Missing the Celebrations.

Today is both Independent Booksellers Day and Local Yarn Shop day and I am purchasing at neither.  But I am reading and knitting:

A friend did pick up a North Texas Yarn Crawl bag for me.

Out of curiosity I counted the stitches in the finished hat:

Actually, I counted rows and multiplied by the number of stitches.  The total is 10,795 stitches, and it's not a very large or slouchy hat.  This photo shows the colours much more realistically than the one with the book, quite a difference in lighting in the two locations.

One week in.

It was a beautiful day for a ride, so I met a longtime friend at a halfway point, the Book Barn in Niantic.

Miraculously, we each managed to go away without anything new other than items we exchanged.  One of my gifts was a jar of bit congee, because I'd gotten a packet of it at a local farmstand and the recent cold and rainy weather seemed a good time to simmer things.

 

I used a quart of vegetable broth, a can of cocoanut milk, and a quart of water.  The end result looks unimpressive but tastes quite good - and made over a half gallon.  Hence the jar given to my friend.  I forgot to take a picture of the result; it's not very photogenic.  However, it is quite delicious.

Last night I made a recipe from To the Queen's Taste as a way to use up the last portion of a pound of ground lamb from the local farm.  I usually just do lamburgers but felt like eating something else.

Given that I had about a third of a pound of meat, I reduced quantities accordingly.

Broth with turnips and carrots added, because.

 

Meat with chopped dates and spices, before mixing.

  

Meatballs simmering in the broth.

Ready to eat!  A pretty Larsware bowl seemed appropriate.

I let the meatballs simmer a bit too long, but they were tasty.  I may try this again and watch the time more carefully.

Resolutions Report

I finished the second sock!

They are definitely not this pink in real life!

I also finished a blanket block for Warm Up America! and one of the UFO baby blankets that was in a bin in my stash:

The block for Warm Up, America!

I read The Game of Life and How to Play It, and while it is a bit "woo" for me, it has a lot about how to do more positive thinking.  I mentioned it in a discussion group at work, and a couple people said they read it every year, so at least one other is going to look for a copy.

There and Back Again

I thought that when I got back to town I would do more to keep the blog current, and of course this has not happened,  Let's see, a quick summary of the last year or so:

• I got a new job and moved, temporarily, to Madison (WI).
• The job wasn't what I expected, and my old boss made a determined campaign to keep in touch and let me know he'd hire me back - which happened.
• So I moved back to the Hartford (CT) area.

This involved selling things, moving, moving back, and buying replacements for things like a bed.  At all times, of course, I kept reading (I am definitely going to miss A Frugal Muse and being near Half Price Books) and yarny things (including a visit to the market at the Madison Knitters' Gui;d Knit-In and the impressive yarn section at the Wisconsin Craft Market, and joining a couple of meetups, and the crafters group at the local makerspace) and enjoyed the Dane County Farmers' Market's winter markets.  I also went to Madison's Winter Festival and volunteered at their first MakerFaire, helping Eepy Bird with their Coke® and Mentos® performance.

And I didn't do much with the blog, because I didn't bother to do an internet hookup at the temporary location, and the wifi in the common area didn't work well, and I didn't feel like saying after hours at work to do the blog because it was about an hour's drive (in good weather) and I was trying to have a social life.  So.  No blog posts.

Now I am back in Hartford.  And trying to not get involved in too many things at once.  I did volunteer to help staff a booth at the Bishop's Corner Farmers' Market because it's associated with my old CSA (I got back too late to rejoin), and the person who was staffing the booth suddenly got a job on Maui.  It's not bad, mostly hot and boring, but I take yarny things and have some sales.  It ended up with a few dates as guest vendor at the West End Farmers' Market as well.

I'm involved again at MakeHartford, of course,  An apparently am considered a volunteer for Bici Co., although I don't participate at the location, although I helped to build some of their storage while home visiting one weekend last fall.  And designed a hat that won a contest and brought them some money when they were getting started.

What else?  I am still deciding.  This is a chance to not get quite so involved, or to do so in ways I wasn't able to do before.  Once the Farmers' Market season is over, of course!  And this period in October when I am traveling quite a lot - to the ACC Annual Meeting (I spoke at two of their previous conferences this year, this makes a hat trick) and then to the North Carolina State Fair for our annual family expedition (being the cool auntie who goes on the more exciting rides).

In the meantime, I have the Berlin Fair to look forward to entering - I didn't last year due to the move.  And this event sounds cool, maybe we can do something like it in Hartford?  I'd suggest it for DFW Fiber Fest, but the crocheters would be annoyed as I think fewer people can crochet while walking than knit while walking.  I can do both, but not everybody does.  I know there are people who drop spindle while walking.  Hmmmm......

I won a book!

My local library has a summer reading program.  In the Adult division, you can get prizes if you read a certain number of books and write a review.  Normally, I read a LOT of books, but I was working on a play this summer and didn't have as much time as usual.  So I was well behind.  Then I managed to do some catching-up, and when I went tonight to see what prizes I had won, this is what I was given:

Actually, I got to choose them all.  The packages of wildflower seeds appeared to all be the same, but there was a choice of two bookmarks (the other has a stylized coffeecup with "Read" on one side and "Relax" on the other) and three shelves of books, most of them review copies.  I could choose my book.  As you may imagine, that was not easy.

First, I checked the two mysteries, but neither seemed very interesting.  One was from a series set in Maine, the other about a bartender in Milwaukee, and while my connections there made that appealing I wasn't as excited as other people might be that it includes drinks recipes.  I looked at most of the books on all three shelves.  A number of them are ones I either have, or have read, or both.  or they are in my "waiting" queue - usually a book being passed around my family and I'm waiting for my turn.

So I went with a book that I thought I'd be unlikely to take out of the library, a historical novel whose central character is a cook.  Uncorrected proof, so I'm spotting typos in the first two pages, but interesting enough, and I'm sure I can pass it to a friend once I'm done.  I won't be able to sell it to Half Price Books, although I intend to take a carton or two of books and magazine there on Friday.  Just another version of recycling - while they work out my price, I do a little shopping......