another knitting blog

what was in my csa share?: 6.12.10

• green garlic
• garlic scapes
• yellow onion sets
• joi choi
• lettuce
• radishes
• turnips
• cilantro

no arugula this week, so I had to fulfill my new addiction to pesto with basil from the store.

while I was making my pick-up, I heard the farmer talking about how understanding the shareholders have been this spring giving the massive amounts of rain and unusual growing season we're having this year. I admit, I have been a bit outpaced by the onion and garlic. I'm hoping drier weather and more variety is on the way.

also, flavorful raspberries from the farmers market baked into a salt-kissed buttermilk cake minus the kissing.

what was in my csa share?: 6.15.10

• lettuce
• arugula
• onion scapes
• garlic scapes
• kohlrabi (new to me)
• five adorable little radishes
• green garlic
• spring onions

the arugula and garlic scapes turned into pesto again this week. is it wrong to just eat it by the spoonful?

what was in my csa share?: 6.8.10

• joi choi
• arugula
• mixed greens
• early garlic
• spring onions
• garlic scapes
• onion scapes
• turnips

I found out last night that garlic scapes can be turned into a tasty pesto.

what was in my csa share?: 5.25.10

• more freakin' leeks
• spring onions
• green garlic
• onion scapes
• mixed greens
• pea shoots
• dried beans
• napa cabbage

Recipe recommendations welcome.

what was in my csa share?: 5.18.10

• green garlic
• leeks
• leek scapes
• spring onions
• pea shoots
• beans
• napa cabbage

I will be at Maryland Sheep & Wool on Sunday. My first chance to come back since moving away almost five (!) years ago.

my sweet girl is gone

song for the year past

Not Your Year - The Weepies

Not Your Year

Scattered shadows on a wall, you watch the long light fall
Some impressions stay and some will fade
Tattered shoes outside your door, clothes all on the floor
Your life feels like the morning after all year long.

Every day it starts again
You cannot say if you’re happy
You keep trying to be
Try harder, maybe this is not your year.

Movies, TV screens reflect just what you expected
There’s a world of shiny people somewhere else
Out there following their bliss
living easy, getting kissed
while you wonder what else you’re doing wrong

Breathe through it, write a list of desires
Make a toast, make a wish, slash some tires
Paint a heart repeating, beating “don’t give up, don’t give up, don’t give up.”

©2006 Deb Talan & Steve Tannen (ASCAP/BMI). All rights reserved

Weepies website

Book Review: The Knitter's Book of Wool by Clara Parkes

Book Review: The Knitter's Book of Wool by Clara Parkes

[A copy of this book was provided by the publisher for review].

Purchase this book from Amazon.com

I have long loved yarn in all its various forms, but a recent step into spinning has got me thinking more deeply about the raw material that turns into that object of desire. To learn to spin is to learn about fiber, and this book is a wonderful reference about that most wonderful fiber: wool.

The first two chapters introduce the main character and describe its transformation in yarn; however, as a new spinner, I'm most excited by Chapter Three. The third chapter provides profiles of the fiber from 37 different sheep breeds along with essential stats like fineness, staple length, and crimp, and color pictures of washed, unspun locks. What a great resource! As someone who has recently been buying fiber more often than yarn, this is information I really appreciate. Adding to overall usefulness quotient, there's a chapter devoted to wool blends, articles on washing wool and moth control, and really too much more to list.

And, if all that information weren't enough, there is a chapter of patterns for hats, socks, shawls, and more. There are some good, basic patterns as well as some stand-outs for me, like the Lillia Hyrna Shawl and the Tibetan Clouds Beaded Stole [designed by new Portlandite and Twisted employee, Sivia Harding].

I believe I will refer to this book often as my love of knitting morphs into an obsession with spinning.

i yam what i yam

and that's all that I yam.