I Tried to Look at Yarn!

The view from my hotel window.

It turned out that I was in Portland for an afternoon/evening by myself so I decided to go out in search of a few yarn stores. A quick Google revealed that there were two yarn stores within walking distance of my hotel, so I bundled up and headed out.

The first one was really close, but there was nothing too interesting to see. It was kind of old school, but it had a decent enough selection of the usual suspects. I was hoping for something local or unavailable in my neck of the woods, but there really wasn't anything like that so I kept on walking.

I had high hopes for the next place, KnitWit Yarn Shop and Coffee Bar. I was totally willing to walk the mile necessary to look at yarn while drinking coffee. Imagine my sadness when I got there only to find they were closed.



I know, I should've called first, but I didn't. Color me stupid. Doesn't it look like someplace you'd like to visit? They have giant wall mittens!



Amber Grove (I was going to link to their website here but when I searched I just found a link to Amber Grove, human being!), the place next door, was closed too, and that was a bummer because I really wanted a better look at these lampshades that appear to be made of felt, or maybe really really thick and pulpy handmade paper. Either way, intriguing.

Anyway, I walked back to the hotel and consoled myself with room service clam chowder and NCIS, and I did make a lot of progress on a second Aestlight that I'm working on.


The next morning I got in the car and headed back to Boston, determined to see at least one decent yarn store. In Brookline I found A Good Yarn, which was a nice little place. They did have some yarn that I'm not used to seeing in person and they had a nice little selection of Koigu, but at that point I was all packed up for the airport and I left with only a few stitch markers and the holiday issue of Interweave Knits. I realize that I was in the general area only a week after the whole Rhinebeck opportunity...maybe next year!

LL Bean

While I was on the east coast I stayed a couple of days after the regatta and drove up to Portland with Fiona. That's the other Portland for those of us west of the Rockies - the one in Maine, not the one in Oregon. I'd never been to Maine so I was especially eager to see it, and as a bonus I got to drive through New Hampshire so now I've been to all the New England states.

It snowed big fat flakes all the way north from Boston to Portland, but the heater in our rented Corolla worked just fine and the radio had enough classic rock to keep us entertained all the way there. We had a lovely dinner with friends (haddock chowder and brie brioche - how brilliant is that, brie melted into the brioche? You put it in when you add butter to the dough, as opposed to wrapping a brie in brioche and baking it whole.) and on the second day we went up to Freeport, Maine, the home of LL Bean and a whole lot of other stores and outlet I didn't have time to visit. As it turns out, LL Bean does not consist of a warehouse with a bunch of telephones and ladies on rollerskates packing your order as you call it in - it's actually a large complex of stores, each with a theme like hunting/fishing, home, or what-have-you. They may indeed have a warehouse with rollerbabes but I didn't see one.

I made Fiona pose in the trout aquarium bubble and then I wandered around taking pictures of the stuffed animals. I love stores with giant aquariums. Out here the Fry's in San Marcos has a couple of them - awesome. But LL Bean has actual taxidermy - how great is that? The moose here were found locked together like that - they starved to death!

Here's a video that explains:

Head of the Charles

Andrew is wearing shorts. He grew up in Fresno, which I'm not sure really explains this.

One of the only things that's lacking here in La Jolla is the change of seasons as traditionally depicted by the cover of Martha Stewart Living. I mean, you know the old joke about SoCal seasons: summer, fire, mud and earthquake. And we do have some seasonal differences in LJ. If you consider May Gray/June Gloom as our own private winter, we have three: Too Cold for the Beach, Not Too Cold for the Beach, and Too Touristy for the Beach. Everything else is a Santa Ana or one of the 10 days it rains around here.

We are clearly not far enough SOUTH.

So imagine how happy I was to be a chaperone for the ZLAC girls on their trip to the Head of the Charles - real New England fall, right in the middle of the beautiful foliage season! Luckily San Diego is full of sportswear stores that are all too happy to fit you out for any kind of weather just in anticipation of an excursion such as this, so I purchased a bunch of North Face layers and fleecy things (and these really cool longies from Lucy) and set out.

My whole lunch is inside that vest and it still tasted like it came straight out of the fridge.

You see me there? I am only smiling because my face is so cold it froze in that position. This was not fall. This was every kind of winter weather all wrapped up into one three-day period. Rain. Frozen rain. Hail. Snow. That's right, snow. Do you know how hard that is for someone who lives in shorts and flip-flops? Good thing I knit, people.

Tuesdays with Dorie - Sweet Potato Biscuits

Okay, here's the reason I decided to join Tuesdays with Dorie this month: It was all for the sweet potato biscuits. You may recall that I made these last year after finding the recipe online (and don't miss the All-in-One Holiday Cake posted on that link - that's awesome). I'd never in my life bought a can of sweet potatoes until I tried this recipe, and then I bought two cans once a week all through the winter.



The biscuits are particularly good if you are serving any kind of pork, but they're also good for breakfast, or when you want something juuuuuuust a little sweet. And you can fool yourself into thinking they're good for you because they have fiber and Vitamin A and beta carotene from the sweet potato, so really, why not eat two? In fact, in the spirit of eating two, I do tend to cut these out on the small size. They don't rise very much so smaller biscuits look better proportioned to me.



Thank you, Erin of Prudence Pennywise, for picking one of my best-loved fall recipes. I can't wait to see how everyone else's sweet potatoes turned out!

Halloween Self-Portrait

I know, I know...another picture of my feet. I don't know what's up with that either, except that they're always a handy subject. (Get it? My feet are hand-y. I just crack myself up.) In any case, I'm leaving for Boston tomorrow night and I don't believe I have proper footwear for the weather, but if I could wear flip-flops, I'd be stylin'.

PS This is the only Halloween decor I'm currently rocking, inside the house, outside the house, or anywhere else on my person. I may have to go straight to Thanksgiving this year. Or maybe Valentine's Day. I'm sure nobody will notice if I skip everything in between.

Purple Aestlight

What's not to love about this little shawl? It starts with a garter stitch triangle, so you can take it with you and knit without worrying about screwing up a complicated part. It continues with a fun-to-knit lace panel that stretches like crazy when you block it. It ends with a knitted-on border so you only have a few stitches on the needle at any time so you think you're making a lot of progress. It can be worn as a scarf, so you never have that moment where you wonder where the heck you're going in a shawl or whether you're the kind of person who can pull that off. It's made with Koigu, which is always fun to fondle as you knit.



And it's purple, just as an added bonus. Timeless, regal, and oh-so-in this season (Okay, my fashionista friends, I know it was oh-so-in last season, but I live in SoCal. We're three timezones and a full 365 days behind New York. Be happy I'm not wearing white after Labor Day, at least today.)



I've had to wait on posting finished pictures of this project because it's a belated birthday gift for a certain redheaded friend of mine who gave me this, and yes, it's taken me over a year to reciprocate with a handmade of my own.



I enjoyed knitting Aestlight so much that I've already cast on and am well through the garter triangle of another, this time in a golden yellow. I'm hoping to have it done in time to wear it in Boston when I cheer on the ZLAC girls, but hey - no pressure!



I'm also still plugging away halfheartedly on a Lacy Baktus in Malabrigo sock. I'm not really feeling it, though, so it might end up frogged yet. I don't know why certain projects take off like your needles are on fire and others just putt-putt along like that...yeah, I'm talking to you, navy scarf, and you, all you other half-finished projects lurking in drawers.

Tuesdays with Dorie - Allspice Crumb Muffins

This week's entry for Tuesdays with Dorie was chosen by Kayte (Thanks Kayte!) of Grandma's Kitchen Table: Allspice Crumb Muffins. I don't do a lot of baking with allspice as the main flavor note - usually it's just one component in a blend of spices - so I actually went all-out and bought a little packet of fresh allspice instead of using the 100-year-old bottle that's been languishing in the back of my kitchen cupboard gathering dust. I had to move the 100-year-old mace to get to that one.



These muffins were pretty good - John and the girls liked them, and I didn't have the sliding streusel problem some other bakers seemed to have. I'm not sure why, because I didn't press the crumbs down into the batter or anything; what I did do was load each one up with so much crummage (crumbage? That seems wrong...) it seemed like overkill, but I figured there had to be a reason there was so much of it and I suspect the sheer weight of it kept it in place. I followed the recipe just as written and included the optional grated lemon rind because I'm always all about the grated lemon rind. The crumb topping was the best part - isn't it always? - and I had just about decided that I probably wouldn't make these twice when I tasted one the day after baking them...it was actually a little better and it was still moist and delish. Maybe I'll try these again with cinnamon or a blend of spices. Or maybe I'll bust out the allspice again. It did feel very much like fall was in the air....

Segway!

This morning I visited a local nonprofit where they let me ride this Segway despite the fact that I was wearing my Coach pumps in an attempt to look respectable. I can't see myself ever actually owning one but I did want to ride it around some more.

Not a Tuesday...

Somewhat misshapen, altogether delicious.

Some of you might've clicked on Dorie Greenspan's link in my post about Split Level pudding and seen that she was talking about brioche on her own blog. I myself went beyond the clicking and straight to the baking. Two batches of brioche later, I think I'm in love. Some of the dough went into little breakfast brioches, which made up for the inevitable argument I have with someone in the morning ("Are you wearing that to school?" Stomp, stomp, stomp.) and reminded my family that they should keep me around for while longer. The rest went into a tarte au sucre...I got a little crazy folding the dough over in the pan and I think the next one will be more beautiful to look at, but even the lumpy one was delicious.

Here's the 2nd rise in the early morning. They are about to make my house smell amazing.

Pardon the terrible iPhone photos of the lovely brioche - I forgot to recharge my camera battery and desperate times call for makeshift measures, I guess.

Blocking Aestlight

Love that bird's-eye lace...

Now that it's finally fall in La Jolla (temps below 70, heh - and that doesn't include the Santa Ana or two we're sure to have any time now) all I want to do is cocoon in my house with something warm on the needles and something warm in the oven. If it would only rain I'd be so happy.

Disclaimer: This image was photoshopped to cover a little more of my skin than actually showed because much as I love you, you just didn't need to see it. I did resist the temptation to give myself the much-needed tuck-and-lift, though. PS I'm the one on the right, in case you were wondering, "Which one of these women has had three children?" - HA! My partner is in the middle, and the hottie on the left is one of the professional dancers, too.

Perhaps you recall me talking about my crazy "celebrity" appearance at Malashock Thinks You Can Dance? Well, it happened, and I'm happy to have lived through it. If you missed it, I'm so sorry - there won't likely be a repeat performance because there's no way I'm getting in that outfit again in this lifetime unless Fiona marries someone I don't like, in which case I think it will make a perfect mother-of-the-bride getup.

This was the day after the Malashock event. I already had chipped salsa nails, because I'm apparently still not grown-up enough to maintain a decent manicure for more than a day.

In any case, now that the salsa is behind me and I've retired into advisory status for Las Patronas, you might be thinking, wow - Lydia must be so bored, right? Well, no. I am so behind on so many things that I'm actually filling my time with as much stuff as I can to avoid doing everything I've procrastinated for so long. Today, for example, I'll be at the La Jolla Wine & Art Festival manning the LJ Historical Society table in the afternoon. I'm taking Anna and Mary with me so that I may even be able to accomplish a little knitting between visitors. Aestight is blocking and I've cast on a Lacy Baktus which will be a perfect project to take with me.

We know it's fall because the tourist have gone.

In addition to Baktus, I'm starting to plan some other travel knitting for later this week. On Thursday I'm heading to Boston with Anna and some of the other ZLAC girls who are rowing at the Head of the Charles. I'm excited because not only is it an amazing event, but Fiona will be joining us over the weekend and I haven't seen her since August! On Sunday Anna will fly back with her team and I think Fiona and I will drive up to Portland (Maine, my west coast friends, not Oregon) for a day. Then she will go back to Vermont and I'll have a day in Mass before I fly home...should I go to WEBS? Or where? Suggestions?

Tuesdays with Dorie - Split Level Pudding

I think I've mentioned the book Baking: From My Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan, haven't I? I just love this book. Not only are the recipes all for things you'd actually want to eat, but they are things you can imagine making yourself. There are great "learning" recipes for basics like pie crust and whatnot, and then there are "playing around" notes at the bottom of each recipe that encourage you to branch out. And that's what I like best - branching out.

So out there in the blogosphere there is a group of bakers who all make the same Dorie Greenspan recipe and post to their blogs on Tuesday - hence the title of this post.

This is my first week as a member and I'm so happy I got to start with pudding. In the event I ever lose all my teeth, I'm happy to report that many of my very favorite foods require no chewing. I'm not sure what that says about me - I guess I'm lazy. Risotto, creme brulee, custards of any sort, soup, creamed spinach, mashed potatoes, sorta melted ice cream, etc. And if it's not soft to begin with, if it will become soft with the liberal application of gravy, that's good too.

This Split Level Pudding is a layer of chocolate ganache topped with vanilla pudding; I pretty much followed the recipe except that I whisked it all by hand instead of using the food processor. I topped it with a little whipped cream (because that's soft and delicious too!!!!) and garnished with a little triangle of dark chocolate. The panel of judges (John, Anna & Mary) all proclaimed it the best pudding they'd ever tasted and managed to finish every little bit of it, whipped cream, chocolate triangle, and all. Thank you Garrett from The Flavor of Vanilla for picking such a wonderful start for October!

September Birthdays, Round 2

Somebody has to teach me how to pipe better, that's for sure.

It always strikes me as somewhat cruel to send kids back to school in September in San Diego (or, in Anna's case, August - it just ain't right). The beach is freezing well through June most years and even sometimes right through July, and just when it starts to warm up in August, bam. Put on your fall clothes, kids, it's time to swelter through algebra again.

Notice Jen restraining Jane from blowing our candles out!

A plus, however, is that I get to have my birthday dinner on the beach. If you're a regular reader, you know I share my birthday with a lot of family, and I also have a bunch of Virgo friends - scary, isn't it? I truly don't know how I'd feel about having a birthday all to myself because I've never experienced it. I think I like sharing.

Mary's motto: Life is short. Eat the frosting first.

This year my sisters organized dinner on the beach, including grilled pizzas and salad and the kids boogieboarded and swam and played while the grownups kibbitzed over the pizza dough. I was in charge of the birthday cake, and while that may seem like an injustice given that it was my own birthday, it beat the alternative: a Costco birthday cake, which I'm convinced would give us all cancer or at the very least a crisco-frosting-and/or-unnamed-food-additives-induced headache. Plus you know I don't mind baking.

That's right, we ate 33 cupcakes that night. Wanna make something of it?

One of my early birthday presents was the book Sky High: Irresistible Triple-Layer Cakes. I let Mary choose the kind of cake we'd have and she chose vanilla bean with white chocolate buttercream (which was simply incredible, in case regular old buttercream wasn't going to do it for you). Because it's hard to deal with tall layers and sun and sand, though, we made cupcakes. The recipe made 40 cupcakes and we frosted half of them with just the buttercream and filled the rest with a little Valrhona chocolate frosting and topped those with the buttercream as well, because I often feel the need for excess. They were knockout.

Wait, Isn't This a Knitting Blog?

Lookit - knitting. Yarn on the needles, 10 minutes into an Aestlight shawl, using some Koigu that I have frogged from probably five projects already. It may be cursed from the start, and you'll notice I'm not showing you the metric assload of unfinished knitting strewn all over my house, but still.

Farmers' Market 9/6

About halfway there. I think Mary was plotting her crepe request here already.

Sunday morning Mary and I decided to walk down the hill to the La Jolla Farmer's Market, in an attempt to get some exercise while it was still cool out while scoping out prospects for Sunday dinner. You know the saying "It's all downhill from here?" Well, that's where I live. It's all downhill from here. I read recently that walking downhill actually has completely different health benefits from walking uphill, which is good, because it kills the calves and is much harder than it appears.

Nutella, we love you!

Upon reaching the Farmer's Market, Mary announced that she was famished so there was nothing left to do but get breakfast instead of shopping for vegetables. There are now two (!) vendors who make crepes, which seems like a lot, doesn't it? Mary ordered a Nutella, strawberry and banana crepe, her fave. I went over and got a lemongrass chicken stirfry despite the early hour. I won't bore you with a picture of mine - imagine zucchini and grilled chicken and that's as exciting as it gets.

Awesome samosas...say that three times fast.

I did, however, get some of these East African samosas which were killer, I tell ya. The beef samosa was spicy and delicious, very crispy, and the potato was flavored with curry. Awesome samosas. Plus the guy gave me some free ones when I told him I was fully capable of eating a dozen.

Squash...no pumpkins yet here, thank goodness!

After breakfast we wandered around taking iphone photos of what was being offered up, just cuz some of it was pretty.

White peaches, which I didn't buy because Fiona is the great consumer of them in our house.

And in case you were wondering, dinner ended up being chicken Milanese (mainly because I wanted to flatten something with a frying pan), a salad of baby greens with herbs and fresh vinaigrette, and some of the bread with caramelized onions they sell at the Farmers' Market too. Some people even had dessert - the cookies & cream cupcakes from Martha Stewart's book...so I got to smash chicken AND whack the life out of 40 Oreos while thinking about Martha Stewart, among other things. I highly recommend it.

The minute it's not too hot to boil pasta, bring on the tomatoes.

Seriously...

It's 150 degrees eff here.... Do we really need to see jack o' lanterns already?

The First Birthday of the Season

The apron is a gift from my friend Denise - it says, "You'll eat it. You'll eat it and you'll like it!"

September is the big birthday month in my family - it starts off with John's birthday, and then there's my niece's, mine, and Mary's all in a clump. When my dad was still with us we would celebrate my niece's, mine, and Mary's with him in a big quadruple birthday bash. Since mine was two days after his, I never had my own birthday - it was always shared. And since Mary's is the day after mine, I suppose my birthday will always be a shared experience, which is just how I like it.

Happy Birthday, John!

Yesterday was John's birthday and we celebrated it at my sister's house; she served up chile rellenos made with poblano chiles her husband grew in pots in their backyard. They were delicious but I seriously feel like I gained five pounds yesterday. I hadn't even planned on eating much for dinner because John and I also had lunch at Roppongi and I ate so many onion rings with wasabi aioli I really didn't need dinner.

I dream of cake!

I couldn't resist homemade, homegrown, homeserved chiles - who could? And of course there was cake made by yours truly. The cake was based on this recipe, which in turn was based on this. I used a mixture of Meyer and regular lemons because that was what I had and since John really, really likes lemon, I added lemon to both the cake batter and the frosting. The batter got the zest of two of the Meyers (they were small), and the frosting got the zest of one Meyer and two tablespoons of lemon/Meyer lemon juice in place of two T of water. I used every bit of the lemon curd between the layers, which was sort of overkill but I liked the idea of letting it drip down the outside and then frosting over it with the 7-minute frosting, which has enough body to cover something like that pretty completely. The resulting cake was very reminiscent of lemon merinque - delicious.