12.17 It's been a difficult day

Brandon

2000 - 17 December 2009

12.3 Back from Thanksgiving

... and running hard. I appreciate all of your good thoughts about Brandon the dog. He's on something which is diminishing his symptoms at the moment, although it's only a stopgap and it's obvious the end can't be pushed off very long. He tires easily, but is still interested in food, going outside, and stopping cat squabbles. He howls at the telephone ringing and barks at the mailman. Life still seems to be ok.

I seem to be thrashing around. I haven't spun anything since two days after I last mentioned it on the blog (a month ago? I don't want to look.) I haven't knit consistently on anything. I've started an SOA, but quit for vacation because the double balls of yarn were too cumbersome to take. I didn't finish the corner-to-corner on vacation because while I thought I had the Next Ball of yarn, when I checked the bag, I really didn't, that was some other yarn. In the fifteen minutes I had before we left the house, I tore apart the stash, but didn't find it. I now have to put the stash back together before the cats are allowed back in the spare room. I also still need to find the Next Ball. Where is it?

In a huff I started a new shawl on the trip, which was fun, but now I have another shawl to keep working on when I really wanted to finish up corner-to-corner and concentrate on SOA.

Like I said. Thrashing around.

11.25 Drive by blogging

Things have been a little interesting for a while and aren't going to calm down yet.

1. I have a part time temporary job, filling in for a one person office whose one person has disappeared in the time suck of Family Emergencies (not 1, not 2, but 3 simultaneous emergencies). This will keep me busy for at least another week after the holiday.

2. The play went well. Really, really well.

3. The guests who came to see the play have come and gone.

4. The sickies are all well again. The sickest has almost finished catching up on the week of homework/schoolwork/tests she missed.

5. The dog has lymphoma and has been given "a few weeks". He "might make it through New Year's." Merry Christmas.

6. It's going to rain all the way to our Thanksgiving destination. It's supposed to be sunny on the way back.

7. I have the Never-Ending-Ball of Yarn to take with me, and the next ball of yarn, just in case I actually finish up the NEBoY. I also need to get the pattern for the last corner of the Corner-to-Corner, just in case, etc. (I knit the first ball of yarn, then started into the NEBoY and decided that when I got to the end of the NEBoY it would be time to start the last corner. That decision hasn't changed in the last two months while I've been working on the NEBoY.)

Have a good Thanksgiving.

11.12 Thankful Thursday

Today's edition of Thankful Thursday is brought to you by Family:

1. I'm thankful for the good relationship I have with both my sibs. We did the obligatory bickering as teenagers, but we get along really well as adults. We puzzle those in-laws who don't have the benefit of getting along with their sibs, but over the past twenty-odd years they have gotten over most of their bewilderment and like hanging with us as well.

2. I'm thankful for the fact that all four of my kids' grandparents have been interested in making good relationships with their grandchildren, without having an overwhelming desire to tell us we were doing it all wrong.

3. I'm thankful for my husband and my kids, who are pretty fun people to hang around with. Our kids keep us on the run, being interested in doing all kinds of things, but it's probably good for us.

Speaking of being on the run, the play starts tonight and goes for four performances (Thursday, Friday, Saturday mat, Saturday night). I'm helping in the box office for most of those - I will be thankful when all of that is over!

11.10 Foods

A bit ago Claudia asked what people liked about November and many of the answers came back as food, which apparently surprised her, as she doesn't associate any month with a given food.

I mentioned foods in my answer to her, but really, I would probably have mentioned foods associated with almost any month mentioned. It's not that I eat more at any one time of the year than at any other, it's just that I grew up, and have continued, a yearly cycle of menus. My cycle as chief cook differs from my mother's to some extent, but she and I both depend a great deal on "what's in season". Additionally, while we definitely have some "holiday foods", these are in substitution for other foods, not in addition to those foods.

So, herewith is my list of foods by month in which we eat them. If you ask me what I like about these months, these foods will come up!

January: New Year's Day we have tamales, because that's an easy going day where all the hands are available for fixings!

February: Artichokes: my mother's b'day is in Feb and she always requested them for her birthday; February is when they first showed in the grocery stores on the east coast. Also, Angel food cake and strawberries (frozen), ditto.

March: I don't care for corned beef, my family does. I fix it once a year, in March.

April: Crown roast of pork for Easter dinner. I fix it then because it is sometimes available then without having to special order one.

May: My birthday - Pecan pie. I don't bother much with b'day cake; b'day pie is another matter! Also, if I can get them, fresh spargeln.

June: Strawberries. Bacon Lettuce sandwiches (don't ask me why this one - It's Traditional. Maybe because that's when the early lettuce is ready?)

July: Blueberries. Grilled items. Lettuce salads.

August: Watermelon and fresh corn. Cantelope. Maple syrup we get when we go to Canada. More grilled items.

September: Fresh corn. Squashes. Grapes.

October: Winter squashes in casserole.

November: Sourdough bread - bread season starts in November when the house is cool enough to bake again. Pumpkin pie. Turkey?

December: Turkey?* Waldorf salad (the kind with mustard dressing not mayo), and butterhorns.

Obviously we eat a lot of other things, but these are the main seasonal ones, and they belong in their own time of the year. What things do you associate with a given month or season?

* Turkey is a toss-up between Thanksgiving and Christmas - once we've had one turkey a year, we're done for another year. Which makes S ever so sad as it is one of his favorites. Last year, he learned to roast a turkey himself so that we would have it twice in a year.

11.9 Missing day...

Yesterday completely disappeared. What happened to Sunday? I dunno.

Monday has been ok. The house is quiet - J & S are off to the school Soccer Banquet. I like the way this school district does things: Scholastic awards are presented at the school, in an evening event to which parents are invited via an invitation mailed to the home*. Music and sports awards are presented at an off-campus event, sponsored by the parents group associated with the particular extracurricular activity, to which parents are invited by somebody running off copies and handing them to the students so they can lose them followed by somebody running off more copies and running around at the last event (three days after the deadline to turn them in) and asking anxiously - have you gotten one of these yet?

K is mostly over her flu - just an ear infection left, which will, with any luck, succumb immediately to the antibiotics.

*While this is a good example of the difference in emphasis and I appreciate the heck out of the difference, I deeply resent the wastage of paper, envelopes, ink, time and postage, of all of the mailings sent home by the schools here. As a parent I was trained in the stern halls of a poor elementary school in California, where only one paper was sent home for each family, sent with the oldest child in the family, and volunteers made the copies and carefully counted out just enough copies for each classroom. Parents knew things came home with their kids and expected to get them.

Here in NY, students are apparently considered incapable of handling such higher responsibilities and the amount of wastage is amazing. The worst case was when the school sent me a letter to tell me that they were going to send me another letter and I should expect it. I kept turning the first letter over and looking in the envelope to try to figure out what I was missing.

11.7 Swatching

The red became a swatch:

Wash, blocked and dried. Moss stitch, meant for a filler in an SOA.

11.6 Dyeing again

This time I dyed some fiber. Using the same basic technique, but allowing the temperature to go a bit higher, I wound up having to rinse only twice before it ran clear. A significant improvement over the dyeing with yarn and red dye earlier. This was a pound of Dunnose Head Farm white and will probably get spun up soon as I have the itch to play with it.

11.5 Thankful Thursday

Three things I'm thankful for?

1. Cats: Despite the fact that I grumble when they annoy me (really, a wet cold nose in the armpit at 4:30 am?) they are soft, cuddly, better than a hot water bottle when I'm sick, and it's incredibly soothing to pat one when I'm stressed.

2. Gardens: Despite the fact that I grumble when I have to weed or water or mulch them, I adore watching them grow and develop, changing from season to season, and particularly when they are in bloom.

3. Pumpkin pie: There is no "despite" associated with pumpkin pie.

11.4 Lentil soup

The ick list has been lengthening - J seems to be developing a sinus infection and K came home from school early with a headache and sore throat. She took a nap, and awoke with a temperature which was rapidly rising. No play practice for her tonight.

Lentil Soup was on the menu for the sick and ailing:

in a 3 quart crock pot:

2 cups lentils

1.5 cups sliced carrots

1 cup sliced celery

8 cloves garlic, chopped

2 tsp Italian herb mix (Penzey's)

64 oz chicken broth

Cook on high for 2 hours, (add more liquid if needed) then cook on low for 3 hours more. I added 1.5 cups diced ham in the last hour.

Sourdough bread on the side!

11.3 Proof of spinning

Pics or it didn't happen?

Here you go.

This is the second bobbin. The first bobbin is hidden from the cat - I'll have to fish it out and get a pic of that one too.

11.2 He does.

He has the flu. He's feeling better.

The rest of us? The jury is still out.

I'm getting some spinning done: Purple BFL from High Bid Farm, acquired at Fingerlakes Fiber Festival.

11.1 Does he or doesn't he?

J isn't feeling well. Sore throat, runny nose, cough, achy all over, little bit of a fever.

He sat in a conference room three days this week with someone who went home early the third day with a "fever and flu-like symptoms".

Does he or doesn't he have the flu? Only time will tell.

Will or won't the rest of us? Ditto.

10.28 Why?

I'm feeling crabby. I want someone to tell me what the magic words are, since I don't seem to be able to figure them out myself.

I patronize a grocery store that has gone to selling reusable grocery bags. I have purchased a large stash of said bags. I even mostly remember to take the bags with me when I go shopping.

Will someone please explain why the same checkers who cannot seem to pack more than 2 items per plastic bag take great glee in packing everything into two bags (generally with the bananas on the bottom) and handing me back the "extra" three bags I gave them?

I have tried reminding them that there are more bags available, asking them to consider using the other bags, and telling them outright that I want all the bags used, not just some of them. Nothing seems to work; it doesn't matter which checker, the age of the checker or when in the process that I make my pleas.

I'm feeling crabby.

10.21 Dyeing results

It's been annoying, but now I am merely apathetic. I've tried varying the water temp, adding more vinegar, length of time for soaking... Nothing seems to make a difference except just continuing to rinse. Eventually, it rinses clean. Fortunately, I don't seem to be felting it.

I do like the way it's turning out.

10.20 Dyeing

(Q. how on earth is it more than a week later?)

Having finally found my dye pot (I've been looking for more than six weeks), I got round to doing some dyeing that I've been planning for a year or so. I had dyed 7 skeins, but disliked the color so much, they've been sitting about looking ugly at me. I'd finally decided on Magenta as the color for overdyeing and am very happy with the way it turned out. The only thing I don't like is the rinsing and rinsing and rinsing that red dye requires. The skeins don't seem to change color, but the water is still red.

24 hours later:
Skein 1: 15 rinses to run clear. Hanging to dry.
Skein 2: 8 rinses: still red.
Skein 3: 5 rinses: still red.
Skeins 4-7: Waiting for their turn.

This is going to take forever. ::le sigh::

10.12 Time for soup

Anyone who knew me while I was growing up would be astounded to hear me say that Fall means Time for Soup. Growing up, I hated soup, just as growing up, my sister hated cheese. As each of us went out into the world of Being the Grown-up, we discovered we were wrong. Rather than disliking an entire category of food, we simply disliked that portion of the category we had been exposed to so far.

Each set of parents presents their children with those food they themselves like, rationally enough. One doesn't usually get up in the morning and say - I think today I'll buy some food I hate eating and make let the kids try it. For one thing, my experience with kids is that it takes between 3 and 7 exposures to a new food before they like it (fewer if it's similar enough to something they already like).* The wider that parents' tastes in food, the wider the children's exposure will be, but it still doesn't usually cover the entire possible gamut. My parents ate a lot of different things, but...

Anyway. Back to soup.

One of my favorites is my version of Mushroom Parmesan Soup, modified from Bernard Clayton's Complete Book of Soups and Stews (this is a book I've enjoyed very much in trying new soups out).

1.5 pounds mushrooms (This time I used a mix of Maitake (Hen of the Woods), Oyster, Crimini and a small package of dried Morels, reconstituted. - previously I've also used Shitake, Chanterelle and Enoki mushrooms in the mix - each different combination gives a slightly different end product. I haven't decided on the definitive combination yet, and may never!)
2-3 cloves garlic, chopped.
2 cups scallions, chopped.
3 T butter
2 T flour
4 cups stock (beef or chicken. If beef, I use red wine; if chicken, white.)
1/2 c wine
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp ground black pepper
4 egg yolks
2 T chopped fresh parsley
3/4 c grated parmesan cheese

Chop the stems off the mushrooms and roughly cut. Slice mushrooms thinly.
Heat oil in soup pot. Add mushroom stems, garlic and scallions. Steam, covered, for about ten minutes, stirring frequently. Put this into a food processor and turn into a chunky paste (don't overdo the processing). Put the paste back into the soup pot, add the butter and flour, stir until melted and merged together.

Stir in the stock and the sliced mushroom caps. Simmer for 10 minutes. Add the wine and stir.

Mix the egg yolks, parsley and parmesan cheese in a separate bowl. Stir into the soup mix. Serve immediately, usually with fresh bread. (Note: This was a taste 5 for K & S - everyone had some and I didn't have to listen to any whining!)

This leaves you with 4 egg whites (usually). After dinner, heat the oven to 350F. Beat the egg whites and 1/4 tsp salt on high to stiff peaks. Add 1 tsp almond extract. On a medium speed, gradually add (1 T at a time) 1 cup granulated sugar. When the sugar is all mixed in, measure out 1 T batter at a time onto a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper. These won't expand, so you can put your batter dabs quite close together. Put cookie sheet in the oven and turn off the heat. Leave the oven closed until morning. Enjoy your Forgotten Cookies the next day.

*Our conversations go something like this:
Taste 1: Ew xyz is awful.
Taste 2: Yuk.
Taste 3: Why do you always make xyz?
Many months later, why don't you ever make xyz?
Taste 4: This is great!

10.8 dye day

While I was running around trying not to dip my shawl in the indigo, I managed to come up with this:



being Jaggerspun Zephyr (wool/silk laceweight), dyed with (mordant)tin+goldenrod+indigo

and this: (the skein on the right)



These are both alpaca lacweight. The ball on the left was done at the last dye day with (mordant)alum + cochineal + indigo. This day's skein was (mordant)tin+cochineal+indigo.

The tin tends to strike on unevenly, and we had a full dye pot, so the yellow achieved with the goldenrod was quite variegated, from pale yellow to full on gold. This then went from blue to full on green and I really like it. The red from the cochineal wasn't quite so strikingly variegated, but you can see where the indigo left some bluer bits.

Both of these are destined to be shawls (what a surprise!). I'm thinking the tin/cochineal/indigo will form the stripe of one of the striped Icelandic shawls from the Triangle and Long Shawls book.

10.7 Hyrna finished

Quite a while ago, I started Hyrna Herborgar. I ran out of yarn and ripped it all out. A while ago (two years and a bit?) I started Hyrna Herborgar again. I got to the part where the fans start, and got stalled because I had a mistake and no time to figure out where I'd goofed. I picked it up again and guess what?

It's done.




I actually wore it to Dye Day, and had many compliments, and worried like crazy that I'd get indigo dye splashed on it (didn't, but i worried). It looks all lacy and fragile, but it's alpaca laceweight and I was warm outside (57 degrees F) all day.

9.29 end of the yarn

Hyrna Herborgar is coming along again (at last). One of the projects that K unearthed for me, it's been waiting for two years for me to figure out why I had two extra stitches appear over the most recently knit two rows. I had gone from 437 stitches (expected) to 445 stitches rather than 443 stitches. I set it down until I had some Attention to give to it, and there it sat.

It's moving along again - having identified and fixed the problem, I've now gotten from 22 rows to go to 13 stitches, one row and a bind off to finish.


Unfortunately, I need to find the other ball of yarn first.