Adjusting to it all...

I'm trying out a new post format.  Pictures taken mostly during the week with a stream of consciousness about whatever comes to mind.  Maybe weekly, maybe less. By no means an original idea...

This week I was scattered.  I was overwhelmed.  That's the thing about not being home very much...there is almost an excuse to let things slide and to put off tasks.  But once I'm home for an extended period of time, I now have to deal with all the backlog -- and the reality that folks know I'm home and have been waiting 'patiently' to start either adding requests or putting pressure on old ones.  I sort of got forced to jump into it all too fast this week when what I really needed to do was ease back into it.  I showed up late to a meeting because I forgot what time it started.  This is the third time in 2 months and I never. do. that.  I put a bowl in the fridge without actually putting the food into it.  I realized it pretty quickly but still.  I don't do things like that.  And so when the weekend rolled around, despite having so many things I needed to do staring me in the face, I realized I needed to take a day off on Saturday and just let my body and soul decide what it could handle.  Feelings of guilt and panic, and feelings of 'I'm not doing enough' threatened to creep in but I was able to hold them off.  I knit a bit.  I baked and cooked and planned.  I worked on a papercut (more on that later).  I moved.  I napped.  I read.  I sipped some whiskey with dinner.  We watched a movie. It was bliss and exactly what I needed.  Today, another slow day but with some more direct guidance to accomplish certain things (some for work and some not).

One thing I can't do when I'm gone a week, home a week, is really get into any sort of groove with cooking.  This week I was finally able to go to the grocery store, buy a week's worth of groceries and actually cook good, healthy, comforting food. I made a meatloaf (recipe below).  Growing up, I hated meatloaf.  Granted, I was a very picky child.  But this recipe, made with local beef and more often than not, some home-baked bread, turned it all around.  And of course baking it in a pottery loaf pan adds to the charm.  Also with the home-made bread, a recipe that we love ... Raspberry bread pudding.  I normally make it with raspberries grown and frozen from our house, but this one was extra special.  I made it using some wild-picked raspberries from this summer in NE British Columbia (species Rubus ideas).  Small berries and a pain in the butt to pick but bursting with incredible flavor.  I can't describe how delicious this was.  And for today, after a trip to visit the girls...with the idea that it's never too late...we ushered our new year in with black-eyed peas and ham.  More new, healthy, and simple recipes this coming week.

I finished those socks before Christmas.  Ravelry said it had been 3 years since I knit socks.  So this summer, I told myself I had to cast on a pair.  Sometimes a yarn and pattern just feel right.  I'm normally drawn to complex sock patterns in solid colors.  And yet when I saw this project, I just needed to replicate it.  As soon as the first sock was on the needles, I felt a comfort.  My muscles remembered the rhythm of sock knitting...the rhythm of dpn's and small yarn.  My mind remembered how nice it is to have a small sock project on the needles to knit a row here and there when I only have a few minutes of time and need something in my hands to calm me down.  And I wondered why it had taken me so long to remember this.  So when I finished, I wanted to cast-on another pair immediately.  I searched my favorites and kept coming back over and over again to this sock.  And yet, it was knit toe-up.  Something I've never done before.  And something I've never challenged myself to learn.  I see a pattern I love and when I read toe-up, I deflate a bit, favorite it, but move on and forget about it.  Why?  Every technique I've tried in knitting, I learn to do.  And so the other night, I wound the yarn, found a video for Judy's magic cast-on and tried.  There was some struggle using dpn's and I admit to almost giving up.  The video was for doing it with one circular...another technique that frightened me.  But my word for 2015 gently pushed me to try it since dpn's and I were not playing nice at the moment.  5 minutes later...the beginnings of a sock using magic loop.  Simple.  Which begs the question: why was I so scared to try?  This.  This is why I chose 'challenge'. 

ps -- that light in the second photo was a christmas gift from my parents.  i have coveted one of those lights for years and finally got one!  I LOVE it.  I had to special order some bulbs for it but the light is amazing and pretty much the same warm glow you'd get from a bunch of candles.  

Italian Meatloaf
modified from Marge Clark's The Best of Thymes

2 slices rye bread
2 slices firm white bread
1 cup water
1 pound lean ground beef
1 egg, slightly beaten
3-4 tablespoons Parmesan cheese, grated
2 tablespoons fresh parsley, minced
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground pepper
1 8-ounce can tomato sauce
1 teaspoon dried oregano

Grease a 9x5-inch loaf pan.  Place breads in a large bowl.  Pour 1 cup water over bread and let soak for 5 minutes.  Drain off excess water.  Mash bread finely with fingers.  Add beef, egg, cheese, parsley, salt and pepper.  Mix well.  Place in greased pan.  Bake at 375 for 40 minutes.  Combine tomato sauce and oregano.  Pour over meat loaf and bake another 15 to 20 minutes.  Let stand a few minutes and serve.  Enjoy.

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Now playing:  Missionary Man by Eurythmics 

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