I’m not complaining but…

It really has been hot around here lately. Dare I say it’s almost too hot to knit? It’s been into the 30’sC (90’s ish) for most of the week. We’re having a little bit of a reprieve today, but it’s still muggy, heavy. It has been a long time coming though, so I guess I really shouldn’t complain too much, should I?

There has been knitting to write about this week. It will look as if I’m being prolific, but that really isn’t the case. Let’s get on with it, shall we?

This is the 10 stitch blanket, designed by Frankie Brown and available for free at Ravelry. I started it a while back and have been working on it off and on. It’s come out more often lately because it’s an almost mindless project and, with the heat, that’s exactly what I need. The yarn I’m using is Marks & Katten’s Fame Trend and it’s worked on 3.0 mm needles. I’m using only this brand of yarn; I like the feel of it and the look of it. John’s already commented on it a few times; he loves the colours and is eagerly waiting for the completion of this blanket.

Another mindless project was cast on this week. This one is the Bias Before & After Scarf, a pattern from Churchmouse Yarns and Teas. It’s a very simple scarf, knitted with lace weight yarn on 4.5 mm needles. What makes this scarf interesting is the cast off; it’s cast off with beads! The beads will give the scarf a bit of weight and drape. I have a feeling this will be the perfect early fall scarf and I must admit, I really like the red. It will be a great pop of colour to liven up any outfit!

I’ll have to keep my eyes open for just the right beads to accent the scarf. I’m leaning towards clear red beads, for just that right little bit of sparkle.

I’ve also been working on another little hat for a friend. P is the friend who can no longer knit. Another friend of hers recently became grandmother to twin girls and another of her daughters will soon be having a baby girl. I’ve already made hats for the twins and P requested a hat for the third baby as well. This was also a pattern I found on Ravelry. Off hand I can’t remember the name of the pattern, but it’s a fairly simple lace knit. I’m up the the top shaping now and it will be finished once the weather cools down a bit. The yarn is 100% acrylic and I find I can’t work with it when my hands are hot. The yarn tends to stick to the needles. Ah well, the baby’s not born yet so I have time.

The final project still on the needles are these work socks for John. I started them about a month or so ago. He loves his hand knit socks and I love making them for him. They’re intended to be work socks but he’s already said they’re too nice for work and he’ll wear them as dressier winter socks first. They’ll likely become work socks by next spring. That’s fine by me.

See what I mean? It looks like I’ve been prolific, but in reality, I’ve just been puttering away, picking up one project and working on it for a while, then putting it aside for something else. Eventually, they’ll all get done. There is a finished object I’ve not yet written about but it will be for another post.

Then there’s the garden. It’s doing really well! As you saw in last week’s post, we’ve been eating from the garden quite a bit already. It continues to provide us with wonderful fresh produce and we’ve been eating from it daily. Whether it be peas (which are producing at an astounding rate!), carrots, onions, potatoes, chard, radishes or lettuce, everything has been delicious.

And… oh, this makes me so pleased!… there’s garlic! Check it out!

Is that not a thing of beauty? I picked it last weekend and will be harvesting the rest of the garlic later today. I’m thrilled! And I’m looking forward to cooking with our very own garlic. Incidentally, that’s the lettuce by the back door. It’s showing no signs of quitting. I’ve just been cutting it to eat and it keeps coming back. Absolute awesomeness!

And She’s Back

First off, thank you to those of you who commented on my putting the blog on hiatus. Your concern was touching and appreciated. Let me put your minds at ease. There was nothing wrong, really. I was just feeling a little uninspired and a little overwhelmed with life in general. You know the old adage, “Sometimes a change is as good as a vacation”? Well, that’s really what it came down to. The break was needed.

And now, I’m back. But where do I start? There has been some knitting, but really, it hasn’t been much at all. The big thing that’s occupying our time these days (besides work) is the garden. It is flourishing!

I could show you loads of pictures but I won’t… not today, at least. I will, however, show you some of the fruits of our labours.

The first of the raspberries and a few new potatoes; we picked just enough of the potatoes for a meal. They were delicious, even though I overcooked them slightly. Really, nothing tastes quite like food just picked and immediately cooked, is there? The raspberries are coming hard and fast now and we’re freezing everything we pick. Amazingly, we’re still eating last year’s raspberries.

S, who lives upstairs and is away for the entire month of July, has stated that she would love some of the raspberries to freeze, so when she gets back, we’ll make sure she gets some as well. She’s planted a couple of rows of vegetables and has told everyone in the building (the other three suites) that they are welcome to pick whatever comes ready for picking.

Just a few minutes ago, I went back out into the garden for a look around; John’s at work and it’s the perfect opportunity for me to poke around out there. I’d been browsing Punchfork this morning and came across a roasted carrot recipe I’d like to try tonight. You can’t have roasted carrots without the carrots, so I went out to get some. While there, I checked out the radishes (from S’s section of the garden; part of the second crop of radishes!) and decided that some new potatoes would go well with dinner, too (there’s leftover roasted chicken in the fridge… dinner planned!). Aren’t they gorgeous?

Even though we’ve had the wettest June on record and even though the weather has been unseasonably cold, it hasn’t seemed to bother the garden. Everything is lush and green and coming along beautifully.

I was amazed to see how well the Walla Walla onions are doing, too. They’re ready for picking! I did, as a matter of fact, pick that one right in the center of the picture. It’s in my sink right now, waiting to be rinsed. I may just try to work it into dinner as well. If you’re not familiar with Walla Walla onions, they’re a sweet onion. People have been known to slice them and put them in a sandwich! An onion sandwich! I wouldn’t, but the certainly are a lovely onion.

The butterfly garden is doing well, too. I won’t show pictures of it today because, at the moment, only the daisies and the bee balm are blooming. Oh, the hens and chicks are blooming too, but they’re not that spectacular.

I will, however, leave you with one last picture. This was a visitor to our yard this morning. John brought it to my attention. This is one of the reasons I love summer around here…

It’s good to be back.

On Hiatus

It is with some measure of regret that I have decided I need to put all blogging on hiatus. I’m not sure for how long. For now, I think it’s for the best.

This, That, and Everything Else

It’s Sunday morning. It’s my son’s birthday. It’s been a lovely weekend so far. I anticipate a lovely day today.

I could leave it at that. But you know I won’t.

It seems that our yard is no longer a construction zone, thankfully. Fences have been raised, pergolas built and all the tools and extra wood have been put away.

This pergola is closest to the house and was to have been continued on the other side of the fence. The tenants there, though, decided they didn’t want one. John put up the hanging baskets but has since decided that they’re a bit too low. There are plants in the baskets, but they’re still too small to see from a distance. The baskets aren’t complete yet; I still have some seedlings in the house that will be planted in the baskets when they’re a little bigger.

This is the pergola at the back of the yard. The fence down the center of it marks the center of the yard. There is an old grape vine along the fence and M now has it tied to the pergola in order to train it along the top. He’s also planted grape vines on either end (where the wire cages are) and a lilac at the center front. In a couple of years, this will be a lovely shady place to sit on those hot summer afternoons.

To help celebrate the completion of this project of immense proportions, we had a yard party last night. All the residents of the house, the landlord and a few friends (and former tenants) were here for Beef on a Bun and whatever else was contributed. John cooked the roast beast; there were platters of veggies and dip, a hot crab dip (my contribution), freshly baked chocolate chip cookies (more than one person sported a smear of melted chocolate on their cheeks or chins), rhubarb loaf, pasta salad, and more! All in all, it was a lovely evening that turned out a lot better than someone (no names mentioned) had anticipated. Now, if only the weather had been just a touch warmer… patience, I know.

In knitterly things, the monster pants are finally off the needles. Now comes the fun part…

…weaving in all those ends! I’m not sure I want to face that today. I think I’ll finish the second little pink hat instead. Once the ends are woven in, though, all that remains to do will be the embroidery (teeth and eyes), sewing the waist casing closed and inserting the elastic. Then, they can be mailed off to Ethan. I do hope Kristen will take some pictures of Ethan wearing these. I’m really looking forward to his reaction.

Now, it’s time to get out there and enjoy the sunshine. It’s supposed to be a nice, sunny day today.

I Thought He'd Never Leave

Isn't that a terrible thing to say about one's own husband? It's not that I can't do what I want when he's here but it's easier to blog when he isn't. I just realized this morning that I haven't blogged in a couple of weeks... again! It's spring. That's my excuse. It just feels more important to be out in the garden that to be sitting at the computer, you know?

There has been next to no knitting in the last couple of weeks. Even John commented on that this week. The second of the little pink hats is more than half finished and I should get it done this weekend. If the day warms up a bit more, I may even take it outside and work on it in the great outdoors. The monster pants have seen absolutely no progress and there's only a few inches left to do on them. The only thing that's seen any kind of progress is the second of the 10-stitch blankets, and even that has been very little.

We have been working in the garden, though. Things are being planted and things are greening up. John picked up and planted some Walla Walla onions. He went to Art Knapps last weekend and picked up a set of starter onions because the ones we started from seed just were not doing very well. We made the mistake of using garden soil in the starter pots and ended up with fungus flies. Seeds were coming up and then being nibbled. We've thrown pretty much all of the starter pots out and bought peat pellets to start more seeds. I love those!

Oh, I just remembered something I wanted to share. If you've read this blog for a while, you'll know that John works as a gardener at our local college. Last week, he was digging in one of the gardens and found these...

They're morels! If you were to buy them, you'd be paying some pretty big bucks. I've seen them listed online for up to $135 per pound. We picked some a few years ago and are still eating them (we dried them). I love them. To find them growing in town, at the college, is quite unusual. It was a nice, happy surprise!

Now, I'm off to do a bit of cleaning and then some cooking (I think). First, a cup of tea. Enjoy your Saturday!

How Does Your Garden Grow?

First off, obviously not much is growing yet, but gardening season is in full swing around here. Seeds are sprouting in the “nursery” (our spare room), the garden is (mostly) prepared for planting, and fingers are itching to get into the soil.

It’s show and tell time, boys and girls!

At the front of the yard, the butterfly garden is taking shape. Yesterday I found an old pie plate (Pampered Chef – never could get the pies out of it even though I followed their instructions to the letter) for the butterfly “puddle”. It’s filled with sand and rocks, then watered.

Also up front, the lovage did survive! And it’s doing splendidly!

I’ll be getting out there today to dig up the hens and chicks; I was going to simply remove them but I’ve decided to spread them out at the front of the garden. Behind them, I’ll plant a generous row of marigolds.

At the back of the house, our little flower bed has become the salad garden.

In it is the garlic I planted last fall (to the far right), which is doing VERY well. At the back is another row of garlic that I rescued from the garden. Apparently, the neighbours don’t use much garlic (we do) and it wouldn’t have been used. I had John dig up two of the clumps and transplanted them here. Along with the garlic, there’s half a row of mixed salad greens, half a row of salad spinach, half a row of lettuce, half a row of green onions and a row of radishes, along with a row of marigolds along the front edge. Once the tulips have bloomed, the bulbs will be removed to another location.

Also, in that little garden is my row of sweet peas! I started them in the house and planted them yesterday. They’ve been living outside for the last couple of weeks so I feel quite confident they’ll do just fine and I’ll have a bunch of lovely, scented sweet peas to enjoy this summer.

And then there’s the garden. (Clicking on the picture will take you to the larger version). As you can see, it’s pretty much ready for planting. Our section is in the foreground, where you can see the rows laid out.

John has decided that we and S (the woman who lives upstairs) can plant some cucumbers on the pile in the center of the picture. That’s last year’s garden waste with a layer of soil over it. Cucumbers should do quite well. I wanted to put one (just one!) zucchini plant in there as well but John figures we’ll have plenty of offers for free zucchini. He might be right but I might just sneak one in there anyway.

These will be planted today, if all goes according to plan. I bought three varieties of potato: Bintje, Innovator, and French Fingerling potatoes. Clicking on each name will take you to a page describing that varietal. Potatoes are not high on the list of foods that I enjoy, but I’m hoping that these varieties will be more to my liking than most of the potatoes we normally eat. John is always amazed that though I’m of Dutch heritage, I don’t enjoy potatoes.

Ok, I think this is a long enough post for today. There’s more I could show you but that will be for another day. For now, I’m just going to do some dishes and tidying up while I wait for the day to warm up a little more and then I’ll be heading out into the garden again.

There Has Been Knitting!

Finally, I have some knitting progress. It isn’t that I haven’t been knitting, but I’ve been feeling that there hasn’t been much progress being made.

I’ve really been enjoying the 10-stitch blanket; I love seeing how the colours work together and how quickly it seems to go. I know the rounds are getting longer and longer, but the knitting is almost meditative, relaxing. As a matter of fact, I’m enjoying it so much I’ve started a second one. Yeah, yeah, Louisa, I hear you. I’m not showing you the second one yet. It’s only about 3” square at the moment and not very exciting; I’m using bits and pieces of sock yarn, those yarns that don’t have enough left to actually make anything else with but have too much to throw out.

The monster pants are nearing the completion mark. The stripes are finished and now it’s straight down to the cuff, then 3” of 1x1 ribbing. Then, it’s just a matter of embroidering the face, sewing the waistband casing down and inserting the elastic. I had hoped to have them finished last weekend, but that didn’t happen. This weekend is a little more knit-friendly, weather-wise. And what am I doing? Blogging.

This week, my order from KnitPicks arrived and I was able to start a small project for a friend, a consignment knit. P had a heart attack and a couple of strokes just over a year ago; as a result, she’s unable to use her left hand and knitting is definitely out. Another friend of hers just recently became the grandmother of a set of twin girls and P wanted to give her a set of pink toques for the babies. She asked if I would knit them since she couldn’t. Here’s one of the hats. The pattern is a freebie I found on Ravelry, the Tiffany Lace baby hat. This is the 6 month size. I’m using KP’s Brava Sport, a 100% acrylic dk weight yarn, on 4 mm needles.

Normally, I don’t knit with acrylic yarn, but I figured that the hats really should be machine washable and easy care. The yarn is surprisingly soft and knits up very quickly. I had this little hat finished in one day (while I was home with a migraine). The second hat will be cast on later this afternoon.

Tomorrow.. garden and yard update. Things are happening around here and it’s looking good (if I do say so myself!)

April… finally!

I hope they (the ubiquitous “they”) are right when they say “April showers bring May flowers” because April has started out with showers. There was even the possibility of snow in the forecast. Ick! Our little corner of the world is definitely showing signs of spring, though.

This was taken yesterday, while on my walk behind our local skating rink facility. There’s a lovely park that goes past the Thompson Marsh and the Mission Sports Fields. The park bench you can just see at the top of the picture overlooks the marsh, a lovely place to sit and watch the ducks. Someone planted these, obviously, as a memorial and, since coming across it last year, I’ve looked forward to seeing it again this year. It’s such a lovely tribute, one that comes back year after year.

There are other signs of spring at the marsh. The ducks are pairing up, the buds on the trees and shrubs are beginning to swell, the redwing blackbirds are singing cheerily and though the air was brisk yesterday, it was a lovely day for a walk.

Here’s another sign of spring…

Construction! You may not know this (or you might), but we live in a fourplex. There was a fence between the two sides of the house but it was looking somewhat worse for wear and wasn’t centered to the house. Over the last few weeks, the old fence has been removed and a new one is being built. There’s a pergola at the back of the yard and we understand that there may be another one closer to the house. Needless to say, it’s a little difficult for us to do any kind of landscaping out there at the moment, but we’re definitely looking forward to the completion of the fence and getting the yard ready for the upcoming warm weather.

And speaking of landscaping and gardening, my little nursery is coming along very nicely. Right now, the following are up and thriving:

• tomatoes (Brandywine and Marglobe)
• Walla Walla onions (lots of them!)
• jalapeno peppers
• basil
• butterfly weed
• sweet peas (to be planted outside soon)
• cabbage
• lovage
• salad greens (up in two days!!!)

I’m still waiting for the Italian parsley and the sweet peppers to come to the party. They’re the slowpokes for some reason. The salad greens, incidentally, are from a packet of mixed greens. The packet calls it “cut and come again”; there are about six or seven types of greens. When I was home last Monday, I filled a basket with dirt (plastic lined) and sprinkled some seeds into it. By Wednesday, some of the seeds were already poking their heads up! I could hardly believe it!

Because the sweet peas will be planted just outside our back door, a fairly sheltered spot, and because they’re thriving already, I think I may be planting them earlier than I’d thought. Hopefully, they’ll do well; if not, I have more seeds.

Oh, I am so looking forward to warmer days!

Marking My Territory

Let me state categorically right at the outset of this post that I’m not really a gardener. It’s not that I don’t like or enjoy being out in the yard but I’m certainly not passionate about it.

For the last number of years (since John and I have been together), we’ve been apartment dwellers. The last two summers, we’ve had opportunity to do some gardening and, yes, I’ve enjoyed it, but it was always someone else’s garden.

This year, I’ve decided it’s time to put my own, personal stamp on this property. I’ve claimed the front garden.

I’m turning it into a butterfly and hummingbird friendly space. I’ve researched online. I’ve pictured it. And it’s all coming together in my mind.

I’ve even started.

To the right is a stand of lavender. To the right of that, outside the picture, is a stand of Echinacea (coneflower). The darker green clump to the top right is a poppy that’s been transplanted from the back of the house. The stands of bulbs are lovely purple irises. Also out of the picture, to the bottom left is a lovely clump of daisies. There are also grape hyacinths (which John would like to get rid of), a stand of ornamental grass (which is coming out and being moved elsewhere), a clump of hens and chicks (which I’ll be moving and transplanting into “interesting” containers), a small rose bush and our blueberry bush. There’s also a day lily somewhere in there, as well as a new planting of tulips, which may do nothing this year; they were given to me by S, the new tenant upstairs. She’d received them as a housewarming gift, already blooming. The blooms are spent and I’ve cut them down to plant them. I rather doubt they’ll do anything this year, but that’s ok.

In the house, I have started some butterfly weed that I’ll be planting in and around whatever’s already out there. We also have a lot of marigold seeds that will be strewn about. I have every intention of making this a bright, colourful, fun little garden, a true bright spot in this yard.

From what I’ve read, there are three things needed to attract butterflies. Flowers are obvious. Secondly, they like a place to land and sun themselves. Hence the rocks. Thirdly, they like to have a water source nearby. Again, hence the rocks. The larger of the rocks, the one with the dark spot (which is water), has a dip, almost the right size and shape to make a fairly comfortable seat. It holds about a cup of water. During the hot summer days, I’ll have to keep filling it but I think it will work quite nicely. If not, that same dip will hold a shallow bowl. It would be nice to have a birdbath out there, but right now I don’t have one. I’ll be keeping my eyes open for ideas.

What do you think? Does it need anything else? I should add that I will be picking up some bedding plants as well (I’ve been researching zone 5 plants that attract butterflies and hummingbirds). As I said, I want this to be full and colourful.

I’m looking forward to summer!

Ten Little Stitches and How They Grew

Today is a gorgeous, sunny day and both of us have spent an hour or more just sitting outside in the sunshine, John reading and me knitting. It’s glorious!! This is the first day this year that I’ve wanted to spend any kind of time outside. The projected high is 10ºC (50ºF) and sunny. Love it!

As I said, I was doing some knitting out in the sunshine this morning, working on a fun little (or maybe not so little) diversion. It’s the Ten Stitch Blanket by Frankie Brown. At no time are there any more than ten stitches on your needles and it’s growing quite nicely, if I do say so myself.

The yarn is a remnant of some Marks & Katten Fame Trend sock yarn and I’m using 3.0 mm needles. The first turn section was a little confusing but now it’s almost mindless knitting until you get to the corners. I love how it looks and I’ve picked up another ball of the Fame Trend, in a slightly different colourway. There was no more of this colourway in the store unfortunately; the new ball has more green in it, as well as brown and grey. Hopefully, it will look alright. I’m coming up to some green in the small ball and I’m hoping that one of the shades of green in the new ball will match that green. If I can’t get close, I’ll start where the green and grey meet.

In other knitting, I’ve also been working on the monster pants, albeit not as much as my daughter would like, I’m sure.

I have four of the seven decreases completed; once those are done, it’s straight down, changing the yarn every 10 rows.

And then there’s gardening. Our “nursery” is coming alive. Most of the tomatoes are up, as are quite a few of the Walla Walla onions. The basil is poking up out of the ground as well.

This week, I also planted some Butterfly Weed, lovage (John accidentally killed the one plant we had in the front garden), mini tomatoes and started my sweet peas. I’m hoping I’ll have more than just one sweet pea come up this year; last year’s sweet pea fail was disappointing.

I have one last thing to show you, something I’m really happy about. Last year, I bought a bay laurel, hoping for my own bay leaves. It did well outside and we brought it in for the winter. Once it came inside, I pinched the top leaves off, in the hopes it would fill out a bit. Was I successful? You tell me…

Ok, I have to get back outside. It’s just too nice a day to waste by sitting indoors.

Repair by Committee

This week has been, shall we say, an “interesting” week. On Tuesday, the hot water tank blew up. Thankfully, John was home when it went and was able to turn off the water before any damage was sustained. BUT… we had no hot water until Friday. It’s a good thing I’d had a nice, long soak in the tub before the tank decided to give up.

The landlord decided, rightfully so, to replace both hot water tanks, ours and the tank for the upstairs suite rather than wait for the second tank to give up the ghost, too. Wise move. We only had the inconvenience once rather than having to go through it all again. I must admit, it’s lovely having plenty of hot water to get into!

In knitting, progress is being made on the monster pants. As of yesterday, one leg is complete and the second leg is on the needles.

They will be kind of cute when they’re done, don’t you think? The knitting, at this point, is fairly mindless. I just have to remember the decreases every 6th row and I have to remember to switch colours every 10 rounds. Other than that, it’s simple and straightforward.

Yesterday was Sit & Stitch and afterwards, I wandered through our downtown area. I did have a goal in mind; I needed to pick up some postcards (more on that in a bit) and I didn’t want to take the car from a free spot and have to pay somewhere else, so I walked to the postal outlet. On the way, I passed a home decor shop and did a bit of a double take. Were those cones of yarn I saw in the window???

Well, they were and they weren’t.

It looks like yarn, but it isn’t yarn. These are ceramic! As a knitter, how cool would it be to have these sitting on a shelf? I love it!!

Now… the postcards. Yesterday, I joined something called Postcrossing. Very simply, it’s a worldwide postcard exchange. You sign up and you can register to get up to five names of people from anywhere in the world. You’re also given a code to put on each card. When the recipient receives their card, they input the code on the website and you are then put on the list to receive a card. Once a card is registered, you can request another name. My first five names are from the Netherlands, Finland, Russia, Malaysia and the US.

It just sounded like so much fun! I can hardly wait to see where my first postcard will be coming from. To help me track my adventures in “postcarding”, I’ve set up a blog, It Only Takes a Stamp, especially for Postcrossing. I’ve added it to my sidebar (there’s also a link to the Postcrossing page, near the bottom of the sidebar). Check out the blog, but also check out Postcrossing. It’s free to join and it encourages worldwide friendliness. And that is a good thing!

Stuff and Such

Well, much writing has already been accomplished this morning. Not all of it is visible to you, you readers of this blog, but the majority of it is.

I started my garden journal this morning (using this great little program, “Efficient Diary Pro”), for the simple reason that we started our gardening adventures for the year this morning. Earlier this week, one of my co-workers and I walked over to Art Knapp’s (a block from where we work) and picked up some seeds. As of this morning, I’ve planted Walla Walla onions (54 mini planters), jalapeno and sweet peppers (6 of each), two kinds of tomatoes (Brandywine and Marglobe… 18 of each), basil, and Italian parsley (6 of each). I’ve also started a small herb planter that has chives, basil, Italian parsley and a jalapeno pepper; there’s a special purpose for that planter, to be divulged later.

Outside, spring is definitely springing around here. The first of the crocuses has been blooming for the past week, bringing with it a beautiful little splash of colour in an otherwise dreary garden.

And… oh, I love it!! This makes me so happy…

Garlic!! Last autumn, I took one head of garlic and planted all the cloves in the hope that they would actually come up. They did! I’m looking forward to our first harvest of our very own garlic. Amazing what I find exciting, isn’t it?

A few posts back, Sharon in Surrey wanted to know more about my adventures in artisan bread. Well, I’ve posted a nice long post about the bread over on my cooking blog. Be warned, it’s a photo-heavy post, showing the process from start to finish. You can find it here, Sharon (and anyone else interested).

As far as knitting this past week, well… it’s been almost non-existent. I did finish one wrist warmer for myself and a second is half finished, but other than that, no progress has been made on the Monster pants. Hopefully, I’ll feel motivated later today or tomorrow to continue working on the pants. They’re going quickly; really, it’s an almost mindless knit. I just need to sit down and work on them.

Today, though, I’ll be doing some tidying around here, washing the dishes, and going out for my first walk of the season. Spring is finally here… I hope.

Edited to add: Just a quick note to let you know that there's a new blog that I'm contributing to. If you're interested at all (and I won't be hurt if you're not), you can find our work blog over at the Rapid Printing website. It is, of course, completely related to the print industry with the hope of (perhaps) simplifying some of the confusing things for our customers. If you check it out, let me know what you think.

A Monster Ate My Time

With the fiasco that was yesterday (the closet has been repaired and the clothes have all been put away), all my plans for the weekend went out the window. I even forgot about Saturday Chatters (a Ravelry group based on a web chat I was involved with a few years ago… if you’re on Ravelry, feel free to check it out; just search for the group “Saturday Chatters”).

I had intended to bake some more of the 5 minute Artisan bread with the intention of blogging about it, but got caught up with knitting instead. A couple of weeks ago, my daughter saw a pair of knitted monster pants on Pinterest  (you can see them on this board) and asked me if I could knit a pair for Ethan, her 3-year old son. I’m sure you’ve seen them; they’re knitted pants (kind of like sweatpants) with a monster face on the bum.

Really?? Seriously?? She insisted he would LOVE them!

The more I thought about it, though, the more fun they seemed. I finally gave in and ordered the yarn (the yarn shop didn’t have the colours I wanted); it came this past week. I cast on almost as soon as I got home.

This was yesterday. I was almost finished with the crotch shaping at this point. The knitting went really fast! It’s mostly mindless stocking stitch worked in the round so it’s no surprise that it went so quickly. The mouth is made up of short rows, which also gives the bum shaping.

As of last night, I’ve separated for the legs and have started working down the first leg. What I really like about this pattern is that it’s top down and seamless.

The legs will be worked in stripes of the main green and a darker green. Once the pants are finished, I’ll be using duplicate stitch for the eyes and teeth of the monster.

All in all, it’s a pretty good pattern but there are a couple of problems. At either end of the mouth, there is a hole because there are two rows of red worked across the back without joining to the green (does that make sense??). A little suture will fix it but I found that a bit odd.

Also, the numbers in the pattern do not add up. When you cast on 160 stitches and work 4 increases per row for the crotch shaping (one stitch on either side of the center two stitches front and back) 9 times, you add 36 stitches to your total, making it 196; the pattern says there should be a total of 184 stitches. Then, for the legs, because that total stitch count is wrong, the leg stitch count is wrong. The pattern says 92 stitches per leg; there are actually 98. I’m going to continue the shaping as per the pattern but will be ignoring the stitch count.

It surprises me that no one who’s knitted these (as per the Ravelry project page) has mentioned this. I’ve gone over the pattern numerous times and I’m pretty sure I’m not reading it wrong. Oh well, they’ll still work out just fine, I’m sure.

Back to the monster pants… I really want to see how they turn out!

Ever Have One of Those Days?

It’s only just past 7 a.m. and today already has the makings of “one of those days”.

At about 5:00 this morning, we heard a rather loud crashing-ish sound… in our bedroom. Needless to say, it woke us both up. I knew immediately what had happened.

Yup, the entire shelf and rod came right out of the wall. Evidently, the landlord hadn’t installed it properly.

We did have plans for today. Now, our day will have to include repairing the shelf and re-hanging all those clothes. Not quite what we wanted to be doing today.

Edited to add: In case you aren't aware of it, I also have a cooking blog, In Ev's Kitchen. I've just posted there with a recipe for Crepes with Ham, Gruyere and Chard. Why not check it out?

They Say Time Flies

It certainly does seem so. Apparently I’ve been having fun. Well, I have actually.

The past couple of weekends have seen a lot of cooking and baking and a little knitting. This weekend has seen the beginning of getting my spare room in order. So, what would you like to hear about first?

Oh, let’s start with cooking. I’ve been on a pasta and bread making binge for some reason, not that I need to add more starch to my diet. I’ve been having a lot of fun with the Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day recipe. Have you heard of it? Basically, you make a dough, a very wet, sticky dough, that can keep in your fridge for up to two weeks. When you want fresh bread, you simply chop off a chunk, shape it quickly, allow it to rise, then bake it. We love it! I think I posted about it earlier but maybe not (just had a quick peek and I don’t think I did post about it). Here’s the link to the recipe I used. (Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day)

In addition to making that bread, I’ve also had the bread machine going this week. Last week, and again this past week, I’ve been frequenting a used book store in the same strip mall where I work. I came across two bread machine cookbooks and bought them both. Hey, for $5.00 each, I think I’m allowed to splurge. I’ve made a couple of recipes so far and I think I could get used to having a bread machine. This week, I made a dark rye bread and raisin bread. The raisin bread isn’t quite up to my expectation but that’s my fault not the bread machine’s fault. I decided to make the dough and bake it in the oven; I should have put it all in one pan but I chose to put it in two and the loaves are on the small side. It does taste pretty good, though. Oh, and the rye bread is pretty good, too, especially for savoury sandwiches.

And then, there’s the pasta. Oh my, the pasta. I’ve been wanting to make ravioli for some time now, but couldn’t really find a recipe that screamed “MAKE ME”. Until a couple of weeks ago.

There’s a back story to all of this. A couple of months ago, a friend took me out for lunch and gave me a belated birthday gift. Part of that gift was an acorn squash. I’ve never had acorn squash before and really didn’t know what to do with it. We put it in a cool spot and forgot about it. A couple of weeks ago, I decided we’d better do something with it before it went bad. That’s when I went searching. And came across this website.

Oh my! Talk about inspiration! If you scroll through the recipes there, you’ll find one for a butternut squash filling. That’s the one I followed. There’s also a recipe for the pasta dough, using a food processor to make the dough. I’ll repeat… Oh my!

There’s also a recipe there for a mushroom filling. Well, it just so happened that we had mushrooms in the fridge and I had some dried chanterelles and morels. That recipe, and the recipe for the Creamy Vino sauce and, well… let me tell you, we ate like kings!

The recipe for the mushroom filling calls for ricotta cheese. In my online travels, serendipitously, I had come across a recipe for making your own ricotta cheese. Are you aware of how simple it is? I wasn’t.

Check it out here. Incredibly simple. Four ingredients: whole milk, cream, sugar and white wine vinegar. That’s it.

Ok, I’m making myself hungry all over again.

I have done a bit of knitting as well. Just for fun, I made a Celestine Sox cushy toy, or as we call it around here, a booby ball. It was a fun little project, but we did learn that even a stuffed, soft toy can break Tim Horton’s mugs. (It was my favourite coffee mug, too… darn it!)

I also made a pair of wrist warmers yesterday. We’re attending a birthday party tomorrow evening and I know that the birthday girl will appreciate them; she asked me to knit her a pair when we had them over for dinner a couple of weeks ago so I’m sure she’ll be happy with them.

They were a quick knit, using some yarn from my stash (which I started organizing yesterday). There was no ball band, but I do know that it’s a superwash 100% merino wool, dk weight. The pattern is based on one of my own designs, the Baby Cable Wrist Warmers; the original pattern is for a mitten-style wrist warmer, but seeing as the recipient doesn’t have the use of her left hand, she’ll find it easier to get these on and off, rather than warmers with a hole for the thumb.

Ok, this has turned into a long post. I’ll end it here. Besides, I still have a lot to do today! I’m making a Light Swiss Chard Frittata for lunch today. More on that next time!

Butterfly, Flutter By

Wow! It feels like a long time since I’ve written here. Last weekend was a rather busy one. We had company for dinner on Saturday and most of the day was spent cleaning and cooking. We had a wonderful evening with great company! It’s not something we do often, but I’m so glad we did. At the end of the evening, I even asked John who our next victims should be!

Sunday was, of course, Super Bowl Sunday. We watched the game at a friend’s house. Again, it was a fun time with good company. All in all, though, there wasn’t a lot of time for blogging or knitting.

This week, however, has been a little different. I haven’t done a lot of knitting, but I did work on the Flutter scarf. I’ve finished the first half of the scarf and have successfully picked up the stitches for the second half.

If you remember, the scarf is started with a provisional cast on and worked from the center to the ends. Using a smaller needle than the size required for the knitting (3.0 mm) made it easier to pick up the stitches from the cast on. Even so, there were a couple of stubborn stitches and a couple of dropped stitches, but very little swearing. In the end, though, I’m proud to say you really can’t tell where the provisional cast on was.

Now, it’s back to the four-row repeat that I can almost do in my sleep. For the first half, I was keeping track of repeats on my iPod, using the excellent app, “1,2,3, Knit!”. For the second half, at least for now, I’m having to keep track the old way… pen and paper.

My iPod has been sick. I don’t think I blogged about that, did I? Well, all of a sudden, the letter “r” on the little keyboard wouldn’t work. In the game, Bookworm, one complete column of letters (corresponding with the location of the “r”) was being stubborn. I took my iPod in to our local Apple seller (not an official Apple Store) and, after examining it, was told by the young man working there (and confirmed by the other two employees) that I should contact Apple directly.

I did. I was sent a box, complete with instructions on how to package my iPod for shipping and, last Monday, dropped it off at my local UPS store. All week, I’ve been tracking my iPod. The upshot? On Monday, I should be receiving a replacement iPod. I’m really happy with Apple’s customer service but I can hardly wait to get my iPod back!

I’ll have to reinstall all my apps, music and photos, but that shouldn’t be too difficult. It also gives me the opportunity to delete some of the apps I really didn’t like or use. I have to tell you, though, I’m surprised at just how much I’ve missed my little iPod. I now realize just how much I use it and depend on it. From getting up in the morning, using my iPod as my alarm clock, to counting the repeats in my knitting, to timing my eggs, to using the calculator and more, I use my iPod a lot!

Technology… love it or hate it, we certainly have come to depend on it, haven’t we?

Productive!

It’s about time I felt like I’ve been productive. I know, I do get things done, but sometimes it just feels like nothing’s getting done or there’s little to show for my time. At least, that’s how it feels to me.

Today, though, is different. Or, I should say yesterday. Looking over the things I did yesterday makes me feel that I’ve been productive. What have I been doing you ask? Well, let me show you.

Bandana cowls from the Purl Soho web site. I liked the one I made for my daughter so much that I wanted one for myself. Then, I found more Noro Silk Garden in my stash, so I made a second one. It’s a really quick knit; these two were made within a 24-hour period. Worsted weight yarn, 5.0 mm needles… yup, they knit up quickly!

While on Pinterest early yesterday, I came across a recipe for No Knead Dutch Oven Bread. Of course, I checked it out. It sounded really simple to make, so I did. To make the bread, you first mix up the yeast (only 1/4 tsp!), water, flour and salt; this sits and rises for at least 8 hours (no labour involved… doesn’t get much better, does it?). After that, the dough is turned out onto a floured board, folded on to itself a couple of times and then allowed to rest for about 15 minutes before shaping it into a loaf. The loaf is put on a clean tea towel, liberally sprinkled with flour or cornmeal (I used a combination). After rising for 1-2 hours, it’s baked in a preheated Dutch oven. When it comes out, it looks like this…

The only thing I can find wrong with this bread is that it got a little burned on the bottom. I can live with that; I just trim off the burned bits. The crust, when it came out of the oven is crisp; the bread itself is tender and chewy, like an artisan bread should be. Even this morning, it’s lovely and chewy and absolutely perfect with olive oil and balsamic vinegar. I will definitely be making this again.

It would be perfect to start it before going to work in the morning, coming home and finishing it up. I can just imagine a couple slices of this bread with a bowl of homemade soup. Yum!!

One more thing inspired that feeling of production this weekend. Remember all the grapes we picked this past summer? We had turned all those grapes into juice and frozen it; some of it I had turned into a batch of grape jelly. John liked it, but decided that it really didn’t have quite the “grape-y” flavour he was looking for. According to him it was good, but tasted more like sugar than grapes (and we even used the reduced sugar Certo). He decided to remedy that and thawed all the juice, put it into a stock pot and reduced it to about half of what it had been. Yesterday, I turned four of the five liters of concentrated grape juice into this…

That’s a total of 15 jars of various sizes and, let me tell you, it’s very grape-flavoured! And it is very definitely John-approved! There is still one liter of juice that had to be re-frozen as it wasn’t enough for another batch. It will be the starter for next year’s batch.

Now, we’re eyeing the raspberries. After all, John ate all the jam and jelly I had made last time (I rarely have jam on toast; I prefer savoury to sweet). I don’t think I’ll be doing that today, though. Seeing as the berries are frozen, they’ll keep for a bit.

I think I’ll make some pasta next. I took some pesto sauce out of the freezer this week and some homemade pasta with homemade pesto sauce, along with some homemade bread would go down really well right about now. What else are you going to do when it’s snowing out?

I Love Eggs!

Years ago, when I left my first marriage, my daughter told me I’d have a very simple grocery list: bread, butter and eggs. She wasn’t too far wrong. I like eggs just about any way you can make them… except pickled. I don’t like pickled eggs.

Boiled, poached, scrambled, coddled, fried, in a soufflé… I like it all. One of my favourite weekend meals is a soft-boiled egg chopped up on a piece of toast that’s been liberally slathered with butter. (See? Bread, butter, eggs.) However, getting that boiled egg to just the right level of soft can be a bit of a gamble. Until now, that is.

Imagine my pleasure when I found a link to a free egg timer app. The best part is, it’s put out by the Egg Farmers of Canada! And it’s free!

There are options for boiled, scrambled, fried, and poached eggs, with directions on how to prepare each. I tried it this morning.

I like my eggs soft so I simply slid the little egg over to soft, then hit the timer button. That takes you to the following screen.

As you can see, it tells you exactly what to do and when to start the timer. The timer itself is a sand timer. If you want to, you can even “play” with the sand. Turning your iPod makes the sand move and it doesn’t affect the timer.

And when your eggs are done to perfection, a clucking chicken lets you know (if you don’t want to hear a clucking chicken, you can also set it to a bell but the chicken’s pretty darned cute!).

My eggs this morning were perfect! The whites were completely cooked and the yolks were nice and soft on the inside, perfect for chopping onto hot, buttery toast.

If this app was just an egg timer, I’d be happy. However, to make it even better, there are hundreds of recipes!

All in all, I heartily recommend this app. The fact that it’s free is just icing on the cake; they could easily charge for the app and it would still be a good deal, as far as I’m concerned.

You can download it here. In a five star rating system, I give it five stars.