Cooking vs. knitting

Previously I mentioned watching the movie 'Julie and Julia', in which a woman vowed to cook every recipe in Julia Child's cookbook. Since then, I've been looking for a similar challenge, just for fun. This weekend, I picked my challenge, knitting.
I received a book titled "Viva Poncho' as a gift. It has 20 patterns for ponchos, capes and capelets. I have decided to knit every pattern in that book over the next year. I have a head start as I've already knit four of the patterns.
I'm sure there were some recipes Julie had to cook that she didn't especially like, but doing 'all' of them doesn't let you pick and choose. Similarly, there are a few patterns in the Viva Poncho book that aren't to my taste. For these, I will have to chose a prettier yarn, or a different texture to make the finished piece better.
I wonder if Julie substituted different ingredients in Julia's recipes? Is this cheating? or is it being creative?
In the movie, the woman kept a blog about her cooking. I suppose I could do that, but knitting isn't always as exciting as cooking. It's more of a meditative activity for me. I can imagine boring blog posts like "Today I knit two rows."
Of course, there will probably be some exciting times, like "today I had to rip out three inches.'
However, I suppose I will offer photos here of the finished projects, and an occasional post about my progress.
To start with, I am knitting a one-piece poncho called Carson. I am using Cascade 220 in a dark green heather and size five needles. This one will take a while, but it is the one that I have kept going back to the book to look at, wanting to make it.
At the very least, this project will help me put a dent in my overflowing yarn stash.

Three wheels and a big dog

Like many people, I spent Labor Day weekend in a campground, Brunet Island State Park. It was the annual Grandma’s Camping Weekend, when my sister Linda, her daughter Sarah and my grandbaby Wren get together for a girls only camping adventure.
We all met at the campground on Thursday afternoon. Brunet Island State Park is a beautiful place near Cornell, surrounded by the Chippewa River. The campground is filled with large hemlocks, maples and other trees, squirrels, deer and several raccoons.
When we arrived, there was only one other camper in the southern part of the campgrounds were we had our space reserved. All the other campsites were tagged as reserved, but we were the only ones who braved the cold and rain on that night. A few more stragglers came in during the continued rain on Friday, and by Saturday, when the rain stopped, the campground began to fill up.
Most campsites were quite similar. Standard equipment was usually a pull-behind camper and some sort of recreational equipment like bikes, canoes, or kayaks. Quite a few campers brought the family dog along. Add a fire ring and a picnic table and you have a typical camp setup. Families gather by the fire and chat while the children ride the bikes or search the nearby woods for treasures. Meals are cooked over the fire and eaten at the picnic table.
Our campsite was similar, with a few exceptions that drew curious campers to either stop by or walk by with their necks craned in our direction.
We had three wheels and a big dog.
The three wheels I’m referring to weren’t on the camper, or the SUV that pulled it. These were spinning wheels. My sister, my niece and I are all into fiber. We knit, weave and spin. So, for grandma’s camping weekend, we each brought our spinning wheel. While the other campers were hiking or canoeing, we were sitting around our campfire spinning fiber into yarn.
On occasion, I’d bring out my hand drum or native flute and add some music to the mix.
It wasinteresting to watch, out the corner of my eye, as the neighboring campers passed by. Conversations stopped, heads turned, and some people stopped walking to watch. We smiled and greeted them, and kept spinning. Children pointed and asked the grown-ups what we were doing. Dogs shifted their noses in our direction, sniffing the scent of sheep coming off my freshly carded fiber.
One woman was brave and came into our campsite with her husband.
“I’ve always wanted to learn how to spin,” she said. “When I retire and have more time, I’m going to try it.”
“Here, sit down and try it now,” offered my sister.
The woman sat down and had a mini-spinning lesson while her husband watched. I walked over and talked to the man about his dog, trying to keep him occupied.
“I may need to go walk the dog and come back later,” he said, obviously sensing his wife’s pre-occupation.
She spun for a bit, then returned to her husband, vowing to visit a fiber fair soon to try out different kinds of spinning wheels. I explained that she should be prepared to learn to knit or crochet so she had something to do with all the yarn she would be making. I didn’t tell her about the urge to buy a loom and learn weaving too. We’ll let her discover that one later, once she has the full fiber addiction.
There were those passers-by who seemed uninterested in the spinning project. However, most of them offered comments on “that big dog.”
My sister has an Alaskan Malamutenamed Raven. He is probably only about 80 pounds, but when you add in all of his soft, fluffy fur, he looks like about 140 pounds. His feet are as big as the palm of my hand.
“That’s such a beautiful dog.”
“Is that a husky?”
“Mommy, look at that dog.”
These were some of the comments we were used to. Raven is a friendly dog and his older age means he’s not as exuberant as younger dogs. He doesn’t jump on people or bark much, so he’s a perfect dog for curious people.
On occasion, we would need to get up from our spinning and take Raven and Wren for a walk, giving the campers in the farther out sites a chance to marvel at ‘the big dog.’
Wren is three years old, so she had her occasional ‘melt downs,’ which is what we call a bought of temper. However, with all the other children in camp, melt downs were a common occurrence all over, nothing to draw anyone’s attention.
It was the three wheels and the big dog that added a different twist to the weekend.

I must be insane...

...at least when it comes to knitting. Yes, my yarn stash is the size of a major football stadium, but that isn't the only reason I'm insane.
I just completed knitting an Einstein coat. It is gorgeous and it took a long time. If you don't know what an Einstein coat is, it is a wool coat knitted entirely with the knit stitch (no purl or cables, etc.) They call it Einstein because when you are done it looks like it was hard, but it's not. However, it takes a long time.
Upon completion of that project, I went back to working on the Frog Tree Origami Sweater I started last year. Again, it's all one stitch. This time it is K1P1 ribbing. The concept is a knitted rectangle 65" long and about 2 foot wide in this ribbing. Then you knit another rectangle, not as long or wide and fold the two together to make a sweater.
All that ribbing takes quite a while to knit.
This week, I got out some Cascade 220 I've had for a while, dark green heather, very nice. And, I started to knit a poncho using size 5 needles. All knit stitch.
Again, it will take a long time to complete.
And, I'm contemplating another project of a lace shawl.
I must be insane to have four long knitting projects going at one time. But, my scheme is to alternate between projects so no one project can get boring.
Of course, there's always the prospect that all four of them get boring as a whole. Then I'd have to start number five....

Where do you come from?

This past weekend I listened to a talk by a man who was adopted at birth. After his parent's death, he discovered that his mother was Sioux and he was united with his birth family of brothers and sisters. He went on to explain how learning of his native heritage had influenced his life.
There is much interest these days about geneology, many internet sites and books about the topic.
Personally, I know half of my story. My grandmother on my father's side did a complete geneology of our family, going back to Norway in the 1700s.
On my mother's side is where the mystery begins. My grandfather was a storyteller and when asked about his past, he would tell many stories, but no one can say which are true and which were embellished. We have no documentation of his past other than there is some German in there somewhere.
Knowing where you came from can help you understand more about your family's traditions, habits, and idiosyncracies. It can explain why you have a certain hair color or facial features. It can help you understand your medical history.
But, it can also do other things.
It can limit you by putting you into a mold of your past.
It can create discrimination by separating you from others.
It can create exclusionism by causing groups to separate themselves.
People may want to know where they came from so they know where they fit in.
I know where I came from. I came from the mother earth. I came from earth, water, wind and fire. I came from the same place every other human on this planet came from.
Which brings us to another question.
Where are you going?
We are all going to the same place, back to our mother earth when we die. It's not where you came from that matters. It's the journey you take before you go back that is the whole reason we are here.
We are all one family, from one source. We all have indigenous roots if we can trace them back far enough. We all have cave man ancestors who sat around the fire and told stories of where they came from.
Perhaps in times to come, someone will trace their ancestry back to us and marvel in the fact that they are part 'earthling.'

Julia Child vs. church cookbook

Recently, I watched the movie “Julie and Julia,” about a young woman who pledges to cook every recipe in Julia Child’s book “Mastering the Art of French Cooking.” She gives herself a year to accomplish this task, meaning 536 recipes in 365 days. The movie was fun, and if you haven’t seen it, I recommend it.
I commend the woman in the story for her perseverance in the task. Personally, I would have a few obstacles on this type of journey:
What do I do with the leftovers? If I cooked 536 recipes in 365 days, that would mean cooking something new every day. In the movie, it was just her and her husband eating these meals. Of course they had the occasional dinner party, but as a matter of day-to-day eating, that’s a lot of food. My refrigerator isn’t very big. Where will I put all the foil covered plates, Ziploc bags and Tupperware?
Who will do all the dishes? We never see her or her husband doing dishes in the movie. We see scenes of her in the kitchen, but never piles of pots and pans stacked up in the sink. And we know she didn’t have domestic help because that was part of the charm of Child’s book, which was written for women who did not have servants. My problem is, I can’t cook in a dirty kitchen. Before I start any cooking endeavor, I must clean all the counters and do the dishes.
With 536 recipes, there must be a few that will not appeal to everyone. Do you make those anyway? What about allergies? Personally, I’m allergic to hard-shell seafood. Do I still need to make the lobster dishes?
How do I find all those fancy ingredients? This woman lived in New York and had numerous markets to shop from. Here in the northland, if they don’t have it at the local grocery store, I’m out of luck. Though during the summer, the local farmer’s markets are a good source for some unusual finds. I have yet to see live lobster or whole ducks.
When my grandmother passed away, I inherited her collection of church cookbooks. It would be interesting to try this challenge with one of them. These recipes are “old school.” They call for things that are not commonly found in today’s kitchens such as lard and sorghum. Quite a few of these women cooked like my mother did, adding a “pinch” of this or a “smidgeon” of that. They also gave instructions like “cook until done,” or “add spices to taste.”
I took a sentimental journey through grandma’s Country CookBook from the Halfway Creek Lutheran Church, 1971.
The first recipe in the book is for rommegrot, which is comprised of rich cream, milk, salt and flour. Then there’s Berline kranser with the only ingredients being butter, sugar, flour and egg yolks. This recipe is supposed to make over 100 cookies. After these delicacies comes brabakkels with eggs, sugar and brandy (add a bit of flour to roll out thin). I’m starting to see a pattern here.
I flipped the pages to the main dish section to find a collection of recipes for casseroles, hot dishes and meat loaf. A recipe called 7-course dinner includes potatoes, carrots, hamburger, onion, rice and tomatoes all combined into a casserole.
The salad section includes a lot of fruit, jello and cottage cheese.
This is a far cry from “Mastering the Art of French Cooking.” It’s more like “Mastering the Art of Blocked Arteries.”
However, my grandmother used the cookbook (I know this by the pencil notes she wrote in the margins and the extra sheet of paper that fell out listing her favorite recipes from the book and their page numbers), and she lived to be 98 years old. I’ll never know if she tried every recipe, but I thought of her fondly when I came upon the recipe for fruit soup. When I was young, fruit soup was a traditional dish my grandmother served. My sister and I hated fruit soup, but my mother always made us eat some so we wouldn’t offend grandma. I won’t be making that recipe.
The last pages are a compilation of “household hints.” I will leave you with this piece of old-country wisdom: “A banana and the white of an egg, beaten until stiff, make a good substitute for whipped cream.”
Bon appétit.

A new twist

Okay, I admit it, I caved in.
I swore I was not going to read any of the Twilight series books. I had enough of vampire stories in my teens. Remember Dark Shadows, the vampire soap opera? I was addicted.
After a while all the vampire hype started getting old. It was always the same, vampire wars, big teeth and lots of blood, so I quit.
I've always wondered about the vampire legends. If vampires are so good at attacking people and biting them, why aren't we all vampires? The garlic part I could understand. I stay away from people who've eaten too much garlic myself, and no, I'm not a vampire. The crosses work too. After all, who wants to spend time with a certified evangelist, boring.
However, I was in the library looking for a new book to listen to in my car. I've just about gone through their whole selection already, so something new was hard to find. I noticed the first Twilight book was on CD. I needed something, so I caved in.
Why not give it a try. I checked out the website of the author and she notes that she loves to put standard characters into different situations, so I thought maybe this would be different, a new twist on an old legend.
So far, I was right. And I have to admit that she writes quite well.
In case you aren't familiar, here's a synopsis so far:
Young girl moves to new town, meets irresistable boy who has some quirks. His skin is pale, his eyes turn different colors, he's moody, he's aloof, he drives too fast and seems to materialize out of nowhere. Oh yeah, and he never eats. Lots of clues there. But the twist is, he's not a people biting vampire (bites animals instead) and he can be out in the daytime. The author gets by that one by having the character deny the daytime thing as 'merely lore.' With all of these clues, our heroine falls for the mysterious one anyway. Love at first sight (bite?).
So far, it seems the story is less about the vampire boyfriend than it is about a young girl moving to a new town and trying to fit in. Outcast meets outcast.
Funny thing, there is a scene where he takes her to an Italian restaurant. She orders ravioli. As far as I know, most Italian restaurants feature garlic prominently, yet, there was not mention of it, hmmm.
I'll keep reading.

Where have all the flowers gone?

Listen, children, to a story that was written long ago.
‘Bout a kingdom on a mountain and the valley-folk below.
On the mountain was a treasure, buried deep beneath the stone.
And the valley-people swore they’d have it for their very own.
So the people of the valley sent a message up the hill asking for the buried treasure, tons of gold for which they’d kill.
Came an answer from the kingdom, “With our brothers we will share all the secrets of our mountain, all the riches buried there.”
Now the valley cried with anger, “Mount your horses! Draw your sword!” and they killed the mountain-people, so they won their just reward.
Now they stood beside the treasure, on the mountain, dark and red. Turned the stone and looked beneath it...”Peace on Earth” was all it said.
Go ahead and hate your neighbor, go ahead and cheat a friend. Do it in the name of heaven, you can justify it in the end. There won’t be any trumpets blowing come the judgment day, on the bloody morning after...One tin soldier rides away.
-One Tin Soldier (The Legend of Billy Jack) by Lambert-Potter

I was 12 years old in 1969, too young to go to Woodstock, but not too young to be influenced by the peace songs and anti-war protests of the era. I wore bell bottom jeans and blousey tops. My hair was long and straight, parted in the middle. I wore peace sign jewelry and memorized the lyrics to many of the peace songs of the day.
The 60s and 70s were a tumultuous time of war, racial riots, sit-ins, peace marches and music. We spoke our minds, stood up for our beliefs, and wore our hearts for peace on our sleeves.
Now, those of us who lived through those times are in our 50s and 60s. What happened? Where have all the flowers gone? Are they still blowin’ in the wind? Did we ever give peace a chance? Or did the Peace Train roll on past with empty seats?
John Lennon saw it. He imagined “all the people, living life in peace.”
“You can say I’m a dreamer, but I’m not the only one. I hope some day you will join us. And the world will live as one.”
And his fellow band members, The Beatles, agreed, “When the broken hearted people, living in the world agree. There will be an answer, let it be.”
Today, we sit in a world still at war. We struggle with issues of neglect for our Mother Earth. We, the children of the 60s and 70s, seem to have forgotten those issues we fought for. We are the ones who grew up, raised families, and helped build our current culture of excess. We are the corporate executives of B.P. Oil. We are the advisors to the President of the United States. We spearheaded the technological revolution. And for all we have built, and all we have used up, we are still at war.
“War, huh, yeah, what is it good for, absolutely nothing.” - War by Edwin Starr
The good news is, we can go back and remember. Our generation, many of us either nearing or in our retirement years, can still change the world. We are the elders. We hold the knowledge of the past, the wisdom to see the present, and the ability to help the young ones move into the future. We can still raise the flag of peace. We can still let our voices be heard.
At her recent performance at Big Top Chautauqua, Joan Baez asked the audience what they were willing to risk. She talked about her youth, the protest marches, and spending time in jail with her mother. She has led her life as a peace activist and is still willing to speak out.
We can be role models for peace. Our stage is our life. Each step we take, each conversation we have, how we treat our neighbors, who we vote for, our thoughts, words and deeds, they all matter.
The 60s and 70s weren’t only about sex, drugs and rock and roll. It was our learning ground, the place where we trained for this present moment. So, don your bell bottoms, and search in your drawers for those old tie-dyed t-shirts with the peace signs on them. Let your hair down and let your voice be heard. We may be old, but we’re not dead yet.
In the words of John Lennon, “If someone thinks that love and peace is a cliche that must have been left behind in the 60s, that’s his problem. Love and peace are eternal.”
This is a call to wear your heart for peace on your sleeve once more. The time is now, before the predictions of Rick Evans, writer of the song In the Year 2525, come true:
“Now it’s been ten thousand years. Man has cried a billion tears. For what, he never knew, now man’s reign is through. But through eternal night, the twinkling of star light, so very far away, maybe it’s only yesterday.”