What did I do in 2011?

• Not enough knitting. I completed a hat in January, maybe February, and I attempted to slog through a sweater multiple times before deciding I hated the yarn choice and giving up. I started a little iPad sleeve in December, hoping to have it ready in time for when I traveled to visit my parents for Christmas, but the new year is here, it still sits on the needles, and I’m contemplating a leather-esque cover I found on Amazon.

• I spun a couple of things during Tour de Fleece, most of which were really nice, and maybe someday in the far and distant future, I’ll find a project for them. And maybe I’ll actually complete them.

• I rediscovered reading for pleasure. I read more books in 2011 than I’ve read in a year since sometime in the mid- to late-90s. I was a voracious reader as a kid, but once I hit high school, the only reading I really had the time or energy for was reading for school and the Lord of the Rings. I did a little pleasure reading in college in the semesters where I had long breaks between classes, but not 20 books-worth.
  
  I mostly read from series, covering some of Ender and all Ender’s Shadow, Millenium, a handful of Dresden, and the first book of Codex Alera. I also crossed Snow Crash and Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell off my list. GoodReads has been an excellent tool for keeping track of all the things I’ve read and all the things I want to read, and the Kindle has been great for keeping a collection of books with me at all times.

• I tried learning C#. I made pretty good progress through a book, but I was only able to stick with it for short spurts at a time, and towards the end of the year I didn’t really make enough time to try to finish it. I really enjoyed working with the language, though, and it kicks the pants off the other languages I’m familiar with.

• On a sad note, I put my cat of 15 years to sleep. On a happier note, I adopted a new cat, who is awesome. And who finally befriended the fluffy one enough to cuddle together.

• I attempted a 365 project. I gave up about 60-70 days in, after getting tired of frantically trying to come up with a photo idea all evening, only to take pictures of really mundane crap. Some of them might have been nice photos, since I purchased a DSLR this year, but it was still mundane crap.

• I played a lot of Skyrim: 121 hours, according to Steam. That’s one playthrough, and I am nowhere near finished with that character.

• I turned over a garden in my backyard and made it a vegetable garden. It was a lot of work, and I finished so much later than I wanted, due to a crappy, rainy spring, but the hardest part got done and the garden will be ready on time for future years. I got a decent yield of zucchinis and cherry tomatoes (more than we could eat), but the carrots grew funky, and peppers and Romas were ready too late in the season to be very good.

• I took my first adult vacation that didn’t involve visiting family or traveling with my parents, and I saw Phoenix, the Grand Canyon, and Vegas.

• Oh. I got married. In Vegas. In a helicopter. That was pretty epic.

I think that pretty much touches on the highlights for the year. Aside from the lack of knitting and the loss of Mings, most of it was pretty damn good. With luck 2012 will be as good or better.

Last night, I made some apple pie pops to bring to work today.

nom nom nom

The initial plan was to also make pumpkin ones, but unfortunately, they didn’t come out nearly as well. I’d like to give pumpkin ones a try again someday, but they’re going to require experimentation, I think. I tried making the filling using the recipe on the label of a Libby’s pumpkin can, having not made pumpkin pie in several years and forgetting how running that filling is before it’s baked. Even using half the evaporated milk called for by the label, I ended up with running filling spilling out of the pops while I was trying to seal them.

I think in the future, I’ll either look for a different pumpkin pie filling recipe. I’ve thought about just forgoing the evaporated milk, since the consistency seemed correct, but I worry about losing flavor.

The apple pie pops came out perfectly, though. To save time, I bought several boxes of the pre-made Pillsbury Pie Crusts, and I really don’t regret that decision. The crusts turned out pretty tasty, possibly tastier than the crusts I’ve made from scratch, and with a brushing of egg white, they were perfectly crispy.

I used a fondant cutter (the largest one in the pack at that link) that I picked up from Joanns to cut out all the crust pieces at once and set them aside on a baking tray, layered between sheets of parchment paper. I prepared the apple filling by mincing some Granny Smith apples and preparing the filling using the apple pie filling recipe from the Joy of Cooking. The key to having the filling turn out well is having the apple pieces cut up really tiny. The pie pops are only about 2 inches in diameter, and you want to get as much apple in there as possible, as easily as possible.

On average, I baked each batch for about 20 minutes apiece at 350°. It would really help to use a flat baking sheet so the sticks aren’t inserted at an angle into the pops, but in lieu of that, I just turned my baking pans upside down and layered them with parchment paper. And per this pie pop Instructable, I put foil on the sticks to keep them from burning.

In all, I ended up getting 33 well-formed pie pops from 3 boxes of crust, although there were 10 completed pumpkin failure pops, plus a couple of goopy messes from spooning out too much filling on my first attempt at the pumpkin pops. If I’d gone with all apple from the beginning, I probably could have had nearly 50 pops total, which is pretty impressive.

The pops were a hit with my coworkers. It’s pretty hard to go wrong when you put delicious treats on a stick.

Meet Clove

We were able to bring home the new kitty yesterday. This is the Misty I referred to in my previous post, although she’s going by Clove now that she’s home with us.

Last weekend, we went back to the rescue and claimed her right away. I had tried to make arrangements to meet with Nike that week, but in the process of doing so, I realized that I just really wanted to adopt Misty Clove. So, once we found out she was still available, we scooped her up into a room and sat with her until someone was able to meet with us and get the adoption going. She still needed to be spayed, though, so we couldn’t bring her home right then.

Now, a week later, she’s sleeping on the floor of my office, by my feet while I write a post about adopting her. She’s been settling in well for a cat that has had so much happen to her in just a few months. She’s very lovey, and in a lot of ways she reminds me of Mings. It’s not a bad thing, though. It gives me a lot of hope that we’ll get along well.

We’re already going through the process of looking for another cat. For some people, it might be too soon, but I really just do not want to constantly expect to see Mings at every turn. I keep seeing her looking through the glass when I sit outside on the deck, and I see her coming down the stairs, and I see her in the living room. It’s hard, and if I can divert my subconscious by having another cat to focus on, that would be nice. I know I won’t ever forget her, but it would be nice to  have another cat around so I don’t fixate on her absence.

We went to visit Angel’s Wish this weekend to look at their cats. I had a shortlist of cats I wanted to see, although only a few of them were there. Some of the volunteers encouraged us to look at a cat named Misty, who had a pretty sad backstory. She was probably thrown from a moving vehicle while pregnant. She was found with a gash in her side, and she was nursed back to health, had her kittens and raised them until they were weaned. We met with her in one of the rooms, and she was just so sweet, despite all the sad things. I really liked her, and if I hadn’t fallen in love with Nike via internet pictures, I think I might have adopted her on the spot. I’m still debating whether I should, honestly.

We also met with Teri, who has a lot of potential to be someone’s sweetheart. She just needs some time to be a little more socialized. From the way it sounded, Teri was surprisingly great with us, despite getting a little upset when she backed herself into a corner. I really do hope she finds the right person someday, and I hope they can adopt her with her sister. That would probably be best for the both of them.

We also met with a cat named Cerise, who was a very cute and friendly calico, and a black DSH/Siamese mix named Suzy. Cerise was friendly, and Suzy was a little bit shy. Both where really nice cats that seemed like that had the potential to fit in with Coopie here at home.

And last, we got to meet a mama cat who had just been picked up with her 3 6-week-old kittens on Friday. The kittens were absolutely adorable, and I played with them a little with a feather stick. The calico was absolutely precious with her little tap-dancing routine around the feathers. She’d probably never seen one before, and she was so excited and eager to play. And the mother cat was so gorgeous. She was a Siamese/tabby mix with gorgeous blue eyes and the most mellow disposition. I’m also kind of interested in her, if her tests come back negative. I’d wait for the kittens to be weaned and for the mama to be spayed.

So, I guess I would still like to meet with Nike if at all possible, but I’m leaning pretty heavily towards Misty and the new mama right now. I’m being so cautious about the whole process of picking out a new cat. I just really want to feel sure I can bond with whichever cat I choose to bring home.

Dainty pawprint

I said goodbye to my kitty of 15 years on Friday. I could say it was time, but I’m still uncertain about whether I really believe that. It’s the hardest decision I’ve ever made. I really miss her.

Abalone in progress

I’ve started on a new knitting project: the Abalone [rav link] sweater. Hopefully this will be the first sweater I ever complete. I started the sweater back in March, about a week before Dragon Age II came out. That was a mistake, and I think I kind of realized it at the time, knowing how much time I threw into Dragon Age: Origins. I played through that game, completely, four times, and I do have one other in progress playthrough. So far, I’ve played through Dragon Age 2 three times, and I know there are at least two more playthroughs I want to do, but I’m done with the game for now. I’ve crawled out of my hole and started playing Nutsy Bolts with my CPaAGers again, picked up my knitting, started catching up on the TV I’d DVRed.

So, I started this sweater off back in March. I diligently calculated all the stitches I’d need at a particular time, based on some measurements I took, since the pattern uses percentages to let you size the sweater how you want it. I cast on 88sts, aiming for a sweater that was 35″ around, so it would gap and hang open. I plugged away, knitting as fast as I could, hoping to finish the thing before I lost a month and a half to two months of my life to DA2 that I knew was coming. I didn’t get nearly as far as I wanted, and by the time I finished the increase section, I knew something was off. As it was, without the edging, the sweater looked like it would be the appropriate size. And then I realized it: I’d forgotten about the edging!

In some ways, Dragon Age 2 came around at just the right time. It gave me enough time to set the sweater aside, mope about what I was going to have to do, and get over it, without it actively nagging and eating at me. I was able to pick the sweater back up a few weeks ago, frog it, and start from the beginning with a better set of numbers that will give me the correct fit. I’m beyond where I was before the frogging, and now I think I can finally finish this thing. I’m itching to start some new projects, and I’m very eager to get this done.

I was pretty pessimistic with my last post, but in the past couple of months, things have kind of turned around. About three weeks ago, I noticed the stumpy little plant I had left was creating offsets. First, it was just one large one, but now I count at least 4 in various places around the plant.

Recovering Sempervivum

Last night, I cleared away the top layer of soil and all the dead leaves, which were coated in the aphid-killing mixture, washed the pot and rinsed the plant. I wanted to get as much dirt and dust off the plant, so I can get a better assessment of whether the aphids are truly gone. They appear to be, but it’s so difficult to tell what is a piece of dirt and what is a plant murderer.

Part of the reason I need to know is because I’ve expanded my succulent collection to include an aloe, a kalanchoe, and a new echeveria. I was an inexplicable dumbass last summer and got rid of my echeveria in a bit of a fit, and I came to regret that decision. Having these new plants means my windowsill is much more crowded than it was previously, and I’d like to protect them  from any aphids, if they remain. Hopefully, they’ll be fine.

Well, I guess the key is that it started becoming un-fun. Less fun than playing Dragon Age 2, anyway.

I’m still taking pictures and contributing to Flickr sets and pools, but I’m not going out of my way to take inane pictures for the sake of having something. My life is just not interesting enough for me to have something of value to photograph each day. Every couple of days, maybe. And maybe it will get easier once the weather gets nicer, and I have more things going on both in the house and outside. The beginnings of a vegetable garden is coming along in my dining room, and we want to really put an effort into the yard this year. But for now, I’m only going to bother with the good stuff. If that means no pictures for a couple of days, that’s fine. Now no one has to suffer through 15 days of my cats.

It seems so early to be starting my garden, but since starting tomatoes from seed last year was so much fun, I thought I would try again this year. And this time, it’s not just tomatoes.

Carrots, zucchini, tomatoes, and peppers

I picked up a tray kit, which came with these really neat pellets where you just add water, and they expand like straw wrapper snakes into potting medium. The tray has 36 compartments, 6 rows of 6. I planted 2 rows of carrots, and one row each of peppers, zucchini, Roma tomatoes, and cherry tomatoes. I also used some potting soil I had around and an egg carton and made a second tray of all carrots.

Most of the seeds should germinate in about two weeks, so now I just sit and wait.

Noeud Papillion

I finished my hat!

It only took me an extra 26 days from the point where I noticed I was short on yarn to reknit it, which is probably pretty terrible for a hat. I was preoccupied with spinning projects, playing IloMilo on the Xbox, and being weirdly mopey/sick. And I had a challenging time with the decrease section, although by the time I got to that point, I was extremely committed to finishing the hat NAO NAO NAO that it didn’t set me back much on time.

The problem I was having was with figuring how the stitches needed to be arranged. On row 4, you’re instructed to put 31 sts on each needle, although originally at that point, I was still on a circular needle. After switching to dpns and setting up the stitches, the next few rows are knit all, followed by a round of p2togs. Prior to this round, there’s 124 sts on the needles, which means that after completing the round it’s not possible to have the same number of sts on each dpn. The instructions are a little vague at this point, but the idea for row 7 is to k the first and last st of each needle and then kfb the rest. This decreases 8 sts each repeat of the pattern.

I think my biggest issue was that I expected each dpn to have the same number of sts. Since the pattern said at one point to distribute the sts evenly across the needles, I was expecting to  have them stay that way. After the kfb round, I expected to have 29 sts on each needle, and that is just not possible. In the end, I frogged back to row 4 of the decreases, distributed my sts so that I had 30 on needles 1 and 3 and 28 on needles 2 and 4. Everything worked out dandy after I made that change.

It’s a really cute hat, and I’m happy with how it turned out, even if it did take me so much longer than any hat should have.