Sunday, March 31, 2013

easter once again.

Watching the bible on the History Channel as I type this blog. Okay, I am doing two things at once but I have watched it before and I have been absent from here for several days. As I have a pile of papers to grade this should probably wait but i will grade in the evening.

Easter always brings a renewal of things for me so I tend to make Easter resolutions rather than the other kind. My mind is clearer when the sun is shining and the chances of ice are less. Going to set up a cleaning schedule and do a little each day. It as worked pretty well during break and the big end of the season thing is not so daunting and I want to list the knitting ufo's in a finishing plan. Bahaus fair isle is so close just 18 rows , second sock is close to the end also, ready to start the back of the Pern and these are listed to get done while I enjoy myself with the Aran. I get a bit bored so that explains the ufo's. Some go in time outs, others are new methods to learn, and others a matter of loving a yarn or a pattern. But most of the new this year will be planned Christmas presents. Not every one will get one due to time and dollars, but some will if I see something they will like(I hope) and use.

Ham is in the oven with new potatoes (yukon gold). It will feed me for over a week as once again I am alone for the holiday event. The penalty for not living in my children's areas and for having them as independent as I am. This is not a bad thing. They are there when I am in need as a couple of heart things have proven. We do not call daily or visit a lot due to busy schedules, but the love connection is there. Guess there is no cling in this mother. Good or bad? Time will tell as age catches up with me. My acceptance of the physical distance is in part due to the fact that all my relatives other than my parents lived far away from my homes in Nebraska and Missouri. Ohio and Pennsylvania were the family filled states.

Friends and faith as well as family fill my world. A cup of tea at a friend's home,lunch with another at a new cafe, knitting and nattering with others at Yarn, letters and cards from others who are further away are daily blessings. Age, economics etc do not matter; common interests, exchange of ideas and events. compassion, and so many other things make them work. They are for me the best of the gifts God has blessed me with after my daughters and family. He as blessed me well.

Easter with the resurrection is for me a new beginning-- a new spring. It is a time to reflect, to remember, to resurrect plans. to renew my life more than the New Year is. Once again it is time to bloom where I am planted. May you do the same.


Wednesday, March 27, 2013

flavorings recipes from life, cleo coyle, and Susan Witting Albert

Bailey's Irish Cream as an ingredient is delicate but sin in a bottle. I have several recipes calling for it--- a cheese cake, and icing on top of Guiness( yes Guiness)cupcakes but my favorite is the newest--Bailey's Irish Cream Coffee Poke cake. It is so easy. first enhance a cake mix , then wen cool poke it and top with a glaze of coffee and baileys and then bailey flavored powdered sugar Frosting. The recipe can be found at mysterloverskitchen.com. Calories galore,moist. sweet lush what other words can I use.To save my a1c results and hips, I took this to Yarn.

Another recipe favorite is from the Darling Dahlia series. It is a molasses cookie that is close to my gran's.Sweet yet spicy, it is best made in smaller cookies and is just the thing with cold milk. I do admit to stumbling on a variation that I like. Once when short on some of the spices it calls for I used pumpkin pie spice and it was great. Susan's books always have good eats in the back and they are not the usual ordinary ones just as Cleo Coyle's in the coffee house series are taste tempting and new twists. by the way the cake mentioned above will be in her new book.

Another cooking author and great read is Joanna Fluke's series set in Minnesota. No wonder I have hips. Reading these books sends me to the kitchen and ten to Yarn or to school with the results. I really do not think anyone minds.

Growing up the kitchen was a safe place. Gran's always had a blue roaster full of cookies. The molasses one, and orange flavored sugar cookies with a orange flavored glaze and my favorite raisin filled rounds that melted in the mouth. Mom baked but her true talent was found in mealtime comfort food. Her meatloaf and pot roast are memories that I have yet to be able to reproduce or maybe I actually have and they lack her jokes to be perfect. Beef Stew and mac and cheese just mentioning those words fills my mind wit memories of petite tornado that was my mom. I have inherited her love of coffee, kitchens, sardonic humor but not her love of house work.

Before I leave this page , I have to mention The Old Black Witch books of my girls' childhoods. They loved the pumpkin bread chick full of raisins and nuts baked in one pound coffee cans and the cranberry bread recipes featured in the series. While the oldest more an outdoor gal as she grew up, all three are good cooks but I do not remember teaching them. Genes, observation and 4h must have done the deed.

If you want recipes, I will share,or you could read te books.



Tuesday, March 26, 2013

Frustration is thinking everything is going right and realizing it isn't. My aran went to error land this pm. Actually probably did it earlier but i caught it tonight. So it is off the needles and my frustration level is not doing well as i can feel the level rising. Still I plan on staring it over tomorrow. I will get it going. Anyway knitting is another life lesson, you can always pick up and going forward is a possibility in any situation when life is off the needles. Do have my sock to the point it needs to be for Saturday's class, the back of the PERN is done and the other sock is ready for the gusset.

It is Tuesday of spring break and i realized I have to go get my plates for 2013-- another chore for tomorrow. Also Wednesday is the hump day and the break will wind down. Monday we start over in school and have four weeks to polish off the year ten four weeks off until college classes start if they make. If they do not fill I will have four months off before I teach again. I may get used to not having anything to do or a set schedule. A taste of coming full retirement and I am sure It is near maybe one year; maybe 2.

Easter is a season of new beginnings-- a new start granted to us by one man's willingness to give His life for all of ours.He bore the pain our errors when we went off the pattern and had to reset the stitches of our lives. It was a great gift and I for one am grateful.



Monday, March 25, 2013

Celebrate Waffle Day with a waffle frolic. The waffle is descended from the oublie, a flat cake cooked between two hot plates and stamped with a crucifix, used in the celebration of the Eucharist. Sometime in the 13th century, a craftsman forged the plates in a honeycomb pattern; in Holland, the resulting cake was called a wafel. The word appeared in America in 1744, when a lady wrote to a friend, after a supper party: "I was not a little grieved that so luxurious a feast should have come under the name of a wafel frolic." Thanks Susan Albert Wittig for the new thoughts for today Marc 25-waffle day.

New perspectives? How many times has this phrase been needed in life. I know my life has been made up of new perspective several times. My family moved often so my grade school years were at three schools and high school and college were at two. I have taught in three states, studied in Arkansas and England, married, motherhood and divorce. Each one caused me to shift focus and priorities and step forward into the unknown. Scary yes but the treasures found along the way were immense. Tree daughters who with their families are the core of my life though we do not live in each other's pocket. Memories of events that can still warm the inner spirit and learning that no one can take away. My life is richer because of the step off from the comfort and known into a new perspective.

I used to worry and fret when a new slant on life presented itself. I do less of that now. About 1992 driving back from Nebraska and a visit to my mother who never once called me by my name( I was Sara, my daughter or Anna Mae, her sister,) I hit a snowstorm that matched the the storm of tears in my eyes. Then suddenly the ditches were full of deer-- the white tailed variety that see cars as hurdles to be jumped. Then the God moment came and I said OK you have me here God. You are in charge. since that day I have not fretted over what ifs in life. Yes I worry but I do not stress and fret about the facts that I cannot change. He is in charge and I follow doing what I can and then letting go so He can.


Sunday, March 24, 2013

Snow last night; sun today. Moisture for the dry earth of my chosen state. not much here but western Kansas and the Nebraska border lands had a real downfall.So once again He shows us that he can care, but I fear the summer heat which mimics the heat of his wrath.Yet his plans for us are always good if not easy to understand or endure.

The vikings on the history channel has an avid viewer in me and also the Bible. What interests me is the Christianity of the latter side by side with the brutality and paganism of the former. A contrast to be sure and both are great viewing. The Bible retells familiar tales and well enacted but somehow lacks the passion and presentation of the Vikings. Perhaps the Vikings attracts me as it is a rendition of the era that rings true and one that is unknown to us. The Bible also rings true do not misread me but at times, it seems serene and calm. Not a bad thing but the bloody swords of the Vikings clashing is more energetic. Cecil De Mille's epics may not have been accurate to text but they exuded passion and drama. One felt part of the tale, and in this new rendering that power to feel part of it is for me anyway lacking.

So I need to get to the needles and work on something. Much of it has to wait until Tuesday when I will steek and spend most of t day in the shop getting ufo's in line to finish,and some rows on the aran. Tomorrow te shop is closed so house and papers are the target. Will also get some naps in and some writing other tan this.

Writing now there's an item. Today on CBS' Sunday morning they had a segment on a 71 year old erotic romance write. she plans her scenes with the use of barbie dolls to see if what she writes is possible. Hmmm! Her publisher and she insist te story is more important than the sex but the samples she read put much emphasis on the words. Porn or erotic romances what is the difference? Should I try this genre? After all according to the report several writers earn a million or more a year. Not to brag I think I could do as well as 50 shades in the writing as being an English prof I should have better style but do I want to be remembered for that?

Dogs are settled. time to check email and work on some other writings.










Saturday, March 23, 2013

Ok I should have gone to the grocery store yesterday. The cupboard here is a mother hubbard clone at the moment Now it is colder and some spotty precip going on. Really, I had a good excuse---dog groomer and her van were due at the house. So now I have clean but hungry dogs. Cheerios and yogurt for them and coffee for me.

Actually her visit and nice weather combined so I got the car dejunked. Funny how it can fill with yarn, sweaters and various other items. somewhat spiffier now. Just hope I did not toss something I will need later. Tat is so easy to do. But until that OMG moment happens te car is nicer than it has been. Also used the shark steam mop for the first time. Floors look good and it was just a quick try out run and i know bugs are killed. Am sure this will be a once a week routine.

Spring break has begun and it can snow if it wants to but hope it holds off the heavy stuff until after mass on Sunday as I lector at early mass. Nothing much planned but a lot of reading, knitting, and just quiet no rush living. I am so greateful tat the juco and the high school have break at the same time. It is a God thing in my life.

D2's orange, teal and black beanie is n the mail. Tuesday i steek the fair isle sweater and voila a cardigan! ave entrelac to get back too and socks to finish. Yes socks actually have 2 on the needles so I may finish a pair in this week. Teacher Marlo will be happy and I will be amazed. Big knit project this week is my Multicabled Aran sweater. Have nine ropws done and want to get more done so I can see it bloom. It is a Starmore pattern. I love her stuff and norah guaghan"s. I hope to take a Beth Reisel-Brown gurnsey workshop but I have her dvd if I can not get it done. Tat is my next pattern to attempt for the challenge of it. About to cast on a sweater for a baby due in July.

So now to venture out to get supplies in case it is a bad one. The dogs are sleeping so I will let them lie.(snicker here). Later.




Friday, March 22, 2013

Last day of classes before Spring Break. Notice the capitals. I am as ready as the students for the ease of no tests, no classes, and idle time. Our seniors are doing Senior Presentations and the smarter ones to my mind have scheduled theirs for before the break. But most are going after the break and I hear both staff and students bemoaning the unfinished but required research for the project. Procrastination is never good--- and judging is basically faculty this year. That means no little old ladies to be impressed by cute decorations or the fact the student is related to their bingo pal so the judging may be a little harder. Some have only 1 judge listed. If I were a senior,I would hope beyond all limits that i had 2 judges to balance the outcome. This is new this year and we will see out it goes.

The weathermen are all over the map---slight flurries today, big dump over the weekend or vice-versa. Whatever is sent we need the moisture and i have no have to night driving this week so it can come. I am to lector at 8:00 AM mass Sunday, so my hope is our moisture gift is fairly light. Moisture is a gift in Kansas lately. recently we have had snow and rain but the drought is not broken yet. Therefore wetness is welcome in any form.

Tuesday I will finally steek my fair isle sweater which means I will cut my knitting to make the tube into a cardigan. It works. I have even cut stitches in a good friend's steek but I still get chills when I realize it is my sweater's turn. Steeking is like life it has to be done to make the sweater useable but it causes fear just as in life stepping into the new can cause fear. Once done the steek creates more beauty and in life taking that step can make all the difference.

My life has been "steeked "several times. Mother hood was a big step and it is still steeking as each new level of the relationship is revealed. Divorce was more of a rip than a steek but the aftermath has left me stronger and need I say happier. Teaching is also like motherhood a constant process so the steeking of living goes on.

There are other knitting terms that can be metaphors for life. Binding off for ending eras or relationships. casting on for new relationships etc but one that speaks to me is trust the pattern.Make that trust HIM because He works in wonderful ways just as all the twists and turns of an Aran cable pattern creates beauty in a sweater do not
always seem to work in the first repeats. The result if you trust will create something worthwhile.



Thursday, March 21, 2013

So here I am after an absence of weeks. I so need to be here. writing and knitting are my release valves and I have needed to write.Was it lack of inspiration? No excuse there as my teaching daily inspires me in some way and can equally cause me to question am I doing it correctly. I know that seems a paradox but I do want to do it well. Maybe that is why after all these years I am still challenged and still seeking. I know that teaching the same thing in the same way for years has never been my style. I teach the same material but not same lesson plan.

Spring break is next week from both schools and I am like all my co-workers looking forward to it. No particular plans are made but in the days off I hope to clean the car, house, reorganize my stash and finish at least two "ufo's" now on my needles. Then I am going to write and veg. Hope the emphasis is on the former rather than the latter.

This is brief but I vow to do better. Right now I have to review my plans for French today.