Very Slow Progress in the Knitting Department

Although I have a handful of projects on the needles, I just haven't gotten very much done in the last few weeks -- for several reasons: Project 2016 took a lot of my time and energy; visiting my family last weekend; extra work taken home for train riding fun (ugh!); a large dose of guilt that I shouldn't be knitting since I don't want to finish the 4 almost done baby quilts and just plain laziness.*

I still have about 4 inches of knitting to get my skirt long enough;



I have only gotten to the point where I begin the heel turn in my socks;





my scarf has gotten the most attention in the last week as I finally got around to plying more of the yarn that I dyed, but my shawl is languishing after a horrible train accident -- the train had a rough stop and I lost several lace stitches with out a lifeline (double ugh)!

*I have to tell you, that after writing this I was so wracked with guilt that I spent the next 2 1/2 hours trimming and squaring up two quilts and attaching the binding to one quilt. I will show you more on the quilts later.

Happy binding!

Project 2016 -- Florida or Bust: Kitchen Makeover -- The Difference a Little Light Can Make

I got the backsplash done and the kitchen cleaned up. On one of my last trips to Lowe's, I found some battery operated puck lights in the clearance section. It was just the thing to give my kitchen the little extra oomph. Thanks for watching the trip!

Happy Makeover.



                                                                                                                            

Knit Yourself a Boyfriend or Husband!

Sometimes I get sent the weirdest things because they are related to knitting. Here is a woman who knitted a life sized man as part of her university design class. He is a cushion with a story!

Read more and see the cute video here.

Project 2016 -- Florida or Bust:Kitchen Makeover -- With a Little Help From My Family!

My brother-in-law is the greatest!

As some of you who follow my blog know, I am in the home stretch with my kitchen make over. Counter tops -- check! Cabinets painted -- check! Walls painted -- check! Down to the back splash for this weekend's project and I got a call from my sister who said she and her husband wanted to come over and see for herself what I had done so far. I jokingly said that I would welcome their visit as I could use my BIL's help with the recycled tile backsplash.

Right on schedule, my Sis and BIL showed up. He brought an old shirt with him to work in and as I set the big mesh pieces of tile, he started to cut the little pieces to fill in around the outlets. He turned an ALL DAY job into just a few hours. After almost 40 years as my BIL, he's turning out pretty useful!

I have to say that one of the best purchases I ever made was a small wet saw. I have done several small tile jobs (and the next job on my list is the guest bathroom tile around the tub) and a wet saw makes a HUGE difference on how fast you can get the job done. Renting one is possible, but when I bought it, the saw was on sale for under $150 and it would have cost me $75 to rent one for a day. Now 10 years later, 2 houses, and a few tile jobs later, buying it was a great decision.

One of the things that I wanted was to make sure that all of the outlets were brought out to the level of the tile and had plenty of support behind it. Cutting all the little pieces was tedious work, but will make all the difference in the long run.

Tomorrow, I will grout the tile and that will be it until the next project! I am so glad it is almost over. Now to plan a little get together for my friends and neighbors to break in this new kitchen. What's a new kitchen if you can't share and enjoy it!

Happy Grouting!

Pressure Cooker Meatloaf -- Yes, It Can Be Done!

I need to get better at thinking ahead about meals. I got home after work tonight and puttered about the house -- mopping the kitchen floor, starting laundry, feeding the dog and suddenly I realized that I needed to get started on dinner, but it was after 7:00 PM. I had some ground beef in the fridge that I had enough foresight to pull out of the freezer earlier in the week, but my plan for it had been meatloaf.

So, I said to myself, "Self -- I wonder if it is possible to do meatloaf in the pressure cooker?" And off I went to google it. Yes, you can make meatloaf in a pressure cooker and there were a lot of ideas on how to do it. I quickly scanned the first few pages at the top of the search and saw that most of them said to use the steam basket for the meatloaf. DARN! My pressure cooker did not come with a steam basket. Now what? Mini loaf pans! I had some in my pantry and I thought it was worth the try.

I prepared my meatloaf, but I'm not giving you my recipe. Not because it's a family secret, but more because I never make meatloaf the same two times in a row. I sometimes throw in whatever veggies I have in the fridge, I sometimes use crackers, breadcrumbs, leftover rice or oatmeal and I use eggs and milk interchangeably as a binder. Sometimes I add Louisiana Hot Sauce for spiciness and sometimes not. The point of this post is not to share a recipe for meatloaf when there are a lot of them out there that are better than mine, but to suggest a way of cooking the meatloaf in a pressure cooker if you don't have a steam basket.

After filling 4 mini loaf pans with the meatloaf, I placed two on the rack at the bottom of the pressure cooker. I had to pinch the ends just slightly to get them to fit side by side.

I poured a cup of water into the bottom of the pressure cooker. (If I had been smart, I would have poured it in first that way I didn't have to be careful not to pour it in the meatloaf.)

I added the other two other meatloafs and turned them the other direction. Once both of them were placed, they stacked nicely and did not tip into the lower tier. I cooked them for 12 minutes with the regulator rocking slowly. While the meatloaf cooked, I microwaved some Brussels sprouts to go with it.

OOOOOHHHHHH! It worked! The little loafs were not really pretty. You could dress it up a little with gravy or ketchup. But they tasted great! And we were eating within 30 minutes of googling "pressure cooker meatloaf"! I would have to say that the only thing that was missing was the caramelizing of the meatloaf when it burns in the oven. I admit that eating the burned fat/ketchup mix out of a pan is the best part of the meatloaf. The pressure cooker actually steams the meatloaf so no burning is possible. Oh, well.

(Missing your meatloaf, Mom!)

Happy pressure cooking!

Project 2016 -- Florida or Bust:Kitchen Makeover -- In the Home Stretch

I am nearing the end of my kitchen project. Last weekend and this, I have been painting the walls. I went with three different intensities of the same color. About 40% of the kitchen will be covered with the lightest color and 30% with each of the two darker colors. The colors play well with the cabinet colors and will look great with the recycled glass tiles purchased for the back splash.

I went with a "soft-gloss" for the sheen and "scrubbability". It was an
option which is between a satin and a semi-gloss with Valspar's Ultra Kitchen & Bath paint. This paint is both a low odor and zero VOC (volatile organic compounds). I can vouch that the low odor is true as within 24 hours you couldn't smell new paint in the house.
The paint covered easily in two coats -- even the darkest color.

I put the darkest color on the walls around the refrigerator and the cabinets next to it. The lightest color went on the walls around the window. This made sense to me as the window is large and it would have looked odd to me to have a very dark wall with a big bright hole in the middle. The medium color is on the wall where the stove sits. I like the way the three colors work together in the room to provide some depth.

I am looking forward to being done with this project. I guess I always think that DIY projects will be easier than they reveal themselves to be.

Happy Painting!

Notorious prison escapes: Dirty laundry, bed-sheet ropes, knitting needles and duct tape - Washington Post

Interesting piece of trivia. In light of this, you would think that knitting in prison wouldn't be allowed. However, most knitting needles are made of aluminum or wood now and not of steel.

"George Blake, a British double agent, used a ladder made of rope and knitting needles to escape Wormwood Scrubs jail in 1966, five years into his 42-year sentence for treason. With the help of accomplices, he made his way to the border of East Germany hidden in a secret compartment inside a camper van. Blake ended up in the Soviet Union and still lives in Russia, where he receives a KGB pension and last year celebrated his 90th birthday."

To read about other methods of escape, here is the link:

Notorious prison escapes: Dirty laundry, bed-sheet ropes, knitting needles and duct tape - Washington Post:

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