Night Skiing, Night Tubing, & a Party

Here is the tubing hill from last night, the humans in this shot are literally a blur due to slow shutter speed. It was SO COLD, but very fun. Very cold on Thursday night when we went skiing, too. Extremely fun though, I can still ski!

I am a little tired now because we went to a party and stayed late. We had a lot of fun though. It is the perfect ime of year for a party in Maine. It is easy to stay home and not venture out into the cold and dark. It feels so good to get out and have fun.

I haven't had time to knit in a few days but I will be finishing up the baby sweater today or tomorrow and I will put that up as soon as it is done. Stay Tuned.

Pretty...Pretty Ugly

Just like my brother used to say to me. " Hey, you're pretty...pretty ugly." Poor potholder.




After completing my other domino square potholder, I thought about how much fun domino squares are to make and decided to use the materials on hand to make another potholder. I wanted to try knitting just the one layer instead of the deluxe,double layer one. I didn't have the greatest colors but I went for it and as so often happens when you use up odds and ends, I found I needed to find some more at the yarn store. As you can see, Maine is NOT the best source for cotton yarn, the shops tend to specialize in wool and other warm fibers, understandably so. I found some that worked okay colorwise but not exactly my favorites to work with.



Oh well, it was quick and fun too. As you can see it works just fine.

I am on to finishing another baby sweater...another long neglected project that is now very close to being done.

I'm the Maker of the Cheese

Well, technically "we" (L & I) are the makers of cheese! It was 30 minute mozzerella and it only took us about an 1 1/2 hours, not too bad for our first time. I asked L if he wanted to make cheese and he said "Why would anybody want to make cheese?". So I started and kept calling him over to look and the comments changed as we went through the process. (Anything in quotes are his comments)



I let 1 gallon of raw milk warm up to 55 degrees and added citric acid. Then I continued warming it up to 90 degrees.



This is when added the rennet and continued heating.
" This is so cool"



AT 105 degrees and looking very curdled and stringy.
"We should do this everday!"



Squeezing out the whey and making the cheese into balls.
"This is so fun"



I heated the whey and we dipped the balls in to warm them up and shape them.



The cheese was delicious we ate most of it right away.
"Can I have another piece?"

My little corner of the world

This is a picture of where I have been spending my evenings. Knitting. It is a little messy, but as you can see it has all I need for a few hours every night. Bags of yarn, needles, books, wine, TV remotes, nunchucks to protect my space, everything. I have been able to let everything go and curl up to knit. I've been working on some domino squares-they are quick and satisfying. I'm not sure where I'm going with these babies but I am having fun. It has been nice to be able to do this sorta regularly. PJ has taken over making dinner, as well as some of the laundry and cleaning. This gives me some time in the evening that I have not had in a long while. I even feel guilty. Not to much though.

Potholder Redeemed

This potholder has sat in one of my knitting bags, patiently waiting almost 3 years for me to weave the ends of the loop together. I don't know why I couldn't do it. I have looked at it more times than I can count and tried to figure a way to attach the ends of the I-cord together at the loop. I looked again last night and thought well I'll just weave it like the toe of a sock! Why that took near to 3 years I do not know. It took me all of 15 minutes to finish and weave in the ends. Potholder joy! I made this using various cottons and Vivian Hoxbro's book, Domino Knitting. Of course I changed a few things and made mine double so there is a different pattern on each side and it is very thick. After I was done I immediately started on another one and began dreaming of the blanket I would make using this technique and Maine wool. That would be another "big" project though and I really want to make things that I can finish in a reasonable amount of time and I am going to try and stick with that for now. However, I can dream ...

Finished!

I finished this hat, and I love it! I am going to make more, I know of at least one other person who wants and needs one one. It is so satisfying to FINISH, except for sewing in some ends that is. I have decided that this is the perfect kind of project for me right now due to it's quickness.

Time is short this weekend due to a sick employee. I worked almost 12 hours yesterday instead of the planned 3, and unless I get a call back soon it looks like I will be working again. So much for my weekend...

Netflix or Local

I know lots of people who use Netflix. In fact, I have people who come into my store or that at least know I have a video store and they like to tell me how great Netflix is. I usually just smile-sometimes I ask why they use it. There are a variety of reasons. I also have a loyal group of customers some don't have a computer. Some customers tell me they are specifically choosing to rent at my store because they want to support the local economy. Some just come in because it is close to where they live, it has great selection, and to see my awesome employees.

My store is doing good and I know for a fact that my store would be doing great if Netflix wasn't so popular. I know that I wouldn't have been so worried when PJ lost his job in December. If Netflix didn't exist I could support my family entirely not just supplement it.

My point is to those of you who like to shop local and want to support your local community-it is more than buying local produce or handmade goods. It means making a choice to give your $ to a human being and not a huge corporation. Easy to talk about but it takes a huge effort to do it for real!

Think about the word...Ruthless

I am not sure why but this is one of the words I was told to think about when I visited my chiropractor yesterday. He is also a Kineseologist and so he doesn't do just your standard cracking business he does what I affectionately call "Woo Woo Medicine" and it does seem to work. So I thought 'Ruthless' and he moved my feet around, he also did a bit of cracking. I could barely move yesterday and spent the better part of the day at rest, but today there is improvement! I can move around a bit turn my head even! I go back again Monday and will hopefully be ready to ski and go snow tubing because those are on the schedule for next week.

Oh, and in response to a comment: I am almost done with the hat and will post completed hat soon.

Snow

PJ and I went out into the winter wonderland shortly before sunset. We have had so much snow and it is beautiful. We enjoyed it especially with the use of snowshoes, because we went much farther than if we had tried just walking in the woods. This was my first time snowshoeing and it was great fun. Snow is such a temporary beauty, it changes so fast. You know melting , falling off the trees, and the dog peeing in it right outside the back sliding glass door where I look out everyday(lovely!) I will be heading out again today if it even gets close to the promised 15 degrees(-7 currently!) before I have to open the shop. I am sure it will look very different from yesterday.