Knitted sweater and better weather!

I have curtailed my baking quite a bit, but one of my favorite baking websites is Sally's Baking Addiction.  She has a monthly baking challenge that I just started participating in, and I love it!  The September challenge:  piping sunflower cupcakes.  I bought my ingredients and set aside some time, only to discover that I didn't have the right leaf tip needed to pipe the cupcake petals.  ARGH!  I substituted a different tip, but between the incorrect tip and the near-90s temps, my petals were a little droopy.

Todd's office still liked them!

I also made one of my old standbys, half chocolate chip and half chocolate cookies.

And now that it's basically PUMPKIN SEASON (despite the forecast of, you guessed it, near 90s again by the end of the week), I'll be baking a lot more.  Next up, oversize pumpkin muffins with crumb topping and browned butter oatmeal pumpkin cookies with cinnamon chips.  Hooray for my favorite season!

Despite my sore fingers, I'm knitting on.  I started knitting a pair of gloves, but chose a yarn that contained silk.  Silk doesn't have any "give" (like cotton) and kills my fingers.  So I quit halfway through...

...and re-knitted in green wool.  I knitted the right glove in the Portuguese style, but my fingers hurt so much by the end that I used my old "clutch and throw" method for the left glove.  As you can see, it's significantly smaller, but fits so much better.  The right glove is a bit too big but will work (I'm thinking about layering with those small, tight gloves from Target).  I blocked the left glove after this picture was taken to make it a little bit bigger, so the difference is less noticeable.  Layering gloves will be fine because my hands are always so cold!

I also finished my sweater...hooray!  I knitted it to be two sizes smaller than I am currently, but since I knitted it in the Portuguese style, I think it's only one size too small.

I had a friend at the gym model it (she's a size S/M) so that I could at least see how the neck laid on the shoulders.  Taking into account both poor lighting and a poor fit on my model - I love it!  It's all blocked and waiting for cooler weather.

I have been working on my Snails quilt, but very slowly.  Our cats are very pleased with this development.  If I leave a piece of fabric out too long, a cat will claim it.

The same goes for quilts.  My Snails quilt has been in the machine so long that the cats think I've really been making them a giant bed.

I've finally had to admit to myself that while I love choosing and cutting fabric and love the actual piecing of a quilt, I despise the actual quilting of it.  I've practiced and practiced...

...but despite the addition of a quilting table, special gloves, and a slippery surface to quilt on, I stink. For my Snails quilt, I chose to quilt a giant concentric circle.  I thought it would be really easy.  But you're constantly rotating the quilt, shoving it through the tiny throat space again and again...such a pain.  Also, when quilting concentric circles, you have to stop and start (when adjusting fabric) every few inches or so.  When you start quilting again, your needle jumps, leaving an obvious jag in the line.

I was ready to pull my hair out, but thankfully someone advised me to "pool" the fabric around the needle before starting to stitch again, and that does minimize the jag.  Todd suggested that I bite the bullet and pay someone to do my quilting - it costs around $130 - but so far I'm stubbornly sticking to it.  I'm forcing myself to put in 30 minutes a day and hopefully it will be done within a couple of weeks!

Speaking of cutting up fabric, I got a package of fabric scraps through the Random Acts of Kindness forum on Ravelry.  I *love* receiving random scraps of fabric.  I took a couple of hours on Saturday and cut them up into common fabric sizes:  2", 2.5", 3", 3.5", 4", and 5".  I also have 1.5", 2", and 2.5" strips.

I would probably never purchase, say, watermelon-print fabric...but it's going to be so fun to use in a scrap quilt!

We're slowly sliding into fall in South Carolina.  Cooler evenings mean Scrabble time by the pond.

Todd is finally able to do some home improvement projects in comfort, like digging a water-diverting trench around the house.

Here's hoping for more cooler days ahead - SOON.  Have a great week!

Browned Butter Takes the Cake

When the weather dropped alarmingly into the 40s and 50s this week (gasp!), I realized how spoiled I'd become with South Carolina's warm weather.  I closed all the windows, washed a load of thick sweaters and swaddled myself in layers, then cranked the heat up.  I bemoaned my lack of fingerless gloves and wrapped up in a blanket when Todd and I ate supper on the sun porch.  He laughed and then reminded me of many of the things I love about fall.

Like...cozy fires down by the pond.

We love to play Scrabble down there when it starts to get chilly.

 

The night sky is so beautiful...

Todd won, but only because he had some extra help (ahem):

Another fall favorite:  early morning hikes.  I love to gather little bits of twigs, leaves, and berries for bouquets.

I love to see the leaves starting to change.

Other little reminders, too.

And look at these strange, beautiful flowers I found pushing up through the pine needles!

I don't feel quite so chilly when I'm distracted by these things!

I'm doing quite a bit of fall baking.  I found an amazing apple cake recipe last week and have made it multiple times in various forms.  

Bundt cake.

Mini bundts.

Cupcakes.

Now, I don't traditionally like apple cake.  I find it disconcerting to bite into a soft bit of cake and come across a chewy - but usually hard - morsel of apple.  I have to admit that I love this recipe, though.  It's become one of my favorites!  The apple slices are incredibly tender and flavorful, the cake is spicy, and the browned butter frosting takes it way, way over the top.  It is best in its traditional bundt or mini bundt form.  The batter is incredibly thick, so the cupcakes didn't rise, but spread, and sank in the center.  I thinned out the frosting a bit and piped a healthy amount on top to hide the sinkhole, but the cupcakes are so dense and sticky...I'm going back to the bundt.  Very soon.   The original recipe is here, at the Cookies and Cups website.  Now, because I can't leave well enough alone, I added a cup of cinnamon chips and additional spices (1/4 - 1/2 teaspoon of cardamon, cloves, ginger, and nutmeg) to the cake batter.  I also decreased the powdered sugar in the frosting by a half cup to let the taste of the browned butter really shine through.  You really, really need to try this recipe.  It's amazing.

I've been knitting, too.  I finished one project...

...and am starting on a pair of those fingerless gloves I've been needing.  I also pulled out an old handknit, the first sweater I ever made for myself.

 

Here's the detail:

 

This sweater was a major splurge for me.  I had the yarn custom dyed in England because I wanted a cheerful minty-green and white sweater for winter and early spring.  Sigh...isn't it beautiful?

The sweater itself is very light, with three quarter-length sleeves.  It was an easy stockinette knit and didn't take too long, even with fingering-weight yarn.

I decided to make it a small sweater for my goal weight.  I was sad to fold it up and put it away in 2011, but I was so happy to unwrap it recently and wear it around.  I'm still 15 - 20 pounds away from goal, but I think the sweater will still fit then.  Hooray for handknit sweaters!

Have a great week!