Rain, Rocks, and Socks

Argh! I try and try to stay on top of things. I will have to make it a much more regular thing. Not just weekends. Even if I have nothing exciting to say I will just write it down so that I can get into the habit of it. That is, after all, my main reason for starting this in the first place.

In short. No cooking has happened. It has been too hot and I haven't had the time.

The seaberry tree is doing well, although the recent sun and heat killed the smallest sprout. The larger two, however, are doing beautifully and will be ready for transplanting soon. Now I just need to find someone with a back yard or some dirt for my little tree to live in.

Last weekend we braved the thunderstorms and promises of rain for Elora Gorge. We spent the first night getting lost ( my fault for printing out only the verbal Google Maps directions and not the maps themselves) - who knew that there were about a thousand roads in the southern Ontario all known as Wellington?

The next day we woke up to rain. Misty, drizzly, down pouring, constant rain. Needless to say, although we did brave out around the park for a brief while, most of the day was spent sleeping in the tent, sitting around the fire, and trying to keep dry. There was a beautiful reprieve later on when four of us headed out to get wood and coffee for the rest, and ended up in a country style diner munching on proper breakfast while our comrades cooked beans on the fire back at the camp site.

Sunday, finally, was a gift from nature. We found the rocks we had come there to climb, and T and J were kind enough to set up top ropes for us to safely ascend on. It was also particularly wonderful that the rocks overlooked the gorge, with water sparkling and shallow and warm enough to excite the blood and take a brief dip in. We climbed, we splashed about, it was over all a fantastic day that made up for the whole messy weekend. Besides, all and all, camp fire, friends, tents, and lover? Even without the climbing the weekend would have been deeply satisfying.


As for the knitting! Oh the knitting. I have finished one sock of the Layburn pattern, and simply out of boredom with the pattern took up the Outside In sock from the latest Knitty.com issue. I loved the Socks that Rock Yarn I got for it, but honestly, the way it pooled leaves me less than impressed. Still, I just love knitting with this yarn so much, I can even put up with poor colour pooling for the experience.

There. Quick and dirty. I will try to follow up with some more things in a bit.
Like my new awesome job which I love love love.

Keeping up!

It figures I would set up a blog and forget to write in it.

Another weekend passes. I always look forward to Sundays, and yet they are always the most difficult days for me to deal with. Now that school is over I feel like I can do just about anything, and that thought itself paralyzes me at times.

We drank into the wee night, and even though I am not normally a drinker, and had a glass of champagne followed by half a bottle of butter-ripple I had no hangover, but did suffer from lack of sleep for which I feel I am still paying.

Saturday started late. Very late. We spent the day entertaining a friend of M's from out of town for his big 30th birthday. This mostly involved hanging around the docks, watching them drink beer, followed by hiding out in Ms room while the boys played N64 Golden Eye. The most exciting part of the evening was watching a guy's roof catch fire not 10 feet away from where we were having our 4pm breakfast.

Sunday I finally put my hand to some cooking, as was my intention when I finished school for the summer. Both recipes were from Vegetarian Times June 2008. The Cashew-Mushroom Pate (p69) was a struggle. Lack of proper food process meant having to attempt the puree of the mixture using two different blenders, neither of which really did what I wanted it too. It tastes way to nutty for my liking, and is not very pretty to look at. I'm not entirely sure what the compulsion was behind creating a nut-heavy food considering I really dislike nuts. I was thinking of M. He loves nuts, so I will leave it to him to consume.

The Curried Potatoes (Pg 80) were much more successful. Though much to my dismay, and in no way the fault of the recipe, my version did not look as good as the magazine one, and tasted a lot like the Vegan Root Stew I have been known to make, also from Vegetarian Times. It's difficult to taste the curry, which may be my problem of not putting enough in, and the one tiny jalapeno I put in there overwhelms the dish with spice, as least too much for my liking. I would make this again, in a more colder season and cut the jalapeno amount in half.

On the knitting front, the Casbah Sock has been like a nightmare. It's not a bad yarn, but with just one skein and a desire to stay away from socks has left me with few choices. I have also struggled with picking the right pattern for the colour without having to purchase more yarn. I even thought about making a hat out of it, but the silk content makes it a bit too floppy for hat. I found a sock pattern, Leyburn Socks, however, and I'm doing my best to stick to it. It's looking good so far, but I am becoming more and more aware of just how lose my knitting is, and how little gauge swatches actually help me figure out what needle size to use. I am knitting socks on size 2 needles which should have been at least 3.75 size. That is far too many sizes of needle down, and yet I could probably go down even lower.


So far, this means that most things I knit I end up having to re-knit several times to get the size right. That sweater I intend to knit before the year is over is looking more and more intimidating with this problem on the horizon.

And finally! My Seaberry tree seeds have sprouted and are doing beautifully. Two of the spouts died, but three are going strong, and I already know which one will eventually have the joy of being transplanted outdoors to do its wonderful work of cleaning up air and producing oxygen.