The workroom cleaning is coming along slowly. I've just been working on it a little while each day. What's taking so long is the closet. I should have gotten a before photo. It was like Dagwood Bumstead's closet. (For those of you too young to remember Dagwood from the comic strip "Blondie," which originated in 1930 and was originally drawn by cartoonist Chic Young. Dagwood had a closet packed so full that everything fell out whenever he opened it.)
A lot of the stuff in my workroom closet have been there ever since we moved. Some of it I realize I don't need anymore, and some of it I had forgotten about entirely. One such item was an afghan I had been knitting at some point and then put away as something else caught my fancy. I bought the yarn in New Zealand when we were there in 1996. The pattern booklet was printed in 1981, but I bought it when I started the afghan (whenever that was, I think about 1999). Well, there it was, in a drawstring bag, one right-side row halfway finished, and the attached skein about three-fourths used up. The design was meant to be much bigger, but I didn't know if I still had more of the yarn (probably not), and I wasn't inclined to knit another two feet of this pattern, so I decided to finish the row and bind off. It was supposed to have long fringe. (I should mention that the pattern booklet was put out by a yarn manufacturer, so, of course, each project takes tons of yarn. I decided to cut some 6" yarn strands, count how many I had, and then figure out how to make a short but even fringe. I did the math, and it worked out to exactly one strand every other stitch on the cast-on and bound-off edges. It took a while, because the afghan was 220 stitches across, and I had two of those to do.
I was happy with how it turned out. It makes a nice, warm lap blanket for cold winter days.
The original design directed the knitter to knit the seven panels separately and then sew them together, but I had chosen to knit it all in one piece, because I hate sewing up. It's easy enough to just switch back and forth between the two panel designs as I worked across the row.
It's good to get it out of the closet. It had been taking up a lot of room. The payoff is, I have a nice new lap blanket, and I can check off "finish a UFO (unfinished object)" from my New Year's Resolution List. Now that it was done, I could go back to my Vilai socks. It's just a few rows of pattern before it will be time for the heel turn.
We've been reading and hearing in the news about the cyclospora outbreak. It isn't a serious problem in Oregon yet, and we have bought lettuce with no problems since this hit the news, but I thought why not grow some more sprouts to supplement our lettuce, especially in sandwiches. We've had the seeds for several years, but they sprouted nicely. This is what it looked like on Tuesday. By Wednesday, the jar was packed full, so I changed the lid and put it in the fridge. We've been enjoying them.
Whenever I make a big casserole, I've been dividing it up between two 8" square pans. We eat one and freeze the other for camping. This week I made lasagne. The recipe calls for regular lasagne noodles, not the no-boil kind. The noodles cook in the pan with just the sauce and some boiling water added to the pan before it goes into the oven. I had some mushrooms that had to be used soon. The mushrooms and some fresh baby spinach layered with a cheese mixture (eggs, cottage cheese, silken tofu, and seasonings) and pasta sauce, makes a tasty main dish.
Tuesday night we attended the Madroña Vineyards pop-up party meeting. We had Vegetable Tikka Masala with brown rice. Our wine was Doris & Leopold Grüner Veltliner 2023, a white wine, nicely chilled. We had a pleasant visit with everyone. They commiserated with us about our annual fire season, which is in full swing. The West Coast wine regions have been having an unusually hot summer. That has an affect on the grapes.
We've been trying to sneak in some quick walks with the dogs whenever the air quality index (AQI) is low enough. Paul Bush, the owner of the Madroña Vineyards, recommended the app "PurpleAir." I picked it up, and I'm finding it more convenient than looking up my location in my browser. This screen shot will give you an idea of what it's been like.
We've been trying to spend as little time as possible outdoors. Sometimes the dogs and I just go around the block, if Charlie has something he has to do outdoors and can't join us.
Saturday, however, the AQI was down in the "Good" range, and the high temperature for the day was only going to be 82ºF, so the four of us went on a longer walk, the full length of the Larkspur Trail and then to the woods, which we call our off-leash area, because that's where people let their dogs run.
The fires are mostly just to the north of us. Friends who live in or near Sisters, Oregon, have been told to get their "Go Bag" ready, just in case they have to evacuate. It would be a real mess if Bend ever has to evacuate! I've decided that our "Go Bag" will have to be our R•Pod, so maybe we should stock it up with some stuff that can just stay there: a change of clothes, toiletries, shelf-stable food, etc. Then if we do have to evacuate, we can just grab our jugs of drinking water and anything we think we can't live without. (I hate to think about all my quilts burning up!) It would be too bad if our house burned down just after I finished tidying and cleaning my workroom! Maybe I should leave it until the fire season is over, about October....
Alexa and Johan are back from Paris. Soren was happy to have his jet-lagged brother back home again.
Summer Choir is coming along. We worked on the most difficult pieces Monday night. I think we're getting a handle on them and they will only need polishing. Tonight we'll undoubtedly work on some different ones.
I've been getting the next book ready. Book #7 only needs proofreading, but while I remember how to use MS Word, I'm preparing the next one. I don't know how much longer I'm going to be able to put them together, so I would like to have several more ready to proofread, just in case.
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What's in The Doll's Storybook: Jolena has come back from another trip with the US Doll Ski Team, this time to New Zealand. Of course, she has photos. Here's Skiing with Kiwis.
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