Cavendish hat

I get the majority of my knitting and crochet patterns from Ravelry. I really love that site. It has a full database for all sorts of patterns, which is really easy to use. It also has a yarn database, which is useful when I have yarn but I don't know what to do with it.

So I was searching for a pattern to make a hat for Cassie. At first I wanted to try some intarsia, which is knitting with different blocks of colour, but I failed miserably at it, and was too discouraged to try again. So I found a pattern from Lion Brand for a Cavendish hat. Here's the link for those interested (http://www.lionbrand.com/patterns/90276AD.html).

Anyways, it took me about a week to make the hat, but actually I wasn't working on it very often. The ribbing took me forever. The cables weren't that difficult, but I'm glad I didn't use a cabling needle. It's much easier to just grasp the stitches by hand, and maneuver them around on the needles.

The final product is quite nice. I wish I had a softer yarn to work with, as I cheaped out and used Bernat softee chunky for the hat. To make the hat more girly, I added a large pompom. I don't have a pompom maker, so the pompom looks a bit rough. I might have to trim it down, depending on whether Cassie likes the pompom or not.

Ok, this time I'm really back.

So it's been quite awhile since I last posted. I didn't think people actually read this blog, but I feel like I should maintain this one.

So, I've taken up knitting, thanks to a friend of mine. Crocheting is great for mini-projects, but I love the look and feel of knitted projects, especially for clothing. My mom taught me to knit quite awhile ago, but I never figured out how to cast on, shape, etc. So, thanks to google and ravelry, I now officially know how to knit.

It's never good to learn another technique, because now I have at least 4-5 ongoing projects. Usually I have one large project with several small ones.

Here are a couple examples of things that I have made in the last while:

Here's a slouchy hat that I made for myself, modeled by my younger daughter. This was a really simple pattern, with a bit of cabling. This is my second cabling project, and it was really fun to do. I think it only took me about 6 hours to knit. I got a lot of compliments when I wore it the first time. Thanks to the same above mentioned friend, I frequent yarn shops, and I got a really nice cashmere/alpaca yarn blend for my hat.











I'm getting too lazy to post more pictures, but I've also made a scarf for my MIL, and a cowl for my mom. I'm currently making baby sweaters, as well as cardigans for my two little critics. For more details, you can always check my ravelry website. My username is anata112. Whenever I have time, I really want to do some lace knitting as well. If you ever have the time, try googling lace knitting images, and you can see why I'm so addicted to knitting.

In terms of cooking, another friend of mine gave me a cookie press for my birthday. Needless to say, I had lots of fun playing with it.

Really nice cookies and very yummy. I used a very basic recipe (butter, sugar, flour, vanilla, salt). They were all gone the next day. My two little critics tried to sneak cookies off the counter when my back was turned. Now I know that even my younger daughter can reach the kitchen counter.








Hopefully I'll be able to post more often about my current projects!

After a long hiatus...

Hi Everyone!

I'm baaaaaaaaaaack! It's been crazy in the last few months, including moving our home. Things have settled down and I have time for baking and crocheting again.

Today I'm going to start off with a crocheting tip. For those of you that ever have to do decrease stitches (aka sc2tog, dec, etc), there are various ways to do them. Decreases are found often in amigurumi. One way is to just sc together the two stitches. Another way is to also sc together two stitches, but to just pick up the front loop for these two stitches only.

I don't really like either method because it looks a bit messy to me. I've recently discovered that instead of decreasing in the usual method, skipping a stitch ends up looking more nicer. I don't have pictures to show yet, but I'll post some if my last two paragraphs are too confusing.

Anyways, onto cooking. My family are huge fans of apple pies, so I make them often. Probably not often enough. Today, I decided to try making mini-apple pies in my muffin pan. Here's the final result:


Not bad. I'll have to do a taste test with some vanilla ice-cream.

Happy New Year!

The holidays have past and I haven't updated for awhile. Due to a number of things going on in my personal life, I'll have to put this blog project aside for the next two months. Sorry!

I'll leave one more tip that I learned this past week from my MIL, my mom, and my husband's aunt:

When making Chinese soup from pork bones, always add a bit of chicken meat as well!

Interesting...

Felted crochet

I have a nasty habit of starting multiple projects at a time. As of current, I'm working on a christmas present for a friend, a vest for my husband, and a blanket for my youngest daughter.

A friend of mine got me interested in felted crochet, which I told myself that I would never do. Until I saw this:

(the BAG)

I have a huge obsession with bags. And this bag, to me, is absolutely gorgeous, and I love the colouring, the simple granny square design, yet it didn't seem tacky at all. In my mind, I envisioned a similar bag but with purple and pink colouring, and most likely a different style of bag. I also brainstormed on how to add a zipper to the bag.

Following this, I went to the closest department store, and found this:


Bernat English Rose wool yarn for felting. And I literally fell in love with this colour scheme. Although the gauge is different, I decided to buy it anyways, and bought the remaining 4 balls of yarn, hoping that it's enough for my project. They recommend a 6.5 size hook, which I think I'll follow, since in the original pattern, they recommend a size 8 hook for size 8 yarn. That means my squares will be a lot smaller, but I'll just make more.

I also made a small square when I got home, and briefly hand-felted it in hot water to see the effects, and the results were promising. As this project is wholly for me, I'll be updating as my project progresses.

My only worry is that b/c the yarn is a mix of colours, the granny square scheme won't show very well.

Shake N Bake alternatives

To be honest, I can be quite a lazy cook when it comes to dinner. Partly it's because no matter how much time I spend on dinner, my husband devours it all, provided that it's completely cooked. Of course, one might think "I bet he won't eat food that tastes terrible", but during my first pregnancy, I could not tolerate the smell of meat, and thus Ken had to eat boiled chicken breast, or boiled pork chop (no seasonings whatsoever) for 9 months. And he did with no complaints!

Oh wow, I really went off topic there, didn't I?

Anyways, being a lazy cook, I rely on shake n bake a lot. Why not? Just throw the meat into a bag, place it on a pan and bake away! The other day, I wanted to make chicken nuggets for Cassie, chicken nuggets being quite high on her favourite food list. Of course, when I need my shake n bake packets, that is the time I run out.

In a panic, I googled alternatives to shake n bake, and came across bread crumbs. Did I have bread crumbs? Of course not. However, I always use cracker crumbs to replace bread crumbs, and there are always crackers around the house, as my two little critics live on crackers.

So, with a rolling pin and plastic bag, I crushed half a package of whole wheat crackers into crumbs, added a bit of salt, pepper, and basil. For proper coating, I should have dipped each chicken piece into a bowl with a beaten egg, then dip into my cracker mixture, but being the lazy person I am, I mixed my egg with my meat, and then dipped into my cracker mixture.

The result? No picture, because the girls ate them up. Ken honestly couldn't tell the difference in terms of taste, but I felt better because I felt the batter coating was much healthier.

So the next time you run out of shake n bake, try using bread crumbs, cracker crumbs, or even cereal crumbs!

Pizza

When I got my new Kitchenaid mixer, it came with a few recipes, including an easy pizza crust. Both my girls and Ken love eating pizza, so I thought I would give it a try.

My goal was to make 4 mini-pizzas from the pizza dough.

I have made pizza before, and the middle always ended up too soggy, so I decided to make smaller pizzas, as well as pan-frying my toppings prior to addition to the pizza. I made a ham and pineapple pizza, as well as a chicken and red pepper pizza. I pan-fried both sets of toppings until pretty much cooked through.

I used a fast rise yeast, which allowed me to omit the first rise.

I followed the recipe exactly, and I must admit that the kneading done by my KA mixer made life much easier. It was very satisfying to see all the dough clinging to the dough hook. After the dough rising, I divided up the dough, rolled it out, pulled it a bit, and then added the tomato sauce, grated cheese, and toppings.

It only took 15 minutes for me to bake two mini-pizzas in my tabletop convection oven. Overall, it took me 2 hours from start to finish to make the pizzas.

I will definitely make these again. My little critics devoured their portions, and all four pizzas were consumed almost the moment they came out of the oven. The dough was soft and chewy, and extremely yummy.




One thing though, a handful of cornmeal was scattered across the pan before the pizzas were laid on top. What's the purpose of this? I must google.