A friend let me borrow a Bento book and I have become obsessed with cute food. I don’t have most of the ingredients that the book calls for but I’m planning on making a trip to the Asian market soon. I’ve also bookmarked a bunch of Bento tools that I’m hoping to buy. Luckily they’re not very expensive.
Today, I’ve made a Bento style breakfast & lunch. I love how the meals are balanced and are nice little compact portions. I’ll be glad when I have a bento box and can start packing my lunch for the office.
Here are photos of today’s meals.
Star Pancakes with low sugar strawberry jam
Rolled Omelet with flower shaped Green pepper and red onion
Bunny Apples
Udon noodles
Turkey & cheese rolls
Pickled olives
Kitty & Bunny Apples
2 Caramels
Monday to Friday eight hours a day, I have an office job. I also have an hour-long drive to work on the weekends. That is a lot of silence to fill and I can only listen to music for so long before I get sick of the same songs over and over. Podcasts are an answered prayer. I’m reviewing some of my favorites to listen to so that others out there like me can check them out and maybe fall in love with them too. Most of the podcasts I listen to are knitting or craft related but not all of them. Some of them are well known and are listened to by thousands and others are just getting started or not as mainstream. Feel free to suggest other podcasts for me to check out and possibly review. Also, if you’re an avid podcast listener, please leave reviews on Itunes and let your favorites (or maybe not so favorites) know what you think.
This week’s podcast comes to us from across the pond, Electric Sheep. Electric Sheep began in March 2009 and to date there are 42 episodes. This podcast is brought to you by a lovely gal who goes by Hoxton Handmade. I began listening to the Sheep fairly early in the episodes, I think I picked it up around 7 or 8, and I’ve listened to every episode.
This podcast has wonderful reviews of knitting magazines, patterns and books, excellent essays (that are usually hilarious), knitterly things going on around London, a fondness for facial hair, and a rather mischievous sheep. There are even a few times we’ve been serenaded by Hoxton Handmade playing her ukulele. Some of my favorite episodes are Thieves, Panto, and any of the movie reviews (especially Robin Hood). BTW, if you listen to the list of Thank You’s in episode 15, you’ll hear a familiar name 🙂 You can find the Raverly group here and the show notes here.
I finally got around to finishing my little Cthulhu He’s sitting on my desk hiding behind the post-it notes waiting for a dust bunny to devour or to bite my fingers the next time I need to jot down a phone message.
Ok, ok, I know it’s Thursday but the sun was shining and it was warm… so sue me. LOL
A Likely Yarn just got in some of the new Springs yarns (that are super awesome & you need to stop by and see them). I’m knitting a shop sample for the new Sublime Bamboo & Pearls. I’m making the Little Mimi Shrug from the new Sublime pattern book #633. So far I really love the feel of the yarn and the fabric that it makes. I’m not so happy about the splittyness of the yarn but it is bamboo, what do you expect?
I’m also working on a hat for charity. I’ve knit through one ball of Knit Picks Wool of the Andes in Violet and I’m a good way into the second ball. It is a basic 2×2 rib.
Everything else is pretty much at the same point as last week except for the gray office socks which, surprisingly; I’m nearly finished with. I have about 2-3 inches left on the cuff then they’ll be ready for walking in.
Monday to Friday eight hours a day, I have an office job. I also have an hour-long drive to work on the weekends. That is a lot of silence to fill and I can only listen to music for so long before I get sick of the same songs over and over. Podcasts are an answered prayer. I’m reviewing some of my favorites to listen to so that others out there like me can check them out and maybe fall in love with them too. Most of the podcasts I listen to are knitting or craft related but not all of them. Some of them are well known and are listened to by thousands and others are just getting started or not as mainstream. Feel free to suggest other podcasts for me to check out and possibly review. Also, if you’re an avid podcast listener, please leave reviews on Itunes and let your favorites (or maybe not so favorites) know what you think.
This week’s podcast comes to us from our neighbors to the north, Muststashyo. Muststashyo began in Fall 2009 and to date there are 7 episodes. The shows on average are about an hour and a half. This podcast is hosted by Cindy & Mat. I found this podcast because of a Raverly swap. Cindy, aka Studioloo, sent me an excellent Monty Python themed package that included 100% bamboo sock yarn from the Muststashyo Etsy shop and a bunch of other super awesome items. I noticed on the business card that it listed a podcast among other things; I just had to check it out. I listened to all the episodes in two days.
The spinning sections of this podcast are freaking awesome. It isn’t the usual, “I’m spinning X and I like it”. They discuss techniques and creative paths to spinning. It totally made me want to spin even more and now I want to buy a spinning wheel more than ever. You should check out Cindy’s art yarns because they are fantastic. They also discuss knitting and it’s nice to have a guy’s perspective on both knitting and spinning. There are wonderful essays and a section on books. The sections on mustaches are terrific and are both entertaining and educational; I love the Mustache of the Day. The “consumer meltdown” section my make you fall down and spend all your lunch money.
Please check out this podcast because I love it and it is awesome. You can find the show notes here, Cindy’s site here, Mat’s site here, the Etsy shop here, and the Raverly group here. BTW, Cindy is the organizer for World Wide Spin In Public Day. The next WWSIP is September 18, 2010. She also runs the Yarn A Day and Spin In Public websites.
I finally finished the Whisper Cardigan from Interweave Knits Spring 2009. I cast the thing on at the beginning of October and it remained in my knitting bag/purse since. I knit it out of Malabrigo Lace in Black Forest. I love the colorway. It appears to be a nearly solid dark color but there are actually nice bits of green and lavender in it. I bought three skeins to knit it but I only needed two.
I also finished spinning the Cloudlover roving called Nothing Gold that I bought at A Novel Yarn. It was fantastic to spin. I’ve left it as singles and it is approximately 300 yards of a sport weight. I’m hoping to make another Ishbel from it but I’m not sure the yardage will stretch that far.
Since beginning my yarn diet, I’ve discovered that I’m much more of a monogamous knitter and I’m trying to finish up some projects that have been lingering in the bin for a bit too long. I’ve mainly been working on the Bulky Asymmetric Cardigan. I’ve knit through the body portion and I’m ready to begin the sleeves.
I’ve also picked up my afghan again. I was surprised at how little work was left to do. In two evenings, I attached what was left of the hexagons and now all that is left to do is weave in the ends and crochet the border. I’ve been working on it while taking a break from the sweater.
I have a pair of socks that I keep in my desk drawer at the office that I’m also working on. They are going so slowly because I’m knitting them on Size 0 needles but it’s nice mindless knitting when I get burned out crunching numbers. They’re made from lane cervinia in gray tones. Sorry, there’s no photo; I didn’t have my camera at the office today. I’ve also been hauling around the yarn to finish my cthuluh but I just haven’t worked on it lately (no photo of that either).
I’m also spinning some wonderfully happy colored roving that my Monty Python swap partner (Studioloo) sent me. I’m about half way through the bump. I’m hoping to learn how to Navajo ply with it so I can keep the color progressions the way they are.
I spent last weekend organizing my fiber stash. I was surprised that I didn’t have as much spinning fiber as I thought I did. I sorted the yarn into three categories: sock yarn, yarn that I have a project in mind for, and yarn that is for charity knitting. My plan is to knit through the project specific yarn before buying any more yarn and knit at least one item per month to send to a charity. I’ve been looking around Ravelry and a few other websites to find charities that I can send my items to. This has proven to be a bit more difficult that I had anticipated. Most of my yarn is wool or wool blends but most of the I’ve found charities want acrylic or washable fibers. Luckily, after much searching, I found a charity that only wants wool items. I do have a few skeins of acrylic hanging around so I can send a few items to other charities too. If you know of any really awesome charities that accept finished items please let me know.
Paper Kitty 