(mis)adventures of spindlerose

Ten on Tuesday: Things To Do Inside When It's Too Cold To Go Outside

Today's Ten on Tuesday was a little bit challenging. I do not mind cold weather; in fact, I kind of enjoy it. I learned the best way to dress for extreme cold (layers, lots and lots of layers) as a kid who walked about a mile to and from school in Wisconsin winters. When I was in fourth grade, my plastic glasses frame snapped from the cold on my walk home from school. After that, I put them in my pocket and walked home a little bit blind on sub-zero days. As a gown-up, I appreciate having the option to stay inside on cold days. 

Here's what I did on Sunday (the first truly cold day this winter):

1. Knit, spin, or do your favorite craft (I'm still working on the never-ending blanket)
2. Mess around online (blogs, Ravelry, the news)
3. Read a trashy novel
4. Practice yoga
5. Cook something warm
6. Drink a lot of tea
7. Vacuum
8. Snuggle with your sweetie, kids, or pets in front of the fireplace
9. Play board games
10. Take a long soak in the tub

Ten on Tuesday: Favorite Soups

Carole's challenge this week is to share 10 favorite soups. Soup is one of my favorite things to make and eat; I'm not sure I can limit my list of favorites to just 10. Here's a try in no particular order.

1. Black Bean. This is on my mind because I made a very tasty pot last night. I started here and then modified it by using red peppers instead of tomato, ground chipotle instead of jalepeno, pork stock instead of chicken broth, and cooking my own beans instead of using canned.
2. Minestrone. I usually make a vegetarian version with parmesan rind to flavor the broth.
3. Green split pea in any form. I love it with ham, but usually make the vegetarian version from the original Moosewood Cookbook.
4. White bean and swiss chard. I pulled a recipe out of the Williams-Sonoma catalog at least 10 years ago and make it at least once every winter.
5. Potato, leek, and kale from another Moosewood book, but I don't remember which one.
6. Mom's post-Thanksgiving smoky turkey noodle. Dad always cooks the turkey on the grill (more space for side in the oven that way), and the turkey stock Mom makes the next day is a little smokey and extra tasty.
7. Homemade cream of mushroom. I use the recipe from the original Vegetarian Epicure cookbook.
8. Lobster bisque.
9. Squash in any form. My sister makes hers with red lentils, curry, and coconut milk. I have that recipe stashed somewhere and all the ingredients in the house. I think I know what I'm making next weekend.
10. Corn chowder.

Now that I've stopped at 10, I realized just how many other soups I love: New England clam chowder, Grandma's Manhattan-style fish chowder, my friend Richard's vegetarian French onion, traditional Indian dal, red lentil, egg drop, won ton, and tom yum.

Let me know if you have a favorite I should try, or, let me know if you want to come over for soup and a nice slice of crusty bread.

Ten on Tuesday: Things I Want to Do in 2012

1. Knit with cashmere. I have cashmere blend yarn for several sweater-sized projects in the studio. This is my year to use it. I will earn a bit of luxury knitting every time I complete a fitness goal. First up is Sabine in Superior.
2. Run a 5K race in March or April. D and I have started running again. If we survive our cold winter morning runs, stay healthy, and stick to the plan, we will be ready for a 5K by St. Patrick's Day.
3. Run a 10K race in September. If we keep training through the spring and summer, we will be ready to tackle a longer distance by the end of summer.
4. Finish 12 sweaters. This is much less of a stretch than you might think. There are at least 10 nearly finished sweaters hiding on my shelves that stalled for some reason. It is time stop procrastinating, solve the problems, and finish them.
5. Finish 12 pairs of hand knit socks and give most of them away. My sock shelf is overflowing, but socks are still my go to project for travel knitting. Since there is a lot of business travel in my future, there will be a lot of socks.
6. Spin every day. Even 10 minutes a day with a spindle adds up to quite a bit of yarn after a few weeks. Daily efforts at the wheel lead to more consistent finished yarn. My spinning focus this year is spinning for a purpose rather than just spinning. I have made myself a personal fiber club of 6 bumps of fiber that I will spin for a specific project.
7. Knit with handspun. If I am spinning with the end project in mind, I need to knit the project when the yarn is finished so I can evaluate my progress and figure out what to do better next time. I also need to make some space in my handspun bin for the other yarns I plan to spin this year.
8. Learn how to weave. The more I talk to weavers and handle hand woven cloth, the more I want to weave. I am going to start looking for a used loom in May and take a weaving class or two later in the year.
9. Go back to Hawaii with D. We have not been there since 2009. It is time for a visit.
10. Post to this here blog at least once a week. I will start with Carole's Ten on Tuesday this month, and see where that leads me.

Desert flowers

This bright flower stopped me in my tracks last night. The brilliant color and desert adaptations (green bark, tiny leaves) drew me in for a close look. I love seeing different flora and landscapes when I travel, even when that flora is dry dry pastures and landscape is full of creek beds. Seeing the Texas drought this year makes it easy to imagine the dustbowl of the Great Depression. I hope this drought ends soon.

Squeezing in a bit of fun

Hill Country Weavers

Today, I found a tiny bit of time to find yarn while traveling for work. I spent a lovely half hour or so poking around in Hill Country Weavers in Austin. I bought one tiny ball of lace weight yarn to knit a Christmas gift for someone, a shop pattern, and a magazine. I hope to go back next time I'm in Austin to poke around a bit more, find more tasty food in the neighborhood, and find the spinning and weaving parts of the shop.

Some socks

Chevrons!

In June, I prevailed over a skein of Trekking XXL that had thwarted all my attempts to turn it into a pair of socks. Many years ago, I bought a skein of yarn. I planned to knit chevroned socks from it. That early in my sock knitting career, I had not figured out exactly how to fit socks to my feet. I did not know that chevrons take away the elasticity of knitting or that my instep requires a lot of extra stretch. I started 3 or 4 different socks from this yarn, and none of them streched over my heel. But I stubbornly insisted that this yarn would be chevrons. This spring, I found a chevron pattern with some stretch, and knit it up in about 2 weeks. I finally have the pair of green and blue chevron socks I dreamed about for years.

Pattern: Stripes Alive
Yarn: Trekking XXL
Notions: 2.5 mm Darn Pretty DPNs
Time: June 3 to 19, 2011

Ten things I did last weekend

 

1. Made coils with Jacey Boggs.
2. Learned how to handcard fluffy rolags with Andrea Mielke-Schroer.
3. Turned those yummy rolags into sproingy woolen spun yarns.
4. Spun cotton on a takhli with Stephanie Gaustad.
5. Sampled seven rare breed wools with Deb Robson and put my new hand carding skill to good use with some of them.
6. Spent the last hours of SOAR spinning with many friends in my hotel room. I took pictures ofbthis, but they are all unflattering, so I'm not going to share any publicly.
7. Introduced friends to D, the little red airplane, and the wonders of aerobatic flight.
8. Watched the first half of the Patriots and Packers games.
9. Picked up big sticks so D could use our brand new lawnmower.
10. Lots and lots of laundry.

No wonder I was so tired all day Monday.

Nine interesting socks

Wednesday's interesting socks

I'm still recovering from SOAR. One of the amazing things about SOAR and all other knitting or spinning events is seeing hand knits and hand woven pieces everywhere. These nine socks were all knit by participants in my three day color workshop. On any given day more than half of us wore interesting socks, shawls, or sweaters. The creativity and talent of everyone at SOAR—the mentors and the attendees—is stunning. As much as I learned last week, I think the real reason that I (and so many others) go to SOAR every year is to spend a week with over 200 like-minded creators. Experiencing that energy is the true power of the event. So many of us craft alone or in small groups all year and never really grasp the wonder of our community. Ravelry, blogs, and other on line communities help, but do not replace the tremendous power of gathering and sharing.

Is this something you have experienced? Are there ways we, as creators, can create more times and places to share, gather, and create together?

I have a lot more I want to say about this, but it's late, and I have to leave early tomorrow morning. More soon, I promise.

Between adventures

Blanket squares for Miss Z

Now that SOAR is over, I am shifting my brain away from fun with fiber and back to every day life. The pile I left on my desk 7 days ago is scary, but I am not going to deal with it until tomorrow. Even though I want to spend the next month spinning the rest of my SOAR samples and practicing all the new techniques I learned (coils! And cotton on a tahkli and handcarding), I need to repack my suitcase for an adventure in Texas that starts Tuesday.

I will be making more time for fiber on this trip (and in the rest of life). I'm going to toss something lovely into my travel spindle case and yarn for more blanket squares into my bag. Miss Z is nearly three, and I would like to deliver her blanket in time for Christmas. I would rather finish this one project than meet my 12 finished pairs goal this year.

End of SOAR

Ingrind and Octavian

I watched Ingrid create this octopus all week fornher entry in Spinnerr's Poker. She won both the Excellence and People's Choice awards.