Special Julies

I have two special "Julies" in blogdom. The first "Julie's" blog is JewelTomes. I discovered her one time when I was just browsing, and she had this funny post about teenagers. I can't really remember the exact content, but I think it had a picture of a crushed bumper and a caveat to parents of girls that the drivers who are usually responsible for doing this to cars are teenage boys. We have an almost unbelieveable connection, beyond the knitting. We both love literature. Julie has a Master's degree in Humanities, just like I do. She's one of about five people, including the three professors on my review committee, who have read my thesis. We've both run long distances although I think that Julie may have run a marathon, and I've "only" run in half-marathons. We both spend a lot of time with our kids and are known to knit at our kids' swim meets. We're about the same age, so Julie is always making great musical and movie allusions from the 70s and 80s. She seems to be a little more even-tempered than I am, but we're both somewhat feisty but enjoy a good joke, even if it's on us. Oh,,, and we both have been married for a long time, and still like our husbands, but don't mention them in our blogs very often (LOL)

A couple of weeks ago, Julie sent me two books. I have to admit that I havent started them yet because I've been kind overwhelmed by school work and I had to finish my book club's book for our meeting next week. I'm planning to start Eggs in Purgatory this afternoon if I get all of my grading done though. It's not a knitting novel, but has another theme Julie knows I love--food.. Anyway, I enjoy Julie's friendship, and I hope we can meet in real life someday.

I don't know the other Julie other than what I read on her blog. She's incredibly creative and produces beautiful handknit toys.. She blogs at Little Cotton Rabbits, and I've practically been obsessed with her little knitted bunnies,shamelessly trying to copy them. I 've pretty much given on on ever purchasing one of her toys because they sell out in seconds when they come up for sale. I am not exaggerating. She's recently, however, made several of her patterns available. I bought her egg cozy pattern last night and had to give it a try right away. It was only $3.50, but I would have happily spend twice that to get my hands on this pattern. What did I discover when I finished? What I already knew...that she's an artist, and I'm not. It's a cute enough bunny, but it looks like the ones I already have been knitting on my own. There's just something that she does to hers that raises the cute factor. Oh well, I'll try again.

In other knitting news, I've knit a felted bowl. I used the pattern from Knit Noel. I'm planning to fill it with Mrs. Meyer's baby products and some handknit washclothes. You would think that I'd be doing this in anticipation of a baby coming, Actually, the anticipation is over. My sister had a baby last week. For some reason, I thought her due date was in April. I guess that's what happens when you don't talk to each other very often. Anyway, she had a little boy, and we're excited to get to cuddle a little baby this summer when we see them. For those of you who know my sister, yes, she is forty-two and that does make five, and yes, I do think five is a bit superfluous. (LOL) We're happy for them though...as long as the economy doesn't get so bad that her husband loses his job and they all have to move in with us. Just kidding, they'd be welcome.

All Day Cookies

When I first graduated from college almost twenty-five years ago, I thought I wanted to be a librarian. I was accepted into San Jose State's graduate program in "Information Science" shortly before Russ and I got married. We arrived in San Jose with no jobs and no idea where we were going to live. After having spent four years within the shelter of a small, liberal arts college in a town of around 15,000 people, the entire big university/big city experience was daunting. Russ soon found a job drywalling, but we still had no money to speak of. We had no furniture in our studio apartment and slept on a mattress from the inside of a discarded sleeper sofa we found near a trash can outside of our apartment. I hated it there, despite its close proximity to many beautiful areas. I lasted one semester and that was only because Russ kept encouraging me to at least finish up the semester, so it wouldn't be a total waste.

I do have some pleasant memories of our San Jose experience though. Most of them are memories of time spent with our friends, Bob and Colene. They were old friends of my parents from when we had lived in Fresno years before, but they quickly became our friends. We loved them. They pretty much adopted us for the six months we lived there, not that they had that much choice because we probably made nuisances of ourselves coming over so often. I remember sitting in their living room having pleasant conversations with Bob about anything under the sun, I remember sitting with Colene in their kitchen that smelled just like my grandma's, and I remember eating tons of Colene's "All Day Cookes." Colene gave me the recipe for them ages ago, but a year or so ago, I misplaced it. I emailed Colene to ask if she could send me the recipe, and true to form, she did more than that. About a week later, a box came in the mail...with a couple dozen All Day Cookies in it, along with the recipe. I asked special permission to share this recipe because I felt that it was practically sacred. Colene agreed that these cookies are close to being sacred in her family, but sharing is allowed. I feel special being trusted with it:)

All Day Cookies

1 cup butter
1 1/2 cups brown sugar
2 eggs
1 tps. vanilla
1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
2 1/3 cups oatmeal
2 tsp. soda
12 oz. chocolate chips
1 1/2 cups raisins
1 1/2 cups peanuts

Mix and drop by teaspoons full of cookie sheet.
Bake at 300 degrees until done. Has to bake at
fairly low temperature or will burn. I baked at
325 degrees for about 12 minutes.

I also have to share what Colene wrote at the bottom of the recipe card, showing that even though we haven't seen each other in years that she still knows Russ: "Makes a ton--or one evenings worth for Russ!"

Paige Went Forth

So, here's a picture of the taconic sweater modeled by its recipient. I told Paige that she didn't have to keep it if she didn't like it, but she said that she did like it; she just didn't think it was very flattering. I know what she means. It's pretty yarn, but it and the sweater are a bit heavy. Why is Paige smiling so happily then. ..Because she's going camping at Pismo Beach tonight. The kids (not the teachers, boo hoo) have tomorrow off. iI's one of Paige's best friend's birthday, and one of her friend's mom's is taking (and staying with) a crew of six of them. They have the crazy idea that they'll be swimming, but unless it's a lot warmer over there than here, they'll barely feel like even having their suits on.

I have an English project that I assign every year to my juniors. I have them emulate Walt Whitman's poem A Child Went Forth. I'm not a huge "Uncle Walt" fan, but I do I love this poem. I have the kids replace his important language with their own, and they come up with their own unique and often beautiful poem. I've had some tearjerkers over the years because the kids often go all out for this project, and they're at that perfet age where they remember all of the kid stuff, but are teeterering on adulthood. They have to create webpages about their lives to go with the poem, and then we present them in the class. I've been meaning to share Paige's poem for quite a while mainly just to show off, and because any time I feel like she's an ungrateful, frustrating kid who hasn't appreciated her parents' near-obsession with making her life great, I read this, and I think that maybe we've done OK.

Most kids just give it the title "A Child Went Forth," but Paige called hers

THERE was a child went forth every day; And the first object she look'd upon, that object she became; And that object became part of her for the day, or a certain part of the day, or for many years, or stretching cycles of years. The smell of the early coffee beans became part of this child, And cinnamon apples, and cilantro and shrimp pesto pasta, and black and white cats, and the classical songs to help her fall asleep, And the sixth-month Nebraska visits, and the yearly Humbolt County Fairs, and the trips to the coast and farmer's markets, and the Sundays in Bakersfield eating at Chipoltle's after church. And the noisy barks of Beagles from outside her door, the voices of joggers outside her window. And the fish from her friend who moved to Kansas suspending themselves to the top of their fish bowl after living for three years, And the See Canyon apples with their delicious sweet fruit became part of her. The hot weather of the fifth month and almost every month became part of her; camomile tea, and those of the candy corn bag every Halloween, and the pink or purple flowers of the garden, And the apricot, plum, and peach-trees cover'd with blossoms, and the fruit afterward, and oranges and Kumquats, and the prettiest poppies by the fence; And the Parkview kids skipping home from school, whence she had once attended, And the two and a half high school years that had already pass'd so quickly, And the volleyball seasons that pass'd-and the basketball and swimming seasons, And the straight hair, Hollister dressed girls-and the Ugg boots on every boy and girl, And all the changes of Taft and Bakersfeild and desert, wherever she went. Her own parents, He that had father'd her, and she that had conceiv'd her in her womb, and birth'd her, They gave this child more of themselves than that; They gave her afterward every day-they became part of her. The mother at school and home, helpful, observative, loving, short-tempered, beautiful; also becoming one of her best friends, sometimes verbal competitor, or at school the distinctive jingle of her keys when she walks down the hall; The mother with made-up words describing everything she likes by dropping the last few letters of the word but keeping the s(such as "Beags") or making up new laws to life, such as " shared candy bars do NOT count", a chuckle coming out of her person; The father, friendly, caring, annoying, joking, concerned; The blog, the quick run, the late night reading, the tan meals, The family traditions, the language, the vacations, the candles-the growing and appreciative heart, Affection that will not be faded-the sense of the future-the thought if, after all, it should prove amiss, The doubts of school-time and the doubts during athletics, the curious why and what, why it is how it is, or what is the answer, is it all memories and hopes? Men and women disappointed and pleased, what is their purpose? The mud pies, the friends moved away, the birthday dinner, the favorite non-matching outfit, the one stolen candy from the store, the books read aloud, the golden retriever long gone, playing trucks with her brother, visits from Black Bart, the forgotten fights between best friends, the SSL Volleyball Championship freshman year, the cell phones new, broken, then dropped in the pool, broken, lost, broken, dropped on the floor, broken, the parties Friday night at the Kopp household, the first lost grandparent, finding another best friend, the trip to the Getty and Medieval Times, the trip to Hearst Castle, the anticipation of getting the first im-perfect report card, first love, where to go to college, who will you meet, who will you loose, what will you look like, what will you accomplish, what will happen to your kids, when will you die?; These became part of that child who went forth every day, and who now goes, and will always go forth every day.

It's so full of familial allusions that it may not be an interesting poem to non-family members (so that means I put it here for you to read, Ann, since you're my only faithful family reader) but I love it, so I shared it.

Hoping for a Long Spring

In keeping with my belief that it's important to buy knitting-related items if you're not actaully producing them, I bought a cup from Jenny the Potter this month. I'm using it to show off some Manos yarn, which I also bought recently, for right now, but it's a perfect cup for drinking coffee too. There's nothing like the feel of handthrown pottery. Russ used to "throw pots" when he was in high school and college. Before I went up to the studio with him to see him throw, I had this image of people throwing clay against the wall or something like that when I heard the term "throw pots." Anyway, I love pottery. Maybe I'll have to buy another one, so I can have one for show and one for function. Jenny also included two cute, little stitch markers, which I thought was the perfect touch. The only thing is that when I use stitch markers, it seems like I need several of them. Mmmmm, that's a thought to ponder.


I jokingly wrote last month that I thought I'd finish Paige's Taconic v-neck sweater around the time it hit 80 degrees outside. I just read on the weather channel that the forecast was for 79 degrees on Monday and Tuesday next week...and I finished sewing the seams of her sweater last night. (LOL) She tried it on but didn't seem overly excited about it, which wasn't unexpected. She doesn't want to look bulky, and it is kind of a bulky sweater. Kitty, on the other hand, thinks it's wonderful. I've shooed her off of it numerable times, but she just looks annoyed and hops back on it. It was a fun pattern to knit although I think I'd change a few things if I were to knit it again. It calls for you to hem the bottom and the sleeves, but I'd do a provincial cast-on. It's easier than hemming, and I think it looks nicer.

One of the reasons I haven't blogged in a month is that I've been teaching an offline college class, which means my students email me their assignments, and I've been preparing for a late-start online class, which means my students complete all of their work on the computer. Now, I'm teaching both classes. I enjoy it, but I'm a slow grader, so most of my evenings have been swallowed up by taking care of those classes. The other time-consumer is that swimming season has begun. The kids have had two swim meets so far, and we've been mildy chilly, bordering on miserable, sitting in the stands. We're heading off for another swim meet this morning, but I think we'll be happy. It's nice and sunny, and we know there's a Starbucks close by where we can go to warm up if needed. Paige and Kai are both swimming this year, so it's wonderful only having to go to one event instead of being torn between two. I love knitting at swim meets when it's still cool outside, which it is today. I'm just hoping that we can postpone the hot temps for a month or two!

Randomness

I could entitle half of my posts as "ramdomness," but I feel particularly random in my focus today. I had a lot of fun knitting my little Valentine hearts during the weeks leading up to Valentine's Day, but I did do some other knitting too. I worked on Paige's sweater quite a bit. Yes, it's the same Karabella Aurora 8 yarn that I bought back in October or November. I really think I have the right pattern this time. It's a pattern I downloaded off of Webs for $1.95 called the taconic V-neck pullover. It's a simple pattern with a pretty cable down the center.The back is just stockinettee stitch, so it was easy to complete. I should finish the entire sweater just about the time the weather starts hitting the eighties.

Some days my kids come home from swim practice starving. I'll be lying on the couch, and Kai will frantically ask, "What's for dinner??" I'll turn to Russ, who will then proceeded to make us a "tan" meal, which entails battered fish, the kind from the yellow box, mashed potatoes, the kind from another box, corn, and possibly sourdough bread. No one is particularly excited about consuming all of this starch, but it's fast and easy, and beggers can't be choosers. Tonight, my kids came through the door, and I had streaming bowls of Ina Gartner's italian Wedding Soup waiting for them. I saw her make it last week on "The Barefoot Contessa." It was easy and decidedly not starchy. Yay for me! Oh and to top it off, Paige came hom with a friend who loved the soup too and now thinks that my kids must have such a wonderful culinary existence with a working mother who doesn't let occupational exhaustion interfer with the preparation of tasty meals....Taco Bell tomorrow? Possibly.


These pictures have nothiing to do with knitting either, other than this is what our yard looked like a week ago. It was wonderful and very cozy to sit inside by the fire and knit for the two hours that it snowed. We had the day off from school, so it was the perfect addition to a great day. Kai went up to the hills behind our hourse with some friends to sled. He tried to leave in his shorts, but I stopped him. What a Californian!




Italian Wedding Soup

Ingredients
for meatball:
3/4 lb. ground chicken
1/2 chicken sausage, casings removed
2/3 fresh white bread crumbs
2 tsp. minced garlic
3 Tbsp. minced parsley
1/2 cup grated Parmesan
2 Tbsp. milk
1 large egg
salt/pepper

For the soup:
2 Tbsp. olive oil
1 cup minced yellow onion
1 cup diced carrots
1/2 chopped celery
10 cups chicken stock (Of, course, Ina used homemade)
1/ 2 cup dry white wine
1 cup small pasta
1/4 cup minced fresh dill (I didn't have this, so I used a Tbsp. dried)
12 oz. chopped fresh spinach

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees

Combine ground chicken, sausage, bread crumbs, garlic, parsley, Parmesan, milk, eggs, salt, and pepper. Form into meatballs and bake on a sheet pan lined with parchment paper for 30 minutes.

In the meantime, heat olive oil in a large soup pot, and add onion, carrots, and celery. Saute until softened for about five minutes. Add chicken stock and wine, and bring to a boil. Add the pasta and cook for 6 to 8 minutes. Add dill and spinach and cook another minute or two. Add meatballs and serve with a little gratd Parmesan.

Happy Valentine's Day

There are just a few hours of Valentine's Day left, but I thought I'd post the little bag I knit today. I used the heart pattern from Monika's Scarves from the Heart pattern. I put some wonderful-smelling Soap Opera soap in it to give to a friend. It will be late as a Valentine's present, but that's OK.I was really lazy most of the day, but I finally rallied and worked in the yard a little. Then, I came in and fixed Russ and me a cheese and spinach souffle. It was pretty good. Why shouldn't it have been when it had a 1/2 cup of Parmesan and a cup of cheddar in it; plus, a little chevre. It was bascially a Cook's Illustrated recipe, but I improvised enough to feel like I can share it.

Cheese and Spinach Souffle

Ingredients:
1/4 cup Parmesan
4 Tbsp. butter
1 shallot, minced
3 Tbsp. flour
1 cup Gouda or Cheddar cheese
1/4 tsp. dry mustard
pinch of nutmeg
salt/pepper
pinch of dried thyme
3 eggs, separated
1/2 tsp. cream of tartar
1 cup whole milk
1/4 cup spinach chopped

Prehear oven to 350 degrees. Butter a souffle dish with 1 Tbsp. butter and 1/2 of the Parmesan and set aside.

Saute shallot in 3 Tbsp. butter for about two minutes until shallot softens. Add 3 Tbsp. flour and whisk until smooth, about a minute. Add milk a little at a time until mixture begins to thicken, about a minute. Remove from heat and add eggs yolks, mustard, nutmeg, salt/pepper, thyme and cheese. Set aside.

Beat egg whites and cream of tartar with a handmixer until egg whites form stiff peaks. Fold into egg yolk mixture a little at a time.

Bake for 25-30 minutes.

Tiny Knitting

Whenever Paige is supposed to be working on AP Biology or Math Analysis homework (new name for Trigonometry and Calculus combined), she'll often tell me that she thinks she has A.D.D. I'm not the person for her to say that to because I think that A.D.D. is basicially a term made up by American doctors so that they can pump more drugs into our kids. I know that there are kids who have a hard time concentrating, but the answer is usually that they need more exercise, a more whoesome diet, and fewer distractions from things like computers. Paige wouldn't be distracted if she didn't have Facebook or My Space open behind the screen that she's supposedly doing homework on. Just like I would have her sweater done weeks ago if I didn't have the urge to check out my friends' blogs all of the time instead of knitting. This morning I found this video on One Day at a Time, a blog that I'd never visited before but was on Wool Winder's links. My kids never read Coraline, and are kind of old for the movie, but I think I might go, just for the knitting.

Hack, Hack, Sneeze, Sneeze

I have about a gazillion sick days, most of which I accumulated during a long stretch ten years ago or so when we got paid fifty bucks for each of our ten yearly sick days ifwe didn't use a single one of them during the year. That practice has long since gone by the wayside, which is fine because fifty bucks is not enough money to bribe me into going to work if I'm not feeling up to it. I do take an occasional "mental health" day, but not very often, and I hardly ever am too sick to go to work. This week was different. I was kind of tired last Thursday, and I just felt like I needed a break, so I carefully planned ahead of time and took the day off. I guess I shouldn't have played hookey because I've been sick ever since, really sick, the kind of sick that you just sleep all day and feel like you're making a huge effort if you get up to get your own glass of water. Mostly my head hurt and I had/have a lot of chest congestion with a painful cough. Poor Kai had it even worse; he had the congestion and stomach flu. I kind of did a "every other day" work week, but I really should have stayed home the entire week. I sounded pitiful when I tried to talk, which, of course, is pretty important for an English teacher to be able to do. Kai seems to be almost back to normal and even made it to swim practice on Friday, but I'm still not feeling great. How sad to have all of the open time and not even feel like knitting. I did knit one more little heart though.
And during one of my rallies, I practiced crochet cast-ons with a picot edge. I knit a little hat, which is probably too little even for a newborn, but it was fun.

My biggest accomplishment of the week was a
Calorimetry for Paige. I didn't know if she'd like it that much, but she says she wants more of them now. That shoud help allay my guilt for not finishing her sweater that I started for her in November.

What I've Learned This Week

• I've learned that felting is kind of fun, but it's also probably a huge waste of water and energy in a front load washer because I had to put this hot pad, which I discovered on Purl Bee's blog though an "express" cycle at least three times to get it to felt, and even then you can still see some of the stitches.
  
• I learned that it's also probably not a good idea to use really fuzzy red yarn with not-so-fuzzy cream yarn if you're going to felt. It didn't exactly bleed, but it sure did "fuzz" onto the cream.
  
• I learned that you can make mistakes in your knitting when you plan to felt, and it doesn't matter because you can't see that much stitch definition even when you do use a front load washer.

• I like knitting hearts. I found this pattern on ravelry, and it's fun and pretty easy, just a ittle fiddly at the beginning and end.
• I've learned that it's fun to prepare to celebrate little holdiays like Valentine's Day if you ignore the sappy, materialistic corporate barrage of commercials. I knit these little hearts, and I'm going to knit more of them and just give them to people I like...and keep some for myself too!

• I've learend that bugging Russ to build stuff for me doesn't work and that I should just let him know what I'd like him to do and patiently wait because it's always worth it. He started this "built-in" bookcase a couple of days ago, and I'm going to love it. Mmmm what knitting-related items can I display on the top?

• Finally, I learned that even though I live in a dusty, oil town that can be the most misterable place in the world during the summer and is pretty much lacking in any culture whatsoever, I'm happy and proud to call it home. I've never hated it here; My husband and I make a good living, which gives us a lot of freedom, and we've always known that we were lucky to live in a nice neighborhood with good friends all around. In these two weeks since Shaye's funeral though, I realized just how deep that "friend" pool is here. The night I wrote my post about Shaye, over two hundred people (mostly kids) showed up in front of her parents' house and laid hundreds of roses around a tree in their front yard, then they quietly left to go to one of two homes of fellow teachers who had opened their doors so that the kids would have a place to grieve and be comforted together. The principal of our high school let school out an hour early so that our students could more easily attend the funeral, and he drove a van full of kids home from school early that day so that the regular bus drivers could attend the funeral. Over 1200 people attended the funeral--that's in a town with a populaiton of just over 20,000. There are all kinds of other "good" things that I could write about, but I think I'm finished. It's still a horrific thing, as Paige says, "It's so terrible, I don't want to go there most of the time." But, life is going on. My friends have returned to work.. at the same high school their daughter attended, and, as I said earlier, I've learned that I live in a place surrounded with wonderful, caring people.
  
• Oh! And I didn't need to "learn" this because I already knew it, but it was also reinforced for me, just how kind the people I've gotten to "know" through blogging are. Thank you for all of your kind and supportive words.

Loss

Our neighbors' sixteen-year old daughter was killed in a single-car accident last night. She and Paige grew up together and were still somewhat close. She was killed on a section of road that has been the sight of other fatal accidents, a section of road that scared me so much that when Paige asked last night if she and some friends could drive out of town five miles along that road to another friend's house, I said only if I drove them. When we had nearly arrived at her friend's house and saw flashing lights on the road ahead, I breathed a sigh of relief that we were turning and that all the kids who were planning to meet at that friend's house had already arrived safety. Paige called me shortly after I got home from taking them to ask me to pick them up. She sounded somber, so I was a little concerned, thinking that possibly there was drinking going on, and she was being a good girl and removing herself from the situation (although that seemed highly unlikely considering the parents of the boy whose house they were at.) Anyway, when I arrived, Paige and one of her friends came out to the car, looking so serious, and then Paige told me that they had just found our that her friend Shaye was dead.She was the reason for the flashing lights. She shouldn't have been on that road. Her parents thought she was in town at a friend's house until they got that call...the one that all parents fear.

I have never been so close to the physicality of grief as I've been in the last twenty-four hours. My friends doted on their daughter, centered their world around her and her brother, and now their lives are irrevocably changed. They're devout Christians, so there's some comfort there, but so many of us feel so helpless. How many casseroles can you take someone, after all. Their house has been full of well-wishers all day, all of us knowing that there's really nothing we can do, all of us wishing so badly that there was a rewind button somehow.


I wasn't even sure that I wanted to write about this. It's like I'm asking for sympathy when it's not my loss. Kai didn't cry last night when he heard although he was shaken. This afternoon, when he went to the house, he cried. He told me later that he wasn't crying for Shaye, it was for all of those sad people, that sadness was like a pandemic. That's how I feel.

I'm going to take a little break from blogging this week and try to do what little I can to help comfort my friends...and I'm going to hug my kids a lot.

Pesky Pets

I finished my last item for my knitting bakery, a slice of cherry pie.. It still looks a little like a tumor, as Kai observed earlier, but I still like it OK.Russ bought us some real doughnuts yesterday, something we almost never do, so I could use the box to send my nieces their pastries. Of course, I realize that he probably could have just bought the box, but that's beside the point. When we got home from church today, someone else showed her approval of my work. I don't ordinarily offer people food that the cat has reclined on, but in this case, I feel fine with just brushing everything off and closing the box.Kitty loves to take naps on balls of yarn, but doughnuts are expecially comfortable, I guess.One of our other pets was more than a nuisance this week. ..financially.The first expensive thing she did was chew up one of Kai's friend's $120 Oakley sunglasses. His friend had left them in Kai's room, and Gidget found them. We felt like we should pay to replace them, but his mother would only accept half of their value, which I thought was really nice. The other reason Gidget cost us money also seems to have ended up OK. She seemed really sad last Sunday, quietly groaning and moving like she was really uncomfortable. Finally, we got really worried when she started crying out when she jumped down from even a small distance. We hurried to the emergency vet's clinic, which is about a half hour away.When we got there, she jumped out of the car, happy as could be. We weren't sure what to do, so we took her for a little walk, and she continued to act like nothing was wrong. So, we headed back home. By bedtime though, she seemed bad again, so Russ took her to the vet in the morning. The vet said that she had intervertebral disk disease, which Russ said instantly made him get a lump in his throat. He got her a boatload of medication, took blood to analyze, and charged us nearly $300. We were so worried about her and we're still concerned, but ever since then she acted like nothing is wrong. She's back to her normal self. Russ says the vet just looked at her and pretty much said, "Her stomach hurts. She's a beagle. It must be this disease." We're hoping he's wrong. A lot of my friends don't take their dog to him because they don't quite trust him for serious stuff. We'll just have to wait and see.

Is It a Bakery Yet?

As usual, it seems like this vacation just zoomed by although this one seemed a little longer than normal because we weren't traveling as we so often do. As I told some of my friends at work today. I don't want to work, but if I have to, I have a pretty nice job. The only bad thing is that my department head is still crazy, which I never anticipated when she got the position last year. She's never shown any interest in curruculum development at all, so I thought for sure that she would have settled down by now with the orders from on high. Department chairs are not administrators at our school, so she has no business dictating curruculum, especially to other veteran teachers. I didn't go into teaching to mindlessly follow someone else, especially someone who thinks that the problem with English classes is that we don't teach like they did in 1975. I love working as a team, but start bossing me around and it torques me off, and then I'm not too fun to be around. This has had nothing to do with knitting other than I'm glad that I have it to help get my mind off of it once I get home. I don't agonize over my students and how they act. It's their "job" to be immature and unmotivated. I accept that it's part of my job to get them to work inspite of themselves, but I hate when other adults make teaching a pain.

I can't remember how long ago it was that I decided I was going to knit my nieces a "bakery." I've been half-heartedly working on it throughout the fall. I think my original plan was to finish it for Christmas. Now I'm not sure that I really know what constitutes a bakery. I've had fun knitting the doughnuts, but they're getting old, and I'm not crazy about the cupcakes that I knit last spring. They seem a little too "mammary." (LOL) I did splurge and buy a really cute tart pattern on ravelry. I also knit a slice of cherry pie, but Kai said it looked like a tumor. I kind of agreed with him, so I frogged it, and I'm trying one more time. I think I'll call it quits once I finish the slice of pie to my satisfaction.

Personal note: Karen, I was so excited to get your comment. I love your mom and thought your dad was such a wonderful person. I'm a little intimidated having you read my blog though because you're an artist, and I'm a...a crafter. I still remember a drawing of a quilt you did for your mom. It seems like it was the friendship pattern, but I didn't know that back then.

5th Day of Christmas AND my 24th Wedding Anniversary

I'm officially ready to start doing something besides relaxing for the rest of my vacation, but I've sure had fun in the mean time. I've wasted hours and hours browsing through other people's blogs, admiring their accomplishemnts. Bear Toes knit Alan Dart's entire Advent calendar from an insert in the October issue of Knit Simply magazine. I, on the other hand, managed to knit one of the ornaments, the hat, which took about twenty minutes. I'm into instant gratifications, I guess.
I did manage to do one thing that took a little effort though. I cast on a sweater for Paige. I bought 10 skeins of purple Aurora 8 yarn on sale back in October, and I've been looking for a pattern that Paige would like ever since, a very difficult prospect. I've finally settled on The Perfect Sweater from Maon Dixon Knitting. I'm going to knit the V-neck version.

I cast on a picot edging with a contrasting color for the back. This sounds like I actually knew what I was doing, which I did not. I had to do a crochet cast-on. I've only crocheted with my fingers making a chain when I was a kid. This was my first time using a crochet hook, and it took a while to get the hang of it. It was kind of cool to use my crochet hook for the first time though. I inherited it from my aunt who died about twenty-four year ago. I know it was twenty-four years ago because even though she was very ill, she flew out for my husband and my wedding, which was... twenty-four years ago today. (As I told Russ, I do think that our anniversary is worthy of celebration; I'm just sick of eating right now, so we've just congratulated each other for making such good choices in our impetuous youth.) My aunt died several weeks after our wedding, which is very sad, but instead of feeling like it was our wedding that did her in, I like to think that she might have died alone had she not come to California.) I've mentioned before that I don't have much of a "knitting history," except for memories of this special aunt. She had severe scoliosis and never married, so we kids were pretty special to her, I thnk. She'd come to stay for a month each summer, which we kids thought was great. (As an adult, I now have to wonder if that didnt' bug my mom a bit since it was my dad's sisiter. I definitely wouldn't appreciate any in-law, even my two favorite "Ann" with and without an "e" sister-in-laws coming for an entire month.) My aunt wasn't a big time knitter really. She was an artist, so I more remember her sketching things rather than knitting. She did, however, get me started knititing. When I was in college, she took me to my first real yarn store. I still remember buying some mauve Brown Sheep wool there for a sweater from McCall's magazine. That was a huge tangent, just to make the point that I know that this crochet hook probably belonged to her mom, my grandmother who died before my parents even met. I like that I'm using it...even though it's probably made out of ivory from some poor elephant.
I'm rambling tonight, so I'll just continue. I crocheted my cast-on and when I was ready to pick up the stitches, I tried to unravel them, but they wouldn't unravel. I had to pick apart all of the old stitches to make the hem. I don't know if that makes sense. I guess I picked up the wrong part of the crochet stitch after the cast-on. It's all good now..until I have to cast on for the front.

I'm going for my record blog lengthwise tonight I guess, Barbara asked if I'd share some of my Danish recipes, which I'm, of course, happy to do. Here's another Christmas favorite. When I was a kid, anytime we had meatballs, unless they were in spaghetti, we called them frikkadeller. I doubt that they were authentically Danish. It was just what my mom and grandma called them. I use a Danish recipe when I make my own now, which isn't very often. This is a recipe from an old cookbook that I also probably inherited from my aunt...or stole from my mom:

Frikkadeller

1 1/2 lb. ground round
1/2 lb. ground pork
1 grated onion
3-4 slices bread
1/8 tsp. pepper
4 Tbsp. flour
1/2 tsp. cloves
1 1/2 tsp. salt
2 eggs
1/4 cup milk

Blend meats together. Add grated onion and bread, which has been softened in the milk. Mix well. Add the remainder of the ingredients, stirring well after each addition. Shape the meatball into ovals and in a hot pan with shortening or canola oil. Fry them until they are light brown.

I sometimes made Kronisburg Frikkadeller, which just means they have gravy on them with a few capers in it. Mmmm, you might as well add a little more fat to such a fattening dish. If I'm feeling really authentice, I also prepare rødkaal, which is red cabbage. Kai thinks it's gross, but Russ, Paige, and I love it. Here's a recipe for it.

Rødkaal

1 medium head red cabbage
1 Tbsp. butter
1/2 cup vinegar (I usually use white, but it doesn't matter)
1 tsp. salt
1/4 cup sugar (sometimes more)

Shred cabbage very fine. (I use the food processor.) Melt butter in a large kettle, add cabbage and vinegar, salt, and sugar. Cookly gently until tender, then season to taste with salt, and more sugar or vinegar, if necessary.

OK, I believe my work here is done:)

Danish Puff on the 3rd Day of Christmas

Willow noticed that our Christmas celebration had a decidedly Danish theme to it, at least food-wise. It's one of those traditions that my immediate and extended family enjoy a lot. Since all of my ancestry is Danish, my family would often prepare Danish food for celebratory meals when I was growing up; however,
I've been more conscious of preparing Danish food at Christmas time since writing my master's thesis on food in ethnic literature. Immigrants would have to give up so much culture-wise when they came to the U.S. Often it would only take a generation for kids to lose their parents' native language and knowledge of the old country traditions, except for the food traditions. I'm a second generation Californian and a fourth generation American, and I still eat herring for Christmas Eve. (Although I have to admit that it tasted pretty gross this year) Anyway, my point is that food traditions help define us and keep us in contact with our origins. Fortunately, most Danish food is really good, so my kids have something to enjoy handing down to their kids too, something to help them create a "hyggellig" (Danish for cozy..kind of) environment for their own kids.

One of my favorite decadent Danish treats is kringle. It's basically layers of butter and pastry and sugar..layers and layers. One Christmas when my sister and her family lived in California she and her husband brought some from a Danish bakery in Los Angeles, but usually I've either made it myself, which takes forever; or we've bought it in Solvang, which is less than two hours from us, or we've ordered it from O &H Bakery in Racine, Wisconsin. I didn't think to order any in time this year and didn't feel like baking it either, so I kind of cheated and baked "Danish puff." I don't know why I say it's cheating exactly. I have just always thought that it was something that Danish descendants made up to seem like kringle without all of the work. I've had a recipe from my great aunt for years, but I've never used it, even though I have tasty memories of her fixing it for me and my friends when I was in college far from home and would walk down the hill to her house on Saturday afternoons.

I've seen the error of my ways now though. I made Danish puff this week, and it is wonderful. I even found it in a Danish cookbook I have, and they called it "vandbakkelse," which roughly translates as water pastry. Here's the recipe.

Danish Puff

1 cup butter, divided
2 cups flour, divided
1/4 tsp. salt
2 Tbsp. cold water

1 cup boiling water
1 tsp. almond flavoring
3 eggs

Frosting
1 1/2 cup powdered sugar
1 Tbsp. butter
3 Tbsp. butter
3 Tbsp. cream
1 tsp. vanilla
1/8 tsp. salt

Cut 1/2 cup of the butter int 1 cup flour mixed with the salt to a consistency of course meal. Add cold water and blend well. Divide dough in half and press each half onto an ungreased cookie sheet.

Four boiling water into saucepan and add remaining half cup of butter. When butter melts, remove from heat and add flavoring. Stir in 1 cup flour all at once. Beat until smooth and let cool. Add 1 egg at a time, beating well after each. Divide in half and spread this mixture over the pastry crusts on the cookie sheets. Bake at 425 degrees for 15 minutes, then at 400 degrees for 30 to 35 mines longer. Watch carefully.

Mix frosting ingredients until smooth and spreadable. Frost while hot and add some sliced almonds. Slice and serve warm.

2nd Day of Christmas

What have I done for the last couple of days besides eat and eat and eat? I've knit a cute little snowman. My friend who dog sits for us has a snowman collection. I've seen several cute patterns for snowmen lately, so I thought I'd try to knit one and give it to her. He's not perfect, but I think she'll appreciate him. I used the felted snowman pattern from mummble-jummble.I have a front-loading washer, so it's a little difficult to felt stuff, but I'm pretty satisfied with the result.


I also finished a couple of felted Christmas presents for my mom. I knit a flower hotpad and a knitted bowl. I followed the pattern from Knit Noel for the felted bowl, I had a little yarn left, so I thought I'd knit a hot pad. I found one on Ravelry. It was a pattern from Whimsical Knitting Designs. She didn't felt hers, but I thought it would work out well with my yarn, and I was right.
It kind of looks like I've been productive this week, but mostly I've been lazy but so have a few other people around here. Russ has probably read three books since vacation began, and the beagles always accommodate him by curling up to take naps with him as he reads. I'm ready to get back to running and eating a little less now, but it's sure been fun while it lasted. Her's a small list of our family intake: medisterpolse (Danish sausage), frikkideller (Danish meatballs), krinkle (Danish pastry), Danish puff pastry, rødgrød (Danish fruit pudding), and numerous cookies. Wow, I'm thinking that a little salad would be good for the next couple of days...or weeks.