knitting

My northern CSA provides international experiences

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Our farm share continues all year. During the winter months, we eat food I imagine Russian peasants have always eaten – beets, cabbage, onions, carrots, potatoes, parsnips, turnips and rutabaga with some kohlrabi and celeriac tossed in.

I make borscht, stuffed cabbage, roasted vegetables, soups and stews.

This week hominy, or dried corn, was added to the share with suggestions to make tortillas. I gathered my corn and culinary lime and headed south of the border.

Lime is calcium hydroxide and is called “cal” in Mexican recipes. It softens the corn, boosting its nutritional value and helps remove the husks. Water, hominy and cal are heated and then left to soak overnight. Next the corn is ground into masa, traditionally between two stones. Since I live on an old sand quarry, I opted for my food processor.

I may have been better off with two stones. I ground the masa as fine as I could then made a dough with some salt and water. Next I flattened the dough with a spatula and peeled them off the board and tossed them in the hot griddle. The flavor was perfect but they were too thick and a little soft. I tried to pass some dough through my new pasta maker but that was too cross cultural and didn’t work.

Next time…

My knitting is well under way for the year. I already knit three mittens, a hat and wove a scarf. Next is to start a quilt and weave some new placemats.

These are the thrummed mittens waiting to get felted by the wearer.

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This is one of my new mittens. I made a pair last year for one of my daughter’s friends a coveted a pair for myself.

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Next up is a scarf I wove with alpaca, my handspun merino and silk and a little novelty boucle alpaca and silk. Sweet.

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‘Sno fun

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Yes it is. We’re still playing and working in the snow. I earned my chaps (kind of like a Girl Scout badge but cuter) and got to run the chainsaw. Our woodpile has a lot of wood too long for our stove so first I chainsawed, vroom, it to the right length and then spilt the logs with the axe, wedge and mawl. Very gratifying to see the burnable wood pile grow. Tim wasn’t impressed.

Today we skied Kingdom Dam Road and ran into a prime example of birth order personality differences. I’m the oldest and follow rules to the tee. Tim is youngest and thinks they don’t really apply to him. So when we came upon this sign, I hesitated.

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The “This Means You” cinched it for me. This was in addition to the standard “No Trespassing” sign. I was cajoled into blatantly ignoring it by the youngest child but turned around after the downhill portions became a little steep and bumpy for me. A likely story.
I rationalized that i was in neutral colors and wouldn’t be seen while Tim wore bright red and would be picked off first.
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The river scene was beautiful before and after the boundary.

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There were snowmobile tracks, actually they broke a nice trail, and coyote tracks and yellow snow but no other people.
On the home front, I am test knitting a pair of thrummed mittens. A piece of merino- alpaca roving is knit in every few stitches and creates a thick warm lining, which should felt to the wearer’s hand. It’s a free pattern from wooltrends.ca called Newfoundland thrummed mittens.

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The pattern link is here
.

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Over the top

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A cold snap has arrived and brought beautiful, crisp, clear weather. I’ve been snowshoeing or skiing every day and remember how fabulous it is to be here in the winter. Except, of course, when you wake up to a temperature of minus 17 degrees Fahrenheit outside and find your oil burner isn’t working, as we did this morning.

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We called the plumber at 0800 and by 0830 we were cranking out heat again. Nice!
I’m prepared though. I finished a double layer hat – naughty and nice. While in town, I wear the Nordic side out.

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But when I am among friends I can reveal the dark side.

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I am getting my cross country skiing mojo back – sort of controlling downhill speeds and confident I can get up again when I’m down. OK I haven’t actually practiced but I think I can. Yesterday I went through the river valley and came upon my favorite junk in the woods – an upended, rusted old car, balanced on the side of a steep cliff.

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I warmed up in the hot tub to crystal clear sky. The Milky Way was like a ribbon, there were shooting stars, it was beautiful. I almost got to enjoy it for longer than I wanted though, because after I got out of the tub and was shivering in the wind, my fingers stuck to the metal latch when I tried to secure it. Yikes!

Repurposed

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This may be one my best ahas. I made a pair of mittens a few years ago while on Seguin.

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They were a problem from the get go. They were different lengths and one thumb was in the wrong place. I wore them for a couple of years but decided it was time to find them a new home. I had them in the back of my car and drove around with them for a few weeks before inspiration struck.

I brought them back home, cut the palms off both, cut the wristbands open and sewed them together into one band. This is what steeking is all about – cutting up your knitwear with abandon- or with caution, depending on how much you love the item coming under the blade. I didn’t even stitch the raw edges because they were going to be sewn in a seam.

I still needed a top for the hat. I cut open the palms in the middle and preserved the side decreases. I discarded the thumbs, sewed the opened palms together, then sewed them onto the band and voila!

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My knitwear finds a new use.

Ship on a bottle

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We finally wrapped up the boat last week. Well, Tim did while I walked around muttering to myself and him. It was a fairly frustrating day but the boat didn’t mind. Tim rescued our olive oil from the galley.

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I thought one of the benefits of a monounsaturated oil was it remained liquid. Not so at below freezing temperatures, apparently.

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We had a wonderful Thanksgiving with family and friends and all that train travel came in handy. Actually I spent more time than usual repairing errors while I knit on the train but it kept me occupied.

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Yesterday I began the task of working off the turkey and fixings by taking a walk and working on the wood pile. Nice to be home.

I’m on the Knitpicks podcast!

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One of the first podcasts I listened to was Kelley Petkun from Knitpicks describing what knitting she would do on a deserted island. I still have that podcast on my iPod. She introduced me to the idea of a Pi shawl as great island knitting and I cast my first one during a hiking trip in the Grand Canyon when I couldn’t possibly take another step. . Since then, I’ve listened to episodes about the creative process, knitting, designers, yarn lines, football, spinning and life in general and I am hooked. I began listening during my hour long commute into Manhattan to work.

I remember trying to describe why I listened to knitting podcasts to my stepson. He couldn’t imagine what would possibly capture my (or his) attention for 30 minutes. But it’s so much more than knitting. And now it brings me back to the Knitpicks podcast because on their 200th celebratory episode, Kelley revisits deserted island knitting and refers to MY BLOG as an example. Because I knit on deserted islands! And love it. And hope to continue doing it because, after the first time, it keeps getting better and easier. Food planning and packing gets simplified.

Some of my best projects were envisioned and completed in remote settings. Like Tim’s Christmas penguin! knit while on Deal Island Tasmania with some beautiful organic merino roving gifted to me by a new friend in Tasmania, which I spun and knit during my three months there. Or the four pairs of socks I have knit for myself on Seguin Island. Or the warm vest I modified and knit on Deal Island. This podcast makes me appreciate and remember what a wonderful life I live.

Today, in the mountains, I worked on three projects: a pair of socks for my daughter’s friend

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A double weave wall hanging with pockets to hold at least some of my weaving tools

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And I continue to work on the overshot sampler

To think, I was working and commuting when I began listening and now I have given most of it up am living the life I never dreamed of!

Sandy swung west

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And missed us. Many others were not so lucky. I was glued to the weather channel and CNN as water swept over some of my old haunts and harbors. 8.5 million people without power for several weeks due to damaged wires and transformers, which exploded. Cars floated in lower Manhattan and houses were destroyed by floods or fires.

We were spared but the County had taken emergency preparedness measures: schools, offices were closed and a talk I was scheduled to give today was postponed. And it turned out to be a beautiful day with a mild breeze.

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I finished a pair of felted clogs for myself, which I may embellish with embroidery.

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Then I headed to the wood pile and chopped wood until I couldn’t stand up straight. Maybe a week’s worth.

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My knitwear is on CNN!

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The real focus is Seguin Island Lighthouse and Life as a Remote Island Lighthouse Caretaker. There was a video filmed on that hectic day when the work party came to work on windows and help close up. You can see the video here.

However during the video I managed to wear threefour of my handknit items. It was very cold and damp on the day of the taping, so I wore a handspun headband made with yarn spun by a friend of mine who took care of my wheel when I was living in Australia for five months.

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The project information is here.

There’s a very brief glimpse of my fingerless gloves when we haul the dinghy up the beach.

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Their project info is here. They are very special because the fiber was gifted to me by a new friend in Tasmania and I spun (on a turkish drop spindle) and knit them during my 3 months on Deal Island, Tasmania in 2010/2011.

At the end (and the beginning but it’s hidden under another layer) is my first sweater, an Aran pullover made, too small, for Tim, so it is mine.

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Pattern info is here.

What you can’t see are my hand knit socks. I think I actually wore two pair because my feet got wet in the morning. At least one pair were these, knit on Seguin Island in 2008.

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So there’s a hidden story to life on remote islands as well.

Of fish and fiber

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I spent the past couple of days holed up inside finishing a number of fiber projects. I completed a zipper baby cardigan which I just love.

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The Marble Chunky yarn by James Brett is beautiful and will be machine washable. I knit a garter stitch button band as I went and it was so easy to insert a zipper by machine.

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It has a seed stitch yoke so I didn’t mind back and forth knitting but otherwise knit a bottom up raglan as one piece. Then to top it off, I made care labels by computer, printed directly onto fabric with Jacquard inkjet Fabric sheets. . The only drawback is I have to set the ink before I sew it on and don’t have any Scotchguard on hand.

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A favorite little summer dress of mine deteriorated and I decided to make a copy. I roughed out the pattern pieces on an old sheet and stitched away. I am pretty happy with the finished product.

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I finished a set of rag placemats on my rigid heddle loom. I may have worked up the courage to approach my floor loom again.

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So this morning I went fishing and spent most of the time trying NOT to catch the little minnows that were attracted to my lure. Not the elusive trout though.

Speaking of placemats and water, I devised these for the boat. I used that rubbery non-skid shelf liner and bound it with upholstery fabric. Hopefully it will keep the dishes in place.

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Finally, my clothing sewing began this summer with this cute little wrap dress. The rayon fabric is pretty but not quite stretchy enough so I look fine standing still but can’t reach for things too well.

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Bing, bing, bing. That’s a typical week for me. What will it be today?

Back to homework

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Our farm share now includes cream cheese and we decided to make cheese blintzes for breakfast. I found a low(er) calorie recipe online at MyRecipes.com. They were a smashing success. I’m pretty proud of the presentation as well.

I finished this lovely Na Craga sweater after we got home from sailing. I knit both sleeves while on the boat. It’s been assembled, blocked and the collar was modified a little bit. Instead of a rolled funnel collar, I made a crew neck. I fear it may be too big. So I will hand deliver it and figure out what alterations need to be made. My gauge was correct but my son wanted it longer and now I could wear it as a dress (and I don’t like showing my knees). It’s also the first time I made a drop shoulder sweater and didn’t really account for the part of the sweater that was part of the sleeve, so the sleeves double as hand warmers for me. We’ll see. At least I know I have the means to alter it and make it smaller if I have to. Much better than having to make it bigger. It took 21(!) skeins of Knitpicks Wool of the Andes.

I’m working on a pair of socks for a Friend’s birthday. I am using the embossed leaves pattern from Favorite socks. I made a pair for myself in the summer of 2008, while at Seguin Lighthouse, and I still wear them at least weekly. They are one of my nicest pairs and I thought the pattern goes really well with this yarn, Melody by Jojoland.

Since the sweater is complete I am ready to tackle a quilt for my daughter. I’m using beautiful batik blues and greens from Hoffman fabrics. It seems one of the good things about batiks are you can’t tell the front from the back. I think this will piece together pretty quickly and may even try to bring the top to her next week so we can pick out a border and backing. I may be too ambitious but it’s supposed to rain and/or snow all next week.