Diving Back In

I've decided to get back on the blogging wagon. In the years since I last posted here I have:
Gotten married
Acquired a house, a cat and a car
Traveled to Greece and ComicCon twice each.
Sold my horse

And surely a bunch of other noteworthy events that only the bowels of faceyspacey would even reveal.

I would like this to be a place again where I may ramble and write and post about the things I think are interesting that are happening around me.

We shall just see how this goes...

This blog is somewhere else

I've moved my primary blogging to
knittingtrina.tumblr.com

Mostly for the easy posting. I may move it back someday. We'll see.

Also, I'm doing the 30x30 ReMix hosted by Kendi

Again, the details and posts are over at knittingtrina.tumblr.com

Getting done

I've actually finished a lot of the projects I've had lying about and I believe I'll be able to finish the last couple over spring break. I have one more pair of slippers to finish, less than an hour's work. My tempest sweater to block and finish, and K's Epic sweater just needs leather patches (going to get them in fresno this weekend)













I really want to get Tempest done before spring is over! Perfect weight and colors!

Things I HAVE finished:

• Pair of socks for me
• Pair of socks for K
• A scarf
• All the Knitting on K's Epic sweater!!!!!
  

I have also made good progress on my knee socks, tempest, and Sock Scrap blanket. Now to decide what to enter in the county fair!

Finishing things

Wow. I suck at blogging. I will continually try to not suck at blogging, but unfortunately to do that it requires posting stuff. I'm apparently not so good at that.

Apparently my new years resolution is to finish things. I have a lot of things to finish so that should actually last me most of the year.

List of things to finish:
Writing Thank You cards
Kier's Sweater
My Tempest Sweater (really close to done now)
Christmas slippers (little bit of sewing and trimming and they'll be done)
Katy's Sweater
Christine's Sweater

Someone should remeind me not to start sweaters. I don't seem to finish them in a timely fashion!

Wonders of Summer

1. Squash Blossoms - stuffed with goat cheese and basil, dipped in beer batter and pan fried.
(photo will appear here when I remember to bring my cell phone in from the car...)
2. Baby Pumpkins in mom's garden - bringing hope for a good harvest and awesome decorating
3. Air conditioner - 'Nuf Said
4. Summer Beers - Anchor Summer, DogFishHead Peche
5. Strawberries - Jam, Sidecars
6. Light - Being able to go to the stable at 8pm and still see.
7. Sleep - Haven't gotten up before 9 in a couple weeks!

Its only the beginning of July and there is so much more summer to go! Yippee!

Wedding Things

Things people should know about our wedding:

1. I am NOT a cupcake. I will not have sprinkles on me. I need no frosting.
   
2. We are not having a Wedding themed Wedding.
   
3. I have already thought about what I want for photos, flowers, and foods. I appreciate your suggestions but I DO already know what I want.
   
4. Our wedding = Our choices.

That is all.

What day is it?

I love summer. I love not being able to tell the days apart. It could be a Monday or a Saturday and I only notice the difference in business hours and parking meter tariffs. Unfortunately this effect also makes the days fly by, but that can be countered by productivity. I got a few things done this weekend that I had been meaning to do. This is a serious accomplishment considering I'm the consummate procrastinator. I made cabbage rolls, I rode 2 horses, I line drove my horse, I baked garlic bread, I stamped postcards, I made address labels, I did dishes, I drank wine. Now I need to go make a to-do list for the week. big event this week is the Vet appointment for Oliver. Hopefully we'll figure out what's really wrong with him so it can be treated. I smell garlic bread burning....

Summer Blogging?

Well, maybe...

Cooking and crafting today. But not really knitting.

Cooking:
I am going to make a HUGE batch of Mapa Dolmathes, or stuffed cabbage rolls. I'm stuffing them with ground lamb, rice, tomato sauce and herbs. Yum! And hopefully they'll last us long enough that I can clean the kitchen and not immediately ruin it again by cooking.

Crafting:
Making an attempt at stamping. Probably not getting as fancy as the 'real' crafty stamping types... but.. whatever. Got a nice custom stamp from Berkeley Stamp. Very nice people, quick turn around, and a very nice stamp.

Knitting:
I dunno... if i get bored with the stamping I may work on my sweater. I should. I want to wear it. urgh... SO Uninspired.

Sad lack of blogging

I want to blog more. I feel like I want to write about knitting, and cooking, and crazy people.

Knitting: Sock scraps blanket. Didn't mean to make it so ' patchwork' the self-striping yarn did it for me.













I bought yarn at Stitches West. All sock yarn. Here is the highlight skien from Blue Moon.














One of their 'rare gems'

Cooking:
Well, actually Drinking...
Strawberry Daiquiris. I love having a new fridge and ICE! I have been making them with a bit of Triple Sec as well as Rum, Lime, Ice, and strawberries (TJs frozen ones, or fresh) Add whip cream and a straw.

Crazy People: People are crazy. 'Nuf said.

Monster Creation

I like knitting socks. I do it quite a lot. I asked my dad what he wanted me to knit him for Christmas. He finally said "socks.". I say finally because I have pretty much knit everyone else socks except him. Mom is up to 5 pairs already but he's never shown an interest in them. I've knit him hats and arm-warmers, but no socks. So... of course I said "yes" and knit him some lovely socks out of rather nice yarn. I didn't have them finished at Christmas but I gave them to him finished on January 4th...... fast forward less than 1 week.... January 9th... Dad wants ANOTHER pair!!!! Dad didn't want knitted socks in the last 3 years that I've been knitting socks and now he wants 2 pairs in as many weeks!

Now, I should probably just consider this as an affirmation of my incredible sock knitting skills... 1 pair and I can hook you for life! But this is a little much!

Now, I also shouldn't encourage this behavior, I should knit slowly, should make him buy the yarn.



Ummm... oops. He managed to ask me for grey/red socks. I just happened to be partway through knitting a pair in just those colors, in just his size.... oh well. Hopefully these will hold him over until his birthday!





Cooking:

I've been on a decidedly Thai kick for over a week now and there is no end in sight. The food is yummy, the cost is reasonable, and it doesn't seem to turn my kitchen into an unrecoverable mess.

Every night I've been doing a Green Papaya salad as a side dish. So good, so cheap. 1 medium Papaya will last us 4 days and costs $1. Shredded papaya plus Cucumber, Green beans or carrots tossed with a garlic, lime, fish sauce dressing.

A reasonable version of what I've been doing is here, but I don't use tomato.

Food Blogging...

This blog may take a bit of a food turn. I am knitting, but I haven't really felt like blogging about it. A quick trip into the knitting before the fooding....

I knit 9 pairs of socks from christmas presents. It was crazy. I finished all but 1 pair by christmas, I finished the last sock for my dad on Jan 2.

These are the socks for Mom, I made them with Fleece Artist Nova Sock, Procured in Seattle. She hasn't worn them yet.






I'm still working on K's Epic Sweater. I'm nearly to the sleeve separation but there are so many stitches now that it takes me 6+ minutes to get around. Its an hour+ of solid knitting to do the 10 row pattern of raglan increases. But in 20 more rows I should be ready to split off for the sleeves.




I really like how the raglan is turning out this time. Its a keeper. If it ends up like the last one (kinda square) I'm probably giving up. 20 more rows and I'm putting it on scrap yarn and making him try it on.






Food!
I got the True Thai cookbook for Christmas. I've been wanting it for a while and I'm going to try to cook as much from it as I can. We made Chicken Satay on New Year's eve that was yummy and has made me even more determined to cook more Thai food!

K and I both acquired colds in the last couple days. We're both taking copious amounts of Sudafed and moaning a lot. But in an effort to begin my Thai cooking craziness I made a Run to 99 Ranch Market yesterday.

The trip to 99 Ranch nearly did me in. I got lots of good stuff but was so obviously not 'all there'...

• I tried to take some other guys cart, he chased me down.
  
• Dropped my list in the produce section and had to go back
• Couldn't find the coconut milk to save my life (went down every aisle twice before noticing it)
• Had to go back to produce a 3rd time to get tofu, tossed the first bag of tofu on the floor crushing it
• Went back to the produce section a 4th time (did I mention the produce section is really difficult to go back to? The flow just doesn't work that way) to get limes only to find they don't have limes, only key limes, I gave up on the limes.
  
• I spent 20 minutes in the soy sauce section trying to find 'sweet dark soy sauce' to absolutely no luck, I ended up finding some 'sweet soy paste' in a jar, and made in Thailand, and not containing MSG so I went with that.

I took me over an hour to do that little bit of shopping. It was brutal and I had to sit down for an hour after I got back to recover before cooking anything. I made Ginger Chicken which was lovely and I paired it with Green Papaya Salad which did wonders for sinus clearing and I think one papaya may last us a week.

I think I'll do a beef curry tonight. I'll try to remember to take pictures.

Duck Chow Mein

I made duck chow mein for dinner tonight. Its REALLY good.

I know.. your thinking... "Is she NUTS?!?@?" ummm... no. Duck is good. Duck isn't difficult and the whole she-bang only cost me $7. We'll have leftovers for lunches too! I love 99 Ranch Market with a passion.

Ingredients:
Duck - 2 legs, $3.82
Baby bok choy, $.99
Fresh Ginger, $.40
Garlic (already had it)
Onion, $.20 (they were .39/lb)
Mushroom Soy (Had it)
Chili sauce (had it)
Brown sugar or palm sugar (had it)
Salt/Pepper
Rice Vinegar (had it)
Fresh Chow Mein noodles, $.79 (and I only used half the bag)


Set a small pot of water to boil (for the noodles). Score the skin on the duck legs. Season with salt and pepper. Heat pan and put the legs in skin side down. Cook until fat is rendering out ~5 min. Flip. Cook for another few minutes (I call it good once I'm not seeing pink on the edges, they'll cook more later). Remove duck from pan and set aside to cool. Wash bok choy and chop (2-3 cups worth). Chop 2+ cloves garlic, grate 1 Tbsp ginger, and +1/2 of the onion. Strip the meat (and any crispy skin) off the leg bones and chop roughly, discard any uncooked fat/skin, set aside. Reheat the duck fat in the pan (2-3 Tbsp is enough, if there is more, remove it). Is your water boiling? Add the noodles and cook until al dente (these really should be on the chewy side, ~3 minutes). To the duck fat, Add the garlic, ginger, onion, and a TINY bit of chili sauce. Stir fry until onion begins to color, add bok choy. Let cook, stiring until bok choy is wilted. Add the chopped duck and stir a couple core minutes. Add 2 Tbsp mushroom soy, 2 tsp brown sugar and 1 Tbsp vinegar. Stir and let cook while draining and rinsing your noodles. Add the noodles, Stir, SERVE! Its not necessary but I also threw in a bit of chopped fresh Basil at the end.

Short Short version:
Cook Duck, get fat
Chop veggie types
Cook veggies in fat.
Add Meat.
Cook Noodles. Drain.
Make sauce with meat.
Add Noodles.
Eat.

The short version is really what I do best. I don't measure. It comes out tasty. I'm happy.

Epic Sweater Returns

I'm attempting to start the Epic Sweater again. Wish me luck.

I have finished a baby blanket. Pictures to come. Possibly a pattern too. I'm still trying to decide what to name it thought... Butterfly Nets? Butter Baby? hmmm... more soon.

I'm such a fink....

I know... I said I'd post... I lied. Oh well...

On to current things. I traveled a whole lot in August, here are some highlights:

The home brewed beer in Utica, NY.













There were also 6 tapped kegs. I came home and recovered for a week before heading out to Colorado on the train.














The scenery was very scenic and I didn't sleep too badly. I came home long enough to get my classroom ready then went to Grass Valley for a driving clinic with Oliver. I was too busy driving to get many pictures but this is Oliver before our last drive where we did a driven dressage test and he rocked!













I somehow haven't done a whole lot of knitting. I started a baby blanket and then left it at school over this long weekend. The baby shower is next weekend. I'm gonna have to knit like crazy next week!
I think I'm going to start a sweater for the baby's older sister. So I'm off to hunt down a pattern....

Travelling Abounds

I'm off to traveling tomorrow. I will start with a weekend trip to Portland. My grandmother is from a tiny village in Greece and there are enough people from that little village that have immigrated to the West Coast that they have started having a Village Reunion every summer. I've never been so it should be fun. We will be staying with my Great Aunt Marina who I haven't seen in about 20 years.

I'm going to knit her a pair of socks while I'm traveling there out of this:


It is Sushi Sock yarn from The Unique Sheep in the Autumn in the City colorway. It looks like summer to me... :) It is Superwash+Bamboo and I Love it!









I'm going to try to hit a few yarn stores while I'm there and I'm also going to stop by the Oregon Brewers Festival
And have some yummy beer while I wait for my mom, uncle, and grandma to arrive.

After Portland I'm off to Upstate New York to visit friends. More blog later, must pack now!

Olympic Trials

The knitting Olympics are technically only every 4 years during the winter Olympics but I'm going to practice with the summer Olympics as an "Olympic Trial". The idea being to begin a project at the Opening ceremonies and finish by the Closing ceremonies. It should be something challenging. Since the Olympics are falling during my train trip to Colorado (lots of knitting time) I've decided to take on 2 Olympic Events. I'm going to be pulling up 2 projects from WAY back.

Project 1: Pixie Cables baby afghan






<-----The blue/green cabled blanket





I have had this booklet for at least 15 years. It has both crochet and knit patterns, but I only knew how to crochet back then. I remember looking at the cables and thinking that that would probably be the softest prettiest blanket of the bunch but that I didn't know how to knit, and mom could only knit and purl and was too busy trying to remember how to do it herself to actually teach me (and I had NO attention span for learning... It was probably more me...). I still have the book so in a weird way I think I'll feel a circle of completion to finally knit the first project I had ever wanted to knit. If I can knit that "unattainable 'cause its knitting" afghan from way back it will be quite the cool thing. So, until August I need to find some yarn for it. I was originally knitting this baby another one of my mitered baby blanket patterns but the stripes are annoying me and I think that one is not going to get finished. I don't think I want to use the Blue Sky Cotton for this one because the cables require something with a bit more elasticity, but I also don't want to go straight acrylic or wool. It would be really cool to do this in something organic but that might be a budget stretcher. hmmm... maybe panda cotton?

Project 2: Argyle Socks

In a random pile of old pattern pamphlets that my mom somehow gleaned from someone else I have patterns from 1940. Absolutely classic and fairly clean instructions for knitting argyle.




















Early in my kntting career just after I started doing socks I bought 4 colors of a super wash wool that I thought I'd make fair isle socks with. I spent WAY too much on the yarn and I don't even know if its enough to make 2 whole socks with so.... Not Gonna Happen. Instead I'm going to use it for argyle! That way I'll definitely have enough for the argyle part and I can use bits of different colors for the heels and toes, and it should use less yarn than fair isle would have since I'm not carrying the yarns around the whole row.

More to come on these...

Moving along

This is going to be one of those 'random' posts. Other people seem to do random Thursdays. I think I'm just going to have to do a random Monday.

1. Tulip on Crack is finished except for sewing in the ends.














Its still awfully cute, and I've started a little ear flap hat for her big sister to match.

2. We did win lots at the county fair this year...



















And those ribbons don't even include the BBQ!

3. I'm going to send in my entry for the Lambtown spinning contests July 19th in Dixon. I'm probably nuts, but it just sounds like fun.


4. Pebbles has just turned 10!

I got Pebbles from the Milo foundation as a kitten when K left me outside of Safeway while he ran in to use the ATM. Less than 5 minutes later I had a kitten. (K now knows better than to leave me alone at pet adoptions)

10 years later she is still the queen of bitchy spoiled kitties. And still quite the round fluff ball. She has stared down a hawk and was bit by a raccoon yet had no other scratches on her.

Many more years pebbles!


5. I got a new cell phone, after I was no longer able to charge my old phone. I got a Samsung Glyde . Its pretty cool. The pictures in this post were all taken on it! Considering our actual camera sucks, the pictures look decent. It also has a web browser (and I get 1 month of free browsing!) and can do movies and music too. Its definitly a step up for me but less of a jump than switching companies to get an Iphone.

More when I'm feeling less random. I'll start temping next week and I'm going to do some traveling in August.

Crack

Warning! Mature content! Not for the weak!

It can be addictive.
It can rule your life.
You think "but everyone else is doing it" or "I don't have an addictive personality, I can try it and leave it.....".
You think you can pick it up and just do a little.
You know people who have tried it and haven't had lasting side effects.
You also know people who have fallen into the cycle of highs and lows.
It is expensive.
The high may last for a full day before cutting you off.
The rush is incredible, It draws you in and won't let you go until its done.
You will find yourself scraping the bag for any last little bit until its all gone.
You may have to get more....




What am I referring to?


This.














The Dream in Crack Tulip Sweater
Isn't it just too cute! Aren't the colors too sweet!

I didn't think I would succumb to the trendiness, little did I know that when faced in person with this kit..... The wool fumes overcame me. I saw the kit. I had to knit it. I cast on immediately. I was halfway done by dinner. I would have been done in 24 hours if I hadn't picked up the button band like I was actually on crack. I ripped it back, then reclaimed the high by knitting the sleeves and I'm about ready to re-attack the button band. The baby I'm knitting this for isn't even due until October but I will be done in a total of 3 days (if not for the crazy button band it would have been 24 hours).

I paid more than it is listed on that website... but I still have this much left over...













I'm going to make matching little hats for the baby and her big sister. Just to prolong the high.

You've had your fair warning. Good luck.

Creating without (many) pictures

I think I am a creative person. I like making things. The things I make may not be gorgeous but I always enjoy the process and seeing results, whatever they may be. Lately I've been branching out a bit.... the county fair is a good starting point, I entered the Potato Pirate contest and the Marshmallow monster contest.
My potato is the big ship on the blue (so stable that they leaned a less sucessful entry on it!) I called my pirate "Yukon Goldbeard" and my marshmallow monster is Cuthulu in green on the far right with the blue base. Both won 1st place.

I also spent some time throwing pots at our school arts day a couple weeks ago. I nearly got a minor in pottery in college but hadn't thrown in years. Lots of fun, I won't have pictures of my creations until next fall (they didn't manage to glaze them before summer!) .

And... I'm making sourdough bread! How cool is that! I even started my own starter (Thanks to the naked chef...). I'm going on week 3 with it and it keeps improving. The hardest part is letting it rise then getting it in the oven without deflating it. It requires a 10-14 hour rise time (natural yeasts are much slower than the store bought kind) so it has to be protected. It also rises better if its moister. So I'm rising the current batch in a little glass pan that I can transfer directly to the oven and I have it in a big ziplock with toothpicks tenting it to keep it from touching (read: deflating) the dough. I'm glad I'm doing mini-batches because this stuff produces bread every couple days and we can only eat so much (especially since I haven't been getting the best results yet...) Pictures to come on the bread.

1 more day of school!

I'll Blog again soon.... Really!

SO... I suck. I haven't blogged in ages. I've knitted all sorts of things, lemme sum up:

1 pair of socks for last year's TA
1 pair of little socks for a 4 year old
1 little baby hat for a teacher at work
1 really little pair of baby socks for someone I don't actually know, but she loved them.
1 eye patch for the county fair (2nd place)
2 potholders for the county fair (3rd place)
1 silly bag (still needs handles)
1 green scarf for this year's TA
1 pair of socks for this year's other TA

I got a new cell phone and my horse has learned to canter (without bucking anyone off).

School's out in 5 days, look for more posts once I'm on break!