Fall Is Sprouting With Blankets, Gadgets and Coffee Beans

Here is my second "Sprout" Blanket completed, but not blocked yet. Taken on my new fancy smart phone. I am getting alot of practice using it and learning how to focus and such.You can see with the larger needles and different yarn, it came out a bit bigger than the original Green Sprout.               I had my eye on a lovely pattern, Vitamin D. I saw another Ravelry user who did the pattern with Elsebeth Lavold silky wool and I fell in love with hers: TwoKnitWit's turned out so spectacular in the Coffee Bean shade, 54, I just had to get some of my own and try my hand at it. Since we live in Seattle, it is appropriate that the Vitamin D sweater be knit with a yarn named "Coffee Bean" I think, since coffee is our Vitamin D almost year round here. This meant a trip to Weaving Works with my mom. I convinced her that it was a great pattern, and that she must also do it along with me. This is called "enabling." We took several hours to wind our skeins of yarn, and had an enjoyable afternoon doing so. This shade of brown has a lovely tinge of cinnamon in it. I adore it.

And of course, I got a chance to try my picture-taking skills out once again while there. Today I tried my skills out again before eating this lovely chocolate truffle cake at The Oyster Bar on Chuckanut Drive.

Even the butter was pretty.... I think those flowers were edible.

Blueberry Cake

The blueberries in my yard have just exploded and it was time to pick a bunch today. I got about 10 cups off of the 3 bushes just today. There will be more on the way. We have given away some and now we must use them while they are fresh. We still have some in the freezer from last year! They are really good over ice cream, just simple and sweet. I thought I would continue the adventures of cooking with xylitol and make a blueberry cake.

We have a family recipe that involves butter and the main ingredients seen below, for the most part. Keeping that in mind, I modified a recipe I found on Smitten Kitchen for blueberry boy bait, a wonderful cake. I used the milk we had on hand, instead of whole. I added 1 tsp. vanilla to the recipe. I used xylitol everywhere the recipe called for granulated sugar. I did use the brown sugar where called for.

So I cut out about 3/4 of the granulated sugar. Where it lacks in grams of sugar, it makes up for it in butter!

I baked it at 350 for 40 min. instead of 45-50 min. Voila!

You could just dig in and eat it plain like this. Yum.

Or you could squirt some whipping cream on and a few more blueberries for good measure.

Or you could squirt on a TON of whipping cream, like my husband did here:

Either way....it was good. Time for a walk to burn off some of those calories!

Bad Women Get Yarn and Fainting Goat Gelato

It was a full day out with my mom exploring the sites of Queen Anne, Ballard and Wallingford. The places we went were many. Here are but a few. The Wallingford Center which houses many awesome shops... Including a Trophy Cupcakes, which we resisted, since we knew we were headed later for something even more amazing.

One of the planned stops was Bad Woman Yarn, which was having a sale on practically the entire store. It was a great shop and had lots to choose from. Very friendly staff who told us the story of how they came to have the store name, and how they originated in Manzanita, OR.

All those were sale tags, yep. They have a big sale on the entire month of July.

I came away with this 100% merino that I fell in love with just due to the colorway.

After that, we braved going out in the heat in search for our final destination: The Fainting Goat Gelato. I'd read about it in the paper and had wanted to try it out. We got there after a late lunch so it wasn't too crowded. Definitely a line, but not out the door. They allow you 3 taste samples. I tried the Espresso. It was good. I wanted to try the Mango, the Mint, and a million others. But we had figured out that one of us would get the Salted Caramel and the other would get the Tiramisu. The paper had pointed out the Salted Caramel was a favorite and the lady in line ahead of us said so too. So we knew it was going to be good....

Don't you just love their logos? The Fainting Goat. The owners are Armenian and I think that is where the fainting goats originate. They had T-shirts too. I wanted one. OK, back to the choices. Here are a few of them...they were so smooth looking. Like pulled taffy, kind of shiny.

Ok, so for one scoop it was $3.30. So we only did one each. I wanted the cute goat cup, but that was only if you bought a pint. And in this heat that would melt before we got to the car.

Hey, look it had organic dairy and sugar. So even though I totally BLEW my "no sugar diet" thing on it, at least it was organic. I can feel good about that. Can't I? Yes, I can...
The one on the left is the Salted Caramel and the one on the right, the Tiramisu. Can't see the difference here. The taste, was well....divine...Almost too good to be true. We laughed so hard because it was so good. We shared them and practically licked the bowls. We wanted to try this other flavor we couldn't pronounce...but would've been too embarrassed to go back in line!

So we'll just have to go back to try more flavors again....

On the sidewalk as we left the block. My sentiments exactly!

On a Lighter Side

I love summer eves when it stays light out later and we do after dinner walks, pick blueberries in the yard...and tonight I could stay out until 9:00 pm knitting on the deck. Heavenly!
Oh, here is my precious homegrown tomato before I ate him! Ahhh, so DELISH! Since it's hot out, I decided to lighten up and knit with some Cotton Ease again. I had one skein of it leftover from another project in Taupe. I went and got another skein for this Ribbed Bolero pattern I found for free. I saw it here on Andipants' Untangling Knots blogsite first. It sounded great! I cast on a few extra for a bigger size as hers was a small. She gives great directions on her blog on what she did.

And another lightening up story: I tried baking with xylitol this week to see if we could make a reduced sugar cookie worth eating, without using Splenda. We have been using Truvia packets alot for sweetener lately (stevia). I tweaked a recipe around and used xylitol for most the sugar called for, only using 1/4 c. of brown sugar. So my smart husband calculated everything out to be 2.5 grams of sugar per cookie instead of a bazillion.

They didn't come out half bad! I ate 7 of them. oops....

Signs of Summer

Roses from the garden...

Blueberries ready to pick!

Coleus plants on our porch. I love them!

Leaves from my favorite smoke bush in the neighborhood. They are the dark plum color now. In the fall they turn the above colors!

First tomatoes! That means we have sun in Seattle! 75 degrees today!

Time for Gelato!

Baby "Gelato" Garter Stitch Jacket is complete and being modeled by Matilda, our bear who was a wedding gift 27 years ago and traveled the coast with us on our honeymoon. Since no babies live here, I had to find a suitable "stand-in."

(Edited to add these pics in the daylight! Poor little sweater is not quite dry and the wind was twirling it around a bit, but hub caught it finally. I know it looks big here hanging in the air. It is the 6/9 mos. size)

Well it was time for a trip to Trader Joes to get some lemonade, avocadoes and their fantastic tiny sugar plum tomatoes. They taste like candy, seriously. We are in the middle of a regular Seattle heat wave, breaking records today. No AC in our house means it's a toasty 82 degrees inside right now. Whew! So, what better time to try out some gelato flavors. On the left we have Villa Dulce Mint and Chip. Very delish! And then there's the local folks of Snoqualmie Gourmet ice cream who put out this snazzy gelato flavor, Raspberry Honey. You can really taste the honey on the "finish". Very refreshing!

Now, my Drops Garter Stitch Baby Jacket is complete with buttons and is ready to be blocked. I think I shall name it "Gelato", in honor of the occasion. There is a hint of pink and sort of a dark mauve so I went with little flower buttons that looked whimsical and funky.

Shown before blocking, below:

And shown here, blocking. Should dry quickly in this weather. Better pic to follow, I'm sure, when we are back to daylight.

Again, this was knit from side to side, on size 2 needles, using fingering weight yarn. (like you would use for socks) The pattern was a free Drops pattern.

I did the 2nd size and used 4 skeins Aslan Trends, Sante Fe -merino wool/polyamide. I have enough of the 4th leftover probably for some little item. I chose to do only 3 buttons at the top. Machine washable, cold water, dry flat. How about that? I still can't believe that. So I hand washed it and then spun out the excess water a bit in the washer. Funky...whimsical!

Wearin' of the Green

Check out the cute cupcake for my hubby with Guiness/Irish Cream flavoring, which we snagged at U- Village Trophy Cupcakes. Fun place!
And in the spirit of the "Green"...I will show you what I've been dreaming of making next:

Helleborus Yoke, from Knitscene Winter/Spring 2010

Love, love, love it! I have some "Green Bushes" Aran weight wool that I got in Portland at Dublin Yarns, made by Kerry Woollen Mills in Ireland. I thought: How appropriate for a cute cabled sweater such as this.., but it calls for a bulkier weight yarn so I am thinking this over. The Thaki Tweed Alpaca they used in the magazine is no longer available in the green, and most stores I have checked do not carry it.

Edited to add: I did find some of the olive green Tahki Tweed/Alpaca at two online shops, in two separate states. I found 8 skeins at: FiberWild. They had great customer service and were a pleasure to work with. The other 3 skeins I found at: MyKnitch. The amazing part is that the skeins are of the same dyelot! After days of searching, I about fell over from shock learning that news! Unfortunately this yarn is discontinued, so if you intend on doing this pattern, you will need to scour the nation to find it, or use another bulky. I will save this Aran wool below for another project :) Enjoy your darlin' corned beef, and Happy St. Patrick's Day to you!

Grand Day Out in Seattle

For a family day out, we decided to see our very own downtown. It has changed over the years and we rarely go down to experience it fully. Our kids are at the university nearby and know it well. So they were our tour guides for the day! We began at Portage Bay Cafe on Lake Union in Seattle for breakfast. Shown here, my daughter's organic pancakes with the added toppings from the fruit and topping bar. Everything on the menu is spectacular!

Next we finally find a place to park against a wall with grafitti art. I hoped our car would still be there when we returned. It was!

On to the famous Pike Place Market. There were daffodils growing on the roof!
Here I am with the famous Pike Place pig, Rachel (?) I guess she has a name...The market stalls are filled with brightly colored fresh produce. Oh, I would love to shop here every day for my food!These fish vendors are famous for "throwing" the fish to the customers once they place the order. Everyone gathers around for the spectacle to watch the fish fly! Gorgeous tulips are now in the market for sale.
Wonderful peppers as well... After alot of walking, we rode the monorail which takes you from the Space Needle through town to the Westlake Mall. Much easier than walking the entire way. It starts out by taking you "through" the Experience Music Project Building.
Another oddity downtown is the "gum wall." Yes, it is really gum. And NO, I did not touch it. Though both my daughters have placed gum here at one time or another. Ew! Hard to believe it is real.

The original and first Starbucks is also down at the Pike Place Market in downtown Seattle.

Along the waterfront is a sculpture park and there were interesting creations there to see. I also saw a man crocheting and wearing a hat with ears on it here. It somehow fit in to the landscape.

The view through the special "viewing glass"of our Space Needle...Another artsy structure found near the Space Needle. Seattle is a very artsy town as you can see! On to view the new Seattle Public library which is also very spectacular inside and out.It has ten floors and one of them is red ...it felt like walking into a tunnel...or into the human body!The escalators and elevators were a very putrid yellowish green and seemed to go on for miles.

Stunning views like this were seen throughout the library as all the exterior windows were seen through these grids.It was indeed a grand day out and we finished with lunch and a Tully's coffee. No, not a Starbucks!