fried chicken...gluten-free!

Before going gluten-free I didn't eat fried chicken very much, but it was one of those dishes that I would really crave from time to time. Maybe once every two months. There are no restaurants that sell a GF version of fried chicken, so when I realized I hadn't had any in 8 months, I knew I was going to have to try some at home.

My brother had recommended my sister-in-law's recipe for Paleo fried chicken, but I waited until I was literally DYING for a fix to attempt it. I didn't have all of the ideal ingredients (and I really don't know how to fry chicken), and it was STILL deliciously amazing, and also amazingly delicious.

How-to:
Split chicken breasts and season as normal. Take three bowls and put coconut shreds in the first, coconut flour in the second, and a few whipped eggs in the third. Coat the chicken in egg, dredge in flour, coat in egg again, and roll in loose coconut. Fry in coconut (or olive) oil until golden brown and fully cooked.

I think I might try bone-in chicken next time...and I might start it in the pan and finish it in the oven. I might need to invest in a cast-iron skillet. Oh the (golden, fried) possibilities...

one-row lace scarf

I saw this pattern, in this yarn (Polaris), as a shop sample and it did nothing for me. Then my friend Meg knit it in the tuxedo colorway and I suddenly loved it. Go figure.

Anyway, I knitted it in the week leading up to Thanksgiving and then promptly forgot to post it.
It was a fun and quick knit...I definitely recommend it (and so does Jose's grandmother, who used it to stay warm over Thanksgiving)!

you like purple, right?

I've had the Bella Mittens queued for forever. Like, before I knew how to knit in the round, before I ever thought I could learn to do cables, and certainly before I had ever considered watching or reading the Twilight books. Now...forever later, I've done all these things and I still want to knit the mittens. Plus, I'm going to Alaska...I'll need mittens, right?

I had the idea that I would knit them in Madeline Tosh chunky. The problem? It would require two skeins. So...$20 mittens would be $40 mittens...and I couldn't bring myself to do it. I started searching for a suitable substitute, but no matter how I diced it, I was going to be spending $20 and none of the colors were right. I eventually realized that I had enough natural chunky in my stash, so I cooked up a batch.

It's not the exact color I was going for, but I really do love it. I love the subtle variations in color as they look on the skein, but I'm anxious to see how it looks when it's knit.

I was trying to think of a colorway, and since it's a Twilight-inspired pattern, it seemed only appropriate to have a Twilight-inspired colorway name..."you like purple, right?"

Hear this, Congress!

SIGN THE PETITION!

clean dishes ftw!

This was the first year that I did any extensive knitting for Christmas, and I completely forgot to post about a few of my projects. I knitted two identical sets of dishcloths for Jose's mother and grandmother. I still haven't used a hand-knitted dishcloth, but everyone says they are great, so I'll keep making them (and eventually keep a few for myself). Seriously, they both squealed about their dishcloths. I knitted his grandmother a shawl as well, and I think she was more excited about the dishcloths. Who knew?

A big shout-out to my friend Meg for supplying me with cotton from her stash. The colors all went together well and made the presentation *that* much better!

what's the deal with bucket lists anyway?

I've been working on a bucket list. Does anyone really have a list? Like a real one - on paper, or in a journal, or on a blog? When there's something that I've always wanted to do or really, really WANT to do now, I'll claim it's a bucket list item, but is it? And is there a limit to how many bucket list items you can have? What are the rules to this whole thing? I mean, please tell me.

In the meantime, I think one of my bucket list items is to visit every state. I spent most of my life wishing to go to Europe, the Caribbean, any place but the U.S. Then my very wise friend Margaret said "sweet pea, you should see America first, it's really a very beautiful country". I didn't see her truth then, but I do now. Thus far, my travels are petty:



A secondary goal is to buy local yarn/visit a LYS in every state. Since I haven't been a knitter my whole life, I've only done this in a handful of states:


If things go as planned, I'll add three more states to both maps this year - Seattle, Alaska, and California. Game on, y'all.

WIP Wednesday: Déjà vu

How many times will my honey cowl be featured as my WIP before I actually finish it? Shortly after my last post, I realized that, 1 - I had twisted the stitches when I joined in the round, and 2 - I had dropped a stitch and the person who helped me pick it up, did it wrong. The twist made me mad, but I could have handled it. The dropped stitch mishap? No.


So I swore off the entire project. Ripped it out, put the yarn back on the shelf and started looking for a new project. But I kept seeing people with their finished honey cowl...on Ravelry, in magazines, and amongst my friends. So I decided to begin again, and I'm super glad that I did. I'm right at halfway done, and the pattern is now mindless. Great TV/meetup project. I hope that the next time I'm posting about it, it'll be finished and blocked. Fingers crossed.

Side note: I've changed my mind a thousand times on whether I'm a fan of this colorway (I'd like it with more blue). My friend Melanie said it looks like a mermaid's tail and I've loved it ever since!

fuchsia swagger

I love Noro yarn. I pretty much feel like you can never go wrong. With any of it. I've heard people say that it isn't soft enough, but if you've used it as much as I have, you know it gets softer. And the colors hold up, it's high quality stuff.

Recently I've noticed that they have some solid and subtly striped yarn, which is a nice change up from the all-colorful, all-the-time thing. On the Autumn 2011 Triangle Yarn Crawl, I saw this fuchsia Noro and had to, had to, had to have it. Had to. The shop had a pair of fingerless mitts as a shop sample (in a different yarn), but my friend Meg decided that we could use this yarn to make that pattern, so I bought the yarn. Meg then realized that that pattern was like $6.50. Cannot do it. Cannot, cannot, cannot. BUT she suggested the Karin wristwarmers, and I loved them just as much.

I put the yarn in my stash and forced myself to finish some other projects before getting started. Along the way, I picked up some fuchsia Lion's Brand that I thought would make a nice accompanying cowl. It's no perfect match, but it goes alright.

Fingerless gloves pattern: very fun to knit. This was the first time that I really used a chart, and it wasn't nearly as intimidating as I thought it would be. I love the way it turned out. This yarn exhausted my hands, probably because it has cotton in it. Still, totally worth it for the final result.

Cowl: I cast on 24 and knit every stitch until it was the length I wanted, then I seamed it together. Eh. The look is fine, but I do hate this yarn. When I first started knitting, I tried (and failed) to knit a poncho with it. I thought it was just a rookie mistake or something, but no, it's awful. It slides and bunches and is very frustrating. Probably won't use it again. Unless there's some epic project that requires it.

Hooray for holiday knitting!

new year, new goals

Last year when I was setting my goals, my brother recommended that I set deadlines and stagger them throughout the year. Yeah, that didn't happen. Since I only met 3 of my 5 goals, I decided to give the staggered deadlines a try.

March 1, 2012 - Take down the window boxes in front of our house. Seriously, they look awful. They were thinly built and time has really taken a toll on them. I had planned to take them down last Fall, but I ran out of time and motivation. I need to empty them of a million pounds of dirt, demo, putty, clean, and paint the surface behind the boxes. First quarter project, no excuses.

April 21, 2012 - Participate in SPCA K9 3K Fundraiser. Last year I had a small team that raised nearly $500 for the SPCA of Wake County (which is where we got the Berg). We were a little late to the game, and I think we could contribute much more this year if we get started earlier and recruit a few more participants! If you're interested in donating, keep any eye out - I'll be posting our team info soon.

June 1, 2012 - Assemble a hurricane preparedness kit in time for hurricane season. I know that we don't get hit this far inland very often, but it HAS happened and we need to be prepared.

August 31, 2012 - Finish painting the kitchen cabinets. I should be - scratch that - I AM really ashamed of the fact that I haven't finished them already. I haven't touched this project in a long, long time, and I have to just buckle down and do it. For real.

December 31, 2012 - Have zero knitting projects in progress. Nothing on the needles, nothing needing to be blocked, nothing needing to be seamed together. I want to start 2013 with a completely clean project slate. If December has to be the month of finishing things, so be it!

Sliding deadline goals:

Regarding yarn...

learn colorwork knitting

complete a lace shawl

learn to crochet

knit a pair of Cookie A socks

Work on my Spanish. My Father-in-law said he's going to call a few times a week and that we will only talk in Spanish, but as of right now, those would be very VERY short conversations. I'd like to work through the first part of Rosetta Stone Spanish before we go on our family vacation in May, but the time between now and then will be CRAZY for me. Both at work and personally. So I'm not committing to that time frame, but I'd like to get 'er done.

Read 15 books. I read 12 last year and I think I can do better. My main problems are that I go through reading binges where that's all I do, and then I completely don't read for months at a time. Also, I finish a series and am so sad it's over, I go into a reading slump. So setting this goal is really more about managing those extremes. For example, right now I'm in the middle of a 10 book series and I got majorly bummed out about a character kicking the bucket...so instead of hammering down to find out what happens, or completely giving up, I am now reading the Hunger Games. When I finish that series, I'm sure I'll be sad, but then I'll have the other one to go back to. Yes, it's genius, I know.

Post at least one blog per week. That means I have to be doing something interesting or taking photos of something interesting at least once every 7 days. No promises, but I will surely try!