Knitting Mojo Regained

My goal this year was to post at least one more time each month than I did last year, not a very challenging goal considering my 2009 record. Since I only posted once last May, I wasn't a bit concerned about meeting my May goal this year, but I failed. I tried repeated times in the last month to get enthused about a project, but I just couldn't.

I've wanted to knit Knotty gloves from Laris Designs for a long time, and I did finally knit one. I was kind of happy with the result, but not enough to knit a mate. I think it's the yarn. Dare I say it....it's just too pink! Then I thought I'd finally try to use up the twelve skeins of Debbie Bliss Silk Aran yarn I bought at least ten years ago, by knitting a set of placemats. I've knit this pattern before, and I  like it, but I don't like the yarn at all. I've read that other people don't like it either. It just doesn't feel good. So, I'm done trying to find a use for it. I'm giving to to a friend who will hopefully be more successful with it.

School has been out for only three days, and I'm already starting to feel creative again. Things have been so fast and furious for the last month or so that when I did have a little time to relax, I ended up falling asleep on the couch most of the time. It seems like the hectic pace of the entire year finally caught up with me. All year, I've been poignantly aware of all of the "high school lasts" that Paige was enjoying to the hilt.

I don't know if other schools make such a big deal of powderpuff football, but at our school, it's almost as important, to the girls at least, as the Homecoming game itself. I remember thinking when we took this picture that the year was going to zoom by, and I was right.

By the time prom came around,  Paige had decided to go to our community college for a year instead of to a university, which kind of helped me be a little less nostalgic. I would have been happy if she had chosen to go to Davis or Cal Poly right away, but I have to admit that I'm relieved to put off paying close to $30,000 a year for school, and I'm also glad that she isn't quite ready to leave home. Her brother is a little disappointed, but her dad and I are happy. Most of Paige's friends made the same choice, even her best friend who was the valedictorian of their class.

 I went to graduation equipped with a wad of kleenex, but was surprised to find that I was pretty much dry-eyed  and thoroughly  enjoyed every minute, with just a few exceptions. Paige and I walked up to the meeting area for teachers and students, and her friends said, You're wearing shorts??? You can't wear shorts!" I walked on ahead of her, hoping that security would give her a break, since they know her and her ditziness. I had to go in a different line, but I was happy to see her come up to me later as I gossiped with some of friends, only to discover that she was holding one of her sandasl in her hand. It was broken. Yikes! I took it into the gym office and attempted to staple iti back together. No luck. Fortunately, one of my friends who lives about five blocks from our school called home and had a pair delivered to us in the nick of time. Did Paige panic, you might ask. Not a bit. She said that she figured that she could always just go out there barefoot.

Paige graduated fifth in her class, which  would be good any year, but her class, besides being full of wonderful kids, has been the most academically inclined class I've seen in twenty-plus years of teaching. There was something like twenty kids who graduated with highest honors.  I have accused the boy in this picture with me of intentionally getting a B last year, so that he wouldn't have to risk giving a speech as valedictorian. I'm not entirely sure that I was wrong! Oh, and he didn't come to this country until he was in the third grade. Don't come to me if you want an unbiased discussion about immigration. At least half of my best students are immigrants or the children of immigrants. Their faces are what I see when people start discussing the evils of immigration. I just have to be content to love the students I have and to hope that we as a nation can quit being hysterical and create real solutions, instead of defaulting to being haters.

Sooo, after getting through graduation and grad night at Disneyland, I'm really ready to start being a knitter again. I've knit two bowls, which aren't works of art, but I like them. Paige went on a field trip to the beach with her A.P Statistics class a couple of weeks ago and brought me back a bunch of shells. I love shells and rocks, but I usually end up throwing them away because I mean how many grocery bags of shells can you have? Now I have a pretty way of displaying them.

I know that there are lots of felted bowl patterns out there, but I really liked how simple this one from Alice Thelma is. It's can also be adjusted with next to no thinking, which is very good for me.

So, my success with these cute, little bowls has gotten me excited about other projects. Kitty should be very happy. As soon, as I began knitting again, she positioned herself in her old spot right on top of my yarn. Everything is as it should be!

Loving My Book Club

I finished my purple socks and now seem to be in a bit of the knitting doldrums. Our weather has still been a little chilly, at least in the  morning and evening, so I'm not adverse  to using wool as I sometimes am by now. I just need a little break I guess.

So, I've mostly been focusing on two of my other hobbies: reading and eating. Some friends from work and I formed a book club last year, and although we don't meet really regularly, we have thoroughly enjoyed every meeting we've had. I suggested our last book, which was Crescent by Diana Abu Jabar. I've read it several times and although I like the story itself, it's the food imagery that make me love it...and yes, I was drawn to it because of the knitted blue sweater  sleeve on the cover.


The protagonist's is of Iraqi descent and is a cook in a Lebanese restaurant, so Crescent is full of references to humus, tabuleah, dolmas (stuffed grape leaves), and baklava. So, that is what the table in my dining room was full of this afternoon. I wish that I'd taken a picture of it because it was really a wonderful sight, but I do at least have a picture of the baklava that my friend, Janet, and I made yesterday.

Russ paid our baklava a very high compliment after tasting it today. Last summer we bought some baklava from an Iranian woman at a farmer's market in Nebraska. It was wonderful, just about melted in your mouth. I loved it so much that when we saw her at another farmer's market later that week, I had to go tell her how much we enjoyed her baklava even though we weren't buying any that day. When I told her that I had tried baklava numerous times and hers was by far the best that we'd ever tasted, she practically teared up and insisted that I take a free box of it. I tried to refuse, telling her that that wasn't why I'd told her that. She insisted though, and we eventually happily gave in. Writing this just now, made me wonder if she had a website, but all I could find was this blog post from a guy who obviously agrees with our assessment of her skills....back to Russ's comment. He said our baklava was about as good as that nice Iranian woman's!

Lucky for me, there were quite a few leftovers, and I was the recipient of most of them. I also helped make dolmades (pictured on the left side of my pic.) last week with my friend Nancy whose partner is of Greek heritage. If this recipe was any indication, he's an incredible cook. I've have dolmas out of jars from Trader Joe's, but eating freshly prepared dolmades can't even be compared to the cold, briney, slimey grape leaves out of a jar.

Sirine, the chef in Crescent makes the most delicious-sounding dolmas. I think she'd approve of these. This isn't exactly the recipe we used since the recipes we used is top secret, but Nancy assures me that this is very close to what we prepared.

Domades

1 lb. ground beef
1 large onion, chopped
1/2 cup white rice
1 egg
1 tbsp. butter, softened
1 tbsp. dried mint (we used fresh)
1/2 bunch parsley
dill
3-4 tbsp. lemon juice
salt/pepper

20 - 30 grape leaves (We're lucky enough to have a Middle Eastern market nearby where we can buy fresh ones, but we used some leaves from Nancy's concord grapes vines.

Knead all ingredient in a bowl. If the consistency is too hard, add a little water.

Boil grapes leaves until they are soft but not tender. Fresh leaves will only take a minute. Cool leaves. Fill leaves with rice mixture and roll "burrito-style."

In a large pot, melt 1/2 stick butter. Arrange rolled dolmades in pot and pour 3-4 cups of chicken or beef broth over dolmades, cover, and simmer for 2 hours.

Serve domades with avgolemono sauce:

Avgolemono Sauce

Ingredients:

• 2-3 eggs, separated
• 1 tablespoon of water
• juice of 2-3 lemons
• broth from the dish being cooked (or hot beef or chicken broth or stock)

Preparation:

Beat the egg whites until foamy. Beat in egg yolks, water, lemon juice, and 2-3 spoonfuls of broth, beating (or whisking) continuously. Add the avgolemono sauce to the dish being cooked, stir, cover with a towel for 10 minutes, and serve.

And the Winner is...

I didn't forget about my giveaway, and I've had so much fun reading everyone's comments, but somehow it' been over  a week from the time  I said I was going to pick a winner! I used a very scientific method...I asked my son to pick a number between one and twenty-three, and he chose eleven, which means that you're the winner, Rani! I know that whatever you knit with it will get good use, considering how long your winters are! Thanks to everyone for "playing." I wish I had enough yarn for everyone....well, actually, I probably do....I just don't want to part with it, ha, ha.

I don't have much to show for my week and a half away from my blog. My daughter has long made fun of me for being boring with my wardrobe. If I like a shirt, I'll buy it in three or four different colors. If I like something, I like it, what can I say.  So in that tradition, I decided to knit another pair of L'amour socks. Coincidentally, I knit it using one of the three different sets of Lorna's Laces sock yarn that I own which are slightly different shades of purple. At least I'm consistent.

Free Yarn

Before I offer up this yarn to someone who can give it a good home and love it as it deserves, I have to admit that I have no idea why I bought it. It's hand-dyed, worsted weight and did look  pretty with its green, pink and orange tones sitting in a basket with more muted-toned yarns. It was $25, so it wasn't terribly expensive...or cheap either.  I just kind of think its color combination is over the top.  I always feel guilty whenever I see it lying in my stash box. I think it was peer pressure that made me buy it; I was with my X-knit (Extreme knitters) buddies, and they oohed and awwed a couple of times over it, and somehow it ended up in my basket.

You may have it by just leaving a comment saying that you want it. You don't even have to say anything other than, "count me in," although it would be fun to hear about your most impulsive yarn purchase. I think I got off pretty cheap with this one.  I'll randomly choose a winner some time next week.

Blogging friends, please at least pretend to be interested. I'll feel like such a loser if no one responds. "Wow! that girl really has strange taste in yarn. Maybe she should just stick with pink!"

Happy Easter

This was about the extent of my Easter decorating this year, not that I usually do that much anyway. My mom always had us paint eggs and make an Easter egg tree when I was little, but I never really started that tradition with my own kids even though I loved the Easter egg trees we used to make.  We did spend a great evening decorating egg with my SIL and nephew before they left, and I've had them on display.

I am really proud of my little Easter mat I finish this week. I ordered the kit from Prairie Point Junction last month but didn't start it until a couple of days ago. It was fun although our living room was a little cluttered with all of the pieces of felt I was cutting out. The pattern suggests using freezer paper to cut out the pattern pieces and then iron the templates onto the felt, and it will stick. How cool. Why can't regular sewing patterns do that? I've always hated pinning the pattern to the fabric to cut it out.

I also finished my L'Amour socks. I had Kai be my model before I ship the away to my SIL. I really loved this pattern. It's labor-intensive, but not difficult really, and the socks fit great. Ho hum, now what to do. I've had this nagging guilt all week about not doing any grading. I hate to ruin a perfectly good Easter Sunday by grading papers. I think I'll start another sock instead.

It's All About the Salt

My family has spent a lot of time on the Central Coast of California,  and I thought I knew Cayucos, the little town where we stayed this weekend pretty well, but it's changed a lot in the last few years, for the better, I think. It's still a tiny place with none of that Southern California congestion and rush, but it's been spruced up. Of course, that also means that we could never afford a home there as people from my town used to be able to do, but oh well.

 Paige and her "Auntie Ann" both love the beach. It was almost too hot for sweatshirts as we walked out on the pier.

 One new addition to Cayucos (Well, they've been there for four years, but we hadn't noticed them before.) is the Brown Butter Cookie Company. We were looking for coffee the first late afternoon that we pulled into town, and it was about the only place open. They did have coffee, one of my favorites, SLO Coffee, but more enticing were their shelves of cookies. Their signature cookie is, of course, their brown butter sea salt cookie. They're way too expensive, a dollar apiece for a little cookie, but they're sooooo good. I made it my quest this week to copy their recipe, and I think I came pretty close. It's al about the salt. I improvised a recipe I found from Food Channel, but this morning, I found an even better one on Maple sugar Lyrics' blog. Hers sounds more like mine.

Brown Butter Sea Salt Cookies


Ingredients:

1 cup brown butter
1 cup light brown sugar
2 tsp vanilla
2 cups flour
1 tsp baking soda
sea salt

To make brown butter, melt butter over medium heat until browned. It will foam up a little just before it gets brown. Stir in brown sugar and vanilla and remove from heat, let cool.

In a mixing bowl add flour and baking soda  Stir in sugar mixture and let sit for half an hour or so.

Roll 1 inch balls of dough and dip in sea salt.  Bake for 12 - 15 minutes in a 325 degree oven.

So, it takes my sister-in-law coming to visit us for me to be introduced to "salt." How could I know that it was all the rage? Being trapped in a classroom with teenagers for weeks on end, I'm really out of the loop.  I don't know if my cookies would have tasted just as good with two dollar Trader Joe's sea salt, but I got mine at World Market as part of a set. Now, I can experiment with salt endlessly. Hypertension, here I come!  Oh...and I do remember that this is a knitting blog, but one has to have knitting accomplishments to blog about knitting accomplishments!

California Weekend

My sister-in-law, Ann and nephew, Sam came from Nebraska for a fun-filled, long weekend last week, which is part of the reason that I haven't gotten any farther on my L'Amour socks than I was a week ago, not that I didn't try. We had a wonderful, leisurely time, and I had lots of opportunities to knit, but it seems that every time I ended a knitting session, I discovered that I had miscounted stitches. I happily unraveled my errors, and then proceeded to make the same mistakes again while busily chatting away. I still say that it's all about the process, but I was getting ridiculous. The socks are for Ann, and I wanted to finish them while they were here, but that was a little ambitious.

There's nothing like out of state guests to remind you of what a great place you live, especially when the weather is perfect and everything is still so green. When we weren't socializing away, we did a few things, like:

eating lunch at Moo Creamery in Bakersfield, highlighted by basil lemonade and incredible raspberry jalapeno ice cream.

going to Brad's in Pismo Beach for fish tacos and walking off a few of the calories with a stroll on the wharf.

stopping at Kelsey See Canyon Vineyards to pick up a bottle of Golden Delicious Apple Chard and admire the peacocks.

enjoying beautiful views of Morro Bay from our rented beach house in Cayucos, and ending the day, listening to the waves while eating some doctored up Ragu spaghetti and Apple Chard for the grown ups out on the deck.

visiting Heast Castle for probably my twentieth time, Russ's ten or twelfth, Paige and Kai's six or seventh, and Ann and Sam's very first. I'd say we were all equally happy about it. Hearst Castle never gets old. It's always unbelievable. Although the price has really gone up --$25 a ticket. Guess I've gotten spoiled not having to pay when I take kids there on field trips every year.

We went on Tour 1, which is the best tour for anyone going for the first time. We were on the veranda at noon and got to hear the bells from the bell tower, something they've recently started doing. Way cool! And that was only half of our four days together.

Spring Has Sprung

I've been trying to enjoy every minute of spring out in my garden. Last week, I wrote a Facebook posting that said, "I just picked a worm up off of my patio and threw it back in the garden. It's official...I'm my mother." Several of my friends thought that was pretty funny, especially since I'm an English teacher, and I inadvertently spelled "threw" as "through." There was further evidence that I'm developing some of my mother's habits this morning when I went outside to check on my flowers and discovered slugs on my gerber daisies. I found myself a little rock and started squashing them. That'll teach 'em.

Between pulling weeds and ruining my manicure this weekend, I did manage to do a little knitting too. I love these L'amour socks from Spilly Jane's blog, and they were so reasonable too. The pattern called for gloss socks yarn, which is a merino and silk mix. It's not the nicest sock yarn, I've ever knit with, but it's the cheapest nice yarn I've ever used. I'm definitely going to use gloss again. Knit Picks is the best!

My sister-in-law from Nebraska, who is coming to visit this week, has hinted a couple of times that she'd like some wool socks (Actually, she said, "Let's go yarn shopping when I'm there, so you can knit me some socks!") I was so excited that she was interested in hand knit socks that I didn't wait for her to come to get them started. I'm not positive that she's going to like these. They are a little on the quirky side, but that's what makes them fun, and if she doesn't like them, I'll keep them and wear them......next January. On the other hand, before I start bragging too much about them, maybe I should finish the second one since my sister-in-law is a bi-ped, after all.

Happy St. Patrick's Day

Being of Danish and German descent, our family doesn't do anything for St. Patrick's Day other than try to remember to wear a little green. On the other hand, I'm always interested in having great food experiences. I waited until the last minute to try to figure out what to cook today. I discovered this interesting recipe for corned beef and cabbage pizza  though. Unfortunately, I discovered that you can't just buy pre-cooked corned beef, so I hadn't allowed myself enough time to prepare the pizza according to the recipe.

My solution was to replace the corned beef with Canadian bacon. I also used a layer of provolone instead of the Monterey Jack that they called for. I have to say that it was really good.

Paige is a vegetarian, so she didn't try any, but Kai did and seemed to enjoy it, which is saying something considering that it had a ton of cabbage in it.

Trader Joe's was selling Smithwick's beer last weekend, so Russ and I shared a bottle of it tonight, not because we are

 abstemious but because Russ failed to listen when I told him that I wanted to save it until St. Patrick's Day. Somehow by today, there was only one bottle left. Oh well, I'm not of a beer drinker anyway.

More Sheep

So, the morning began at 5:30 for Russ and Kai since Kai had to leave for a swim meet at 6:00. I was helpful enough to wake up and tell them to hurry, but then promptly went back to sleep. Paige didn't go either since she's battling a cold. We eventually headed to the swim meet at 11:00 ourselves but had to make a perfunctory stop along the side of the road so that I could admire the sheep, which actually look a bit bedraggled considering all of the rain we had last night.

I didn't take this picture. Russ took it of a Great Pyrenees who was a little concerned about the woman who got out of the car to go get a closer look at the babies.

 
He wasn't aggressive but was pretty adamant that we needed to move along. He was wagging his tail, but he made it clear that he could take care of businesses if he needed to. I told him not to worry and got in the car to take this shot.

Got home in time for Russ and me to take a little nap on the couch. Gidget thought she'd join us even though she almost assuredly spend the entire day napping. I did accomplish a little knitting on our trip today, but I'll post about that later. I have lots of grading to do tomorrow, but for now I'm looking forward to a nice evening of watching Michael Palin's New Europe from Netflix, and knitting, of course.

Awaiting Spring

I have lived in Central California for most of my life, and the summer weather here is almost without exception very harsh. Somehow though, every spring I pretend that the flowers that I plant will make my yard look beautiful for months and months. There is a chance that they will make it until July though, and I enjoy them for the brief time I have them. I used to buy Shepherd Garden Seeds because I loved the pictures on the seed packets. Shepherd Garden Seeds has closed, but Renee Shepherd still sells seeds at Renee's Garden. I ordered a nice selection of them and started planting today. Zinnias and cosmos are hardy and come in pastel colors--the perfect combination for my tate.

As usual, I've had a pretty busy week, but I have also gotten some knitting in too. I bought this alpaca yarn on my  alpaca field trip last fall, and found a scarf pattern in Knitted Gifted that was simple and showed off the yarn well.

 

I'm glad that I have knitting so that I don't need to spend my evening worrying about how I'm going to confiscate cell phones from high school students all day long. Our dean (probably directed by those above her) has decided to wage war on them since there has supposedly been a rash of cheating and fight syncing (planning fight location via phones) among students. If kids even have a phone out during lunch or if they have one visible in their pocket, it's a criminal offense practically.  This is what I love about education. Let's make sure that teachers are focusing on the important things: taking role and trying to hold back the wave of the 21st Century. Poor Kai, he had his phone taken away today in class. I had a hair appointment, and my hair dresser called his phone to cancel. He had forgotten to turn it off since his friends don't call; they text. I can see that it was reasonable to take it away, but he forgot to go pick it up after school. It better be waiting for him tomorrow. I will not be happy if it is "misplaced."

Lovin' Thorpe Hats

 

I really do love Kristen Kapur's Thorpe hat pattern. I can knit one in a day if I'm so inclined, which I was on Sunday.  I actually was knitting this hat for a boy on my kids' swim team who kept teasing me last week at a swim meet that he hoped I was knitting a hat for him.  I thought I would just go ahead and knit him one since I have a gazillion skeins of yarn just waiting to be knit into hats, and he did really seem interested in my knitting. Then my son Kai told me that that that boy had cancer, so I was even more inclined to knit him a hat. Well, Paige fell in love with this particular hat when I was finished with it, and commandeered it for herself. When I protested that it was for the boy on her swim team who had cancer, she said that he'd just found out that he didn't have it after all, and she didn't want some goofy underclassman wearing hats like she wears. Mmmmm, well, I was flattered that she liked the hat even if she does sound a tad insensitive. She has lots of other good qualities really....I guess I'll just knit that boy another hat.

I got Kai to model it  because he didn't go to swim practice today. He didn't go to swim practice today because he is the biggest procrastinator in the world and has two big assignments due tomorrow before the quarter ends. He thought he would just sit down and drink an Amp and eat a bag of chips before he got to work, so I caught him and made him be a model. He may not be the most focused student there is, but he sure is cute, and about as nice a person as you could ever meet. He would have given the boy who ended up not having cancer that hat!

 

On the other hand, Paige really does wear her Thorpe hats all of the time, as evidenced by a picture that she took of herself in the car today on our way to school.

Thanks Capital One, But We're OK

Email Message From Capital One: Please call us ASAP so that we can confirm that your credit card account has not been compromised. There has been unusual activity on it today.

What I Would Have Emailed Back Had I Not Simply Called: Dear Capital One. Thank you for your concern. There was indeed excessive activity on our account today, to the tune of $3,300. I spent five unbelievable weeks in the British Isles during my senior year of college, and we have decided for some reason that my daughter should get to have a European experience too before she even goes to college. She is going on a fast-paced tour which will be much different than my more slow-paced experience, staying in bed and breakfasts, hiking through quaint villages like York and Cambridgeshire, and attempting to read Dubliners at a park near the Guinness Brewery after having a pint....or two.  When we decided to give our daughter this Christmas, birthday, and graduation present combined, we anticipated having paid for the entire trip long before this time, but the economy seems to have affected our finances a bit, so we have not paid a cent since our original $1,000 down payment. Rest assured that we will eventually pay off this amount, but for now, enjoy charging us the nine percent interest rate that we have agreed to have between us, and thanks for checking on us. It is true that we are ordinarily much more frugal than it appears that we are being this month.