Lots of stuff!

I didn't post last weekend because I had a busy weekend at the NY Sheep and Wool Festival. I have no idea why I didn't post the previous weekend. So, to make up for all that, I have a lot to talk about today. It is a real mish-mash of stuff.

First of all, aren't these cute? They are popcorn cobs from my CSA Farm. Apparently I can pop them right on the cob. I haven't tried that yet. It will be a treat for the week.
A couple of weeks ago, I had an open house at my place for some of the local knitters I've met through our local yarn store. It gave me the opportunity to photograph these two Faroese shawls that are similar to the one I made from sock yarn. It is a great way to use up those single skeins of sock yarn and because the st count varies with each row, you don't get splotches of color.
Here's a photo of our happy crowd! We were so happy to sit and chat and eat lots of goodies. Everyone brought goodies so we had more than we could consume.
Another photo of all of us. So many bags of knitterly things...
Now, on to my activities on the fiber front...
I've made good progress on the silk featherweight cardi. The body is done and I'm on the first sleeve.
I also got a haul of red mink/cashmere yarn from Great Northern Yarns. I wore the shawl I made from it to the Sheep and Wool Festival. It kept me warm and lots of people fondled me (in a very fiber-y way). My hands were kept warm by the fingerless mitts I made from the leftovers. One of the knitters at Camp had a jacket made out of this yarn and she inspired me to make one for myself.
In contrast to that lovely yarn, here's my very first spindle spun skein! It is a mix of different fibres but it was spun and plied on my Bosworth spindle. I took a class at the Sheep and Wool Festival for the first time. I plied the yarn in the class and finished it this morning. It isn't much but I'm proud of it.

Now on my acquisitions from the Sheep and Wool Festival. I had a ball most of the day helping out at Jennie the Potter's booth. It was a very exciting day and it helped me keep my purchases to a minimum. I really need to make a dent in what I already have rather than adding to my stash.
I bought a niddy noddy to make skeins from my handspun. It is a pretty basic one.
I bought a Golding Tsunami spindle made of purple heart. There is a better picture further down on the Golding page. It is a lightweight spindle, to complement my mid-weight Bosworth. I want to try spinning some laceweight.
Lastly, I bought 3 oz of Icelandic lamb roving from Frelsi Farm. The black yarn in my spindlespun skein above is Icelandic roving and I loved spinning it. The lamb is very soft but supposed to be easy to spin. So I thought I'd try it on the spindle.

The class really re-ignited my interest in spindling and so I am now going to do some more with it. It probably will mean even less knitting. I'm not sure how to fit everything I want to do into my life!

Confessions of a book addict

I thought I would show you some of the things that have been occupying my time lately. I grew the tomatoes and peppers above in pots on my patio and porch. The tomatoes are called Sungold cherries and they are the most amazing, sweet tomatoes. Eating them is like eating candy!
This gorgeous bowl of red cherry tomatoes came from the Community Supported Agriculture farm. Also, the lovely heirloom varieties below. They come in all colors of the rainbow. I didn't get any of the purple ones this year but there are green, yellow, orange and red tomatoes and each has its own unique flavor.
I am really enjoying the vine ripened tomatoes, peppers and greens. I love greens. I could spend my life eating just greens. The only thing I don't like is cleaning and cooking them. But one can't have everything that one wants.

Today I am going to do a comparison of the original and the new editions of Alice Starmore's Aran Knitting. I can't resist buying books. I bought the new edition published by Dover even though I had the original book. But it provides a good opportunity to see what has been updated in the years since the original version was published.

The books are approximately the same size. The new one is softcover whereas the original publication was hard bound. The new one is slightly smaller than the original.
Some of the photos are the same but many garments have been re-knitted and feature new photographs. Here is Irish Moss in the new edition (left) and in the original (right). The colors of the new garments are generally more vibrant and feature Alice Starmore's Hebridean 3-ply yarn. Some call for Bainin (which I believe is being reissued) and Scottish Fleet. You can see the newer versions of the patterns at Virtual Yarns. The new edition also includes an additional pattern as well as information about Alice Starmore's yarns.

I really like the new pattern. It isn't boxy and is very feminine. It is called Eala Bhan and Alice Starmore says that she originally knit it for herself. She includes the pattern to show that Aran patterns can be fitted precisely to the body. As you can see, this is one curvaceous garment!The instructions are a combination of written instructions and charts and cover 11 pages. This is because of the precise shaping instructions that are included and I think the end result is worth it. Of the many patterns in the book, this one immediately caught my attention. Now, maybe that is because the others are very familiar, but it might also be because the body skimming Eala Bhan will suit many real women. It doesn't hurt that it is knit in a color that I love. The yarn used is the 3-ply Hebridean yarn.Next, I will do a compare and contrast of Alice Starmore's Fair Isle Knitting and also one of the commemorative edition of Knitter's Almanac. The latter was brought out by Dover to celebrate Elizabeth Zimmermann's 100th birthday in August.

A short little update

I had meant to do a review of Knitting Green in this post but the weekend got away from me. I had commitments that I had not anticipated and that left me with no time to craft a review.

So this is an update on knitting and cooking:

• Knitting: the contest entry is moving along. Nothing much else to say about it.
• Cooking: I want to recommend garlic scapes to everyone. They are a secret guarded by those who frequent farmer's markets and grow their own garlic. The flavor is clean and mildly garlicky. You can only get them at this time of the year. I usually have to collect them over weeks from the CSA farm to get enough to make garlic scape pesto which is amazingly delicious. I made the mistake of telling someone this at the farm distribution and she promptly went back and collected her share. Darn! If I hadn't, maybe I could have gotten her share out of the trade bin.
  

That is all for now. Next weekend is a long weekend and I will do the review.

How I have been spending my time

I am back in my non-knitting mood. I am slowly working on the project since it has a deadline. I have lots of ideas of things I want to knit or design but getting down to the actual work is not at all interesting.

I have been working in the yard off and on. We have been giving many of our shrubs a hair cut. They are 20 years old and were getting rather over-grown despite pruning. I took a chain-saw to the ones by the mailbox earlier in the season and they are looking very nice now. So I am doing the same thing with other shrubs as they finish flowering. It makes for a lot of clean-up but the result is cleaner and neater looking. I also think it gives the shrubs a new lease on life.

My non-flowering hydrangea has buds on it! This is a plant I got on clearance at the end of the season a few years ago. I made the mistake of pruning the old wood at the beginning of the season. Hydrangeas flower on old wood. OK, so I should have lost one year's worth of flowers. No, it hasn't flowered at all. Maybe it was just mad at me. I have left it alone for a number of years and this is the first year I have seen buds. It always had a lot of leaves and looked pretty.

The CSA produce has started coming in. That also keeps me busy on weekends - cooking and freezing it. We get a lot of greens early in the season and they take a lot of prep time. Knitting should be a nice refreshing change of pace from all this but it isn't attracting me. Maybe I need to work at getting back into it?

Yet another busy weekend

It is an understatement to say that I'm exhausted. I think I could sleep for a month.

I spent the week driving an hour each way as I was the organizer of a conference. The days were long and made longer by the commute. I also took the opportunity to have dinner with some out of town friends, which made that day even longer.

Therefore, there was not much knitting going on. In fact, there was zip, zero, zilch.

I also spent the weekend teaching. So there was a bunch of knitting and I have made some progress on the Wild Apple. I hope to really finish one sleeve this week! I know I've made this promise before but this time I'm really hoping.

Today I am using the remainder of the focaccia dough from last weekend to make rolls. I am making veggie burgers Indian style for dinner. Here is one recipe to give you an idea of what I'm talking about. I am making my own recipe with vegetables from my CSA farm. I thought it would be even better with freshly baked rolls. I was going to make a calzone with the potato vegetable filling instead of the traditional kind but I thought that if I made patties, I could have it another night during the week. I may need to bake the rolls the evening before as I don't think I will have time to bake and then eat for dinner.

Cross your fingers and wish me luck in finishing that sleeve this week!

A busy weekend

I have no photos to post so this is going to be quick. My camera is traveling and I don't have a replacement.

I thought I would have finished one sleeve of the Wild Apple by now but I haven't. I had a busy week with very little knitting time and so am making slow progress. I am about half way down the second sleeve. Nothing exciting to share visually yet.

I have been busy this weekend with lots of non-knitting stuff. I am cooking and baking and if I get some time, need to freeze some hot peppers. My plants produced a lot and I need to do something with it. Ditto with the basil. Let's see if I get anything done. I got a lot of CSA produce so I am focused on cooking and preserving that.

I made a focaccia with cherry, currant and pear heirloom tomatoes, rosemary and basil. It was visually and tastefully appealing. I used the crust recipe from Artisan Bread in 5 mins a day, which worked really well. It is the Olive Oil Dough. I have enough for a couple more in the refrigerator which I can use over the next two weeks.

I am also oven-drying the remainder of the little tomatoes for future use. They look like little jewels - purple, orange, yellow and red. I ate my fill in salads and as snacks. If we get some more, I will take a photo and post.

I also did a lot of data entry, adding all my recent acquisitions (some from Camp) to my databases of yarn, books and magazines. Now all that is put away, instead of littering the floor of my bedroom. Neatly littering, but littering none-the-less.

More next week

No pictures

For the next couple of weeks, there will be no pictures as the camera is traveling with my husband. I could use the one on my cell phone but it doesn't take very nice pictures.

I am almost through the back of the cardigan on the cover of the Summer 2008 Vogue Knitting. It is looking good. I decided to lengthen it a bit as my midriff is not something I care to show off. Otherwise, I am just knitting the middle size. It is a pretty boring knit as the pattern on the bottom is very easy and mindless. But not mindless enough to zone out completely. I have taken to reading while knitting it if there is no TV to watch.

Since it is a pretty lacy, see-through kind of cardigan, and I'm knitting it in a fairly light cotton, I went looking for something to wear underneath it. Serendipitously, I was looking through a Good Housekeeping while waiting (and knitting on the lower back) and found an article on shapers. Both Spanx and Assets have camisoles that will work. In the process of looking these up, I realized that Sarah Blakely designs both these. Just a piece of trivia with no value whatsoever.

I have been busy washing, chopping, cooking and freezing greens from my CSA farm. I did spinach, chard, mixed greens, turnip greens and radish greens yesterday. Today is reserved for kale and bok choy. Both those will be cooked and eaten. Only the spinach and chard made it to the freezer. I love fresh greens but the washing and chopping is tiring. Lots of grit. I soak them in a sink full of cold water and slosh them around. Then I rinse them vigorously before I stack them in piles on the chopping board and chiffonade them . After that, I run the knife through them in a direction perpendicular to the strips to cut the strips into smaller pieces. As the summer wears on, I will move to my quick and dirty chopping method. Wash the greens as before and drain. Put them in a dish and microwave them for a few minutes so they wilt. Dump them (with the collected liquid) into the food processor and pulse to chop. Then add to the dish and finish the cooking. But for now, I am making lovely little pieces.