Tea and T's!

Can anyone guess what I'm up to now? Here's a hint:

DH has about 10 boxes of T-shirts, mostly from Hash runs while we lived in Indonesia. T-shirts were given out to participants to commemorate a special event, like a member's 100th run or some special holiday in a participant's home country (usually Indonesia, Australia, New Zealand, the Netherlands, France or the US). The shirts are loaded with advertising for the companies they worked for or brewers of beer (the organization's beverage of choice). He wants a T-shirt quilt made out of them. When we have 20 fronts and backs cut away from the sleeves and neck binding, we will have to figure out which one is the largest and cut the others that size. I have iron-on stabilizer to use to keep the blocks from stretching. I've never done this before. This will be my first attempt.

Getting ready to CO for doll sweaters for the Oregon grandsons' dolls, Parker and Jackson. (I'm certain they will be getting new names. Stay tuned.) Here's the pattern I'm planning on using: Bright Lights by Sharisse Dunn. Remember this yarn?

It turned out to be too thick for Pippa's Chilly Days of Fall, so I switched to another yarn. I don't know if I have enough of the grey yarn, and I would have to hold it double. I will probably have to go stash-diving.

A few more picks on the trailer rugs and another section of the quilt got done, but sending out books cut into my play time.

I made a big batch of "Six-Weeks Muffins," a La Leche League recipe I've used for years. It came from their book "Mother's In The Kitchen." I have adapted it somewhat.

Here's my version of the recipe:

Six-Weeks Bran Muffins

Servings: 6 dozen
Prep time: 23:26

Ingredients

• 6 C wheat bran, divided
• 2 C Boiling water

• 1 C Olive oil or melted butter
• 1 1/2 C honey (I spray the measuring cup with cooking spray before measuring.)
• 4 eggs, beaten
• 1 quart cultured buttermilk

• 5 C whole wheat pastry flour
• 5 teaspoons baking soda (I used 3 at 7200' elevation and 4 at 3600')
• 2 teaspoons sea salt or lite salt


Directions

Add the boiling water to 2 C of the bran in a large bowl while you assemble the other ingredients.

Mix the wet ingredients.

Sift the flour, salt and baking soda together into a bowl. Add the remaining 4 C bran and mix well. 

Add the buttermilk mixture and the flour/bran mixture to the soaked bran.

Store in refrigerator for up to six weeks. (I make a note on my calendar, so I know what day they need to be used up.)

To bake, spray enough muffin/cupcake papers for the number of muffins you want to bake and place in muffin pan. Put about 1/4 to 1/3 C batter into each paper cup. Bake at 400° for 20 minutes.

Raisins, dates, other small pieces of dried fruit or fresh apple may be added to the batter in the paper cups. Don't overfill.

Notes
I just rediscovered this great recipe of mine that was inspired by the recipe by the same need in "Mother's in the Kitchen," a cookbook put out by the La Leche League. My copy was published in 1971. I don't use shortening or regular sugar, so I've made some changes, but it still works.
What I like about this recipe is you can mix it up once, leave it in the fridge and bake only what you need. However, if you bake the muffins all at once (!) it makes six dozen.

Here's some tea to go with it.

The Oregon grandsons got their Covid vaccine on Saturday. No side effects so far. The other two young grandkids have already had Covid, so they're waiting until Daphne is finished with her ballet performance this coming weekend.

50ºF and breezy is a bit chilly for a walk, even with the sun shining, but we managed to get nearly a mile in during a walk to the Rec Center and back on Saturday. As usual, Rocky rode in the stroller for a while and then wanted to get out and walk.

If you have a few minutes and are willing, please go to Amazon and B&N and search for "Emil: Stories from The Doll's Storybook by Peggy Stuart" in Children's. 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 our first book, Mariah: Stories from The Doll's Storybook, it would help if you left 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: Getting ready to CO for doll sweaters.

What's on my loom: Still the trailer rugs.

What's on my sewing machine: Its cover, but I'll soon be piecing the T-shirt quilt.

What's in my hoop: Still the whole-cloth quilt. A little more progress this week.

What's in The Doll's Storybook: Help comes from a surprising source in The Rescue, this week's story in The Doll's Storybook.

What's on my iPad/iPhone: Still listening to Wildwood by Colin Melloy on the Audible app. 

What's in my wine glass: Apothic Dark 2018, one of my favorites.

What's my tip of the week: If you use dried lentils or split peas in soups and stews, the first direction usually says to rinse them first. It's a good idea to pick through them to see if there are any small stones before you rinse, but the rinsing can be simplified after that. Rinsing them in a colander leaves you with a sticky clump of lentils or peas that are hard to get out of the colander after the liquid has drained. It's much easier to rinse them in the pot they will be cooked in, unless you're using that pot to also sauté onions, etc. Just put them into the pot, pour water in until they're covered, swish around in the pot and then drain off the dust over a small strainer or your colander. The clump of washed lentils/peas will then be clean and will just dissolve into the cooked dish.

Where are my books: The stories in each book first appeared in the blog and they are reproduced with few changes. Emil: Stories from The Doll's Storybook is now available for preorder from booksellers world wide. Book Baby already has stock. The link is here. The three stories are Best Buds, Getting What You Want, and The Boys Cook Dinner.

Mariah: Stories from The Doll's Storybook is also available. The three stories in the first book are Being Little, Besties, and Distraction.

If you don't get free shipping from Amazon or B&N, please 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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Not Shopping

Somehow, with everything, some hand-quilting got done.

I'm finally to one corner, so it's a little more interesting work. 

I found my sourdough starter had grown a bit, so after I made bread for sandwiches, I made this crusty loaf, still with 1/2C of rye flour. 

The starter is active enough now that I can make bread without any additional yeast.

I worked on the Steampunk Blouse for Daphne's dolls.

We had Charlie's brother over for Thanksgiving dinner. He lives alone, so we didn't want him to have to have Thanksgiving alone. We figured if we wore masks until we had to take them off to eat and sat at opposite ends of the table, it would work out OK. We are all careful when we go out, which we only do when it's necessary, but it still isn't risk-free.

I gave him his own serving utensils. I kept the plates turned over until we were ready to eat, and the eating utensils were rolled up in our napkins. I kept my mask on when I cooked, when I set the table and when I served the food. The table with three leaves is 7' long. The two chairs in the foreground were ours, and my BIL sat at the window. The other chair (the one in front of the bookcases) wasn't used.

Even the living room was set up for social distancing.

Normally, our younger son and his family come to us for Thanksgiving, but they didn't come this year. They live more than three hours' drive away in good weather. Last year it took them 12 hours to get here. They would have had to sleep here, and with the two little boys we all thought it was better not to have Thanksgiving together this year. The state guidance says no more than six people from no more than two households, so we were in compliance. 

We managed to Zoom with the rest of the family, though.

Our daughter's family and our older son had already had their dinner, but it was almost like sharing a meal together. They live in Wisconsin and Indiana, so they couldn't have come for dinner anyway.

The technology has been very helpful in getting through this difficult time. Our choir managed to sing on Sunday for the annual "Lessons and Carols" service that marks the first Sunday in Advent. Not everyone in the choir participates in these virtual performances, due to the complications of having to record yourself while you listen to a recording. There were some lovely images displayed while we were singing, but they included us for a short bit .

We're eating leftovers, but we had used up the salad by the day after Thanksgiving, so I made a batch of my corn salad, which keeps for several days in the fridge.

I didn't have any cucumber or spinach to add, but we had extra tomatoes and avocados, and I tossed in from fresh basil leaves, because our Aerogarden is still producing, so I used what I had. It's OK without the Feta cheese topping, too. Here's the regular recipe.

Easy Corn Salad

Dressing:
• 3 T olive oil
• 3 T lemon juice
• 1/2 t Salt
• 1/2 t dried cilantro
• 1/2 t dried basil
• 2 T salsa
• 1 T pickled garlic

Salad:
• 1 16-Oz pkg. frozen corn
• 2 chopped tomatoes
• 4 green onions
• 1/2 chopped red onion
• 1 C chopped cucumber 
• 1 handful fresh spinach, chopped
• 1 chopped avocado
• 1 bell pepper (any color, optional)

Optional Topping:
• Crumbled feta cheese

Mix dressing ingredients. Add remaining ingredients and toss. Top with feta cheese. It keeps pretty well in the fridge for several days. It's great in the summer when it's hot out.

My book comes out tomorrow. I'm going to come back and correct the link to Mariah: Stories from The Doll's Storybook when it comes out in the publisher's store. Tomorrow is also "Giving Tuesday." If you are interested in giving to St. Jude through my fundraising page, here is the link. Purchases of my book will provide a small donation to St. Jude as well.

What's on my needles: Still the Steampunk Blouse for Daphne's dolls.

What's on my sewing machine: Awaiting its next assignment.

What's in my hoop: Still the Whole Cloth Quilt. A little more progress this week.

What's in The Doll's Storybook: Pen Pals. Pippa finds Emil writing a letter to a friend. He reads it to her, and their discussion leads to an interesting revelation.

What's on my iPad/iPhone: Elsewhere by Dean Koontz. Just getting into it.

What's in my wine glass: Domaine Paretlongue, Cité de Carcassonne Syrah-Cabernet Franc. Pretty good.

What's my tip of the week: Operating two different devices with Zoom in the same building doesn't always work out well. It helps if you can turn off the microphone on one.

Mariah: Stories from the Doll's Storybook is available from Amazon or Barnes & Noble.

<a href="https://store.bookbaby.com/bookshop/book/index.aspx?bookURL=Mariah1&amp;b=p_fr-ho-bl" target="BookShop" style="display:inline-block; text-align: center; background: url('https://www.bookbaby.com/bnb/p/fr-ho-bl.png') no-repeat; background-size: 235px; width:235px; height:184px;" title="Mariah by Peggy Stuart" data-class="wide"><img src="https://store.bookbaby.com/BookShop/CommonControls/BookShopThemes/bookshop/OnePageBookCoverImage.jpg?BookID=BK90045873" alt="Book Cover Image" width="110" height="160" style="position: relative; top:15px; left: -40px;"></a>

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.

Time To Vote!

Well, it might have been a quiet week at Lake Wobegon, but not at our place. The biggest event was the arrival of the book. (The phone is for scale. The book is 8.5 X 11".)

I was very happy with the quality of the printing, especially the photos, which I had worried about. The quality is very nice, and the pages lie flat when the book is open.

Everything looked great except that I apparently made a mistake in putting together the pdf to send to the publisher. My original version would have been correct, but after talking to someone in the department that does the printing, I added a blank page at the beginning and the end. This was the resulting location of the title page. Oops!

Not what I had planned. The book still need the ISBN number and bar code added, but it should be OK once I send them a new version with the blank pages deleted.

I ordered a boy doll from American Girl for Zachary for Christmas. He's called "Truly Me 74," but that's not his real name. He will tell Zachary what it is.

He will have me sewing and knitting for him soon. I will need to finish everything earlier than planned. It was to be our turn to have the kids here for Christmas, but then Covid happened. (Insert unhappy face here.)

You may remember that our furnace needed to be replaced. We spent the early part of the week getting estimates for the new furnace, while the temperature dipped down into the 20s during the night. We used the fireplace and some small space heaters, and the temperature inside the house never got below 65ºF. It made us happy that we had replaced all the windows. We informed the winner of the estimate competition on Thursday and Friday they showed up at 8:30 AM and had the new furnace installed by 3:30 PM. Now it's up and running nicely. 

We don't have AC yet. They will install that in a month or so, when they get the parts, and certainly by the spring. In the meantime, we have what we need.

The new furnace looks a lot better than the old one, not that looks matter. It should also be much more efficient, which means we can set the temperature at 70ºF instead of 68ºF! We suspect the hot-water heater will go out soon, but not until we finally have company visiting again. That's how things usually go for us.

We barely got the house warmed up when the power went off. It was expected, though. The power company had warned us that they would be turning off the power at 7:00 PM for about an hour. We had some pleasant candlelight and flashlights, so I was able to keep knitting.

What was I knitting on? I had finished the Everyday Play Dress for the Little Kidz early in the week and posted the pattern on Ravelry. I used Patons Kroy Sock yarn.

Someone requested the jacket that goes with the dress, so I CO for a smaller version of the jacket. I used the 80% rule again, and it worked well. Here's the jacket. For this, I used my mystery 4-ply (fingering/sock weight) left over from my supply brought back from our sojourn in the UK, purchased from a company that is no longer there.

I was able to get some shoes that are close enough to fitting with a little stretching that they fit  on over the thin "socks by the yard" socks. The shoes are designed for Wellie Wisher dolls. They are a little wider and shorter than would be perfect, but they work, and Pippa isn't complaining that her toes hurt. The shoes came from Doll of a Kind. They come in an assortment of colors with grey. I picked the blue.

All week I continued to write letters for The Big Send, which happened on Saturday. I had 480 letters to mail, so it meant a trip to the Post Office. They let me (or rather DH) take a photo of the agent behind the counter and me as I passed my two boxes of letters over to her.

There were two other people there with boxes full of letters for The Big Send, so I wasn't the only one from Bend doing the letters. Now I will be phone banking at least several times a week until the actual election, although the election is already underway. Our ballots arrived on Friday. We filled them out Sunday and will put them into the official drop box today.

Our usual Saturday Zoom meeting to write letters was replaced with a Zoom meeting to train us to make calls. I had some technical difficulties, because I didn't have the right browser, but they got me straightened out. It's so nice to have the one-on-one help from Indivisible Oregon! I didn't get to make any calls on Saturday, but I attended a phone-banking session on Sunday, during which I did get to make some calls, after a new training. Sunday's session was for Reclaim our Vote. We were calling people who had been dropped from the voter rolls because they had moved or hadn't voted or for some other reason. We gave information on how to reregister or find out what they needed to do to be able to vote.

On our way home from the Post Office on Saturday, we stopped off at the park to let the pups run. Rocky socialized with the other dogs, while Dusty chased the ball. No one had masks on, so we stayed away from them. It's too bad, because it would have been nice to chat. The pups had a good time, though. We're expecting snow soon so it was good to get them out for a run.

What's on my needles: The Which Came First Shawl is still not blocked. I'm working on the cardigan for Pippa. 

What's on my sewing machine: Pajamas for Pippa.

What's in my hoop: Still the Whole Cloth Quilt. No progress this week.

What's in The Doll's Storybook: Pippa, which introduces the new Little Kidz doll.

What's on my iPad/iPhone: I've still just been listening to music. I didn't even get time to listen to my new Dean Koontz novel, Devoted. I'll probably get back to it this week. Maybe I'll have time to be more devoted.

What's in my wine glass: The Winery of Good Hope Pinotage 2019. Nice.

What's my tip of the week: If you haven't voted yet, you can check your registration, register to vote and get other voter services at I Will Vote.

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.