Knitting and photo editing

I finished a few projects this weekend. I was not happy with the pictures. I looked tired, haggard and, and, well, 48. My birthday is next month, I'll be 48. It's ok really. No, no it's not, I'm scared to death.

I started this hat at Jonathan's 2nd basketball game on Sunday. I finished it watching the football marathon on TV. I don't know what came over my hubby, but he cooked dinner Sunday so I had a lot of unexpected time on my hands. It's a stash hat made with Crystal Palace Fling novelty yarn, Jo Sharp Silkroad and something else I've long lost the label for. I kept fussing with the photo editor trying to get the light right so that you could see the yarn better when I discovered these fun filters that let me do this -

Wow, what an improvement on the nearly 50 face! I used a colored pencil filter.

This is more Fling yarn in blue along with some mohair and Jo Sharp Silkroad - 4 strands in all. My oldest son says it looks like a synchronized swimming hat. Whatevah!

I finished that Aura hat worn by the really gorgeous model in the Rowan book. I decided to take some more liberties with my photo editor -


I did the hat with 70 stitches on a 7 circular needle. I also left off a few rounds of filler between the decrease rounds. I should do a better job with taking notes.

I am really happy to report that I redid the picot edge on the truffle clutch and now it's all ready to be lined. My friend Phyllis had promised to help me gain some skillz with sewing so I hope she'll help me do the lining. I haven't found the fabric yet and I guess I'll have to buy a cute vintage like pin for the front.

This is my version

Jo Sharp's version

Finally, this is a sweet hat done with Lisa Souza yarn. It's from my Knitters' Coffee Swap pal, LaVerna.

Vintage Swap

I learned about a fun swap called Vintage Swaps. I did it as a whim really because I love visiting vintage stores and I have some nice vintage sewing and knitting notions. I also have some pictures, postcards, linens, jewelry... well you get the idea, lotso stuff. I thought if I did the swap I'd find a nice home for some really nice things.

Unfortunately, I didn't include much of my own things. My vintage books and other stuff, I found too hard to part with. This meant that I had to go look for new/old stuff! I have some terrific pictures of what I found that I'll share after my swap buddy gets her package!

Here's what I received from Meegan. She has been patiently awaiting my package which is regrettably late. So sorry Meegan :(







This book is my favorite thing that Meegan sent me. It is Wuthering Heights! Isn't it beautiful. I love the art deco binder. The linen napkin was also in my box, so sweet.

I be back

It's a new year and I had plans to do fun stuff. You remember - cook from a favorite cookbook, knit several projects from a favorite knitting book...

Well, it seems that folks are lining up early to throw me curve balls. Exhibit A -

Who needed a furnace when the temperature here in New Jersey has been so balmy? But, last night we got some ominous news by way of a power outage - the dang cold front that has iced over nearly everything past the Mason Dixon line was coming this way. When the lights came back on at 4am, I tested the furnace because the temperature is supposed to drop below the 20s. Furnace comes on ok but with an awful sound. After the furnace guy shows up, he took one listen and said, "hey, lady, youse guys are lucky, sounds like your pump is cooked." Two hours later, he fixes my 'cooked' pump and my house is hot again! One curve ball for a base hit (sorry for the sports analogies, I live with all men remember).

The curve ball before the busted furnace was with both of my cars. Two flat tires on one car, 1 flat tire on another and an expired AAA membership! You don't want to know what it cost to get out of that fix. Now I'm below the count (it's another baseball thing, look it up).

Before the 3 flat tires, it's college application deadline time for my senior in high school. I should be a drinking woman by now but, I manage to trick the pitcher into a full count and I squeeze out a walk. My son sent off his gajillion applications via a wonderful invention called the online, Common Application! I'm too dizzy to tell you what that cost me.

Before the college application deadline night, there was Martin Luther King Day speech writing marathon. My same high school senior was one of the youth keynotes. I hadn't seen his speech. I won't tell you what ensued but it was similar to college application deadline night. He wrote a wonderful speech and delivered it as if nothing ugly happened the night before...

Before the Martin Luther King Day speech marathon, I thought I'd have some knitting progress

Lovely, right?? WRONG. This is the Jo Sharpe Truffle bag I've been working on forever now. I thought I had finished it. Instead I realize that I knit the picot edge ON THE WRONG SIDE. I'll have to rip that some day but not now...

Here's the Rowan hat I modified for knitting in the round.

Something is wrong, I don't know what it is exactly. I must have mentally wandered off at some point. It will have to be ripped back too.

Lastly, my final report on how I had spent the most miserable last two weeks of this new year has to do with my middle school son. He comes home from school and announces that he needed a food item to take to Spanish class. The food item had to be an authentic Spanish dish that he can share with the class (read enough for 25 kids!)

"Hey mom, can you make a Tres Leches cake?"

So, 7am the next morning, I was up to my elbows in milk and flour and Karo syrup -







Oh, and aside from the cheers that the class gave me upon seeing my Tres Leches cake, I did have another delightful surprise -


This cheerful young lady arrived to my house for theatre practice (it seems my college application/speech writing son is directing a play this month). She is wearing a hat that I knitted last year for him. She said that it fit her better than it does the college application/speech writing/theatre directing dread head! I think she is right!

I'm not big headed

Nope that's not me. It's a picture from the Rowan Calmer book, the Aura hat. I just finished it. It only took 2 basketball games!




That is not the fit I was hoping for.

I had such high hopes that it would be perfect. While knitting it (and as with all lace projects), I only had to rip it once. Here it is, right off the needles -

Why I did it flat the way the instructions said, I don't know. That should have been my first bad sign. Who wants to sew a dopey seam in the back of any hat??

I was so mad, I popped out my box of travel mints. Have you tried these? Yummy!

I think I ate a dozen or so before I got to thinking about how I could fix the hat.



I pulled it back just to see if I at least got the pattern stitch right. Looks ok... Whelp, looks like back to the drawing board. I'll have to cancel my SOS call to my genius buddy Phyllis about sewing the seam. I'll knit this again, in the round on smaller needles and perhaps take out one repeat. Stay tuned...

Head for the Hills

I don't know about you, but I'm preparing for locusts, I mean what's left??

It was so balmy here on Friday, I nearly crashed the car when I saw not one but two cherry blossoms in full bloom! Even my birds are molting.


On Friday, this was the temperature here in Northern New Jersey


Along with the weird weather, I've been feeling really strange, artistically so. Remember that Noro bag I just finished? I put it on my head, just to see -





I discovered that Noro isn't as scratchy after it is felted. So I decided to make another one for a hat. I don't like making ordinary hats so stay tuned, I'm going to try to do something weird with this.

The weekend was chock full with basketball games. I got to finish another project from the Sally Melville book



This is Jen's Poncho that I made for a 2 year old. I still have some projects to finish that have to find their way to Italy (my sister-in-law's new daughter) and a few bags for other family members from Brooklyn to Hawaii.

Stash Resolutions

No this isn't a laundry list of resolutions. It's a wish and a game plan to do more of something I adore - to use the delicious and coveted yarn stash I've hoarded over the years (some of it is 10 years old) and to cook from my favorite cookbooks - from cover to cover. Why will I be successful? Because I've resisted the gargantuan yarn sale at Webs!

Have you ever cooked or knitted from a book, cover to cover?? I've never done either. In the case of my knitting, I hold onto yarn waiting for the most perfect pattern or I buy a pattern book and hold onto that waiting for the most perfect yarn that is better than what the pattern calls for. Don't ask me why. I guess it must have something to do with delayed gratification or just plain dumb procrastination. With cookbooks, I don't want to waste a good recipe on everyday eating (???), I would reserve it in my mind for a dinner party or special occasion. Spell it with me D-U-M-B!!!

My plan, and I'm having fun already on this 3rd day of the year, is to pick 2 books - one knit book and one cook book. Start making stuff from cover to cover - random order is ok. With the knitting, I'll only select yarns from my stash.

What have I done so far? Well it's only been 3 days but...

From my cookbook stash -

I adore this book. I've owned it for over 10 years. I have a greased up, dogged-eared version that I use when I cook and I have that one just for reading. I've made many, many things in it but I've only scratched the surface. There are recipes for perfume even, and cough medicine and lots and lots of great southern cuisine. One of my favorites is what I call funeral pound cake.
No, no this isn't a macabre story. We all go to funerals, right? Stay with me now. If you've ever attended a funeral for a fond old aunty or uncle, most of the time they have old friends right?Trust me, this won't get strange. Well, those 'old' friends have great 'old' recipes and they bring the most delicious foods to the repast. Like you, at most funerals, I've been too overcome with grief to appreciate anything. But, for the times I've gone to support a friend or a distant relative, well, I do notice the food. Almost always there'd be poundcake. Well, just like with my silly cannoli search, I also had a funeral pound cake search. No I do not need a life, this is part of life. To enjoy and appreciate all things sensual including ya taste buds. You don't have to eat the entire portion of something and end up looking like my boy Chef Prudhomme, but tasting is good, if I could I'd taste just about anything.

There are over 100 years of recipes in Spoon Bread and Strawberry Wine starting from pre-reconstruction times when there were just a handful of years when black people had many high hopes. There are stories of how some of the authors' families were run out of town by the Klan and as long as they kept their life and limb, they kept on cooking and creating great food for their families in celebration of their survival. I guarantee that whatever your ethnic background, you'll adore this book (I know I sound like those kids on Reading Rainbow). You may even start your own project of collecting recipes from friends and family and document the circumstances around how you acquired the ingredients.

Tonight for dinner I'm going to grill outdoors and make barbecue ribs. There is a wonderful tangy sauce in the book. Why am I grilling outdoors in the middle of a Jersey winter? Two reasons. First today it is 60 degrees and 2nd, this happened last night while making dinner:


I forgot to pierce the baking potatoes before putting them in the oven and THEY EXPLODED!! I'm hoping some fairy gnome or someone comes over and volunteers to clean it out. It's bad enough she's just a Susy Bake Oven, now she's all a mess...

From My Knitting book stash -
I like the photographs in Sally Melville's books. You all know about her Einstein Coat, I've never made it, I'm going to now. I have made several of the Jen's Ponchos. I'm doing another one now for my 2 year old niece -

The scarf featured on the cover I made for my son last year but he has since lost it :(

Finally, this is one hold over from last year. It's the Noro bag I started at the DMV.

Martin - DMV Blues - Ms.Geri Fight

Just for Iris, 'cause she had to ask!

Friday!

First, Happy New Year to everyone! I hope that you all had a pleasant holiday week.

About my adventure to the Motor Vehicle Department. As it turned out, I wasn't the only last minute Annie showing up on the last possible day of the year -

That's the line! It snaked around inside and spilled out about 10 people deep outside!

And, I wasn't the only one frustrated with all of the new regulations about proving one's identity. A friendly Jersey truck driver cussed out a very heavily accented eastern european clerk because she advised him that his old (and still valid) drivers license and his passport wasn't enough identification... I felt like I was in a Martin rerun!

I only had to go home once to get more papers. After a few hours and this start to a Noro bag to show for the time, I paid my $33 bucks and came away with a new, digitized and probably micro chipped license!

Later that night, I was off to the city to see what eyes are partly for