Happy Friday the 13th! :)

It's hard to be spooked by it though when it's so bright and sunny and warm though, right?

(I've come across this multiple times today on Facebook, etc. and, while it doesn't seem that fair, I have to say I've snorted  laughed at it every single time. Why? I don't know.)

Hard to believe another week has gone by!! Let's see, what did I get into to this week.......

I finished up all of my current sock projects!

Oh, don't be too impressed though - the "Wayward" (red) ones have been ongoing since the beginning of March. 

 I just had a bitty foot on the right one to do to put that project to bed. (And, because of the complementing wrap-a-round cables, these socks actually *DO* have a left and right to them. Thankfully, I paid attention to what chart was what, out of the stack that this pattern comes with, and ENDED UP with a right/left one vs. two lefts, etc. WHEW!) 

 The Dragonfly socks were a quick knit - easy, easy! Probably could have gone with another repeat for the leg so I'll remember that for next time. (I don't like my socks too long so it's no biggie either way.)

Also (semi) finished:

Stitched my flag stitchy again, this time on the 'proper' fabric so it will fit on top of the star box that came in the kit. Just need to find the time to do the finishing now. (I didn't improvise a little '2012' on the new one but now that I see them together, I kind of miss that? I might have to go back and put that in!)

Anyone else doing the L*K Mystery Sampler Club that was just released??? I started it and love the colors but the fabric is a little larger count (30 ct.) than I would prefer. It's not a deal-breaker though. I'm just a diva and will get over it. *cough* I think the transition from 40ct from the last project to 30ct was a little oogy for me, is all.

I know so many of you are BROILING out there, in the heat, but it's been phenomenally seasonal here the past week...........again. Much better than it usually is for this area! If this is the new 'face' of climate change for this area, I'll take it!!!! Got lots of biking in last week, picture is from one of the (many) bike bridges on the Blackstone River Trail in Lincoln/Cumberland, Rhode Island.

This last pic is from my Epic Kitchen DeClutter this morning. Does anyone else find the kitchen gets cluttered if you so much as take your eyes off of it for a second? I hadn't SERIOUSLY decluttered it in awhile so I went at it in a ruthless manner this morning and now it's all back down to clean surfaces everywhere you look. 

I had to laugh and stop to take a picture of this ridiculousness though:

I *might* have a packet problem. As in, drink packet?

Yeah, I gots it bad. REAL bad.

And I'm not sure the picture is *quite* capturing just how many are there. (And I'm not even getting into how many bottles of MiO are around. *ahem*)

In my defense, I do drink a lot of water. (I even have a water cooler in my kitchen to facilitate things.)

I don't have any defense, really, for ordering more though the other day. True Lemon has 50% off all the lemonade packets this month and I..........may have ordered some more? Less than a 100 packets but, uhhhhh, more than 50. Okay so it was 80. Crap. WHERE IS THE 12 STEP PROGRAM FOR PACKET ADDICTION????? o_0

(Not that anybody asked, but my favorite one is the stevia-sweetened Apple Pear ones from Target. If I could get that one on tap, that would be GLORIOUS.)

Did we all survive the holiday??? :)

I'll let you know if I did - as soon as/if I make it through the heaps of turkey soup in my fridge without bursting. Ooof. *pats stomach*

I filled a big stockpot right up to the tippy-top when making it (literally - I had to watch it like a hawk so it wouldn't go over the edge) as I kept throwing leftover stuff that didn't get cooked (a bit of string beans, a slice of prosciutto) and stuff that was cooked but leftover after a couple days...........WOW. Truly EPIC amount of soup going on in this house this week. It's a good thing I like soup. lol

It was back to work on Saturday so I only got three days off - more than some people, less than others, I'm sure. I'm just smack-dab-in-the-middle-bear, I guess. I did a little shopping online but not too much. A few presents down, a couple things for myself. One small (silicon tea strainer set), one really big (more on this one later maybe *grin*). No 'real' Black Friday shopping offline (unless a trip to the supermarket for salad stuff counts) but we did go to the Country Folk Art show out in Sturbridge, MA just to get out and enjoy the nice weather. (It can be a quiet ride getting out to that area.)

I did pick up a couple presents but mostly I admit to indulging in my weakness for Blossom Bucket figurines and a couple fabric ornaments. God I love these little guys. They are just SOOOOOO hard to resist.

Oh, and glittery Charlie Brown type trees. Totally weak in the face of those too. :)

(I had to get some glittery cinnamon scented teeny pine cone potpourri too because if it sparkles, it's guaranteed to be coming home with me.)

 

The husband found this beehive for just $3 so we had to have that too. I'm just not sure what to do with it......yet.

If you pull back you can see it's a beehive..............tree. A two foot high tree. Hmmmm. Hang teeny tiny cross stitch finishes off of it? Do up some bees/birds beads and hang them from invisible thread? I'll figure it out eventually or just lop off the tree part and call it a day. (It was only $3.)

I didn't finish the mittens but I'm close (REALLY close!) and I did manage to finish up a pair of Boy Socks. Super long, super big boy socks. It felt like I would never finish them but, in actuality, I finished these up in 3 weeks.

Regia Striping Yarn, pulled from deep in the stash. 

He has a pair of these, only with blue stripes and they are holding up well. I wish I more of it actually. I really miss when elann.com had great deals on Regia and other 'boy sock' (read: has nylon/holds up well) yarns.You could get enough yarn for a pair of socks for like $7-8, which was awesome. I think I only have *one* skein left now though from that particular stash. *sniff*

So all in all it was a pretty quiet weekend, with the minimum of family dramaz. (There is one person who likes to ramp it up, so to speak, at this time of year and she's nothing if consistent but we're ignoring it for the moment. lol) 

Hope you all had a nice holiday weekend too! (Or a nice weekend in general if you don't celebrate.)

Whew! Weekend overload.

That was such a crazy weekend I needed a few days to recover from it. Seriously.

First up was the crazy overwhelming and much-anticipated Stitches East show in Hartford. 

 

(Picture from last year because I wasn't brave enough to thwart security this year and try and sneak a pic. They are CRAZY SERIOUS about no picture taking inside the venue.)

God, this show is exhausting. I mean that in a good way - but it's so big and there is sooooooooooooooooooo much stuff. *fans self* A huge convention center full of knitterly goodness every which way you look starts shutting my brain down after 4-5 aisles, you know? DON'T WORRY THOUGH: I pushed through it and made it to the end *and* even managed to be coherent enough to buy something from all corners of the room. I take my responsibilities for propping up the US economy with my purchasing power VERY seriously. *cough*

I did collapse here in the hall for a bit though to get my sea legs before taking off though.

After a quick jaunt to West Hartford for an outdoor lunch (to enjoy the perfect fall weather) and a little shopping at stores that aren't around here (Penzey's) we made the long haul back to our part of state and had just a wee bit of time to freshen up and haul off to Foxwoods Casino to catch a Kathy Griffin show. A love her/hate her comedian to be sure...........but I'm partial to foul-mouthed broads. Not gonna lie. : )

I'd never been to the MGM Grand theater here before and it was quite nice.......inside anyway. I haven't been to Foxwoods Casino in a long time (I only manage a trip every 5-8 years, even though it's only 30 minutes away) and, yep, I still HATE the place with the burning passion of ten thousand white hot suns. Choking with cigarette smoke, drunk hootchie-mama women traveling in ho herds everywhere you look and the place is just waaaaaaaaay too big for me to the point of utter ridiculousness. And this is coming from someone who LIKES Vegas, mind you. (A Vegas joint is a 500 sq. foot NYC hole in the wall compared to the size of this place.) Anyhoo. I was so annoyed with the casino areas and the awful smell, per usual, that I forgot to play a few quarters in a slot machine 'just in case' I had some lucky ju-ju hanging around me at the moment. *snort* 

Oh well. I'm sure they won't miss my dollar. :)

 

Such a picturesque setting for a fall festival. Perfect!

We got home late late late but didn't let that stop us from heading out to the Johnny Cake Festival at the Kenyon Grist Mill the next morning. Johnny Cakes are, I BELIEVE, a distinctly Rhode Island thing? (Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.) They're basically little fried up corn pancakes dating back to the Civil War era. Crispy on the outside, creamy on the inside, with or without maple sugar and that sort of thing. The Kenyon mill has been grinding corn the same way since 1696. I kid you not. That's crazy, right? 

 Though the building they still grind in *only* dates back to 1886. ONLY. *snort*

 

Round and round the stones go, grinding corn and other things all day.

This was a great festival because EVERYONE had free samples to try and TRY I DID. We noshed on locally made chocolate milk, pumpkin seeds, chai tea, hot apple cider, bbq sauce, freshly made bread and, of course, those johnny cakes. There were lots of other vendors demoing their wares like potters, chair caning,  and broom makers, etc. Very fun to watch! Will definitely have to hit this festival up again next year.

Of course we had to take home some purchased goodies from here too. Tea, pumpkin seeds, two jars of honey (as if we need MORE honey in this house!), johnny cake mix (OF COURSE) and I liked this piece of pottery that looked like a beehive to me.

It was nice to get out and enjoy the weather before it turns nasty for good, that's for sure. They are predicting a nor'easter for this area this weekend so that might be that as far as 'enjoying' the fall goes. *sad*

(Don't worry - I'll do a post about my Stitches East purchases. I think I need a whole separate post for that. lol)

NOM NOM NOM

We don't really watch the Super Bowl in this house (we're more of a NASCAR family and nothing else, though I'm tired of that too now) but I do love the lead-up to it as people post all the yummy-nummy foodie things they are planning to make or want to make, etc. 

One thing I saw last week was these Buffalo Chicken meatballs on the Martha Stewart show. DING! DING! DING! I loves me some Buffalo Wings and Frank's Red Hot sauce so I *had* to make these. 

Oh. My. God. are they good! 

NOM. NOM. NOM.

I followed the recipe as is EXCEPT instead of using the ONE STICK of butter it calls for - I used 4 tablespoons. You won't miss the extra butter - I swear. (Though if you are on good speaking terms with your cardiologist, maybe go for the full stick?) Oh and I ditched the 2 TB olive oil for the sheet pan. Uhh, spray oil anyone? lol
Doing it that way they came out to be 51 calories each with 44 total meatballs**. I figure I can shave that down even more next time (AND THERE WILL BE A NEXT TIME) if I use Egg Beaters instead of 2 whole eggs and maybe trim the breadcrumbs a little.(Anyone have any experience using Egg Beaters in meatloaves and the like instead of whole eggs? I've been meaning to try that out to cut down on calories/cholesterol but *keep forgetting*. Grrr!)

They were great with baked potatoes, celery sticks and more Frank's dribbled over them.
ENJOY YOUR GAME DAY WEEKEND, Y'ALL, no matter what you are doing!! :)

**This is based on grinding my own chicken breast. I can't find pre-ground chicken in the supermarkets around here but once in a blue moon so we ran skinless chicken breasts through the grinder attachment for my KA mixer instead. (Which is INDESCRIBABLY GROSS BY THE WAY. I don't even like the *sound* of meat grinding. *hurl* ) I have no idea what parts they use for store-bought ground chicken so the calories when using that might be higher?

It's been a bit of a crazy week.

The hubby had this week off on vacation so we've been here, there, and everywhere, did a bunch of shopping and had a bunch of great food.

 To that end, we finally managed to go to Bobby Flay's burger joint up at the casino. It opened up last fall and we've been meaning to go since but, enh, we're not really casino people. There are only two casinos in the state and they're both only 40 minutes or so away from my house but, even still, before this week I'd only been to each of them ONCE in the last TEN YEARS. I hate the cigarette smoke, I'm not enticed by free booze because I almost never drink alcohol, I'm bored with window shopping after about 15 minutes, and I'd rather spend my money on 'stuff' vs. pumping it into a machine that (let's be honest) is not going to give it back to you. (A long time ago the slot machines were sorta fun when they took quarters. There was something neat about the clink, clink, clink of quarters pouring out of them when you won your hand but they did away with that and now you either use a casino card or big bills. Pffffftttttt. Boring!)

But having only been to Mohegan Sun once before, it was interesting to poke around for a while. I'm pretty sure I was half asleep/dead the first we went (it was the end of a VERY long day) so I was fuzzy on the details. And Bobby Flay's place was pretty AWESOME. I even ordered my burger with CHEESE. Honest to goodness CHEESE. On my BURGER. I've never done that before in my life. lol (I don't like most cheese........which is putting it mildly.) But I picked a Santa Fe burger and it had 'queso' cheese to go with it's black corn tortilla chip/pickled jalapenos topping and I thought I would give it a try.

 I love that fake-as-anything Velveeta queso you make using Ro-Tel and, while I didn't think THAT was what was going to be the type of cheese they were serving, I thought all the flavors would blend together nicely. And they did. I was a little disturbed getting cheese on my fingers (gross gross gross) but it tasted great. It was definitely a one time thing though - I'm not suddenly a cheeseburger lover or anything. lol

Oh and I got to go to A FABRIC STORE TOO. It's been a long long long time since I've been to an actual fabric store. I love browsing through fabric stores but there are NONE around here. NONE. Even the Walmarts don't bother with fabric anymore. *sad*  I wouldn't go back to living in the city but I do miss the 'little' things sometimes like just being able to drive 15 minutes to a Joann's whenever you need a little trim or some buttons. (Shopping for that stuff online just isn't the same.) That being said, I have 4 big-ass storage drawers full of fabric from ages and ages ago when I DID live near fabric stores so it was mostly a looksy thing. Mostly...................

I did succumb to these two packs of fabric quarters. *pets* They were on sale and the green ones match the Blackbird stockings I'm doing right now. (I think they match anyway. They match INSIDE MY HEAD but I was going on memory. So that could turn out badly. lol Well see how it goes when I go to put them together.)

I'm all random today. Sorry.

 **My brisket came out FABULOUS, if I must say so. (And who else around here is going to say it for me, right? lol) I ended up just making my own recipe out of a hodge podge of recipes that some of my favorite bloggers had posted/stuff I readily had on hand. It basically boiled down to: 1 cup ketchup, 1/2 bottle of chili sauce, 5-6 cloves of peeled/crushed garlic, TB of dry mustard, packet of onion soup mix, 1/4 cup of so of brown sugar, and 2 chipotle chilis (and a little of the adobe sauce they come in). Mix it up, marinade if you want, stick in the crock-pot on low for 8-10 hours. Skim off the fat when it's done and then reduce the sauce on it's own in a pan. Throw sauce over meat and eat. YUM! Only thing I would do differently? Add more chipotle peppers. Those things are killer hot (to me) but two didn't seem to give it any heat at all. At least not for a 5 1/2 lb. brisket. So MORE HOT PEPPERS next time. :)

**I would be a liar if I said I WASN'T desperately jealous at seeing this project that Mary Kathryn posted about the other day. This is so up my alley it makes me want to weep. It's incredibly detailed, endless, and epic in scale - what's not to love? I was halfway to figuring out how big a piece of linen I would need to do it myself before it dawned on me I needed a project like that like I needed a fork in the eye. WANT, BUT DO NOT NEED.Bye bye hundreds of colorful houses. *sniff*

(picture is from her flickr feed)

**I HAVE been trying to do some new beads for an update (which is long long long overdue). The problem? I'm so not into it, it's scary. I'm totally fine with doing custom orders because that seems to say 'do your job' to my head and I get to it but just doing stuff randomly on it's own? NOT FEELING IT THIS MONTH. But I'm doing a thing here and there so it will get done soon. Promise. :)

**I should do a bigger post on the nightmare about us trying to buy a new (HD) tv. The short story is: fell in love with tv, tv is too big for entertainment center, went shopping for new entertainment center, which cemented the decision that the rugs in the living room/hallway have to go and be replaced with a wood floor (continues what is already in the kitchen/dining), which led to discussions on expensive area rug to also buy. Is this normal? You start a debate about which tv to buy and you end up in a $4,000 hole? Or a theoretical hole as no money has actually been spent right now. We went through this last year when shopping for new couches and what did we end up with? NO COUCHES (STILL need those) but all new paint colors in 3/4's of the house to 'theoretically' match with the couches we liked. I feel like this time we're going to end up with new flooring (which actually *IS* needed) but no new tv. Which is no biggie because our current tv still works but we've had an HD TiVo for about 3 years now - with no HD tv. EPIC.FAIL.AT.SHOPPING.

Why is it so freaking hard to find an UNCORNED beef brisket around here in the CT/RI area??????????????

Corned beef is great, love it on rye with a schmear of really GOOD mustard.  But sometimes you want to slow cook your own brisket with other flavors, you know?
I've been systematically looking for one for a month now (4589 food bloggers blogging about their Passover briskets will do that to you) and struck out at: Stop and Shop, Shaw's, Big Y, and Dave's Marketplace. Finally found one today at BJ's. Just a huge ass piece of drool-worthy brisket!! Now what to do with it?

Go with a recipe from P-Dub or do something closer to the BBQ Beef aka Heavenly Goodness that I adore and generally use flank steak for. Decisions, decisions.

Oh shoot, I forgot to do another EPIC Lost post on Wednesday, using appropriately awesome macros. :( I've resigned myself to the fact that every Tuesday night, from now until the end of May, I will be going to bed with a LOST-sized headache/brain scramble. Anyhoo, if I HAD DONE a macro post it would have contained this:

RUN BEN RUNNNNNNN! I heart you so much, you dark and twisty soul. lol

 Who buys more spices than I do? NO ONE, NO ONE! 

LOOK AT ALL THAT. *drool*

God, I love buying spices. Well, I love using them too - I'm not just HOARDING them or anything. I've been out of this, that, and the other since Xmas so I did a huge order last week and it came on Friday. OH HAPPY JOY! I've been without thyme for, like, two MONTHS. The horror! Do you know how indispensable thyme is?  ALMOST AS MUCH AS TIME. I thought I would be smart this time and, instead of ordering everything in 1oz glass bottles, I would order some 4oz bags instead so I could get a few refills out of each one. Why not, right? The bags are usually less than a dollar more and I don't NEED fresh bottles every time. Well, to that I say: heeeeeeeee heeeeeeeeeeeeee hooooooooooooo hooooooooooooo haaaaaa haa haha! Turns out that 4oz of basil (bag) is, like, A LOT. A lot-a lot. I saw those big bags of basil and thyme and started looking over my shoulder for FBI agents because it was like I was dealing weed or something. THEM BAGS ARE BIG. Now I just have to cook like a mad fiend to use it all up!

Are these new for this year or what? Just looking at them I think I'm in lurvvvvvvvvvvvve. *nom*

Hope everyone had a nice Valentine's Day. :)

Personally, I'm not a big fan of the day but I'm also not a big fan of being all grouchy-Grinchy so I sucked it up and made some 'love' cupcakes for the day. I don't have the patience (or equipment) for fancy decorations on baked goods but this..........ahhhhh, this I can do.

I mean.............how freaking PRETTY is that??? A RAINBOW INSIDE OF EVERY CUPCAKE. *squeeeeeee*

I used just a normal white cake and standard buttercream (1 part butter/3 parts powdered sugar/dash of liquid). Nothing fancy here except the colors. :)

(Ain't gonna lie though - it's a bit a tedious to do. Lots of mixing of colors and dabbing and you end up with 234234123432 more dishes than if you had just left them white. BUT OMG AREN'T THEY PRETTY?????????? I had hoped to get some purple in there too to go along with the red/orange/yellow/green/blue but 5 colors turned out to be exactly what I could handle. lol)

New Recipe - Baked Parmesan Garlic Chicken Wings

Recipe Link.

Photo credit: Steamy Kitchen

These are sinfully good. It made my face go like this: o_0  Which I was surprised by because I generally don't like making chicken wings at home. (I pretty much only like them when they are fried and I try to avoid deep frying at home, except for making french fries once in a while. I deep fried chicken wings ONCE. ONCE. And the guilt that followed dogged me for at least a week, maybe even two. lol So now I just occasionally get my fix when we eat out. Somehow deep fried restaurant food is more acceptable than fried food made at home. I DON'T MAKE THE RULES PEOPLE. It just is what it is.) Other than grilling them once in a blue moon during the summer months, I never make wings. Ever. But the food bloggers have been out in force this month with the wing recipes (gearing up for the Super Bowl) and this one grabbed my attention. I only made 8 (whole) wings out of a big family pack because I didn't want there to be any leftovers in case I didn't like them but, wow, was that a mistake! We gobbled these up and made sad faces when we realized there was no more. All that was left on our plates was steamed broccoli and, whoaaa, VERY POOR SUBSTITUTE!! lol I still have the other half of the pack left to cook up so I might just makes these again later this week. :)

Mods: Nothing major. I poked small holes all over the wings before cooking so the rendered fat could escape and to help them get crispier. This is essential, I think, because chicken wings nowadays are so so so fatty. I also turned them halfway through cooking and switched to 'broil' near the end to also help crisp them up.

Oh! And I also made hummus for the first time too this weekend. Something I've been meaning to do for a loooooong time. It's so easy to buy pre-done, eh? Verdict: unbelievably yummy and well worth the little bit (and it really is a VERY easy thing to make) time to do it yourself.. I added more garlic to mine because I worship at the altar of Toxic Garlicky Mouth Fumes and needed to make an appropriate monthly sacrifice, *ahem*, but you certainly don't NEED to do that - the recipe is just fine as is. :)

New Recipe - Lemon Parsley Pasta

From Budget Bytes

(image from budgetbytes.blogspot.com)

Or newish recipe because I've done lemony type pasta things before. But I saw this post last week while browsing that site and it looked so yummy I knew I wanted to make it right away. And it *was* yummy. Ate it with some grilled chicken and grilled yellow squash, and, oh, NOM NOM NOM. Delish!

Mods: I used fresh basil instead of parsley because I had that on hand. (I think it would also go well with cilantro but I have Big Massive Inappropriate Love for cilantro so YMMV.) Added a pinch of red pepper flakes to the lemon/garlic/oil mixture. The lemon flavor was quite delicate, I think next time I'll give it a a tablespoon of lemon juice in addition to the zest. I wouldn't want it TOO lemony but I think, for MY palate, I could kick it up a tiny notch. :)

Note: the recipe has one small error in it in regards to pasta cooking time. No biggie but if you really were to cook angel hair pasta for 10 minutes like it says you could very well end up with a pile of mush. 4-5 minutes will do it for that size pasta.