A belated birthday brunch

There were flowers from my garden,

Vegan tofu scramble with a heart-shaped mushroom,

Cinnamon swirl buns,

Breakfast strata with potatoes, rosemary, and swiss,

A vegan ice cream cake,

And my lovely new butterfly pin from Chile, made with dyed horse hair.

Finished knit: North Roe Shawl

My second lace shawl, this time the North Roe Shawl in midnight blue Knitpicks Shadow alpaca yarn. I held the yarn doubled and used size 6 needles. The perfect thing to wear during top-secret espionage missions. [ravelry link]

Help me choose

Ok, so I'm doing a bit of overseas travel this summer, and I think I need a sizeable yet mindless knitting project to keep my hands busy. I do have a couple design projects I'd really love to work on, but I think both will be too tricky to manage while on the road. This evening I thumbed through my stack of vintage knitting magazines and found a few candidates. Any thoughts?

Adorable striped cardigan. The dark stripes are seed stitch, while the light ones are stockinette. I love this in the two shades of gray.
From Fleisher Hand-Knit Favorites vol. 37 from 1967

This placket neck sweater might be the leader at the moment. I'm seeing it in a soft fawn brown color, but not mohair like the original.
From The Mohair Book by Bernat, 1961.

This bulky cardigan is so great with the collar and cables. It reminds me a bit of that really popular Drops cardigan. I'm seeing this in a rich navy blue. Bonus for this pattern is that it calls for Fleishers 'gigantic' yarn on size 15 needles. It looses points for the same reason though, as it would take up more space in the luggage.
From Modern Needlecraft No. 42 Fall Winter, 1963

EDIT: Thanks for the great suggestions so far, guys! I should note that I will be abroad for 8 weeks, and I will be nowhere near a yarn shop (or any other shop, for that matter). The length of my trip (and my flights) and the lack of opportunity to buy new yarn is why I was thinking of going with a bigger project.

First baby sweater

Using about 2.5 balls of leftover white cotton from Sweetgum Duncan, I quickly knit up this cute baby sweater. It is the 6 month to 1 year size of the Child's Placket Neck Pullover which is available in the book Last-Minute Knitted Gifts, and also as a free PDF from the Purl Bee. I think this is really a timeless design, and should be really cute on a baby. This little sweater will be sent off to Chile as a gift to my friend's niece, who was born last week.

Stencils take two

We tried out the freezer paper stencil idea on knits last week, with success! This time we cut out the stencil using mylar (thin but sturdy plastic material) so that it could be reused. The drawback to mylar is that it won't adhere to the fabric. I used a bit of glue stick to tack it down, and then was as careful as I could be to avoid getting paint under the edges of the stencil. I also learned that you can use scotch tape to add in little details, like the eye on this 'animal.' The lettering and word bubble were hand painted since stenciling thin lines is kind of a pain. Working on knits is not as nice as woven fabric because it tends to warp more with the moisture in the paint, and the paint stiffened the fabric more than the knit. All in all, a fun project and the recipient of the t-shirt was very pleased.

Recipe roundup

New in the kitchen this week:

Vegan Laksa
Very nice curried noodle soup with tofu. I added a bit more curry than I would have ideally liked, but otherwise this was a nice dish. The fried tofu with salt and pepper was good enough to eat plain, and the generous splash of lime juice really added a nice note.

Fancy Mac & Cheese with Leeks
Yum! Historically, I am not a mac & cheese fan, but this was delicious. The leeks added enough flavor to keep me very interested.

Snickerdoodle Muffins
Also really tasty. Please note: the batter rises like crazy in the oven, so don't fill the tins too high! I ended up with burnt muffin bits on the bottom of my oven. That being said, this decadent treat reminds me somewhat of those cinnamon covered cake donuts, only better.

Meet my latest obsession

I planted a vegetable garden in early March, and it's just about all I can talk about these days. It's the first thing I visit upon waking up in the morning, and the first thing I go to see when I come home. It is so satisfying to see the plants grow day by day. This is my first attempt at gardening, and it has been at least 18 years in the making (and that was before I actually liked vegetables).


The radishes are the first edible products from my garden. They are wonderful to grow because they only take about a month to mature from seed. See the little one peeking out beneath the leaves below?


I harvested a bunch of them today, and was shocked to see how big some of them became! Although I did eat a few raw, I decided to see what other possibilities there are for radishes. I came across a recipe for roasted zucchini and radishes that had wonderful reviews. I'm guessing you're like me (and everyone I've mentioned this to) and have never heard of cooking radishes, but I must say it's actually quite good!


Once roasted, radishes lose their bite and most of their crunch, but remain really juicy and have a nice mild flavor.

It's pretty incredible to know exactly where my dinner came from, and that it was as fresh as it could possibly be!