Distractions

I've got a few things in the queue to be blogged about, but work is pretty mad at the moment, so apologies if the blogging slows down. There's been way too much of all 3 of these things in my life recently...

I confess, Laurence was right, I broke my own rule about not starting another scarfy project until Jeanie was finished. I'm blaming the work for that one too! My brain has been too frazzled to comprehend reversible cables and dropped stitches so I've been spending some quality zoned-out time with my new project from Twist. I finished it yesterday and an quite pleased with the result. It was all squashed up on normal straight needles so I didn't realise just how long it actually was until I bound off and released it from the squeeze.

Being at home writing for the last week or so, I've been getting a new insight into the life of a cat. Dilly is very noisy and keen to get the humans out of bed in the morning so she can have breakfast, but then at around 9am she takes on the pose in the pic and remains absolutely still, fully unconscious for a full 6 hours. It can be quite hard to tell which end is which when she turns her head upside down and puts her tail over her face. She wakes at 3, and begins the food acquisition routine - galloping up and down the stairs, walking all over my desk/keyboard, biting my pen and trying to knock my work onto the floor. She also miows very loudly from the lounge to try to get me to come downstairs and see what's going on, hoping that I might just feed her while I'm down there. It's a tough life being a cat!

The daffs are still out at the bottom of the road by the way...

Saturday stuff

This is a bit of a random post of a couple of things, not much to do with anything really! First of all I wanted to show you a picture of Jane's orchid which is in my office at work. We inherited it when Jane left, and since then it's been working very hard at producing a flower stalk. A couple of weeks ago it reached full height and started to open, and we've been enjoying these beautiful flowers ever since...

I had a very nice Saturday yesterday, doing lots of fun Saturday things. First it was a trip to Newburgh for a good old knitting session. Last week I finished the peacock shawl I've been frantically knitting for the last month (post to follow next week once it's been sent, but ravellers can see it here), so I started something quite quick and easy a few days ago with some Blue Sky Alpacas organic cotton. It's nice and thick and chunky and very soft. Nearly finished that one already, so I'll save the pics for when it's fully done in a few days time. The knitters then headed back towards the rain in Dundee and went for lunch - the parlour was full so we tried out a new place that has opened near the Rep theatre. Pretty decent for lunch, and reasonably priced I'm glad to say.

After lunch I met up with Barry and we continued round the corner to Tonic where I had a bit of dessert and a coffee while continuing with the knitting and watching the England/Scotland 6 nations match. I like sitting at the window watching people coming and going, and was quite amused by the poster on the other side of the road which seemed to be saying that the daily record comes with free kids this weekend.

In the evening I met up with Diane and Fiona again to go and see Jung Chang give a lecture on her new book about Mao which was extremely interesting. It's part of the Dundee Saturday evening lecture series and was also tied in with international women's day celebrations.

Poor old Dilly went to the vet on Friday to have most of her few remaining teeth removed (she just has 2 very tiny ones at the front on top and bottom now). She was a bit subdued afterwards but by the time we got home on Saturday night she was fully recovered and ready to fight again. She's totally weaponless however because they also trimmed her claws right down while she was under anaesthetic, so had to resort to slobbering Barry into submission...

A Christmas FO

Knitting has really moved up into top gear as we hit T minus 3 weeks to Christmas. Some stuff I can't show you yet because their future owners will see, but here is the felted bag that I'm making for my mum. Before felting...


...and after...



It's a beast. I'm calling it a FO because all the knitting/sewing up is done, but to finish it off I have to find some beads to put on threads hanging down from inside the flowers. I'm guessing I'll be doing that on Christmas eve probably!

I have another felted project that I'm very excited about which will go into the washing machine tonight. At the weekend I also made a little hat for Anna's model mouse as part of our lab christmas decorating effort. Dilly liked it too...

Pumpkins

I'm not the biggest fan of the whole hallowe'en thing, but one thing I do love is pumpkins. Lantern carving is a lot of fun, and there's so much potential to embrace the River Cottage nose to tail ethic so to speak, although I'm still trying to come up with a veggie alternative phrase. From seed to stalk maybe, or something like that. We've got at least 4, maybe 5 items out of this one - and first of all is the lantern of course...

Chop off the top of the pumpkin to form the lid. Once you're in, set aside the seeds for later. Scoop out at least half to two thirds of the thickness of the flesh and set this aside for later too, then carefully score and cut out the pieces. Be careful not to scrape the walls too much as I did though - the face is already going soft and starting to implode, I'm a little worried it's not going to stay intact until Wednesday!

Place a tealight or two inside and enjoy. I also like the slightly burnt smell it gives off as the heat from the candles starts to char the lid. I'd go for that over a sickly scented candle any day!

I made a couple of knitted pumpkins too, based on Curly Purly's pattern. They were really quick and easy, both of them completed in one day. Perfect prop for customising a hallowe'en cat.

So all that scraping wasn't ideal for the lantern itself, but here's what I've been up to with the results...

Roasted Pumpkin Seeds

Rinse and resudual fibres and slime off the seeds and allow to dry. Coat in a little olive oil and season with smoked paprika, cayenne, cumin and salt. Roast at 180 for 10 mins or so.

With the reserved flesh you could make pumpkin soup or add it to stock, but there's also the American classic:

Pumpkin Pie Filling

• 1.5 lb pumpkin flesh
• 2 eggs plus 2 egg yolks
• 1.5tbsp treacle
• 4.5oz soft dark brown sugar
• 1 heaped tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 heaped tsp each of ground cloves, allspice, nutmeg and ginger
• 15fl oz double cream

Cook the pumpkin flesh over a gentle heat until soft, blend until smooth. Whisk the eggs and yolks in a large bowl until combined. Heat the other ingredients until they reach simmering point, pour onto the eggs and whisk, then whisk in the pumpkin flesh.

This is enough to fill 3 ready made pastry cases - place the empty cases on the oven shelf before filling so that you can pour in as much as possible. Bake at 180C for 35-40min.

I still had some extra flesh left over, which Rebecca is going to use for pumpkin scones - looking forward to those! Finally, I reckon it'll still be possible to roast the remaining pumpkin flesh still on the lantern once we've enjoyed it on the mantlepiece for a few days. Et voila, nothing wasted!

Here's a pair hallowe'en snaps... the two-headed cat/girl with a freaky borg eye, and the four-eyed ghost cat...

Cat yoga

Can anyone say what's going on here? I'm not entirely sure what this position is called but it's often caused by over-exposure to hot sun through glass! A rare close up glimpse of cat underbelly - usually swiftly hidden as soon as a person comes within striking distance.

Summer is coming

Dilly is enjoying the sunshine and warmer weather, and insists on being half in and half our of the door if she has the chance.