Stoneview

Despite Gwen’s claim that she can’t stand Winnie we sure find them napping together often enough! Gabby is not really a bed napper, she prefers to nap in my computer chair and is even more pleased if I am in it.

The garden continues to bloom like crazy. Here are the new coral bells I planted this spring and Daniel’s Lamb’s Ear that’s going on 4 years-old now as well as some red hot poker I planted a few years ago.  I divided the red hot poker last year so the blooms are not as pretty as normal but they should be nicer looking again by next year.

We are heading off for ten days vacation in the wee hours of the morning tomorrow so there’ll be no posting until I get home again. Take care everyone!

Yesterday while I was running all those errands I forgot to pick up my shirt for tonight’s Relay for Life event. This is our team "uniform".  The Westford group has raise almost 7,000 dollars so far and donations are still coming in.  Just this week I had some new contributors donate on my page, thanks so much! I’ll be heading over there in just a few short hours to do my stint of walking and tent watching.

Last night I made it to a scrapbooking workshop and finished up an album. These are pictures from the U.S.S. Alabama which we often visited when going to see my grandma in Foley, Alabama. I also learned to make this cute little pink border.

And last but not least- here are some of today’s visitors at the feeder.

I’ve been working very slowly on Madli’s Shawl from the summer Interweave Knits 2004. This is a merino laceweight from Skakel that’s actually pretty easy to work with. I’ve had the pattern marked since Fall ’04 when I did the Fair Isle Bag class but never had the nerve to try lace. With the Flower Basket Shawl under my belt though I felt ready to give it a shot. It’s a long rectangular shawl with a border on each end, this is the first border and I’m ready to start the center pattern repeats now. I have to do 31 of those and then make another border separately and graft the two together. It’s been slow to work on since it really requires concentration but I’m hoping it’ll get easier once I get into the first few repeats and my hands know what they are doing.

My right arm is quite sore after three mornings in the library sorting out the fiction shelves. Two more days of that to go. Hopefully that’ll make Mrs. Weaver’s closing for the summer a little easier.  I made it to letter P yesterday and should manage to finish fiction for her by tomorrow.

Here’s the latest Sophie all felted and waiting for some applique. I plan to cut out the roses and iron them on and take it with me tonight to SnB at the Java Room to work on.

This is just to show that I’m still spinning, I’m just really slow. I’ve also been intentionally dragging it out a bit because Daniel is very fascinated with the wheel and wants to play with it. I’d rather not let him near it though until I get to know it a little better and can deal with any problems that might arise after he’s fiddled with things. This is just about halfway through this particular batch of roving so I’ll start a new bobbin as soon as we are back from our trip west and then when it’s done I can try to ply them together.

This terrific package arrived for me yesterday from my Secret Pal. There are two scented candles, some chocolate (always welcome!) and the Hat’s On book that’s been on my wishlist since last winter. I’m looking forward to making something out of that!

Sophie is very nearly finished with just a little more i-cord to knit before I felt her. This is the rose fabric I was considering for applique.

I’m headed off this morning to help at the school library. Most of the volunteers have fizzled out by this time of year and extra help is needed to get things in shape for the summer closing. I’ll be shelf-reading and putting away the cartloads of books that come in during the final week of school. Most likely I’ll head over there for at least a little while every morning this week.

Friday, June 17th will be the Westford Relay for Life event so this is a last opportunity for anyone who wishes to do so to donate. This is the first year for our team to participate and we are still far from meeting our team goal of $2000. Thanks again to everyone who’s already donated!

Yesterday afternoon Jason and I went photo-printer shopping and came home with the cannon he’d picked out. It’s a Canon Pixma ip8500 and has 8 colors of ink. There I am posing for a test shot to print on it- the Fair Isle bag helped give a good range of colors. The sales guy says oranges are hard to get and will show how much better this printer is than others. We’ve been printing on a more general purpose printer and the pictures come out looking fairly pixelated. They look just like film prints with this fancy new printer.

And here’s the next Sophie on the needles.  She may be a gift or I might keep her myself, I haven’t decided yet. I think I have enough to do two of them like this though so perhaps I’ll keep one and make another as a gift. She’ll have two pink stripes and the rest will be charcoal grey. I have some nice rose fabric that I plan to try to use as applique after felting.

Here’s Amanda’s Sophie all decorated and ready to ship. I’ll take it to knitting at Kimball Farm this morning and box it up for mailing this afternoon. I hope she likes it!

Yesterday morning I baked these cinnamon snails. It’s a lightly sweetened bread with a little cinnamon sugar and butter rolled up inside but it’s not heavy with fat and sugar.

Cinnamon Snails

1/2 cup warm water
4 1/2 teaspoons active dry yeast
7 tablespoons butter, divided, at room temperature
2/3 cup milk
2 large eggs
4 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons salt
1/4 cup cinnamon sugar

Preheat the oven to 350 F.

Combine the warm water and yeast in a large bowl with a pinch of sugar and let stand 5 minutes or until foamy. Warm the milk and 3 tablespoons butter just until bubbles begin to form along the edge. Lightly beat the eggs and combine with the milk mixture. Whisk together 4 cups of the flour, 1 teaspoon salt, 3 tablespoons sugar and add to the yeast mixture in the large bowl. Add the milk mixture and with your hands begin to bring the dough together. Knead the dough in the bowl, adding flour as needed until smooth. Cover tightly with saran wrap and allow to rise until doubled in bulk, about an hour.

Punch the dough down and divide into quarters with a knife. Roll each quarter out into a rectangle about 1/4-inch thick on a lightly floured surface. Spread each quarter with 1 tablespoon softened butter, sprinkle with sugar and roll up lengthwise, sealing edges tightly. Turn this tube vertically and roll up again, forming a snail shape. Place on a baking sheet coated with cornmeal, covered with a floured towel and allow to rise about 30 minutes. Repeat with other 3 quarters.

Bake 20 minutes at 350 F.

It didn’t take long to finish up Amanda’s Sophie yesterday morning and after that I felted her and let her dry in the sun for a few hours. Now I’m considering how to embellish.

Chris headed down to New Jersey yesterday to spend the summer at my sister’s house working for her husband in his construction company. His first day will be today, hope it goes well.

Next to him is the blue flax blooming in my garden. I wonder how long it will take to fill up the computer memory with flower pictures?

While Daniel was at his final tutoring session I worked on Sophie. I have only a couple more rows and then the handles and she’ll be done.  Daniel has one more week of school before he goes to his dad’s for the summer.