Okay. I will stop knitting long enough to update my poor neglected blog. I am making rum raisinette soy ice cream and while it's churning I thought I'd do this. I just got a lovely new cookbook called "Vegan Ala Mode" by Hannah Kaminsky and like her other books, it's great. I've made "cheesecake" ice cream, jam ice cream (so easy and great) and the rum raisinette....made my own raisinettes thank you very much :)

I also make my own soy milk, which is what is next to turn on. I certainly have gotten my money's worth on that machine because I make it all the time. I've also made my own tofu but that's a little trickier and I'm not so good at that.

This is my first attempt at making my own dough. A deep dish Haiwaiian pizza with pineapple chunks, Tofurky "ham", and Daiya mozzarella "cheese". Thing was about 4" high. But delicious. 

Finally was cool enough to go to the farmers' market on Sunday morning and I got quite a haul.

The squash blossoms were the special find! Once a year and we beat out the chef that was in line behind us waiting to buy all of them. Too bad for you but good for us. We still left him some but should've been faster I guess. I made a tofu basil ricotta and stuffed them and then battered them with a lovely tempura batter that was so good I could've just fried the batter and eaten it. Also got a nice pattypan squash and heirloom tomatoes that I just pop in my mouth and eat. So good. My other find was some delicious kohlrabi. They were the last of the season at one booth so I was glad to have them. I just like them peeled and sliced with some salt on them. I must admit though, I was looking for something else to use in the tempura batter and voila! kohlrabi slices. Also very good.

This past week I've been test knitting a pair of socks for Claire Ellen Designs.

http://www.ravelry.com/projects/knitsensei/rosie-cotton-test-knit. I really like her patterns and was thrilled at the chance to test knit one before release. I love them. Loads of cables with lazy daisy embroidery. The yarn is Cascade Heritage sock yarn and shows the pattern beautifully. I'm about halfway through the second one because I'm trying to finish to be eligible in the SolidSockKnitters group on Ravelry. I grabbed some dvd's and hunkered down to work on them. It was good to have something inside to do because it was miserably hot here last week. Upper 90*'s with heat index in the 105-110* range. I've decided not to call it the heat index but the wind chill because it will seem cooler that way. Sure, why not.

Okay, the soy milk is ready to be taken out so I'll end for now. Stay cool and keep knitting.

Busy test knitting a pair of socks so I'll be back in a day or two. Here's the yarn though.



It has just been so unbelievably hot this past week that I haven't really done much of anything except knitting. Every day it's been in the high 90*'s with the heat index of over 100*. Got a bunch of dvds from the library and have just been hunkering down inside the house. Last Friday night we had one of those derecho storms and it knocked out the electricity. Lovely. It was out for 25 hours and, of course, it was in the 90's. Mostly I was concerned about our parrots and cockatiel but we took them down to the basement in their cages and it stayed relatively cool. Only lost about 3 items from the refrigerator so Thank God for that. Spent some time at Starbucks (recharging cell phone and tablet...and I wasn't the only one...it was hard to find a free plug) and some time at my sister's. I was never so happy to see traffic lights when they came back on. I love electricity! But I did get some sock knitting done. I had to find a worsted weight and size 5 needles so I could see by the camping lanterns but got quite a bit done.

Here's what I just finished yesterday. They are the Treebeard socks by Claire Ellen and the kal was called the "Not not-so-hasty-kal"http://www.ravelry.com/projects/knitsensei/treebeard-socks. I won a free pattern of hers (they are great) and some stitch markers. I can't wait to see them!

 The yarn is more orange than the photo and it's Malabrigo in "Terra Cotta". I love the pattern and the yarn. I could barely stand to put them on 'cause it's so hot but they look wonderful. I can't wait to wear them.

This is what the crazy weather did the other day. It's 90* and we had a ton of hail. About the size of a nickel and came down for about 10 minutes. Insane.

This is one of the things I'm knitting on now. It's the Swiss Cheese scarf/shawl made with Kauni. I like this yarn. It's fun to watch what color comes up next.

Got up early the other day to do a little cooking before it got too hot in here. Made the "double drive through burger'' from "Chloe's Kitchen", which is a great cookbook and I highly recommend to all, vegan or not. Also made cinnamon expresso chocolate chip cookies which are fabulous.



Also made the tomato gratin with pinenut ricotta which was easier than I thought.

Okay, I have to go and get some iced tea. Stay cool and keep knitting.