidied and swept the main floor carefully then tippy-toed the trash and recycling to the bin outside. The kids woke up one by one and greeted me with a hug and a “What’s for breakfast?” They ate sleepy-eyed and I packed our bag for the hike. We arrived at the Doyles River Falls lot around 11am and it felt a little like my house that morning. It was calm and still, as if our presence alone would wake up the residents. Not far onto the trail we rounded a turn and met a deer. Then, one after another, we saw lots of life on our hike: flowers, snails, millepedes (so many millepedes), gnats (so many gnats) and a snake (which I did not get close enough to photograph). We even passed our Harrisonburg friend Danielle and her boyfriend Cody on this trail! Doyles has two falls: upper and lower. The trail guide I have says “two waterfalls with different personalities.” I didn’t know what that meant until I saw the second waterfall. They were equally beautiful but so very different. And, they’re close to each other so you get two falls in one hike which is sweet. On our way back we passed a group of hikers that let us know there was a black bear ahead, peacefully turning over rocks, looking for food. I had a little tinge of fear, I’ll be honest. But it was way helpful to know it was up ahead and that the people who told us about it lived to tell us so… We saw it, I took a blurry photo of it and then we hauled it up the path. On the last leg of the climb, Ben and Blake raced to the parking lot. They each met their match…neither wanted to keep going and neither of them would quit. It was a fun sight for me and Ella, casually lagging behind. The day ended with one more pull-off along the Drive to take in the rolling mountains under gray skies followed by a Mother’s Day barbecue courtesy of my little sister, Brook. It was the perfect gift from her and a delicious post-hike meal for all.

Bonus mini-waterfall on the hike.

Upper Doyles

Lower Doyles Cell phone summary:

Red Wing Roots II: Day 3

Posted on August 25, 2014 by bsome under Celebrating Life Series, Kids, Music, People, Summer, Uncategorized

It felt a lot like a Sunday when I parked my car on the third and final day of the second annual Red Wing Roots Music Festival. Time moves differently on Sundays. It ticks away and reminds us to notice the smells and colors and faces and light, to slow ourselves down and enjoy one last little morsel of, in this case, a mid-summer musical dessert. When I shut my car door, there were no echoes on this third day…no soft melodies or harmonicas bouncing off the Chimney’s. There was quiet. A little alarming, I admit, for a music festival…but I proceeded anyway, with curiosity and camera. As I moved towards the back of the seated, silent crowd, I heard Trent Wagler wailing out a line from his gospel set. It was an experience to be there in that moment, watching this community church under overcast skies, surrounded by beauty and bodies who needed this healing sound. People napped and recovered and carried themselves to the stage to wake up. Dang good way to start a day.

Next up was Willie Watson, who I found to be a pleasant surprise. I love watching passion pour from a face with each lyric…eye wrinkles forming in the delivery of a verse, veins bulging with blood pounding from an aching heart and a shaky esophagus to distract from a tear. I got to see this in Willie’s performance of Rock Salt and Nails, among others. I feel you man. But before I let myself get stuck in my own head, I wandered around to mingle and grab images of smiling faces. It was a good move, the sun joined us and the rest of the day came with a smooth, steady beat as each new band took the stage.

Above: Lucas Roasting Company saved the day for a lot of folks. Below: Year-old swag…we missed you this year Caleb!

Above: Blackfeather Furniture made taking a break look goooood.

JP Harris & The Touch Choices

Bourbon Barrel Congress

Bryan Elijah Smith & the Wild Hearts

The Revelers

Love Canon

It was time to fill our tanks with some Hanks.

Peter Rowan’s Bluegrass Band

Townes Van Zandt Tribute Set packed the stage with a smorgasbord or festival talent.

Hayes Carll wrapped up the evening and the festival for the year.

See you next year, friends!

Didya miss Day 1? Click here to get caught up! What about Day 2?

This post is part of my year long series Celebrating Life.

Check out my photos from last year: Red Wing Roots Music Festival 2013! Day 1, Day 2, & Day 3.

Red Wing Roots II: Day 2

Posted on August 14, 2014 by bsome under Casual, Kids, Music, People, Red Wing Roots, Summer, Uncategorized

It took two showers to wash away Day 1. Fragments of nostalgia broke away from my muddy footprints on the shower floor. Pieces of Mt. Solon dirt and blades of surely the greenest-grass-in-all-the-land sang sweet harmonies as they swirled to their watery death. I assured my lonely pores that their sweat buddies would return soon. Red Wing Roots Music Festival II, Day 2, started at noon with two bands I did not want to miss: Loves It and Smokey and the Mirror.

Loves it.

Above: Red Wing shirts printed by The Mark-it.

Lucas Roasting Company (above) keeping folks energized and Wholistic Wisdom (below) keeping folks relaxed.

Smokey and the Mirror

Above and below: So sweet to see their daughter watching the performance from backstage.

Above: remnants of Pokey LaFarge’s performance.

Above: One cute little Blue Mountain supporter. Below: One cute little Red Wing supporter.

Mandolin Orange

Below: Artery kicked off on Day 2. Hundreds of children and adults came to help work on this community painting.

Eric Brace and Peter Cooper

Above: Grilled Cheese Mania. Below: Jack Browns Beer and Burger Joint

The Stray Birds

Brothers Comatose

Miss Tess and the Talkbacks

The Judy Chops

Sarah Jarosz

One really awesome thing about photographing this festival, is that I get to work with other photographers who I know and love. I admire each of them in very different ways and I’m truly a fan of their work. I feel we have a great network and support system of creatives here in the Valley and I simply can’t imagine it being any other way. I’ll introduce my photog friends below. I encourage you to check out their work!

This is Keesha of Ruby Sky Photography. <–If you click on that link, I have a feeling you’ll enjoy her music selection. In fact, feel free to let it play as you continue to look through the rest of this post…you’ll find it quite relevant. Keesha can usually be found with three little assistants. In the photo below, the third assistant is playing hide-and-seek.

This. Ha. Well, this is Pat Jarrett. He likely rode in on his motorcycle that morning after shooting in Newport News. He’s a busy dude and if you’re a Stauntonian, you’ve probably seen him walking to and from his downtown studio.

These girls are my studio neighbors at Spitzer Art Center and are an inspiration to me. They own and operate The Pinwheel Collective. It’s great how well they not only work together but also how nicely their work compliments each others. They do cool stuff. And sometimes funny stuff, too.

Oh hay. That’s me. You’re looking at my work now…but I do some other stuff to. Like weddings and portraits and I photograph for a blog I do with my friend Katie about Harrisonburg. I also plan this really cool community portrait show with my friend Denise Allen every year called Art Lotto.

Trent Wagler and the Steel Wheels

Didya miss Day 1? Click here to get caught up!

Check out this writeup and MORE of my photos from Red Wing Roots 2014 Day 2 on ilovemyburg!

This post is part of my year long series Celebrating Life.

Check out my photos from last year: Red Wing Roots Music Festival 2013! Day 1, Day 2, & Day 3.

Today is not National Macaron Day.

Posted on May 30, 2014 by bsome under Celebrating Life Series, Food, Kids, People, Spring, Uncategorized

This post is a testament to one of the most delicious mistakes I’ve ever made. May is home of National Macaroon Day. May 31st, to be exact. There it was, jotted into my planner, making it fact. For this month’s Celebrating Life post I wanted to photograph a macaroon maker, working his or her macaroon magic at home in their kitchen. With some word-of-mouth references I quickly landed a sweet, willing candidate…and cute to boot! When I arrived at Amelia’s house to invade her space for the afternoon, she greeted me at the front door with a big smile, warmly welcomed me into her home, offered me a glass of water…then straight up schooled me. “People always confuse macarons with macaroons,” she explained as she showed those eggs who was boss. Wait, what? Ah geez. That’s me. I’m the people.

MacarOONS are chewy and made with coconut. MacarONS are made with almond meal and resemble a cookie-like sandwich. They basically share the same list of other ingredients, but let’s face it: as delicious as they both are, macarons are the Homecoming Queens and macaroons are sitting at home in their sweatpants, eating a pint of Kline’s peanut-butter-cookies-n-cream, watching reruns of Girls. After some brief research, I learned that they both started in Italy but the recipe branched into the two directions where macarOONS became more popular with the European Jewish folks and macarONS became a thing of France. Which is why you may know them as French macarons rather than just plain ol’ macarons. Went to foodiversity; servin’ up some knowledge. Aw sookie! Seriously though, you have no reason to trust me. I just used high school, Hollywood and binge eating to prove a point.

As I photographed Amelia in her kitchen, her daughter and the two boys she was babysitting that day played contently in the room around us. Crawling in and out of the sliding door, tossing sippy cups for more water, piecing together giant puzzles on the floor, tugging at her apron and coming in for leg hugs. All the while, Amelia mixed batter, refilled their water, cleaned her work surface, translated the child-grunts, carried on conversation with me, babbled with the kids and distributed about four rounds of gold fish crackers. What a sweet juggler-of-the-daily-circus she is.

When Amelia pulled the macarons out of the oven, she pointed out their feet. “They gotta have feet,” she explained. That’s the raised up, crispy-looking bottom half of the cookie that is not as smooth and fluffy as the top half. She had lavender and buttercream ready for the first batch of decorating, followed by cocoa powdered macarons filled with a family recipe for caramel cream that she whipped up on the spot. The kids acted out my thoughts as they tried to snatch a filled macaron at each hint of her potential distraction. It was also hitting that weird hour of nap time when kids turn into zombies on the verge of self-destruction…fearless of consequence. Must. Eat. Coooo-kieeee.

Even though this was intended to be a shoot to celebrate National Macaroon Day…it is not. I didn’t even shoot macaroons for cryin’ out loud. But I did learn something new and meet a pretty cool gal…and that’s really why I created this whole series to begin with. It was great spending the afternoon getting to know Amelia and taking a glimpse into another hardworkin’ mama’s life…and learning that I’m a culinary idiot, but I’m trying ova hea! I didn’t know anything about Amelia before knocking on her front door, other than she was kind enough to invite me into her home for baking and photos. And after checking out her work online, I’m thankful I knew very little because I would’ve been intimidated by her craftiness! Amelia does creative design/styling and has a growing portfolio of handmade details to make any event extra special and unique.

The most precious unintentional smear of flour on her face is a document of hard work in the kitchen…with a super sweet payoff.

The most precious unintentional smear of flour on her cheek is proof of her hard work in the kitchen…with a super sweet payoff.

As I drove home to my children with a packed plate full of freshly made macarons, I felt a wee bit smarter, a wee bit plumper and whole lotta happy.

Stop by your local bakery and taste a macaron today…then tomorrow, celebrate National Macaroon Day by trying one of those coconut goodies. You can feel smarter and plumper and happier, too.

Check out more from my Celebrating Life series by clicking here.

Tres-giving

Posted on November 28, 2013 by bsome under Fall, Food, Kids, People, Thanksgiving, Uncategorized

I am not complaining about my bulging waistline. Really, I’m not. It was a labor of love that I would do all over again tomorrow. I am so so thankful that my day was filled with three separate events, each with amazing family and delicious friggin’ food. I paced myself. I did. But as you scroll…you’ll see why there is more of me here this evening than there was this morning.

#1: Harrisonburg: Lunch

#2: Luray: Dinner

…love comes in droplets…

#3: Woodstock: Dessert Drop-in (cakes made by a sweet lady named Peggy Keller)

Happy day everyone.

A lake named Anna

Posted on September 4, 2013 by bsome under Casual, Food, Kids, Lake Anna, Summer, Uncategorized

The sun was beaming as I packed the car with a cooler, the kids and a Ben and we headed over the mountain to enjoy a day at Lake Anna for a friend-reunion of sorts. As I was driving I realized that the last time I drove over that mountain to see Toff and Cara, I was using printed mapquest directions. And possibly listening to a cd burned from my napster downloads? Haaaaa. Ancient. It was also before they became parents of sweet little Trip and Meg. Time leaves us. Too too fast. We were welcomed at the Newcomb lake house to lots of open international arms but the hugs didn’t last long as the kids were ready to enjoy the water!

Day 2. A slow, easy morning filled with lots of coffee, crossword puzzles, dogs and amazing food. The shrimp and grits that Sam and Elizabeth concocted were so good that I didn’t even get a chance to photograph them. After brunch we all waddled down to the lake to float like buoys until our food digested. Australia is a lifetime away, it seems, and any time with these guys feels like a ticking clock is dangling over us. I miss their faces already.

…note the vanilla slice: Toff and Cara’s number 1 seller at their bakery (activate saliva)…

Blake took a moment to teach Trip an American greeting: The Fist Bump. Blake still giggles at Trip repeating “Pound it!” with his young Australian accent.

Copyright © 2013 · Photos by Brandy Somers. All Rights Reserved · friendlycitylens.com & brandysomersphotography.com. This material may not be copied, downloaded, altered, cropped, reproduced, or printed without express written consent. Thank you for respecting my creative property.

Shenandoah County Fair 2013

Posted on August 28, 2013 by bsome under Casual, Kids, Summer, Uncategorized

Sunny Sunday

Fair enough

showing some love

Red Wing Roots Music Festival: Day 3

Posted on August 15, 2013 by bsome under Casual, Kids, Music, People, Red Wing Roots, Summer, Uncategorized

The third and final day of Red Wing was upon us. We stopped caring about the mud under our toenails, the sweat beads on our forehead, and the mild stench that was totally-that-dude-beside-me and not me. Right? We were all friends now. Rained on, shined on, danced together – friends. I was a little sad finishing these photos. Nostalgic even. They reminded me of this pocket of happy that existed in my summer. A pocket I’ll dig into again next summer only to rediscover it all over…just like that wrinkled up five dollar bill that’s surely waiting for me in my winter coat. ….winter…. Ah geez.

Robin & Linda Williams Danny Schmidt & Carrie Elkin Brian Patrick Band