Groin Stain

Just in case the inevitable family pictures sporting gray-black hag teeth were not enough reason to not have black icing on a cake, I will now offer the following:
1. Parents of diapered chilren have to spend a greater than desired time trying to decide whether their children ATE something or have an upper GI bleed.
2. Groin stain. That's not a typo. My "g" key is a little wonky, but the "r" works just fine. Holden has a gray stripe on his groin that looks like somebody took a Sharpie to him. I'm hoping in soaks off in the tub.

So let's recap:
1. Black hag teeth.
2. Scary blackish poop
3. Groin stain.

Maybe just a dark chocolate would do?

Who'd a thought it?

What Kind of Knitter Are You?

You appear to be a Knitting Purist. You are an accomplished knitter producing beautiful pieces with a classic feel. You sometimes lament losing half of your local yarn shop to garish novelty yarns. Perhaps you consider fun fur scarves the bane of knitting society and prefer to steer new knitters towards the wool and cotton blends. Some might call you a bit of an elitist but you know that you've been doing this craft long enough to respect the history behind it and honor it with beautiful piece that can last a lifetime. http://marniemaclean.com
Take this quiz!








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A purist. Really? Snort. The real joke here is that I won't even knit with cotton. And I've been called an "elitist" before. As long as nobody's trying to explain to me how my knitting is furthering the conservative Christian agenda - as my homeschooling is, evidently - we'll all be ok.

A Whack of Socks

I pity the person with the second sock syndrome... maybe it's envy, it's really hard to say. In any case, with four little-boy feet and two little-big-girl feet, socks do not come by the pair at my house. They come by what the Harlot refers to as a "whack". I'm not Canadian, but - for our purposes, at least - socks come four to a whack. Of course, if you do have a problem with finishing a pair, you may want to consider knitting 'em by the whack, then. You can finish when you're half done and still have a sock for each of your feet.


Madam's slipper socks. These have actually been done for a while, but they were snatched, worn and funked before I could photograph them, so the picture had to wait until after I washed them. Generic short-row heel pattern, in Bartlett 2-ply (heavy worsted/aran) and some unknown cream color wool.



Crocs socks for little boys who are obsessive about their crocs. Again, generic flap-heel (which I like better) recipe, in sport-ish weight BFL/mohair handspun from Spinning Flock Farm. Lovely and soft. I will totally be stalking their booth at the Sheep & Wool festival in a couple of months. (Yes, those socks ARE all the same size. Really. It's just the stacking that makes them seem off.)

Yarn porn

My friend, Beth, posted yarn porn on her blog the other day. For any non-knitters, "yarn porn" is the pictorial of your pillaging acquisition after a trip to the yarn store. This may be a term actually coined by Beth.

Of course, like any good porn viewed with no outlet at one's disposal, the yarn porn kept me up last night. Then, frustrated, I drifted off to dream of sock yarn. Handpainted sock yarn. Beautiful, flowing sock yarn, running through my fingers as I slipped a pointy, silver pin behind each perfect little stitch and... huh? where was I? Oh, right. Excuse me.

Anyway, today, we went to look at a lovely 110 year old upright piano, which we will be buying so the little children can take lessons and make wonderful music. The little children stayed with Auntie while we looked and we took the opportunity to sneak to stop by Inez's Stitchery, which, if you're ever in the Silver Spring area, you should really visit, as they are a proper yarn store, with lots of wool and inspirational, handwritten signs like "BLOCKING means WETTING". Heehee.

There was a lovely selection of sock yarn, though I managed to make all purchases in the Brown Sheep family... hmmm.


Left, top to bottom: Wildfoote in Rock N' Roll (2), Bluegrass, and Ragtime.
Right, Nature Spun in Amethyst, Pagan Pink and Red Fox.
(Note the nifty little pointy sock pins. They say 4-ought on them, but they're bigger than that. I'll have to gauge, but I'm guessing 0 or 1)


Please note that, while Beth's porn is of the highest quality, a classic in its own time, mine is more of the campy, homemade variety. Do not despair for me, however; the hubby is currently working "stashtime" (that's overtime that he knows is going to be converted) for the Sheep & Wool Festival, only three months away! Come mother's day weekend, I'll be like a repressed divorcee turned loose at Hedonism!

I can't wait to finish my other socks, which I'm knitting by the "whack" as the Harlot would say (there are 4 socks in a pair for the boys) in lovely handspun 70 wool/30 mohair sportweight. More on those when they're officially FOs and I can have my way with the new stuff.

Finished objects...

I've finished some objects this week. Let us be clear that said objects have been languishing in my knitting bag (one of the many, actually) and really only needed minimal finishing. The boys' woolies are getting a little long in the tooth and short in the waist, so it seemed like time to add some legs and weave in my ends on these.

LTK longies, knit knee length, with the curly-purly waist in 100purewool "winter joy".

LTK Longies, knit knee length, in HPY thick and thin (discontinued), unknown colorway name.

My American accent... who knew?

So, I'm orginally from Maine. This should come as no shock to people who know me, only because I've told them. Otherwise, I pronounce Rs, even in combination with a preceeding vowel, never say "a'yuh" and, generally speaking have no accent. Really. I know people think they don't have an accent, but I really, really don't. So isn't it interesting that this ridiculous quiz pegged me. (Well, except they apparently don't know there's anything north of Rhode Island, except Boston, a whole accent unto itself.) Am I missing something?

What American accent do you have? Your Result: The Northeast   Judging by how you talk you are probably from north Jersey, New York City, Connecticut or Rhode Island. Chances are, if you are from New York City (and not those other places) people would probably be able to tell if they actually heard you speak.
Philadelphia
The Midland
The Inland North
Boston
The South
The West
North Central
What American accent do you have? Quiz Created on GoToQuiz

The Green Hat-Along

So, one of the local knitting geeks posted to a local knitting group about the Green Hat Knit Along and, being the huge geek that I am, I simply couldn't resist. I haven't "officially" joined, mainly because I'm too lazy to create an account. Also, I had to finish Natalie's stuff and Bailey's slipper socks before I could start a new project - especially one for me! - in good conscience. Also, I couldn't find a pattern. I have this absolutely yummy hand painted merino and can't find a pattern to knit a hat. Issues. Really, my issue isn't a dearth of patterns - there are certainly a bazillion hat patterns on the 'net - but a strong dislike for hats. And it's not really that I don't like hats, rather, I have long hair that is worn up almost all the time and the donning of a hat results in my looking like I have a rodent stow-away on the back of my head. Add to that the fact that my hair is almost always put up with sitcks and the look gets even more interesting. Only a beret would do, then. I looked at beret patterns. Hundreds of beret and tam patterns, patterns for "pithy" hats... and then I began to understand that, in order to do justice to this lovely wool, I would simply have to design my own. I've decided to do a cabled band, topped with a bit of seed stitch, then your standard beret increase.

I probably, in retrospect, should have used a provisional cast-on and grafted the band into a round, but I had already frogged a bunch of cable prototypes and temporarily lost my mind, so this puppy will have a seamed edge to the band.

I do enjoy how the slipped edge stitches mirror the cables. Couldn't have worked out better if I'd planned it that way. Well, I did plan to slip the stitches to give a nice area for picking up for the rest of the hat, but I had no idea they'd behave so nicely. The seed stitch flanked cable is nice and firm, to combat the tendency of merino to want to stretch with use. I think of everything. Except, of course, that provisional cast on.

Bailey's party!

Grandma and Pop-pop did some festive foraging in Chinatown and in the goodies packed away from their trip to China, and Auntie - in the regular Auntie style - decked the halls with lanterns, dragons and fans and set up a Chinese eatery for the kids.

Bailey is most thankful for the party.

The boys are only there for the hats, really.

Wait! Was that the lo mein that was just delivered? Nope, just another picture of the marzipan on top of the cake!

I also finally got Natalie's birthday gifts to her. I felt terrible at Christmas - already three weeks past her birthday - that the gloves weren't done and I totally couldn't find the hat... of course, being late meant that I had time to knit her the calorimetry from this winter's Knitty issue. She almost always wears her hair up and when I saw that, I knew it would be perfect. Now her ears will be nice and toasty! AND I found her hat, so if she decides to wear her hair down, she's still warm and fuzzy. She was very excited about the flip mittens, too.

And then I made a cake...

Bailey's 6th birthday theme was Chinese New Year. It was totally her idea, we were thinking a tea party would be nice, but what do we know, really? The party was lots of fun, of course. Auntie is unequalled at planning and executing these things. She was a little at a loss because the food was ordered, so she had nothing to cook in those last few hours. I took on the cake project and needed something to work with our theme. What says "Chinese New Year birthday party" better than a big ol' container of lo mein? So I made a half-sheet of butter cake, cut it into thirds and filled it with some yummy chocolate pastry cream, applied some rolled fondant and stuffed in my marzipan lo mein...



and painted a blue willow-esque scene. (that dog is a pig... it IS, after all, the year of the pig)

Then, I added some calligraphy that says "Happy Birthday Bailey" in Madarin characters.





I was quite tickled that the guy delivering our feast saw the cake, from the calligraphy side and asked who Bailey was... then wished her a happy birthday! Birthday pictures are next. Hang on!

The Habit-ual Offender

What is it with habits? They say it takes 21 days to create a new habit (as in a thing that sticks) and we all know it takes years to break a bad one, evidenced by the prevalence of nose picking in traffic, if nothing else... so, when I've spent months honing good, productive habits, and easy routines that let me get everything done, I want to know why it takes approximately ONE day to flush the whole thing down the toilet and I can never seem to get back into the groove. I don't understand and I demand an answer! I've gone from actually hunting for laundry to do as part of my routine, to cowering as I sneak past the towering, festering pile in my bedroom. I know I did all of the vacation laundry when we came back... and then that was it, apparently. Other things to do? Holidays? The Husband being home? (not that he wears more laundry when he's home, just that we tend to find other things to do when he's around for an extended period and I don't have a "catch-up" day, like I do when we plan things for his regular off days.) Hard to say but, whatever the cause, I have now resorted to the "idiot's scavenger hunt", with notes taped in various places, starting with the coffee pot, directing me to the next task in my morning.

School has taken a nosedive, too. We're just seemingly doing this random learning thing. I wouldn't debase unschooling by calling it that. This is definitely non-schooling. Again, is it the holiday weirdness, looming other crap that I need to address? Who knows. I've decided to take a new approach. Every day, we will cover the quick and dirty basics - spelling, handwriting, math practice - and then have a day dedicated to each subject. Monday will be history/geography, Tuesday, science, Wednesday, math (as in more in depth math than the morning practice), Thursday, language arts. Friday is co-op day, so we don't do lessons, other than Bailey telling us about hte content of her classes. Each day, we'll focus our reading on the subject at hand, do projects / experiments, watch any shows I can Tivo, and play games that fit with the subject. Hopefully, that will get us back into the groove. Part of our (my) problem seems to come from the added labor of setting up / cleaning up when we move from subject to subject during a day and the need to plan various lessons over the course of a week. It just seems easier - to me, anyway, having not done it yet - if I can spend an hour in the evening, planning a single subject and related acticities/reading for the next day. We shall see, shant we?

So, onto new recipes...


Chicken Char Siu and Chinese Barbecued Pork Tenderloin, both from Cooking Light, were on plates and in tummies this week. Both were reviewed very highly by the under-10 set, particularly served with rice and green beans sauteed in toasted sesame oil. The chicken is a nice, tasty, moist satay and the pork is juicy, with a complex tasting crust, thanks to the layers of flavor that include Chinese Five Spice powder and hoisin sauce. Both would be delicious on a salad with Cardini's Asian Sesame dressing, if you can find it in your neck of the woods. The Husband - my personal shopper - has bought out the stock at Graul's in Annapolis, yet again. It's the only place we can find it. I wonder if they think he's deranged.

A New Year, a new goal

So, in the spirit of the new year, we had to come up with new goals, right? I mean, it seems sort of pathetic to begin 2007 with the same goals we had in 2006. It just screams failure, does it not? Of course, we also can't abandon these oldies-but-goodies in their entirety... so our new plan is a bit on the, um, "broad" side.

I've always hated the New Year resolution; either you shoot too low and end up done by March, or you shoot for the moon and end up horribly defeated by, well, March. This year, we have instead created a mission statement. The gist of this is that our goal is to live a more peaceful, healthful life and that we will make efforts in the areas of physical health (eating better, moving more), mental health (cutting out stress), financial health (making a point of frugality and saving) and household health (decluttering, organization, repairs/improvements we've put off for years) and that we will be conscious that each decision we make will positively affect one or more of these areas.

So, of course, the first order of business is to get back to eating like people. For whatever reason, the end of the year, from, say, the beginning of November on adds tonnage to us like we've had reverse-lipo at the hands of a mad scientist. I don't understand how jeans I bought when the boys were one can no longer be pulled further than my knees. I have bulges and jutting flesh where none has ever existed. My other in law refers to this state as "fluffy". At this point, I'm about as fluffy as Angela Davis' afro in a cyclone. Not good. Anyway, we both lost a substantial amount of weight when Bailey was small, just by restricting calories a bit, recording our goals, nutrition and activities on FitDay.com (free online is good, PC version is better). It was excellent. We planned three meals and three snacks per day, with our target calories in mind. Most dinners were from Cooking Light magazine, as were many breakfasts and some lunches. After the first two weeks, I had trouble meeting my calorie intake goals and would often have to have a weirdly heavy evening snack to have eaten a reasonable number of calories. 45 pounds later, I felt great, fit into my clothes again and had lots of energy. It was not a "diet" I had to stick to, just a manner of being a little more cognizant of what I was putting into my mouth.

Now, we're back on the "program". Today, I had oatmeal, a steak sandwich on a Trader Joe's "everything" bagel (complete with onions and real mayo), a cranberry scone with my afternoon tea and a fabulous dinner, using new (to me) recipes. I thought I'd share some reviews, in case anyone else is looking for good food that won't stick to their asses like gum on hot asphalt.

Arborio Rice, Parmesan and Green Pea Pancakes from Cooking Light was fabulous. We loved it, the kids loved it. It made exactly as much as it said and was easy to prepare, if it did take a bit of time (most of it waiting, so I could, theoretically been doing something else... like knitting). The one thing about this recipe you should know is that non-stick is NOT optional in the browning phase. These things will adhere to anything they can before they brown. Trust me. I have three pans to clean.

Black Bean Soup from Cook's Illustrated: The Best Light Recipes was OUT. OF. THIS. WORLD. Black bean is one of my all time favorites and I'm usually sadly disappointed by any form of light recipe. I decided to use this (and a couple of other, selected recipes) as a barometer to see if I need to own this book. If the others are this good, it will have to be mine. Absolutely everything you would look for in a tasty, satisfying black bean soup is in this bowl. I used the chipotle in adobo variation, because I like the added heat and smokiness.

Last night, we had Southwestern Lasagna, from Cooking Light. I have to admit, when I was out shopping for the ingredients, I was a litte put off by the recipe. To be fair, it may have been a prejudice due to the trauma of shopping with three kids, pushing a stroller, and dragging a cart while grocery shopping on a Sunday afternoon (inadvisable) with every rude, stupid person in the universe. Whatever it was, it was completely out of line with the finished product. The lasagna was yummy. Again, high marks from all age groups. I think it's reminiscent of Amy's Enchilada Bowls, which is a favorite from when I used to take my lunch to work.

I'll keep posting the reviews, for those who are interested. My test kitchen is open!

Knitting? Yes, I'm finishing up a pair of Magical Mittens for my brother-in-law's girlfriend. I'll post a picture of them, and their companion hat, when I finish.

Cheers!

The Knit-Along Continues!

8:55 a.m. And now Trudi has joined along and, even though she thinks she's far behind, if she keeps up the pace she started yesterday, she'll probably finish before the rest of us or, at least, me!

1:00 p.m. Well, naptime went, er, well, it went. The boys napped for 45 minutes, then they were done. I suppose that's one way to decide whether to spend their nap time finishing the soaker or sewing on jammies. Anyway, now we've come to the seaming part of our program. Blech. Hate seaming. I'm trying to bribe myself into seaming with the thought of knitting the leg cuffs.

Here it is, ready to be seamed.


4:00 p.m. Quinn models the one-legged soaker. I may redo the legs to give them a little more room, but it looks like the rest of it stretches very nicely to make a really nice, trim soaker.

Living dangerously

7-22-2006 10:00 a.m. I confess: I didn't swatch. Everyone else seemed to be swatching and coming up with a much tighter tension and needing to go up in needle size, so I threw caution to the wind and went with my 10 1/2 straights. What a renegade.

So, with 5 rows of ribbing done...


4:15 p.m. Okay, so maybe I won't add rows throughout. I will probably still add some through the crotch to add to the rise and the leg holes, but it's looking like a good size with the ribbing and about half of the back done. (Yes, I DID have a nap)



8:15 p.m. So, I thought I'd multitask and do a little knitting with the wees in the tub. Everybody got in, I got BS paste on the boys' heads, blew some bubbles for all three to catch and then commenced to knitting. I got a whopping two rows done before Holden pooped in the tub and I had to pull everybody out, drain, clean and refill. Now the boys are out & clean and Bailey's soaking and playing, so I should be able to pick it up again. Do they know I'm working on something?

11:25 p.m. Babes in bed, there's quiet in the house. Bailey conned Daddy into painting her toenails after her bath. He does good work. They were letting them dry while they read some of Harriet the Spy when I brought the boys up.
I've decreased my way down to the crotch, made the increases and I'm ready to start the front. Not bad for having cast on this morning, huh?

The Ottobre-Knit-As-Fast-As-You-Can-Along

(Thanks, Annalea, for instigating and Ashley, for the perfect title!)

So, it's 1:15 a.m. and I've rubbed pork for tomorrow's cookout and now I'm winding wool. Perfect! Hopefully, I'll have time to get the ball wound before Holden wakes up and looks for a boob. (Quinn just woke up a few minutes ago.)

Meanwhile, here's the wool I'm using:


It's 100purewool merino in their "Orchid" colorway. We're using the
Ottobre Designs pattern and I will be adding some rows in each of the sections to make sure I have a high enough rise for the bumless, yet tall, wees.

This Boob's for You

Well, not really. They're actually for somebody else, specifically a colleague of my mother-in-law who was admiring her boobs. The knitted ones. Anyway, they are leading productive lives as bookends (ok, boob-ends) and, jointly, a conversation piece, fulfilling their wooly destiny.

Here is their practice run. They were just born to their job, no? I think they were enjoying the air.

Now, here's a question for the ages... is it in poor taste to vamp with someone else's boobs?

(Yes, I AM sure that's vamping. I'm not that good at it.)

Please excuse the giant ass I'm wearing. I think that's somebody else's, too.

Geekin Faeries

Not that this has anything to do with knitting ( though it does have a lot to do with geekin') but I thought I would take the opportunity to post pics of the Maryland Faerie Festival. Ok, I'm really just putting up a picture of Bailey in her faerie dress, an embellished pillowcase dress. I didn't use an actual pillowcase, just made a tube of fabric the same dimensions and went from there. I also grabbed some lovely white sheeting material that has pink butterflies embroidered on it for another dress. (But, then, being the rocket scientist that I am, only got one package of the pink bias tape and neon green thread... I feel a trip to the fabric store coming on) I also thought I'd treat everybody to a view of the "meanie ogre face" that shows when my children force me to peel my human face off by acting like total animals in public places.

Meanwhile, on the knitting front, I've been busy knitting odds and ends. I have two pairs of longies (or shorties, I haven't decided yet) without legs, four thumbless mittens and I made my mother-in-law boob bookends for Mother's Day. They're weighted with 6000 copper plated bb's in each boob and weigh about 5 lbs apiece! They're FABULOUS. Did we take pictures? Of course not. Off to knit some thumbs...

Ponder...

One of the lovely neighbors seems to have developed a habit of driving up and down the street (at 10:00 p.m. or thereabouts) on a lawnmower... why do we suppose this is? Could it be that they are idiots? Yes. But I wonder what the inspiration for the Tour de Road is.

Obviously, I'm not too good at this blog thing...

I'm sure I've bee doing stuff, too. For instance, by some odd alignment of the planets, the Wees all decided Santa was an OK guy this year. Go figure.

The rest all blurs together, though.

The holidays seemed to sneak up. One minute, I was proudly declaring that my shopping was almost done, a month or so early... the next I was wondering if I had ordered things for people on Christmas morning. It's gotta be that short attention span thing again.

(what was I saying?)


Plus, I have new obsessions (not people, that's creepy)

Tie-nappies. They rock. No pins, no poop on wool. Whoever came up with this little wonder should be kissed passionately, several times. I'll start.

Merino. Love it. 'nuff said.

Crepes. There is nothing you can't do with a crepe. Leftovers become magical. People think you're enormously cool, even though you're only cleaning out your fridge. Love the crepes. Embrace the crepes. You, too, can be very cool while cleaning out the fridge. It's multitasking.

Curricula. I need to stay away from the home school catalogs. The obsession is becoming unhealty. It's also beginning to squeeze us out of our dining room.

Catalogs. Oh, my god. They're almost as good as getting STUFF from catalogs. I love catalog stuff, too, but just getting catalogs is nearly as much fun and much more economical.

Of course I still have the same love-affair with my washer and dryer. Every time I turn them on and they make that little happ-to-see-you noise, I get all fuzzy again.

More evidence I need a life.

Holden models the new LTK longies

These were knit in Bartlett yarns Rangely line, Blueberry colorway. I decided on seed stitch leg cuffs and matching cargo pocket. (The pocket it stuffed with the un-woven tails, it doesn't normally stick out like that.) I like that they're tall enough on the boys for me to fold over the waistband. I think it will keep them from untie-ing and dropping trou' this winter. I love Bartlett yarns. And this color was out of their bargain bin ($4 a lb) at the mill. Even better.

Please ignore the dog hair on the floor. No, not the big pile of it with the tail - that's the actual dog - but the ones lying here and there like Autumn leaves. We need to rake or vacuum or something.

Also, has anybody noticed the level of skill in my picture taking? This is the only modelling picture that wasn't blurry. And you like how I got Aaron's leg and Mia's butt in there, too, don't you? I know. Sometimes it's difficult, being this gifted.

And now I'm off to work on the "super-secret-excellent-surprise-that-I-can't-add-photos-of-until-after-it's-done-lest-the-intended-recipient-for-so-unknown-reason-look-in-on-my-blog-and-discover-it".

Peace.

UFOs

I have never kept a to-do list. I think it's time to start. There are so many things swirling through my brain, getting stuck in various pieces of fluff... then one untangles and comes flying to the front. It startles me when that happens.

So, on my unfinished object list I have... drumroll, please...

One half finished bootie.
Two unknit gnomes.
Three waiting sweaters.
Mittens without needles.
More yarn to roll...
Countless un-balled yarn hanks.
Piles of undone laundry.
More yarn on order.
Customers with deadlines.
Looming homeschool co-op.
A giant list of phone calls...

And a partri-idge in a pear tree.

Ok, it's backwards. I can't think in reverse order. Remember the fluff. Off to put the leg cuffs on a soaker I "finished" at the beginning of July. Gnomes and customer tomorrow.