These past few weeks have been all about finding a rhythm at the new house. I am a very habitual person, and that means getting settled into the new place also includes getting things running on a schedule. There’s a new trash day, a new watering schedule and a new cleaning system to get familiar with. It’s all the mundane things like washing sheets, vacuuming floors and scrubbing dishes that make me really feel at home. Hopefully that means I’m just an obsessive engineer and not a robotic android. Just wait until I get my meal schedule in order ;)
Other than turning into a household robot, I haven’t been up to a whole lot lately. I did finish the Fiddlehead Mittens, but they deserve a spectacular photo shoot, and let’s face it, who wants to model wool/mohair mittens when it’s 98 degrees out?
I do have a few small projects in my knitting basket, but not really much to show for them. There’s a washrag I’m making with some green hemp, to go in the bathroom with my collection of handmade soaps. It’s a slowly progressing washrag, because I can only stand to knit with the hemp for about 10 rows, and then my fingers need a break. I have another one in pewter already finished, and to the yarn’s credit, it does soften up beautifully after a wash.
I also have the beginnings of a knitted runner, which I’m making out of some of my own hand-spun. I have a lot of little skeins here and there, which should each be enough to get me a few long rows in, before switching to a new color and texture. It’ll be mostly blue and white, and knit in garter and seed stitch. I think there’s nothing better than texture to warm up a room, and this should be just the trick. This project also gives me an excuse to wind a bunch of small balls of hand-spun yarn, since it seems a shame to run such lovely yarn through the mechanical winder.
In my culinary exploits this past weekend, I thought it’d be fun to make some cherry ice cream to celebrate the 4th of July. I got some delicious cherries, and went to work pitting and halving them. It’s quite a messy job, but thanks to a tip from good old Martha, I used a piping tip from a pastry bag to poke out the pits. Definitely a time saver, and much cheaper than a $10 cherry pitter that really has no other use.
After getting all the cherries prepared, I made up the ice cream and got ready to head to my family gathering, where I planned to pop it into the ice cream maker and freeze it. Sadly, the bowl of the ice cream maker didn’t get cold enough in my freezer, so the dessert was doomed from the start. It wouldn’t set, and despite many attempts to get the bowl cold enough to set the mixture, it was a wash. I was a bit bummed, since after all that work, I ended up with a bowl of frozen cherries in crystallized milk. Ces’t la vie, right?
Thankfully, the cherries weren’t lost in the pit of despair forever, since a few astute Flickr people suggested that I make some tasty milkshakes. And let me tell you, milkshakes with home-made cherry ice cream are quite delicious. Yes, indeed.
It’s getting late, so it’s time for me to wrap this sham of a post up. Hopefully next time I’ll be a bit more enthused, and/or have some actual knitting or household projects to show off. Or maybe I’ll tell you how owning my own house has turned me into a crazy granola hippie. ;)
You can come be a robotic android at my house any day! A meal schedule??? For real???
Good to hear things are going well!
“Crazy granola hippie” must be going around. I’m defintely getting on that train, too.
Cherry ice cream turned milkshakes? Yum.
I don’t like cherries but that bowl of cherries does certainly look tasty!
that’s funny… i WAS a crazy granola hippie until i moved into my own house, and it briefly turned me into a yuppie. the pendulum is swinging back, though…
your post about the cherry ice cream inspired me to beg my mom to let me borrow her ice cream maker for the summer… i gave it to her years ago and she’s never used it (GASP!!!)… where do you get your recipes from?
have fun settling in!
Yum! I totally want some cherry ice cream now!
Hmmmm….mom always warned me about those obsessive engineers. But she never said anything about home-made ice cream!
you sound like you’re getting in the swing of things. cherry ice cream sounds like a great way to relax and enjoy. can’t wait to see the house and knitting progress.
The fact that you even attempted to make cherry ice cream is proof positive that you are not robotic android, as the latter would clearly want to stick to vanilla…
My advice, find a child to model the winter-wear in the searing heat, sometimes they think it’s funny.
I love your house, Adam. I also love that you made cherry milkshakes from the unsuccessful ice cream venture. That is what I would have done…well, no, I guess I would have made ice cream in a bag.
I know exactly what you mean about the routine and rhythm… granted, my life is so chaotic there isn’t any semblance of method. (I use to pretend there was a method to my madness… anymore I think it’s more there’s a madness to my method.)
The milkshakes were a brilliant idea. I learned on blueberries… Whole fruit has to be added as a mix-in after the ice cream is frozen, otherwise it’s always a little ball of tooth-breaking ice. To flavor the ice cream, pulverize some of the fruit in a blender, add and freeze; mix in the whole fruit for a garnish just before serving.