Out of ideas

So it's day 19 of the blog challenge and I'm simply out of ideas when it comes today's blog. Maybe it's Sunday. Maybe it's because I'm still fuming over encountering so many cheap people at yesterday's garage sale. Or maybe it is because it's pretty grey outside and I'm a bit annoyed that I haven't been able to use my clotheslines for the last week.

So I leave you with a photo of yarny goodness, taken during Tour de Fleece. Enjoy!

Open letter: Charity garage sale

Oh man, oh man! Although I've helped to run several garage sales in the past, this is the first time where I've nearly lost my cool. And I wasn't the only one. My friend had to walk away from customers a couple of times because of insulting monetary offers. Yes, we do expect a degree of haggling. But offering us ridiculous sums of money for good quality merchandise is just plain insulting. At one point I had to snip at someone to put down the merchandise if they weren't going to buy it. This was after I was offered 10 cents for a book. Apparently 25 cents was just too steep of a price.

Sometimes it's painful to bite your tongue.

And the kicker was all proceeds of the garage sale go towards charity.

So here's my open letter to all the cheap people who attended this morning's charity garage sale for Run for the Cure:

Dear cheap people attending my charity garage sale,

Stop being cheap! We, meaning the garage sale organizers, do expect a bit of reasonable haggling. However, what some of you offered today was downright insulting. Expect no apology from me about my pissy behaviour after offering me an insulting amount of money for good quality items. I almost spit out my watermelon after one of you offered $2 for a pristine luggage set. None of the money we made today goes to us. One hundred per cent of today’s proceeds goes to Run for the Cure, a fundraiser for the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation. Also, I don’t appreciate you rolling your eyes at me when I point out to you that this is a fundraiser for cancer.

My friend almost wanted to post signs that said, “Thanks for not haggling as this is a fundraiser for Run for the Cure.” She thought it may be rude. Now, I think it is appropriate and we should definitely do this next year.

And to the guy who let his kid play with all the kids toys for 20 minutes before leaving without spending a cent … you stay classy!

Sincerely, 
Sunburnt and peeved Yarnitmomma

Photo Friday

It's been a cookie kind of day, today.

Speaking of sandwiches

This dinosaur cutter I purchased at Wal-Mart has been a huge hit at our house. I initially bought it to cut up sandwiches for my daughter's birthday party. Since then, she has been asking for dinosaur sandwiches constantly. She enjoys biting off the dinosaur's head before eating its body. That's the way she rolls.

A BLT sandwich in my future

It hides among the leaves. But I can still see it. Slowly but surely it's turning red. And once it turns bright crimson, I'll pounce. My bread, turkey bacon and lettuce are all on standby. Although impatient, I'm determined I will make a BLT sandwich by the end of the week.

The tomatoes in my garden have been slow to ripen. To date, I've only eaten two tomatoes. One ripened on the vine, the other my husband saved from rotting on the ground. It sat on the counter for more than two weeks before it decided to turn red. 

I'm unsure if (a) weather or (b) growing location have contributed to the problem. Despite being a farmer's daughter, I've got zero experience in the gardening department. I'm flying by the seat of my pants. 

Ironically, I'm not a fan of tomatoes. Unless I need them for a recipe, I don't consciously seek them out in the grocery store. But when it comes to growing your own food, everything seems to tastes a bit better. Also, I do enjoy a good BLT sandwich from time to time. 

So here I wait. Waiting for the tomato to turn red. I just have to be patient. 

Busy morning

It has been a busy morning at Little Suburban House, which happens rarely around here.

I kicked off the morning by making more chocolate chip zucchini muffins. I had leftover shredded zucchini in the refrigerator from the batches of muffin I made on Sunday. So instead of chucking it in the green bin, I made more muffins.

While the muffins were baking, I threw on a load of laundry, packed my daughter's preschool backpack and got her ready. Once the muffins were done, I set them aside to cool, turned off the oven and got the kidlet out the door for school.

After dropping her off at school, I zoomed back home, cut up watermelon and veggies for tomorrow and started on baking chocolate chip cookies for an upcoming bake sale. Word to the wise, traditional cookies and sweet bake goods do well at bake sales. Healthy treats do not, unfortunately. So I now stick to cookies.

I threw the clothes into the dryer before tackling dishes. I continued to work on baking the cookies while I folded clothes. And in between chores, I snuck in lunch before chopping up eggs I made last night for egg salad.

So it is not even noon yet and I feel pretty productive. Great morning. Hopefully I can relax some before I've got to schlep to preschool to pick up the kidlet.

The end of fiber challenges

It has been a busy month and a half in my fibery part of the universe.

I spun every day during Tour de Fleece. Tour de Fleece is a personal spinning challenge that runs during Tour de France. I think as a newbie spinner I was over . . . what's the word? . . . enthusiastic. By the time the tour ended, I had acquired an Ashford Kiwi spinning wheel and a fiber stash that competes with my yarn stash.

I had a couple of days break before the Ravellenic Games. Like Tour de Fleece, the Ravellenic Games coincide with the Olympic Games. By the time the Games were over, I had made two knit shawlettes and spun 100 grams of some lovely blue Merino.

So the challenges are done and what's a spinner/knitter to do? Well, in my case, continue to work on my Rhinebeck sweater. I'm holding out on casting on another pair of socks on the needles until a new Sock Knitters Anonymous year begins in September. I'm currently spinning some BFL. Even though the Olympics have been over for less than 24 hours, I am enjoying the fact that I've got no knitting or spinning challenges on the go. Although they are productive, they can suck the fun out knitting and spinning.

Text me, maybe

When it comes to cellphones, don't call me. Text me. 

I've got the cheapest plan out there. I can text all I want, but when it comes to calling, I've only have 50 minutes to spare. 

And that's okay with me because I hardly use my cellphone to communicate with the outside world. It's only for emergencies. These days, the only person I seem to text is my husband. We talk about mundane stuff, such as, Can you get some margarine at the grocery store? Oh yeah, we need ham, too. I'd rather have artificial vanilla extract instead of the real thing because I'm cheap like that. Thanks!

I'm starting to enjoy texting. Instead of pressing one button on the keypad multiple times to get a letter like I had to do on my old phone, I've got an virtual keyboard at my disposal. I think the text bubbles are really cute. Reminds me of VH1's Pop Up Video. 

I really should have made the switch to a smart phone years ago. Now I've just got to find more people to text with. 

Dryer Days

As I write this, it's pouring rain outside, making my retractable clotheslines useless.

I've had to turn to my dryer this weekend to complete my laundry. For the most part, the dryer has been sitting idle since I started my clothesline challenge. Since we've been in a drought situation for the entire summer, I have no excuse other than to harness the hot summer sun and dry my clothes outside. I'm not sure what kind of impact, if any, using clotheslines will have on my electricity bill as the central air system has been running full tilt since the beginning of summer.

Even though it has been a couple of days, I miss using my clotheslines. The clotheslines force me to me more efficient when it comes to putting away laundry. When the clothes come off the line they immediately get put away. But the clothes seem to languish in the laundry room when I use the dryer.

However, I may need to change my ways, if the forecast by Environment Canada is correct. The rain continues through the weekend, with a brief break for Monday and Tuesday, and returns Wednesday.

Oh laundry, it's the never ending chore.

Photo Friday

Too bad I couldn't implement this rate schedule.

Technologically inept

I'm technologically inept. I was hoping to amaze you all with some awesome after-a-thunderstorm flooding photos I took with my cell phone last night, but unfortunately it won't co-operate. After waiting for it to install drivers, I still can't figure out how to take photos off the darn thing. Not impressed. Obviously I'm not computer  or cell phone savvy. 

To make a long story short, we had a huge downpour of rain yesterday and it flooded the intersection. Not as badly as last year, but bad enough that cars had a difficult time getting through the intersection. 

So I leave you with a photo I took last year after one of two major thunderstorms that flooded said intersection. 

Crazy eh? 

Sweet, glorious rain

This morning when I strolled through the back yard I was greeted to this sight:

A rain puddle in a chair. One may consider this as an annoying part of a summer thunderstorm. I think it is simply a glorious sight.

Here in my part of the universe we've been a drought situation for the entire summer. It has only been in the last day or two that we've been seeing regular rain fall. It rained on Sunday, resulting in the rain barrel being replenished. It rained again last night, which was simply icing on the cake. With all this rain maybe by the end of the summer my lawn may resemble a lawn again, not a crunchy, brown straw field.

My vegetable plants love the rain. Although they been getting regular watering via either the rain barrel or the water hose, watering can only do so much. I think some of my plants, in particular my pepper plants, have grown an inch or two since Sunday. They are much greener and happier. Hopefully all this rain and less hot weather will have them producing peppers in the next week or so.

On life support

Rest in peace little Motorola flip phone. You did good.

My five-year-old Motorola cell phone is slowly dying. I've known this for a month. Two weeks ago things looked to be improving when it could hold a charge for more than a day. Must have been a blip as now its capacity to hold any kind of charge is 12 hours max.

It's on life support. In order for it to work I've got to plug it in on a regular basis. This is no way for a cell phone to live out its remaining days. I realized this morning enough was enough and it was time to take action on the cellphone front. 

Old cheapo here (meaning me) bit the bullet and bought a new phone. I went to my current cell phone provider and had abysmal results. System was down. Told to come back later. Customer service lacking. I immediately had flash backs to five years ago when I had to replace my old phone because of a malfunction. I remember getting horrible customer service then. Things haven't changed in five years.

Getting all huffy, I went to the mall, talked to a discount cell phone provider, walked out with a smartphone and no contract. No contract! Yay for me. The last time I signed a contract I swore no more contracts. Contracts are horrible and I no longer wanted to be a slave to them, despite the carrot any cell phone company dangled in front of me.

So now I've got a new phone that doesn't require me to press a phone button multiple times in order for me to text. I may be able to text like a pro. Or not. But at least I will be able to text without swearing under my breath.

Out of the dye pot

Since it's a holiday Monday in my world and I'm not that eager to write today, I leave you with this photo. Ain't it pretty? Unfortunately I've give it up as a prize for the Ravellenic Games. I hope the lucky winner enjoys knitting with it. Although it reminds me of a blue Freezie, I call this colorway electric blue dreams.

Since I was such a keener, I made a ball band. 

Yummy zucchini muffins

I planted zucchini for the first time this year.

My zucchini plant hasn't been a disappointment as it is producing lots of zucchini.

I bring you this recipe that I've tweaked from a banana bread recipe I acquired nearly four years ago. You will notice in the photo that there is only 11 muffins. I ate one. I couldn't help myself.


Fairly healthy zucchini muffins

Dry ingredients:
1 cup of oatmeal (I use the quick cooking kind)
1 cup of whole wheat flour
1 teaspoon of baking powder
1 teaspoon of baking soda
1/3 cup of chocolate chips


Moist ingredients
1/2 cup of apple sauce
1/2 cup of plain yogurt (if you want the muffins to be moister, add a couple of more spoonfuls of yogurt).
1/2 cup of honey
1 egg
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
Shredded zucchini (I don't measure it, but you'll need at least a cup of it)

Mix dry ingredients in one bowl. In a separate bowl, mix together moist ingredients well. Make a well in the dry ingredient bowl. Then pour the moist ingredients into the well. Mix dry and moist ingredients together with a spoon.

Pour batter into muffin tins. If you don't want to clean up a mess, use muffin cups. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes, or until golden brown, at 350 degrees F. Makes 12 muffins.

Cool and enjoy!

To the finish line with two grams to spare

Sometimes knitting is a leap of faith.

I finished my first Ravellenic project with two grams of yarn to spare. It looks like the remnants won't make a lone hexipuff, let alone anything else.

I chose to knit Gaenor as my first Ravellenic project. It's a lovely shawlette pattern designed by Corrina Ferguson. When I chose the skein of yarn I wanted to work with I had my doubts as I was concerned about yardage. But I decided to throw caution to the wind, which isn't necessarily a good thing when it comes to knitting.

I had a quandary near the halfway mark. Do I try to get one last repeat out before starting the decrease section? Or should I play it safe and start decreasing now? I decided to risk it. Since I'm not a person who likes the concept of risk, I decided I should thread a lifeline in my knitting in case I decided I needed to rip back.

Glad I did because I had to frog. Halfway through that last increase repeat I soon came to conclusion that I wouldn't have enough yarn. Glad I listened to my instincts because I would have been SOL without a paddle.

Despite frogging, I started to get worried as the yarn cake grew smaller and smaller as I continued with the decreases. It wasn't until I was at the third last decrease repeat that I started to breathe easier. It was a sprint to the finish.

Although it was too close to my liking, I've since started on a second shawlette project. But I've knit this pattern in the past so I know what to expect.

As my first shawl project of 2012 I'm hoping to gain a couple of inches when I block it.

Nothing like a knitted penis on a toy bear to get some people riled up

I'm a big fan of Ravelry. One could say that I'm addicted to it as I'm always on it.

In the last 18 hours I've read three, well make that four if you were to count the project comments, threads regarding the Knit Dicks (penis) pattern on Ravelry. Before I possibly offend your sensibilities the pattern is of a knitted penis on a bear. Amazingly this has caused a bit of an uproar on Ravelry. As of today at 11:40 a.m., this pattern was the number one pattern trending on Ravelry in the "hot right now" section.

Some Ravelry users have used terms such as "poor taste," "disgusting" and "abomination" to describe the pattern. Some are offended and some have gone as far to say the pattern should be removed from Ravelry. I don't think there has been such a kerfuffle about a pattern since the hexipuff/purl-oined debacle, which happened almost a year ago.

According to pattern designer Camie Rigirozzi, she posted the pattern after receiving requests by many Ravelry users to make it available. The pattern is marked as mature content. Also, the bear's little penis has been censored so you can't see it when you read the pattern description. Personally, I'm unsure why people are clutching their pearls so hard about one particular pattern. It's a knitted penis. If you are so upset about a knitted penis then you seriously got some first-world problems to resolve.

As one commentator has said, if you don't like, don't knit it.

As for me, I know what pattern to download if I'm ever in need of penis garland.

Clothesline challenge continues

If there is one area of my life where I have not been lazy this summer it is using my clotheslines.

This past post explains the no summer dryer challenge I set back for myself in May. Except for washing bedding and drying a couple of loads of clothes from our Toronto trip, the challenge is going well. Actually, I've become militant about it. Because of the drought, I figure I don't have an excuse not to dry clothes outside as almost every day is sunny and hot. I've only used the dryer about 10 times since launching the challenge back in May.

However, I'm pretty lax when it comes to washing. We've got time-of-use electricity pricing here in Ontario. It's cheaper to run the washer during non-peak hours, between 7 p.m. and 7 a.m. My normal routine is to throw a load on at 10 p.m. and hang the clothes out the next morning. Depending on the amount of dirty laundry I've got or my schedule, I sometimes end up running the washer after 7 a.m. I dislike doing this, but sometimes I've got no choice, especially if I need clean clothes.

I'm surprised how durable these retractable clotheslines are. If I've got a particularly heavy load, I'll run one of the lines along a branch of my cherry tree for support. Works like a charm.

The neighbours may think I'm a tad weird for hanging out clothes, but I don't care. I'm having fun, while trying to reduce my electricity bill. What more can you ask for?

Update and new blog challenge

Well, it's been awhile, hasn't it?

My poor blog. I'm neglecting it like I've neglected the rose bushes at the front of the house. I know it exists. I know I should pay attention to it, but I just don't have the time. That's really not true. When it comes down to it, I really don't want to. The dog days of summer have made me lazy with a capital L.

Well no more, I say! I have issued myself the following challenge: post one blog post for each day for the entire month of August. I may have set the bar a tad too high since I've only got 10 posts since I started this blog in May. But we shall see if I live up to the challenge.

Lots of things happening at Little Suburban House. I've taken up spinning and that's a whole new (or multiple) post in itself. The garden is growing despite the drought. Summer is plodding along. May get a job (fingers crossed) and I'm participating in the Ravellenic games.

And if you are wondering what the photo is, it's actually a photo of my neglected rose bushes.