domesticity and daydreaming

tomatoes
Originally uploaded by vivi en france.

I found an interesting tarte recipe the other day, so I made my first attempt to roast some tomatoes. They looked so pretty in the afternoon sunlight before going in the oven that I couldn't resist a picture. Unfortunately, something went horribly wrong and both Steph and I were sick after eating the tarte. I don't know if it was the tomatoes or the sauteed onions, but I don't think I'll be trying that one again anytime soon. I have something like a 90% success rate with new recipes and the majority of meals in my everyday rotation come from recipes found online, so this one setback certainly won't deter me from trying others.

Otherwise, nothing much going on. I don't know if I'm still recovering from the weekend, but I've been uttery exhausted all week. After a mad cleaning session downstairs yesterday, I spent the afternoon in a haze (which can be dangerous when weilding sharp utensils for chopping up veggies), but I did manage to prep some materials for yet another bookbinding. I'm hoping that I'll improve my bookbinding with good old repetition. Each book seems to be a bit better than the last, so maybe there's something in that old adage "If you don't succeed, try, try again."

On Wednesday, we went to pick up the computer (that's a whole other post) and on the way back we talked about my dream of one day making my bookbinding into a real business. Steph was under the impression that I just wanted to make a few and sell them on Ebay or something, but no, I have visions of making this into a legitimate business. The biggest obstacle is going to be dealing with a workspace; the French government is pretty strict about home businesses and it may be that I'll have to rent space for a workshop. Obviously that's a long, long way off but the idea of having my own business and my own workshop to go to everyday absolutely appeals to me, though heaven knows how we'll afford it. For now it's the daydream that keeps me going. Hopefully we'll be able to spare a few euros next month for buying some tools for making paper, which is step two in my plan for taking over the wor-- um, making lovely journals.