And the storm breaks...

So the weather forecast only has one little day left for us to get some winter weather this week and this morning when I woke up the sun was trying to peak it's head above the fog.  I naturally ran outside to take pictures in the 16 degree weather.  Enjoy!

A taste of life around here...

So it is Sunday, which this week is the 6th day in a row that Mom and I have gone to work and so we are quite tired and ready for our one-day weekend.  But here is a real conversation that happened tonight as we picked up dinner from KFC...

Intercom:  "Place your order when you're ready."

Mom:  "We'd like the 10 piece feast.  What chicken is in that?"

Intercom:  "Breasts, wings, legs, feet, thighs.."

Mom:  "Okay, that sounds good."

Me:  "Did he say feet?"

Mom:  "Yeah, but he didn't mean feet."

Intercom:  (Speaking really fast)  "How'd cha wan that?"

Mom:  "Uhhhh..."

Me:  (Coaching her) "original recipe."

Mom:  "Original recipe."

Intercom:  "Do ya wan mached potatoes, gravy and coleslaw with that?"

Me:  "yes."

Mom:  "Yes."

Intercom:  "Wha kinda cake you want?  We have chocolate, lemon and red velvet."

Me:  "lemon."

Mom:  "What?  Lemon?"

Intercom:  "Yah we have chocolate, lemon and red velvet."

Mom:  "Yeah, chocolate lemon."

Me:  "No chocolate or lemon, not chocolate-lemon."

Mom:  "Yeah!  Lemon, just lemon.  Haha."

Intercom:  "Will that be all?"

Mom:  "Yes."

Intercom:  "Please pull forward to the second window."

At this point I'll give Mom the benefit of the doubt because it was (of course) snowing again and it was hard to see which window was the second one.  She pulled past the second window and was heading for the end of the drive-thru.

Me:  "Um, that was the second window."

Mom:  "Wait what?  Where was the first window."

Me:  (Turning around to look) "Back there."

Mom:  "Oh geeze, this guy's gonna think we're drunk already."

She backs up and pulls forward to the second window.  Remember it's snowing and there is NO ONE else in the drive-thru.

Mom:  "I'm still kinda far from the window.  Should I try again?"

Me:  "Nah, he can lean out and hand it to us."

We get our meal and are heading home laughing about how crazy that whole situation was.

Me:  "Should I check and see if there are really feet in here?  We might have gone through the mexican KFC where they really do hand out feet..."

Uhhh..it's snowing....again.....

Though you can't really see it in this picture...

Um....it's still snowing...

So I shoveled the walk yesterday when we got home and it was pleasant this morning to walk out to the van through a semi-clear path.  It was spitting some freezing rain on the way into work and around 10 it started snowing again.  And it hasn't stopped yet.  This was what greeted us when we got home.

So I went out and shoveled the walk again.

Yeah that's shoveled!  It snowed that much as I was clearing the path.

So now we are up to around 6 inches though it sure feels like more.

And I am off to make some tortellini soup.  I'd invite you all over, but I don't want anyone to drive in the weather.  :)

It's snowing!!

That's right, just like the title says...well okay it was snowing earlier today, but it has currently ceased and is thinking about dumping some more later tonight.

We got about 3 inches out here and it is sorely needed.  We had a bit of snow earlier in November and then it melted and we had nothing but cold temps and blue skies for weeks! (How can I complain, right?) It was wonderful to see so much sunshine during the darkest days of the year but the brown was starting to get to me.  It's much nicer now that it's white.  :)  We also really needed the snow in the mountains because word on the street was that we were heading into a d-word.  That's right....drought.  And oh how the people in charge like to remind you about it all summer.  There's not enough irrigation water for this, there's not enough water in the reservoir to allow Seattle to make it all summer, why are you thinking of filling that pool!?!??!  We don't have ANY water!  I love it when mother nature takes care of it before they get their knickers in a twist.

I personally am glad too that we'll have lots of irrigation water because I've been mapping out my garden for next year.  I'm thinking that word has gotten out that I am a gardener because this is what has shown up at my house just in the month of December.

I think I have received about 15 seed and plant catalogs, which definitely gives me a selection, but is a bit overwhelming.  I'll probably stick to the few tried and true places I have been getting seeds and starter plants from.  Last year the best place I ordered from was Territorial Seed Company out of Cottage Grove, OR.  All the plant starters did really well, and like a co-worker at work agrees, I believe it is because there is little shock to the plants and seeds since they are grown in the Pacific Northwest.

I'm hoping to get to some of the other things I want to do this year like making cheese.  I've only done mozzarella before, but I'd like to take it to the next level and go with a cheddar.  I got a new cheese making kit for Christmas and I've got the low down on a place that sells fresh milk, so I'm ready.  We also received a fun catalog recently that has peaked our interest.  So I'll let you guess from the picture what we may be doing next...(this is a big MAY).

An ode to an amazing purse...

So after Christmas I happened to be at Kohl's, and whenever I am there I check out their purse selection.  As I meandered through the aisles towards the back of the section there it was.  A beautiful plaid purse with handles long enough for me to wear over my shoulder without my armpit feeling like it needed to take said purse to court for molestation charges.

It was HUGE inside and I love that because as time goes on I end up carrying around more items that I feel are "necessary" to my survival.  If you read my blog challenge about my bag last year, you'll understand.  First it has this nice open compartment for all of my random stuff, you know keys, iPod, work badge, Kleenex, calculator, etc.

Then it has a convenient zippered compartment for stuff I don't want to lose.  (You'd think the iPod would be in here, but I grab it out too often.)  So that's got my cell phone (which I never use), wallet, coin purse, etc.

And last, but certainly not least, it has a third compartment for...... MY KNITTING!

I know.  Crazy awesome, right?  It's even big enough that I could put my Kindle in there too...

So I didn't want to just throw my knitting in there and let important tools getting lost (cable needles and counters!) or dirty, so I searched online for a project bag that was a good size and could be cinched up.  When I saw these I was sold.

I've been seeing the line "Keep Calm and Carry On" from the posters that the British government released during World War II popping up a lot lately and there are some funny spoofs of them out there that you can see here and here.  So I was instantly taken with these bags that spoof it in a knitting way.  I found them on Etsy at JennieGee's store and have had to resist going and buying more on a daily basis.  Lets see how many projects I get through this year now that I have my knitting with me all the time!

2011 - A Year in Review Through Knits

So I have been asked to post what I am knitting, since I am almost always knitting something (or two or three somethings), but have had trouble with that the last couple of years.  The problem lies in the fact that my blog reading audience consists mostly of people who will be receiving the items I am knitting.  In order not to ruin a surprise, I hesitate in posting about what I've finished.  In 2010 it was quite a few pairs of felted slippers, though my mom helped by knitting about half of those.  This year I took a picture of all the items that were going to be shipped away for Christmas presents and was pretty impressed.

Again, I was not the lone knitting ranger in this endeavor, I am not THAT good...yet.  While I really enjoy knitting items for presents, mostly because I feel that a handmade item is a more heartfelt and meaningful gift because of the time spent looking for a pattern and yarn that the specific person will like, and the time spent knitting it thinking about how you hope the person will love it, I am going to be knitting more items for myself this year.  2012 will be the year that I get to knit up some of the projects I have bought and put aside for later.  There are scarves, shawls, socks, mitts, gloves, cardigans and baby items that I have yarn and patterns for and have all been sent to the back burner because I am trying to plow through Christmas knitting that takes me most of the year to finish.  So you will be getting more blogs about my knitting this year and fewer handmade gifts.  Okay scratch that last, I already have ideas for presents for next year, they just may not necessarily be knitted. :)

To start off the year right, after I had finished all of last year's presents by mid-December, I started on a cowl that I had been dying to knit.

Pretty right?  I ended up finishing it on the day after Christmas!  That's right it took me only a couple of weeks to complete!  I was surprised myself and I think I have all of you to thank, all of those miles of stockinette stitch that I plowed through has turned me into a pretty fast knitter!  So since I had the week after Christmas off, I picked up another project that I had knit about 4 rows on a year or so ago.  It was these fingerless mitts.

Soooo nice.  And I finished those in 2 days.  Instant knitting gratification!!!  And since they went so fast, they may be ending up in some Christmas presents this year....

We also had a pretty thrifty Christmas this year, mostly movies, books and a little bit of yarn, but I did manage (without using my credit cards >D) to get mom a loom.  We had seen this baby blanket to weave in a yarn catalog we got earlier in the fall.  It was so pretty, but it needed a bigger weaving width than the looms we had.  I got mom a Kromski Harp rigid heddle loom that folds up and can be taken places, like oh say, the beach.  She spent her time off putting it together and getting it warped and will be spending most of her evenings weaving while watching TV.

We hope you all had a Merry Christmas and have an awesome New Year!

Christmas Cookies - Part 2

Okay, so this was supposed to be posted A LOT earlier in December, but then Christmas business got in the way and then after-Christmas laziness set in.  I also thought about bagging the whole thing, because who is going to be making Christmas cookies in January?  But then I ended the title of the first post with a "Part 1" so there had to be a "Part 2."

Our last Christmas cookie that we made was Spritz cookies.  They are pretty much a traditional cookie in my home around this time of year although the struggle with the cookie press is immense and so traumatizing that the mention of Spritz cookies puts my mom into facial tics.  But I assured her that I would struggle with the great cookie press and she would have to only make the batter.  We used a new recipe this year, one that called for some citrus flavoring called Fiori di Sicilia and some lemon (or orange) zest.  You can find the recipe here at the company we bought the flavoring from.  I forgot to color the dough before I threw it in the press so I added Christmasy sprinkles to the tops of the cookies before I baked them, and I think they turned out better than coloring.  We made up a second batch to take down to my Uncle Fred's for our annual Christmas exchange and they were a pretty big hit!

Also during this little break I got after Christmas I made 2 batches of 3-minute fudge.  The first one was chocolate-peanut butter fudge.  I took 1 bag of Ghirardelli Milk Chocolate chips, 1 bag of Reese's Peanut Butter chips and 2 cans of Eagle condensed milk, and poured them all into a microwavable bowl.  After heating them on half power for 1 minute increments until the mixture was smooth and well mixed, I poured it out onto wax paper and let it harden overnight.  It was easiest to cut the fudge into squares and then flip the whole thing over and remove the wax paper from the bottom and allow the bottom of the fudge to dry.  The second batch was chocolate toffee fudge.  That time I used 1 bag of Ghirardelli Milk Chocolate chips and 1 can of Eagle condensed milk, microwaved it until it was smooth and then stirred in Heath toffee chips and poured it onto wax paper.  I added chopped walnuts to the top and let it harden.  The flipping of the fudge after I cut it resulted in most some of the walnuts coming off, but I pressed them back on.


The moral of this post is that all these treats need to be eaten up before I go back to work, or will be taken to work for the masses to eat, because I need to lose weight this year!