If I were to marry a dog, it would be Cini.
If my best friend were a dog, it would be Sabine. She is always happy. Always.
Mrs. Doubtfire is such a smiler. If some toothpaste company were looking for a spokesgoat, it would be Mrs. D.
Willoughby is just lovely. Nothing funny to say here.
Churchill & Charley are not exactly lovely, but they are beautiful to me.
I am officially homesick, y’all.
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Tagged Features, In Pictures
So far we’ve seen lovely posts featuring hand-knit/spun things by you. But where did all these patterns come from? Some of them came from designers that JMF has hired to design specifically to pair with the characteristics of the yarn. Sometimes an adventurous knitter saw a pattern that they liked and paired it with a JMF yarn instead of the recommended one. Sometimes, a knitter had a need to fill and some JMF yarn on hand and improvised a pattern.
Today, we’re going to look at patterns that have been designed for JMF yarns that you might not have seen before. These are all patterns that you can buy (or download for free) that were created by independent designers. Some of them might do this as a part of their knitting hobby, some of them might be doing it as a way to make a living, some of them might have just made something up and thought that there might be others out there that might like to make it, too. Whatever the reason for making these patterns, I’m happy that they chose to use JMF yarn and I’m happy that I can share them with you!
Winter Branches was designed by Jenna Swanson. Knit in Chadwick, colorway Mercury, it is a hat that either a man or a woman could wear. I particularly like the attractive way the decreases for the top of the hat work with the cable pattern.
The Hope Grows Cowl is a cute and quick knit designed to be worked up in Willa (Colorway Norwell). Stacey Pope is donating all proceeds to finding a cure for Neuromyelitis optica (NMO). She also designed a matching scarf.
Ellen Stratton’ Hearts on a String Shawl in Findley’s poppy colorway seems like the perfect way to show someone that you’re thinking of them and to keep them wrapped up in lots of love even when you can’t be there.
Picket Fence on a Country Road is another hat designed to use warm and snuggly Chadwick. Designed by Jennifer Cox, the stranded knitting is sure to keep you warm on even the coldest of January days.
Frozen Spires Cowl was designed by Beverly S, of yarn intercept designs for Chadwick’s swimming pool. It is a quick knit and includes both written and charted instructions.
This delicate lace shawl was designed by Adrienne Ku and is based off of Elizabeth Zimmerman’s Pi Shawl. Learning Curve was designed to as a skill-building project.
Up to this point I’ve featured designs from JMF’s fall yarn lines. (The spring yarn line designs will have to wait for another post!) But even though this next pattern is designed with Yearling, right now seems like the perfect time of year to wear it, so I’m including it.
The Cardiff Bay Ponytail hat is a good example of a designer (Beth Ann Beck) seeing a good use for a yarn that isn’t “in season.” The cotton/merino blend of Yearling is perfect for wicking moisture away from your face/hair while trapping in heat and being nice and soft.
If you’re interested in finding any of these designs (all of which can be purchased / downloaded right now online!), you should click the pictures to be taken to the ravelry pattern page.
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Tagged Features, Knitting, yarn, Yarned by You
As I’ve have gotten older, I have become That Dreaded Aunt that Gives Books for Presents. The thing is, the kids I know get so. much. crap, for their birthdays and Christmas. So much plastic. So much that will be forgotten and discarded within weeks of unwrapping. It exhausts me, and makes me sad.
So, instead of adding to the great pile of toys, I opt to give books. I know books will never be opened with the excitement of a noisy, brightly colored plastic thing, but books don’t mind not being the star of the show. Books will patiently wait on the shelf, and, long after all the flashy gifts are gone, those books will beckon. Books will take them places and hopefully become their life-long friends. Books are sneaky like that.
Here’s a short list of some of my favorite knitting, yarn and sheep related picture books for your consideration.
The The New Sweater: The Hueys, Book 1
“The Hueys are small and mischievous, unique compared to the world’s other creatures–but hardly unique to one another. You see, each Huey looks the same, thinks the same, and does the same exact things. So you can imagine the chaos when one of them has the idea of knitting a sweater! It seems like a good idea at the time–he is quite proud of it, in fact–but it does make him different from the others. So the rest of the Hueys, in turn, decide that they want to be different too! How? By knitting the exact same sweater, of course!”
A hand knit hat and the moon? You know I’m going to love it! Actually this book is so lovely it made me teary.
“Red Knit Cap Girl lives with her animal friends in an enchanted forest. There is so much to see and do, but more than anything Red Knit Cap Girl wishes she could talk to the Moon. Join Red Knit Cap Girl and her forest friends on a journey of curiosity, imagination, and joy as they search for a way to meet the Moon.”
This is a great book for knitters with a sense of humor.
“A fastidious fellow, Lester likes everything just so. So when Cousin Clara moves in and knits him truly dreadful sweaters as fast as he can surreptitiously dispose of them, Lester must think of a way to get rid of them for good — or be doomed to look like a clown forever.”
This picture book captures what really goes into knitting a sweater, the love and the care and the intention. It’s just achingly lovely and so full of truth.
“On a fresh spring day, young Yetsa, her mother and her grandmother gather to prepare the sheep fleeces piled in Grandma’s yard. As they clean, wash and dry the fleece, laughter and hard work connect the three generations. Through Yetsa’s sensual experience of each task, the reader joins this family in an old but vibrant tradition: the creation of Cowichan sweaters. Each sweater is unique, and its design tells a story. In Yetsa’s Sweater, that story is one of love, welcome and pride in a job well done.”
Shall I Knit You a Hat?: A Christmas Yarn
“To protect his ears from the cold and snow, Mother Rabbit knits Little Rabbit a hat. He loves his hat so much, he and his mother make them for all of his friends.”
I have blogged about Woolbur before; it’s one of my favorite picture books of all time ever. It’s fun and sweet and the message is that being yourself is okay. Every child should have this book.
From Booklist: ”Nell is a busy young knitter, but because she has a quiet voice and a hobby that doesn’t engender much excitement, she takes a back seat to her friends. Nell is not just knitting for herself; much of her knitting time is spent making scarves, blankets, and mittens for those in need. When the sweater that she enters in the county fair earns a blue ribbon and she gets a special medal for her good works, both Nell and her hobby become a lot more popular. Knitting may not seem a natural subject for a picture book, although more girls and boys are taking it up. However, Roth zeroes in on common kid traits such as shyness and a propensity to help others and wraps the knitting around them.”
This one will be of particular interest to the weavers.
From School Library Journal: “In this satisfying picture book, a young woman raises sheep, shears them, cards and spins the wool, dyes the yarn, and weaves it at a loom. She is an artist who takes pleasure from and applies patience to each phase of her work. Lyon’s writing is lyrical, and the gentle pacing is calming. Terms like “yearling,” “skein,” “warp,” “weft,” “shuttle,” and “treadles” are understandable in context and bring richness to the text.”
“A shepherd shears his sheep, cards and spins the wool, weaves and dyes the cloth, and sews a beautiful new red cloak.”
This book is sadly out of print but, if you are lucky, you can find a second hand copy. Although she has no money, Anna’s mother barters and trades with craftspeople to get a new coat for Anna. This book is a treasure.
This one is for the goat lovers!
I have been fighting off a cold for about two weeks now. TWO WEEKS! Every time I think I have it knock, some new symptom rears its ugly head. Today it was fever and chills. Yesterday it was a cough. The day before that was made memorable by a runny nose. It’s like I’m hitting every single steam table at the Cold Symptom Buffet and coming back from another portion.
I am away from the farm right now, which makes me sad in general but I am extra-especially sad now because there is a freezer chocked full of my homemade chicken soup there. I am a big believer in spending a half day in the fall making a gallon of so of chicken soup and freezing it small, sick-person serving sizes. Because, when you are sick, the last thing you want to do it make chicken soup from scratch.
By stocking the freezer with soup, I am doing myself (and everyone who has to listen to me complain) a giant favor. The Sick Me thanks the Think-Ahead, Whiz-Bang Chicken Soup Maker Me for being so gosh darn thoughtful.
The trouble is, this time Whiz-Bang Chicken Soup Maker Me got the location wrong.
Since I do not want this terrible fate to befall Future Sick You, I am re-posting my recipe for The Best Chicken Soup in the Universe today. In addition to it’s restorative powers, this soup is madly delicious.
Sick You will thank me later.
This soup is also dead easy to make and doesn’t ever require homemade chicken stock to be sublime, although homemade stock would make it even…um…sublimer. I didn’t have time for it to thaw. I used boxed stock. So sue me!
First make a mirepoix. Mirepoix is two parts diced onions, one part diced carrots, one part diced celery. I used two medium yellow onions, four carrots and four celery stalks.
Gently sautee’ your mirepoix in your largest dutch oven or soup pot. Cook over medium-low heat until they are softened by not mushy.
When the mirepoix is softened, add the leaves from three or four sprigs of thyme, the chopped leaves of one rosemary stalk and lots and lots of garlic. I usually mince an entire head of garlic for this soup but I didn’t have time for all that fiddly chopping this time, so I used an entire tube of concentrated garlic paste. You can used jarred minced garlic, although I think it is a poor substitute for the real deal. Garlic, rosemary and thyme all have medical properties, which is why they are the flavor stars of this soup.
Since we want to make enough soup to portion and freeze, we’re going big! Add three 48 ounces boxes of low sodium chicken stock to your pot and raise the heat to medium high.
You can either roast a chicken on your own or buy rotisserie chicken at the market. If you go the rotisserie route, be sure to get an unflavored chicken, i.e. not bar-b-que or lemon flavored.
Shred the the entire chicken with your hands, discarding the skin this will seem like a lot of chicken but that’s kind of the idea. I like my chicken soup packed. Add the chicken to your soup pot.
Okay, here’s secret ingredient number one. Have you ever wondered why restaurant chicken soup is so much better than yours? Here’s why. In restaurant parlance, it’s called chicken base and now you can get it at the supermarket. Stir a HEAPING tablespoon of chicken base to your soup pat. [I actually great prefer Glace de Poulet to Better than Bouillon but my grocery store doesn't carry it. I stock up when I'm in Charlottesville or Baltimore but Better than Bouillon is a perfectly good substitute. What isn't a good substitute is bouillon cubes! Don't be tempted to toss a couple of those in- too salty and too weird tasting. If you find Glace de Poulet, stir into the soup exactly the way I did here, ignoring the package directions.]
Let your soup simmer until thoroughly heated, 20 minutes or so.
Secret number two to the best chicken soup is to cook the noodles in a separate pot of water only when you are ready to serve. Yes, it’s another pot to watch but trust me, it’s entirely worth it. Most chicken soup suffers from mushy, over-cooked noodles and it is entirely unnecessary. The other benefit of cooking the noodles separately is that you aren’t limiting yourself to only noodle soup. Sometimes I like to add wild rice to this soup, or even couscous. In this case, I used super-wide egg noodles.
When you’re ready to eat, simply add your noodles to the bowl and then ladle in the soup.
Reward yourself for all that work with a bowl for lunch.
Tuck the rest away in portion-sized containers for a day when you are too under the weather to feed yourself.
‘Drunk Nate Silver’ Sweeps Twitter: Prognosticator Goes Mad With Power from the Huffington Post. Made me laugh until I cried.
Taking a Closer Look at an Odd Pair of Very, Very Old Socks from Threaded, a Smithsonian blog. (Via my friend Vicki. Thanks, Vicki!)
The Food Lab’s Complete Guide to a Stress-Free Thanksgiving, 2012 Edition from Serious Eats.
Is Lying on Twitter a Crime? from the Wall Street Journal.
Why knitting is the new rock’n'roll from The Telegraph.
Can America Embrace Biking the Way Denmark Has? from Slate.
How to Crack a Wi-Fi Password from LifeHacker. Not that I endorse such behavior.
Cross-Court Winner from Slate. Really, really good.
The Heart of the Jack-o’-Lantern from the NY Times. Four ways to cook a pumpkin.
Forest debate out of balance: forest owner from ABC Rural. This article is about Peter Downie, the man who created the Cormo breed of sheep.
The Garbo of Fashion from the NY Times.
Revisiting a Famous Meal, Soup to Nuts: Ross King’s ‘Leonardo and “The Last Supper” ’ from the NY Times.
Date an Entrepreneur from the Knowit blog.
Letitia Baldrige, Etiquette Maven, Is Dead at 86 from the NY Times. This is my Obit of the Week!
40 Things To Say Before You Die from Forbes. Print this out and hang it over your desk!
Stargazing in the Elevator from the NY Times. How to talk to celebrities in elevators.
Murder of an Idealist from GQ. “For six hours on September 11, the American compounds in Benghazi, Libya, stood siege. When the attack was over, J. Christopher Stevens’s body was pulled from the wreckage—the first U.S. ambassador killed by militants in over thirty years. Since then, his death has been politicized and the details of the attack distorted. Sean Flynn straightens out the story of Stevens’s last days in Libya—and reveals the true believer we lost that day.”
This Land Is My Land from Atlanta Magazine. “In the high country of North Georgia, an old bootlegger and a gun merchant feuded for years over a quarter-mile property line. It ended in the worst possible way.”
How Do You Raise a Prodigy? from the New York Times.
What are you reading this weekend?
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Tagged Features, Weekend Reading
It’s that time of year again! When Susie is shipping Spring 2012 shares to shareholders excited or surprised (if they forgot that they purchased one!) to get them. There’s been lots of talk on the Ravelry group about what to make with these share yarns, so I thought today I’d show what other people have done with their previous shares to give you some ideas!
Featured below are all spring yarn shares. The spring shares are all 100% pure cormo goodness direct from the farm animals and by Susie’s hard-working hands. The yarn produced is a labor of love, filled with heart-ache, joy, hard-work and patience. How many of the sheep that produced this yarn did Susie sit beside while they gave birth to tiny (or huge! Alabama, I’m looking at you!) baby lambs destined to also create this lovely yarn.
With each share, I like to think about what yearlings added their first clip into the lot. For the Spring 2012 shares just mailed out, it was the sheep named after birds (born Spring 2011) that were shorn for the first time! Robin, Wren, Peregrine! (Large baby) Emu! Indigo Bunting and his twin, Scarlet Tanager! I think about the conversations I had with many of the knitters whose work is featured in this post. It’s lovely that so many of them are active on the Ravelry group and we can all talk about the impending babies!
Speaking of babies, ElysaWolfe knit this in threes: baby cardigan for HowdyPandowdy’s much-anticipated baby girl. This Spring 2011 colorway is pistachio. Fortunately while we’re waiting for new babies to be born, HowdyPandowdy keeps us up-to-date with her own picture posts of her darling girl!
And because this sweater now fits the sweetheart it was made for, here’s a photo! (Do you see the blanket in the background? That was one of the specially woven blankets from the Babydoll Southdowns on the farm. HowdyPandowdy snatched one up and I’m completely jealous!)
CraftyHistorian used her undyed Spring 2009 share to knit this lovely, just-enough-lace-to-keep-you-entertained Peabody:
Flarkin put up a poll to let the people decide what she should knit next. The people elected the Wood Hollow Vest in her Spring 2011 share, colorway Nantucket. (I happened to be one of the people that voted in the majority!) I think democracy worked well here!
SusanM has been without power since Hurricane Sandy hit last Monday. It just came back on a few hours ago. She has had a lovely sense of humor about it all though, and I’d like to think that her son’s been keeping warm in the Staghorn Aran Second Edition sweater she whipped up for him in time for last St. Patrick’s Day. (I know you’ve been dreaming about this sweater since you saw a sneak peek last week!)
In addition to SarahVV being an incredibly kind person, she also has terrific taste in sweaters. This Dark and Stormy is anything but dark and stormy, but is a perfect match for her Spring 2011 Nantucket share yarn!
Trinknitty’s Spring 2009 yarn share became this lovely Textured Shawl Recipe. I’ve been eying this pattern for awhile and with the Nor’easter blowing outside my window, it seems like it would be perfect to wrap around myself and keep out the drafty winds seeping in from the windows.
SarahVV does not seem to suffer as much as other people from Pattern-Paralysis when it comes to her shares. I know plenty of people (myself included!) who just can’t find the perfect pattern for the share yarn. Here’s her Tea Leaves knit from her Spring 2010 share in this cheerful blue!
Finally, I’d like to end with a pattern that was made specifically for the farm. Back when Juniper Moon Farm was Martha’s Vineyard Fiber Farm, Emily Johnson created this lovely sweater, Ethel Mildred Ferguson, for her Family Trunk Project. Check out her blog for the story behind the sweater and the project.
I hope that if you’re just receiving your Spring 2012 share that this post gives you a few ideas of what lovely thing your yarn can become. If you’re having cormo-sweater envy and need to satisfy yourself with a definitely-not-instant-gratification-purchase (remember, the share names are for when the wool is clipped and it takes time for the mill to process the fiber), you can become a shareholder here. Up for sale right now are 2013 Spring Cormo Shares and 2013 Spring Colored Flock Shares.
And Susie brought back half shares, so if a full share is more than you can commit to, you can try it out with a half share!
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Tagged Features, Knitting, shares, yarn, Yarned by You
It’s Election Day, y’all. I don’t care who you vote for but I hope you’ll take the time to vote. Don’t waste the opportunity to make your vote heard.
This List of candies from Unlikely Words made me laugh like a madman:
“Also, a special warning. If something is motivating you to give out Raisinets on Halloween, don’t. They are terrible and you are terrible for thinking about it. Just give out raisins or a toothbrush. If you’re going for it, go for it. Raisinets are an attack on Halloween, and that’s fine, just don’t try to mask your intentions. It’s disingenuous.’
I love this illustration by Tutticonfetti.
Ladybugs take off – in slow motion. Incredible.
12 Politicians And Their Animal Doppelgängers
RECIPE: Pistachio Lover’s Pound Cake
RECIPE: One Bowl Chocolate Cake with Whipped Chocolate Frosting
Wool Cycle from Meanest Indian‘s Flickr stream
Don’t miss the Probably something you would like… post over at BY HAND today. There’s a giveaway!
Emily, my friend and sheep shearer, spent last night at the farm along with her daughter, Lydia. Since the storm was much worse in Maryland where she lives than it is here so far, I talked them into hunkering down here for an extra day. Lydia is great friends with Amy’s daughter Oona, so we invited Oona over for a playdate.
She arrived with a backpack full of plastic cake and a pink wig, as one does.
Pumpkin pancakes for breakfast.
I asked Oona if the pancakes were good and I got this reaction. I think that’s a yes?
I’ve made a quick trip to the post office to ship out a bunch of CSA Shares. Now I’m making cupcakes (chocolate AND vanilla because there was no consensus) and prepping one of Amy’s precious and infamous chickens for roasting this afternoon. Emily is reading. We’ve got a roaring fire in the woodstove and there is a nap in my near future.
So far, we’ve had some unimpressive rain. Here’s hoping that this is as bad as it gets!
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Tagged Features, In Pictures
Yesterday I let the sheep out to graze on the lawn for what will likely be the last time till Spring.
The view from the back deck.
Roquefort
Insert your own “Ebony and Ivory” joke here.
Buster and Cosmo, just relaxing in a pile of leaves.
Little Cam
Lyra and Cassiopea
Meanwhile, I spent the day making sure all the hatches were battened down and the stock tanks were topped off ahead of the impending storm. When we lose power, we also lose our water supply. And, since we lose power during normal rainstorms, I figured it was better to be prepared for DOOMY-HELLSTORM 2012.
I’ll let you know when the power is back on.
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Tagged Features, In Pictures
A few weeks back, Amy Carol blogged about how much she was enjoying baking form a new cookbook called Vintage Cakes. Since cake is pretty much my raison d’être, I immediately went to Amazon and ordered a copy for myself. Only I ordered the wrong book. Because there are currently two brand-new cookbooks called Vintage Cakes. Go figure.
Vintage Cakes: More Than 90 Heirloom Recipes for Tremendously Good Cakes
Vintage Cakes: Timeless Recipes for Cupcakes, Flips, Rolls, Layer, Angel, Bundt, Chiffon, and Icebox Cakes for Today’s Sweet Tooth
The good news is that both books are well worth having. Each is filled with recipes for cakes that I have only read about in British “Big House” literature and seen on BBC dramas. Lardy cake, anyone?
I haven’t baked from either book yet, but I have planned which cake I’m going to make every week from now through the holidays, starting with the Victoria Sandwich Cake on the cover of the Jane Brocket book.
If you care about cake like I do -and I’m not sure anybody cares about cake like I do- you need these two books.
The Life of a Bowerbird: Creating Beautiful Interiors with the Things You Collect by Sibella Court
This is the most charming and inspiring book I’ve seen in a long time. I am a big fan of Sibella Court’s previous book but it’s hard to explain exactly what kind of book this is. It’s not a “how to” book but it’s a lot more than just eye candy. FYI, Bowerbirds are most known for their unique courtship behaviour, where males build a structure and decorate it with sticks and brightly coloured objects in an attempt to attract a mate. Delightful!
Remember when I was reading that book that I couldn’t put down long enough to pee?
Joseph Anton: A Memoir
Joseph Anton is by far the best memoir I’ve read in ages and it’s packed with awesome details about Britian’s version of the witness protection program. For example, not only did Rushdie have to pay for his own ever-changing hiding places, he also had to find them himself! He even had to pay for the armored car that his government protectors drove him around in. There are also real and serious issue about freedom of speech addressed here. Can’t recommend it highly enough.
Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (And Other Concerns)
Okay, I admit to having a total fangirl crush on Mindy Kaling, actress, producer and director from The Office and now her own adorable show, The Mindy Project. This book is pretty much the polar opposite of the Salman Rushdie book. It’s just fun, although the writing is smart and funny and charming.
Death in the City of Light: The Serial Killer of Nazi-Occupied Paris
Okay, in my defense, this book was a late-night, Ambien-induced Kindle purchase that I have no memory of actually making. But when I finished what I was reading and needed to start something new, it was already downloaded so I started it. And finished it the same night. This book scared the socks off me! I actually got up in the middle of the night to make sure all the doors were locked because I was terrified of a serial killer from the 1940s. I mean, even if he hadn’t been executed for his crimes, he’s be dead by now anyway! That’s how scary this book is.
But it’s also a fascinating look into Occupied Paris during World War II. I knew very little about the history of this era in France but I will definitely be reading more deeply on the subject. (My friend Amy recommends Sarah’s Key, another non-fiction book set in that era.)
My Ideal Bookshelf
I am so excited about this book that I’m writing about it even though I haven’t received my pre-ordered copy yet. Here’s Amazon’s description:
“The books that we choose to keep –let alone read– can say a lot about who we are and how we see ourselves. In MY IDEAL BOOKSHELF, dozens of leading cultural figures share the books that matter to them most; books that define their dreams and ambitions and in many cases helped them find their way in the world. Contributors include Malcolm Gladwell, Thomas Keller, Michael Chabon, Alice Waters, James Patterson, Maira Kalman, Judd Apatow, Chuck Klosterman, Miranda July, Alex Ross, Nancy Pearl, David Chang, Patti Smith, Jennifer Egan, and Dave Eggers, among many others.”
Do you have any great book recommendations? I would love to hear them. I’ve been thinking about starting a JMF book club; let me know if you would be interested in participating.
