A Slight Melt Down

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Had a small “incident” Sunday while cooking dinner. Let’s just say I was scraping burned Velveeta cheese sauce of the burner and out of the burner pan. Actually I just threw the burner and the pan in the sink and let them soak for a while. NOT PLEASANT. And so we had veggies in “smoky cheese sauce.” Actually the cheese sauce was not too bad. Velveeta can take a lot of abuse. NO FIRE, just a boil-over. A fair quantity of horrible smelling smoke, though.

Had to eat at Roll Cafe again the other day, it was cool and rainy and a day that required soup. Tried the shoyu ramen rather than the spicy ramen, of course I prefer the spicy ramen. The shoyu was still good. Don’t know if I will eventually get the miso ramen, I like the spicy too much. It comes in a combo with four pieces of California roll, I added on a drink and that was about $12, so a little spendy for lunch but delicious.

When I was at Pacific Ocean Marketplace last week, I wandered up and down the ramen aisle, looking for new and interesting packages for breakfast/lunch. I tried one of them last week.

For the record, I do not like instant sweet potato threads. Too gummy.

I just read “sweet potato,” I didn’t know that the noodles were sweet potato. That is what I get for not reading directions. The broth was really tasty, I think there was quite a bit of chili oil in there, but those noodles, ugh.

We had fun at knitting Tuesday night. There were only four of us but we made about enough noise for eight. K., who hadn’t been there for a while, was an enabler and allowed all of us to go down the street to the old-fashioned ice cream and candy store and get ice cream. It was a great night for it, lots of people out walking around enjoying the weather. I discovered I had left my wrist warmers that I intended to work on at home, and then I was going to rip out the toes of my Mom’s socks and make them smaller, but I didn’t bring any small needles to work on those with, so I worked on my Chevron Scarf and we all visited and had a good time. Even to the point of staying 10 minutes past our usual time.

Finally Some Yarn Content

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Are you all tired of pictures of food? Well, it is easy to take pictures of food, because I generally eat some every day. Sometimes it is not very exciting food, so I don’t take any pictures of that. Sometimes I just forget. I almost always do something with yarn about every day too, perhaps I need to take more pictures of yarn. Ta-da! Pictures of yarn today.

This yarn is from a party my friend Judy hosted at her house. Myra from Fancy Image Yarn was in town and Judy had an open house for her, and we all got to see her delicious, squishy, colorful yarn. She has a gift for putting great kits together! I purchased two kits for wrist warmers (scroll down to Cutest Girl Leg Warmers or Adult/Girl Wrist Warmer) which are for me, but then I might have to make some for the nieces, because they are so cute. I got the pink/black/white set (looks like Good N Plenty Candies) and the pink/wheat brown set (looks like Neopolitan ice cream) (yes, still with the food obsession, I know.) I am eating Good and Plentys as I type this, now all of you who are food-suggestible like I am are going to go buy some, aren’t you? At least the next time you are at the store.

I also got an “assorted” package of blues/purples in sock yarn, and I am thinking Chevron  Scarf from Last Minute Knitted Gifts.

And a pattern for a sweater that is very attractive in person.

However, I am not allowing myself to start anything new (except for the wrist warmers I already started) until I get my Mother’s socks fixed. I thought I was all done with them but when I blocked them they turned huge, and the cast on at the top of the leg is too tight. So I am going to have to do some ripping and readjusting. Plus I am working on a couple of gifts for my youngest niece, which involve the sewing machine and embroidery, I am not sure they are going to get there in time for the birthday party, but they will be done this month.

Also: I went to Bagel Deli this weekend when I was on my consignment store shop-hop. I have to go to that place if I am in close proximity, it can’t be helped.

Potato latke. This was fine, nothing spectacular. Nice side dish.

Matzo ball soup. Amazing as always.

Prake or stuffed cabbage – delicious! I forget that this is HUGE, I should not have ordered the latke with it. Mmmmmmm. Excellent.

It really cooled off here Monday night and Tuesday. I need to start hardening off my little seedlings, getting them ready to go outside, but I think that I will not subject them to 34° tonight, poor little things. I would like to get them planted this weekend but may need to wait another weekend, still supposed to be in the 40s at night on Saturday.

Friday Night Freak-Out

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I don’t know if it was the upcoming full moon, or Cinco de Mayo, or Derby Day, but there were two accidents on my way home on Friday (thank goodness I had 2 hrs to commute to my haircut) and then on my way home from the haircut, the power was out for quite a section of town and then there was a big accident at an intersection that did have power. I decided that we weren’t going anywhere on Saturday night if we could help it.

I ate at Mimi’s Cafe, they really used to be one of my favorite places but either I have outgrown them or they have gone downhill. I had the $5 red wine flight, which I enjoyed (they were pretty sweet reds, I don’t really care for dry reds too much),

and the quatre fromaggio quiche with the French onion soup.It is hard to mess up French onion (although it is possible – imagine barely cooked onions in chicken broth with processed cheese melted on top – THAT restaurant has gone out of business) so that was pretty good.

The quiche was, I don’t know – gummy?

Parts of the crust were OK and parts were just meh, and the filling had maybe too much cheese, because it seemed to have collected at the bottom and was causing the gumminess. So, thumbs up on the wine and soup, thumbs down on the quiche.

Report on my quilt last week from class: Good job on the design, but not so much on showing luminosity. I didn’t show enough of the direction the light was coming from, and the background wasn’t helping because it was too mottled and had some light in it itself. I still like it.

I Am, as a Matter of Fact

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Best thing that someone said to me today:  “I like you, you’re twisted,” by one of the other training participants. I love compliments like that.

Finished my 2nd day of a training seminar. Started out the day with another potato bomb from WSB Soup and Chili, this time I got the sausage gravy on the side instead of the green chile on the top. This was much easier to eat in the car. Although he very generously give me about 3 times as much gravy as I needed. And I remembered to take a picture:

And he remembered me from yesterday and called me Sunshine, what a hoot.

I will go there when I can but they were on the route to my seminar, not my route to work. So I might try this recipe suggested by a Facebook friend: http://gimmesomeoven.com/idaho-sunrise-baked-eggs-and-bacon-in-potato-bowls/.

It was a long day in training but I learned a lot, tires the brain out to be doing something so different all day.

Ken watched something about Cinco De Mayo at work and then was hungry for Mexican food (apparently he is easily suggestible too) and that was fine with me. I said we had to eat somewhere different than we usually did so I had something to blog about. He remembered a restaurant he had covered an event at that was close to my location so we met there – Luna’s. They had shrimp soup but I have been disappointed in shrimp soup almost everywhere except at Gregorio’s, (no webpage), so I decided to try something else new. I had the sopes, which have a fried masa base and then are topped with refried beans, your choice of meat (I had the al pastor) and then lettuce, tomato, sour cream, and cojita cheese. T

*(*&^*%&^% WordPress just crashed and took 1/4 of my entry, doggone it.

Back to my original thought: They were good but very filling. I only ate one, and brought the rest home for breakfast.

Ken had the tacos, and said they were good.

And then I decided to have an easy night at home and let my brain recover, do some knitting, watch Antiques Roadshow…..

Have An Interesting Day

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Before I left the house this a.m., I misplaced my briefcase, misplaced my keys, accidentally set off the car alarm, and Leo barfed on both the couch and in front of the bedroom door. I was on my way to a seminar/training all day, and I had been dreaming about being in a quilt class, being in the WRONG quilt class, and MaryAnne woke me up at 4:00 so she could snuggle with me. Ken said, “Have an interesting day,” and I said, “It already is.”

I stopped at White Soul Brothers Chili to have one of their “potato bombs” for breakfast. It is essentially a potato half, with some of the potato scooped out, and then baked with an egg and cheese on top of it. Getting it smothered in green chili did not make it easy to eat in the car, but it was delicious. I am going to get back there some day for lunch so I can have some of their soup. I had fun talking to the two gentlemen there, one who was preparing my food and one who was cleaning the blinds. The one cleaning the blinds asked if I would be offended if he asked me if he was cleaning them correctly. Heck no, of course not. They were right next to one of the tables and looked like they might have had pop spilled on them or something – and I told him there wasn’t really an easier way, you just have to wipe them all carefully down (metal mini-blinds) and that it was going to be a pain. Apparently I impressed them with my cheerfulness, because when I told them to have a good day, the blind-cleaning one said “I know you will, because you have the right attitude!”

We had Udi’s sandwiches for lunch at my workshop, and I had an excellent one with turkey, granny smith apple slices, and bleu cheese, on cranberry walnut bread, which was amazing.

My seminar was good, but it was exhausting, and I don’t talk about work on this blog so that is all I am going to say about that! :  ) But using a different part of your brain all day than you typically use is very exhausting.

Then I went to GB Fish and Chips because it was close by, and now I remember why I don’t get fish and chips very often, they are so greasy. And it was early for dinner for me, so I wasn’t very hungry, So I didn’t really do justice to the HUGE pile of squid strips and few oysters and chips.

Some of the squid strips were cooked just right and still had some tooth to them, but most of them were overdone and you couldn’t tell the difference between them and the breading. It was certainly a LARGE serving, and this was supposed to be a half order!

Then I went to my quilt class, I will write more about that tomorrow when I have more than half a brain cell. It was certainly exhausting going to another learning experience after having been in one all day!

Banh Mi #2 (Pacific Ocean Marketplace) and Knit Knight

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I stopped at Pacific Ocean Marketplace (POM) on my way from work to knitting, because there are the ONLY place with banh mi sandwiches between work and knitting, and because I have just discovered banh mi and need to try them at every opportunity. There were a few reviews of their banh mi on Yelp so I decided to try one.

In comparison to the Banh Mi at D’Deli in Golden: Bread – both had excellent bread. Size: the one from POM was bigger, even for a small. It was about 8 inches long. Fillings: slight edge to D’Deli just because the filling was juicier. I don’t know what was juicy on the D’Deli one, perhaps there was more aioli, theirs also had a teriyaki taste to it. Value: POM wins  hands down, D’Deli was between $7 and $8 and POM’s was $3.50.

What separates Banh mi from other sandwiches is the excellent bread and the pickled vegetables, and the cilantro (POM wins on the cilantro front) – they just don’t taste like a typical sandwich from anywhere else. I am a big fan.

Plus, POM has green cake available.

Pandan cake is, according to wikipedia: a light, fluffy cake of Malay origins (Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia) flavoured with the juice of Pandanus amaryllifolius leaves. The cakes are light green in tone due to the chlorophyll in the leaf juice. It also sometimes contains green food colouring to further enhance its colour. The cakes are sometimes not made with the leaf juice but instead simply flavoured with Pandanus extract, in which case colouring is added if a green colour is desired.

It is quite tasty but would be good with frosting. They also had these long fried sticks of dough labeled “fried stick $1” which I was extremely tempted by, but you have to leave something for next time.

I also bought a large jug of soy sauce (I don’t fool around with those little bottles you can buy at Kroger, I have a recipe that uses up an entire one of those….). And I went through the ramen aisle and chose random packets of ramen, some of THOSE should give me something interesting to write about.

I didn’t exactly have a successful, or maybe I should say productive, evening at knitting. I tried to cast on my wrist warmers (scroll down to Cutest Girl Leg Warmers or Adult/Girl Wrist Warmer) from Fancy Image Yarn, and well, let’s just say I had casting-on issues, and then I had gauge issues (I knit loosely, so I need to go down a couple of sizes in needles), so that project didn’t get off to a great start, but I had fun playing with the yarn. And I just realized I didn’t post yet about the yarn party my friend Judy had at her house featuring Fancy Image yarn, so I will do that tomorrow, if I have my hard drive along with me that has those pictures on it…..(pictures of yarn, not pictures from the party, although that would have been a good idea too…). I think some of my younger nieces may need me to make some of the things on this page for them.

I tried the wrist warmers on two different sizes of needles and didn’t like the look of the fabric I was getting with either set, so I admired everyone’s projects they were making with their yarn from Fancy Image and worked on my “Christi Shawl” which I will show you pictures of later!

All of my knitting friends are very bad influences when it comes to enabling me to get new ideas for projects. Thanks to C.O., C.S, and J.P. (using their initials because I didn’t ask how they felt about me bandying their names about on the internet), now I have many more bookmarks on Ravelry, the website where knitters and crocheters meet and plot to take over the world. I saw the Color Affection shawl on Yarn Harlot earlier, and was tempted to bookmark it, but I am not that big on shawls, and then Cheryl came in wearing hers, and it was lovely, and I will have to make one. The asymmetrical way the sections join is just fascinating. Then J.P. was working on the Wingspan shawl (although I keep referring to it as “Wing It” in my head, hmmm, that might be a good quilt title) and that was also very cool. And C.O. has been knitting on the Yvonne sweater, and I have been admiring it, so I might as well add it to my queue, even though at one point when you are knitting it, it looks like a giant pair of underpants for a sumo wrestler. I have shown restraint by NOT buying yarn for any of these projects yet. Yet. Tomorrow is another day…..

I have over 60 projects on my Ravelry queue, I need to get to knitting faster.

Fried Chicken at Wishbone and the Seed Starting Project

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This was not a good weekend for cooking, because I was trying to finish the koi quilt and that was taking all of my attention. I gave Ken a list of places to choose from for lunch on Saturday, and he went with P.F. Chang. I am not normally a big P.F. Chang fan but my sister-in-law took me there in December when I had a horrible cold, and I had their chicken soup, which was excellent and large. So I was in the mood for that and had that again (sorry, no pictures, I am not in the habit enough, apparently….), in addition to the chicken lettuce wraps which are also excellent. Ken did not think so, however, and just stuck to his beef and broccoli.

Sunday we went out to lunch at Wishbone, which is about as old school as a place can get. The parking lot is full of Buicks, which is a very good sign. They do other things besides fried chicken, but really, why bother? They have been doing fried chicken since 1963.

I go with the 3 legs, Ken goes with the 2 pieces of white.

These pictures do not convey the true yellowness of the gravy. That gravy is neon yellow. They also do a fine piece of Texas toast. Not everyone does Texas toast right. The correct way to eat it here, in my opinion, is to tear it into fingers and dip it into the extra cup of gravy.

After I got done with the latest color quilt, I needed to get some more seeds started or re-potted. These were ones that I had started mostly in moist paper towels in zipper baggies. Let me tell you, that technique really works. For the first time ever, I managed to get some yucca seeds to sprout. We will see how they do now that they are in little peat jiffy pots.

Here is what they look like sprouting in the baggies:

Those are cypress vines.

This just started as a small project but you can see it is out of hand, as is usual for one of my projects.

Currently growing: basil, cilantro (that is slow to sprout) two different kinds of sunflowers, pumpkin, marigolds, forget-me-nots, dill, morning glories (mixed and blue), cypress vine, and, hmmm, probably a few things I forgot. The pumpkins and the sunflowers sprouted so well I am thinking they will be taking over most of the garden, unless I can give them away. Free pumpkin plants!

Luminous Koi and Water Lily Quilt

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I am more done at this point than I think I ever have been for this class. That may all change when my instructor sees this and suggests any changes. I knew I had to be quick on this one, though, because I had about a week and a half to get it done, so I couldn’t afford to dilly-dally and mess around with weird ideas. So this one is maybe not as wild or creative as some of my other ones, but I like it quite a bit and it is going to go up on the wall as soon as I get home from class.

Ken thinks I should have quilted water lines on top of the fish since they are UNDER the water and the lily pads are on top of the water. We will see what my class says.

You can see my quilted scales, and then I did some painting with an iridescent white Shiva oil paint stick to make the fish shiny.

Fish #2 has even more paint. He and the first fish are in quiet poses, trying to convey a restful or peaceful mood.

Fish #3 has a little more motion. Ken also implied that if they were on top of the water they were “floating.” Hmmmmph.

I didn’t quilt the interior of the water lilies, which I think makes them look more like they are on top of the water. We will see what the class things.

Water lily bud.

I did most of the stitching on the fish before I put the back on, because quilting that heavy makes that part of the quilt really stiff. I should have done the same with this flower.The colors I picked (blue, orange, yellow-green, red-violet) actually form a tetrad – I have a feeling she is going to be quizzing us about the colors we pick, making sure they are picked for a reason.  This is actually the same tetrad as the landscape quilt, but used in a very different manner.

MaryAnne being unladylike again.

She is not the only one.

It was cooler here this weekend, so I didn’t have a problem staying inside and quilting rather than working out in the yard. I need to get back to that this week. I did work on the seed starts on Sunday night, that is another project that has gotten totally out of hand. More on that tomorrow….

Gardening and Banh Mi

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I continued my adventures on Monday by going to Golden so I could go to Golden Quilt Company and Golden Fiber Arts, (where I usually take my class) and get some additional fabric and embellishing materials for my Koi Quilt. I got a roll of “nature” themed pastel fabrics (and now I am not sure I will use any of them in this quilt, well, maybe for the water lily) and then some Angelina opalescent fibers (I always think of Angelina Jolie and wonder what she has to do with quilt embellishing….), some Shiva Paintsticks (oil paint in a stick – can Glenderella still make a mess? Why yes, yes she can!), and some hand dyed fabric by my color instructor Heather Thomas. I think the fabric will be used to make the koi, it is yellow and orange.

Another good reason to go to Golden was for lunch. I had been debating my lunch options. Lao Wang (soup dumplings) was closed on Mondays, but I had been looking at some other options in the area. When it occurred to me that I would go to Golden, of course I went to D’Deli for lunch.They are only open until 5:00 p.m. so I don’t get to go there when I have my regular class. They are always busy, but on Monday there were plenty of tables inside because everyone wanted to be outside since it was so nice.

You can choose to make your own sandwich with your choice of meat, etc., but I always go for one of their pre-concocted options, because they really have some wild ones. This time I had the Bahn Mi – Pork Loin, Chili Garlic Aioli, Mixed Greens, Jalapenos, Cucumbers, Carrots, Green Onion, Cilantro. I am now a fan of the Bahn Mi. I have no idea if theirs is authentic Vietnamese or not, but I sense an impending trip to sample various bahn mi around the area.

Lots of interesting and delicious veggies.

You are correct in assuming the Dear Husband would never eat this.

Last time I was here I had the Banano – Salami, Pepperoni, Cream Cheese, Sriracha Hot Sauce, Honey Mustard, Lettuce, Tomatoes, Red Onions, Jalapenos, Banana Peppers, Salt and Pepper. Also excellent. D’Deli has excellent bread, with a toothy crust, mmmm, I want some right now.

I ate, made the above-referenced purchases at the quilt store and the fiber store, and headed home. I knew I had to get that quilt sketched out. I sat down with the colored pencils, crayons, and markers and went to town.

I spent my entire life believing that I couldn’t draw. I got to be pretty good at drawing in Adobe Illustrator, and I thought, why can’t I do that in real life? Turns out, I am actually OK at it. Better than I thought at least. I just needed to spend more time with it and do things slowly  – story of my life!

From an early report card: “Glenderella hurries.” That pretty well sums it up. Everything that I have learned to take my time with has improved. (I scanned in those sketches yesterday.)

It was lovely out that day so after dinner I worked in the yard, clearing the old weeds from last year and dead leaves from one of the front flower beds. The little grass-looking-clump type plants apparently are pretty good at re-seeding themselves, hmmmm. Will need to dig some of those up and relocate in the current “Weed Garden,” future “Rock Garden.” I am busy digging up all of the current plants in the Rock Garden and re-locating them so we can level it and start over. By ‘level’ I mean, kill everything else that has decided to grow in there, such as a bunch of elm trees and grass. And thistles from across the fence.

“Weed Garden” in 2010

See, we have already made a start.

Then we will put down black plastic and mulch and use some of the interesting rocks I have brought from SD to make some beds, and re-install some of the plants that have shown sufficient vigor to grow over there, the sunniest and hottest part of the yard.

In other news, the neighbors with the alien landing pad have now camouflaged it with mulch, so as to be less obvious. There might even be one or two aliens hiding UNDER the mulch. Small ones, you know. You can see they put down some cement stepping stones for the landing vehicle.

Ken would say “Ok, this blog is long enough.” So it will be!

The Tetrad Landscape Color Quilt and the Koi Quilt

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I took Monday off because I missed my Color Theory Class earlier in the month because of a work conflict. It was nearly 80° so it was a pretty great day to have off.

The class was from 10-1, and was at a different quilt store, Wooden Spools, than the one I usually attend, but same teacher, and they are at the same place in their schedule. Different ladies in the class, ha ha ha, like new victims, but I didn’t have as much back story to tell with this quilt as I usually do, so they lucked out. The way the class works is that everyone displays their quilt or weaving or painting that they made since the last month that fits with the color theme we are learning about – this month it was the tetrad – four colors equidistant from each other on the color wheel. I chose blue, orange, red-violet and yellow-green, and so did most of the class. There were, as always, a very wide variety of designs and ideas.

I think I posted the design I drew and worked from:

I lost my mind and made this quilt about 35″ by 50″. What was I thinking? But I am happy with the way it turned out.

It is not quilted yet but it is fully assembled and fused together. I got some hints on a few finishing touches and how to quilt it and finish it from my teacher and classmates.

The sun is my favorite, of course.

After everyone has shown their quilt and we have all commented and asked questions, then our instructor lectures about the next quilt and shows examples. In this case, the next quilt is supposed to use color to show light or luminosity. It should look like light is shining from within, or shining on, or around the subject or part of the quilt. I have a week and half to get this quilt done, because I did want to wait until I heard the lecture, so I will be making a SMALL quilt. And I think I am going to do koi and water lilies, with the dark water as the contrast.

After my class, I went to Golden for lunch and to buy materials for the next quilt, but I think I will include that lunch report tomorrow!

Here are a couple of my sketches. After working on these, I had to go out and buy a new box of crayons, because the ones I have are very disappointing.Nothing like a new box of crayons!

I am well aware those lily pads look kind of like giant Pac Man monsters ready to chomp on my fish.

I put some fabric up on the wall and started cutting out patterns. (These are not the true colors of the fish/lily pads).

I really like this layout the best, but the fish and the lily pads are not interacting with each other at all.

I just don’t like this as much for some reason.

I am not wild about this one either. Maybe the lily pads need to be bigger. Maybe the blue piece needs to be less wide, because I just slapped a piece that was a handy size up there. I need to decide, and get to quilting, because my class is one week from last night! It sounds like it might rain this weekend, which would be good, because then I wouldn’t feel like I should be working in the yard, and I could work on this piece.

The four newts say “hi!”