braaaaaains

Can't blog, zombies will eat me.
Can't blog, zombies will eat me.

Charlie's finishing up a huge project, and it's at the stage where I can be helpful by playing the game a lot. So I'm spending my evenings and weekends at work reloading my shotgun as fast as I can. Normal crafting and bread-making will resume soon.

Lally terminology, lesson one

I grew up in a creative family. We didn't just play croquet....we made up our own rules where you had to march and keep your mallet at parade rest and called it 'military croquet.' There were entire casts of stuffed animals that had their own voices. Hell, even our cats had their own personalties and spoke via the sort of spirit medium of my father throughout their lives.

You get the picture. One other thing we did was make up terminology. Here is your first lesson.

Butt-Weasel: [buht] [wee-zuhl]
- somewhere between a noun and a verb, plural -sels
1. A semi involuntary emotional reaction, often expressed as a nose-wrinkling grimace accompanied by a vigorous clenching of the butt-cheeks. Usually caused by exposure to an image or story detailing great discomfort, pain, or other inconvenience.

A few examples:
"When I saw her chewing tinfoil, it gave me a total butt-weasel."
"The little needles are ok, but those huge four inch progesterone syringes give me a complete butt-weasel whenever I think of them."

Let's see if we can elicit the reaction in you, dear reader. So last night I had the oven open to cool it off after roasting a head of cauliflower. We have two wall ovens and I had been using the upper one. I walked over to close it, and in the process was dodging something on the floor, I think a cat, and the corner of the door caught a particular piece of my body jewelry on it's way up. And the door kept going until it closed.
It happened so quickly that I barely registered what was going on. I was extraordinarily lucky in that the metal chose to bend before my body gave way. I heard a "ping" and looked down to see metal lying on the floor. There wasn't too much pain, but I had an ice pack on there for a half hour or so. If you know me, you know where this was. If you don't, well, let's just say it wasn't in my ear.

Did you feel it? That, my friends, is a butt-weasel!

Humanitarian Effort

Early this afternoon I noticed that Harry was transfixed by a basket of children's books in the living room. An hour later he was still there. That kind of diligence can only mean a mouse.

safer than a cat's mouth

Usually the mouse is terrified by the cat standoff and this one was no different. I was able to move the basket and pop a cup on top of him without him trying to run away. He then was kind enough to wait until I got my camera. I took him out into the yard and did my good deed for the day.

thanks lady! I promise to wait 24 hours before coming into your house again.

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After a day of mad cleaning and a failed sewing experiment I am roasting a head of cauliflower for dinner and will finally sit down for a while. Dear readers, if any of you have experience with sewing tight curves (a three thread narrow edge to be specific) on a serger please enlighten me! I can fuss it on lightweight material, but I'm working with oilcloth and it is reluctant to bend as much as I need. I'm working from a sample I saw at a store, so I know it can be done.

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Eggs laid in the coop today: 4
Eggs laid in the coop Tuesday: 2
Eggs laid this year: 129

twirl

I came home this afternoon to a phone message from my sister requesting a super-twirl skirt. It is a credit to my sister's fun-loving and fancy free nature that I first started computing in my head to see if I had enough fabric to make her a super twirly skirt.

Then I realized it was for Calliope. I've had fun over the years making her clothes that are sometimes practical and sometimes more like dress-up. It seems that lately she has been preferring the items that have the best twirl. I know exactly what she means. When Gabe and I were young we used to do the same thing. Put on a skirt, whirl around, and then judge it on movement. There was one pleated skirt (or was it a dress?) that did this crazy thing where it belled out horizontally and then fell straight down. While you turned around fast you looked like you were wearing a tall wedding cake.

Calliope twirling in the petticoat of a red riding hood costume I made her last year

Sewing experience tells me that the more volume the better. I headed downstairs and pulled out a big piece of lilac calico that I hadn't known what to do with and some plain white. I figured I would intersperse some straight panels with some triangular pieces. Sort of a bastardization of a dirndl skirt and a flamenco style. Along the way I kissed my serger for providing me with a three-thread rolled stitch which meant that I could connect the fabric decoratively and have no seams to worry about having to hide. It also made for a weightless hem, important when you are looking for swishy volume.

twirly back

twirly front

I piled a lot of fabric onto the waistband and gave it two ties. Since it's more dress-up than super functional, I'm assuming that it will likely be worn over pants or tights. No fussy zippers or buttons here. And just in case the twirl isn't enough I threw together two gypsy wristbands with bells. A girl should have her own musical accompaniment (and Gabe, I promise the bells are not too annoying!).


This will go in the mail tomorrow....and I demand pictures of it in action! I'm kind of breaking my rules by showing pictures before it's been received, but since it was specifically requested I'm not ruining a total surprise.

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Eggs laid in the coop today: 5
Eggs laid this year: 123

mumzilla

Several weeks ago Ido and Mona were kind enough to gift me with a potted plant. I opened the front door to see Ido staggering towards me, his entire torso obscured by an elephantine chrysanthemum. It is huge, it is the perfect russet-orange of autumn, it has that great chrysanthemum smell.....

Behold mumzilla

In order to contain its awesomeness I needed to find a big pot. Bigger than anything I have. So I headed to half price pots, which happened to be going out of business. When I was there it was twenty-percent-pots. Score! I bought the chrysanthemum vessel as well as five other pots and also little claw feet to go under them for the princely price of $28. I am not usually one to crow about fiscal conquests, but damn. I giggled on the way out the door because I felt like I was stealing the pots.

Artistic rendering of what a takeover by mumzilla would look like

almost-free pots, waiting for next spring and pretty plants

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Breaking news: this afternoon I was standing in the kitchen making a cup of coffee when I heard a scrabble from outside the window. I looked up and saw a beautiful wild cat holding an equally beautiful twitching newly killed squirrel. Bobcats don't usually hunt during the day around here, but this one must have been feeling especially safe or exceptionally hungry. Fortunately I had my camera in my pocket and was able to grab a long-zoom picture of the cat with her spoils. Paul, have I thanked you lately for helping me build the chicken aviary?

thanks for the dinner, lady, but I prefer chicken

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Eggs laid in the coop today: 4
Eggs laid in the coop Saturday: 4
Eggs laid this year: 118

Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn

My spooky sewing project? Well, Wednesday was our fourth wedding anniversary. I think that the traditional gift is fruit, which just wasn't very exciting. A basket full of peaches is not very romantic.

What is romantic? Being in bed! Being in a big comfy bed with soft sheets and sleeping for eight hours. Charlie has been working a lot lately trying to get a product shipped, and sleep has been at a premium. So I decided to make him a pillowcase and a sham.

Besides work and sleep, right now Charlie likes Cthulhu. We've both been reading the Lovecraft short stories and also playing a rather involved board game that is set in the universe. Cthulhu, in short, is a huge tentacled horror of a god, lurking and waiting until it is his time to come wreak havoc upon the world. He hovers on the edge of dreams, occasionally gifting sensitive people with glimpses into his realm. They pretty much always go mad. It's dark stuff. It's wonderful, creative, spooky, creepy dark stuff. And Charlie loves it.

I went to my favorite quilting fabric store, one that has a stunning array of cotton prints, and tried to pick out a handful of fabrics that looked like parallel universes of utter insanity. Then I cut them up into strips and made a few long swaths and turned those into the borders of the cases. Tucked up next to them is a thin strip of black-night-and-stars, the border between dreamtime and madness.

innocently lying on the deck

Perhaps I got carried away. But part of the glory of being married to someone for this long is that you know that they understand exactly what you were thinking and can appreciate it. Not everyone can say "Happy anniversary, love, here are your pillowcases for sweet dreams. See that strip of stars? It is the only thing lying between you and the unmitigated horror of these other universes. I especially like the one that looks like tentacles or eyeballs, whatever you pick."

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Eggs laid in the coop today: 5
Eggs laid this year: 110

Chicken doings

Some chickens I've had love to get up as high as they can, some like to live on the floor. This particular group is middle-of-the-road. They spend their days scratching around the floor but some bit of ancestral knowledge tells them that sleeping on their set of night-perches (across from the nest boxes) is safer. A few months ago a particularly large branch fell from a tree in our yard, and I stripped it of twigs and put it in the coop at about waist-height. None of the chickens seemed particularly interested, but I thought this may be because the stick was a little wobbly. The coop is 8 feet wide, after all, and a stick that long is bound to have some bend to it.

let's just say that Muriel was encouraged up to this perch for a picture

Yesterday I finally got around to making some proper perches. I wanted one to replace the stick, and then a smaller but much higher one in case the girls decide that they want to take in the view from 6 feet up. I used 2x4's, since I needed something strong enough to not sag over and 8' span, and also because honestly I had a few of them in the shed and didn't want to buy more wood. To make them easier on chicken feet I used a planer to round the edges. Then in keeping with my "everything about the coop will be aesthetically pleasing" rule I stained them the same color as the walls so that they blend in.

After two hours of measuring, sawing, and staining I drove the chickens crazy with 5 minutes of drilling and they were in place. Hopefully they will like them!

let us out, woman!

Since the girls do sometimes come out and wander around the yard (only when I am there the entire time, doing yardwork) I made them a little ramp so that they can get in and out of the coop more easily.

newer "big-girl" sized nestboxes

but everyone still lays in the little a-frame

In other chicken news, the other day I cracked an especially large egg and found a double yolk. Exciting!

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Eggs laid in the coop today: 4
Eggs laid in the coop Wednesday: 5
Eggs laid this year: 105

Mountain of jars

a week's worth of canning

I took a break from the big boiling pot of water over the weekend, popped the blueberries in the fridge, and finished up the last of the blueberry jam yesterday afternoon. I ended up freezing three pounds of the blueberries because they were just incredible. They are tiny and intense, much like the berries I remember from Maine. I am not often inspired to bake sweets, but I have a fantasy of making a batch of muffins deep in the middle of the winter and using some of those berries. Charlie made blue corn pancakes on Sunday morning and sprinkled some in and it was divine.

neatly labeled and ready to go into the cabinet

I am afraid to go to any farmer's markets for fear I will come home with another 25 pounds of....something. Who knows.

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Today was a flurry of sewing. For a change of pace, it's for an adult! Tomorrow is our 4th wedding anniversary, and here's a sneak peek at something I'm making Charlie...

does this look scary? Creepy? Even a little?

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Eggs laid in the coop today: 3
Eggs laid in the coop Monday: 5
Eggs laid in the coop Sunday: 4
Eggs laid in the coop Saturday: 4
Eggs laid this year: 96

Marinara Mayhem

Yesterday started with a 25 pound box of roma tomatoes. I figured I would make two batches of marinara sauce, and then experiment and try to can the rest of them whole. First came the skinning. Few things can ruin a mouthful of sauce more than a beastly little roll-up of tough tomato skin that gets caught in your teeth. Luckily, all it takes is a huge pot of boiling water, a knife, and a willingness to have every cut on your hands sting like crazy.

naked, vulnerable tomatoes

Then I used my old recipe for sauce. It's simple....just tomatoes, carrots, onions, red wine, garlic, oregano, and basil. The carrots make the final product look a bit orange, but they do wonders for sweetening things up. I let that simmer for a few hours to thicken and then filled six quart jars. Two of them have a generous dose of red pepper flakes, so we'll see how that turns out over the long term. Hopefully it will be nice and spicy and not bitter.

a jar waiting for some whole tomatoes

The rest of the tomatoes got stewed briefly to soften them up a bit, and then they went straight into jars with a few fresh basil leaves. Then came the scary part. For the marinara, I just processed it in a hot water bath for a long time. Extra cooking wasn't going to hurt that sauce. But with the fresh tomatoes I wanted to try to preserve their flavor and not have them taste too stewed. Commercial canners can flash-boil them and the total processing time is super hot but very brief.

I'd been putting this off for years. I bought my pressure canner specifically for this sort of thing and have been assiduously avoiding it every since. There are only a few things you can safely process in a hot water bath, but these are also what I make the most of. We're talking high sugar things like jam and high acid tomatoes. If I were to make canned pumpkin pie filling, for instance, it would have to be pressure canned. It makes things insanely hot and crazy in there, but also shortens the cooking time exponentially. For instance, I could have boiled the tomatoes in there for an hour and a half, or I could do a mere 20 minutes at 11 pounds pressure.

11 pounds of terror

The pressure terrifies me. I can't stop looking at the pot like a big bomb sitting on the stove. And I have to be there the whole time to make sure the pressure is constant, so I can't get it going and hide. But I did it. I did the tomatoes, and everything worked out fine. Now we just have to see if they taste good. We go through a lot of big cans of tomatoes in this house when Charlie makes sauce.

marinara on the left, whole tomatoes on the right

Next up: blueberries. I am sporting a sunburn as I type, but that story will have to wait till tomorrow. My kitchen is beginning to look like an episode of Little House on the Prairie, and I'm exhausted.

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Eggs laid in the coop today: 3
Eggs laid this year: 80

When the cat's away

those leaves are grape leaves, put one in the bottom of each jar to help keep the dills crispy

Charlie is out of town for work, so last night I decided to have a little party. A pickle party, to be precise. Earlier in the day I'd bought 12 pounds of pickling cucumbers at the Yakima produce stand, a big bunch of dill, and a new box of pickling salt.

dills ready to go in the pot to process for 10 minutes...they start out so vividly green

I uncorked a particularly fine bottle of wine and got to work. I made two kinds of pickles. One straight recipe of kosher dills (kosher means that they have garlic in them), and one of slightly spicy bread-and-butter chips. These particular cucumbers were really bumpy and they looked great when cut into thin slices. While the chips were sitting in their salt bath for the recommended three hours, I made the dills. I originally had planned on making whole dills, but found that it was really difficult to cram them into the jars that way. Cut in half lengthwise it was much easier to fit and I could put more in. They're not exactly whole, not exactly spears, but they look good.

Once the chips were done soaking I rinsed them well (I don't like salty pickles) and simmered them in a delicious smelling brine for a bit. It had vinegar and brown sugar, hot sauce, some miscellaneous pickling spices, and tumeric to give the chips that distinctive golden-yellow color.

pickles this morning, ready to go in the cabinet

By the time everything was processed it was 12.30am, I had drunk almost an entire bottle of wine over the course of the evening, and I retired to bed with slightly sore feet. Now comes the worst part of pickles: the waiting. They have to sit for at least three months or so to develop their true flavor. Once these jars are labeled I'll put them in the cabinet and try to forget about them for a bit. In fact, I'll probably find some pickled asparagus in there that I tried to forget about three months ago, so it should work out fine!

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Eggs laid in the coop today: 2
Eggs laid in the coop Wednesday: 5
Eggs laid this year: 77

Miscellaney

I am patiently waiting for my mouth to un-numb. I spent the morning at the dentist getting some old fillings replaced, and he had to shoot me up a few extra times with anesthetic. Thankfully no one can see me drooling.

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how to tell we're having a party: mountain of shoes

On Saturday we hosted a baby shower for friends. I didn't manage to get any pictures of the actual festivities, but it was a rollicking afternoon of kids playing in the chicken coop, adults drinking "punch", and everyone eating lots of good pot-lucked food. Elisa planned the whole thing....I just provided the house. Easiest party I've ever thrown!

Ido and Elisa fully explore some toys

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I solved my smocking problem. I knew that my bobbin case had a tension you could fiddle with, but I'd been told to never ever mess with it from the factory settings if they are working. Having a spare bobbin case let me play around with the adjustment without fear and it worked! The outfit is going in the mail tomorrow, and if it fits and is comfortable a whole new world of smocking awaits me.

smocking success!

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Eggs laid in the coop today: 5
Eggs laid in the coop Monday: 4
Eggs laid in the coop Sunday: 3
Eggs laid in the coop Saturday: 4
Eggs laid in the coop Friday: 4
Eggs laid this year: 70