Holiday Show

We will be appearing at the Multi-Artist Holiday show in Santa Cruz this weekend, December 4th and 5th, 2010. Join us from 11-5 at the Freight Building, 119 Center Street! http://www.ribbonstreet.com/holidayshow.html

Monarch Craft Fair

We went to the Monarch Community Craft Show yesterday. It was really nice. We went last year and there were a lot of the same wonderful venders there this year. We were actually even invited to be in a craft fair in Santa Cruz next weekend! I have to get the exact date from Hedgerose before I post the information though. We met a lot of really nice people.

A woman came by our booth and told us that her husband had bought on of Hedgerose's books last year and given it to her for Christmas. She took it with her to Italy and back and now it is her traveling journal. We were thrilled to here that our creations had gone so far and were being loved.

Like all craft fairs it seems, this one was a bit of an adventure to get to. (Hedgerose can smack me for that proposition at the end of that sentence later.) I had gone down to L.A. to see my family for Thanksgiving, so had just gotten off of a plane. Elderbeast (brother of Warebeast), had volunteered to come get me from the airport and drove me down to Santa Cruz, saving me a bazillon hours on the bus. O.k. like 2 or 3, but still a huge difference. However, Hedgerose and her housemates win. One of their housemates fainted in the kitchen and they had to call 911. The upside to this however is that they assure me that the fireman was extremely hot; every cloud has a silver lining. All in all, however, it was a very enjoyable day. Details about next weekend's craft show to come shortly.

~Riastiltskin

Corn Chowder!

I've been sick for several weeks and have eaten a LOT of soup. Today I made a big batch of delicious corn chowder. Try my original recipe!

Servings: 4-8

Cook Time: 1.5-2hrs

INGREDIENTS

1 large yellow onion, minced

1 large carrot, chopped small

2 medium leeks, chopped

2 stalks celery, minced

4 yukon potatos, cubed small

4 cloves garlic, minced

1 cup sliced mushroom

1 can sweet yellow corn, undrained

2 quarts, chicken or veggie stock

1 cup half and half

1/2 cup white wine

3 tablespoons butter

ground black pepper and salt to taste

1 teaspoon paprika

shredded cheddar, sour cream, and/or chopped chives for topping

INSTRUCTIONS

Slowly sautee onion, garlic, leek, celery, mushroom and carrots in butter until onion and leek are soft and golden. Add corn, potato, stock and wine. Simmer on low heat for 45-90 minutes, stirring occasionally. Potatoes should be soft and falling apart. In a blender or with a hand blender, smooth 1/2 of the contents of your pot. Add in half and half, paprika, salt and pepper. Continue to Simmer on low heat 15 minutes then serve in deep bowls. Top soup with sour cream and shredded cheese.

Laci's

Now that I am not waiting tables and only teaching at Montessori school, I am experiencing this beautiful thing known as weekends. They are in fact amazing. I also have these things called evenings too, but that is another story. These weekends are giving me a chance to see my friends again. I went over to Oaklandia to visit a friend and she popped my Laci's cherry. An explanation for those of you who have not experienced that which is Laci's: it is a museum of lace and textiles. The front part of the building is a store. There are shelves of books, separated by subject. There were crafts I had never even heard of before. There were hat forms and parasols, hoop skirts, fans, tools, wig making. It was amazing. After you get through the front, there is another 2 rooms that is just the museum part. There were wedding dresses and veils in the first room and an exhibit on embroidery in the second. My friend is an embroiderer. I dabbled in it in high school, counted cross stitch, but she is the real deal. It was amazing to go through it with her and her input about the various techniques. I would definitely go back. I love museums and seeing the evolution of crafting but it was a different take to know that people had done this hundreds of years ago and were still using the same techniques today.

Going to Laci's made me think about the the nature of crafting. Most things there were fairly recent, within the last few hundred years, and many of the fabrics were falling apart. The intricacy and size of the stitches and patterns indicated that the artist had spent hundreds of hours creating each piece for something that would would only last a finite amount of time. I also thought that it was interesting that none of the pieces I saw seemed to be made with the intention of being in a museum one day. It was all something functional: a piece of clothing, a sampler, etc. It makes me wonder what we have lost, what was see as something frivolous and meaningless because it was being created by a woman. Not seen as art but as something less. I wish I had more answers. It was a thought provoking weekend.

I was all proud of myself for making a sock for the Warebeast. I made excellent time on it. It was a nice yarn. He loved the pattern. He tried it on. It was the biggest sock I have ever seen. I must have been in some kind of denial while making it. There was no amount of squinting or tucking that could make it work. I kept telling myself that the cables would make it gather more, that I needed the extra inches. After a night of mourning, I pulled out the sock all the way back to the foot. I kept telling myself that I knit for the process, that this is ok, but I had some choice words to share with myself.

An Evening at Havenscourt Homestead and Upcoming Events

On Tuesday, the Boy and I spent a LOVELY evening in Oakland at the Havenscourt Homestead where we learned to milk goats, collected eggs and spent an evening of leisure around the fire pit listening to the goats bleat, quail coo, chickens cluck and the occasional distant siren-- the sounds of urban farm life.

Kitty Sharkey started work on her homestead about 2 years ago and has an impressive back yard farm in high production now. With four Goats, twelve hens, four quail two hives, two cats, two oscars and a couple dozen pond fish, you'd think her place would be crowded but I was very impressed with how well she had used her space. Between two goats, she milks just over half a gallon every evening and collects a handful each of quail and chicken eggs daily as well. She swears her gardens are a mess but I look at them and am in awe of the tomato harvest she filled her fridge with. She's looking forward to a time when her organic farming practices will bring her up to 75% self sufficiency. It is an ambitious goal, but certainly one worth working towards.

Aside from her day to day farming practice, Kitty is working with her goats to train them as therapy animals. Sammy, her young wether (castrated male goat) is often the favorite of visitors as he is small, friendly and has an extraordinarily soft coat for his breed. Many of the neighborhood children have been invited into the yard to meet "the kids", as Kitty affectionately calls her little herd and she will be bringing them to the Norther California Renaissance Faire's brand new petting zoo starting this upcoming weekend (September 18th and 19th).

Speaking of which, The Ren Faire has 2 for 1 tickets THIS WEEKEND ONLY! Come see the court, stay for a show (or three) and cool down with a pint while you browse he marketplace. Stand aside when you hear drums and fanfare because the Queen is coming! Boy and I are at the head of the parade as part of the St. Blaise Town Criers followed by drummers, revelers and the Yeomen of the Guard. See you there!


Homestead photos are property of Kitty Sharkey and Havenscourt Homestead.

NCRF Promotional photo is property of Play Faire Productions.

A return to spinning

For the first time since the Napa craft fair, I have actually felt like spinning. My great uncle has a farm and gave me a huge bag of wool last month. They have three sheep and this was the fleece from one. I was so incredibly thrilled to get it, as you can imagine! My grandmother was less than thrilled. It had been sitting in her garage for a few weeks, until I could get down to pick it up. Warebeast and I went down for a friend's wedding and stopped to visit and woolgather. After my grandma fed him as much as she could, Warebeast had to stuff this trash bag full of raw wool into our trunk and we drove 6 hours back home. I've been giving the wool a daily bath, a third at a time. The first third is clean and carded, which is a story in itself. A story involving my non spinning friend fixing my drum carder, which cut the prep time into a fraction of what it was.

I have the whole house to myself this week. Freya, the Boy, and Warebeast all being at BurningMan. I had a pajama day, my own private craft day, and after knitting most of the day, looked back at the bag of batts that had been staring at me for most of the day, and spun two batts. I am loving the way it is spinning up and am glad to have the urge to spin after that intense prep work for the Napa show.

Burning Man, Christmas Knits and Other crafting Chaos

It's been a while since I posted an update. Life has been almost too hectic to bear. The Boy and I are leaving for the annual pilgrimage to Burning Man in 9 days and we're still working franticly to get everything ready to go. theres costuming to be sewn, shopping to be done and gear to be collected, not to mention shelter to be constructed.

Last year our sleeping quarters were a moderate sized dome, sheltered under the shade structure of the Foxy Kokonauts. This year we've gone rogue! We've built the skeleton for a 16' diameter dome and are nearly done with the fitted cover. take a look at the work-in-progress pic. The door is 9'+ tall!



In addition I am sewing some costume pieces(pics to come) including a Bedouin robe and a Turkish tassel-belt, both in warm earth tones. These are as much for the hell of it as they are for Burning Man and I'm really excited to have some nifty, durable costume pieces that aren't Renaissance Faire related.

As if these were not enough, I am still sticking to my Christmas knitting. One scarf down! I am now 4 reps into the Swallowtail Shawl which I mentioned wanting to do before. Dear gods that's a lot of counting! I'm not even 1/4 of the way through and I've muddled my pattern a handful of times. It didn't look too complex and I knew all the stitches it took, but this is certainly not a project for the undetermined or easily frustrated. A while back Riastiltskein tried her hand at it and I know she gave up 6 reps in. I however am determined not to be discouraged by its complexity and not to criticize myself too much for the practically invisible flaws I've knit into the pattern. Its complex enough that it hides my mis-knits pretty well. My grandmother will never notice, right?

My camera is still on haiatus, guys. I'm very sorry. The charger has disappeared but I'll be tearing apart my room before my trip to Burning Man becasue I will decidedly be taking lots of photos this year.

Well... Crap

I was part way through knitting a hooded blanket for my baby cousin and then I got photos from my grandmother... That little tyke ain't too little anymore! By the time Christmas rolls around she'll be trundling along on her own and that blanket will be far too small for anything she might need it for. I think I need to make a sweater... change of plans then... damn...

ADOS

I have a horribly horrible psychological disorder. I have ADOS. Attention Deficit... OOH SHINY!!

Case: I went out to lunch yesterday with a fellow I just met and we wandered around Berkeley a lot. We had some fantastic conversations and seem to get along splendidly but what really got me excited was a friend of his he introduced me to. He had to drop by one of the grad student housing buildings so he could say goodbye to someone he knew there but before I could stand awkwardly in the background while he said his goodbyes, I noticed that one of the gals was wearing a Swallowtail Shawl!(free pattern under the link) She noticed my handknit hat and we both started squeeing about yarn and knittng and spinning and she took me up to her room to fondle her stash! The fellow I had come with had been forgotten. Oops! >_<

Point: Distractability is bad for dates but good for making crafty friends.

Cheers!

Cat Yarn

So I went back and watched the kid that likes the spinning wheel. Of course I brought the spinning wheel and he watched me spin for a while. He likes to treadle for me while I draft the fiber. I think he is less interested in the fiber than the spinning wheel and all the mechanical parts. He does however have a knitting bag with a loom though, which is adorable.

He had saved a bag of cat hair for me and asked if we could spin it. The short answer is no. We tried. I think it could have been possible given a few parameters: a long haired cat or carders. Halfway through the attempt at spinning the cat hair, I decided that it would be much easier if I mixed in some wool. However, I hadn't brought my carders and we couldn't find the cat brush, so I just sorta did it by hand, which wasn't terribly successful. We managed to get a little spun, but on the whole it was not terribly successful. So now when people ask me if you can spin cat hair, I know the answer: not easily.

Riastiltskin

It is the first day of summer! Happy summer everyone!

Knitting lesson

Freya, the Boy, Warebeast, and I were all watching Bones when the Boy noticed that Warebeast was the only one not knitting. I have showed him a few times how to knit and he has a project at my house. It is just a blue garter stitch random square-ish thing. Now, I knit backwards. Well, backwards is not the right word. Technically, it is called Combination knitting and the main difference is that the every knit stitch is knit through the back loop, which functionally makes the twist backwards and patterns harder to read. I learned how to crochet before I learned how to knit, and knitting through the back loop makes more sense to me in that crossover.

Back to this evening. Of course, when I showed Warebeast how to knit, I showed him my way. I think it is an easier way for him to learn. He is very mechanically inclined and I thought a way that showed what was happening with the yarn would be a preferable method to one that was easier to maneuver.

However, with 3 people all showing him different ways to knit and each expressing strong opinions about which way was best, no one noticed that Warebeast had quietly set down the knitting and gone back to coding. Here is the project of much contention.

Turkish Delights

Following up on Sarah's post, I decided to make my own food post. There isn't too much going on the fiber front. I am still working on Allison's shawl and the commissioned socks but am somewhat lacking in the picture department. I did start spinning for a kid hat. A while ago, I showed WareBeast's brother, Elderbeast, the Etsy site. He loved Fawkes ( an orange base with differnt shades of reds sprinkled on top) and being one of us, got the Harry Potter joke. So I made him a hat of it, which he wears everywhere. Anyways, they have a four year old cousin, who greatly looks up to the Beasts. I started spinning up a thick merino to make into Fawkes for a smaller hat for said cousin. So I guess there is a fair bit happening on the fiber front, but nothing is quite to the picture stage and as we all know, pictures or it didn't happen.

Anyways, back to the food. A dear friend is having a birthday party tonight and going to Japan in a week. Therefore, as he loves turkish delights, I have made him a metric buttload for his birthday. They are of course rose flavored. I used a recipe I found on the internet, but then altered heavily. I took unflavored geletain, rose syrup, and cornstarch and cooked them together. Then I let the whole thing gel for a day and now they are sitting in the fridge cut up, covered in powdered sugar, waiting for me to be ready to go!

On the needles

I finally got to start something that isn't craft faire related or a commission. A friend of mine from high school is getting married and I am working on a shawl. It is the Swallowtail shawl from Interweave Knits. I am making it in a sock yarn that is a wool/ bamboo blend in a green and blue colorway. As soon as I get a good picture I will post it!

Maker Faire!

As some of you know Maker Faire is in San Mateo this weekend. No we don't have a booth, but yes we're going! And we're excited! You should be too, dag nabbit! I mean how can you not be excited about the world's largest and most comprehensive DIY/inventors' festival?

The coolest part? I GOT FREE TICKETS!!!

I'm the manager for a local pizzaria, but a sizable chunk of my responsibility is a 5-hour shift behind the counter Monday-Friday. Yesterday I was on the register taking delivery orders by phone as usual (bored out of my mind if it weren't for the kindle app on my ipod). A woman called in and said she needed a huge delivery to the San Mateo Event Center ASAP. She was feeding a set-up crew of 80+ people. On a hunch I asked what event she was working on. The answer: Maker Faire! I was super excited about that and gave them a discount for being awesome! (Well, technically for being an educational event but that's just what we're telling the boss-man, right?) After paying she says "I'm giving you a couple tickets so let your driver know to pick up an envelope from me." To which my response is naturally to jump up and down flail my arms and jibber gratefully at her! I may also have squeed. :P

That made my freakin day! C., f you read this THANK YOU!!!

Food Post!

Because food and yarn are totally the same thing.

Well, I haven't been working with fiber a lot (aside from almost finishing a pair or two of socks-- I'll post pictures someday, I swear!), but I have been cooking a lot!

This weekend, I went down to LA for my younger brother's college graduation (congratulations, Daniel!), and I stayed an extra day so that we could hang out. Well, one of the things that my brother and I like to do a lot is cook! So, we drove to the nearest nomful supermarket (they had pine nuts for $20/pound!! It's at least $35/pound up here! SO JEALOUS!), and ended up making scallops for lunch.

To be specific, we made baked scallops with prosciutto, pesto, and toast. (Or, you know, rustic pesto and pan-fried bread, if you're being pretentious. Which I sometimes am.) The pesto involved a lot of chopping (Daniel managed to cut himself somehow) because my brother's household doesn't own any sort of food processor. Then we cooked the scallops (sear and bake!), wrapped them in prosciutto, and put them and the pesto on toast.

It was incredibly delicious! I'm looking forward to cooking more with him this summer-- it should be a lot of fun.

The epic craft faire

So the craft faire adventure was epic. For starters, Napa is further than I understood. It is about 2 hours away. However, we had to come back Saturday night, which made the trip seem farther.

So our saga really begins Friday night. We had way too much to do in way too short a time. There were coffee runs, excellent chinese food, harsh words, heartfelt conversations, musicals, and maniacal giggling. We finally went to bed at 3 am, woke up at 6, finished measuring out yarn, packed up the car, picked up the Warebeast at 8, and headed out to Napa. After I took the wrong 80 and ended up on the bay bridge, we had to turn around on Treasure Island.

Now, I have lived in Northern California for 6 years, and have family who live in Berkeley so I have crossed the Bay Bridge several times. I have always wondered what Treasure Island was and rather than look it up, I made up an elaborate story in my head about it. Well, it turns out that Treasure Island is a tiny stretch of land, with a lot of cops, slow speed limits, and about a million cement mixers. Ok. Maybe not a million, but the fact is that we passed 4 cement truck in 5 minutes. The weirdest thing is that they were all going different directions.

So, after we stop at Freya's mom's house to pee, Warebeast takes over driving, since he has gotten a full night of sleep and has a much better since of direction than I do. Freya and I continue to skein balls of yarn in a desperate attempt to get ready. We finally get to the venue about an hour later than we anticipated, which we think is when the faire begins. Turns out it didn't begin until noon, so we had another hour. We get everything labeled and set out and waited. And waited. We sold a few things, packed up, drove home. Freya fell asleep when we got home and sleep for 12 hours. Warebeast and I had some fries and then followed suit. We got up the next morning and rinsed and repeated. This time without Warebeast and substituting the Boy. And of course less getting lost.

On Sunday, there were baby goats. 5 days old. They were wonderful. The faire seemed to go better on Sunday. More people took cards etc. The ride home was uneventful and we slept normally. Now, we just have to get the house recovered from the month of prep!

Frustration, Fun, Fumes and FOOTNOTES!

OOF! Dye fumes are all in my head and my brain, while the muddle of color and swirls is really pretty, its not really helping me stay on topic. It's entirely possible that I won't be entirely coherent in writing this. See, I've already been redundant at LEAST twice! In an effort to keep my tangents from destroying the coherency of my post, I have added footnotes.

I spent ALL DAY yesterday dying and carding and dying and carding. It was AWESOME.

Remember that GIANT bag of stinky unwashed fleece that Riastiltskein and I washed a few weeks back? Well, we're still working on that but, now(1) we have a drum carder!!! Sort of. It is a drum carder and it is awesome and all the pieces are there but, and it's a big but(2), the drive band is stretched beyond use. As a result I'd need to have three or four hands to run it efficiently. I'm managing though. It takes me substantially longer to card a full batt than it ought to but it sure is nice to be able to blend the fleece evenly and card it into big batts rather than the tiny ones we get off our impromptu hand-carders(3). It's not a brand-name drum carder so I'm gonna have an interesting time trying to find a band that fits it properly... That's an adventure for a later date.

All my carding was between dyeings which was my main focus yesterday and also the cause of my befuddlement(4). I dyed about 10 small batched of roving in different colors to card together into batts for the "Learn to Spin" kits I'm building for our upcoming DIY fair in Napa, CA. I've been using three different dyes each with a different fixing agent so the smell of our apartment was... interesting, to say the least. I can hardly wait to have a place with a yard that I can set up a dedicated dying table in(5). We had all the windows open but I'm pretty sure that wasn't enough.
My brain may not be up for math or logic today but I'm already plotting more dying tomorrow.

I keep promising pics of all the neat stuff we're cooking up, but I seem to have thoroughly misplaced the charger for my camera. I'll have to steal the Boy's so I can document some of these beautiful colors here(6). Look for more updates in the next week as we work our fingers raw to get ready for the InDIYpendent Culture Faire.

(1)Cue fanfare!
(2)I do NOT like big butts and I might be lying about that any other time I say it.
(3)They're two dog brushes bought at petsmart. While it might have been a good idea if we were just fluffing up some roving, they are unfortunately not made to withstand the wear and tear of carding this volume of knotted fleece en masse. Go figure.
(4)Ooh! Shiny! Aw...it's just a gum wrapper...damn. See? 'Train of Thought' has not only been derailed but has forgotten that it needs those rails and has continued to speed down the hill at breakneck speeds.
(5)Keeping in mind that this may be years off, I really do wonder how much of my brain will be left by then. At least It'll be the prettiest thing on the autopsy table. They'll cut my open and go "Holy, hopping unicorns! This girls insides are sparkly rainbows, and she has the full palate in her skull instead of a brain. No wonder she produced such nifty color-weighs. Unfortunately cause of death was a spectral overdose." Did I mention I watched a lot of Bones and Castle yesterday too?
(6) I'm of the "Pics, or it didn't happen" mentality. Probably because of my crappy memory.

Baseball Game

Yesterday Hedgerose and I met up and had a wonderful day! She called me a few days ago and told me that her father had gotten tickets to Saturday's Giants game but couldn't go so she had free tickets. She took the train up from Santa Cruz and I got on the same train up in San Carlos. We got off the train and walked over to the ferry building. Now, since Hedgerose usually puts her foodie posts on her personal blog, you might not know that she is a complete and total foodie. So the Ferry Building was like she had died and gone to heaven. We walked around the whole building and looked at everything. We got there a little too late and missed the farmer's market, but it was still excellent. There is a whole booth for salted pig parts, which I thought was hysterical, as that was the actual name. I didn't get anything there, having headed down the herbivore path, but I did get this amazing cheese at the Cowgirl Creamery. It was a creamy spread with apricots and walnuts in it. Hedgerose got some hard cheese as well and we took all our booty back to the game.

We gave ourselves a lot longer to walk back from the Ferry Building but when we got back to the stadium, there was a huge line to get in. When we finally got up to the front, it turned out that they were giving out bobble-heads of Pablo Sandival. So I got one.

Now, I grew up a Dodgers fan. My dad always listened to the games on the radio and we went to a game every year. I feel that baseball is one of those things that you are born into, like religion or politics. Now there are always converts, but often, it is a tradition that you are filling. We root for the Dodgers because my dad listened to games with his grandfather. It is a family tradition. So, when I went to the Giants (the hated ones) game, I felt vaguely dirty. Like I was cheating or something. I had a great time, but it only helped that guilty feeling get bigger. All and all, it was a wonderful day.

Announcement

I know we have been kind of quiet over here and the etsy hasn't been updated in a while, but we have been working on something. We have offically been invited to be in the inDIYpendent culture faire in Napa on May 15 and 16th.

Here is the offical blurb: This two-day, family-friendly event celebrates the Do-It-Yourself (D.I.Y.) movement and embraces all art forms. There will be a marketplace of craft and food vendors, art installations, stages for performances, live sidewalk art, workshops, and information booths. 100% of proceeds go to the Community Venue Project to make space for alternative art in Napa.

Check our fan page ( http://tinyurl.com/y7ktwjj ) for updates and details on schedules and participants.

We have been running around getting the paper work filled out, (Hello San Francisco and your $3 for 15 minutes parking) and building up inventory. We will be adding a few new items, most notably a spindle kit. Come check us out!

Aww....

I used to babysit just about every day to earn a living. I was a nanny by day, babysitter by night. One family has stayed in contact and asks me to sit once a month or so. I have known this little boy since I worked in the daycare, when he was 2 years old. He is now a 5 year old and very smart. His parents are both extremely intelligent and have definitely encouraged his growth. Anyways, this little boy has a long standing fascination with wheels and gears and things that spin. He used to turn over strollers and spin the wheels. He informed me that he had learned how to knit and weave and showed me his projects. I decided to bring over my spinning wheel when I went over to watch him and show him how to spin. He LOVED it. We spun all night and I even showed him how to dye with Kool aid. His parents have emailed me to say that he is obsessed with spinning wheels now and keeps making not so subtle ploys to get one of his own!

Spinning demonstration

This month I went to the school where Hedgerose teaches and gave a spinning demonstration. Several of the kids remembered me from last year when I did the same thing. It was awesome. I love her kids. They came up with really great questions and were genuinely interested in me and what I had to say. I think one of my favorites was a boy that I remembered from last year, when he took a great interest as well, who watched me for a long time and then was fielding questions for me at a certain point!

An Eventful and Ambitious Weekend!

This weekend was one full of craftalicious eventfulness.

Boy and I spent all day yesterday wandering around San Francisco on our first sunny, warm (ish) day of the spring. Aaaaand spent too much money. The yarn fumes got me and I couldn't help myself! I spent $100 on beautiful luxurious yarns to make into a big throw. It's going to be amazing!

And this is why blogging is a little sad. You can't feel the sleek Misti Alpaca (in Spring) or drool over the the color of the Malabrigo Indiecita (a color-weigh discontinued in the bulky but similar to the Indy) or giggle over the dead muppet texture of the Fiesta Flirt. The Boy posted the project on Ravelry and pictures will be up soon.

Okay, the yarn was awesome and all, but seriously the best part of the weekend was traipsing through the Castro in search of the perfect tiny swim trunks for the Boy. And he found some. Oh how tiny they are! I can't post pics because they are definitely not SFW or for family. Maybe I'll convince him to model later. LOL.

Facebook

As many of you already know, Wildwoodyarn has added a Facebook page.  We will be maintaining the blog, but many of our updates, such as craft events and etsy updates will be announced there as well.  The interactive features of Facebook, such as the discussion boards made it appealing to us.  Please add us as a friend on Facebook and give us feedback on what you would like to see!

My friend Meri Sefit, of fan fic fame, came over this weekend and it was lovely.  We talked and nerded out to the extreme.  It was very nice to see her again, it had been far too long.  I made mac and cheese for dinner.  I had a lot of various cheese in the house that were starting to go to live with Jesus.  I started with a stick of butter, made a roux with flour, added mozzarella, cheddar, goat cheese, cream cheese and a lot of milk.  The mozzarella made it much stringer than usually, but the cream cheese seemed to help it integrate better.  I added salt, pepper, chili powder, and cayenne.  It seemed to go over very well and Sinspinner and her Boy ate the rest.  Meri Sefit then introduced us to affogato, which is espresso poured over vanilla ice cream.  However, we did it with earl gray tea.  I am a huge fan.  Like holy cow.  I tried it the next day with thai tea and that was amazing a well.  I have found a new way to eat a massive amount of ice cream.  

Well, it finally happened. All of my Christmas presents have been finished and given!  It only took an extra month and a half.  

New House!

So Sinspinner and I have moved!  We are no located in San Carlos, which is on the San Francisco Peninsula, near the train.  We have a yarn closet! When we were looking at the place, Sinspinner opened in the closet and squeed, much to the landlord's surprise, and and said look! a yarn closet!" The landlord looked a little stunned, but I think it might have helped us get the place.  Here is the yarn closet in all of its glory.  

It has actually become a storage for all fiber-y goodness. We have unspun roving, dye, yarn to dye and sewing stuff in the yarn closet, but still, I find it awesome that we can have a yarn closet.

Archie has moved into the house and has found himself an nice corner to call home.  I can sit and spin and look out the window or listen to podcasts.

~Riastiltskin

Krod Mandoon

So I realize this is supposed to be a crafting blog but I don't care. I was sick on new years eve and went to bed early so I've got to get excited about something gorrammit!

I grew up watching a lot of shows like Xena and Hercules and Beastmaster. That whole genre, while horribly campy, is very dear to me. So last night the Boy and I cuddled up with our knitting and he introduced me to the mini-series Krod Mandoon which is a satire of all those heroic fantasy shows of the 90's.

I was laughing my ass off. It's clever and crude without being obscene. There are moments which reference not only the cheesey low-budget shows thats it's created to poke fun at, but also pop culture, like when the loathesome oaf of a villain is puplicly scolding Krod, the good looking, affable hero. At the press conference he quotes of former prez, "Fool me once, shame on... shame on you. Fool me... fool me... you can't get fooled again!" A perfectly seamless lead-in to the episode in which the tyrant must welcome a weapons' inspector into his castle where he is hiding some great arcane relic of death, doom and destruction.

So my new year didn't start with a bang, it started with a giggle. Somehow I think that's just as good. I could go on to list all my boring and generic new years resolutions but really I think it's better if I leave it with these parting worlds:

*Happy New Year!*