Nachos!!! That’s what you were thinking, right?

One of the great things about living in California is that our CSA runs for about 10 months a year. It recently started up, and we received a head of romaine lettuce and a bunch of spinach last week. This week we received a head of romaine lettuce and a bunch of spinach. Let’s also say that we barely ate any of the original greens, which are still fresh. And Bill is out of town for the week. That is a lot of greens for one person (me). CJ loves leafy greens. I could use them as a training treat. Here she is while I prep my lettuce.

Believe it or not, one of my favorite ways to eat greens is to put them on a pile of nachos. The nachos are simple. I use multigrain tostitos (which taste almost exactly like regular tostitos). I make a layer of chips on a dinner plate and top with cheese. You can then add an optional second layer of chips and cheese. I pop those in the microwave for about 90 seconds. They need to be watched so the cheese doesn’t get overcooked. Once the cheese is melted, I top with Trader Joe’s spicy bean dip (fat free and full of flavor!) and lots of salsa (and it looks like this). Then I put on the greens. If we have tomatoes I dice those up and put them on top. And if I have an avocado, and IF I remember, I add avocado. (I have avocado and I forgot.)

This is the easiest version. You can also top it with beans, or taco meat. It’s pretty simple, and you get some grains, calcium and veggies.

Another crazy thing people like to do with leafy greens is make salads. I had one of those today. It was yummy, but the nachos were better.

Tags: cooking

Last week I went to London with Bill. He was going for work and I went for pleasure!! It’s the first time I’ve been able to tag along on a work trip and I was super excited about it! Of course the first research I did on London related to yarn and fabric.

I had a couple of splurges. The first being at Liberty of London. Their cotton fabric is beautiful and I was surprised to see they had silk too. I bought a meter of silk to make myself a scarf. Then I bought some cotton for myself and for my mom. The fabric was pricey thanks to the crappy exchange rate, but I was told that if I wanted to buy a dress of their fabric, it would cost me more than 500 GBP which is WAY more than I spent. Interestingly enough, I did see a blouse made of the fabric of the red rose fabric, and it cost 95 GBP, again, much more than I spent for 3 meters. That made me feel better about my splurge.

My second purchase was at the Swarovski Crystallized store where they sold…yes, Swarovski crystal beads. They also had necklaces and bracelets that you could buy (for $$$). I fell in love with two pieces (this necklace and this bracelet) and bought some of the components to make the jewelry myself. It won’t be exact, but close enough. This did lead to buyer’s remorse but I felt better when I got home and found that I could not get the components in the US, even on the internet.

My third purchase was at iKnit. Cute store with great yarn. A lot of it available in the US, but I was able to find some great organic wool from Cornwall. It’s from Blacker Designs and not widely carried in the US. My goal for my yarn purchase was to get something I couldn’t find at home and I’m very happy with the Blacker Designs yarn. It’s a DK weight which I think is more practical for me living in Northern California. I also fell in love with some Hand Maiden Fine Yarn (dyed in Canada). But the color reminded me of London with the blues and greys, and I don’t have anything like it.

That was the bulk of my shopping. Bill bought me a silk scarf as a Valentine’s Day gift. (Actually, he told me he would get me one as a gift but I picked it out and bought it while he was at work.) I was enthralled with all the British women and their scarves. Silk scarves, pashminas, winter scarves… they wore them all so stylishly. I bought my scarf at Liberty of London, and they showed me how to wear it and I love it.

Let me tell you a little about Liberty of London. It’s a high end department store in this distinctive building in a big shopping district. They sell all brands of clothing, including pieces made from their fabric, and they sell their fabric as well as yarn and other haberdashery. I love that some of the department stores have haberdashery departments. I also went into John Lewis, another department store, and they had decorator weight fabrics available! They also had every type of Rowan Yarn in every color, as well as a few other brands. I showed amazing self restraint and didn’t buy any yarn, but I did buy some fabric for bedroom curtains. They had beautiful fabrics. I’ve been looking for bedroom curtains but I have a very specific color scheme in mind and I was very excited to find the perfect material. It’s decorator weight but it’s machine washable which is hard to find.

While I did spend a bit of money, I also did quite a bit of window shopping. New spring clothing was out and I really enjoyed looking at the styles and construction. It gave me some ideas.

So that’s my London trip for the crafty perspective. I did a ton of sight-seeing, but that will be a second post.

Tags: fabric, knitting, travel

One pair down, 11 more to go. They’ve actually been done for over two weeks, I just couldn’t get around to blogging about it. They are simple picot edged top down socks. The yarn is from my Sundara subscription. When I first started these, I wasn’t sure about the yarn. It was ok, but was seeming a little yellow. Now that I’ve finished, I really like the yarn. And the socks. The first half of the first sock took me over 6 months. The rest of that pair and the second sock took me about five days.

Bill picked out my February pair which I haven’t started yet. Instead, I started a pair of socks with some Vesper Yarn in the sweetheart colorway. They are perfect for February. I wonder if I can get two pairs of socks knit this month…

Tags: knitting, socks

If you are looking for the Weaving In Ends Department, that department is closed. Thank goodness.

Today I caught up on some projects that have been sitting around nearly finished. I have a shoulder warmer (the blue tube), a textured triangle shawl (the pink triangle) (rav link here), and a cabled caplet (the light blue thing that is hard to see at the top of the picture) (rav link here). There’s a recently finished project on the table too, my January socks (from my pair of socks a month challenge).

Three snaps in a circle for me for getting things done today!

P.S. Did you happen to see Conan O’Brien’s final Tonight Show last Friday? I thought it was very well done though a little crazy at the end. He had the opportunity to be really bitter and negative, and bad mouth NBC, but he was classy and positive. This is a quote from my favorite moment of the show: “All I ask is one thing, and I’m asking this particularly of young people that watch. Please do not be cynical. I hate cynicism. For the record it’s my least favorite quality. It doesn’t lead anywhere. Nobody in life gets exactly what they thought they were going to get. But if you work really hard and you’re kind, amazing things will happen. I’m telling you, amazing things will happen.”

Tags: knitting

Today is my birthday! I’m not obsessed with my age but 35 does sound like a big number. I like to torment my parent’s and ask “do you believe you have a daughter that is 35 years old?” (insert evil laugh here)

This has been a great day. (Will be near perfect if the Blackhawks win tonight.) Bill took the day off work to spend some time with me. He took me to my allergy shot, dropped me at the hair salon while I got a cut and color. Then we went to lunch at The Garret for a burger and beer. There was a quick stop at Blockbuster to pick out a movie for the weekend (500 Days of Summer) and then home to relax and knit and watch the Blackhawks game. I got birthday phone calls from all the parents and lots of facebook happy birthdays! It’s not been too different from most Thursdays, but different enough to make me happy. Suffice it to say, I feel pampered, loved and special.

Green Planet Yarn made me feel super special a couple of weeks ago with their birthday sale program. You can go in one day during your birthday month and have the opportunity to save 20, 40 or 100% off your total purchase. I had my eyes on some Lorna’s Laces Worsted in Valentine and Spud and Chloe in grass for two sweaters. Then some other yarn caught my eye for a little capelet. It’s a decent amount of yarn that came up to a pretty hefty total, but then I picked out a 40% chip (!!!) and once I put in my Christmas money, it didn’t cost me very much out of pocket.

Today I’m working on a top down raglan sweater in the Valentine yarn. I’m very nervous about it because I have to modify the pattern for my size. I’m not an experienced sweater knitter but I have confidence in my math skills. It’s just such beautiful yarn I don’t want to wear out the fiber if I have to frog it. The beauty of a top down sweater is that I can try it on as I go. My other “issue” is that I agonized over which pattern to use. I went with the garter yoke cardi because it’s a simple silhouette that won’t compete with the multi color yarn. Fingers crossed that it fits well when I’m done.

Well, it’s time for some special birthday cupcakes from Sprinkles. 34 years later, I still get the same happy and excited look on my face when someone offers me cake.

Tags: knitting, life

This is a project I stitched up years ago, in 2004. I think I bought the cross stitch kit at the Walmart by Ocean City, MD to entertain me during a beach week with Bill’s parents. For whatever reason, I never got around to the finishing. I even had the fabric. But all things happen for a reason.

I was finally motivated to finish this project as a Christmas present for Gran. Gran is keeping Harrison (Bill’s cat) permanently. We miss him, but he’s good company for Gran and I think Harrison is happier being a single child. Plus, we do have visitation rights. Anyhoo, I finally had a reason to finish this project.

It’s the first cross stitch that I made into a pillow, and the first pillow that I did with piping. Lots of firsts. I think my piping skills have room for improvement, but I’m happy with how the project turned out. Very happy actually, and that’s saying a lot. Here’s another picture.

It was a fun project to work on, and I was happy to give it as a gift.

Tags: cross stitch, sewing

I lean towards no, but we’ll give it a shot. What brings this up you ask? Well, we bought my mother-in-law, Jeanne, the Yarn Harlot’s page-a-day calendar for Christmas. Jeanne is a knitter and we thought it a good gift. It’s not quite as overwhelming as a stitch-a-day kind of thing. Those are nice but that’s a lot of stitches to keep track of. Jeanne emailed me a tip she read from her calendar. The tip was to create your own sock of the month club from stash yarn and patterns you have queued up.

I’m going to interrupt myself and ask a question: Is my sharing this violation of some copyright or something? I prefer to think of it as unpaid advertising in that Jeanne really likes the calendar and if you enjoy tips like this, pick up the Yarn Harlot’s page-a-day calendar, available at Amazon or other fine retailers. Hopefully that has covered some bases that may or may not have needed covering.

So last night (see how exciting Saturday nights can be!) I pulled out my sock yarn and my sock patterns. Scary thing, I actually have enough yarn for 12 pairs of socks. That surprised me. In reality, I have 11 plus two on the needles. My January sock is going to be one of those WIPs. The other on the needles is a pair of knee socks. I also laid out another pair of knee socks but swapped that out for a pair of regular sized socks. In my mind, one pair of knee socks is about two pairs of regular socks knee. Thusly, knee socks are separate projects from this challenge. The rest of the yarn has been matched up with patterns. I have 6 “hard” pairs and 6 basic pairs. If all goes according to plan, by the end of the year I will have 12 pairs of completed socks.

This challenge seems, well, challenging. I don’t know if I’ve even completed 12 total projects in a year. Regardless, nothing ventured, nothing gained and this seems like a fun way to get some socks knit up. Wish me luck!

Tags: knitting, socks

Over the summer, I found a dresser at a garage sale. It was in need of some serious TLC, but I saw potential. Fast forward three months or so, and I finally got around to working on it. I sanded it and primed it and painted it and then realized I hadn’t done a good job of sanding it. Or washing it before the priming. Back to the beginning; I resanded it. The top had some serious damage to it, lots of scratches and stuff etched into it. I thought the paint would fill in the scratches (lazy talk). This time around, I sanded the crap out of it. And then I really did a good job washing it. I re-primed and re-painted and this time I was very happy with the job. I used spray primer and paint to get a smooth finish, and I used glossy paint. My big splurge was the hardware which I got at restoration hardware. I looked at Home Depot, but wasn’t impressed. Anthropologie had/has some nice hardware, but RH had the look I was going for. I lined the drawers with wrapping paper from the Container Store. It can’t be seen, but if the drawers ever empty out some, it will be there. Bill installed the hardware for me, and my dresser was finally done. $25 for the dresser, around $25 for supplies (paint and sand paper, etc) and let’s say a bit more for the hardware. Not a bad investment for a pretty & very solid piece of furniture. Whatcha think?

I’m using the dresser in my craft studio for my sewing stuff. The top drawer is for my notions (zippers, ribbons, bias tape, purse handles, etc.). The second drawer (in the photo) holds he majority of my crafting fabric (as opposed to my garment fabric). The fourth drawer holds some of my more special garment fabric as well as some heavy weight fabrics. And the third drawer. Well, that’s the one drawer that is left. It will hold more crafting fabric, and I’m hoping there might be space for my buttons.

The folding of the fabric is quite tedious. Bill has been a treasure and helped me with some of the folding. And if there’s a good movie on, the folding goes quickly. I’m hoping that I can finish the third drawer today and be done with the project. That will be a big accomplishment!

I’ve been working on my craft room, trying to get stuff put away once and for all. I know I’ve said that before. I’m trying hard to get to the point where everything is away and tidy and I can concentrate on the projects. This is the closest I have been to that goal.

Tags: organizing, sewing

I hope that you have been enjoying the first four days of the new year! It feels pretty much like last year except for the underlying current of a fresh start and new opportunities. I’ve been giving my “goals” addition thought. There’s a few more things that I want to accomplish:

7. Finish at least 5 photo albums this year.

8. Organize my fabric stash.

9. Finish the curtains for the craft studio, living room, and master bedroom.

10. Refocus my efforts on my etsy shop. Figure out what I really want to do with it.

A couple of these are pretty specific, but I think that’s good. It will hopefully help me stay focused.

While I’ve been pondering my goals, I’ve been working on my textured shawl. It hit a speed bump as I got a little obsessed with the textured section and getting it symmetrical around the center stitch. It took me about a week, but I’ve finally got it worked out. This is a pretty mindless knit and perfect to work on while watching tv and doing laundry.

Speaking of laundry, I washed and folded nine loads today. For two people. And a few of the dog’s socks, but really, just for two people. I think that little munchkins come in, dance around in our clothes, and put them in the laundry hamper while we sleep. But five episodes of Heroes, two episodes of Chuck, the first period of a Blackhawk’s game from New Year’s Eve, and an episode of Rachel Ray made it go pretty quickly. Okay, it didn’t go quickly but it was pretty painless.

Tags: goals, life

I’ve spent the last few days thinking about the new year. I am a fan of new year’s goals. (I like goals more than resolutions.) To me, it’s an opportunity to start fresh and re-energized, with a clear focus and full of optimism. Perhaps a little schmaltzy, but that’s me.

I think my mantra for the year is going to be “baby steps.” When I get an idea, I tend to think I have to dive in. For example, exercising. I have these grand plans for daily hour long walks. A healthy aspiration, to be sure, but for soemone just starting out it can be a bit ambitious. And easy to lose motivation. Last month, I read the editor’s letter in my fitness magazine and she said that she started jogging fifteen minutes a day and now she’s running marathons. I might be wrong about the marathons but the bottom line is, she started with baby steps.

My theory is that by starting small you gain strength and confidence. The better you get at it, the more you want to do it. The stronger you get the farther you can go. I think this applies to more than just exercise. I mentioned in my previous post that I needed to work on the guest bedroom, the wrapping room, the garage (which I didn’t mention but was on the list). So I tackled one project a day and I still had time for the other fun stuff I wanted to do. Baby steps.

While looking forward, I’ve been looking back too. 2009 was a pretty darn good year. We sold our house and I moved to California. I knit my first sweater. I knit my first triangle shawl (and second, and third, and am on my fourth). I read 42 books this year with 104 in my queue. I attended the inauguration of the 44th President. I did some of my most challenging hikes at Yosemite this year. I know there are other highlights but these are the ones that stand out.

As for what I want to accomplish in 2010…

1. Continue to try and live a more simple life. Get rid of stuff, eat local, use what I have, waste less, stop and smell the roses.

2. Use up my stash. I have bought a lot of yarn lately. I’m going to allow myself one more shopping spree (there’s a birthday special at my LYS) and then I’m going to work from what I’ve got.

3. Read more. I love reading. I’d like to get the number of books in my queue to under 70 by this time next year.

4. Spend more time outside. Knitting outside works, but biking, walking, or hiking would be better.

5. Eat more fruits and veggies. This should be pretty easy living in California where they are quite plentiful. It’s more a matter of choosing the fruits and veggies instead of the carbs.

6. Remember that life is a precious gift.

There could be more, but I think this is a fair start. I hope that 2009 was good to you and that 2010 is better! Happy New Year!

P.S. The photo is me and Bill, in the kitchen, preparing our New Year’s Eve feast of hors d’oeuvres. I think Bill looks really good in the photo.

Tags: goals, life