Drop Spinning

Starting a new hobby for me is starting to become difficult. I used to joke that whenever there is a rainy day I'll start a new hobby... It becomes a little less funny to some people when they find out just how true that statement is! But I think that learning something new is one of the best things you can do for yourself and it is a lot of fun. I've been a knitter since I was a kid and have always loved looking at different colors and textures of yarns in the stores. Recently I wondered if it would be possible and feasible for me to make my own yarns out of wool. I got super excited straight away and decided I wanted to get a spinning wheel. I did a bit of research and decided on the one I wanted:

The Ashford Traveller:

I just love it! But I can't really justify spending so much money on something I've really never tried before... It would just be a shame to get it and then find out that I don't love spinning yarn as much as I thought I would.

Fortunately there is another much cheaper option out there.

Drop Spindles:

Drop spindles are a LOT cheaper than a spinning wheel and can do pretty well the exact same thing! Both tools put twist into fibre (such as wool) to create yarn. Drop spindles, however, are a lot more affordable and portable, to start off with especially. My sister also wanted to start spindling so she picked up an Ashford Student Spindle from a yarn shop in our area for $11.50! And she has already made some beautiful yarns with it.

My spindle looks a little bit different because my Husband actually got me a handmade one for Christmas that they had at the yarn shop. =) I really love the look of it and I think I'll probably always use it. =)

I'm still working on getting really even yarn, and working on how much twist to put into the yarn, but I'm having a lot of fun learning! And I think that I've gotten even with just the bit that I've done so far.

I decided to take most of the pink and grey fibre that I also got for Christmas and make a pair of pink and grey mittens. I'm pretty excited to see how they work out.

I've got half of the yarn done for the mittens, and then the rest of the fibre to spin up for the other ball in the background there. I'm excited to get to try making something out of my own yarn soon!

A Day of Cooking

Where I live January tends to be the coldest month of the winter. This year has decided to make no exceptions. I think January is probably even more difficult to get through because there are no cheerful Christmas lights or warm family gatherings to look forward to anymore. It's just kinda the daily grind... and then Mother Nature drops another foot and a half of snow. Not Awesome.

This past weekend there was a pretty decent snow storm that lasted a lot of both Friday and Saturday which made doing anything at all pretty unappealing. On Sunday however, my Husband and I needed to get groceries and all either of us really wanted right then was piping hot homemade soup.

We decided on our two favourites, French Onion Soup, and Borscht. We realized at the time that this was going to be kind of a task to get everything done, but to have enough soup for the next week or two would be worth it!

Cooking up onions and beets, and then the pots of finished soups simmering on the stove!

For the Borscht we used:

4 Cups of Shredded Beets
3x900ml Boxes of Beef Broth
1 can (1.36 Litres) Tomato Juice
3 Medium Yellow Onions
1/2 Cup White Vinegar
2 Tbs Sugar
2 Tsp Black Pepper
1 Tbs Dill

Chop the Onions and fry until slightly browned in a frying pan. While the Onions brown, pour the Beef Broth and Tomato Juice into a Large Pot and set the stove to Medium - High. Add the Onions to the Beef Broth and Tomato Juice once they've browned. Fill a Medium Sized Pot with water and bring to a boil. Add the beets to the boiling water and turn down the temperature to medium. Cook until the beets have lost most of their colour. Strain the beets and add them to the hot beef broth and tomato juice.

The Vinegar, Sugar, Pepper, and Dill should be added to taste. I sort of wrote in about how much we used, however. We've made this soup a few times now and I think every time we make it we do things a little bit differently, but it always turns out to be delicious!

We decided also to make Perishky or Sauerkraut Buns to go with the Borscht. We fried Onions and Mushrooms with the Sauerkraut to make the filling, and I didn't know what kind of dough to use (and by this point was pretty tired...) so I just made a pizza / bread dough recipe that I already knew I could make as I've made it a few times before. It's actually the Jamie Oliver Pizza Dough Recipe and I think it tastes really good and is really easy to make!

For the Filling We Used:

About 2 Cups of Chopped Mushrooms
1 Medium Sized Onion
1 1Litre Jar of Sauerkraut

We fried the Mushrooms and Onions separately from the Sauerkraut as the Sauerkraut just has to brown slightly and we wanted to cook the mushrooms and onions a bit longer.

 I think maybe next time I will only make maybe one soup at a time, and maybe we'll give the Perishky their own separate day as well... But all of this cooking was totally worth it! And even though we were crazy tired by the end of it, it was really nice getting to spend the whole day cooking with my Husband as we usually sort of just go off and do our own thing. It's kind of surprising how little you can interact with someone on a day to day basis, even when you live in the same little house! So it's really nice every now and again to slow down and do something fun together.

Thanks for reading!
Keep Warm!
xoxo

Happy New Year!

I can't believe that it's already 2013! The start of a new year is always so exciting! I love "starting points" like, I'll start new projects on sundays typically because it's the start of a new week, or maybe I'll start a big project at the start of a new month, so a new year is always fun because you get to think of any goals or projects that you want to start to hopefully last the entire year!

I love sitting down and really thinking of a list of new goals to set into place every new year, but they always seem to end up looking tragically similar. I usually just end up with a new diet and work out plan that I stick to until february. This year I decided that weight loss could not be part of my resolutions and this is what I finally decided on.

Get Organized: Basically I want to actually find a place for everything in my home so that every room doesn't feel like it's cluttered with every random thing I own. I also want to organize my time better so that I can always stick to my daily cleaning and working out goals without really having to even think about it much.

Live a Little More: I spend far too much of my time planning for the future instead of actually doing things. I couldn't honestly tell you why that is, but it is a really bad habit I've fallen into. This year I want to plan dates with my husband, go out with my friends, and just spend a lot more time with the people in my life. I also want to sort of live life a little bit more on my own too by doing things I don't normally let myself do like, cook a meal that takes all day, or go for a drive to take pictures in a park somewhere, and I want to do a lot more small projects around the house. I basically just want to have a lot more days where, at the end of the day I can look back at how fun a day was, or how much I accomplished and just feel really fulfilled.

And that's basically it! I'm really excited about these goals as they are really out of the 'norm' for me, and I'm just really excited for 2013!

Happy New Year!!

Decorating for Christmas

Christmas has always been filled with a lot of traditions in my family. Things you don't notice when you're a kid, but that I've really come to appreciate them now that I'm moved out. We do things like a gift exchange between all of the siblings, have an advent wreath that we light at supper, and we always put up the Christmas Tree as a family. 

Putting up the Christmas Tree is always a lot of fun because we usually listen to Christmas Carols, or watch Christmas movies and eat some snacks. It's just a really relaxing time to hang out and not worry about anything else that's going on in our day to day lives.

I decided that for my tree I would kind of go with a blue and silver theme for the plain "Jingle Ball" decorations, and mostly just scattered the more sentimental ornaments around the tree. I'm looking forward to collecting a lot more original and special ornaments over the years.

Merry Christmas Everyone! And Happy Holidays! I hope everyone is happy and warm and with their families.

Low Fat Tuna Sandwich

Hey Guys! So with the weather getting colder I've been really tempted to eat of ton of carbs, and I somehow always seem to be super hungry. In an attempt to not eat rice, and toast all-the-time I figured I'd try to find something that was filling and still pretty good for you at the same time.

 I decided on a tuna sandwich! I used to love tuna sandwiches as a kid, but I haven't had one in forever! I wanted to try making it lower in fat, while still tasting good, so instead of using the usual white bread and mayonnaise I used:

1 Can of Flaked Light Tuna
1 Tbs of Lemon Juice
1/4 Tsp of Black Pepper
1/8 Tsp of Dill
A couple Tomato Slices
1 Slice of Whole Wheat Bread

I lightly toasted the slice of Whole Wheat Bread and mixed together the Lemon Juice, Black Pepper and Dill. I then spread about a third of the tuna onto the bread and put the tomato slices on top. To warm everything up I put it in the oven under the broiler for about a minute.

It tasted so good, and totally handled my craving for carbs. I think I'm going to have a lot of hot sandwiches this winter.

Red Christmas Nails

Hey Guys! So I know that it's a little early to be thinking of pulling out the Christmas Nails, Carols, Fuzzy Socks etc, but I figured that every year I wait until a couple weeks before Christmas and I always feel like I missed it. This year I decided to start pulling out some of my Christmas stuff slowly just so I can really enjoy it. 

Anyway, This is a really really simple nail design that can be done in red and white if you want it to look a little Christmas-y (or Green and Gold would work too), but it would also look good with any two colors that go well together for just a normal nail design. Also, if you don't have dotting tools you could use just about anything like, a tooth pick, bobby pin, knitting needle, anything like that

So Basically I just painted my nails two coats of a sparkly red nail polish and, with a white nail polish, used a bigger and smaller dotting tool to make different sized dots randomly all over each nail. After the nails had quite a long time to set (so as not to smudge the dots) I used a top coat.

This design was so easy to do and really did not take that long. I hope you give it a try!

Day 31: 31 Days Finale!

Happy Halloween!! Today I've sort of looked back to all of my other 31 days posts and I'm really happy with the way things went. I feel like I actually have learned to live more by doing less. I now am more likely to set reasonable goals for myself, and have started to work on things one project at a time until-it-is-done which has really helped me to be more productive.

"Productive" is also a word I have been using a lot less. I no longer feel the need to be "productive". I just get done what I set out to do, and if I spend the rest of the night watching a movie, or knitting then awesome!

Today was a pretty relaxing day for me. I just got up and got my cleaning done and spent the rest of the day getting ready for trick-or-treators and then my husband, sisters, and I sat around, ate candy and watched halloween movies. It was a really good, not-at-all-productive sort of night.

Have a Happy Halloween Everyone!
Thanks for Reading.

Day 30: Winding Down

Hey Guys! So this is something I've really been trying to do for a really long time. There is really nothing that improves my quality of life so much as a good nights sleep. There is really no amount of coffee or cold showers that can make me feel alert and awake if I have had just a really bad sleep the night before.

I've heard in quite a few different places that one way to get a better sleep is to sort of 'wind down' before bed. This just means, like, turning off unnecessary lights, turning off the computer, and phone, and just relaxing for a while before you go to sleep. A normal night for me is where I literally close my computer and jump into bed, and when I close my eyes I can still vividly see whatever it was that I was just working on.

Tonight I decided to actually try this "winding down" business. I'm turning off my computer and phone well before I plan to go to bed, and I'm just going to look through these knitting (well knitting and crochet) books while I drink some tea. Here's hoping I'll actually get to sleep right through the night!

Day 29: Try Try Again

Hey Guys! So today I tried something new, and it seemed like a really simple project, but was still something I'd never done before. Basically, I was trying to make a frame for a cork board I bought. (Hopefully I'll get to show you the finished product in a few days, if everything goes well!!) I bought a really basic looking not-that-cute cork board to go up in my office and I was going to frame it with, basically a base board that I picked up at a hardware store, to give it a little more personality and make it look a little bit nicer.

I figured this would be crazy easy. My husband has a saw that cuts on an angle, so I got him to cut the pieces, and then all I had to do was glue them together, and then glue them onto the board! Easy peasy. =)

A LOT OF THE TIME I look up how to do a project and because I fully understand all of the steps and the basic concepts, I figure it's gonna work out like a dream the first time around. This ACTUALLY does not make any sense. If you have never done something before? It's not going to be a familiar action for you, and it will not likely work out like clock work. That being said, if you can get past that, and work through it, you might actually end up with a workable finished product!!

When I was trying to put the pieces together, and they weren't fitting or staying the way I wanted I got super fed up, and said it "wasn't worth it to fight with a $5 piece of base board anyway." Which is really just silly! Yeah, I didn't pay much for the project, but that was kind of the point! I wanted a nice looking cork board without PAYING for a nice looking cork board.

Anyway, we stuck with it (thanks honey!!) and now the pieces are drying in the basement, and (hopefully) tomorrow I'll have a frame that I can paint and turn into a really nice cork board. Much nicer than a pile of supplies sitting in the garbage can outside. I'm hoping I actually do learn from this, and give myself a bit of a break while I try to learn to be a bit more handy. Who knows! Maybe one day I'll actually be doing cool things like re-finishing furniture.

Day 28: Hot Cocoa

Hey Guys! Today was an especially brisk day for this fall, so I decided to indulge in a simple pleasure. Hot Cocoa! Originally I was going to make some Hot Chocolate mix that I bought from a coffee shop a few weeks ago, but I've been kind of avoiding making it. Eventually I realized that it was because I knew it was so bad for you! The calories alone pretty frightening at 160 calories per cup! So I decided to try something new and just make Hot Cocoa myself. I've never made hot cocoa before, but I've been really interested in learning how to use simple ingredient to make the foods I like, as opposed to buying frozen and pre packaged foods. Making the cocoa was amazingly easy! I actually just followed the instructions on the back of the container: 1 tbs of Cocoa and 2 tbs of sugar per cup of hot milk.

It turned out to be super delicious! I think next time I may actually use only 1 tablespoon of sugar per cup as it was really really sweet. I was really pleasantly surprised with how well this turned out, and considering I only used cocoa, sugar, and skim milk, I'm thinking it can't have been that bad for me either! I think this will be a regular treat for me in the coming winter.

Day 27: Roasting Pumpkin Seeds

 Hey Guys! So I decided after carving my pumpkin to try my hand at roasting pumpkin seeds!! Every year I carve a pumpkin and I always just throw away the seeds, figuring that I couldn't make them taste the same as when you buy them from the store.

Not true! I followed this recipe I got from simplyrecipes.com and it worked out really well. Basically the recipe just instructs you to boil the seeds for about 10 minutes, and then bake them with a little olive oil for about 10 minutes.

I ended up having to cook them in two batches and I added a little worcestershire sauce to the first batch (the farther bowl) to spice it up a bit, which someone suggested in the comments on the recipe. I didn't find that it made a huge difference in taste, so I did the second batch without.

I'm really happy with how these worked out, and it was basically a free snack because I would have bought the pumpkin either way!

Day 26: Pumpkin Carving!

Hey Guys! So I decided today to carve a Pumpkin! Carving Pumpkins is a really fun thing to do around Halloween, and it makes for a really quick and inexpensive decoration. I picked up this pumpkin at a local market. It was really awesome because there was a lot to choose from, so I got this perfectly round pumpkin! 

I bought a pumpkin carving kit that came with a book of templates. I don't really have a ton of skill in this department, so I played it safe and picked out the easiest looking one.

I think it turned out really well! It was actually kind of fun and sort of relaxing to get to just sit down and work on something so quick and instantly gratifying. I'm really excited to see how it looks on Halloween!

Day 25: Halloween Decorations!

Hey Guys! Halloween is less than a week away, so I decided to get into the spirit by putting up some cute decorations! I just love these pumpkin lights. They're so cute and I feel like they instantly decorate the front of your house!

I think decorating your house for holidays is a lot of fun, and can be really inexpensive! Most of these decorations were $1!  I'll probably end up running back to the dollar store to grab some decorations for the yard, so we can decorate inside too! I really feel like if you get into holidays and have fun with it, it can make you appreciate the space you're in a lot more, and just makes every day a little more special.

Day 24: Hello Kitty Glasses!

I've decided lately to try to sort of get out of my comfort zone when it comes to fashion, and sort of life in general. All my life I have sort of played-it-safe and always had a very safe jeans-and-t-shirt wardrobe. But I got bored of it! I think sometimes it's important to just go for it if you like something. These glasses are sort of the start of that for me. I already kind of tried to change it up a bit. A few months ago I went blonde which was a HUGE deal for me, and then about a month ago I bought pink and purple clip in hair extensions. I figured those were pretty safe seeing as you could just take them out.

I think for sure the most outlandish thing I've ever bought with the intent to wear are these Hello Kitty Glasses which I got from this ebay site.

I have been considering these for a massively long time because I was positive that they would look god-aweful on me, and I would never wear them, and even be embarrassed that I bought them!

I finally realized that at a little over $5 for the set of three, it wasn't exactly an investment, and they made me happy! Even if I never ever wore them, I decided it was worth it to give them a go. I really like them! I'm actually pretty disappointed that you can't put lenses in them, because I think I would actually wear the black ones as my regular glasses... and maybe eventually convert the other ones as well!

I'm happy I decided to step out-of-the-box with this one. I've been having a lot of fun even just wearing them constantly around the house.

Which ones are your favourite?

Day 23: Use Your Supplies

Back on Day 17 when I was sorting through and sort of taking stock of all of my knitting supplies I realized that it was almost absurd to have so much yarn. My Husband actually saw me stacking up all the now-neatly-rolled bundles and laughed "you'll never need to buy yarn again!". Problem is, I'm CONSTANTLY tempted to buy more yarn when I'm at the store. So, in order to keep off the Hoarding  show, I decided I wasn't going to buy any more yarn until I used up some of that stash!

I have been looking at knitting a cowl, or infinity scarf, for a really long time. I love how they look and figured they would be pretty wearable. I'm the kind of person who is constantly cold, so it would be nice to have a kind of scarf that I could not only wear under my jacket, but also around the house.

When I was sorting my yarn I noticed that I loved the way that these olive toned green and oatmeal colours go together. I was instantly inspired! I grabbed a pair of circular needles and set to work.

For this project I used:

Around 5mm or 6mm Circular Needles (The Packaging is gone, and it doesn't say anywhere on the needles the exact size, sorry!)

I cast on 135 stitches with the main colour
(you could make it wider by casting on more, or more narrow by casting on less, but for the textured pattern I recommend using an odd number of stitches)

I  used a (British) Moss stitch pattern, or Seed Stitch which just means that you Knit 1 Purl 1 all the way around.
        - Because you used an odd number of stitches you do not need to change anything when you start a new row, you just keep going around with your Knit 1 and Purl 1. The design is created because all of your knits are on top of purls and vice versa.

The way I did my rows was 10 rows of the main colour and 5 of the contrast colour alternating, with a total of 55 rows all together.

I'm really happy with the way the cowl turned out! and I'm also really excited to be knitting again. I already have two more cowl ideas I want to try. It's just really fun, relaxing, and rewarding! As these can be knit up in just a few days even if you don't have a ton of time to commit to them.

Day 22: No Such Thing as Wasted Time

Today I decided to do something I don't usually let myself do. I went out, purchased a Magazine, sat down, and read it.

This is almost silly, it's such a small thing, but it goes against most of the limitations I put on myself! Wasting money (a magazine isn't super useful) and wasting time (reading a magazine is also not super useful). Wasting time and money is pretty huge in my books, but lately I have been challenging the definition of a "waste". I never really gave it much thought before, my current definition of a waste is anything that is not ultimately productive in some way; Window shopping, Going out for Coffee, Reading Magazines. Basically things that are just for fun.

Anyway, my Husband finally pointed out to me (as I was clearly not going to get this on my own) that sometimes having fun IS productive! And that if you take a break from work to have fun, you're bound to get more work done later when you pick it up again.

So I read a magazine today, and I really liked it. I think I may even subscribe.