It's stahmin'

Yes, it's storming. If you're an honest-to-goodness Downeaster, having been born in Downeast Maine and having lived there all your life, you'd probably say it's stahmin'.

Whatever, it's a rather lousy day. Snow, sleet, rain, you name it. The snow is as coarse as a really coarse salt. Icicles hang everywhere.

I took this photo of a bluejay who wasn't enjoying the weather any more than I. He perched in the lilac bush outside the kitchen window this morning and stayed there a long while.

He couldn't even muster up the enthusiasm to visit the bird feeder nearby. Can't say that I blame him.

According to the forecast, the ice build-up on tree limbs could cause them to snap and fall on power lines later today. Power outages are likely. Not fun. I'd better go do some knitting while the power is still on....

Bread in a bag

...except I don't put the dough ingredients into a bag.

I've made this bread three or four times recently because it's so darned easy and it doesn't make a baking mess in my kitchen.

I found the link for the recipe on Facebook. I decided to give it a test run, to see if it might be something Violet and I could do together during her next visit. I thought mixing up bread dough in a plastic bag sounded like a terrific idea.

Once I went to the actual recipe site, though, and read some reviews, I liked the idea of mixing it in a bowl even more.

While mixing the ingredients, I have a two-cup measure of water heating in the microwave.

Once all the ingredients have been mixed together and stirred well, I set aside the two-cup measure of hot water in a corner of the microwave, place the bowl of dough in the microwave, and let it sit there to rise.

(I do NOT turn on the microwave while the dough is rising.)

I remove the risen dough from the microwave, stir it down, and put it back into the microwave. I repeat this step 3-4-5 times, depending on how much time I have, what time I need to have the bread baked, etc.

After letting the dough rise several times, I take it from the bowl, knead it a few times on my flour-dusted bread board, put it into a greased loaf pan, and place it in the microwave one final time to rise before baking.

I bake it at 350-375 ° for about 30 minutes. Done. Delicious bread.

The last two times I've made this bread, I substituted one scant cup of whole wheat flour for the third cup of white flour. I use a scant cup because whole wheat flour is heavier than regular flour, and I don't want the dough to be too heavy.

So that's how I make Bread-in-a-bag (but not in a bag).

Some snow and some knitting

We received a beautiful snowstorm on Thursday, December 29. The timing couldn't have been better, because that was also the day Violet arrived to spend two nights with us.

We woke up to 18-22" of the light, fluffy stuff on Friday morning.

Violet and I were eager to get out into the snow, she to go sledding, I to go snowshoeing.

We found the snow was too light for good sledding and snowshoeing, though. Violet's flying saucer simply sank down into the deep snow, and my snowshoes did the same.

Undaunted, we got up Saturday morning for another attempt. By this time the snow had sunk down a little and was easier to pack.

Here's Violet's favorite sledding hill. As you can see, she made several runs down the hill in her flying saucer.

Snowshoeing was much easier for me on Saturday, largely because of the more-packed snow, but also because I decided to use my cross-country ski poles as walking sticks. What a difference!

It wasn't long before Sage decided to join the fun. She's usually on a leash when outside, but this time I unhooked her leash and let her run free.

I managed to capture this photo as Violet and Sage came up the hill after a wild ride down.

Sage sometimes stopped during a wild run and began digging furiously in the snow. That's what she's doing here. I wondered if maybe she could sniff out mice living beneath the snow for the winter.

It's safe to say Violet, Sage, and I got our money's worth out of that snowstorm. Now I'm ready for another one. So is Sage. Violet, of course, is back at school.

On the knitting front, this is a sweater (Sirdar 1401) that I knit for my friend's grand daughter, Phoebe, for Christmas.

Except it's too small.

I valiantly offered to knit the sweater again, this time in a larger size.

I'd forgotten, apparently, how much I'd hated knitting this pattern the first time.

I've been knitting attempt #2 for several days now. Yesterday I grew so tired of it and its crazy design that I came this close to raveling out the darned thing and selecting an easier pattern.

Then I got myself under control, pointed out to myself that I was more than half done with the project, and told myself to forge ahead.

So that's what I'm doing now.

What causes me to get discouraged with Sirdar #1401 is, first of all, the stupid line just above the top garter stitch edge on the back. With both the pale aqua version, and now with the pink version, I do a really, really, really awful job of picking up stitches along that edge to begin the garter rows. I thought I might do a better job of it the second time around, but I was definitely mistaken. I've been pondering this problem and wondering if perhaps I can add a little hand-embroidered bit along that top garter edge to hide my messiness.

Then there's that ugly seam halfway down the middle of the back. On Ravelry, others who've knit this cardigan and who've hated that ugly seam as much as I do have said, casually, that they avoided the seam altogether by "knitting the entire sweater body as one piece." I wish I were that accomplished as a knitter!

Oh, well. The sweater will get done, and Phoebe probably won't notice my amateur knitting. The pattern will be going into the paper recycling bin as soon as the project is DONE.

Still alive

Yes, I'm still vertical. I've intended to write a blog post many times in the past three weeks, but somehow I just didn't get to it. That's pretty much what my Christmas preparations were like this year, too: I just didn't get to them. I never did bring the nutcrackers down from the attic and put them on the mantel; I didn't get out any of my Santas; I decorated the tree with about half the usual ornaments.

(I blame all of this on Trump. I've decided it's going to be fun to blame everything imaginable on Trump for the next four years.)

Today I removed the ornaments from the tree. I don't think Ken has noticed that yet. We always disagree as to when the tree should be taken down. I'd like it down at 12:01 a.m. on December 26, ideally, but Ken wants the tree to stay up until after New Year's Day. I decided to remove the decorations today, without consulting Ken, and I'll be interested to see when he notices that they're gone. If he still wants to leave it up until after January 1, that's fine with me. My work, at least, is done.

We spent Christmas Eve with Jim and Lynn. Their son Karl was there with his wife Dani and little girl Liv. It's been our tradition for years to be at Jim and Lynn's on Christmas Eve, and we always enjoy our time there. Liv provided added entertainment this year, of course. She's a sweetie. She enjoyed sitting at the piano with her Grammy Lynn and belting out a fine rendition of "The Wheels on the Bus." I predict all three of Lynn's grandchildren will play the piano one day, because that's the first thing they ask to do with Lynn when they arrive at her house.

We had a White Christmas, and we knew quite certainly that we would several days in advance. Now our snow is looking old and tired after a rain storm a couple of days ago, but not to worry:  a Nor'easter is headed our way even as I type. It should arrive tomorrow morning and give us 8"-10" of new snow.

This was our tree, pre-nakedness.

I put some of my cold porcelain and salt dough ornaments and tags on our coffee table, thinking they made a nice little attraction there.


Then I noticed one or two had mysteriously disappeared.

Then I realized the culprit was, of course, Sage.

The basket of ornaments is now up high where she can't get them and no one can see them.

My favorite gift that I gave this year was a Chatbook for Violet. I filled it with photos of her various visits with us since she was two years old.

Most of the photos are from her sleepovers with us, and our many adventures together during those visits.

I'm not sure the photobook means all that much to her now, but I suspect it will someday.

And speaking of Violet, I'll pick her up tomorrow morning so she can do a two-night sleepover with us. I've bought a new flying saucer, so I'm sure much of the visit will be spent sledding on our back hill.

Done! (I hope)

The  Neck-down V-neck Shaped cardigan by Knitting Pure and Simple, which a friend asked me to knit for her adult daughter, is done. Done, I tell you.

It took me two weeks of intense knitting, usually at least three hours per day, to get 'er done. (I even knit while Ken drove us to our nephew's house for Thanksgiving dinner.)

Then, once it was done, I agonized over the sleeve lengths, so I raveled the sleeves back from the cuffs about two inches and re-knit them, adding an extra inch of length to each.

Of course, now I'm worried that the sleeves are too long. If they are, I can ravel them yet again and decrease some of that extra length. Then I'll worry that they are once again too short.

One thing I absolutely cannot do is re-knit the body of the sweater. No, spre That was a LOT of knitting, and I don't want to  repeat any of it.

In the top two photos you see the miracle that is called "blocking." In the first photo, that's the cardigan as it came off my needles.

I soaked it for an hour in cool water with Eucalan added.

I spread it out on my blocking boards, which are actually children's play mat squares, and let it dry for two days.


(That's when I decided the sleeves were too short, so here I am re-knitting the cuff end of each sleeve.)

After that, I placed the sweater on my ironing board, placed an ironing cloth over it, and gently steamed the entire thing. The yarn is an acrylic/wool blend, so I wasn't going to chance accidentally placing my iron directly onto the sweater and watching my gazillion stitches melt before my eyes.

I added my personalized knitting label, to make my work look a tad more professional.

Then I folded it carefully, with tissue paper within the folds.

I placed it inside a box, added a jute bow and one of my cold porcelain stars for pizzazz, and declared myself now able to attend to some of the much-neglected Christmas preparations in this house.

I hope Anne likes the sweater and is pleased with my work. Better yet, I hope Sarah, the sweater's recipient, declares it a perfect fit.

Knitting angst

In mid-October, at an Alpha Delta Kappa state luncheon, I happened to wear a cardigan I'd knit for myself about six years ago.

It's the Neck-down V-neck Shaped cardigan by Knitting Pure and Simple.

One of my A∆K sisters admired the cardigan, asked if I'd knit it, and asked if I might be able to knit one for her daughter, Sarah, for Christmas.

I said I could, since I was already familiar with the pattern and I needed a bigger project than knitting winter hats. (I've been knitting winter hats all fall.)

A few weeks went by and I heard no more about my knitting a sweater for Sarah.

Then, about 1 1/2 weeks ago, Anne contacted me to see if I still had time to knit the cardigan. (She'd shown Sarah a photo taken at the state luncheon, a photo of us "girls," and, of course, I'm wearing my sweater. Sarah told her mother she'd like to have a sweater like that one.)

I said yes.

I saw Anne at an A∆K meeting last Tuesday evening, and she gave me the yarn she'd selected for the project.

I cast on the next morning. This was an exciting project, I told myself, because Sarah is one of my former students, a really lovely girl, and I'd love to create for her a cardigan she is proud to wear.

Then the fears set in. Oh, boy, the fears.

First I feared that although I'd checked my gauge carefully (and I almost never check the gauge when I'm knitting for myself), this cardigan would be way, way too large.

Once I got beyond that fear, I started worrying about its opposite: The sweater would be way, way too small.

By yesterday I'd made enough progress to compare the new sweater with my original one. Sarah's is to be a size small; mine is a size medium.

When I placed Sarah's partial sweater on top of my completed one, I calmed down a little. Sarah's is a bit smaller than mine, but it's not ideal for a six-year-old. Phew.

So now I'm forging ahead. Although it's a simple pattern, as the design suggests, it's time-consuming. I'd like to have it done by December 6, so I can take it to our A∆K Christmas party and give it to Anne in time for her to give it to Sarah at Christmas.

Fingers crossed!

A Sage update

So how is Sage doing, you ask? Or, more important, how are we doing since Sage moved in with us?

We've had Sage now for 3 1/2 months. We adopted her through New England Lab Rescue on the last Saturday of July. She was almost seven months old when she became ours; she'll be one year old on January 6.

Of course we went through a honeymoon period of, oh, a few days. Sage had us hoodwinked. I even remember telling Ken I sure wish we'd adopted her when she was only seven weeks old, because she was such a good puppy and I felt bad that we'd missed out on her early weeks and months of life.

Then Sage began feeling comfortable in her new home with her new parents. Comfortable, indeed.

So comfortable, in fact, that here she is sitting in the wing-backed chair, which I specifically told her was off-limits.

Pretty though, isn't she?

She's a very loving dog, and she's certainly attached to us. If Ken leaves the house without her, she fusses; if I leave the house without her, she fusses.

I designated the far end of the sofa to be her end; the near end of the sofa was to be mine. I put a cushion in the middle of the sofa as a "line of demarcation."

Like that would impress her, right?! When she wants to get onto the sofa, she wedges herself in between the cushion and me. The far end of the sofa remains vacant.

By October we decided obedience training could not be avoided: too much jumping up, too much counter-surfing.

We've now completed four of the six Saturdays of training, and we're seeing improvement. If you want to know the truth, the improvement is more a matter of our being consistent with our expectations than it is with Sage knowing what not to do.

Sage and I take a long walk each morning, theoretically to wear some of the hyperactivity out of her.

Usually it doesn't work, but I enjoy our walks together, and I think Sage does, too.

Sage absolutely adores our wood stove. That's where she is right now, in fact, instead of here in my study with me.

See Pink Piggy under the stove? Pink Piggy has now gone to Stuffed Dog Toy Heaven. So have many other stuffed toys. It's all about removing the squeaker then dismantling the rest of the animal seam by seam. Sage is an expert at eviscerating and de-limbing.

My nephew Kevin visited us with his family recently, and Sage, as  you can see, was in her glory all evening.



But the stuffed animals beside her here? All deceased.

Sage enjoys watching me work in the kitchen. She's usually in the way, but I just step over her rather than call attention to her blocking my path.

I took this photo of Sage a couple of days ago. She was lounging on our bed, watching me clean the bathroom. I loved the contrast of her sleek, pure black coat and her green ball. She set up the shot herself; all I did was grab my iPad.

She's a beauty, all right. She's gradually getting us trained.