I want to thank you all for the thoughtful comments, well wishes, prayers and good karma. I really appreciate it more than I can express.

I made my mom's hat and gave it some whimsical felt buttons I found at the craft store. I'm also in the process of planning a warp for my SIL belated scarf from Christmas. As it turns out she is not allergic to wool and I have been stash diving through the inherited wool yarn to see what I come up with. I want to do color bold and in jewel tones this will suit her personality and wardrobe.

Once I get the cones lined up I plan on just warping a mishmash of color without much thought I'm in the mood to experiment and just let my mind go into the process for a while.

The best laid plans always go bust

I had a plan for Saturday that was until my mom called me. Her hair is starting to fall out, not just a few strands here and there noooooo.... in freaking clumps. She was so depressed by the time I got to the house, my heart ached just seeing it. I knew it would happen was even expecting it, but really you not prepared no matter how much you picture it. I spent a good few hours with her, talking, laughing, crying it was soul cleansing. I took her my Ruana and a pair of knitted socks for the next treatment on Thursday, I plan on taking Friday off just to hang at the house with her for the day.

I got home and didn't feel like doing anything other than knitting her a hat, I wanted something soft for her head and decided on Caron Simply Soft paints, she's also sensitive to wool . I got this great colorway called Spring Brook, greens, blues, teal very flowing. (blogger is not letting me post pics today, hopefully tomorrow). I'm almost finished with it and if she likes it I"ll knit her another one, since she has three more treatments to go.

This my friends is a true test of faith, it's hard, it's heart wrenching and has me crying at the thought of what she's going through. If you knew me personally you'd know I'm not the crying type, I usually breakdown after the fact, pillar of strength through the hard bits of life, but this........ I just can't explain.

Other than Weaving

We will have a new baby in the family soon, my niece is pregnant after some difficult miscarriages last year. Thank God the baby and her are doing well and I've started knitting for him, yes we know it's going to be a boy! He's due in July and so I'm creating some larger pieces for the winter when he'll be 5 or 6 months old. This is the baby blanket I started the pattern is from this washcloth, I just increase it to get it to baby blanket size. It's a challenging knit and keeps you very aware of your stitches, especially if your like me and lace is an issue.

While I was recovering from surgery I was also knitting this Baktus for my DD that's her lovely neck sans head as per her request. She choose the color from my stash of Caron Spa, in Ocean Spray, goes great with her green eyes, but not in this shot hehe..

Dishtowel Specs

Left pic - unwashed 13.75" x 31"

Right pic - machine washed and dried 9.75" x 26.5"

Materials 6/2 cotton - beige

4/2 cotton - red

15 epi reed / 4 shaft waffle pattern - Mastering Weave Structures

The waffles are deep, although small in structure, the cotton is soft and absorbent. Should use a finer yarn for the hems they turn out a bit bulky after the wash.

Thoughtful Thursday

Art in any form is wonderous, generous and beautiful.
I got this from a friend via email, don't really know who's work it is, but I wish I did to give them proper credit. The talent, patience and time it must have taken to create this is a cake leaves me breathless.

Chicken Pasta with Sundried Tomatoes and Fresh Herbs

Ingredients:

Pasta of your choice 16 oz box

For the Sauce
3 shallots finely diced
1 tablespoon minced garlic
1 bunch of sweet basil
1 bunch of Italian Parsley
4 tablespoons of sundried tomatoes3 cloves of minced garlic
4 sprigs of fresh rosemary
Grated peel of one lemon
Juice of two lemons
1 cup of white wine
2 cups of vegetable broth (or chicken)
2 tablespoons of flour.
¼ cup of olive oil

For the Chicken
4 boneless chicken breasts, can use thighs if you like
Flour for dredging
2 eggs beaten
¼ cup of olive oil, 1 teaspoon each of garlic powder, onion powder, dry basil, dry oregano, and a pinch of crushed red pepper flakes. Marinate the chicken in these overnight.
In a heavy skillet, pour in the ¼ of olive oil, dredge the chicken in flour and then egg and fry in the skillet till the exterior is golden brown, about 7 mins per side, place chicken in oven proof dish and finish cooking in the oven at 325° for 15 mins. (I use a toaster oven for this)

Pour in the white wine to deglaze the pan, add the 2 tablespoons of flour and make a rue, you can add butter to this to soften it out a bit.
Once the rue is cooked add the vegetable broth, lemon peel and lemon juice, let it come to a boil to thicken. Add the sundried tomatoes, minced garlic; chopped shallots bring it down to a simmer.

In stock pot boil pasta as per box instructions add one sprig of rosemary and salt to flavor the pasta. Cook it aldente.
Take the chicken and cut it into cubes, it should be crispy outside and moist on the inside. Place the chicken in the skillet with the sauce add the fresh herbs, reserve some for garnishing, then add the pasta, toss and let is soak up the sauce for 10 minutes, then serve.

Finished Towels

I finished up four towels last night, with about a yard of loom waste on the back beam.

The one hemmed towel is 13.75" x 31" a bit on the longish side but I expect it to shrink a bit.

Hand hemming wasn't really all that bad, just a bit more time consuming. I have three great towel to keep and one to give to a friend's hubby that often cooks us lunch and delivers to work, it's always a wonderful treat when he show up with goodies for us.

I loved working on the towels and figure that I can get some done for next Christmas now that I have the experience of the first set. I must admit that next time I will work with shorter warp, I tend to wrap my warping board on the long side always fearing that I won't have enough for loom waste, but now I know that I can warp less and not have the tangle issues I had with this cotton. I also have learned that if I make two or three warps at once, I won't have any lapse time between dressing my loom and weaving. If anything, I am learning and that's a really great feeling.

Mr. Deepend has a car show this weekend (he's won 1st place 3 years running hoping for the 4th) this means, I have a free Saturday to play with yarn! I'm excited with the ideas of spending the day at the loom.

Curried Carrot Coconut Soup

Since most of the country is frozen and Florida didn't escape, I thought I post a wonderful soup that I make when the temps are cooling down.

Ingredients

1 onion, chopped

1 tablespoon curry powder

1 teaspoon of Thai Curry paste

2 pounds carrots, peeled and chopped

4 cups vegetable broth
3 cloves of pressed garlic

3 chunks about an inch each of fresh ginger peeled

1 1teaspoon of ground ginger

1 teaspoon of corriander
1 12oz can of coconut milk
parsley or cilantro for garnish

Put it all in the crockpot except for the coconut milk, cook on med for 6 hours until carrots are soft and falling apart. Blend with an immersion blender (I don't know how I ever lived without this gadget)  or use an upright, add the can of coconut milk, garnish with cilantro or parsley.

Curried Carrot Coconut Soup

Tubular!

As I was weaving along on the dishtowels (I'm on the third one in red) I needed to steal an idea from my mom's sewing room. She has, for as long as I can remember always tied scrap material to the neck of her sewing machine to put in the pins. As I strapped my loom with my improvised pin cushion I found that this material was tubular, this is the scarf warp that I sleyed two strands per dent. I was surprised and baffled, why did this happen, I know the how but why?? Some weaver's need to clue me in on the why, it's neat, but I need some answers. I research through some books but no answers.

:0(

Speaking of the warp for the scarf I did finish it before Christmas but declined to gift it. The scarf's edges are how do I put this delicately..... well honesty, they look like crap, there really is no way of masking my disappointment with it, I threw it in the closet only to bring it out today to snap a sad ass picture of the craptastic looking scarf edges. The weave itself looks good, I like the structure, which I will try again at some point, but the edges arrrrgggghhh.

Needless to say I need to make a replacement scarf for my SIL, that's the next project in queue for the loom.

Friday Funnies

I got this via email and just had to share, ummmm maybe add to the project queue for 2011??

Tired of no one noticing you??
Are you sick of being ignored? Do you sit unnoticed on the sidelines while others are picked? Are you tired of being overlooked?Get a new scarf ! ! Try the latest scarf fashion and you too will be the centre of attention . . .





We don't stop laughing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop laughing.

new season, new weaving

Thank you all for the well wishes! I am doing great and thank God can breathe with ease . I've been off work since December 23 and have been resting, knitting and weaving. Nothing like a little R&R to get your batteries charged and ready to start a new season.

Since I had some time off I warped my loom, no easy feat this time around the warp did not behave well and I wound up cutting 1/4 the chain off the loom ( I warped back to front). Once the cotton decided to untangle and get it's act together I threaded the heddles and tied up the lamms for some cotton dishtowels in waffle weave. I got the pattern from the book Mastering Weave Structures that I checked out of the library, very interesting book with a ton of information.

I'm working with 6/2 cotton in beige and 4/2 cotton in red, 15 dpi reed, 4 shaft waffle weave structure. I wove about 7" and decided to put in a 2" stripe as an accent. I like a nice big towel for the kitchen and have decided that these will be 34" with 2" seams, once I wash it I'll figure out how much it will shrink. (need to measure width on the loom and off)

Blogger thought you guys needed some head twists so this one's sideways, but its a close up of the weave structure. I've woven about 18" and think it's going really quickly so I may be able to get these done this week.