March 29 2009 Happy Days Are Here Again
Holy moly - is it almost April already? I feel like I have been hibernating this winter...just barely existing...eating and sleeping and generally keeping a low profile. Not being terribly productive.
I am starting to peep my head out though, just in time to see the bulbs poking up from the soil, and the buds dotting the winter bare branches, and so I can see things are starting to look up. Before I moved up here I had no idea how exhausting and depressing winter could be. I thought I was a gloomy weather girl. And, well, I guess I still am, but winter far surpasses gloomy, it outpaces it entirely and ends up in the "vast timeless abyss of endless and terrifying ennui" category. I prefer just plain old, run of the mill "gloom".
I have been able to trade a few of the daily treadmill sessions for walks around the neighborhood, and although I would swear up and down I am not a "people person", it just makes me so glad to see baseball practices at the high school and little old ladies gardening and little old men out and about and taking trips to the Polish deli up the street. Everyone is smiling and nodding and waving and it is just a wonderful feeling - a beautiful time of year. I am sure that by mid-summer everyone will be churlish and grumpy again, but even that's ok, because I feel like summer crankiness has a bit of a sass behind it. An "I'm hot as hell and you are NOT going to f*ck with me today" type attitude." Winter grumps are based on depression and exhaustion and a lassitude that makes you just want to say "I give up. What the f*ck. Whatever." Maybe that is all in my head, but that is definitely the way it feels.
Somehow I lost my memory card for my camera, so now it is only letting me take 5 pictures at a time. In cleaning old things off it, I came across two hearty, stick to your ribs type meals from the past few months. The lighting is very poor here, particularly in the last two since they were actually taken today - I do love some rainy, grey weather, but it is not so great for photo taking:
Chicken with 40 Cloves of Garlic
Home made naan and black eyed pea curry
I really much prefer warm weather food...not to sound like I eat healthy all the time (because I. DO. NOT.) but some of my favourite things to eat are different kinds of salads. This is one that I actually find myself craving - The wheatberry salad from Supernatural Cooking. It's got a light, lovely citrus dressing, spinach, scallions, feta, and those deliciously textured wheatberries. I make this every other week in the warmer months, along with the Otsu recipe from the same book:
Finally, just in time for spring, I finished up my Froot Loop socks:
Pattern: Froot Loop Socks, from Knitty Spring 2008
Yarn: Malabrigo Sock yarn from WEBS
Dates: February 2009-March 2009
Hopefully the advent of spring will bring more enery, more motivation and better lighting!
February 15 2009 Terribly Fabulous
This past week was awful, just awful. I will not go into particulars because it will make me sound like a candidate for the looney bin, but you know you're in trouble when a pan of too-yeasty cinnamon rolls sends you flying over the edge. (Seriously though, what the HELL? Why do yeast doughs give me so much trouble? This was the WRONG WEEK for your shenanigans, my yeasty little friends.)
The Man, observing my nutso-craziness, suggested that some online shopping would make me feel better, ha! Does he know me or what? This is both a terrible and a fabulous idea. And of course at any given time there is a list a mile long of things that I want, but now that I have "permission"*, I just can't find anything I want/need all that badly.
I have a few little plans for the house that I would like to implement in the next few months, so I really should save my money for those sorts of things - for example, I would love to get rid of the table and chairs in our little "dining area", find a straight-backed wing chair, a nice rug, move our bookcases and make it a mini library. We never, ever eat there anyway, and all it serves as is a dumping place for mail, library books, etc.
I am thinking a chair similar to one of these guys:
I don't know why I have it in my head that it must be one of these more formal style, Queen Anne chairs, but that's what I've decided and there is no going back. Ideally we'll find something similar at a garage sale or an estate sale or maybe a used furniture place. I really don't want to break the bank for something that is bound to be uncomfortable anyway! That coupled with a little round table, and a bookcase and a rug like this, or this and we'll have a perfect little alcove-library!
HOWEVER, I need some more immediate gratification, so I may pick up some malabrigo yarn to make this sweater :
Or maybe this one, which I have loved since the moment I saw it:
Or maybe just hang onto my money for a little bit longer, I mean next week is bound to be better, right?
*I do not need "permission" to shop; but it's always nice when someone says GO FOR IT - makes me feel less guilty!
February 14 2009 You Win Some, You Lose Some
...and in this case I literally DID lose "some". Some to the tune of my entire 2008 archives. Whoops. Not sure how that happened. I could be upset about it, I guess...but I don't think all that much happened in 2008 anyhow.
But I was actually referring to the epic fail that is the Lopi sweater vs. the amazingly awesome cardamom & lime sweet rolls (neither picture is all that great):
Ugh. This is super itchy. super boxy and shapeless, and the yoke is weird and puffy. This sweater makes me very sad.
The Lime & Cardamom sweet rolls, however, were delicious. I cannot recommend this recipe highly enough...subtly sweet, tangy and light. If you only eat just one, that is.
Just finished watching Wait Until Dark; I guess I could say that I enjoyed it...I was able to watch it the whole way through, which is a pretty rare feat for me nowadays. I HATED the ending though. Not the actual ending, but something that one of the characters did. It was a little bit...dick-ish, I would have to say.
Also, Alan Arkin was kinda cute in his younger days...I had no idea!
February 8 2009 Currently Coveting
In the past 6 months or so I've been exposed to more and designer clothes and I am afraid it's had an unhealthy influence on me. I will never be someone who NEEDS a ...Louis Vuitton bag for example, but I have discovered that there are designers/design houses who do some lovely things...things that don't actually make me cringe if I were to say, bring them up in a conversation (unlike the above mentioned LV handbag!)
For example:
Tsumori Chisato, who has been described as "bohemian meets anime"
Another favourite lately is Nanette Lepore, whose beautiful things seem a bit more subdued, but still with a slightly bohemian, gypsy/folk tale aesthetic.
And lastly, Chie Mihara, who I am convinced makes the most gorgeous (and spendy) shoes that I have ever seen...
Of course all this is a little bit beyond my means at the current time, but a lady can dream can't she? The Man keeps reminding me that in order to win the lottery, I actually have to play! It's worth considering, I guess.
February 6, 2009 ...and we're back!
Whoops! Apparently, (and of course unbeknownst to me) I had an expired credit card on file for the site and it was de-activated sometime in the past few weeks. Now that's all taken care of I am going to start making a few changes and probably move the whole thing over to wordpress...but it wll undoubtedly take me a while to figure that out, so this is where it's at for now.
Not that it really matters, no one missed all that much around here. Just a few sorry loaves of bread and nary a push-up to be found. There has been rampant consumerism, however, which I will use as filler until I do something interesting.
As a reward to myself for a bonus I recently earned, I purchased a bag that I have been lusting after FOR YEARS - The Tano "Sexbomb". There's really nothing sexy about it, but I do quite love it!
In addition to the handbag, I also got this little wallet/clutch which I hear is an organization masterpiece, but I confess I bought it partially based on the company's name - HOBO International:
And lastly, I finally caved and got a decent winter coat, one that will actually keep me warm. It's down, yet somehow it's still flattering, and made by Soïa & Kyo (it's sort of a combination of both these styles, I can't find it on the site):
The amazing thing is, I didn't pay full price for any of it - I shopped around, did my research and made the final purchase from eBay. I save about $20 on the wallet, $50 on the handbag, and about $150 on the coat!
Oh! And I almost forgot! I've gotten my bangs cut for the first time in a loo-oong time. Oh, say, 25 years? I went in with this picture and my stylist totally nailed it.
Of course, doing on my own is something else all together, but for one whole day it looked fabulous!
January 4, 2009 The Year of Using Up
So, aside from achieving my massive goal of ONE PULL-UP, and I also going to make an effort to use up things that I already have. This could mean throwing out less produce, pulling from my enormous pile of yarn first before purchasing more, (and working on current and old projects before starting new ones) and plowing through my huge stockpile of beauty products, just to name a few examples. I am trying not to look at it from a budgeting standpoint, because that is no fun, instead I am looking at it as an "Adventure in Wasting Less"!
Another "semi-goal" I have is to once a week, give one room of the house a thorough cleaning. This week it was the kitchen and I spent 4 hours scouring, scrubbing, and mopping; it was excruciating I tell you what. I really, really, hate cleaning...but it was worth it to see it all sparkly and shiny afterward.
Plus, The Man got us a new toaster and microwave for Christmas, so I thought it might be nice for them to have a clean home. The pictures are dim so it's not apparent how clean things are, but they are.
Ok, well looking at the photos just now, maybe the base of that blender needs a scrubbing, whoops!
Although I was loathe to make a mess after all that hard work, I had some whole wheat flour that had been sitting around for ages, and after the (mostly) success of last week's pulla, I wanted to give a yeast bread another try.
I found this recipe for Old Fashioned Whole Wheat & Oatmeal Bread.
The dough did not seem to want to rise, so my loaf did not achieve much height, but it turned out pretty good nonetheless:
In the interest of finishing things up before embarking on new endeavors, here is my Gathered Pullover, prior to sewing in the second sleeve. I can tell that this is not going to be the most flattering knit (or else my jeans push up and out all my flub) because it seems to accentuate unsightly waistline bulges. Since then I have added the second sleeve and I will have The Man take some pictures outside where the lighting is better. He also is a magician, and I am sure he will make me look much thinner as well. Speaking of those sleeves...they are super, super long; I have it cuffed in the photo below, but that thing is rolled up TWICE.
Most of the other versions of this sweater have the rolled up bottom edge due to the stockinette stitch, but I don't care for the way that looks. When I first started knitting this, I knit a few rows then added a purl row (sort of like the Hourglass Sweater) so that I could go back, fold that edge under and hem it.
That certainly added to the finishing time, but it's actually peaceful, calming work. I turned off the television and the radio and just silently slip stitched for and hour and a half straight.
I do have a few other projects lying around, but one looks like it is going to be too small, and the other one I have absolutely no interest in anymore.
Instead I am going to start on this Lopi sweater by Norah Gaughan. I received a gift certificate for yarn.com from Melissa (so I didn't actually spend my own money!) for Christmas, and I picked out a few colours that I hope will work:
Tomorrow it is back to work. I have had such a nice relaxing break though, watching movies, knitting, crocheting, reading...I guess I wouldn't appreciate it so much if I got to do these things all the time. Ah, nuts. Who am I kidding?
Of course I would!