2013 - Week 39

Hello from Week 39 :) Two small things to share this week before I get to the fun stuff: 1. For my exercise I did more pilates and Fit Sugar workouts . . . I really do love the 10 minute workouts . . . it doesn't seem so bad because 10 minutes goes by really quickly and the instructors are very encouraging. 2. I finished my whole dream journal. Since it really isn't enhancing my life in any way, I decided not to start another one, but I thought it was pretty crazy that I had so many dreams that I filled a whole journal with them already. It will be interesting to go back and read through it some time and remember all of the crazy things my mind created while I was asleep :)

Okay, for my recipe to share this week, I made a faux alfredo sauce using cauliflower (creamy cauliflower sauce). I know, it sounds weird, but it was actually really good, didn't taste like cauliflower hardly at all, and it made me feel much less guilty covering my chicken fettuccine with a creamy white sauce :) I added some fresh black pepper and garlic salt to it for extra flavor. Also, I just drained out the water, added the recommended amount back in, and blended it with my immersion blender . . . I thought that was much easier than trying to transfer the hot cauliflower to a blender or food processor. Try it out, I think you'll like it.

For my task this week, since I was still not up to scrapbooking and our house stuff was kind of in a lull, I decided it would be okay if I got back into knitting. I'm so glad I did . . . it was so much fun and I really enjoy making presents for people :) (Family, consider yourself warned about Christmas ;)) I really love knitting because I think the finished products look so professional, and one of my favorite things about knitting is cables. I don't know how many cable knit sweaters I own, but I just love the look of them, so I decided to be brave and give it a try. After watching this video: Knit Mug Holder and reading over this pattern: "Pumpkin Spice" I was pretty certain that even with my basic knitting skills I could complete my first cable knitting project . . . and I did. I would say it only took me a little over two hours and the whole project was complete :)

I wanted it to fit a little higher on the mug, so I put the button closer to the end.
Thank you to my awesome friend Karmen for the button :)

Ta da

If you are afraid to try cables, this is a great project that whips us easily and doesn't require a big time commitment . . . definitely a good place to start.

Now, once I had finished this, I took it with me to show a friend who had recently had a birthday. She seemed to like it a lot, and since it was still near her birthday, I decided to try out another pattern and give it to her as a present (along with the Mr. Coffee mug).The pattern I got from "Purl Avenue" . . . she has some neat stuff on her site. This one was a bit more complicated since it had three cables instead of just one and it was wider, but I still managed to finish it. Because the cables were bigger, my stitches got much tighter at the crossovers, which worried me quite a bit, but I guess that is normal. So, I just focused on keeping them loose and not stressing about it too much, and I think I came up with a pretty good product. I ended up repeating the 12 row pattern six times to get the ~ 9 inch long sleeve.

Finished mug warmer (sewn together . . . no button on this one)

Two finished products . . . sorry, the pictures don't really do them justice

So there you go . . . that's what I've been up to this week. Let's see what we can create next week :)