17.3.11

because I'm super grandma

socks

This little knitting hobby that I picked up nearly a year and a half ago blossomed into a full-blown obsession this past fall and winter. It was the first year that I was dedicated (and fast) enough to knit Christmas presents to go around-- precisely, a baby sweater vest, a baby hat, three adult hats, two cowls, and a set of armwarmers.

At the beginning of 2011 I was itching to get going on something new and potentially scary, and after seeing Jenny Gordy's delightful sock knitting posts on Wikstenmade, I became determined to knit my own wool socks. There's something ridiculously archaic yet wonderfully exciting about spending hours laboring with tiny yarn and needles to make what really is such a utilitarian and basic part of our wardrobe.

So far I have one and a half pairs, as evident above. I'm still working out the kinks of gusset and toe shaping (turning heels ended up being much easier than I'd imagined!), but I'm pretty proud of what I've got so far. As you can see, I decided to dive right into knee-highs, which is slightly insane when you're not used to working with size 2 needles. I felt that it was necessary to do justice to the space-dyed wools I chose (when the green yarn came in the mail, I died of joy).

tomatillos

Just in case the first part of this post didn't highlight my penchant for domesticity, I'll share my latest cooking venture: using tomatillos for the first time. I'm sure I've eaten them in salsa verde at some point, but I've never bought them before, so I decided to try them out-- in this case, sauteed with corn and spinach, topped with a fried egg and served with corn tortillas and green tomato relish. The overall dish was good, but I'm pretty neutral on the tomatillos themselves-- they didn't really wow me in any way, though I'm sure there are more interesting ways to cook them.

After a week of being cooped up in studio doing homework and skipping meals in lieu of snacks, I've come to realize that I really miss cooking homemade food, even simple things. Yeah, yeah, I should probably just go ahead and become an octogenarian already.

2 comments:

  1. oh my goodness! that meal looks so delicious! and, yay for socks. i love knitting them too and yours are so pretty and vibrant. even though socks are so utilitarian, i always think of handknited ones as so special. i was once knitting a pair on the subway, and a woman asked me what i was knitting. when i told her, she said, you must save SO much money! ....i just laughed......haha

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  2. Haha if only she knew how much sock yarn usually costs... and how many hours it takes for one pair. Seriously, if I could charge minimum wage for every hour I spent knitting them... those would be some crazy expensive socks.

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