Well, the Rose City Yarn Crawl Mystery Knit Along shawl is finished. Here it was, blocking. It dried overnight.
The 5th and final clue came in the wee hours of Valentine's day, and, although it was a busy week otherwise, I was able to get the knitting finished Saturday night and washed and blocked on Sunday afternoon. I had bought two vials of cobalt glass beads, based on weight, as the vials don't say how many actual beads there are, but I have some left over from the first vial. Not sure yet what I'll do with the rest of them.
I also finished the Everyday Play dress for Pam, my new character.
While working on it, I discovered a problem with the pattern (which is mine). One paragraph somehow was out of place. I'm going to try to fix that today.I heard from Kim, the quilter on Thursday that Zachary's quilt was done. I picked it up and am very happy with the job she did. Now that I'm done with the shawl, I can sew the binding on. Hope to get that done this week.
Tuesday was another of our biweekly Zoom pop-up sessions with some fans of Madroña Vineyards. It's basically a wine-drinking party with a little wine and vineyard trivia thrown in. We don't always have an assignment, but we had one this time. We planned around the Alsace region of France. If possible, we were to come up with an Alsatian wine and cook a typical Alsatian meal. We've actually been there, and when we went we were surprised to find out how strong the German influence was. It comes from the fact that the border of Germany and France has moved back and forth a number of times over the centuries. Right now it's French, and it was when we visited there. We had our daughter with us and were expecting to depend on her to communicate with people. When we arrived at the Pension where we had a reservation, though, we learned that the owner spoke very little French. German was her mother tongue. The three of us speak German, so it simplified things.
So, for the Pop-up party, I did a little research and found a favorite dish was Spätzle (spaetzle), served with various other ingredients, such as sauces, sausages or cheese, or simply with melted butter and parsley. I chose a recipe called "Schnelle Käsespätzle," or "quick spaetzle." The first ingredient was fresh spaetzle from the refrigerated section of the grocery store. Well, I new that wasn't going to happen in Bend, so I looked up how to make the spaetzle. I came up with this. (I like to save recipes to my Recipe Box app, because it makes them easy to find, and the recipes are easy to read when I'm cooking.)
There is a special spaetzle maker you can buy, but you also can use a simple colander. I found the colander a little unwieldy, because you have to hold it over boiling water. It worked better turned upside-down, but I think I would like to get a spaetzle maker. They're fairly inexpensive. (See tip, below.)
I was very pleased with my homemade Spätzle. I made it on Monday, and our special meal was Tuesday evening.
Now the recipe really could be quick. I have it on my iPad in German, but I translated it to share with friends...and you, of course.
We were happy with how it turned out.
To go with it, I found an Alsatian cabbage recipe.
It looks a little like sauerkraut, but it isn't sour at all. We really enjoyed it.
Charlie found a nice Alsatian Riesling to have with it. I somehow missed out on getting a photo of the wine, either in the bottle or in the glasses, but here's a photo of the empty bottle. It's an Allimant-Laugner 2020 from Alsace.
We were ready at the appointed time.
When "our guests" arrived at 5:30, we began to eat and drink. We had a partial glass of the Riesling before eating and were not overly impressed. However, as we began to consume it with the Alsatian dishes, it changed character, and we found it delicious. (I could even tell the difference, although my sense of smell is still impacted significantly from my accident in November.) You can see us on the screen, second from left at the top. The person in the upper left-hand corner is Paul, the owner of Madroña Vineyards.
Valentine's Day was a snow day. We got snow almost all day long.
It was very pretty, but the city closes up when we get this much snow. Our trash pickup wasn't cancelled this time, but it has been in the past, and we didn't have choir.
We get flocks of robins coming through the neighborhood. Apparently there are more of them coming through Bend now because of the destruction of habitat by wildfires in recent years. They don't mind the cold, but they need food, and our neighborhood has a lot of juniper trees. I tried to get a photo of them but had to zoom in on the tree, because they didn't show up. When there's no snow on the ground, they can walk around and just eat. We have almost as many juniper berries on the ground as we have soil.
We have been getting snow off-and-on almost all week. It's snowing this morning.
Charlie sent me this on Valentine's day, a photo of a slot canyon in Utah. It came from the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance. He stole it, but he donates to them, so it's probably OK.
Since February of 2023, I have had an account on Spoutible. It's sort of like Twitter (now X) but without all the nastiness. I gave ups Twitter in April, because I've found Spoutible a better alternative. The website was just getting started when I signed up, and it has been fun watching it grow. The developers have added a lot of features. One of them is called "pods." It's a place where people on the platform can hold meetings or demonstrations. On Thursday, Representative Jasmine Crockett of Texas held a virtual town hall on the platform. It's audio and chat only, but that works fine, I think. I was amazed at how well it worked. At one point we had 500 people in the pod.
In medical news, Charlie saw the ophthalmologist. His eye is doing well, having recovered well from the cataract surgery, and he now has a new glasses prescription. If that seems OK, he'll get a prescription for computer glasses. I saw my doctor for a follow-up from my accident. She's very happy with my progress, which was good news.
Well, off to another busy week!
I have a lot of difficulty responding to comments to my blog posts because of technical issues beyond my control (my lack of understanding of how things work). Message me on Facebook, Ravelry or Spoutible if you need information.
If you have a few minutes and are willing, please go to Amazon and B&N and search for "Our Favorite Verses: Poems from The Doll's Storybook by Peggy Stuart". Every click on the page for the book makes it more likely they will keep a good supply in their warehouse and stores. If you are outside the US, you may have a separate website for these retailers. If you have a copy of any of our books, including Emil, Mariah or Classic Tales Retold, please leave an honest review on the websites, especially if you bought from them.
Where's my blog: If you want to follow my blog, go here and sign up to follow.
What's on my needles: The Happier Days Shawl, the Mystery KAL for the Rose City Yarn Crawl 2024. is finished. Clue #5 came on February 14th, and I finished the knitting Saturday evening. Also finished the Everyday Play for Little Kidz Doll for my new character, Pam. The Milk Thistle Shawl is on hold for now, but I plan to take it with me for the Yarn Crawl to see if I can figure out exactly where I'm supposed to pick up the yarn "as for a make-one." I'll probably CO something for a doll, just so I have some knitting.
What's on my loom: Still folded up.
What's on my sewing machine: Ready for the binding for Zachary's quilt, picked up on Thursday, and clothes for Zachary's doll Alex.
What's in The Doll's Storybook: Keeping Up With Jonesy. Billy wonders about something a friend tries to get him to do. He isn't sure, so he asks Veronika.
What's on my iPad/iPhone: Listening to Harry Potter und der Gefangene von Askaban. For my physical-book reading, I'm still reading Die Letzten Magier by Andreas D. Hesse, also in German, about halfway through.
What's in my wine glass: Ravelston Cellars Cabernet Sauvignon 2022 from South Australia. Nice.
What's my tip of the week: When making the Spätzle, I used a colander, but you have to hold it over boiling water. I found it difficult to keep my hands over the boiling water without getting scalded. Most of the "spaetzle makers" are set up like a grater, so you would have to hold it in the steam. I did find this, though. It should fit over the pot of boiling water. I think this is the kind I'll get.
Where are my books: The stories in each book first appeared in the blog and they are reproduced with a few changes.
If you don't get free shipping from Amazon or B&N, buy from the BookBabyBookshop, because 50% of the price goes to St. Jude. Other booksellers pay much less.
Note: This blog post was produced on the iPad and the MacBook, using the iPhone for some photos and some photo processing. No other computer was used in any stage of composition or posting, and no Windows were opened, waited for, cleaned or broken. No animals or dolls were harmed during the production of this blog post.
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