Yarn to dye for at CJKoho Designs

I spent yesterday at CJ's (Carla's) studio dying a set of colorwheel yarns and then two skeins to attempt to match a cowl that my friend, Jackie had knitted for me.  It was tons of fun and I think more yarn and fiber dying is in my future.

The Beekman 1802 Heirloom Vegetable Cookbook

I've been trying a couple of recipes out of this book and they were very good.

 Savory Vegetable Bread Pudding and the Beekman 1802 Split Pea Soup.

Chicken Patrol

Making Olga Bread

I made OLGA bread today.  Just like Olga's.  I  googled the recipe and almost all were identical.   I let the dough rest over night in the frig (actually it was about 20 hours).  It still was really stretchy and when the recipe said "roll out", it was more like a pizza dough so using my hands to finish it by stretching and twirling in the air helped to get it a little bigger and thinner.  Now that I've dipped my fingers into this recipe, I will look at the book "Artisan Pizza and Flatbread in Five Minutes a Day" by Jeff Hertzberg and Zoe Francois to see what they suggest.  This should make an awesome sandwich this afternoon.

CONQUERING "FEAR OF PIE CRUST"

My friend and baker extraordinaire, Melissa, came over on Friday to give me ANOTHER pie baking lesson.  I think I can safely say I conquered my fear of pie crust phobia.  The pie crust recipe was from Cooks Illustrated (the no-fail one with vodka) and we used Melissa's delicious home canned peaches, some fresh blueberries and some frozen raspberries.  Things I would do different next time: - a little less juice or a little more thickening and remember to take the pie out of the oven RIGHT WHEN THE TIMER GOES OFF.  It got just a wee bit brown.  Also, I need to buy some of that big crystal baking sugar for the top.  We used raw sugar crystals but it just wasn't right.  On the upside - it was delicious!!  No doubt about that.  Thanks, Melissa.  You have won a special place in this baker's heart.

Spied Saturday a.m in Ann Arbor

Back to the important things in life....

"People may not remember exactly what you did, or what you said, but they will always remember how you made them feel."- Maya Angelou


I know, right?   

I laid Holly to rest this afternoon.  She was in a lot of pain it was the only thing I could do to fix it.  It was only going to get worse and I loved her too much to ask her to go through that just to stay a few more days with me.
She was my best pal.  Goodbye, my love.  xoxo

Holly's Osteosarcoma Update

Holly, after a great night of partying with the  knitting club
Holly is having a good day today.  I went to MSU yesterday and talked to Dr. Annear.  I listened to all he said and then told him that I would go with pain relief, eye lubrication, and watching until her bad days start to increase.  He suggested that at that point I could try oral corticosteroids to increase her appetite and energy again for a while longer.  He said if it was his dog, he would have made the same decision.  So we didn't even do the chest -xray because it wouldn't have changed the course of her treatment.  Right now, she will eat anything in sight and can make it up the stairs faster than me because she knows I have treats stashed upstairs (LOL- sorta like the candy bowl).  She has up to 6 months and it wasn't that much longer if I would have chosen chemo/radiation.  Some of my knitting group came over last night so she got to sniff in all the knitting bags and everyone fed her a little from their plates (cuz thats ok for her to do now).  Actually, she's having the time of her life, which is as it should be.  Holly and I are eating, drinking and being merry until further notice.

Tatted Butterfly

This is from my first tatting lesson.  Its supposed to be a butterfly though I suppose the color and the antennae are a little off.  But all in all, I'm pretty pleased.

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Knitting Podcast

Knitting Podcast: is a really cool blog that keeps track of all the knitting and fiber related podcasts available.
She also keeps track of whether they are active or inactive.  Wow!  I could spend my whole day listening to podcasts.  This is a wonderful thing!!  Check it out.  M

'via Blog this'

I MADE RUGELACH WITH JULIA!!!

Yesterday and today, I made rugelach from Baking With Julia.  We are making recipes from this book in our bake-along on www.tuesdayswithdorie.com   Here are some of the highlights:

Sour Dough Cheddar Crackers

Well, here they are.   My second batch of sour dough cheddar crackers.  The first batch I made with my rye starter and forgot to take a picture.  This one I made with my white flour starter and they turned out beautifully.  I have my friend, Melissa, to thank for the recipe, the initial starter, and the personal lesson when we were at Luann's.  Ok, I'm off to nibble.

Sour Dough Onion Rye Bread

Got the "sour" part right!

Oh, my goodness.  My friend, Melissa, gave me some sour dough starter about a month ago.  I've been nurturing it along and finally decided to make bread this week., inspired by her recipe.   It was definitely sour!!! Almost like vinegar.  I toasted it and added some jam to sweeten it up.  It didn't raise very much.  I had cut the recipe in half to make enough for one loaf but then put the dough in two smaller loaf tins.  I will have to figure out how to make it a little less tart next time.  Wow!

Nora & Elena bring deelish breakfast & nostalgia for Taste Our Goods – Selma Cafe

Nora & Elena bring deelish breakfast & nostalgia for Taste Our Goods – Selma Cafe:

'via Blog this'

This is such a great place for breakfast.  I may have to try my hand at the french toast sammies with roasted sweet potatoes and farm fresh cheese.  Yum!!  Such good ideas for breakfast from Selma Cafe.  But even better to just go enjoy them already prepared for you!!

German Short Row Technique

Ravelry: Ask a Knitter:

'via Blog this'

Haiku for Holly

HOLLY BELLE

          The dog is quite old

          Her eyes still send messages

          Food? Water? Scratch my neck?

                   

         

Ravelry Widgets

Since we visited (and enabled, I might add) Luann last weekend, I have been adding a few more things to Groovy Spinning.  Luann helped me figure out how to add a Ravelry button to my project page and then I extrapolated that to a Ravelry widget for a link to a pattern I'm currently working on.  I suspect you have to be a Ravelry member to get to these pages.  If you are not a Ravelry member, please try them and give me some feed back.  I may have to put "login required" underneath as a caption.  I hope not.  You can find some really cute ravelry widgets by just googling "ravelry widget".  Too much fun!

Meet Lydia

I've been lusting after a new spinning wheel for several months now.  One in particular - the Schacht Sidekick.  Its not like I don't have...let's see...6 or 7 already.  Its like the old lady in the shoe- I have so many spinning wheels I can't even remember their names sometimes.  Time to get rid of one or two.  That will take some thought.  In the meantime, I have been bonding with Lydia since I bought her at Deer Camp from Carol (River"s Edge Fiber Arts).  I named her Lydia because I was listening to the first episode of the Craftlit podcast on my way home on Monday and Pride and Prejudice was the book being read.  She's amazingly stable and spins like a dream for such a little lady.  Take a peak.....

Deer Camp is a reference to the fall circular sock knitting machine retreat held in Coleman, MI about the time that deer hunting season opens.  Melissa, Edie and I stayed at our favorite B&B in Beaverton, the Nestle Inn.  We had an amazing visit and even though things didn't go quite perfectly at the CSM retreat (meaning I didn't finish 4 pairs of mittens and 8 pairs of socks). It was a great get-a-way.

Shaelyn Shawl from hand spun

I just finished spinning and knitting a shawl in a record 10 days.  I used my sport weight 2 ply hand spun.  The wool breed was Bond and it was in its natural dark brown color.  The pattern was easy and memorizable.  It was a very fast knit.  I knitted an extra repeat.