Calico?

I don't care what you say, it is NOT calico!

Beautiful

A rainy Tuesday, a gorgeous bouquet, loving daughters, delightful day!

Pie Parade

Since Zachary's been home from college for the summer I've been on a pie-baking binge.

Last week was lemon-merengue and sour cherry.

On tap for this weekend is blueberry and strawberry rhubarb, perhaps even rhubarb cream.
Zachary has always been my pie-eater. While everyone else has a favorite and even one or two kinds they don't like, Zach can always be depended upon to devour whatever fruit-filled pastry I whip up.

I'll never forget reading Farmer Boy when my boys were little. Finding out that Almanzo regularly had apple pie for breakfast was a a revelation for Zachary, and I must admit, a sheer delight for me!

Nothing makes a mom feel more satisfied than watching her boy gobble up her baked goods...

Garlicky

What you see here is all that remains of the garlic I stored last fall. Actually, after last weekend's cooking, there are only about 1 1/2 bulbs left.

I had a lot of garlic from my CSA last fall, and combined with a big purchase from Coyote Run Farm at October's Farm Crawl, I made it through the fall and winter using only locally produced garlic.

I simply stored the bulbs on the top shelf of a kitchen cupboard, pulling off a bulb as needed. At this point, some cloves are unusable and others are a little withered, but overall, I'm pleased with the outcome.

Last spring we planted garlic in our flower beds, but not until early June. The fall got away from us and we never harvested the bulbs or even took a look at their development.

This spring, the garlic is growing like crazy and I've pulled some to use as fresh garlic in my cooking.

I'm not sure if the bulbs will develop correctly, but it's been a fun experiment.

To left, you see the garlic I bought in October.

Fresh, local, goodness

We chose not to go to the farmer's market Saturday.

We had only just finished up 2 batches of asparagus from the last market, our own lettuce has provided us with as much salad as we could want, and I've been using rhubarb someone gave away at Michael's office.

I didn't really need anything.

I could have gone anyway and I'm sure I would have found plenty to buy, but the Valley Junction Farmer's Market is on Thursday. Often I prefer this market, it's late afternoon time, smaller crowds, more intimate feel. I plan to stock up on greenhouse tomatoes and more asparagus then.

No, what I really needed was milk.

Picket Fence Creamery milk, to be precise.

So, on Sunday Michael and I drove out to Woodward, about a 35 minute drive, to stock up. We thought we were out of luck, as the shop was dark and we realized they don't keep regular Sunday hours, when the Burkhart's pulled in the drive right behind us!

I purchased 10 gallons of skim milk, which should last us about two weeks. I'll probably freeze several gallons to assure it's freshness. I also needed cream and whole milk, 2 packages of bison dogs, 10 lbs. of hamburger, 2 lbs. of bacon, 2 packages of chicken breasts, a bag of spinach, a pint of fresh pea pods, and some cheese dip, all for $129.87.

I don't doubt that some would look at that amount and declare how much less they would spend on milk, hamburger, bacon, etc. , at the grocery store.

And I'm sure they would.

But to me, quality is far more important than price alone.

This milk is predominantly organically grown, as are the meat and veggies. Not only are the products just about as fresh as possible, but all come from local farmers. If I want to, I can watch the very cows that produced the milk as they graze near the creamery, discuss crop rotation and winter feed with the owner/farmer, and find out how business is doing.

I believe these products are healthier for my family, and the animals certainly are humanely raised and cared for. This is more important to me than "coupon savings" at a grocery store, where my money goes to support CAFOs and their use of antibiotics, where animals are treated as a commodity alone, not as a beings deserving of respect, and where the farmer sees only a fraction of the profit.

This little local creamery demonstrates a micro-economy in action: the creamery buys winter feed from its neighbors, who buy milk and meat products from them. They sell products from 80 other local producers right in their store. I spend my local dollars at the creamery, where the profit stays with the farmer and, in turn, is spent locally.

All this, and I've never had tastier milk!

So if you're a coupon maven, you might want to rethink your spending habits. Coupons can indeed save you money, but almost exclusively on processed foods, disposable paper goods, etc. Instead, why don't you try buying basic ingredients from a local farmer and see how much better your food tastes and how much healthier you feel.

I think you'll see the value in getting more "bang for you buck."

Crafty

One of Melissa's best friends turned 13 a few weeks ago. Her birthday kind of snuck up on us this year, and Melissa found herself in need of a handmade gift with only a couple of days to make it.
We found a free pattern online for this nifty crocheted backpack, dashed to the store for yarn, and in two nights Melissa whipped this up.

She only worked on it at night, starting at 10 p.m. or later.

The second night she was up until 2 a.m. in her dash to finish.

I'm hoping she'll help me make one, too, though it might be a little difficult.

She thinks she crocheted in her sleep most of the time and doesn't remember much once she hit the middle stripe!

And to think, only last year she couldn't read a pattern...

Quiche on the fly

Earlier this week I had a hankering for asparagus quiche, so I went hunting for a recipe.
Every single recipe I found, both in cookbooks and on-line, required ham or bacon.
Unfortunately, I'm down to 1 package of sausage and 2 packages of spare ribs from the 1/2 hog we purchased 2 years ago.
We don't eat a lot of meat.
I didn't want to go to the grocery store, mainly because I only buy meat from local producers. What to do?
Rely on the magic of substitutions!

With a little ingenuity, a willingness to experiment, and lots of cooking experience under my belt, I set off to create an asparagus quiche recipe.
Here's what I came up with.

1 lb. asparagus cut into 1 inch pieces, steamed until just tender
about 1/3 cup chopped fresh spring garlic, including the greens, plucked straight out of my flower bed
4 eggs
2 T pureed oven dried tomatoes (these were in the freezer from a batch I made from our tomatoes last summer)
1/2 t coarse ground black pepper
1/2 t salt
about 1 cup total, cream and whole milk mixed (what I had left in the fridge!)
about 2 cups freshly grated local gouda cheese
Sprinkle top with paprika

Preheat oven to 350.
Bake in your favorite pre-baked whole wheat pastry crust for about 40 minutes or until puffy and set.

It turned out pretty well, though I may tinker with the recipe some in the future. I also think it would have been better if I'd had smoked gouda.
Still, everyone liked it and the leftovers got eaten up right away.
That's usually a good sign!

In memoriam: Carrot Cake

What do you do with 6 lbs. of free carrots?
Make carrot cake, of course!
Carrot cake is one of my husband's favorites and our "family" carrot cake recipe is one he aquired from a the mother-in-law of a good friend back when he was young and carefree. Though she passed away in the mid-'70s, she'll always be remembered in my family for her fabulous carrot cake.

Esther Weitz's Carrot Cake

2 cups sugar or 1 cup honey

2 cups unbleached white flour (can substitute 1 cup whole wheat)

2 t cinnamon

2 t baking soda

2 t salt

7 oz. coconut

1 cup walnuts or pecans, chopped

2 cups carrots, grated

1 cup safflower oil (can substitute 1/2 applesauce for half the oil)

3 eggs

7 oz can unsweetened pineapple w/juice (can use fresh pineapple or substitute grated fresh apple)

2 t vanilla

Mix together and bake in greased 9 x 13 pan at 350 degrees for 35-45 minutes.

Frosting:

8 0z cream cheese

1 stick butter

honey or powdered sugar to taste

1 t vanilla

Add cream to desired consistency.

Frost cake when cool

This cake rarely lasts longer than one dessert and breakfast the next morning for my family!
Thank you, Esther.

A freegan weekend

Everyone here was too sick to go the farmer's market Saturday, but by Sunday afternoon Michael and I were able to run a few errands. I've started shopping at the day-old-bread store, something I used to do all the time when the kids were little.
Somehow I fell out of the habit, and with my broken foot, I didn't bake nearly as much these past three months as usual. Consequently, we often ran out of bread and would grab a loaf from the grocery store.
Bread prices are crazy now and I just couldn't justify spending upwards of $3 a loaf for store-bought bread. I always buy a high fiber, whole grain bread, and those tend to be the most expensive.
I was delighted to discover the day-old store sells this bread, often 2 loaves for $1.50. I like to stock up with about $20-worth of bread and buns. They freeze beautifully and no one can tell they are day-old.
On Sunday, our cart was loaded when I noticed a sign behind the counter offering "feed bread" for $2.50 for a large bag. I could see several clear plastic bags full of loaves sitting in the back. When the man in front of us bought a bag, I could see that the bread inside looked just fine.
So, in addition to our cartload, we bought a bag of "feed bread," figuring that if anything was wrong with it we could always feed it to our chickens.
But the bread is fine - the only thing I noticed is that the loaves had reached or passed their "purchase by" dates by a day or two. Heck, lots of people have these loaves in their kitchens already, having bought them a day or two earlier.
Jackpot!
We got 9 loaves of whole grain bread for $2.50. I'll just make sure we pull these loaves out of the freezer first.
We did have to sign a "release" of sorts - we didn't read it before signing, but I imagine it detailed that the bread was not to be eaten by people and probably served as a legal waiver for the manufacturer.

Afterwards, we checked out a couple of dumpsters, but most were either too gross or empty. We did have good luck at a Hy-Vee Drugtown, finding 2 lb. bags of baby carrots for the taking. As with the bread, the carrots were either a day past their sell-by date or expired that very day. And there is absolutely nothing wrong with the veggies.
6 lbs. of carrots for free!
Not a bad day...

Slushy

It's a beautiful day here in Des Moines, but a little too warm for May.

Our high today is supposed to hit 84 degrees.

Summer temperatures call for a cool, refreshing summer drink, but all I have in the fridge is milk, and milkshakes just seem too heavy.

Once again, my freezer comes to the rescue, offering up a quart size bag of frozen strawberries.

I thawed the berries just enough to break them into smaller chunks, put them in the blender with a little water and about 1 cup sugar. It took two batches to blend it all up and the result was fabulous!

Thick, cold, strawberry yumminess.

Just be careful to drink it slowly or you might end up with a cold headache!

Unfortunate

What if you made a cake and nobody ate it?

Above you see my entry for most-unfortunate cake.

It may be the ugliest cake I've ever made.

I plan to blame it on my foot.

Two weeks ago I had my third visit with the podiatrist about my broken foot.

The one I fractured in February.

Walking.

The one I re-fractured in March.

Walking.

This time, he gave me a walking cast. One of those massive jobbers that totally encases the foot in hard molded plastic. All that heavy molded plastic is held onto my foot and leg via more hard molded plastic and multiple velcro strips. I had to put a "lift" in my other shoe just to even out my clomping.

I have to say, the device really works.

It's now next to impossible to move around and hurrying is out of the question. Climbing the stairs is likely to frighten small children into believing the bogey man is indeed coming to get them.

The day after aquiring this new orthopedic accessory, my son was due home from college, my daughter had an evening doctor's appointment, and I needed to make supper, all within about 2 hours.

Despite starting the process after 5 p.m., I felt compelled to make a cake to celebrate the end of a successful first year in college. I had to properly welcome my baby boy home.

9.9 times out of 10, the only kind of cake to grace our oven is chocolate with chocolate frosting. Never one to go with the flow, I decided to make one of Zachary's childhood favorites, Orange Cake.

Oh, but not just any orange cake.

No, this orange cake required the making of orange filling in addition to frosting.

I made this decision about 29 minutes before needing to leave for the doctor's appointment.

No problem, though, Melissa would be here to take the cake out of the oven. I quickly mixed it up, popped it in, and cooked the clear orange filling, leaving it on the stovetop to cool.

By this time, I'd been on my foot, gimping around the kitchen, tripping over two dogs, and cooking up a storm, for about an hour.

My foot, the broken one, didn't hurt exactly.

Instead, it sort of felt heavy.

And achy.

One might even say dead.

We flew out the door to the appointment, whereby "flying" equals me clomping at about 5 steps per minute, changing out of my cast into my orthopedic shoe in order to be able to drive, wiping the sweat from my brow, and cursing high arches. At least I was able to prop my lifeless limb on a waiting room table.

Fast forward about 1 1/2 hours and you'll find me painfully clumping up the steps into the house.

By this time, the cake had been left in the pans to cool too long.

You know what happens when a cake cools in the pan too long, don't you?

Yep.

It was stuck.

I did my best to pry it out of the pans, put the water on to boil for the pasta, make the sauce, prepare the salad, and slather the orange filling between the layers.

By now, said foot was not only heavy.

It was throbbing.

Each step was painful, my back hurt from my strange galumphing gate, and I still had to frost the dumb cake.

Now, usually a somewhat lop-sided, crumbly cake can be hidden under a glorious layer of butter cream frosting.

But I was past butter cream frosting and nowhere near glorious.

Instead, I mixed up a quick, somewhat runny frosting and uncermoniously dumped it over the mess.

And what a mess it was.

Everyone finally made it home for dinner around 9 p.m.

The meal was good, we laughed, we talked, we reminisced.

Who wants cake?

No one.

Not a single soul in this house, excluding both dogs of course, wanted a piece of cake.

In my 21 years as a mother, this has never happened before, and I hope it will never happen again.

I shudder at the memory.

Poor cake.
Poor unfortunate baked good.

Poor, sad, me.

Luckily for my ego, however, most of the cake was devoured by the next evening, and despite it's ugliness, was delicious.

Just don't try to bake it with a broken foot.

Fresh Orange Cake
Sift together:
2 1/4 cups flour
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt

Add:
1/2 cup shortening
1/4 cup orange juice
1 1/2 tsp. vanilla
Beat 2 minutes, then add:
3/4 cup milk
2 eggs
Beat two minutes more
Pour batter into two greased and floured 9" layer pans


Clear Orange Filling:
Mix in pan:
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup cornstartch
1/2 tsp. salt
Stir in gradually:
1 cup orange juice
Bring to boil. Boil 1 minute, remove from heat and add:
2 T butter
2 T grated orange rind
2 T lemon juice
Cool thoroughly.

Spread orange filling between layers of cake, frost with favorite white frosting.
Enjoy!

Traditional Hostess Gift?

Hmm, maybe not.

My experiment with homemade laundry detergent was a success, so I decided to share my accomplishment with a couple of good friends.

Each pint jar holds about 8 loads-worth of detergent.

Good Eats

Over the past 11 years, my ego has learned to deal with a difficult situation.
You see, my youngest, who just turned 12, is what you might call "finicky."
Picky.
Fussy.
You might even call her downright persnickety when it comes to food.
Gradually, however, her tastes have broadened a smidgeon, her list of "likes," though still vastly out-numbered by "dislikes," has increased, and her tact, fortunately, has taken great strides forward.
We've come to an understanding; don't ask, don't tell.
If I don't ask her whether she likes what I've served, she won't have to tell me the truth.
So when she asked me what was for dinner one night a few weeks ago, I responded with the usual "I don't know."
"Will I like it?"
"Probably not."
She then asked if we could have pesto, one of her favorite foods. I was glad for the suggestion and that she would actually enjoy our dinner that night.
On the spur of the moment, I decided to ask her to plan the week's menu, reserving the right to add more vegetables if necessary. This idea came out of nowhere, as I never really meal-plan, but we both ended up delighted with the result.

Melissa's Menu:

Sunday: pesto, with fresh tomatoes and french bread
Monday: homemade pizza, with salad
Tuesday: garlic pasta, homemade french bread and salad
Wednesday: hamburgers and oven fries
Thursday: cheese biscuit with carrot sticks and tomato wedges
Friday: nachos (whole grain tortilla chips w/melted cheddar cheese, topped with black beans and chopped tomatoes for the kids. Adults, add chopped red onion, avocado, jalapenos, and red peppers)

I think I might do this more often, giving each of the kids a chance to "meal plan."

Blowing Out a Forest

Photo from www.mental-hygiene.org

This week my family was hit with a horrible cold virus.

Sarah started first on Sunday, followed by Melissa and me on Tuesday, and Michael on Wednesday.

This wasn't just the sniffles, but a full-out assault on sinuses, throats and energy levels that still has us recuperating.

Most colds are miserable but don't land us in bed. This one, however, left us all but incapacitated for days. Even Michael, who never misses work for illness, called in sick three days in a row.

Fortunately we fell in succession, so there was always someone to fetch orange juice, cold medicine and more Kleenex. Zachary has yet to succumb; thankfully he could still walk the dogs and make grocery store runs for supplies.This morning, while viewing the aftermath of empty Kleenex boxes, juice cartons, and bags of used tissues, I counted up the number of boxes of Kleenex we used last week.

It was more than 15.

I kid you not, we produced more than 15 Kleenex boxes worth of snot in one week.

So now, as the sneezing subsides and energy slowly returns, in addition to a disastrously messy house - there's even fur in the cobwebs, folks - I'm faced with environmental guilt.

While trying to find out how many trees are in a box of Kleenex, I came across this Greenpeace site explaining that Kimberly-Clark, the makers of Kleenex and many other disposable paper products, uses mostly virgin fiber from clear cut ancient forests to make its products.

Most of the company's products, including Kleenex, use no recycled fiber at all.

None.

I'd hate to think how we would have survived this virus with hankies, but people used to do it. Even using the softest tissues available, we're all sporting Rudolph noses. Would flannel reusable tissues be as soft? Softer?

Plus, who would end up washing all those goobery, snotty rags?

That's a rhetorical question, by the way.

I know who.

Kleenex were invented in 1924 as an applicator for cold cream. In 1926 the company was surprised by how many customers said they used Kleenex as disposable handkerchiefs. The company listened, and by 1930, Kleenex was marketed as just that; disposable tissues.

So, I'm off to take another dose of cold medicine, drink another cup of coffee, and ponder the practicality of reusable snot rags.

Kermit was right.

It's not easy being green.

Natural Beauty

These lovelies are blooming all over our yard.

When we first moved here nearly 3 years ago, there were no flowers...

no landscaping...

just a scrubby yard...

with lots of grass to mow.

There's just something about a non-landscaped yard I simply cannot tolerate.

I think it's my dad's influence, living on through me...

I always think of him when planting flowers, growing veggies, seeing our little apple trees bloom...

He had a special love for hostas. I bought this little beauty last summer at the farmer's market.




Of course, no yard would be complete without a healthy smattering of these...

Simple Pleasures

Fresh picked eggs from our ladies...

gathered in a handmade, homemade egg basket.

Life is good.

In the Spotlight

Everything was going well at the kitten convention...

until the papparazzi showed up...

Some people just can't handle fame...

Locally Grown

So what's the big deal about eating local?

I think I've always wished I lived on an acreage, but we never seemed ready or able to make such a move. I feel such a loss now that my kids will never have that experience, especially since my dad died nearly 5 years ago and my mom sold their acreage and moved to town.
Being on a farm was a large part of my childhood, though I was only a summer visitor to my grandma's farm in Iowa. Most of my childhood was spent in suburban Long Island, New York, about as far away from Iowa farmland as you can get!
I loved picking raspberries to go with ice cream after haying, picking apples from the orchard, helping my cousin gather eggs, holding the baby chicks, and eating my grandma's homemade apple pies and applesauce. Nothing tasted better than the catfish my uncle caught in his ponds, fried up that very same day.

My dad was a horticulturist and we always had a garden of some sort. Often it wasn't in our own yard, but in a patch he'd prepared at work. My dad worked as director of horticulture at several different public gardens on Long Island. These public gardens used to be the summer homes of America's robber barons, a la Carnegie. Down the generations the families could no longer maintain the properties as private residences so they became public gardens. We lived on the grounds of two of these former "family" homes, Planting Fields Arboretum and Bayard Cutting Arboretum.
My mom always canned tomatoes, applesauce, and huckleberries, made pies from scratch, and put up beet pickles and bread and butter pickles; somewhat uncommon, I think, for the Long Island woman of the 1970s.
So I always had good food, made at home, and a connection to the land and gardening.
Maybe this experience led to my openness about local eating, and I have long tried to limit my meat eating, what little of it we do, to sustainably and humanely raised animals.
Michael and I have always had a garden, though until recently, it's often been quite small and relatively poorly tended! When we moved to this house nearly 3 years ago, we made a determined effort to downsize our lifestyle and raise our standard of living. This involved converting most of our yard to vegetable/fruit gardens and perrennials, eliminating waste wherever possible, and embracing a simpler life. We aren't there yet, but we've made a lot of progress.

I think the real turning point for me was reading Michael Pollan's Omivore's Dilemma, followed shortly thereafter by Better Off, The 100-Mile Diet, and Animal, Vegetable, Miracle. I realized the importance of supporting small farmers and that research is beginning to show that locally and sustainably produced foods are, in some ways, healthier. I know they are almost always tastier.
My husband works in industrial agriculture, so I certainly live with a fair amount of hypocracy. I think the world would be better off if local foods were grown by local people for local consumption. Unfortunately, seed company's proprietary rules and extensive mono-cropping often prevent this from happening in some of the poorest places in the world. And it just doesn't make sense that the bulk of our agricultural acreage goes toward producing grain to feed to animals. It will become ever more imperative as the world population continues to grow to reduce the amount of meat consumed per person; something I don't think the developed world, especially Americans, are ready to embrace.
It's also important to me to support local economies, and what better way to do this than to spend my money for goods produced locally, to people who pay local taxes and will spend that money locally as well? It just makes economic sense to me to buy a bag of spinach at the farmer's market where the farmer herself - no middle-man involved - gets the profit. And I get spinach that is fresher, likely safer, and healthier than what comes sealed in a bag at Dahl's.

After nearly an entire year of eating as locally as possible, my kids can taste the difference between a store bought apple and farm grown, between the "fresh" strawberries purchased off-season and those locally grown and frozen at their peak of flavor, between dill pickles at a restaurant and those we made at home. It's been a long time since I've bought ground beef at a grocery store instead of from a farmer, but I'll never forget the "rotten" smell of grocery store beef cooking versus the rich aroma of farm fresh, grass pastured beef.
We've always eaten well, with almost all our meals made from scratch. This makes eating in a restaurant a typically less-than-satisfying experience for the whole family. But cooking with ingredients picked when ripe or plucked right out of the garden, or meats grown humanely and naturally, or eggs laid fresh that very day, imparts a quality to our meals I never would have imagined possible.
Buying locally also gives my family a connection to the land and to where our food comes from. How many children have never seen a real chicken? Eaten a fresh egg? How many don't know that raspberries grow on bushes and that potatoes grow under ground?
It seems unhealthy and perhaps a little dangerous for people to be so disconnected from the foods they eat. I want that connection for my family and myself, and to foster a sense of community responsibility.
Most of all, however, I want the foods I eat to be as fresh, ripe and delicious as possible.

Natural Serotonin

Life renewed

Nature's promise

that summer's bounty

is just around the corner



Enjoy

Breakfast Burritos

After the Farmer's Market on Saturday, Michael made us an incredible meal of breakfast burritos. He sauteed a little local sausage, onions and peppers, salt and pepper, then scrambled in our own eggs.

Wrapped up in a whole wheat tortilla with a side of fresh strawberries - yum! There's a stand at the Farmer's Market that sells breakfast burritos, though I've never seen it. I go to the market on a mission: to gather locally grown fruits and veggies for home-cooked meals. An article in today's paper said a breakfast burrito at the market costs $4.50.

Wow. I'm so glad Michael cooked these up from scratch for us!

Oh, and they weren't blurry in real life.

The Road to Hell: Story of a Handmade Disaster

I was only somewhat successful in my quest for a handmade Christmas this year.

Don't get me wrong, many handmade and heartfelt gifts were exchanged amongst and between my family.

It's my poor friends who bore the brunt of my "handmade" holiday.

I felt proud of the jams, pickles and other homemade goodies I gave.

Each jar was covered with a circle of fabricin an old-fashioned print and tied with a bow.

The jars were artfully arranged in a small, homey basket, also adorned with a bow.

Wish I'd taken a picture.

No, the problem was with my crocheting.

One dear friend received a crocheted throw in bright colors that match her personality. That gift was relatively successful, though on a recent visit I noticed I''ll need to re-sew some of the granny squares together.

Again, no photo.

But it was my dear friend Chris who was the recipient of the most disastrous gift I've ever given. I found a free pattern for an "urban wrap," a long, somewhat tailored shawl. My friend's favorite color is purple, but I didn't care for the purples in the recommended yarn for the project.

"I know," I thought, "I'll just find a similar weight yarn and subsitute."

Wat is it they say about good intentions?

Yeah, something about heading south.

Way south.

The day I stopped at the yarn specialty store to find just the right purple, the saleswoman was busy helping another customer with a knitting project.

No problem.

The yarn just needed to be heavy weight and bulky.

I could figure it out myself.

I found a gorgeous yarn, soft and warm, in a lovely shade of purple. It might have been called eggplant, I can't quite remember.

I think I've been blocking the horrid details.

Now, I always buy more yarn than the pattern requires.

A little fear of mine about not having "enough," that applies to many areas of my life: food, garden plants, food, fabric for sewing projects, food...

I bought 10 skiens, all the store had in stock, and to allay my fears of scarcity, ordered 10 more.

Gulp.

Specialty yarn is, shall we say, on the pricey side.

But this was going to be the ultimate handmade representation of appreciation and affection for a dear, dear friend.

You can't put a price on that.

Right?

Right?

So, several weeks later, once I'd worked up the nerve to start the project (every new undertaking of mine requires overcoming a hugely obstructive level of fear. I know. I'm on medication, remember?), I began to crochet.

Wow, that yarn sure got used up fast.

But the wrap, which was to be crocheted in three separate sections then sewn together, was growing.

And growing.

And growing.

The reaction of the saleswoman to my order of yet 10 more skeins should have alerted me to imminent disaster.

"Wow," she exclaimed, "that must be some shawl you're making!"

Um, yeah, it was.

The shawl grew and grew.

I found myself putting it together in a frenzy up to the very last minute.

And you know, it was really huge.

I mean, it hung down to my calves and I'm not a little woman.

I'm nearly 5' 11".

My friend?

Maybe 5' 5."

Oh, and there was another little problem.

In my quest for super soft, yet natural fiber, I stumbled upon a blend of mohair and wool, with a little acrylic thrown in.

Wow, talk about soft.

It made me want to throw it all on floor and just roll in it.

But I digress.

Whether it was the mohair or the wool, I'm not sure, but this yarn has a major shedding problem.

Every time I worked on the shawl I ended up covered in a blend of mohair and wool. The yarn shed so much that I practically had to furminate myself.

My worries began to mount.

But the moment of truth had arrived. The day of gift-giving was at hand. My children encouraged me to go ahead and give the shawl, despite my doubts. In the crush of the moment, I caved and wrapped up the gift.

I thought maybe I could take it back, disassemble it, and make a throw out of the largest piece. I could unravel the whole thing and start over. Somehow, there would be something I could do the remedy the booby gift of the season.

The reveal was even worse than I expected.

My friend, initially, raved over the shawl, it's softness, it's color.

Then, she put it on.

She looked like a fuzzy, purple plum. I don't think she could have moved without tripping. But even worse, the shoulder seams were slowling pulling apart.

In short, it was an unraveling nightmare.

I apologized profusely and quickly took the aberration from her shoulders, stuffing in back in the bag and assuring her I would fix it, somehow, only to look up and see her covered in fuzz. I've never before given a gift that not only fell apart but required the recipient to lint brush herself from head-to-toe.

I brought the horror home, set it up on a shelf, and tried to forget about it. But it sat there day after day, daring me to come up with a solution. Defying me to right this horrible embodiment of wrong.

Finally, one day, several months later, it came to me.

I would felt the whole mess!

Before felting

After felting

After resewing the unraveled seams, I threw it into the washing machine on hot, with dab of detergent and few other heavy items to aid in the agitation.

A stroke of near genius it was, as the felting shrunk the stitches more tightly together, shortening the overall length and strengthening the fibers.
I was able to give the shawl back to my friend, as a semi-usable item. Of course, there isn't much call for wool shawls in April, but she'll be prepared come fall.

One little problem remains, however.
The darn thing still sheds like a rough-coat St. Bernard.

I think next year I'll give her a lint brush and a roll of masking tape.