march feature pattern

I did say the Gretel dress was a hint for this pattern, right? Well, I didn't end up calling it Hansel's shorts or something similar (because that was a bit too silly), but that is where the inspiration came from. The lederhosen are really very simple, and meant to be decorated with embroidery. If you're not so good at embroidery, you can add a belt made from felt with a button belt-buckle. The hat took me a while to figure out, but I really like the results. You need to block it to get the shape right, so you'll need to knit it from wool or something that will block really well. Altogether, I think it's a fun pattern, and I bet kids would get a kick out of playing dress-up with this outfit. Too bad there are none around here to try my patterns out on!

It seems that the kits I put together are popular! I sold 2 already, and hopefully the rest will go while there's still time for them to arrive before Easter. The Fuzzy Knits kits will be available at the end of March, but I'll let you know when I'm ready to list those. I forgot to mention yesterday that the pin cushions are on sale. I've decided to limit my inventory to patterns, toys and kits, since I've had trouble selling my other items. From now on any items I sew will be just for kits. It's too bad really, because the other things are fun to make. But I suppose I can still sew things for myself and my friends.

I think that's all the exciting news I have for today. I think I'll take the rest of the afternoon off and knit something for myself. I started a scarf yesterday from some pretty sock yarn I had lying around. It makes me think of Spring and flowers, and I can't wait for it to be warm enough for me to wear it with my pretty pink jacket.

easter bundle kits

The Easter bundle kits are now available in my Etsy shop. I took advantage of a little spare time today to get all the materials together and take photos. They seem to have turned out quite nice, and I think they would make a excellent gifts. Some don't have bags, but I did give people the option of requesting one and paying for it separately. I dyed a lot of the yarn for the outfits, trying to match it to the bags, but also choosing pretty spring colours.

I suppose I should get back to work and finish off that March feature pattern. Good thing February has an extra day this year!

oatmeal cake

I'm glad you like the idea of the weekly soup. Photos of the soups would be nice too, so you can see what they're like, although most soups don't look like much. The mushroom and barley soup is just dark brown with bits floating in it, so not very aesthetic :)

In a fit of restlessness last night, I made a cake from a recipe I found in the Joy of Cooking. I'd been teasing my husband by reading bits of cake recipes out-loud, and this is the one we decided to try first (my husband is a big fan of oatmeal). This turned out more photogenic than the soup, so I thought I would share the recipe. The cake is dense and moist, and tastes a lot like oatmeal cookies. When I make it again I might add some raisins and walnuts. I cut down on the sugar a little, but otherwise this is right from the book.


Ingredients
1 cup old-fashioned rolled oats
1 1/2 cups boiling water
1 1/3 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp freshly grated nutmeg
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup unsalted butter
3/4 cup white sugar
3/4 cup packed brown sugar
2 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla

Preheat oven to 350 F. Grease and flour a 9 x 13" baking pan.
Place rolled oats in a small bowl and add water. Let stand until water is absorbed (about 10 min). Meanwhile, mix together dry ingredients in a separate bowl.
In a medium bowl, at high speed beat butter and sugars until light and fluffy. Beat in eggs one at a time, then add vanilla.
On slow speed, beat in oat mixture, then dry ingredients until blended.
Scrape batter into pan and spread evenly. Bake until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, about 30 minutes. Let cool briefly on rack.

This is delicious on it's own while still hot, or have it with ice cream or vanilla yogurt. Once it cools, you can ice it with your preferred icing. I've put on some store-bought icing with nutmeg added, but I bet cream cheese icing would taste good with this cake too.

I've also been working on a little surprise for you guys, which I'll write more about this weekend.

weekly soup feature!

I had this silly idea last night that I should share the soup I make each week. It does say in my bio that I make delicious soup, so maybe I should prove it. My husband thought this was a good idea, since I've been lacking interesting things to talk about lately.

As a bit of background, I make a big pot of soup at the beginning of each week. We eat it for supper on workdays, so I don't have to take time to make supper every night. My husband loves soup, and usually I'm too hungry to care what I'm eating, so it works well for both of us. There are a couple hitches in the plan, though. First, my husband is mostly vegetarian (he will eat some fish and humanely-raised meat) so that limits the kinds of soup I can make. Second, I'm allergic to garlic and onions, so I need to modify most recipes. In spite of these limitations, I do manage to make something pretty tasty each week, and because I dislike repeating recipes too often, I make quite a variety of soups.

I recently bought myself a copy of "The Joy of Cooking" which seems to be a very good all-round cookbook. It's possible to get recipes on various websites, but I find they often lack good basic recipes, and you can't always trust that they'll work and be tasty. "Joy" has been around for years, so I can trust the recipes and information in it. On the downside, nearly every soup recipe in it has onions, so I'll need to modify any that I want to try.

Okay, if you're still with me after that dissertation on soup, here's the one I made last night: mushroom and barley. I added carrots and parsnips, and seasoned it with thyme and bay leaf. The recipe called for beef broth, but since I can't get good broth at my grocery store, I substituted free-range chicken broth plus some red wine and tomato paste. It turned out very tasty, although I only made enough for about 3 meals. I didn't want to go overboard with a new recipe.

If you would like me to share my recipe for anything I post here, just let me know. I'll try to remember all the changes I made to the original!

lazy

I know I've been a bit lazy about blogging lately. Mostly it's because I don't have anything really interesting to say, so I thought I would save you boring posts about all the toys I've been knitting. I have been doing a few other things, like sewing, dying yarn, and visiting with friends. Did you enjoy the photos from the other day? I think I'm slowly getting better at photography, but short, dreary winter days don't give me many opportunities to practice.

I did take a bit of time in the last few days to work on the next feature pattern. It turned out so adorable, that I can hardly wait to show you. What I have so far is pretty simple, so I might try working on a hat to go with it. That depends on how much time I can scrounge in the next few days, and if my ideas for the hat work out. We'll see...

I thought I would leave you with a picture of some pretty flowers from a couple years ago. There won't be any popping out of the ground around here for at least 6 weeks, but as wintry as it continues to be, spring will come eventually :)

when I get bored

When I get bored, and it's freezing outside, I attack the house with the camera.

Mila in the sun

Bookcase in my studio

Current toy I'm knitting

Yarn stash for toys

messy work space

sewing day

Sorry for the slight technical problems with my last post. I had uploaded a better shot of the toys to flickr, and forgot I needed to fix the link in my post.

Today will be a sewing day. I've been knitting like mad on my second order of Easter toys, and find myself with a whole extra day to do something besides knitting! My plan is to whip up some bags for the upcoming kits. I'm going to make 2 different styles of bags this time, so there will be a variety of kits and prices to choose from. At the moment I think there will be 4 Easter bundle kits: 2 with just the book and yarn and 2 with book, yarn, plus a draw-string pouch. If I can find enough yarn for 2 more kits, there might be some with tote bags too. These will come with safety eyes and necessary buttons for the outfits. I'm also planning to dye most of the yarn for the toy outfits, which I hope to get done this weekend. I know with my first set of kits I gave stuffing, but I found it made the parcels very bulky (thus more expensive to ship), and I have a hard time supplying myself. These should be ready for my shop by next Friday, but it depends on how soon my order of safety eyes arrives.

I have some Fuzzy Knits kits in the works too, but they will come later (aimed more at Mother's Day). I'm also planning to mix them up a bit, so you could buy just book and yarn, or buy a kit with a pouch or tote bag. All the supplies will be enough to make a specific toy, rather than just some random yarn and buttons, although that encourages more creativity :)

I really love sewing, but my sewn items don't sell well in my Etsy shop. From now on I might just include these things in kits, rather then on their own. I had high hopes for the magnetic pin cushions, but they might end up as gifts for friends and family, and the materials go towards other projects.

In pattern writing news, I am trying to arrange things so that towards the end of April I should have nothing to do but work on new patterns. I have some really great ideas floating around in my head, and I want to get them made! They are quite different too, so will take a bit of trial and error before they are ready for you.