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About 5 days ago, I had my gallbladder out. Since then, I’ve been going back and forth showing my ‘girl power’s and ending up kicking my own ass.

I am highly motivated to return to normal, so I jumped at the chance today to do my normal routine (outside of returning to work, because I don’t think I’d be able to escape my captors).

I set the alarm for 3 AM. Barely any trouble getting myself out of bed. This is good, because there have beendays I’d like to knock some teeth out for helping me sit up.

I have been without my post op pain meds for over 24 hours at this point. Things are great.

I did it all, and was so excited. Until…

I went to put on my warm boots. See, I got cocky. Again. Instead if slipping on my high boots, I decided I would just do what I would normally do and put the warm boots on. Big mistake.

That’s what did me in. I lamented to my husband, ” I cannot have hit my limit before 4 AM!”

I went and filled his water and coffee cups. A lot slower than normal, because I do have weight restrictions of what I am allowed to lift, and I’ve been sticking to them. I went outside, and it’s cold!

I came back in, a little dejected. I mean, I know I shouldn’t be back to normal, yet, but to be honest, I am bored. Don’t get me wrong, it’s nice being taken care of, but I was never so glad as I was the first time I got to pee alone, and I mean, there wasn’t someone standing outside the door continually asking, “Are you doing ok?”

With all this down time, I’ve made a lot of stuff. I’ve learned a lot too. I’m sure, I’ll still have to relearn it again, because I’ve learned how to do this stuff several times already, but I’m learning!

Here’s something I’ve whipped up really quickly just this morning

Supplies:

Worsted weight yarn

Size I, 5.25mm crochet hook

Yarn needle for weaving in ends

Here’s what I did:

Row 1: FHDC 12 stitches, Ch 1, turn

Row 2: hdc in blo of each stitch

Repeat row 2 for a total of 32 rows

Slip stitch ends together, through the blo of the last row starting edge.

Weave in ends

Voila! A baby sized headband.

Stunt Baby is my model, his head is approximately 20″ around, if I remember correctly. Leave it plain, or attach the accoutrement of your choice!

I was recently asked to make a Harry Potter themed hat and scarf. Specifically a Gryffindor set. For an infant. A preemie infant newborn.

Yikes!

Now, I know babies come in all sizes, but this kid was born at the same gestational age as my oldest boy, who will be 21 (!!!) in January.

Babies heads are small, but a preemie head, that’s up in the air.

I managed it, though. I used a pattern by Nancy Anderson from Red Heart Yarns, which is now part of the Yarnspirations family.

Its the Baby Elf Hat and it’s free!

I did make an adjustment on the brim, to make it a teensy bit smaller around, but not much.

I finished it, lickety split, but realized it wouldn’t be very convenient to go back and forth to see if it fit. So I bought a babydoll. I didn’t just grab whatever baby, though. I looked and tried to make sure it would be close in size to an actual baby’s head, but not so large that the hat wouldn’t fit the baby its being made for.

I think it came out pretty well. All thats missing is the tassel, which I’ll make once the scarf is done.

Now, I have had a really thick Gryffindor scarf since last year, and I was totally prepared to finish it up a f just use that. However, after much discussion with my friends, and myself, I decided to just start from scratch.

See, the color in the scarf I made last year doesn’t match the hat. And I’d really like for them to match.

I used Red Heart Super Saver in Claret and Saffron. The Saffron is a shade thats new to me, or at least to my Walmart. I picked it up thinking it was Gold, and when I asked my friends, they thought it was a better match color wise.

Also, I was going to do it single stranded, but quickly changed my mind.

Supplies I am using:

2 skeins of each color, yarn is held double.

Size 11 knitting needles

Cast on 25 stitches, or however many you want.

Row 1: knit

Row 2: sl 1 st purlwise, knit to the end of the row

Row 3-12 repeat row 2.

Change color.

Repeat rows 1-12

Continue in this manner until desired length is reached, making sure there’s enough yarn for fringes or tassels.

Its not a great secret that I have a lot of yarn that I dont know exactly what it is.

Occasionally, I can go through my Ravelry stash and figure it out. However I have a yarn that I was sure was one kind, so I didn’t have to look it up, but since I’ve used it in this hat, I’m pretty sure it isn’t what I’ve been thinking.

A quick gander through my Ravelry stash tells me I’m right, it’s not what I thought it was.

So, here it is, my basic knit chunky beanie:

Supplies:

1 skein Lion Brand Wool Ease Chunky

Size US 13, 9mm needle, for working in the round

Stitch marker

Yarn needle for weaving in ends

Cast on 38 stitches. Join for working in the round. Place stitch marker, if using.

K1, p1 ribbing for 4 rows

Row 1: k all stitches

Repeat until work measures 7.5″ from cast on edge. Directions between **, repeat to end of row

Decrease as follows:

R2: k2tog, k17

R3 and all odd rows: k all stitches

R4: *k7, k2tog*

R6: *k6, k2tog*

R8: *k5, k2tog*

R10: *k4, k2tog*

R12: *k3, k2tog*

R14: *k2, k2tog*

R16: *k1, k2tog*

Cut yarn, weave through remaining stitches , pull tight and tie off.

I’ve added a pdf file to my Ravelry shop. For $1.25, you can download to have your own ad-free copy.

Fridays in general are pretty special around here.

My husband is off (unless he’s on a fire), most times the kids are home, and now, I’m off in the morning.

Since it’s his first day off after 40 hours, husband likes to take it easy and since we aren’t running around trying to not miss busses or rides, everyone takes their time getting up.

So, we sort of do breakfast well on Fridays. Sometimes, it’s a big show, with two of us in there cooking and a spread that would make breakfast in hotels look like a snack.

Other times, it’s just some stuff tossed together. Today was one of those days.

We are low on funds and basically making stuff up for dinner.

A quick discussion about the tube of Jimmy Dean sausage and dozens of eggs and we determined just to cook it all together.

But plain eggs and sausage, while delicious, is plain!

So I looked around for what else I could add in.

My garlic had about 4 cloves left, so I diced them up and tossed them in with the meat. I also grabbed some cilantro and a serrano pepper.

Which, by the way I planted out in my garden and hasn’t shown any signs of anything outside of some leaves, so I’m having doubts that it’s not basil, because theres a bunch of stuff in another plot that is basil, and I thought it was something else.

Anyway, it turned out pretty well, with just a touch of spice.

Here’s what I used

1 tube Jimmy Dean ground sausage

4 cloves garlic, diced

1/4 C chopped cilantro

1 Serrano pepper, seeded and diced

Eggs, mixed well

Here’s what I did:

Brown sausage in a large pan over medium low heat.

Add in garlic, cilantro and pepper, cook until sausage is no longer pink.

Add in eggs, stirring often, until eggs are cooked well.

I seasoned lightly with black pepper.

Serve warm.

Many, many moons ago, the husband I and moved our then only child to Idaho. Husband had lived there when he was younger, and as luck would have it, his mom was still living there.

It was there, in the little two bedroom home we rented that I discovered the secret to making great tasting fried rice.

Growing up in San Francisco, I was spoiled with really great food. Not just Chinese, but every kind of food you can imagine. Luckily enough, most of these places were truly authentic and when we would go elsewhere, we sometimes found ourselves disappointed.

Most of the time I was able to duplicate the taste of food I cooked myself. The one thing I could never get right, was fried rice.

We would go to Kim Ling on Mission Street. My most favorite thing in the world to eat there was the barbecue pork fried rice. I was a very picky eater as a kid, so me finding something that I wouldn’t consider punishment to eat daily was a small feat.

At the time, we had been married for around 4 years. Husband worked evenings at a beer plant across town. We has one car.

Twin Falls is a pretty good sizes city, so often, I’d be loading the baby up in the night to go pick up the old man.

I tried my best to make food that wasn’t only nutritious, but that was tasty.

On the side, I delivered newspapers in our neighborhood. Naturally, I got the paper. One day, in the food section was a recipe for fried rice. I didn’t know what some of the stuff was or even looked like, but I made my way to the store to get what was needed.

That night, I made the greatest pot of fried rice I had ever made. It was perfection. It tasted like HOME.

The secret I had been missing ginger, but more than that SESAME OIL! Where had this been my entire life?? It was an life changing experience.

I tried to save the recipe and may have for a while, but these days, I just wing it.

Keep in mind, for this, I dont really measure, except for the ginger.

Ingredients:

5 slices thick cut bacon, chopped

3 green onions, chopped

Garlic, as many cloves as you feel the need to add, diced

1/2 tsp ginger

1 egg, whisked

Cooked rice (I cooked 2 cups of rice)

Sesame oil

Soy sauce

Here’s what I did:

You’ll need a big pan.

Fry the bacon, after a few minutes, add in green onion, garlic, ginger l, sesame oil and egg. Cook for another minute, stirring

Add the rice and mix everything well.

Add the soy sauce to taste. I always add a little bit more sesame oil.

Serve warm.

We had this Friday evening with Spicy Korean Style Pork Medallions, which everyone said were great.

I hope you enjoy it! Let me know if you give it a try!

Its Sunday again, and like usual, I took something out to cook and then fret about what I was actually going to make all day long.

I finally decided on Arroz con Pollo. I don’t exactly remember where I learned to make it, I think it was just a recipe I found somewhere.

It’s a great one pot dish and everyone loves it.

Here’s what you need:

Olive oil

1 package chicken thighs

Garlic powder, onion powder, salt and pepper to taste

1 onion, chopped

2 cups rice

2 tbsp chicken bullion

4 cups water

2 small tomatoes, chopped or 1 can chopped tomatoes, undrained

1 package Goya Sazon

Heat the oil in a large pot/Dutch oven. Brown the chicken. Usually, its 2 or 3 batches. Season the chicken to taste.

Remove chicken from the pot. Cook onions and rice, until onion is translucent. Add the bullion, stir well.

Add water, and stir, scraping the brown bits on the bottom. Add remaining ingredients and bring to a boil.

Add chicken back into pan, cover and lower heat to simmer for 20-25 minutes.

Its Saturday!

Saturday dawns much like any other day: I wake up early, sit on my butt for a bit, I make coffee and go outside. I get wet and complain to the dog about my hands being cold now. I come inside and pour some coffee. Then I sit down and wait for everyone else to get up.

Nothing to exciting. Plus, I get a chrome every morning. I mean so what if he runs off to the back of the property and then tries to sneak up on me two or fourteen times.

I have been getting some ideas lately though.

I have a lone dwarf plum tree in the back. Basically, it’s our mini orchard. There should be two apple trees and a plum tree, but one died and the other broke off at the dirt line. It gets pretty windy sometimes.

Anyway, we have had the tree back there for over a year now, and it’s just a bit taller than me and full of beautiful green leaves. That’s all there is though.

So I did some research and apparently not all dwarf plum trees are self fertile and more often than not, they should be planted at least in pairs. Whoops, probably should have read past the watering and planting instructions on the card it came with.

Reading that made me think about what my other plants might need. Then I saw something swoosh by me. It was a bee.

Of course, pollination! I realized I haven’t seen many bees around the property. Truthfully, we DON’T have a lot of flowers around, but there are some.

So, we bought some flowers yesterday. Petunias that can handle the sun a bit. I also bought a planter of Russian Sage, but that was more because I wanted to have some sage.

My raised bed in the back has now been fertilized, and planted fully. Theres barely a spot that shouldn’t have something growing soon and if there is, it’s probably where I put the cantaloupe seeds (they take some time)

To recap, my garden will hopefully soon have some green onions, okra, spinach, radishes (they’re my favorite. They grow quickly and help build confidence that you aren’t a murderer of epic proportions), bell peppers (hopefully) serrano peppers, more spinach, eggplant, tomatoes and green beans.

Whew! That’s a lot! I’m very excited to see what we can harvest.

The tomatoes, I purchased two tomato plants, a sort of cheat, I know, but its July, for goodness sake I gotta get busy on this stuff.

So, the flowers, we’ll see if they help. Down the road, though, I’d like to get a beehive on the property and be able to have them nearby, so they aren’t travelling too far. My husband agrees, but bees aren’t his top priority right now.

First is a gate for the goat pen. He has a garden gate on it now. Its worked fine, but they’ve all bit destroyed it and it’s being held together by various strands of hay twine, which we have in abundance.

The goats occasionally got out and wreaked havoc on my plants. One day I went out and found stuff had been pulled from.the ground, only to hear, “Oh yeah, the goats got out.” Well, thanks.

So he and my son have constructed a new door. Its wood and heavy, which is what he wanted. It’ll probably go in today, but first we have to figure out how to do it without the goats escaping and eating all my vegetables.

We have an idea, but who knows if it will hold long enough to get everything done.

I guess we’ll find out.