kmkat and her kneedles

Fun with food.

At dinner Friday night:

Look, Mommy, I wrote my name!

* * * * *

Behold, see what happens when one uses the last of the very, very, very old -- and hence dry -- bread flour (at least 2+ years old) PLUS a cup of extremely old and dry craisins in the bread baker AND for some unknown reason decides not to add the tablespoon or two of extra liquid that has enabled the past three loaves using this old flour to turn out perfectly:

 

 

Despite its gnarled and craggy appearance, the bread was delicious. Must have been the cinnamon and nutmeg and cloves...

DIY yarn swift.

Found via ikeahacker:

 

If you are a DIY-er this may interest you. If there is a DIY-er in your family who is pondering what to make/give you for Christmas, let me know and I will send that person this link anonymously ;^)

How to make a Lazy Susan yarn swift.

Query: Why is the Kauni Effektgarn yarn cake in the photo being wound back into a skein? Does anyone ever do this? I'm thinking it was done just for the photo op.

Caturday.

Eye candy Friday: the random edition.

 

Carved ostrich eggs in store window, Cape Town, South Africa; December 2005.

* * * * *

Thank you all for your help in finding someone to design the caduceus for the Christmas mitten! Lisa hooked me up with an amazing Canadian knitter (I know, that's redundant) who has already knit a prototype for me. Follow the link to her Ravelry page -- she has done amazing stuff.

I'm going to share the other resources that y'all offered me -- there are some really good ones.

From Ruth @ 5elementknitr: "...this woman does outstanding things with dishcloths and she has a whole medical category here. There's two caduceus...es - one at the top and one if you scroll down a bit. They are not cables just knit/purl and when I bought a design from her before, there's no charts, just row by row instructions." digknittydesigns

(Blogless) Berta in Texas sent me to Knitting Pattern Central for several dishcloths that have wings in their design. Several are by RaAnn Clegg, who clearly loves to create knit and purl designs and is very good at it.

KMK (she and I share the same initials) told me about the DNA helix scarf she had in medical school. A light bulb went on over my head. The mittens will be fraternal twins: the other one will have the DNA helix design on the back.

Helen offered to design for me, but she has several (amazing!) things OTN right now and wouldn't be able to get to it right away.

Thanks again -- you guys are the BEST!

* * * * *

In addition to November being the month of NaNoBloMo and NaNoWriMo and Vestvembe, it is also Novembeard...

 

...in which Matthew is clearly participating.

He showed me another of his artistic creations, one which is in the header rotation over at MplsBikeLove.com.

 

Here's a closer look:

 

He and Maggie surprised me at 8:30 last night by showing up with a pumpkin pie cheesecake and saying, "No one should be alone on Thanksgiving." What a couple of sweeties they are.

* * * * *

And now, in honor of Black Friday/National Buy Nothing Day, one last image:

Share the thankful.

Reposted from Knit Think:

" 'Tis the season for thankfulness, and I have many reasons to be so. If you also have much to be thankful for and can share, please read Laurie's blog post and consider helping someone who could desperately use some reasons to be thankful this Thanksgiving season"

Thanksgiving.

The ten people I would most like to have around my table today:

1. Smokey, Matthew, and Andrew (they are a gimme, of course).
2. Smokey's Uncle Carl and Aunt Olga. There is a particular gene in my husband's family that makes its carrier clever, hilarious, imaginative, mischievous, and a natural mechanic. Grampa Karl (who died before I met Smokey), Uncle Carl (who died about ten years ago), Smokey, and Matthew all exhibit these traits in spades. (I think it takes a certain exemplary kind of woman to love this kind of man; Aunt Olga is exactly that -- lively and peppery and crusty and loving.)
3. My parents, who have been gone for ~25 years.
4. My paternal grandfather, George, who has been gone for ~45 years. He won a liars' contest sponsored by a local newspaper when he was 81, got a new rod and reel and a week's stay at a local resort for he and my grandmother.
5. Barack and Michelle Obama, although my Republican father might have a few words to say to them.
6. Eleanor Roosevelt, although my Republican father, etc. Franklin can stay the hell away.
7. Albert Einstein.
8. Golda Meir and Margaret Thatcher. They can be seated next to each other; the rest of us will just watch and listen.
9. Stephanie Perl-McPhee. (I had Leonardo da Vinci in this position, but he lost out to the Yarn Harlot for a place at my table.)
10. Ozzie and Sharon Osbourne, just for the hell of it.

That's seventeen people. I need to get a bigger table.

National Buy Nothing Day.

Please join me* on Friday for National Buy Nothing Day. We can sit in our comfy chairs with knitting and beverages of choice and miss out on the crazy insane madness that is Black Friday in the US. Together.

From the linked site:

So this November 27 (November 28 in Europe and overseas), we’re calling for a Wildcat General Strike. We’re asking tens of millions of people around the world to bring the capitalist consumption machine to a grinding – if only momentary – halt.

We want you to not only stop buying for 24 hours, but to shut off your lights, televisions and other nonessential appliances. We want you to park your car, turn off your phones and log off of your computer for the day.

* I already have my Christmas shopping done, remember?

More nesting.

On Sunday I made split pea soup. First I sauteed a one-pound ham that I had cut into 1/4"-dice. See all that yummy brown stuff on the bottom of the soup pot? That's why I sautéed the ham.

 

Of course, it didn't do the ham any harm, either.

 

I used a ham bone and some ham stock that has been taking up space in the freezer for at least a year. Even though every food writer says to use only the best, freshest ingredients, yada yada yada, I used these anyway. (The soup was delicious, btw.)

 

Baked a loaf of whole-wheat bread last night, made a trip to the store today for split peas. I made a double batch of soup so I would have some to freeze for when Andrew is home for Christmas.

 

Simmered with diced potatoes and carrots and onions and my own multitude of herbal seasonings.

 

Oops, that's how a photo looks when one lets the lens get steamed up.

Let's try again.

 

It was soooooo good.

Hatz.

I am getting a little bored with knitting hats, although I keep thinking of other design ideas that will use up oddball skeins. So I am probably not done yet.

Here is the latest crop.

 

The black one:
Yarn: Plymouth Encore, a little over half a skein (~114 yds.).
Needles: Addi Turbo US#5 (I think; might have been #6).
Pattern: Clamber (V.1.0) by Laura Wilson-Martos, worked on 108 st.

The red one:
Yarn: Colorado Durango (worsted weight; 50%wool/47% acrylic/3% rayon), a little more than one skein (~120 yds.).
Needles: Addi Turbo US#5 (I think).
Pattern: Pattern? I don' need no stinkin' pattern (for a 2x2 rib)!

The navy blue one:
Yarn: Bernat Lana (worsted weight; label says 100% merino, but it felt like ordinary wool to me), about half a skein (~110 yds.); stripes are ~20 yds. of some Noro Silk Garden left over from scarves I did a couple years ago.
Needles: Addi Turbo US#5
Pattern: (see above)

One more hat, this one intended for #1 son for Christmas:

 

Yarn: Cherry Tree Hill Supersock DK Moody Blues, about half a skein (~170 yds)
Needles: Addi Turbo US#2
Pattern: Clamber (see above), worked on 132 st. I hope it is big enough for his large noggin; it fits me, but his head might be a skooshi bit larger. I didn't weave in the end, and I have the second half of the skein if I need to make it a bit longer. )Andrew never reads the blog unless I specifically tell him to, so it should be safe to reveal this hat here)

I also intended to knit him some sockweight mittens; he requested a pair to keep his hands warm when he runs. I wanted to put this caduceus design on the back, using cables for the staff and snakes and other fancywork stitches for the wings, but designing turned out to be harder than I thought. It might be doable if I were experienced in lace knitting because then I would know how to conjure up the wings with slanting lines of increases and decreases. I know I could knit it if someone else wrote the pattern for me -- anybody interested? I pay in yarn :-)

Ready for a laugh?

Not my kitteh, although it would be so cool if I could teach this to Hannibal.

What famous dead person are you most like?

Florence Nightingale here. Yeah, right...

Eye candy Friday: the MLIA version.

When I got dressed yesterday morning, I realized all my hand-knit socks were dirty. Later, I decided I could wash one load of laundry that was just hand-knit socks. When I hung them on the rack to finish drying I felt I had achieved a hand-knit sock milestone. MLIA.

Thankful Thursday the third.

I am thankful for/that:

1. "...my fingers" although probably not for the same reason that Paul Simon was. My fingers like to knit and tap the computer keyboard.
2. ...it was the wild bear and not My Bear that was injured in the recent crash. But I regret that anyone/thing was injured.
3. ...cinnamon, garlic, salt, balsamic vinegar, chocolate, sugar, butter, shrimp, steak, bread, etc. In other words, food that tastes good.
4. ...wine and beer to accompany #4.
5. ...flowers.
6. ...the last presidential election.
7. ...the end of civilization as we know it has not happened. Yet.
8. ...Monte Python.
9. ...YouTube.
10. ...SNL.
11. ...laughter. It, along with love, make the world go round.

Nesting behavior.

It must be the cooler weather that portends winter. I have been moved to nesting behavior. Knitting, of course, but also cooking! even baking!

Twice I baked a double batch of pumpkin bread using the Joy of Cooking recipe (2 good-sized loaves each time) and threw in a bag of chocolate chips each time. One of the first loaves went into a CARE package for #1 son, and I ate the other loaf almost entirely by myself. It was sinfully good. One of the second loaves went to #2 son to take back home with him after last weekend, and the other went into the freezer in preparation for having the boys here at Christmas.

On Thursday I made beef stew from this new cookbook I got a few days ago:

 

Mise en place:

 

Browning half the chunks of chuck roast:

 

There was red wine and chicken broth and carrots and onions and potatoes and bay leaves and thyme and garlic involved, too, but I didn't take photos of everything.

Just know that my house smelled really, really good.

There was freshly baked whole wheat bread, too, from this:

 

This is my third bread baker over about 20 years. The first one made a 1-pound loaf. Great bread, but the loaves were too danged small and therefore had an unsatisfactory crust-to-bread ratio, imnsho. Plus, a loaf was gone after one meal. The second bread baker made a 1.5-pound cylindrical loaf. Much better ratio, plus it had an exhaust fan that cooled the baker when the bread was done so I didn't have to be right! there! to take out the bread when it was done.

When that one died after a long and fruitful life, I bought this Zojirushi, which had been very favorably reviewed somewhere. It makes a 2-pound loaf, which was perfect, especially when the boys were home. Its main flaw is that it seems to knead the bread too much, so much that the bread is has a perfectly smooth texture and not enough tooth, if you know what I mean. I use bread flour and w.w. bread flour, not all-purpose flour, so that is not the problem. Perhaps I need to experiment some more. Fresh-from-the-*oven* bread is soooo good...

Another food thing I recently discovered is the wonderfulness that is oven-roasted root vegetables. Oh, sure, they have been around for years and everyone and their cousin has raved about them, but I just discovered them about a month ago. That first time I had some carrots that had been in the crisper drawer for so long they had started to grow new roots; some semi-soft potatoes that were in roughly the same condition, and some (relatively fresh) onions. I peeled and chunked and tossed them all with olive oil, salt, pepper, minced garlic, minced fresh rosemary, and a pinch of cayenne. Although we ate them with a marvelous tenderloin from the grill (tenderloin is my favorite!), the vegetables were the star of the meal.

Since that first time I have experimented a bit with other vegies. Found that neither brussels sprouts nor leeks lend themselves to this preparation, or at least not in combination with root vegies. Rutabaga and turnip were my latest experiment, in combination with potatoes and onions (tragically, there were no carrots in the house that day); they received positive votes from both Smokey and I. (Smokey, when I told him what was in the vegetable melange, said that he had never understood why people grew or ate rutabagas because he had never eaten any that deserved a repeat performance; he changed his mind after the first bite.)

* * * * *

More proof of nesting behavior: another Hat for the Homeless.

 

Yarn: Tahki Lana (old version): 100% merino; 2/3 of the skein, or 86 yards. I got this from lisa as a bonus when I won her contest awhile back. While gray might not be a choice I would make for myself, it was perfect for this project. The yarn is lovely to knit.
Needles: Knit Picks Options circ, US#10.
Pattern: Made it up: mistake rib worked on 60 st. Work 6” even. Decrease by P2tog every other rib, every other row, until ~30 st remain. K2tog around every row until ~6 st remain. Break yarn, thread through remaining st.

* * * * *

Okay, I see in the Feedjit in my sidebar that I have a reader in Durand, Wisconsin, which is 69 miles (111 km) from where I live. Fess up, please! Who are you, and why do I not know this already? Oh, and when can we have coffee and knit together? ;^)

Knitting retreat w/ CPE credit; day 2.

This was the scene Tuesday.

 

Same audio book, different hat. I finished this one on Tuesday and knit the first 3" of another.

I learned less during this conference than usual (NOT because I was listening to my iPod -- I did that was ONLY between sessions). The keynote speaker, who also led on one of the ethics sessions, was entertaining but absolutely irrelevant to the accounting profession. He tried to tie in his message to business but failed, imho. Other speakers varied from okay to miserable.

One of the better speakers, who led three sessions on various technology topics.

 

From him I did learn a few things. Unlike most of the speakers on tax matters, he chose fewer topics to present in his sessions but did every one thoroughly. The tax guys tended to attempt to cram way too much into their 75 minutes, with the result that nothing was well-presented. There is a lesson in there somewhere.

But accountants are not all about spreadsheets and tax code and hidden treasures in Excel.

 

The Society, sponsors of the conference,  also raised nearly $1200 for the Second Harvest food shelf. Good work.

* * * * *

Now I am back home in Polk County, another 16 CPE credits (of the 40 required annually) under my belt, sipping my morning latte and listening to Bear the dog snore under my desk. Life is good.

Knitting retreat w/ CPE credit; day 1.

Today I was the Minneapolis Convention Center for the annual tax conference, put on by the MN Society of CPAs.

Besides listening to various speakers, I was doing this:

 

That's a stealth project, finished today. The yarn is STR Raven Clan, Corbie medium weight, US#2 needle, 120 st. I photographed this during the down time between presentations; hence, the iPod with audiobook (A Smile for Own Meany by John Irving; a v-e-r-y long book, but I am enjoying it.)

Tomorrow, who knows?

Fiber guild.

I was able to go to Fiber Guild last Wednesday. Normally I have county meetings all day on the second Wednesday of the month when the Guild meets, but because this Wednesday was a holiday all my meetings had been rescheduled. It was such fun to knit and chat for three hours! I have only been able to attend four or so meetings, but the groups has met for years and all the ladies have become fast friends over that time. Such a warm and welcoming and comfortable group, they are.

 

Here are Joannie, spinning; Eloise (hostess this month), showing off the Navajo loom and in-progress rug she acquired from a former fiber friend; and Linda, who organizes every month's meeting, knitting on a brown sock that will match her cozy brown sweater and who announced she is getting studio all of her own! Not just a room to use as a studio, but an entire 24'x36' building! She said she and her husband burned down an old chicken coop and are building the studio in that spot. (Several of these women live on farms and have sheep and/or llamas and/or other livestock.) Not pictured, Pat and Peggy, because they were sitting on the other side of the room, not because they were not photo-worthy as well. We were all sitting in Eloise's sun room, which has a 20' wall of floor to ceiling windows facing south. It was a glorious place to be. No SAD for that lady!

I am working on a stealth knitting project. The intended recipient may read this blog so it shall remain stealthy until after Christmas.

Today and tomorrow I shall be attending that two-day knitting retreat with CPE credit, the annual tax conference. Two whole days of knitting! W00t!

Mememememe.

Still cleaning out my drafts folder. Originally written May 8, 2009.

True: I was doing this meme just because I like it, without having been tagged, when took a little break and clicked over to Jen's blog only to discover she had done it, too, and tagged me. Clearly, this was meant to be...

* * * * *
What are your current obsessions?
Knitting. Blogs. Blogs about knitting.

Which item from your wardrobe do you wear most often?
My Merrell clogs. Every day. (Must buy another pair. These are starting to stink.)

What's for dinner?
Dinner? That is hours away. Well, okay, spaghetti with Italian sausage and sauce from a jar, just because that was what was going to be for last night's dinner until we decided to go out instead.

What's your greatest fear at the moment?
That the economy will tube so badly that Smokey and I will have to retire to subsidized housing, eat mac'n'cheese for the rest of our lives, and never, ever get to travel ever again.

What are you listening to?
My iTunes playlist, "Singalong Rock." Right now CSN&Y are singing Woodstock; the last few songs were Don't Look Back by Boston, Peggy Sue by Buddy Holly, Hot Rod Lincoln by Commander Cody and the Lost Planet Airmen, Rag Doll by Aerosmith*, and Blue Sky by the Allman Brothers.

If you were a goddess what would you be?
But I am a goddess...

What are your favorite holiday spots?
Right here in my house on the lake is my favorite. If I have to go somewhere, it would be the Florida Keys. Or maybe Tahiti.

What are you reading right now?
The Waters of Babylon by Nelson DeMille. Hey, I may be a goddess but sometimes I read total crap just like everyone else. Oh, and The Natural Step for Communities: How Cities and Towns can Change to Sustainable Practices. That one is NOT crap.

What is your guilty pleasure?
Heh. I realized about a year ago that my guilty pleasure (and those are exactly the words I used) is George Thorogood and the Destroyers. Smokey and I are going to see them in concert in August at the Grand Casino in Hinkley, MN.

Who or what makes you laugh?
Smokey, Matthew, our dogs, our cats, people in general, lolcats. I like to laugh.

What is your favorite spring thing to do?
Inhale. Look for wildflowers blooming in the woods. Listen to the spring peepers.

What is the best thing you ate or drank lately?
The fresh pasta with vegies, including ramps, at Common Roots restaurant at 26th and Lyndale in Minneapolis last week. Although the chocolate chip muffin I just ate was pretty darned good, too.

When was the last time you were tipsy?
That night last week when I had two glasses of wine (instead of my usual one) at bedtime.

What is your favourite ever film?
The Big Lebowski. That one has been amusing me for at least ten years. Dude.

What is the biggest lesson you've learned from your children?
How much fun they are and how much I enjoy their company. I didn't expect that.

What song can't you get out of your head?
My head is totally empty. No songs in there at all.

What book do you know you should read but refuse to?
Love in the Time of Cholera and Gravity's Rainbow. I have tried numerous times with both, haven't gotten past about page 20 in either one yet.

What is your favourite color?
Red. Blue. Jewel tones.

Where's the best place to get decent Indian food within 10 miles of Northbrook, IL? (in case you can't tell, this is the question Jen added).
I have no idea. Sorry, Jen.

What do you like to think about while you are waiting to fall asleep?
Duh. Knitting.

* * * * *

Later today I will head for Minneapolis for the annual 2-day tax conference, aka 2-day knitting retreat with CPE credit. I should be able to knock out a couple-three hats for the homeless.

Biking.

Matthew showed me these awesome biking videos last weekend. He says he is not inspired to learn to do these things, but he would like to know how to do them. I think what he means is that he would like to acquire the skills magically, without the bruises and potential broken bones that he would incur during the learning process.

Wouldn't we all prefer to acquire new knowledge that way?

And now for something [not] completely different...

Eye candy Friday: Pooktre.

StumbleUpon is one of the best ways to waste time on the internet. It led me to this site.

"In 1986 Peter had the idea of growing a chair. Nine years later Peter and Becky became partners. Pooktre was born. Together they have mastered the art they call Pooktre, which is the shaping of trees as they grow in predetermined designs. Some are intended for harvest to be high quality indoor furniture and others will remain living art."