knitting for kids

The thing about knitting for kids is, I always hesitate because I know they will grow out of the thing in a couple of years.  As much as my daughter really does appreciate the things I make her, and she even has a little sister to carrythe torch, it still smarts to put all that into something that will be too small in the near future.

So I was very happy with these little wrist warmers I came up with.

The 5 year old wanted me to knit her a pair of mittens, since the ones I made for her 2 years ago are now too small. I thought it would be a good idea to try a pair of ribbed wrist warmers. I knit them just a tad too big for her but the ribbing makes them fit perfectly. And now she can wear them for years before she grows out of them. WIN, WIN.

The importance of pre-washing. (And how to make a cute nap blanket)

I made a little nap blanket for the 5-year old to bring to preschool with her.  I found some great lavender chenille that I planned to back with a printed flannel.

When I started sewing I always used to skip pre-washing.  I didn’t really think it made that much of a difference.  But it really does.  Especially when you are working with 2 fabrics that behave very differently.  I had the fabric store cut both of these fabrics to be the same size.  I washed and dried them before stitching them together because I knew that one would shrink more than the other.  I really didn’t realize how much more, but take a look for yourself.  (Sorry for the terrible photography.  My camera doesn’t like night time)

The picture above is the crazy amount of lint that the piece of chenille released in the dryer.  It was rather beastly.

So after all that, it was quite easy to stitch the 2 pieces together to make a very nice, cozy nap blanket for school.  Check it out…

Rainbow cake

The older daughter had her birthday this month, she turned 5!  She had been telling me for MONTHS that she wanted a cake with roses made of frosting.  So I had been watching the youtube cake ladies show me how to make roses, and getting up my courage to attempt one myself, when I was SAVED at the last minute!  I started showing her cakes on the internet, to get her reaction, and she saw some cakes with rainbows on them that really got her excited.  So we looked at more cakes and she decided she wanted hers to look like this one over at the Spicy Skillet.  Looked do-able!  And the little flowers would serve as a reasonable substitute for roses!  Hooray!

On our journey through the land of rainbow cakes we also spotted this one at Whatever.  Looked very good!  Kind of intimidating…. all that baking, all those bowls…. all the food coloring.  Oy.  Looked very fun but I was concerned about handing a 5 year old a slice of cake 7 inches tall.

THEN… My husband told me about this video from the New York Times.  A very inspiring glimpse into some old school baking.  These ladies and their pancake-thin layers of cake just about blew my mind.

So.   Here is the cake I came up with.  Overall, it was a big hit.  She told me “mommy, I want you to make me the exact same cake next year!”  So I guess she liked it!

I started out by just making a regular cake batter.  I used the white cake recipe I found on epicurious.

Then separate the batter into 5 bowls.

Add food coloring.  I used gel food coloring from Wilton to get really vibrant color.

Spread the cake batter really thin, about the thickness of a pancake.  I sprayed the pans with non-stick spray and lined them with parchment, and then sprayed that too.  This is critical to making such thin layers that will release from the pan without tearing.

Each layer only needs to bake about 10 minutes.  I only had 3 pans so I had to bake them in 2 batches.

Apply a crumb coat, let it cool, then go back in with more icing.  I used a buttercream.

I used the leftover batter to make a batch of cupcakes for school.  I used one spoonful of each color batter per cup.  It made a nice layered effect, too.

Think with your hands

Just a quick link.  I love Ted in general, it’s such an interesting site to troll around on.  This lecture by Tim Brown hit a few chords with me.  I love the phrase “think with your hands”.  I have certainly found that in my work.  I can sit and think myself in circles, but it is not until I actually start working in 3 dimensional space that the process starts to really start chugging along.

I do think it is a bit problematic, however, to promote this creative work = play meme.  Too much of that gets misunderstood by the non-creative population, who add it to their “creatives don’t ACTUALLY do any work” file in their head.  I think what Brown is actually getting at, here, though, is that the play approach allows you to do MORE work, and achieve better results.

Check it out…

More pickles.

I’ve been so busy making pickles that I have had no time for blogging!  My pantry shelves are overflowing and I’ve spent way too much money on canning jars.  It’s a problem.

Just kidding.  The truth is that sometimes my life gets whirling away and my internet life suffers for a while.  Which I think is OK.  I’m sorry if I have disappointed anyone.  But I’m quite sure it will happen again sometime.  Usually in summer.

But… getting back to pickles!  I have a recipe for pickled pears that I got out of my trusty Joy of Pickling book by Linda Zeidrich.  And have been meaning to post it for months now.  (Sorry Abby)  so here goes.  Hopefully not to late.  there are still pears out there right?  Here goes:

Pickled Pears

4 3″ cinnamon sticks

2 tbs whole cloves

1 1″ piece fresh ginger, sliced thin

3 c water

2 c distilled white vinegar or white wine vinegar

4 c sugar

6 lb pears, peeled.  (I like to cut them in quarters and remove the core.)

1: Tie the dry spices and ginger in a spice bag or piece of cheesecloth.  In a large, nonreactive pot, combine the water, vinegar, and sugar, and add the spice bag.  Bring the syrup to a boil, stirring ot dissolve the sugar, then reduce the heat.  Simmer for 5 minutes.  Add a single layer of pears and cook them gently until they are just tender, about 5-25 min, depending on size.

2: Transfer the pears to quart or pint jars and cook the rest in the same manner.  When all the pears are cooked, pour the hot pickling liquid over them, leaving 1/4 ” headspace.  Close the jars and process in a hot bath for 15 minutes.

3: Store in a cool, dry place.

note: when I purged my pantry shelves of all the old pickles, I kept these.  They are still yummy one year later.   And with all that sugar, vinegar, and heat, it is no wonder.

Putting up pickles.

It’s the height of summer!  My garden is producing cucumbers and tomatoes like wildfire.  I love taking some time out to preserve the bounty of summer.  Cucumbers are my favorite thing to preserve, but I also can pears from our pear tree, and make Quince jam from the Quince bushes that were here when I bought the house 10 years ago.

My husband and I have been pickling for a few years now, and are still getting the hang of it.  There certainly is a learning curve to produce pickles that are not soft and will keep a few months.  Our favorite book on the subject is The Joy of Pickling by Linda Zeidrich. This year I am taking to heart her admonition that “Vinegar is not embalming fluid” and throwing out all the pickles from previous years.  I don’t know why I let old jars of pickles stack up but I resolve not to do it anymore.  I’m also resolved to get all our pickles consumed by us and our friends and neighbors by spring of next year.  The point of canning is to prolong the harvest, and enjoy your garden veggies through the winter.  When spring comes I will be ready to eat fresh again!

Here’s a pic of this year’s crop so far.  I’ve made pickle relish, olive oil pickles, dill pickles, and some cornishons I am very excited to try in a couple weeks when they are fully pickled.  I put up a batch of 14 pounds of fermented pickles in a crock and they all ended up in the compost.  I just can’t get the hang of fermenting pickles.  They always taste awful. I made the dutch lunch spears and LOVE them.  I made a batch of four quarts, gave 2 away, and am almost through the last jar.  I’ll probably make more next week.  They are refrigerator pickles, ready in only a week and last a few months in the fridge.  Also pictured are the quince jam and pickled pears from last year.  The fruit seems to last longer but I promise to throw them out before I harvest this year’s pears and quince!

I am switching over from my ball jars to glass jars with rubber rings.  I’m concerned because the dome lids on Kerr or Ball jars contain BPA, which releases nasty stuff into my home-grown produce when heated.  I do still have an inventory of these jars, and use them when cold-packing pickles.  Anything that calls for hot pack I will use my Weck jars. The only trouble I have with those is that the jars are so beautiful I am hesitant to give them away!

I have also been using some old style ball jars with rubber rings and glass tops.  They seem to work fine but I am a little suspicious of the rubber rings, as they are made by the same company that makes the BPA dome lids.

yum!

Summer Break!

We are all going away to Maine for a while. We will be far away from computers. So…. see you in the fall!

Wowls

Recently we paid a visit to the Maine Wildlife Park in Gray, Maine.  The park is set up to permanently house animals that can not survive in the wild due to injury or human intervention of some sort or another.  It’s a pretty interesting place.  Not exactly a zoo, but close.  It is greeat to see the wild animals that co-exist with us up there in the Maine woods when we are there for the summer.

The girls both had a great time, but the main attraction for the 1 year old were the big birds.  There were haws and eagles and owls, and she called them all “wowls”.  I taught her the baby sign for owls which she enthusiastically showed back.  And for the following week, she was constantly saying “wowl!” and putting her hands up next to her head in her version of the sign. We all just about died form the cuteness.

When we got home to RI I realized I didn’t have any owl toys.  NOT ONE.  I had a copy of owl babies, which frightens the 4 year old to this day.  Which is probably why we have no other owls around.  This situation had to be remedied quickly as the 1 year old was desperate to point at owls and tell me about them.

I recruited the 4 year old to make me a couple of drawings of owls.  She did a great job, and I was able to make a sewing pattern from the drawing to create a pair of “sister wowls” in under an hour.  Basically I just added an extra inch to the drawing that she made.  (1″ for seam allowance, 1″ for depth) and cut approximations of the shapes she drew for the eyes and feet.  For the main fabric I used an old wool shirt of my husbands that had been shrunk and felted from too many accidental trips through the washer.  The four year old picked out the fabric for the eyes, beak, and legs.  For the legs I used a double thickness of decorator canvas from my scrap box.  The legs need a fabric with a bit of body.  If I were to do it again I might use stitch witchery to attach the eyes to the body before top-stitching them down. But at the time I couldn’t be bothered to drive down the street to fetch it from my studio.  So the eyes are a little wiggly.  But the girls don’t care.  The sister Wowls are very popular and seeing a

lot of play time.

Blogging at the speed of summer.

There’s lots going on around here right now.  Most of it happening outdoors, away from the computer.  I’ll post soon, I promise!

Slugs

Oh. It’s been a stellar year for slugs.  I’ve never really had a problem with them before.  But now I do.  The unrelenting rain has created the ideal environment for them and they are blossoming like daffodils in spring.  They ate up my little bean seedlings.  And now they’ve started on my lettuce, and my peppers, and my cucumbers.  I am mad.

So, I am fighting back.  Here’s my strategy.  Their little soft bodies can’t handle the rough texture of metal screening, so I made little cuffs from it to wrap around the stems of the pepper plants.  (they already had paper cup cuffs to ward off cutworms) I also pulled back my straw mulch and found lots of them hiding under the straw.  Yuck.  So I picked them up with my garden shears (If you touch slugs with your bare hands you will get this disgusting slime that really really doesn’t want to come off.  Really.  Ask me how I know.) and stuck them in an old peanut butter jar.  (or the slug jug, as the 4 year old calls it)  And closed the lid.  I am going to decide what to do with them later.  For now, they are trapped, and the slithering around inside the jar is very entertaining to the 4 year old.   I got about 8 of them today.  Yucky little creeps.