Thimbleanna – Page 137 – My little online diary.

Whistle While You Work…

14 Comments / August 17, 2008 February 18, 2011 / Around the House, Quilting

Well hello there! Did you all have a mighty fine weekend???

It was all work here in Thimbleannaland. I decided I couldn’t stand it anymore, so I rolled up my sleeves and started cleaning on Friday and cleaned all weekend. Sadly, there are still a few rooms that need attention, most notably the sewing room. I think I had sewing stuff in almost every other room so all that junk got dumped into the sewing room. That will be another weekend down the drain of productivity.

The motivator that got me cleaning was the departure of the kids last week. I started with their rooms and now that they’ve taken all of their stuff I have my guest room back. When SweetiePie came to stay a year ago, I packed away my quilts, so I put them back on the beds this weekend.

I made these quilts for the boys when they were very young and shared a room. The colors matched a cute little toy soldier wallpaper that covered the walls. (Thank goodness we moved before they got older and I had to remove all that wallpaper!) I’ve always loved the pinwheel block so I knew I wanted to incorporate it into their quilts. I also wanted to use the same fabrics on each quilt, but make them each a little bit different because they boys are both different.

This block above, was made for TheSecondChild’s quilt. He was a little wilder as a little boy (and funny, that’s still true!) so I wanted a pinwheel with a little more “movement”. The block below is the block that I chose for TheFirstChild who was a little more calm and reserved.

Both quilts are hand quilted, but not by me. I’m still working on a wall hanging that was started around the time I pieced these quilts, so it was a very good decision to have someone else quilt them. Sadly, in spite of a window blind that is constantly drawn, TheFirstChild’s quilt is fading badly. I now keep that quilt covered all the time with extra sheets, even with the blinds closed.

I’m off to NJ for my monthly trip tomorrow, so I won’t be around to enjoy my almost clean house. But maybe I’ll be able to catch up on some blogs!

XOXO,
Anna

Chocolate and Knitting

42 Comments / August 13, 2008 February 18, 2011 / Knitting, Recipes

Gosh, you guys are all so sweet and kind! Thanks for all the sympathy for my empty nest. I enjoyed reading all of your comments. Sweet Molly even left me a nice bit of prose from Erma Bombeck on her blog — if you haven’t been there, run over and read it. Thanks Molly, I love it!

So, while I sat around wondering where the last 24 years went, I managed to log into Ravelry since so many of you are participating in the Ravelympics. I always forget to check in on Ravelry and I think it’s partly because it just confuses me. There’s SO much going on there — it’s like it’s own separate blogland. One click leads to the next and pretty soon you’re lost. Today’s very short session got me lost somewhere in a food thread and I found this recipe for a 5 minute chocolate cake. Sign me up! Anything for a beeline to chocolate!

You make this cake in a coffee mug and the recipe goes something like this:

Stir 4 T cake flour (not self-rising), 4 T sugar, and 2 T baking cocoa into a mug and mix well. Add 1 egg and mix thoroughly. Pour in 3 T milk and 3T oil (several people commented that this seemed to be too much, so I only added 1 1/2 T oil) and mix well. Add 3 T choc. chips (optional — I opted not) and a splash of vanilla and mix again. Put the mug in the microwave and cook for 3 minutes at 1000 watts.

Here’s how my cake looked through the microwave window at about the 2 minute mark. It grows way out of the mug, but the recipe said not to worry about that.

When you remove the mug from the microwave, it will shrink back into the mug. Allow it to cool, run a knife around the edge and tip it out onto a plate to serve.

There was a lot of discussion on Ravelry about all the possibilities for this little cake. Add ice cream, sauces…the sky’s the limit. I decided to sprinkle mine with powdered sugar.

How’d it turn out? Well, I thought it was a little rubbery. Maybe my microwave runs hotter than 1000 watts? Maybe it needed a little less egg? Proportionally a whole egg is a lot — doesn’t a whole cake usually only take 2 or 3 eggs? Maybe it really did need 3 T oil??? If you try this cake, I’d love to know what you think of it or if you found anything that made it be a little less tough. TheManoftheHouse ate it but I only had a bite. I guess I’ve just been spoiled by MeMum’s awesome chocolate cakes that are moist and delicious and loaded with great frosting. I really missed the frosting option about this little mug cake.

And while we’re talking Ravelry and knitting, here’s the precious little knitting that’s been happening around here. I was working on this dishrag a little bit at the rehab hospital when visiting BigDaddy, but then MeMum and I discovered that we can play Hand and Foot while we’re sitting around, so that shot my productivity all to pieces! Anyway, this pattern is called Washcloth Sampler and the quilty peeps got it from The Idea Studio in Chicago when we went there for the April quilt show. It was a freebie and there isn’t any kind of a copyright on the pattern so I posted it over in my projects section (here) for anyone who might be interested.

I sure hope you’re out there getting more done than I am!

XOXO,
Anna

If You Set It Free…

61 Comments / August 10, 2008 February 18, 2011 / Family

Long time, no blog, huh? I seem to be having a bit of trouble keeping up these days. Do you ever feel like you’re doing a lot but not getting anything done? That’s how it is here in ThimbleannaLand, plus it feels like things are falling down all around me. I could probably write my to-do list in the dust on the furniture! Ah well, busy is happy, right?

TheFirstChild had his orientation for medical school this weekend and families were invited to attend the White Coat ceremony. We arrived early and I was glad we did because it was cool to see all of the white coats neatly laid out on the student seats before the students started arriving.

It was a wonderful ceremony and in a tradition that we saw when TheFirstChild went to his undergrad orientation at a different college, the Dean of Admissions spoke about the characteristics of the students in this class. He spoke of the diversity of their gender (56%M/44%F), race, age (19 – 41), and home countries, states and counties. As you can imagine, they come from very different backgrounds and some have overcome hardships to make it to med school. He read excerpts from a few essays by the students — my favorite was from a young man who had been an army medic and had been to Iraq three times. They are also an incredibly talented bunch — among them they have enough musical talent to form an orchestra, with the exception of a bassoon. The Dean read a list of a few of their hobbies and at the end he said they had knitters, crocheters and sewers among them who would hopefully use those skills in surgery. That comment got a lot of laughs!

There are approximately 305 students in this class which, I think, is the largest med school class in the US. Each student walked across the stage and handed his white coat to his dean who then helped him put it on. One of TheFirstChild’s friends since kindergarten (and a groomsman) is also in this class so we had the added bonus of seeing him receive his white coat too. Before we knew it the ceremony was over and it was time to go. We had dinner with the newlyweds and then sent them on their way.

I suddenly find myself joining Isabelle in the ranks of the melancholy. The newlywed’s wedding and their move were small potatoes compared to this. This time it’s real. They’re off on their own now to work long hard hours in pursuit of their dreams. My little butterfly slipped out of my grasp when I mistakenly had my palm open. What was I thinking? I should have held on tight.

XOXO,
Anna

Not Much to Report

29 Comments / August 4, 2008 February 18, 2011 / Recipes

Unlike those of you who were moving, notcamping, and road trippin’, we had a nice quiet weekend here in ThimbleannaLand. The weekend was spent doing fun, oddball things around the house. There was much weeding (finally!) in our PERFECT Saturday weather, along with some sewing (working on the cupcake swap, so I can’t show you), sock knitting, and reading (I’ve started a fun new book, Three Bags Full, recommended by Kristy).

And a bit of cooking was thrown into the mix. I managed to finally try the famous No-Knead Bread recipe.

I Loved it! The crust was crispy as promised — my favorite kind of bread. The only problem I had is that it doesn’t seem to me like the bread rose very high. Could be one of two reasons: 1) even though the recipe said to use a6 to 8 qt pan, my 5 1/2 qt pan seemed awfully big, or 2) the recipe called for instant yeast which we couldn’t find, so we got rapid rise yeast. Have any of you tried this recipe? Does anyone know the difference between instant yeast and rapid-rise yeast? (I could probably google that, but I’m having a case of the lazies.) Anyway, volume or not, I loved it — it was easy and I’ll definitely be making it again. I’ve heard there are variations to this recipe too, has anyone tried one they’d recommend?

I hope you’re off to a good start to your week. Mine will be busy — BigDaddy had a knee replacement today (everything is going great — he’s amazing!) and I’ll be in some goofy training until 8 o’clock tomorrow evening. So, have a nice relaxing cup o’ tea (er, diet pepsi?) tomorrow for me!

XOXO,
Anna

A Finish and A Start

29 Comments / August 1, 2008 March 8, 2016 / Knitting, Socks

Whew! That pesto exercise was sure fun! Thanks for all of your great comments — you either love pesto or you don’t, huh? Several of you even left some great sounding recipes, so be sure and go read the pesto post comments if you’re a pesto lover.

Yipee! It’s the weekend. It will be very low-key here in Thimbleannaland. There are so many things that need to be done around here, so I’m just going to stick my head in the sand and do as little as possible. Maybe some reading, knitting and sewing. But very little cleaning (which is the most pressing need!) and cooking. Although, I do hope to finally try the No-Knead Bread recipe that everyone has been raving about. It looks yummy.

I did manage to finish my first-ever two socks on one circ socks this week. I thought they’d NEVER be done, so I’m happy that they’re finally finished.

I didn’t enjoy knitting on US size 0 needles one tiny little bit. I’m hoping never to have that experience again LOL. These were made from some Knitpicks yarn given to me by a dear friend. (Thanks Sweetie!) This yarn made for a nice, comfortable weight sock and it didn’t tangle or anything, but it’s not a real smooth, plush yarn with which to knit.

While I didn’t love knitting on size 0s, I did love knitting two socks on one circ. So when I was at Cami’s last week I bought a US size 1 needle. She was out of size 2s, which is what I wanted, but as it turns out, size 1s are perfect. I started these Mockery socks with yarn I bought at Cami’s last fall. I should probably call these my Cami Socks, especially since Cami is where I learned about mockery socks in the first place.

I’m having a great time knitting these. The yarn is heavenly and they seem to be going much faster on size 1 needles. I certainly wouldn’t have thought moving up only one size would make that much difference, but my progress seems to be much faster.

I thought I’d see how socks in progress look as earrings for Pooh Bear, but I see now that they should be modeled as ear muffs. Pooh would be so happy in winter and maybe they would keep his ears from cracking like his face has. Poor Pooh … I know how you feel. It comes with age.

Happy Weekend Everyone, cracked face or not!

XOXO,
Anna