Almost done with Paulie

I literally have 4 more rows and the ivied bind off.  So already done with this!  I can't wait to try it on and block it. 

I made bread (http://m.allrecipes.com/recipe/6788/amish-white-bread) this week so we're having French toast ...

Happy holidays!

Don't know about anyone else but I have ton of baking lately, which always makes me happy. Pecan pie, cookies, more cookies and cinnamon bread. That last was made just to be used in French toast tomorrow. How decadent.
For knitting, my aim for 2013 is to work in color. I've spent the last couple months working in earth tones and I've had it. Kauni, here I come!
So I hope everyone is having some wonderful time, hopefully off, with good company.

Pre-Thanksgiving tradition

I hope everyone is gearing up for a fun and safe holiday. Every year for Thanksgiving eve we have baked Brie in puff pastry for dinner and chocolate mousse. And we watch Charlie Brown. I also made cornbread for stuffing tomorrow.

Interesting day

Went to see Van Halen last night, so we took today off. Nice relaxing day - did some laundry and errands, got buttons for Hallett's Ledge, discovered my gauge was all wrong on Cecily and ripped it almost all the way back (sad), and made strawberry shortcake.

Something fun for fall

We made these over the weekend - awesome.  The little one also played soccer, his last regular season games and did a nice job.  That could be somewhat to do with his new found interest in hockey.  We also went to a Gladiators game:

where I worked on Sara's mittens:

Swatches and muffins

In case you hadn't noticed, I love to bake.
I'm making buttermilk dried cherry muffins right now.
I'm also thinking I  like my pattern, but maybe these aren't the right beads:

The sample is very small, I know.  I'm thinking maybe I want to use matte beads, so they look like sea glass.
I need votes . . . .
What about these? http://www.fusionbeads.com/shop/product/27565/
http://www.fusionbeads.com/shop/product/27625/
and these
http://www.fusionbeads.com/shop/product/27500/

It's the day before Thanksgiving

So more cooking and cleaning than anything else.

Here's what's on for after dinner tonight:
http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/White-Chocolate-Mousse-with-Dark-Chocolate-Sauce-2639
And for Thanksgiving Breakfast:
http://baking.about.com/od/sweetrolls/r/ultimtecinnroll.htm

And something we'll undoubtedly make again this weekend:
http://www.cookography.com/2007/french-onion-soup

No, really; you should make this. It's amazing.
Have a great holiday everyone!

wow, that's really ugly, or the Messenger Bag of Doom

So, at home today, waiting for roofers.
I pulled out the sewing machine to fix some hems.
I also pulled out the leftover fleece from the Halloween costume this year to make a knitting bag.
It's based loosely on a messenger bag design, and I made 2 smaller bag inside for sticking scissors etc., in. I made it out of fleece because I get tired of bags being so rough they make my yarn pill before I even knit with it. When working on something complicated, like a Fassett sweater, I used to use an old pillowcase to bring it with me, but that's inconvenient (no handles or compartments) and kind of makes you look, well, insane, actually.
Boy, is this thing ugly!
Maybe if I had picked out colors I wanted to use instead of using up leftovers . . . I dunno. But's very soft and I think would look like more with a real project in it. I kind of want to crawl into it myself.
Other things to do today - making pizza and finishing plying that Gotland.

Again, no picture

It's been really cold down here this week, which I love, being from a cold place.
While I plan to ply the blue silk/merino tonight, I may or may not have a picture of it to show before going to bed. But I did get all 8 oz. spun up last night.
So, a random thought from the past weekend - Apple Crisp. (Note, we made on big one, cooked it for 40 minutes, used Granny Smiths and Macintosh apples, added a dash of ginger, nutmeg and cloves to the apples, and a full stick of butter for the topping.) We generally try to roll out some new dish in our house every other weekend or so when the weather gets cold, this one was a keeper.
Thanks to Lori for inspiring me to share that one.

I'm back

And spinning up a storm. Or, since school has started and vehicles have been cranky, I've been spinning up some dust.
Fun, at any rate.
Soryu is complete!
And here is the Gotland started. Looks quite different inside and outside, colorwise it's right in the middle. It spins up nicely, easy to work with, but makes a hairy sort of single. I'll be interested to see how it looks plied.
Other fun things lately include making these chocolate chip cookies. Thanks NYT!

Testing testing

Still not sold on whether the coal and the hand painted go together, I've started a test of the cabled cuff, the pick-up-and-knit-off version. I like the cables as cables, I like where the join of the pick up meets the cable band; I think that part works pretty well --nice and even. But I'm not happy with the way hand painted yarn looks in cables. Maybe it's just too much going on at one time for my eyes, it looks messy and muddy to me. Puts me in mind of icky jumbo-sized afghans made of Lion Brand multi acrylic (not that there is anything wrong with Lion Brand). Next I think I'll do a test of the two color idea - straight stitch with a turned cuff and have the colors grade into one another. I'll keep both so I can compare.
One of the things I like about getting older, and this isn't the first time I've said this, is that I no longer think making swatches is evil or lame.
And this little picture is what happens to your pizza crust when you have to wait 55 minutes for a dental appointment.