CMS/Colloquium knitting

The heel is turned, and the gusset is finished! I think this will be finished in the next three weeks, and then Taylor can wear her new socks.

Last week's CMS knitting

Last week there was no colloquium, but this is what I got done in CMS. I'm more than half way through the heel flap!

Adventures with Rudy - and a recipe!

Robert and I spent last weekend taking care of this wonderful, sweet, and energetic dog. Rudy's owner, Taylor (who is one of my office mates) was at a conference, so we stayed at her apartment and walked and fed and played with Rudy.

We almost always have a "special" breakfast on Saturday mornings - usually it's pancakes from Robert's mom's recipe (which I veganized with a flax egg and soy "buttermilk") or vegan french toast with our own home-made breadmaker bread (Robert puts pecan bits in the bread to make it extra delicious). So I brought the more unusual pancake ingredients with to Taylor's place, but to my great surprise, the only flours she had were whole wheat flour and vital wheat gluten! So here is Robert's mom Lynn's oatmeal-buttermilk pancake recipe, adapted to be vegan and whole wheat, and scaled for two people:
Ingredients:
1 1/4 cups "soy buttermilk" - a splash of white vinegar to cover the bottom of the measuring cup, and then the rest filled up with soymilk
1/2 cup oats - not the quick-cooking kind
1 flax egg - 1 Tbs flax seeds ground up and mixed with some warm water
2 Tbs canola oil
1 1/4 cups whole wheat flour
1 Tbs vital wheat gluten (this keeps the pancakes from being too whole-wheat heavy and dense. Don't leave it out)
2 1/2 Tbs brown sugar
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
a few dashes of cinnamon

Method:

1. Mix the soy buttermilk and oats and let them sit for 10 minutes or so. Then add the flax egg and oil.
2. Combine the dry ingredients in a medium-small mixing bowl, and whisk them together to mix.
3. Add the wet ingredients to the dry. I always have to add a few extra splashes of soymilk to the batter at this point to make it the right consistency. Even so, the batter should be pretty thick.
4. Fry up the pancakes. I usually scoop the batter using a 1/4 cup measure. (Lynn's recipe recommends using a 1/3 cup measure for this, but I like to have more pancakes, even if they're smaller.)
5. Serve with margarine and real maple syrup!
   

The whole wheat version was a success! They were fluffy, not heavy, and they had a nice nutty kind of whole wheat flavor.

Two weeks of CMS/Colloquium knitting

This is Taylor's second sock at the end of colloquium last week. Here it was at the end of colloquium yesterday:
I am almost done with the leg! Next week I should be able to post a heel picture.

Yesterday's colloquium was super cool, because the speaker talked about work that one of my undergraduate professors did. Also about trees and flowers and forests and gardens.

CMS/Colloquium knitting

I finished the first sock today! Taylor tried it on the moment it was finished, and it fits and looks lovely on her. I immediately cast on the second sock. I'm estimating that it will take me 5 or 6 more weeks to finish the second sock: two for the leg, one for the heel, and two or three for the gusset, foot, and toe.
These are the first pictures I'm posting from my new camera. My old camera, aside from being very old (only 5 megapixels, compared to the new one's 16!), developed the nasty habit of not opening the lens cover fully when it powered on. This led to several blacked-out pictures on my summer vacation and a lot of annoyance at needing to poke the thing open with my fingernail every time I wanted to take a picture. But one thing I really loved about my old camera was the fact that it uses AA batteries. I know opinions are strongly divided on this subject, but being able to carry and acquire extra batteries easily is really important to me, especially when I'm traveling. When I started looking at new cameras online, I had a hard time finding many options that use AA batteries, so when I saw a few options on sale in my price range last week that used them, I got one. So far I'm very happy with it.

In other news, the baby recipient of the receiving blanket I made this summer was born this week! Her mom sent me two very sweet and adorable photos of her all swaddled up in her blanket. She is a beautiful baby!

CMS/Colloquium knitting

 The sock fits Taylor!  However, last week I knitted the foot length to fit me (shoe size 10.5) and Taylor wears a size 6, so I spent most of CMS and Colloquium on Thursday tinking.  But once I got back far enough, I did have time to re-start the toe.  Next week the first sock will be done!

CMS/Colloquium knitting

I knitted away on my sock in CMS and Colloquium on Thursday. I even started the toe! And then I tried it on, to check the foot length, and it doesn't fit at all. The cuff is too narrow to go around my heel. My friend Taylor likes this sock a lot, and her feet are much smaller than mine, so if it fits her I am going to give the socks to her. But first I will need to undo the toe work I did Thursday and about an inch of the foot, so the socks won't be way too long for Taylor.