Nourish

Last night there was nourishment for my mind, my heart, and my belly. It was an easy dinner shared with a newer friend. Time was given for touching base, sharing laughs, and eating a meal designed to comfort.

Fresh Corn in Basil Butter

Roasted Chicken with Lemon and Fresh Herbs

Mac and Cheese with Gorganzola

Peanut butter and Raspberry Cheesecakes

Autumn

I am really trying to enjoy the heck out of fall each weekend. Work seems to be a bit more hectic and involved this year. I am making home just in time for dinner, which leaves me no time during the week to stop and peep at the leaves or engage in fun fall activities.

Since I finished my big order for MPM, I decided to treat myself to a trip up north for some exploring. To be honest, I really haven't gone up north since I moved here. Isn't that embarrassing?! I think it because when I have time for a little road trip, I typically go to Maine. Well, yesterday that all changed and I owe it all to Chronicle. Do you have Chronicle where you live? No? Well, you should. It's a quaint little newsmagazine show that keeps its audience in the know of all things New Hampshire. This week they did a two night feature on Castle in the Clouds. You know it's gotta be special when Chronicle does a two night feature.

I woke up early yesterday morning, hopped in my car, grabbed an iced coffee and drove up to Castle in the Clouds in Moultonburough. It was a bit warm yesterday, like August warm. Too warm for the end of September. It definitely felt a little bit odd to be cranking the AC on a trip to check out foliage, but I'm versatile, I went with it.

I won't give you the play-by-play of the day, but it was definitely filled with beauty and serenity, a bubbling waterfall, a trolly filled with Russians from Sheepshead Bay, remarkably fresh air, gorgeous colors, and a gratifying cheese dog from a little dairy bar on the way home.

Hats Off!

And finally, here are some pictures of the Pom-Pom Hats for Modern Printed Matter! Thanks for bearing with me and all these boring photos over the last few days. Now that I'm at the end of this little journey, I promise to get back to normal blogging. It is autumn in New Hampshire after all! There are beautiful things happening up here that I am dying to share with you. But, for today you just get hats!

In Iced Blue

In Navy

In Pumpkin

In Raspberry Swirl

In Shades of Purple

From Sweaters to Scarves

Round two of goodies for Modern Printed Matter: I present The Bow Tie Scarf!

In hunter green

In Rose

In butter

In Plum

In teal

In burnt orange

Sweaters

I am pretty much finished with my order for Modern Printed Matter, just need to add labels and tags, package it and send it on it's merry little way. I'm not gonna lie, I initially felt a little bit of stress about getting it all done. But once I got started, it became much more manageable. I figured that I would start by sharing the sweaters with you first. These provoked the most anxiety in my because I typically do them on a custom level. Which means one at a time. So producing 6-8 in a shortened amount of time was cause for a bit of concern on my behalf! I'll share the first five because six and seven aren't completely off the needles just yet!

Kimono Style in Shades of Violet

Daisy Sweater in Teal

Shrug in Plum

Hoodie in Shades of Cranberry

Kimono Style in Pumpkin

MIA

What a terrible blogger! I am so sorry that I haven't gotten here this week, it's not you, it's me. Ask my best friend, I can barely call her back! My excuse? I don't really have one. I've been working and knitting. Lots and lots of knitting. I am thisclose to finishing up the order for Modern Printed Matter, I also dropped off lots of new goodies to Sisters We Three in Newburyport on Monday. So there is an end in sight. Not so much. But I am not complaining because I have more great news!! I got the most lovely, ego boosting email on Wednesday telling me that my Pom-pom hats have been accepted to participate in Craftland! Seriously, this was one to the nicest emails that I have ever gotten. I think that I will keep it in my inbox for those less-than-confident-days. So, as soon as I finish up my MPM order, I will begin to make loads and loads and loads of baby hats!!

Bear with me over the next week~I promise to be more present and around. But it might be a bit boring, cause I have loads of finished hats, scarves, and sweaters to show off to you!

Sunday at the Shore

I woke up mid-allergy attack at 4:00am this morning. Sneezing, coughing, itchy throat, running nose; the whole nine yards. It was then that I decided that I would go to the beach in the morning. I actually contemplated going to the beach right then, but instead turned on the light and read my book for a bit. When I did wake up for reals, I waited for the coffee to brew and then decided to go to Dunkin' Donuts on my way. I realized yesterday that I am struggling to follow-thru on most anything these days. I blame it on being back to work.

It's cold out today. Cold might be an exaggeration, maybe cool is a better word. Regardless, I threw on a hoodie, a scarf, and some socks. This is my weekend uniform each fall, needless to say, I was a little excited. Fall is amazing up here. It's what northern New Englanders live for nine months of the year. The sky seems closer, the air feels cleaner, and the colors are beginning to show. I took my usual route to the coast and enjoyed a little Maine NPR. (As much as I love NH, Maine always seems to do things just a bit better.) So, today I keep my words to a minimum and share with you my morning through pictures.

(See those yellow flowers? I'm not sure what they are, but I am fairly certain that they are the cause of my daily allergy attacks. I curse them.)

(I confess, I actually took this photo post-"hurricane" last weekend, but it was too pretty not to share with you.)

Genius!

You should know what my favorite foods are. They aren't fancy because my taste buds are at the same level as my students. (Whose mean age is 4 years old.) And truthfully, I've really come a long way since moving out of my parents house 14 years ago. Now I eat chinese and mexican. Impressive, right? But back to my favorite comfort foods. Ready for this? Pizza and macaroni and cheese. You know the desert island question about what you would bring? I have four things on my list: 1. An endless supply of either pizza or macaroni and cheese. 2. Ice cold drinking water. 3. My blankie from childhood. 4. An endless supply of yarn to knit with.

Recently, I found a new twist on pizza that I had to try. Pizza cupcakes. Awesome idea, right? Perfectly portioned, lunch box friendly, and cute as can be! Let me show you how easy this is.

Step 1.

Open a bag of pizza dough. I'd like to pretend that I made pizza dough earlier today, but truthfully I came home from work and spent some quality time on facebook.

Step 2. Rip pizza dough into hunks. (That's the technical term, by the way.)

Step 3. Grease a cupcake pan.
Step 4. Press hunks of dough into each cup. And a tablespoon or two of your favorite pasta sauce, a favorite topping or two, (I chose shredded chicken today because I ate school lunch today and felt like I needed some actual protein in my life) and sprinkle with mozzarella cheese and slide into a 425 degree oven for roughly ten to twelve minutes.

Step 5. Remove from oven and let cool for a minute or two, if you can wait. In my opinion it is worth the wait so that you don't burn your tongue. Not that I know that from experience. Pop onto a plate and dig in. Good right? In my opinion, genius!

Goodies!

I took a trip into Boston to celebrate this little guy's 1st birthday on Sunday. It was an absolute perfect day. Sunshine, blue skies, and cool breezes. Perfect for a quick drive and some walking around time. So I headed out early. Ok not that early- I have to watch my Sunday morning news shows!

Initially I had planned to go to Ikea. A trip to Boston always brings Ikea to mind. Kind of a kill- two- birds-with -one- stone mentality. But then I realized that what I really, really wanted to do was visit Anthropologie. There is only one Anthropologie and it touches a little part of my heart every time I go there. Ok, it's true. I want to live there. I want my life to be filled with perfect and beautiful details. For my sweaters to be decorated with rosettes and my drawer pulls to be jeweled and my measuring cups to be hand painted. Is that too much to ask?

At Anthroplogie prices it is. So I settle for a visit every now and again. A chance to treat myself to something lovely and delicate. This time my focus was on my ears. Every school year I resolve that this will be the year that I look like a proper teacher. That I will brush my hair each morning and not throw it into a braid or top knot. That my clothes will be freshly pressed and clean. That I won't wear the same pair of Danskos each and every day. Of course by November, it all goes out the window, but I always hope that I will create new habits. This year I've decided that I should start wearing jewelry on a more regular basis. How hard can that be? I have a ton of it. And it all hangs on a lovely ceramic branch in my bathroom. All I have to do is put. it. on. Building a new habit warrants some motivation. So, I went in search of some new earrings. And I found these three pairs. Aren't they lovely? Now the challenge. To actually get them into my ears. Wish me luck!

How Not to Be Lonely

Many fellow bloggers are posting this video and I hate to jump on a band wagon, but it is too lovely, appropriate, and thoughtful to pass up. I hope that you enjoy it as much as I.

TV Time

I recently knit up my first pair of fingerless gloves for my friend Heather. Well, she did the best thing ever and recommended me to a friend who contacted me for another pair. She requested a yarn with shades of blue, teal, and apple green~a tall order, until I found this! Right on.

I really enjoy knitting these up, they are quick and have the perfect degree of

difficult. Hard enough so that I remain engaged while knitting, but easy enough that I am able to pay attention to the complex plot of Rubicon. Is anyone else watching this show? It's my new Alias

which was my new Twin Peaks. Anyways, it requires a good amount of focus to follow what is happening. That being said, I really have no idea what is happening, but I trust that they will straighten it out before the season is over. It is an AMC show after-all.

Anyways, I love how they turned out! a perfect size and length and will hopefully keep her hands toasty warm through our long winter.

Exciting News....

First, I apologize for being such a negative nelly yesterday! Today was a much better day, putting everything back in to perspective.

My Freshman year of college, I roomed with a lovely girl who grew up on an island off the coast of Maine. I didn't love that college, but I loved her. After transferring my sophomore year, Anna and I stayed in touch. She'd pop in for a visit when she came to Boston or New York and I'd stop in for a visit with her when I was in Rhode Island. We didn't talk often, but it never seemed to matter.

In many ways, Anna and I couldn't have been more different. She was quiet, I was a loudmouth. She was crazy intelligent, I almost lost my mind in whatever fundamental freshman science class was required. She was always patient and sweet, I get frustrated and irritated easily. Basically, we fit. Our room was at the far end of the hall, across from the RA, which was fine by us. Neither one of us were doing anything that might get us in trouble. Seriously.

After any performance (I was a theatre major at the time. Listen, I was young, I didn't know any better, ok?!) I would come home to a handmade card from Anna congratulating me. And it was always amazing. It always left me wondering why I couldn't make a marker and paper do the things that she could make them do. Her thoughtfulness always made my day.

Well, Anna went on to become this amazing, famous, super star designer. All by herself. Ok, her equally talented hubby helped out a bit along the way. She started with Etsy, opening her little design biz before Etsy hit the masses. And she pretty much became aninstant hit. Ya know those people that have hundreds of sales? She has thousands. Seriously. And soon she started selling in some shops here and there and soon after that, she was selling everywhere. From there her work started to pop up in trendy magazines that you and I read like Domino and Martha Stewart and dozens of others. Finally, she realized that she was so damn good at this that she opened a shop in Rhode Island where she sells all of her goodies, and other handmade loveliness that she picks from Etsy and other venues. This is where I come in.

Last week, Anna contacted ME to sell some items at her store. Crazy, right? I mean, her store is tops! It was voted Best of Rhode Island and she wants to sell my bow tie scarves, hats, and baby sweaters! I'm so excited and overwhelmed and flattered. This will be the second shop that I sell my goods at which makes me feel sort of legit. Like I might actually be making some sorta, kinda small business over here in my own little corner of the world. Which is validating and motivating and just plain good. And the fact that this is Anna's shop makes it special and nice. It all makes me wonder what our 18 year-old selves would have though if they knew that this was gonna be us at 32.

So, if you are looking for me over the next week or two, I'll be knitting. She wants 6-8 baby sweaters and I've only got one off the needles! Knit, purl, knit, purl, knit...

Back to School

This week so far, in list form.

1. Locked my keys and a full cup of coffee in my car on Saturday morning. Thankfully it was at a local farmers market that friends also happened to be at. They saved the day! They took me to buy another coffee.

2. Woke up at three am, Monday morning with food poisoning. Or a virus. Either way, it wasn't pretty.

3. Did I mention that my toilet broke over the weekend and I thought I had fixed it? Well, I hadn't.

4. Monday was the first day of school and I was stinkin' sick.

5. It was 90 degrees on Monday.

6. I was still not feeling well when I got home, so I took my temperature. A cool 101. Because it wasn't hot enough outside.

7. It's been in the 90's all week. My classroom isn't air conditioned. And it is very sunny.

8. I come home each afternoon after sweating for eight hours straight and feel like a walking salt lick.

9. I hear that there is a hurricane coming just in time for the four day weekend. Super.