Today, we brought home a new puppy. His name is Felix, which means “happiness.” He’s a standard poodle and at 3-1/2 months old, he already weighs 25 pounds. He’s very sweet and fun so far- we’ll see how our first night goes!
Tie-Dyed Theatre Shirts
June 20, 2007 at 7:43 pm (Crafts)
On Monday, I helped the cast of my daughter’s show tie-dye t-shirts. I had a great crew of volunteers which made the whole process go very smoothly. The kids rubber-banded them in whatever way they chose. They then added a few cups of water and a bit of salt to a ziploc bag, sealed and got their shirt all wet, then added some dye concentrate. They then re-sealed their bags and gently squished them a bit to spread the dye around. We only had one person drop their bag- which has given me some pretty feet for a few days :).
After letting the shirts sit all night, my daughter and I spent two hours removing all of the rubber-bands yesterday morning. We let the washing machine take care of rinsing and washing. Here is a picture of our 57 beautiful shirts, although the color is brighter than this picture shows. They are a blue-violet color.
Tonight, my husband put logos on them, which turned out really well:
This Saturday, the cast will wear them at our local Farmer’s Market while they pass out flyers about their show. It’s always fun to see the sea of tie-dyed color spread over the whole market.
Rhubarb Pie
June 12, 2007 at 6:46 pm (Cooking)
My family loves pie, but it is mostly a holiday food at our house. After many years of working at it, I can finally make a decent pie ( with the help of Joy of Cooking), but it is not something I love to do. It takes a lot of time and the results are often gone in a few minutes. Every once in awhile , I decide to make a pie for no reason, and today was one of those days. Part of my motivation was the pile of rhubarb from our yard that needed to be made into something- and rhubarb pie is a favorite here. At least taking a picture will make it seem to last a bit longer :)
June Evening in the Yard
June 11, 2007 at 6:49 pm (Garden)
The weather this evening is perfect- not too hot or too cold, with just a light breeze. I have been enjoying spending time outside and snapped a few pictures of what is growing in the yard.
Here is our just-sprouted corn. My daughter and I are attempting to grow a small “3 sisters garden” in a corner of our yard. So far the corn has sprouted and we just planted the beans and squash today. We purchased a kit for this with a neat booklet from http://www.bountifulgardens.org/
Here is a picture of lettuce in our square foot garden:
These are our purple bush beans. These are really fun- they are purple when you pick them and then turn green when cooked:
These are my daughter’s pumpkins. She’s been leaving pumpkins around the yard for the last couple of years hoping that one would eventually sprout. It finally happened this spring:
Here is the first blooming rose of the season:
Here is some lavendar from my front yard:
And finally, a picture of our chickens. They are out in the yard running around whenever we are in the back yard. We live in town on a regular-sized lot, but are allowed to keep a few chickens. My daughter has wanted to get some for awhile, and this spring we finally decided to try raising some. We got these Rhode Island Reds as 1-day old babies and hope that we will be getting some eggs by August. We have two more tiny ones (of different breeds) that are still inside that will be moving out in a few weeks. I love watching them running around, chasing bugs and just doing silly chicken things.
Finished Knitting
June 6, 2007 at 5:14 pm (Knitting)
I finished up two knitting projects today. The first is a simple pair of booties for a gift. They’re knit from the Fiber Trends baby basics pattern, which is my fall-back quick-gift pattern. The yarn was originally white(wool) with little colored flecks (acrylic) and seemed a little too boring, so I overdyed it orange.
The second project is a market bag I’ll use at the Farmer’s market. It’s knit from a free pattern from Knitpicks, found here:
Rather than their suggested yarn, I used 6 different colors of some hemp-wool blend yarn that I had dyed for assorted other projects (I do my part to support their business, though!). I ran out of colorful yarn and had to make the handles out of undyed yarn. I thought about dying it, but decided I just wanted to finish it now. I can always pull it out and dye it later, although it’s fairly unlikely that I’ll ever get around to that :).
Frozen Treats
June 2, 2007 at 6:43 pm (Cooking)
No picture with this post- perhaps I’ll add one later. It’s currently cooled down to 93 degrees here- it’s been a very hot day. I was craving something cold, a little sweet and fruity, but there was no ice cream or sorbet in the freezer and not even any yogurt in the fridge to make a smoothie. I looked through the cupboard for inspiration and made up a simple mixture that I froze in our cuisenart ice cream freezer. My daughter and I both loved the results- my husband and son won’t even try it, so that just means more for us! Here’s the recipe:
Frozen Pineapple Coconut Cream
1 can ( I think around 20 oz.) unsweetened crushed pineapple, including juice
1 can coconut milk (I used Native Forest brand classic- I think it’s 13.5 oz.)
1/2 cup evaporated cane juice (basically a slightly more natural version of sugar)
1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
2 Tbsp. unsweetened coconut ( more or less)
Mix together, pour into cuisenart-type ice cream maker ( the kind with the bowl that’s kept in the freezer) and freeze for around 30 minutes.
This really hit the spot for me, and there’s still lots more in the freezer for later- like tomorrow when it’s going to be somewhere around 100 degrees!
Hinzpired 