CSA week 3

Last weekend we were out of town, so this weekend we received a double allotment.

Using the strawberries from our garden, I made strawberry rhubarb pie with a crumb topping. It was delicious!



While the oven was hot, I also made some Oatmeal blueberry bar cookies. Also yummy!

Emily Gould Exposed

My friend Cara posted a link to Emily Gould’s piece on blogging, and it definitely struck a chord.

"I think most people who maintain blogs are doing it for some of the same reasons I do: they like the idea that there’s a place where a record of their existence is kept — a house with an always-open door where people who are looking for you can check on you, compare notes with you and tell you what they think of you."

This is what initially horrified me about starting a blog at all but now I've come to really enjoy it and delight in the one of two comments that arrive in my email once they've been posted to the blog. Though I do try to keep my over sharing in check, for which I'm sure we're all glad. Emily also talks about writer's block, which I have gone through myself in varying degrees (usually tied to the heat of summer and the lack of desire to knit).

"The will to blog is a complicated thing, somewhere between inspiration and compulsion. It can feel almost like a biological impulse. You see something, or an idea occurs to you, and you have to share it with the Internet as soon as possible."

But more, since Knerq is supposed to be a knitting blog, I worry more about staying on point... which is funny because I seem to get more comments about the posts that are not about knitting at all. Visitors spike on the days that I post pictures of my cats or flowers in my garden... which makes me wonder who are my readers? How did they find me? Why do they read my blog if they don't knit and don't know me?

Baby blanket

It's small, knit in fingering/DK weight yarn. Started out using leftovers from my stash but it soon became apparent that I would need to buy a few balls of yarn to finish it. Here's how it looked on Thursday before Max and I left for Marvin's graduation in Ithaca, NY:



After 8 hours of driving and a trip to Knitting Etc. in Ithaca, NY to buy some Plymouth Dreambaby:



Knitting at commencement:



Last night, after convocation, and a 7 hour drive home:



The baby shower is on Thursday but I'm hoping to finish it tonight. I'm now working on a white outer border of 9 ridges each... and maybe a crochet edging to unite it all. I have another baby shower on June 10 and for that I'm making a baby surprise jacket. Wish me luck!

Pixie

Another hat but a completely new pattern. I printed it out in 2006 and just made it for the first time. It's a little bigger than the pattern calls for because I was using fingering weight and not lace weight. Still, I like how it turned out and I think it would be the perfect dress up item for a little girl.

Irises

When I was little, my Mom had a patch of irises growing in the garden. I've always associated the flower with her, especially purple ones. This one came from my garden.



This one is from the park near my house:

In progress

As you may have noticed, I make the Frivoli hat a lot. It is one of my favorite patterns... this is the 7th one. On a cold, rainy day... this colour is the perfect cure.

CSA week 2

The first helping from our CSA was a little challenging for us... we never eat radishes, swiss chard or turnips. We made scrambled eggs with scallions, (incredibly delicious) country rhubarb cake, Chinese noodles with swiss chard and scallions, vegetable soup with turnips, carrots, onion, green onion, fresh oregano, and farro, rice pudding with farro and eggs, and, below, is the sauteed turnip and radish greens, grilled radishes, asparagus and salmon.



The swiss chard tasted like spinach and although it's not my favorite consistency, doable. The sauteed greens were too bitter for me but Max was okay with them (even if they were vegetables), grilling the radishes neutralized any spark they may have had so I probably wouldn't do that again unless I knew they were going to be extremely potent. Everything else was great.

Here's this week's:



Green buttercrisp lettuce, red romaine lettuce, rhubarb, asparagus, dill and oregano, scallions, and a dozen eggs.

Shrinky dinks

So when I learned that you could use any to make your own shrinky dinks, I immediately started checking all of my thin, clear plastic to see if it was usable (since it's not recyclably anyway). Finally last week I discovered that the inside plastic packaging from my favorite Trader Joe's mushroom turnovers was #6. While it's disappointing that Trader Joe's would use packaging that can't be recycled, I was still excited that I could use it to make some crafty items. My first thought was buttons but the packaging was small and I wanted to test how much it would shrink before I made some. My main concern was that the holes would disappear altogether - not entirely unfounded as you'll see. Also, after I saw the wee wonderful pins, I thought I would try that too. (Pin cushion provided by Mommy Rimes)



Here's my button:



Now that I know it works, I'll probably make two more. Max even got into it and made his own Spider-Man mask. Who knows what he's going to do with it but he seemed happy with it.

Green hat

I started this hat last week but then got distracted by the hand puppet and also some out of town visitors. The colour is truer on the left.



Here's the finished hat, from the top:

Happy Mother's Day!

Dear Mom,

Have a great day!

Love, Nicole

CSA

Last week Max and I purchased a share of a CSA, community supported agriculture. Our share includes a case of fresh, local produce and a dozen eggs for $24/week. We don't get to pick which produce we'd like (or not) so it will be a surprise... could be rhubarb and asparagus or cabbage and brussel sprouts. My friend Amanda said it's like Christmas every week. I thought it might be fun to share, so here's our first installment:



Asparagus, scallions, radishes, rhubarb, white turnips, swiss chard and a dozen eggs.

Interested in signing up yourself? Check out Local Harvest.

Not a hat

I started this project on a whim and was delighted to find three shades of Lion Brand Wool-Ease in my stash that were quite similar to the original. The gauge is a lot bigger so I had to pay attention and stop when I got to the right lengths. I improvised the tongue and I'm quite happy with it. There's an embroidered nose but it's kind of hard to see. For the eyes I used some buttons from my stash. Max thinks he looks Chinese. Here is the full out Elliot the Dragon! (In all his photoshopped glory)

Brita filters

Do you use Brita water filters to purify your tap water? Have you ever wondered what happens to all the used plastic filter cartridges at the end of their lives?

If you live in Europe, you could take that filter to a drop-off location where it would be sent back to Brita for recycling. Unfortunately, in North America we have no options for recycling our Brita cartridges at all. Each plastic cartridge is either landfilled or incinerated, adding to the toxic waste that is already choking our planet.

That's why I have signed on to the Take Back The Filter campaign (http://www.takebackthefilter.org) to urge The Clorox Company, which owns Brita in North America, to redesign their filters and provide a way for us to recycle them, as is done in Europe. I urge you to join me!

Here's how you can help:

Sign the Petition (http://www.gopetition.com/online/18444.html)

Read more about the issue: (http://www.takebackthefilter.org)

This is a grassroots movement... so if we don't speak up, who will?

Dishcloth

As part of being more green, I've decided to slowly faze out the disposable sponges and use a cotton dishcloth instead. Enter the red dishcloth:



It was knit using Lily Cotton yarn on US size 7 needles, 25 stitches per row, garter stitch until it was a 6.5" square. I had leftover yarn so I used a crochet hook to decorate it, sturdy it up and use the rest of the yarn.

Reuse, reduce, recycle

Max asked me this morning what I considered worse, filling up landfills or releasing green house gases to recycle. Ick, those are my only two options? No! That's why I have been making a greater effort to buy less, buy used, and reuse what I have. To that end, I ask you...

How can I reuse or recycle lanyards?

Any ideas?

April showers...

...bring May flowers, right?