Accidental Curry

I wasn't planning on cooking. I was just gonna clean up the kitchen, but I was hungry and it was nearly lunchtime, so as I loaded the dishwasher, I found a few ingredients that I wanted to use, and began to cook.

 

In a large saucepan with melted butter, I sauteed onion, celery, red and green pepper, a frozen mirepoix from the grocery that I always keep on hand. As this sizzled, in went about 1/2 cup of basmati rice, adding a bit more butter to coat. 

Then I thought...do I still have any curry powder? 

Eventually I did find it, and added about two heaping tablespoons to the 'mirepoix' already cooking. Yeah, that was alot. 

When everything was properly toasted, I poured in hot water, and a big fat dollop of Better than Boullion chicken flavoring. 

As the rice cooked, I opened the package of mixed berries, which includes golden raisins, cranberries and cherries. About a half cup was added to the bubbling rice, and began to get plumped. Then in went a good half cup of coconut flakes. 

When the rice was finished I added about three tablespoons of peanut butter, and the zest and juice of a fresh lime, and a cup of chopped leftover roasted turkey breast from the weekend.

 For freshness and crunch, I cored and chopped a honeycrisp apple and added it to the pan. I wish I had some cilantro, but no gots, so to finish the dish, I topped it with a good handful of honey roasted peanuts. Green onions would have been nice to add, but I forgot I had them. Next time...

It's freezzzzzing cold here and I am wishing so hard that I had gotten my new front and back doors when the weather was nice. Duh. The gap at the bottom is covered with rugs, but not doing much to keep out the cold. 66 degrees in the living room isn't deadly, but still. O well. We have the space heaters if we really need them. Mustn't grumble.

Watch and Discuss

If you have watched all four episodes of You Are What You Eat on Netflix, I would love to get your response. For privacy, just email me with your thoughts and then I will do a post on my conclusions and what I may want to put into action.

My email is fibermania@gmail.com

The Potzblitz Finale

 Here it is on the blocking pads. 74" wide and 33" deep. All the yarns are 100% merino, which made it so yummy to knit. I dyed the turquoise yarn myself, so I was happy to be using it. The white yarn is Madeline Tosh in Antler and the blues, purples and magenta are all Prism. Details of the construction are available on Ravelry. Sold.

  
I knit this over four days, and while that sounds fast, let me just say that it was a vacation. I have had electrical problems in my studio, so I had my work light and my TV on a heavy duty extension cord and I had a nice warm quilt over my legs. Hot tea kept me fueled and I binged watched "Fool Me Once" on Netflix. My review of the series: Kept me glued to the set, but was so pointlessly complicated and unlikely that I can't rate it any higher than 4 out of 10. I still had about three hours left of knitting when I finished that series, so I finished with the most recent episode of Fargo on Hulu. This is a really great series, especially this year with Jon Hamm and Juno Temple, who I loved in Ted Lasso. Now we are binge watching Billions on Prime Video, which is riveting and so well scripted. I've also been listening to the My Life in Crime podcast with Erin Moriarty. 

 The smaller pictures don't show the purple mix in the stripes. so I thought a closeup necessary.

 This is a large shawl but because the yarn is fingering weight or sport weight, it only weighs in at eleven ounces. Excellent for spring or fall wearing. 

 As mentioned in yesterday's post, I am not keeping this beauty, and will offer it to you for $45 plus shipping. Email me. I gets my kicks just clicking the needles and figuring out the pattern.

Knitting Pattern Disobedience

This is the Tuch Potzblitz shawl. I kept seeing it on Pinterest and wondered how it was constructed. I could figure out the beginning, but then was stumped as it shifted from knitting vertical to simultaneously growing horizontal. I looked at the pictures of works in progress done by other knitters of this pattern on Ravelry, and that didn't help much. Finally I bit the bullet and did what I haven't done in 25 years. 

I bought the pattern. 

Argghh. I felt I let myself down. My pride was teetering. I had to admit to myself that I don't know everything. ha!

After examining the first few pages (of 24) my eyes glazed over and I invited my knitting pal, Patsy, an expert knitter who follows patterns regularly, to look it over and see if she could help me understand. She arrived at my house with a pefectly lovely knit sample of the start of the shawl and I saw to my surprise that the 'secret' ingredient was the icky-to-me I-cord. O geesh.

Well, I didn't wanna do the I-cord. But I could see the possibilities of doing it another way and I relaxed a bit. The pattern also had increases I don't like, M1L and M1R. Never do those. I prefer Kfb for my increases. ( I know this is inside baseball to many of you, but hey, this is my blog and I gotta tell it like it is).

Since Patsy had followed the directions, I could imagine how to achieve the same or similar results another way, and we agreed to try to make this pattern the right way for Patsy and my way for me. 

We spent some time in my yarn room choosing yarns for each of our projects and I tried to hold myself back from 'all color all the time' and chose these:

Of course I later changed my mind and only used three of those and added two others, so nevermind. What is important is that these are all really quality ($$$) yarns that I have been saving for something really special for YEARS. All are fingering weight which means smaller size needles and more time to make the project. No biggie. 

I began to make a sample to see if my disobedient idea would work and I was gratified that it did. Here's the sample:

The beginning and its increase. You don't need to remember this. it is merely for my records. 

 

Then I continued with this section in two colors:

Yes! My confidence surged and I was ready to use the real good yarn. 

OK so here's the deal. I could keep knitting the beginning part til I got to the part I disagreed with and do some testing of my alternate idea and see if it worked and so I sped along and got there that same day. After trying it out, I quickly decided my idea was way better (excellent imho) and I was on my way to success, never looking back.

 

This is what is so great with knitting. There are so many ways to skin a cat and one needn't be a slave to the original pattern. I know this to be true with all the patterns I have offered for free on Ravelry. In fact one time a knitter had a way better idea for one of my jacket patterns and I had to take a deep bow to her and change my pattern to make a better product. 

It's all good. 

So four days later, the shawl is finished and  has been washed, blocked and is waiting to dry. I am very pleased with the result and learned some good stuff in the process which I know will show up in future projects.

As for Patsy, after day one she was fed up with the pattern and I released her from having to make it. We can always find something else to knit together for our weekly Friendship Friday meetings. 

I love the final product which I will post tomorrow when it is dry, and offer it for sale to you. I cannot keep another knitted item, there just isn't room. In fact I really should post knits that are available while it is still winter, so I can make room in my closets.  Maybe I will have a separate blog of items that needs a home. We'll see.

Pennywood Lane #6

 It seems I cannot count. I was sitting in my living room and saw this quilt on my picture ledge. I missed adding this to the list on yesterday's post. Duh. It's #6 Pennywood Lane, also 12x12" hand dyed, and commercial cottons, fused, hand embroidered, machine quilted, and stitched at the corners to a (fused) fabric wrapped artist canvas. 

When I first saw pictures of this house online, I was so excited by the woodwork on the walls in the living room and the room I saw as my future studio. It had a built in ledge to prop up artwork. No NAILS!!! The place was made for me. Praise the Lord! I bought it on the spot. Two weeks later and I was in. 

It has it's drawbacks, like faulty wiring which we have been dealing with since day one. Yesterday it got fixed again but I decided with my contractor to rewire the entire house, once and for all. I guess I am committed to staying, she says.

There were a few nails already in the walls, so I was OK with hanging this mirror, but I really try to avoid pounding nails into plaster walls. 

 When I saw the house in person, I knew it was made for me. As I unpacked, I found spots for almost all of my smaller mounted works. 

I have propped up my drawings, collages, photos and paintings, as well as work by other artists that I have collected over the years. 

I needed a place for my jacket and purse, so I mounted a Command Hook there on the woodwork. It stayed stuck, thankfully. 

This house was built in 1960 and another little old lady lived in til she was 96. Unfortunately no improvements were  made in all those years, and so the flipper made choices about what to fix or not fix, and I imagine this woodwork was added for the sake of character. He musta saw me coming.

The Pennywood Lane Series

For those of you who didn't follow me to Instagram, here's a collection of small works you missed. The title comes from the street adjacent to our house, where we walked the dogs and had a bit of house envy. Lots of mature trees and well manicured yards, with flowers and creeks.

I love making house quilts and come back to the subject every so often. With these I wanted to take advantage of the stretched canvases I had stashed and they made a nice finish, covered with fabric. I sewed  the quilts right through the canvas.  

1 Penneywood Lane, April 24, 2023. 11x14" All are fused, quilted, hand embroidered, wrapped and mounted on a frame.  Sold to Carol.

2 Pennywood Lane, 12x12", April 27, 2023

3 Pennywood Lane, 12x12", May 2, 2023

4 Pennywood Lane, 11x14"May 5, 2023

5 Pennywood Lane, 12x12",May 12, 2023

#2-5 are available for $125, including shipping. Email me. 

I've been knitting

Knitting is my drug of choice, and keeps me calm amidst life's storms. Plus, it is such a sensory experience. I love to make stuff and then I like to find a home for it, since I have oodles more yarn and fewer closets than ever to store things. If it is gone to someone who likes it, I am encouraged to keep going. Everything here is available for $45+postage. Email me if one should go to you.

Triangle Cowl, 78" in circumference and 10" deep. Merino and silk yarns. 

Bits and Bobs shawl. 78" long and 20 inches deep. All merino wools.

 Dots and Dashes Cowl #34, but who's counting? Sold.

Missoni Inspired Cowl, merino and silk yarns. 

Dots and Dashes Shawl, Casablanca and Boku yarns.