Two Finished Things

Two nights ago a friend called and said he had a gift for us, and could he stop by. Of course I said yes. Who turns down gifts? A few minutes later he was at our front door, with a huge paper bag full of chanterelle mushrooms that someone had given him. He wanted to know if we wanted them, since he wasn’t sure what to do with them.

A glass of wine later, we had the menu planned, and sent Greg to the market to get pork chops while John and I did a little prep work. Here’s what we came up with.

John cooked the polenta, using Marcella Hazan’s recipe from her Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking. This is a great cookbook, by the way. Someday I’d like to cook my way through it, in the style of Julie & Julia. I never seem to get past the first few pasta sauce recipes, though, since they are so perfect.

I sadly neglected to get a photo of the fresh chanterelles, but here’s what they look like.

I cooked the pork chops and mushrooms. After cleaning the mushrooms, I sliced them thickly, then sauteed them in a bit of butter and olive oil until they were just starting to get soft, then added a little white wine and simmered briefly. Meanwhile, the pork chops were cooking, first sauteed, then a little shallot added, then white wine. They braised with the lid on for about 5-6 minutes a side, just until done. Don’t overcook pork chops, by the way. We actually prefer them just a tiny bit pink in the middle. If you cook them all the way through, they get tough and chewy.

The pork chops went into the warming oven, the braising liquid went into the waiting mushrooms, which were then cooked down a little until syrupy.

A little chopped Italian parsley went in at the end.

The whole mess went on plates, with some lightly steamed green beans on the side. We also had a salad with fresh heirloom tomato slices, topped with fresh mozzarella and slivered basil, drizzled with olive oil and balsamic vinegar.

And here’s Lewey, pretty sure we might drop something.

Not bad for last minute made-up cooking!

That was the first finished thing. The other thing that’s finished is this.

Yes, it does look like sort of a wonky blocking job. It’s a baby blanket, for pete’s sake. I just mashed it out and pinned it down. More details will follow in a later post.

Miles & Miles of I-Cord

Hey, that could be a country-western song!

I’m nearly done with that endless baby blanket. I have to say that I almost wienied out on doing the I-cord that this pattern suggests. By the time I got to the last pattern row, I had 544 stitches on the needle, and the thought of doing I-cord around all that was enough to make me want to drink bourbon.

Wait, I already drink bourbon. Oh well.

Here it is. I’ve almost finished three sides, so don’t have too much left to go.

I really like this yarn. Since it’s taken me so long to finish this thing, I’ll forgive you if you’ve forgotten what I’m doing here. This is Knitpicks City Tweed, in the heavy worsted weight. It’s very soft and squishy, and I just hope it holds up well. It’s soft enough that I’d worry a bit about pilling and wear, but we’ll see. Baby blankets don’t need to last forever, after all.

I’ll be glad when I get this done and off in the mail before the intended recipient is old enough for college. I need to finish John’s True Blue sweater next, since the Major Knitter and I have just committed to a knit-along starting November 1st. Here’s what we’ll be knitting. We were planning on doing a Rogue knit-along, then saw this, and fell hard. Within about thirty minutes, we’d both changed our minds and ordered the Black Water Abbey yarn for Faery Ring. Mine will be in Haw, which is a lipstick-scarlet red. I believe the Major will be knitting hers in Wine.

Here are the Ravelry links for the pattern. There are two versions, but the only difference is the range of sizes. The pattern is free, which makes up a bit for the fact that I just bought a couple thousand yards of yarn for the danged thing. There’s even a Ravelry group, of course. Anybody want to join us? We’ll see if either the Major or I can hold off on casting on until November 1st!

Grilled Pizza

Here’s how the grilled pizza turned out. First of all, the review. It was definitely something I’d repeat. It sounds fussy, having to make dough, but if you wanted to cheat a bit, you could buy ready-made pizza dough. The recipe makes enough for six individual pizzas, and we made two and froze the rest of the dough in two-pizza servings. Next time all we’ll have to do is top them and grill. The recipe is from Sunset Magazine.

With a bread machine, this is a snap.

Have I told you about my new bread machine? No? The old bread machine worked just fine, that is, until we bought a gas generator and had it set up. The boys had to put in a new circuit breaker panel to get it going, and in the process of testing it, blew out a bunch of crap in the house. Most of it was just small appliances, and fortunately I’d had the sense to unplug the computers, or they’d be toast, too. There was one near-disaster, with a surge protector in the pantry that nearly started on fire and filled the house with burned plastic smell. That was fun. It left black soot all over the desk in the pantry.

But, I digress. Back to the pizza. I got a new Zojirushi bread machine out of the deal, and that’s it, up there.

Here’s the prep work:

After you finish the dough, you pat it out on oiled parchment paper (waxed paper would work as well). Don’t even think of combining the dough and making one big pizza. It would be a little tricky to manage flipping and turning on the grill that way.

Then you grill the first side, without the toppings.

Take it off the grill, turn it cooked side up, then put the toppings on the already grilled side. We used a local farmer’s goat cheese, a bit of tomato sauce out of a jar*, fresh heirloom tomatoes, thinly sliced sweet onions, and added the basil at the very end.

Put it back on the grill, uncooked side down, and finish. Really, this only takes a few minutes for each side.

Poor another glass of wine, and enjoy.

*We used some really good stuff from Trader Joe’s. I normally make spaghetti sauce from scratch, but this stuff is good in a pinch.

Half FO

I actually partly finished something today! Actually, it’s one sock of a pair, but that’s something, right? Everything else has sort of taken a back seat lately to 1)Spinning; 2) Feather and Fan baby stuff; and 3) Finding a new job and getting all the ridiculous paperwork done that is required, even though I’m not changing states or moving to a different hospital. And I haven’t even started with the HR stuff yet.

Anyway. Today was such a nice day, that I got to do a little knitting outside. The heat wave that we’ve had has passed, and I’m not sure it even hit the mid-70’s today, but it was nice and warm out in the sun. We went to the Steilacoom farmers’ market, which is only about ten minutes from our house, and found a lovely spot to have lunch on an outside deck. Knitting in public ensued.

After we got home and put away all the veggie loot, I sat down and finished the first sock. Here I am, trying it on to make sure it’s long enough before I close the toe:

And done.


Pretty, eh? That’s Zoe sock yarn from Shalimar, in the color Peonies. You can get your very own at the same place I did.

And second sock started.


There was more knitting loot that arrived at my house today. I have a set of the Knit Picks Options needles, and a set of the Harmony wood tips. They came out with acrylic Zephyr tips, and I had to have those as well. A lot of people despise plastic needles, but they have their place. They are a lot easier on my hands than metal needles, for one thing. Those lovely Signature sock needles up in that photo are beautiful, but they really make my hands hurt if I work with them for hours on end. They also have lethally pointy tips that I would not try to sneak on an airplane.

Here are the Zephyrs.

I’m off to make pizza. Sunset magazine had an article about making grilled pizza recently, and the dough is all done and ready to go (made in my brand spanking new bread machine). We have all sorts of options for toppings, but I think tonight’s version is going to be white cheese, basil, and perhaps some of those heirloom tomatoes from the market. I’ll take photos!

A “Real” Post

With “Real” Knitting!

Well, maybe only partly real knitting. I’m still working on that baby thing. The secret thing. Yes, I know, the baby’s almost a month old. What I’m knitting won’t be usable for a few more months anyway, since it’s very heavy wool. Which is why I’m not done with it. We’ve had an unusual heat wave in the Pacific Northwest, and knitting with a ton of heavy wool in my lap is just not fun.

If your name is Janet, go do something else for a few minutes. You’ll see it when it’s good and ready.

Here’s what it looks like at the moment.

OK, it still sort of looks like crap. It’s in the round, so it just looks like a bag of wool. Trust me, this stuff is squishy and warm. I want a king sized bed version of this, except I’m already sick to death of feather and fan.

I’ve discovered that when you’ve got nothing for the blog, post photos of loot. On the Alaska trip, I managed to find a few yarn shops. One in every port, as a matter of fact.

Here’s the shop in Ketchikan:


Cool, eh? My husband has no idea how I manage to unerringly find yarn shops where-ever I am.

Here’s the loot.

All of those are local, except the one on the far right, which is laceweight from Estonia. It’s prettier than it looks in that photo. Oh here.

That still doesn’t do it justice. It’s just gorgeous.

And I need more lace yarn. I didn’t blog this before, but while we were on the ship, someone made off with my Langsjal Jóhönnu shawl. I had it at dinner one night, and had it across the back of my chair. The next day I didn’t have it, and nobody ever turned it in to lost and found. If you see it on anyone, grab the damn thing off her back and shoot me an email.

Here’s a photo to memorialize it.

Outlander

By Diana Gabaldon


Now, this is a novel. I’ve read this one before, but have never gotten around to reading the rest of the series. I decided that this whole set of six books would make good summer reading, and decided to start over with the first one. The seventh in the series is due to be published this fall, so I need to read faster.

If you haven’t read these, and like historical romance, I’d highly recommend this. The main heroine, Claire, is poking around a set of standing stones in 1945 Scotland. When she accidentally touches one of the stones, she’s whirled back through time to 1743, in the Scottish Highlands right before the rebellion of Bonnie Prince Charlie. She has loads of perilous adventures, and due to her smart-ass personality, gets in a lot of trouble along the way. She meets rogues and outlaws, and ends up marrying into a large Highland clan for protection.

The whole thing is completely preposterous, but Gabaldon writes it so well that it ends up being a real page-turner. This is a terrific book, and I’ve already gotten well into the second book of the series.

627 pages.

Guenevere, Queen of the Summer Country (Guenevere Novels)

By Rosalind Miles

Hmmm. What to say about this one? I sort of liked the story, though it’s been done a few too many times. It’s part of a trilogy of Guenevere stories, and I’m a sucker for trilogies.

In the end, I’d have to say that I wouldn’t buy the rest of the set. So many books, so little time to read those that don’t grab me by the throat. I liked Mists of Avalon, by Marion Zimmer Bradley, much better.

515 pages.

You might have noticed that there’s been a gap between the last post and this one. One might think that reading that last book threw me off for months, but I just forgot to post. I’m not even going to try to catch up. I’ll try to do better in the future, but there have been a few hundred or so pages that missed getting counted because I was too lazy to put them in here.

Oh Yeah, The Blog

OK, you want it in a nutshell?

1) Cruise to Alaska. Wonderful!

2) 4th of July. Great party, great neighbors, lots of fireworks. Dogs hated the noise, we loved it.

3) Knitting. Still working on that baby blanket.

4) Baby. Baby Jacoby was born on July 6th to my niece Janet and her husband, Charlie. It’s now the 20th, and the danged baby blanket still isn’t done. Knit faster, Lorette, knit faster!

5) Spinning has consumed my life. There are bits of fiber all over the place in this house. Bits of wool now are overwhelming even the Lucy-furr, which is saying something.

6) Teyani came to spin, eat, and drink wine on Saturday. We had a great time, check her post for photos. I have some that I’ll post when I get them off the camera.

7) Tomorrow at 7AM I go back down the rabbit-hole to work. I may or may not get more details of the above events posted before I come out the other end of the warren on next Monday.

8) Last, but most definitely not least. I have a new job. It’s probably no secret to anybody that knows me that my hospitalist practice pretty much consumes my entire existence during my work-weeks. I currently work 7 days on, 7 off, which sounds great in principle, but. It’s starting to do me in. I mostly spend the first 2 days out of the rabbit hole recovering, then the last 2 days getting ready to head back down the hole again. A local thing came up, I jumped, applied, got it. Starting in November, I’ll be working a more consistent 40-hour week. I’ll be in the same hospital, don’t have to move, and I already know all the other docs that I’ll be working with. Changes can be hard, but as changes go, this one will be relatively painless.

I’ll try to get back here to post photos if I have time this week. To tide you over, here’s the Picasa link for the Alaska photos. And here are just two of my own.

Of course, Sweetpea had a good time. Did you really have to ask?

So did I. Photo from our veranda. Yes, I know, I live with a good man. He packed lemons, vodka, and bought me martini glasses at our first stop.

Ooooh, Shiny!

Here’s my second handspun yarn. This is a merino-tencel blend, though I don’t know much else about the fiber as it was in a big bin at the only LYS in town that sells spinning fiber. I think it’s from Ashland Bay, but I’m not sure.

I keep reading that merino is hard to spin, and not for beginners. Bah, I say. I just waded right in. I figure the only thing I have to lose is my dignity. It looks better than my first yarn, so I think I’ll count it as a success. There are about 260 yards of that stuff, and it’s roughly a bulky weight, though I haven’t swatched it yet. It’s just dreamily soft, and I think it will make a lovely winter scarf.

I promised a better photo of my first yarn. Here it is. This is Colonial Top, about 112 yards in all.

The wheel now has a name. Meet Seamus:

Yes, I went ahead and bought the silly wine glass holder. It just had my name on it, don’t you think?

In knitting news, I’m still working on the stealth baby project. It’s coming along, but I still can’t show photos. Oh, OK, here’s a teaser.

Big and grey, that’s all I can say. It’s much prettier in real life.

Last but not least, we’re leaving for an Alaskan cruise in the morning. It was sort of a spontaneous thing that we signed up for just a month or so ago. It’s a round trip from Seattle, so didn’t require an airplane ride, and if you can book close to last minute, the deals are pretty good. What’s not to like? Work has been a bit of a drag recently, and it’s been somewhat of a difficult early summer around here, so a cruise seemed just the ticket. No, I’m not taking the wheel. Yes, I am taking the Bosworth spindle. I’m also taking the laptop, so hopefully there will be a post or two.

9 Out of 10 Doctors Recommend….

More fiber in your diet! So I’m following my own advice. Yes, I came home yesterday with a lovely wheel, and a whack of pretty blue fiber. After trying both the Schacht Matchless and the Kromski Minstrel, I wanted both. I indeed had a difficult time making a decision*, but in the end the Schacht came home with me. Here are some photos.

That’s Elizabeth fixing my overspinning and all the little pigtails I put in the fiber.

Really, I was having fun. I was just concentrating.

In the car, on the way home.

I’ve discovered that spinning on a wheel blows through miles of fiber much faster than a spindle. This can mean only one thing. I need to clear out more space for stash.

Isn’t that a beauty?

First yarn!


On the niddy-noddy. I just love saying niddy-noddy!

Hanging up to dry on the deck. I’ll get a better photo of it once it’s dry. I wasn’t going to ply this stuff in all it’s craptitude, but what the hell. You only make your first yarn once. I might even knit something out of it.

Here’s my second yarn.

That’s a merino-tencel blend. I appear to have been in a blue-violet mood this week. This stuff is a bit slippier to manage than the Ashford Colonial wool, but it’s awfully pretty. I might have a few more bags of fiber on the way.

The Schacht doesn’t have a name yet, but I think it’s trying to tell me that it’s a boy. We’ll see. Do you all name your wheels? What does he/she look like to you?

Have a good weekend, everyone! Guess what I’ll be doing?

*Any bets on how long I’ll hold out before the Minstrel comes to live here?

Stealth Knitting

I promised a link to my latest Stealth Knitting project. The problem with gift knitting is that it can’t be used as blog fodder. If you’re on Ravelry, here’s the link.

Baby knitting is a mystery to me. It’s not like this is a surprise, I’ve had at least six months notice to come up with something clever and unique to knit. Why is it that suddenly 3 weeks before the due date, I’m stunned by the fact that there will be a new baby in the family? Because I’ve waited so danged long to get started, everything else on the project list is in a time out until I finish this.

So what am I making? As a clue for all you knitter-blog readers, a certain East Coast knit designer who happens to love knitting with tweed posted a finished project on his blog recently. Though there is no pattern for it, at least not yet, I’m doing an improvisation of the same thing. I’m not saying anything more. Ravel it to find out.

OK, here’s something that I can show photos of. I’m continuing to work on my spindle spinning, and of course all you spinners out there predicted that I’d fall hard once I fell into the spinning well. Here’s my second spindle full of that garish Mountain Colors stuff.

Perhaps a bit better, eh?

The next bit should also come as no surprise to those of you following this blog for a while. I’m not so much a fan of that clunky Ashford student spindle. It’s heavy, the hook is not terribly well designed, and there is no notch for the yarn to follow. I did figure out how to improvise an “outie” spindle notch using these very creative instructions from Knitty. I can spin on this thing, but it would be hard to make anything other than the heavier weight yarns with it, at least for a beginner.

Meet my new friend.

This is a Bosworth Midi spindle. The whorl is made of Zebrawood, and it is just a delight to use. It weighs about 29 grams. If you haven’t tried one, go look at them. Sheila was very helpful, with speedy and friendly service. I also bought a new wad of fiber. This is Blue Faced Leicester from Paradise Fibers, and it is just the nicest stuff to spin. Here are a few more pictures.

That’s a hard color to photograph well. It’s actually not so grey in real life, it’s more of a tweedy light oatmeal color. If I ever get enough of this stuff to ply*, I could see this as a pair of socks.

I’m off Thursday for my spinning lesson and wheel investigation. I’ll take the camera to document the adventure so you all don’t miss a minute!

*Ply?? Good grief, something else to have to figure out.

Nights On The Lake

I got nothin’, so I’m reduced to posting cell phone photos of the lake at sunset. Here are two recent evenings. Man, I love summer.

Knitting and spinning are proceeding. I’m working on a stealth project, possibly there will be a Ravelry link soon so the intended recipient can’t see it. Not yet, not yet. Yes, there will be a new baby in the extended family this summer.

Spinning is coming along. I’m having enough fun that I’m looking at wheels. Yes, I know. It was inevitable. I’m at least trying to be smart enough to not just order the damn thing sight unseen. I have an appointment with a local spinner-shop owner-fiber-lady next week when I’m off work to test drive* some wheels. My current flame is a Kromski Minstrel, but I’m certainly easily swayed. What do you all have, if you are spinners?

*Shhhh. Please, don’t tell my spouse that “test drive some wheels” is code for “buy a wheel and bring it home in the back seat of the car”. Let him have his little delusions.

Fruit Loops

No, I’m not having a flashback to the breakfast cereal, though I did love the stuff when I was a child. I’m talking about my newest lace project.

The yarn is from deep in the stash, Brooks Farm Harmony, in the color Froot Loops. They don’t make this any more, but it’s lovely stuff, half mohair, the rest wool and silk. It’s just as soft as can be, and very lustrous. I have a thousand yards of it to make a stole.

This will eventually be Morning Glory, by Anne Hanson (aka Knitspot).

I’ve had some fun and games getting this one going. I did a proper swatch, then cast on and knit away. This is knit in two pieces, starting from either end, and then grafted down the middle. There is a 12-row edging, then a wide border, then the morning glory stitch pattern for the main part of the stole. I got the edging done and about an inch of the border, and decided I needed to go up a needle size. Out it came.

Round two, bigger needle. Knit the edging, all of the border, and then the four transition rows to the center pattern. I get to the increase row, the one that has you increase a bunch of stitches across the row to get from the 50 center stitches up to 67. Here’s what it looked like.

I did so, counted, came up with something like 80-some stitches. Read the directions again, realized that I’d done the increase row wrong, tinked back, did it again,counted again. I still had way too many stitches. I decided to go to bed, sure that when I got up in the morning that the knitting fairies would have fixed this.

In the light of day, with a strong cup of coffee, I really read the pattern. It appears that during the transition between the 12-row edging and the border, way back about 12 inches of knitting ago, I just plain forgot to do the decrease row that was the transition between those two sections. Crap Crap Crappity Crap. I did that whole border section on too many stitches. There may have been some harsh words said in earnest when I finally figured this out yesterday morning. I tried to rip back just to the initial edging, made a mess of it, and ended up just ripping the whole thing out.

I would like to point out that in no way does this reflect on Anne’s pattern-writing abilities. She writes a fine pattern. The charts are clear, the directions could not be more plain. I just didn’t follow them.

I now have the thing restarted, though I was sorely tempted to go paddle the canoe out in the middle of the lake and sacrifice the yarn to the Loch Steili Monster*. I love the Froot Loopy-ness of it too much to do that. I have most of the edging done. From now on, I’m reading directions.

Oh, and that’s my new yarn bowl, from Knit Witch. Go and get one of your own, they are lovely!

*Yes, we have our own Monster on Lake Steilacoom, where we live. John and I have both seen her swimming across the lake. She appears to be friendly, as no water skiers or small pets have gone missing, but it never hurts to give her a peace offering now and again.

And Now For Something Completely Different…

This came in the mail today:

Don’t even ask what prompted this. I’ve always said that I have enough yarn in this house to last the rest of my life and then some. I certainly don’t need to make my own.

Yet, there it is. I made yarn.

It’s the crappiest yarn in the world, it gives new meaning to the term “thick and thin”, yet, yet. There it is. I made yarn.

I’ve gone to the Dark Side at last. Wouldn’t that back yard look nice with some sheep?