Skip to main content

Finishing. Starting.

Finished: Book

photos for blogThe Circle by Dave Eggers.


I thoroughly enjoyed And you shall know our velocity by Dave Eggers, so when my work friend Nick was reading this I asked if I could borrow it.

I tend to read borrowed books faster than my own as I feel the impetus to return them before they get lost in my piles of book. I had no trouble finishing this and found it compelling from the start.

I won't say much about the plot (I hate spoilers and hardly ever read the blurb on the back of books which seem to give away half the plot) but it starts with a young woman leaving her dull hometown job to work at a googlesque company, Circle.

I work in digital communication which may have piqued my interest but if you use the internet (and here you are dear reader), you should read this. Heck, I'm not even sure I should be blogging after reading this book.






Started: Allotment 2014



photos for blog We headed to our strip of land on Saturday.

Most of the work was wedding, pulling up an excess of strawberry and anise plants which had continued to spread through the mild winter.

I also admired the bare stems such as these wintered chive heads.

However there was some bounty. Red chicory, a turnip, lettuce and Jerusalem artichokes had grown well and were ready for the eating.














Finished: Chicory and lettuce

photos for blog
















Started: Garden

We now have a small garden all to ourselves. It's pretty unkempt at the mo and there are some minor jobs such as weeding and pruning as well as the possibility of total overhaul. The brickwork is pretty crumbly and I'm not keen on the paving stones. There's a fair bit of work to do in our new place too, so we'll see which gets done first.


photos for blog

Started: hot sauce

photos for blog

Hot sauce recipe. I've made this before. Scotch bonnets are a pretty fierce chili (hence the gloves on the left) but they mellow into a tasty, zingy, sauce with this recipe from Epicurious. Stage one involves roughly blending the ingredients and letting them ferment for at least 12 hours. I'll finish the sauce tomorrow evening.


Almost finished?

photos for blogAnd finally, knitting!

Of course, it's socks.

These have turned out to be pretty international. I bought the Norweigan yarn (Drops) in Sweden before Christmas. Cast on in Ecuador, knitting a bit more on my flight home via the USA - including a stop in Atlanta to see my in-law in laws - knitted some more in France, and almost finished them in Yorkshire last weekend. I've got one more toe to do, then they're off to my mum (back to Yorkshire) for Mother's Day.

Pattern: Into the Groove
Designer: Knittingtastic
Yarn: Drops something or other 4ply
Needle: 2.25mm (my first socks on chiagoos, mmmm, so smooth)

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Picture this

I was surprised to see that visitors to London's galleries and museums are down as the National Portrait Gallery (NPG), cited as having the largest drop in numbers, was busy when I visited earlier in the week. The busiest part was the Portrait Award exhibition and while the pieces were technically brilliant only a few grabbed my attention. People often get hung up on art, what should they like, what's the correct way to talk about it. I say ignore all that and look with an open mind. If something takes your fancy, great, if it doesn't, move on. Someone else will like it. If you can't make it to the NPG you can see all the entries online . Here are a couple I like. I'm not going to say anything about them. It's up to you what you think about them. If they intrigue you there's more info on the gallery website. Patchwork   by Paula Wilson  © Paula Wilson The New Religion   by Conor Walton  © Conor Walton It is disheartening to see visitor...

Champagne Bubbles

We went for a stroll this afternoon along the Seine where my MIL lives to work off the champagne and cheese from New Year celebrations and build up an appetite for our postponed Christmas meal. It was a good opportunity to take some photos of my latest FO, Bubbles hat by Woolly Wormhead . Compulsory Catalogue Pose I've met Woolly at several shows over the summer and we sat together at several meal times at the infamous Knit Camp as well as getting tipsy at Knit Nation. She's ace and also a great designer. She leads a pretty interesting life, living in a converted double decker bus in Italy. Take a look at her blog which is a good mixture of her day to day life on the bus with her partner and young son and loads of great knitting tips. The Bubbles pattern was great fun to knit and worked up pretty quickly, the cables providing just enough interest to make this a great knit while watching Agatha Christie mysteries on TV in between eating festive leftovers. I used Araucan...

Food: easy five spice soda bread

In that idle time between Christmas and New Year some have dubbed Twixmas, I found myself recuperating from spending a week with my very intense mother-in-law by watching mid-morning TV. I flicked over to Nadiya's British Food Adventure  where this recipe for red split lentils and five-spice soda bread caught my eye. I'm a big fan of curry; it's my favourite cuisine and the combo of lentil soup and soda bread ticked the right boxes. My dad is a keen breadmaker and he talked about making soda bread over Christmas which had tickled my interest. While I like the idea of making bread, I'm unlikely to have bread flour or yeast in and I find the kneading and proving off putting, but soda bread is doable. The lentil soup was eaten before I thought of photographing it. It's similar to dhals we routinely make for dinner - so cheap and easy to do - though the garlic and butter were a treat. The bread has lasted for a few days as there are only two of us in the house...