Handspun Milo Vest

I took a small break from working on the sweater for Seth's Dad (I just have part of a sleeve, seaming, and the collar left!) to whip up a quick baby gift for an old co-worker of mine from Maine. Her baby is due in early March and since she received tons of newborn stuff at her shower, I decided to make something for the fall/winter.

There was a skein of handspun in the shop that had been sitting there for quite a while, and I thought it would be perfect as a little girl gift.

It started as this handspun:

And was knit into this:

Pattern: Milo by Georgie Hallam 

Yarn: Handspun Rambouillet Wool dyed by Two if by Hand

Modifications: None. I followed the directions for the 9 month size. It was a really well written, easy to follow pattern with several different options for the cable. It knit up really quick (I finished in a day) and only used about 200 yards for the 9 month size. 

I will definitely be making more of these as baby gifts. So quick and so cute!

Seth and I took a drive up into the mountains today to do a little bit of XC skiing. The weather was beautiful and we had a great time...and of course Sailor had a great time romping through the snow.

Please excuse my terrible XC skiing form....it's really quite atrocious.  

 Sailor spent the first 1/2 mile running around like a madman...until we ran into a 1 year old goldendoodle. They practically knocked me over and then had a good time wrestling and playing. Unfortunately we didn't think to snap any pics of the madness. Sailor slowed down quite a bit after that!

 crazy dog.

We had to stop at the store to pick up some essentials that we were completely out of on our way home. I was fully intending to just have soup and sandwiches for dinner tonight since we ate out last night and had a HUGE meal complete with appetizers and dessert (flourless chocolate torte....soooo good).  But then I was walking through the baked goods aisle and a loaf of cinnamon swirl bread was begging to come home with us and become french toast for dinner. It was a loaf from some local place and it made for some crazy good french toast:

This is Seth's french toast with bananas and walnuts. There was maple syrup added after the photo was taken! 

Well, I should start thinking about bed...

Miss you!

Love,

liz :)

A whole lot of pears, a kitty cat, and a little knitting.

In addition to our apple tree, we have a pear tree in the backyard. Seth climbed up in the tree (surprise, surprise) and picked all the ripe pears last weekend. On Wednesday we canned them. All 16 pints of them. Phew.

We gave a jar away already and Seth opened one of the quart sized jars. 

Thankfully, I think we're done canning for the season. It's definitely worth all the work, but we're running out of room to store things! Hopefully next summer our tomatoes will do better and I can make and can some tomato puree for sauce. 

In other news,  Sailor has had an exciting few days! One of the neighborhood kittens has decided that our backyard is an awesome place to hang out. This pleases Sailor to no end. This morning I woke up to him barking like a crazy dog and clawing at the sliding glass door because the kitty was in the yard. It has certainly made for some good laughs. 

When the kitty (Seth has named him/her Polka Dot) came around this afternoon, I took the camera outside to snap a few photos.

The first thing Polka Dot does is jump up on the fence and hide behind the shed. Big Dumb Dog (sailor) has no clue that the cat is up there.

 Polka Dot peeking out from behind the shed.

 Pretty Kitty. 

Sailor watching me pet Polka Dot. He was surprisingly calm. 

Polka Dot clearly isn't phased by Sailor giving him the stare down. 

Impressively close to the kitty...

And....chasing Polka Dot.

Silly Pup. 

Now time for the knitting. I actually have TWO finished projects to show off. 

Seth's mom asked me if I would make a baby boy sweater and hat for her to bring as a gift to a baby shower she is going to in a couple of weeks.

Pattern: Manda Ruth by Jane Richmond 

Yarn: Dream in Color Classy in Happy Forest

Modifications: A whole bunch. Ummm, let's see. First, I used a smaller gauge than called for in the pattern which resulted in some creative math being done to make sure it didn't end up as doll-sized sweater. I also skipped the hood and made a collar instead. 

Pattern: BuzzBee by Woolly Wormhead (this is from her pattern book "Wee Wooly Toppers"- a good investment for 10 ridiculously adorable baby hat patterns)

Yarn: Dream in Color Classy in Happy Forest

Modifications: None. Followed this exactly as written and it's adorable (even Seth thinks so!).

How cute are the planes, trains, and automobile buttons?? 

Well, I think I've inundated you with enough pictures for now! 

Love,

liz :)

Start of the Salem Hooded Jacket

I cast on for my Salem Hooded Jacket earlier this week. And I'm in love. I've knit with Malabrigo Worsted a whole bunch and love it. But the Malabrigo Twist....amazing. It's softer that the Worsted and doesn't pill as easy. Not to mention, it's knitting up super duper fast on size 10 needles.

I have one sleeve finished and have already started the second (you knit the sleeves first, then the body up to the arm pits, then join them all together):

It's so squishy and soft....love, love, love.

I also made some really yummy soup last night, Corn and Potato Chowder from the Dinosaur BBQ cookbook.

Despite the fact that I forgot to have Seth get two of the ingredients at the store (carrots and green peppers...whoops), it still came out really tasty. So tasty that the leftovers are already gone. I halved the recipe, but next time I might just make the whole recipe and have leftovers for the week.

Seth is running another ultra this weekend...the McKenzie River 50K. The weather is supposed to be great, so it should be fun!

I'll make sure to take lots of pictures of Seth flying down the trails :)

Love,
liz

Weekend of Preserving

Seth and I spent almost the entire weekend canning! We have an apple tree in our backyard that has been dropping apples for the last several weeks. I admit, we've been lazy about picking them up off the ground (or at least I have), but on Thursday Seth picked them up and bagged up the ones that were suitable for cooking with. We ended up with a big paper grocery bag full of apples. 

Saturday, we cut up apples and threw some in the dehydrator and made applesauce out of the rest. Okay, I peeled the apples with our Apple Peeler Corer Slicer, and Seth sliced them. The apples are too soft for the Apple Peeler Corer Slicer to actually do the slicing, so we just used it to peel the apples. I definitely had the easy job!

We made 3 batches of applesauce and ended up with 6 quarts. I looked at a bunch of recipes ended up just kind of winging it. Basically, we used apples, a little bit of water and cinnamon. It was plenty sweet without any added sugar (at least Seth thought so). 

There were tons of left over apple peels:

Seth wanted to do something with them, so I put a bunch of them on a baking sheet, sprinkled sugar and cinnamon on them, and baked them in the oven. 

On Sunday we picked blackberries from the side of one of the trails nearby. Unfortunately, the blackberry bushes are full of thorns and it was difficult to reach many of the ripe berries. We still have tons of strawberries in the freezer from earlier in the summer, so we combined the berries to make Strawberry-Blackberry Jam, and then used the remaining blackberries from Blackberry Preserves. 

Check out all that canned goodness:

Poor little half jar of Blackberry Preserves!

We were on a roll with the cooking this weekend. Last night we made a whole roast chicken with green beans, radishes, carrots and onions. There were also mashed potatoes. Everything except the carrots and onion was from the Corvallis Farmer's Market. The chicken was from Afton Field Farm in Corvallis. All of their animals are pasture raised and grass fed. We've bought quite a few things from them this summer, and it has all been delicious. 

On the knitting front, I'm hoping to finish my Mom's Tea Leaves cardigan by Tuesday. It's going to be rainy today and possibly tomorrow, so I'm planning on watching movies and knitting until it's done. Then, the goal is to finish the sweater for Seth's Dad by sometime mid-October. 

Hope your last few days/weeks at camp are going well!

Love,

liz

Paddle, Paddle, Paddle

Yesterday we went paddling with our neighbors on the Salmon River and almost (but not quite) into the Pacific Ocean. It's their favorite place to paddle, and I can see why!

Photo credits go to Seth, by the way. As soon as we put the boats in, a cute seal popped his head up and was swimming around! Unfortunately he was too quick and we weren't able to get a picture of him.

We paddled about 1/2 mile down the river (although, since the tide was coming in it was like paddling up river!), pulled our boats up on the sand, and saw this:

Gorgeous, huh?

We walked up and down the beach for a while collecting cool rocks and even found some sea glass and a starfish:

Seth found lots of sand dollars. Don't worry. We brought them all home. :)

We had lunch on the beach and then paddled back up the river, which involved a lot more sitting than paddling since the tide was still coming in!

Don't I look like a pro?

Here's our neighbors in their tandem kayak doing a little bird watching:

We ended up having perfect weather. The weather at the coast can be unpredictable, at best. Most of the time it's cloudy/foggy and cold. We ended up with 60 degree weather and sun! The water, however, was freezing. Colder than the Atlantic in Maine, by quite a bit. BRRR! I was a little surprised to see a bunch of little kids swimming in the ocean! It was too cold to do anything but dip your toes in.

No knitting to share today....but I did make a pretty fantastic dinner with cherry tomatoes from our garden. I meant to take a picture...but it didn't last long on the plate! It was just roasted cherry tomatoes with garlic, olive oil, and basil tossed with pasta. Oh, and some parmesan cheese. Yum. It was delish. I'm also trying my hand at dehydrating apples. We have an apple tree in our back yard, and have more apples than I know what to do with. I'll definitely be making some applesauce, but I need to get some new cans first.

I'll leave you with one last parting shot of gorgeous Oregon:

Love,
liz

in limbo

so i have one or maybe two weeks left of my job.  the house is almost completely cleaned out- i have 3 bags of clothes to be deposited at the goodwill today and i'm tired.  tired of feeling like i made a crazy decision.

tell me it's not a crazy decision.

in other news- not having tv or a whole lot of responsibility, i've been knitting like a crazy woman... i started drew's vest, the same i'm making for my dad, but a smaller version... i just finished my first ball of yarn, which took a while, but you are right, you get used to the pattern and pretty much all i have to do now is keep track of where i am in the middle section and trot on from there...

i also have photos of the munchkin in her birthday dress :) which fit so perfectly and she was so darn cute in it!!!

front...

 and back!

I'm also going to make one more of those cute baby boy bumps for another friend who just adopted a little man who they named george :)  sooooo cute!!!!  and he will be so much more delicious in a precious sweater from me :)  Mom also bought me some gorgeous fingerweight yarn from webs- i have to look up what it is- for me to make a shawl... it was on sale in their super summer sale and is like 900 yards!!  F was a trooper and helped me wind it by hand.. and then asked if there was a machine that could do this... haha.

But backtracking a bit now...  the move was fast and the visit home was super short.  Drove wed to ohio, dropped the stuff at the G parents and then to VT with the dog on thursday.  Home friday for the day, to mass for the baby birthday sat and sunday (we stayed in the dorm with the family, ha!) and then back to VT sunday night, home for the day monday and back to ohio on tuesday.  stayed the night in cleveland and took a short detour to get wings on our way at the official home of buffalo wings and a few beers, cause let's be honest, that was one hell of a long drive... once we were in cleveland, we went to an old market- which was amazing.  they had isles and isles of vendors and michael symon's pick for "best thing i ever ate" - beef jerkey.  seriously.  it was amazing.  

speaking of michael symon- we went to his restaurant Lolita for a treat for dinner that night.  it was amaaaazing.  we started with beet and feta salad and bruchetta for an appetizer... then i had the salmon special and f got the hanger steak.  it was all so good, i was so stuffed!!  But of course we had dessert- i had the vanilla gelato and f had the lemon panna cotta.  Our waiter was amazing- he was very informative and funny- giving interesting tidbits about the restaurant and food we were eating. a great experience!

then we drove to Nashville and stayed there (no bed in the house didn't sound like fun for two nights).  We ended up going to the Chihuly exhibit at the Frist and F totally loved it.  They had a video that explained everything about the process of making the sculptures, which was fascinating- totally collaborative!  We also at out quite a bit and walked a little bit too :)

Then i dropped him off at the airport on Saturday pm and drove home to start the big cleanup in Kentucky.  It's a good feeling to be almost finished, but as I mentioned before.  I'm teetering on terrified at not having a job...

off to do a bit more work :)  talk soon?

Blueberries!

Last Friday Seth and I went down the road to a local blueberry nursery (blueberry patch? blueberry grove?) to pick some blueberries for jelly and smoothies. We ended up picking 16 pounds of blueberries which took me several days to wash and freeze (you can only fit so many cooling racks of blueberries in the freezer at a time, you know?!).  Since well before blueberry season started Seth has been asking for "Blueberry Buckle".  So....Friday night while Seth was at work I found a blueberry buckle recipe and whipped one up. It was super easy, and came out pretty well (according to Seth, anyways). I didn't get around to taking a picture until yesterday...

I also made some blueberry jelly with the recipe from the Sure-Gel box...I ended up with 6 small jars:

I also have a bit of knitting and spinning to share. I finally finished up a pair of socks that I started at the beginning of the month. Hand knit socks are wonderfully comfortable, but I have second sock syndrome.   I love knitting the first sock, but then I have a hard time motivating myself to start and finish the second. I think I need to learn the "2 socks at a time" method. Anyways.....here they are in all their glory:

Pattern: Chicklets Sock by Anne Hanson 

Yarn: Socks that Rock Medium weight by Blue Moon Fiber Arts

Modifications: None. But if I were to knit these again, I would make the leg part smaller, but keep the foot circumference the same size for a better fit on the leg. 

This is a great sock pattern that is easily memorized and has just enough texture without being over the top (the yarn does a fine job with that!). 

Please don't look too closely at the "cankles" I have going on....

This picture shows the texture of the pattern pretty well:

I also finished spinning up some merino today. It's the thinest yarn I've spun yet, it ended up as about 300 yards of fingering weight:

(check out my huge daisies!) 

Seth and I are flying back East tomorrow to attend a wedding in Vermont (yay!)....our friends Elizabeth and Ben are getting hitched! We're taking a little trip up to Maine before the wedding to see some friends and of course stop at Purl Diva yarn shop (what's a visit to Maine without stopping?!)! I'm sure I'll have lots to post about when we return next week! 

Love,

liz 

Glad You're Alive!

Before I tell you about our weekend at Da Vinci Days....

1. Wow! You're moving back to New England! Now you can knit lots of warm things to wear during winter! I'm actually going to be home in October....we'll have to plan something!

2. Creepy about your wallet. ugh. Sorry you had to deal with that.

3. The birthday dress for baby Charlotte is ADORABLE!!!! Even as she grows too tall to wear it as a dress, she could wear it as a super cute shirt.

4. Love the vest you are going to make! It's actually similar to the one I made (Kristen Kapur's designs are lovely and really well written). I highly recommend checking out this post on Purl Diva's blog about organizing all the charts. I did something similar and it was really helpful to have until I had the pattern memorized. Also check out this post, also by Purl Diva.

5. I don't like rhubarb. The smell.....ew. We actually had some in our yard and Seth's Mom used it to make strawberry rhubarb pie.

6. Which Ysolda book were you thinking about buying? I have Whimsical Little Knits I and II. They both have great patterns in them. She also has a book coming out in September called Little Red in the City which will be all sweater patterns. You could also just buy individual patterns on ravelry if there are certain ones you want.

7. Weekend Sewing is a good book. It has a lot of cute dresses and kids stuff in it, but I've honestly only made the drawstring bags so far. I'm not brave enough to attempt any garments yet! I think the PJ pants will probably be my first garment, though.

Phew.

Corvallis has a festival every summer called Da Vinci Days, which is a science and art festival. The big event of the weekend is the Grand Kinetic Challenge. Kinetic sculptures are built to ride on roads, climb sand dunes, ride through mud, and float down the river. It's kind of hard to explain....so maybe some pictures will help! :)

Friday the sculptures were judged and the teams had to sing their team song. On Saturday there was a parade of the sculptures along with unicycle riders, electric cars, and solar powered cars. We caught a little bit of the parade while we were biking around town. A few hours after the parade the sculptures take off down the race course, which is mostly on the bike path. Tons of people take off on their bikes to ride along. The sculptures stop at the fairgrounds and have to climb a sand dune before continuing on the race course.

Here's one of the sculptures waiting in line at the sand dune:

Here is the lobster climbing the dune:

Some more sculptures:

This guy has participated in the race for a number of years, and you could tell. He flew right up the sand dune with absolutely no problems.

On Sunday, the sculptures had to ride through a mud bog and then go 2 miles down the Willamette River. I was going to try and catch all of the Sunday festivities, but I ended up skipping the mud portion. It was pretty entertaining to watch the sculptures come down the river, though!

Crazy, huh?!

Well, I have some foodie things to share, but I haven't uploaded the pictures yet. I'll post tomorrow with those :)

Love,
liz :)