Resolute

Between the Man and myself, we have stuff… a lot of stuff.  We’ve lived here for a year and we still have boxes of things that haven’t been opened in all that time.  And now we’re on the cusp of adding another person… and another person worth of stuff… to our family.  We are in desperate need of some uncluttering. I’ve been following the Unclutterer blog for some time and in a moment of impulse, I decided to check out her book.  The paperback release and a trial of Amazon Prime provided the perfect alignment of the stars and now we are the proud owners of a copy of this book.  So far it’s brilliant, totally palpable and feels completely doable.

If I’m not to busy, or not too in labor, I’ll try to post about our progress (which I’m hopeful will be significant).

project(s)

Got this through Inter-Library Loan (oh dear ILL, how I love you so…)

The Man and I are going away for the weekend – someplace remote and quiet.  I’m refraining from bringing half of my yarn stash with me because any thoughts that I might get that many projects completed in one short weekend may be just a titch lofty.  It doesn’t mean I won’t try though (sorry honey, you can’t bring clothes, we need more room for yarn).

Today at work (shhh) I printed out a ton of patterns from Ravelry.   The babe needs a hat (or 3) and so does The Man.  I think I love this one the best for the babe (third one down -pdf).  Oh, and Pip changed his Solstice gift request from a hat and mittens to pichouxs (slippers for those of you who don’t have my Memere).  The problem with this much stuff wanting to be made is… what to start first?!?

named

The Man and I had a date night (oh, la la). We had delicious Indian food and then zipped on over to the theater to catch HP7.1. It was good, but felt short, probably since it’s only half. Unlike when the others came out, I didn’t re-read the book prior to seeing the movie. I think it might be better that way since I was pretty disappointed in 5 and 6 because I thought they deviated too much from the book.

As I was watching, I found myself listening for names, or ideas for names for this baby. We’ve got a girl name all set, but there hasn’t been a boy name that has clicked for us. As much as I trust technology, ahem, I think we’ll only be sure about the gender when this wee bub is born.

I’m going through this with my trusty pencil hoping this library book sale find on “dollar a bag” day will show us the perfect name.

more beans

The stack of sweaters was just sitting there looking at me (because I hadn’t put them away yet, ahem) and they suggested I make another bean bag out of them.  So I did, of course…

while Hopper played with Legos.  I love this particular felted sweater.  Hopper asked if I was planning to make this one for the baby.  I told her that we’ll be sure to make some for the babe when the time comes.

When she was done with her Legos, she wanted to make another.  To my surprise (and pleasure), she wanted to be more involved in the actual sewing this time.

She wasn’t quite flying solo, but progress I say.  I only had to rethread the needle about 12 times.  The sensory bin doesn’t look too empty… yet.

bean

Hopper found this book on in the sun/playroom and fondly remembering our evening of bean bag making, asked to make another.  I snagged my stack of neglected felted sweaters and we sat down to make one.  I thought maybe she’d be ready to sew her own, unlike last time.  I was wrong.  She got a few stitches in and handed it over to me to finish up for her (we’d had enough frustration for one day, I sacrificed the teaching moment for a moment of self-preservation).  Pip was too busy doing something crazy on the computer to be bothered (I wish I could explain the things he does, but they involve virtual machines and operating systems and whatnot). But later, he got on board himself.  Perhaps the lack of sharing by Hopper was his motivation?  Hopper’s is the striped, Pip’s the wine color.  The striped one is nice and thick and doesn’t hurt quite as much when you get hit with it, fyi.

A quasi-tute perhaps?

Bean Bags

Materials

Felted wool sweater(s)
Beans or seeds
Thread
Needle

How-To

Cut two of your desired shape bean bag from your felted wool sweaters.  Because they’re felted, they won’t unravel, so you don’t need to turn and topstitch or anything crazy like that.  Holding the two pieces together (pin if you need some stabilty) stitch around with your stitches close enough so your beans don’t escape.  Keep sewing until you have about an inch left.  Raid the sensory bucket* for black beans.  Fill your bean bag.  Sew up the rest of the way.  PLAY!

*We have a plastic tub filled with 25 lbs of black beans and various accouterments (wooden spoons, clean containers, small pitcher, etc).  It is currently missing two bean bags worth of black beans.

need

Remember these?  They blew out on the bottom.  I need to make myself a new pair (and share the pattern this time).  My feets are cold.  I suppose they’ll go on The List.

The List (in no particular order of importance or likelihood to be finished)

Slippers for me

Slippers for The Man

A hat for The Man

Hat and mittens for Pip (Solstice gift)

Fingerless mittens for Hopper (Solstice gift)

Gray Baby Yoda for the babe

Another sweater for the babe (this one might get cut until later…)

More booties for the babe (can you possibly have too many booties for a winter baby?!?!)

lyra

Soltice gift #1 for Hopper, finished.

pattern

yarn

and to go with it… mittens or fingerless gloves… what to do, what to do…?

32

Just a couple months left and I have SO much I want to make make make for the baby.

I specifically bought fabric to make some of these, enough for at least three pairs.

In my quest to decided which carrier I wanted (Ergo… bEco…?) I stumbled on this pattern.  A little ambitious for the next 8 weeks, but I see some sewing time in my future post baby (and won’t really need this kind of carrier for a while since we’ll be living in a knit wrap for quite some time).

And then of course the sweaters.  I already knit one Baby Yoda, raglan style (I worked it out myself, after I successfully knit another, I’ll post directions with the original designers permission).  The Man wants an authentic gray one so we’re probably going to get some of this and I’ll knit another.  Darn, I just realized they’re out until the first of the year.  Hmmm.  But then I also feel like I have another sweater in me, a brown wool one.  I haven’t come across just the right pattern yet even though I’ve spent days on Ravelry looking.  I may have to wing it.

Oh, and for the midwives gifts, I found THE perfect idea – scale slings!

absence

work untouched : eating to kill the heartburn : falling asleep in this big bed alone : glad he’ll be home tomorrow

eat cake

When I read this post, I knew I wanted to eat this.  But, since I can’t eat gluten, it would mean a bit of experimentation.  I was up for the challenge.  I mean, it’s cake, with pumpkin, and there was talk of cream cheese frosting.  Not that I eat dairy either, but like I said, up for a challenge.

I’m happy to report it was, mostly, a success.  The cake was absolutely awesome, the ‘frosting’ needs a little help.

The inspiration recipe is actually located here.  My recipe is here:

Pumpkin Cake

gluten-free, dairy-free, soy-free, corn-free, nut-free

2 eggs

3/4 cup sugar

1/2 cup sunflower oil

1 cup plus 2 Tbsp of flour mix (scroll down)

1/2 can pumpkin (just shy of a cup)

1.5 tsp cinnamon

.25 tsp ground cloves

Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees.

Beat eggs, sugar, oil and pumpkin until smooth.

Stir in flour mix and spices.

Pour into 6×9 glass baking pan lined with parchment.

Bake for 60 minutes or until slightly browned and toothpick/knife comes out clean.

Cool before frosting.

Note: my recipe is halved because I wanted to make sure it would work before I took the plunge for a full batch.  You’ll also note I did not include the ginger called for in the original recipe because I didn’t have any.  It still came out very very yummy.

So… the ‘frosting’.  I tried.  I was out of palm shortening which is what I usually use to make frosting (in lieu of butter… mmm… butter).  So I tried coconut oil.  Don’t do this.

I got the ‘cream cheese’ aspect by using cashew sour cream, which we had leftover from burritos earlier in the week.  Like I said, this didn’t turn out how I hoped.  Next time, palm shortening.  It was still a very nice accompaniment to the cake.

Frosting Glaze

gluten-free, dairy-free, soy-free, corn-free, vegan

1/4 cup (about 2 oz) vegan cashew sour cream

1.5 cups confectioners sugar (Whole Foods brand is made without cornstarch!)

2.5 Tbsp coconut oil (I would have used palm shortening, but I was out, don’t do this, seriously, go buy palm shortening or use softened butter if you can)

1/2 tsp vanilla

1 Tbsp orange juice

Blend well and if you used coconut oil, you’ll have lumps to pick out.  Hey, you were warned. This makes enough to cover the above amount of cake.  If you double (aka. make the full recipe) you’ll need to make double the frosting/glaze as well.

This tastes remarkably cream cheesy.  Yum.  Yumyumyum.  But it is definitely more of a thick glaze.  When I master actually frosting, I’ll post the recipe.  (For what it’s worth, I really think it will work with palm shortening. Let me know if you give it a go.)