Vegan Cleanse: Day Six, Day of Fail

Today started out really well, I had a bowl of gluten free cereal, with coconut milk for breakfast. Then I watched church this morning, except for the internet was a little glitchy. I watch Church of the Resurrection United Methodist every Sunday morning. Then, while the internet was spazzing out I made vegan banana pancakes. I made them really thick.

In a blender I put about a cup of coconut milk, a banana and a cup of gluten free oats, and I blended it. Then once it was blended I cooked the pancakes, about two spoonfuls per each pancake in a skillet on medium high heat. I saved the pancakes in the fridge, and I'm going to eat them for breakfast this week. This will help me in the morning, making it easier to get out the door in time.

I also made Jasmine rice in the rice maker, just so I would have more of it pre-made to put in dishes this week.

For lunch I put about a cup of rice on a plate, and then put about half a cup of green chile refried beans on top. The I microwaved it for a minute, and put black bean salsa on top of it. It was good and filling.

I watched some Olympic Judo, and then decided to work out myself. I planned to run on the elliptical for 10 minutes, and then be on the bike for 35 minutes. I did not succeed in this goal. I did run on the elliptical for 10 minutes. It was rough, and I was sweating profusely, but no pain no gain, right? While I was on the elliptical I watched the dramatic last few minutes of the Women's Cycling event. Anyways, I got on the bike, and was pedaling as best I could, but at 20 minutes I just hit a wall, and couldn't push through. So, I only exercised 30 minutes total today, but it was pretty rough on me, so I think it was a good hard workout.

After exercising I watched some more Olympics. And then I went to the all church picnic with my mom, and that's where I fell down.

I tried to eat as clean as I could, and I didn't eat any meat, but I did eat cheese and pasta. If I'm completely honest I could've just skipped the pasta salad, or not eaten the pasta part. And I really didn't need to eat the macaroni and cheese, but sometimes things are really tempting, and I only have so much willpower. Then I started having anxiety, and I came home without hearing any music or playing any games. I knit just a little, but overall, didn't accomplish a lot.

Then I came home, and coffee was calling my name, it had been five days since I had had any coffee, and I couldn't finish the drink that I made myself. I put it in the fridge for tomorrow morning, so I can have coffee at the all-district training session. I think I will pack my lunch tomorrow and hope for the best.

Vegan Cleanse: Day Three and Four

So yesterday was another lazy day, and I ate my vegan diet with no interruptions, or exceptions. I did go to UMKC with my mom to get my classes set up, and I'm now enrolled and have my books and am ready to start getting along with being a student there again. I then went to Costco, and the temptations were everywhere! Costco gives out samples, and not much was both vegan and gluten free, although I did find a few things, and things were a lot better than they've been in the past. There was a lot of gluten free products that they were marketing, so that was kind of fun to see. I don't think veganism will catch on to be as much of a craze as gluten free has though, but maybe that's just me.

I came home and made a smoothie, and saved half of it for this morning, which was a good thing, because this morning was a bit of a doozy!

I then went to shallow water aerobics, and got wore out by the class, that hasn't happened to me in a while, and it was a really strange feeling to be just beaten by a series of exercises. I was really trying to keep up too. It made me think either this diet isn't that great for being active, or I'm not in as good of shape as I delude myself to be, maybe a combination of both. At any rate I came home and went to bed, exhausted, and then...

I woke up when I had planned to wake up, ate a bowl full of gluten free granola with coconut milk, and drank the rest of my smoothie. Then I went to the site that I thought I would be training at this morning, only to find that it was the wrong site, so I got to my designated site, I thought 10 minutes late, but it turned out that they had started at 8:00 and not 8:30, so I was 40 minutes late. Oh, and it was raining when I came in, so I was soaked when I made my late appearance, and had to sit there in damp clothes for the training. And I felt so awkward already that I didn't even get out my knitting, although I will give them that it was pretty interactive and engaging, so I didn't really feel bored either.

On my way home I was having some serious cravings, most seriously for Taco Bell, and then for Chinese food. But I did not give in to either, and came home and ate rice with mushrooms, peppers, onions, and black bean salsa for lunch. It was pretty tasty, but it's hard to say no to oozy gooey cheesy Taco Bell, or maybe that's just my weak point.

Then I came home and slept because I was still worn out from water aerobics, and now I'm up and about making brown rice pasta, having eaten sweet peas with hummus and apples with peanut butter. And I'm baking a chocolate cake from a gluten free package, and I just didn't put eggs in it, and put extra vegetable oil in it instead.

I'm getting ready to hunker down and watch the Olympics opening ceremony with my boyfriend, so that should be fun.

Episode 16- Special Guest!

This week I had a very special guest. My mother! My mom is an avid quilter, and she mostly machine pieces and quilts. She is very creative in her designs, and innovates many of her creations. She doesn't often work from a pattern, and freehand quilts most of her projects. I hope you love her as much as I do, my mother.

Thanksgiving was this week, and I made stuffing and rolls for the dinner. I cooked at my grandma's house, and they both turned out really good. I'm not sure of the recipe for the stuffing because I made it up with my grandma's help as I went. The rolls I got the recipe out of a Better Homes and Garden cookbook. 

This week I focused mostly on Thanksgiving, because it was the main take-away of the week. Being thankful, focusing on family, all that cool jazz. But this week did not start out that great for me. I got so stressed out, just from working on an extra project at work that I came home early because I felt like I was going to throw up! It made me feel like a miserable employee, but now that I have had a couple days to rest without thinking or worrying about work I feel much better. I even had a dream about my work last night! I was working, and then got fired, but I appealed and they kept me on because I showed how much passion I had for what I do. I think that is a good sign, if even in my subconscious state I really want to work at my job.

I think the kids are really what does it for me. I worry about them, and want to help them to achieve the best that they can. It's a different world when you may not have a stable home, but still come to school everyday. I miss the kids when I am not there, and keep trying to work at making sure that they have a good experience when they come into the program.

This week I finished many things. I finished two pairs of slipper socks to give as Christmas gifts, and two washcloths that are also Christmas gifts.

I also finished a cowl that I will hopefully wear sometime this week. It's longer than other cowls that I have made, but it was flat instead of being a tube, so I think that's why the yarn went further. I made it out of Purl Bee Laceweight, which is the Hobby Lobby brand of yarn, in the Sun Valley colorway, and I held it double with cream sockweight yarn that is acrylic that is from Fabric Recycles which is a crafting consignment store, so I'm not really sure of the brand on it. I made up this design in my head, and completed it without looking at any pattern, but then I watched Amy Beth on the Fat Squirrel Speaks, and she showed her cowl that she made out of handspun using Foolproof by Louise Zass-Bangham. Seeing her explain the pattern I realized that I did almost exactly the same thing, but I didn't buy the pattern or even look at it, so I'm not sure if I really ripped off the pattern, or just had a weird synchronous moment in the universe or knitting patterns.

My mother showed her pumpkin that she made for a pumpkin contest at work, but they didn't really let her enter the competition because it wasn't a "real" pumpkin. So she set it on her desk, and then brought it home and set it up in the dining room. The picture I took is where it is sitting in the dining room, just to get at idea or what it looks like set up. She appliqued the pumpkin pieces onto the background, and then machine quilted it freehand. The pattern was 100% her own creation. 

I am currently working on two blankets for Project Linus, a charity that makes blankets for children that are sick in the hospital, or have endured another type of trauma. I am working on a Tunisian crochet blanket that is orange and black. I bought a Tunisian crochet hook that has a cord connecting two hooks, but I don't like doing that long of a row. My mother thinks that it is partly because of the color, and the yarn, and if I had different yarn I would like doing it better, which I think is mostly true. Working on a bright orange blanket is hard to stay focused very long, but the action of Tunisian crochet becomes very rhythmic and addicting. After I finish this panel of Tunisian crochet however, I am going to switch to regular crochet and just do borders until it is an appropriate size for Project Linus.

The second blanket that I am working on for Project Linus is the Nuts for Neon competition blanket, and it is coming along nicely. I am using different colors of Red Heart Super Saver and working different panel and sections to create a crazy quilt look with knitting. I like how it is coming along, and hope to win the prize this May.

My only other project is my Christmas socks that are just plain vanilla socks that I am making to wear on either Christmas Eve or Christmas Day. I hope to make a second pair to wear on the other day, so my feet will be very festive.

My mother is working on finishing the binding on her fall quilt that is a couch size throw. She used a gradient and put the colors in an order, working out from the center, that represent that different colors that leaves change as they transition from Spring into Fall. I think it looks really cool. It is a French braid pattern, and it was machine pieced and quilted, and she is hand stitching the binding on.

I also showed my next Project Linus blanket that I am going to tackle, which is going to be to finish a blanket that I got in a bag from a thrift store. I am just going to keep adding crazy colors to the granny ripple pattern until it is big enough to be a blanket. The yarn will be all old acrylic from donations and other random places.

I also got some spinning done this week, both on my wheel and on my Turkish spindle. I finished a skein on the wheel, it was a 50/50 blend of alpaca and wool, in grey and white. Then I am spinning a 50/50 blend of mohair and wool on my Turkish spindle to be plied with another single of handspun that I spun on my wheel. 

Thanks for watching and I'll see you next week with more progress on more projects!

Splitting A Ball in Half

Today I finished a scarf that I made with four different balls of Hobby Lobby's I Love This Wool, but before I show you the picture, I am going to describe my method for splitting balls in half without a ball winder, a swift, or a scale.

This is the ball in it's original state. One could just start knitting from the inside or the outside, since it's a center pull ball, which is perfect for my purposes. The first step is to find the inside end and the outside end, holding them together, start winding a ball, just manually. 

At the end of all that you will have a single ball held double. Cut the string in half when you get to the very end of the original ball. If you are making two at a time socks you can stop here, and can knit both socks from the same ball, meaning that if you are knitting toe up you will know exactly when to end in order to use up as much of the yarn as possible. I prefer knitting two at a time toe up, on 40" cable needles, size US 1. I think that they go fast. I will describe my vanilla sock recipe in a later post. 

 Next take both ends of the ball and start winding two separate balls. If the yarn gets twisted, simply untwist it. I never find it to become terribly troublesome.

Continue winding into two separate balls. 

Eventually you will end up with two completely separate balls.

Tadaa! A ball split in half with no fancy equipment whatsoever.

After I split the ball in half today I finished crocheting a scarf. I used half of four different balls of Hobby Lobby's I Love This Wool, so I have exactly enough to make an exactly identical scarf, which I think that I will end up doing. I would just like to say that I did not love the I Love This Wool though. I thought it was too splitty, and it kept splitting on me. It did come in a variety of different plies in the Naturals line. I started with a solid brown, then did a section of three plies of brown with one ply cream, then half and half, two plies brown, two plies cream, and finally three plies cream and one ply brown. I think it ended up being a really interesting gradient, and I may have to experiment with making gradients like this using handspun, since I have never really played around with anything more than Navajo plying or two ply, so playing with more plies would be fun. Here is the finished scarf. I used a size US J crochet hook, and used the berry stitch, which is just alternating double crochet and single crochet stitches every other stitch and then double crochet in the single crochet and single crochet in the double crochet in the next row.

I came home this evening and made an especially yummy dinner. I roasted peppers, tomatoes, and chickpeas in the oven, sprinkling them with garlic salt and pepper. I sauteed zucchini, yellow squash, and red onion and minced garlic in a skillet on the stove top, and then I cooked some gluten free spiral pasta. I waited until each component was done then I mixed them all together with olive oil and Parmesan cheese in a plastic container, I ate half and saved the other half for tomorrow. It was really delicious, and I might write out a more specific recipe, but I don't really want this to become a food blog, since I think my crafting is more interesting than my cooking. I'm also not always exact when I cook, so making recipes is not my forte.