Baby | Page 2

Friday Roundup: New Beginnings

What I’m Knitting

I think I’ve finally figured out a cable pattern I like for the Malabrigo Rios blanket I talked about last week! This is most of it, just minus a couple of rounds of cable/lace patterning and a garter stitch border:

I’m a teensy bit worried about how well the superwash yarn is going to hold a block, since I had to pull the square pretty tight to get the pattern to show up well. But oh well, I figure I’ll finish this square off and block it, then manhandle it a bit and see what happens. The nice thing about doing blankets in squares is that you’re not getting unpleasant surprises at the end of knitting a whole huge blanket.

What I’m Cooking

Hey, I’m starting to feel a little better! The morning sickness isn’t quite as bad as before—enough that I actually managed to cook and eat several things this week that I couldn’t have even contemplated a few weeks ago.

First up, my old healthy standby: quinoa, lentil, and kale stew. I’ve made this stew a lot, but it never fails to amaze me that it’s so tasty. I mean, it doesn’t really SOUND that tasty, does it? But it’s delicious, trust me.

I also made some vegan chili from a new recipe. It had several secret ingredients which sounded really odd to put in chili (maple syrup and lime juice???), but it was totally amazing! I also made some really tasty cornbread muffins and a salad to go with:

What I’m Reading

I have several books I want to read, but they’re all checked out at the library… so while I wait, I’m revisiting one of my old favorites. This is the first book in the Hand of Thrawn series by Timothy Zahn, sequels to Return of the Jedi. I liked the new movie, but I have to say, this will always be my favorite account of what happened after the original trilogy!

“Friday” Roundup: Big News!

So as you may have noticed, it’s not actually Friday anymore (oops).

I figured it was time to let you in on the reason I’ve been so flaky about blog posts, cooking, knitting, and other things over the past few months: we’re expecting another baby this August! Morning sickness (which is really inappropriately named, if you ask me, since I’ve had it all day, every day) has been kicking my butt for the past few months. Cooking was completely out of the question for a solid month. I’m just starting to feel a little more like myself, so hopefully I can get back on track!

Now, on to the regularly scheduled roundup post!

What I’m Knitting

While I wait for yarn for a commissioned design, I’ve been doing some swatching. I picked up a blanket’s worth of gorgeous Malabrigo Rios for the new babe, and I’ve been playing with some ideas for modular cable/lace panels. Here’s my current swatch—doesn’t look like much right now, but I’m going to wait until I get a few more inches to make a decision on whether I like it or not.

What I’m Cooking

Hey, I made something this week! Here’s some tasty tortilla soup. We’re still enjoying the leftovers a few days later:

What I’m Reading

After finishing the most recent book in The Naturals series, I haven’t picked up anything new yet. A trip to the library is in my immediate future!

Friday Roundup: The Waiting is the Hardest Part

What I’m Knitting

As promised, I’ve been working away on the hat to match my Mystic Falls Mitts! I finally came up with a swatch that made me happy, so I cast on and got to work. This is just a quick phone snap, and obviously blocking is desperately needed here, but I think you can get the idea:

I haven’t exactly figured out how I want to do the decreases in the colorwork pattern yet (I know, I know, bad designer!), but I’ll have to work it out soon. That’s 1.5 repeats of the pattern in the picture there, and I don’t think I want to go much past 2 repeats before starting the crown shaping.

What I’m Cooking

I hadn’t made curry in a while, so I whipped up a veggie-filled red curry over rice for my weekly meal-for-a-crowd this week:

It was delicious, but then you can’t really go wrong with full-fat coconut milk curries. Mmmmm….

I also baked some banana-oat muffins this week, which fascinated my son. I put him in his high chair right next to me so he could see the whole procedure. And then he was introduced to the joy that is licking the spoon after the batter has been mixed (vegan baking means no raw eggs to worry about, bonus!):

He was not, however, a fan of waiting until the muffins were cool enough to eat before he got a taste.

What I’m Reading

After devouring the first book in the Naturals series, I moved on to two and three! I’m halfway through book three right now (the most recent one published) and it’s just as good as the first two—love it when that happens. I’m going to have some withdrawal when I finish this one…

Friday Roundup: Back in the Groove

What I’m Knitting:

I’ve been doing a whole lot of planning and swatching this week for two designs. One is for a submission that I can’t show you, but the other is a hat to match the Mystic Falls Mitts I released last fall. These ones (did I ever show off the final pics here? I lose track of these things…):

I knew I wanted the hat to have a similar feel, but not quite the same pattern. The mitts were an experiment in yarn dominance and required switching the dominant yarn halfway through the back colorwork. Since I’d have to do much more than two panels on the hat, switching yarns all the time could get really annoying, really fast. So I’m scrapping that idea for the hat and focusing on getting the colorwork swirls along with the square check pattern on the palms in there.

My swatch has been ripped out a few times and doesn’t look like much at the moment, but here’s an idea of how it might look (as long as I like the way the swatch comes out!):

What I’m Cooking

Remember the tasty vegan alfredo that I forgot to take a picture of last week? Well, I liked it so much that I made it again this week. Over some gluten-free pasta and veggies with some garlic bread on the side, it was delicious:

For my weekly meal-for-a-crowd, I made shepherd’s pie with a new recipe, one that used parsnips (really good!) and skipped the lentils. The big revelation was the vegan, gluten-free gravy I tried out to go on top. I figured it wouldn’t be that great, but it ended up being delicious! (Not the greatest picture, but you get the idea.)

What I’m Reading

I finished the first book in a new YA series this week, The Naturals. It was really good, and I’ve already snagged the second one so I can keep going.

Friday Roundup: Closeups

What I’m Knitting

Well, there’s been a whole lot of knitting on the secret commissioned sweater project… which means that once again, I don’t have much to show off here. I’m cruising through the yoke now, so it won’t be long before I can show off some actual knitting content again!

In the meantime, I figured I could show you some extreme closeups of some of my favorite details. (Side note: these remind me of a feature they used to have in the Highlights for Children magazine, where they’d show closeups of everyday items and you had to guess what they were. I LOVED those!)

Texture:

A nice squishy rib:

One of my favorite features, subtle waist shaping away from the sides:

What I’m Cooking

Uhm, nothing. I’ve really fallen off the wagon on cooking healthy meals, yikes! Work has been crazy for both me and the husband, so there’s been a lot of takeout and ready-made meals stuck in the oven or microwave. But I’m determined to get back to it! Posting here makes me more accountable, so maybe that will help….

What I’m Reading

I’m currently writing a young adult mystery novel, so I’ve been looking for some examples in the genre. This one, which involves the witness protection program, a believable romance, and a really scary villain, is excellent so far!

Friday Roundup: New Year’s Edition!

What I’m Knitting

A fairly low-key day (not a day off—freelancers have it tough sometimes!) means plenty of time for knitting! I can’t show you the whole sweater I’m currently working on for a publication, but I can give you a teensy peek. Look at that gorgeous, rustic yarn:

I’m also working on two(!) other designs for publication with a similar deadline, so there’s going to be some frantic knitting around here for the next few weeks. Wish me luck!

What I’m Cooking

Family in town means lots of eating out, so not too much to show this week! I did manage to make a double recipe of this tasty tortilla soup, which everyone appreciated:

What I’m Reading

Is there anything better than getting a big stack of books for Christmas? I’m working my way through, starting with this one that’s been on my wishlist for a while:

Happy New Year!

Friday Roundup: Greens and Browns

What I’m Knitting

I’ve doubled the progress on the sweater from last week:

It’s about to go on hold, though, because the Indie Design Gift-A-Long starts next week! (If you aren’t familiar with it, check out the Ravelry group for the annual event here. It’s awesome.) This is pretty much the only time of year I knit other people’s patterns anymore, so I’m really excited. I’ve already got a pair of yummy cabled fingerless mitts in my queue. I’m hoping to find a small pattern to try steeking for the first time, too!

Twenty of my patterns are included in the Gift-A-Long sale (25% off from Thursday, November 19th at 8:00 pm EST to Friday, November 27, 2015 at 11:59 pm), and all of my paid patterns are eligible to win prizes. Check out the details in the Ravelry group, and you can see the patterns I’ll be discounting with this direct link to my Ravelry bundle.

What I’m Cooking

For some reason, everything I cooked this week happened to be some shade of brown. It doesn’t make for very exciting photography, but everything was delicious nonetheless.

From my Appetite for Reduction cookbook challenge, this is a mushroom and cannellini bean dish flavored with wine and smoked paprika, served with caulipots (the author’s tasty mixture of mashed potatoes and cauliflower):

The leftover caulipots went really well with the next recipe, chili-lime rubbed tofu:

The tofu tasted really good, but it wasn’t crispy the way I like my baked tofu. I think it’s because I didn’t press the tofu to get all the water out before baking. I really have to remember to do that 20-30 minutes before I start the recipe.

And overripe bananas meant I had a good excuse to whip up some banana-oat muffins. I found this recipe that doesn’t have any refined sugar and used local maple syrup that we bought recently. They were SO GOOD.

What I’m Reading

After completing my tour through Jane Austen’s world, I picked up the second book in the Cormoran Strike mystery series and just finished it last night. It was so good! Although this series (written under a pseudonym) is completely different from JK Rowling’s Harry Potter series, it still has a lot of the same compulsive readability. I’m hoping to grab the third book in the series sometime today.

Friday Roundup: Yummy Cables and Even Yummier Chili

What I’m Knitting

The dolman-sleeve sweater is well underway! I’m knitting directly off of the old sweater—which means the yarn is all kinked up and the stitches in the WIP aren’t quite as even as they’d usually be. But I know from experience that it’ll look just fine after blocking.

What I’m Cooking

I continued with my private low-fat vegan cookbook challenge this week. This chili stuffed with vegetables is quite possibly my favorite thing I’ve made thus far. It was SO GOOD. And its healthy aspect was much appreciated after some, uh, overindulgence in Halloween candy last weekend…

And this next one might be a contender for the prettiest dish I’ve made from the cookbook so far. It’s a sort of salad niçoise, although I used black olives because they’re the only kind I like, and a mashed chickpea mix stood in for the usual tuna.

What I’m Reading

Almost through Emma!

Friday Roundup: Beginnings, Sneak Peeks, and Comfort Food

What I’m Knitting

I finally got enough math done that I could cast on for the dolman-sleeve sweater I’m planning! I’m only a few rows through the ribbing, but look—photographic proof that I have an actual adult sweater on the needles:

We also went out yesterday into the chilly morning to attempt a photoshoot for the nautical-themed toddler sweater. My son did remarkably well, and I think we might have gotten the shots we needed! (Side note: wrangling a toddler on a lakefront path is extremely difficult, even for two people.)

Here’s a sneak peek:

What I’m Cooking

The weather turned chilly this week, which always makes me crave fatty comfort food! But I managed to stick to the low-fat vegan cookbook for three recipes.

This is tofu chimichurri (a herb marinade usually used on meat). It was yummy!

Broccoli potato chowder, in which I used parsnips for the first time ever (they’re pretty good!):

And Pasta de los Angeles, a Mexican-inspired pasta dish that was really tasty:

For my weekly meal for a crowd, I chucked low-fat out the window and whipped up a cashew-cream-laden potato corn chowder and homemade croutons to go on top. It was amazing. People couldn’t stop talking about it, even the non-vegans—I love it when that happens. :-)

What I’m Reading

Still making my way through Jane Austen’s catalog! I don’t know what it is about these books—I seem to be able to read them in half the time of other books of comparable size. This week I finished Northanger Abbey, started and finished Sense and Sensibility, and am most of the way through Mansfield Park. Just Emma and Pride & Prejudice to go (although I might skip P&P, having read it more often in the past…)

Friday Roundup: Lace/Cable Hat FO!

What I’m Knitting

We managed a photoshoot for the lace/cable hat, so I have an FO to show off this week!

Here are the specs:

Pattern: My own, to be released sometime in the next month, hopefully. I’m kind of stuck for a name—let me know if you have any suggestions!

Yarn: Frabjous Fibers March Hare in color Curiouser. Although the picture above is pretty accurate in terms of color, it doesn’t quite capture the subtle nuances of this colorway. It is gorgeous. I bought the single skein on our recent trip to Seattle because I absolutely couldn’t resist it. The yarn was lovely to knit with, too.

Notes: I’m really happy with the way this hat turned out! I wanted a longer hat to cover the ears, which took some finagling since the lace/cable pattern has a 16-row repeat (meaning length is harder to adjust to taste). But 2.5 repeats worked out nicely. I’m just finalizing the pattern writing and then will have it up for testing in my Ravelry group. Come check it out if you think you might be interested in test knitting!

What I’m Cooking

I made a truly delicious vegetable korma Indian dish this week, but I forgot to get pictures. Oh well. Trust me though, it was amazing.

I did get a shot of my latest recipe from my personal cookbook challenge, though. This is garlic broccoli and chickpeas:

I was kind of amazed by this recipe. It’s just broccoli, chickpeas, and smashed whole cloves of garlic, roasted with a little olive oil and spices… but I couldn’t believe how flavorful it was! Just, uh, don’t make this one if you’re going to be in a small room with anyone for a while, if you catch my drift.

What I’m Reading

After finishing the Terry Pratchett book (sniff), I needed something to read on my phone while putting my son to sleep… so I started in on Jane Austen’s oeuvre! I reread her books every few years—there’s something so comforting about them. This week I read Persuasion and Sense and Sensibility, and I’m just starting in on Northanger Abbey.