Eatin' in the Coziverse (Subtitle: Cinco de Mayo Part Uno)

Food in the Coziverse often revolves around tortillas.
This is logical, because tortillas are round.
Here, we have a corn tortilla. 

It's cold and lonely.

It wants to become stacked enchiladas con huevos.

So the first thing we need to do is find it 3 more tortilla friends.

Before we proceed further, we will open a can of red enchilada sauce.  Our personal fave is Hatch, but Old El Paso does nicely.  Pour the sauce into a lidded bowl you can store in the fridge, cuz unless you're making 3 or 4 stacks, you won't be using it all.  We're just making 1 stack today, so we'll need to refrigerate the leftover sauce.

Next, get the 4 corn tortillas stacked nicely and and wrap them loosely in a paper towel - which is laid upon a nukable plate - and nuke them for about 10 to 15 seconds on high.  And quickly remove them from the micro and open the towel to let the steam escape.

Next step:  find a grody old beat up pan, because you'll be taking photos and want the world to know you have this well loved old pan.  Ladle a bit of sauce on both sides of the tortilla.

And put some shredded cheese on it - a couple tablespoons will do.

And repeat with the rest of the tortillas.

When you've sauced and layered the tortillas, find the nearest oven, which has been preheated to 350, and bake your nicely stacked enchilada about 10 minutes.

If you're a good blogger, you've cleaned the oven first.


While the enchilada bakes, you'll fry an egg or two.  Sunny side up is the favored method.

It is rumored that the yoke cools the heat of the chili.

Here is a second photo of the skillet.  It's a nice skillet.  See?  Nicer than the baking pan.   

Purty, huh.

So now, remove the enchilada from the oven and plate it nicely.

Try not to get sauce all over so Gordon Ramsey doesn't show up and cuss at you.

Slip the fried egg(s) atop the stack of enchildas.

And there you are.   Nom.  Let's eat.

Hold your breath - it's a pattern!!!

You know how some bloggers just pop off free patterns here, there and straight down the middle?  Well, grab the edge of your seat because it's about to happen here.   It's an amazingly cool super easy faux cable, done without a cable needle. 

What you're getting here is the Baby Cable stitch pattern, which is worked over a multipule of 8 stitches.  You will be plugging this into your favorite basic knitting pattern for whatever - hat, socks, scarf, dishcloth... 

Baby Cable pattern:

Round 1: Baby Cable 3 times, purl 2

Round 2: K 6, p 2

Round 3: K 2, Baby Cable, K 2, p 2

Round 4: K 6, p 2

To work the Baby Cable Stitch:  Knit 2 Together, but do not remove from left hand needle. Insert the right needle between the 2 stitches and knit the first stitch again. Slip both stitches from the needle.

And there you are.  It's that easy.

Starting a Forethought Heel

Looky - something that vaguely resemblesl a how-to.  It's about a heel technique that involves no short rows and looks amazing in self-patterning yarns.  It's a Forethought Heel, and it makes a nice bull's eye looking sock heel.  The Pepto pink waste yarn represents the forethought setup.  This is the Rice Crispy Snack Bar of heels.  Looks like you slaved for hours...but it's soooo simple.

You just knit along until you reach the point where you wish to start the heel.  Knit half of the stitches using a string of waste yarn.  The bigger the contrast to the color of your sock yarn, the happier you will be later.  In this case, I have a cast on of 48, so I knit 24 sitches.  Now, return to the point where you let go of your working yarn to knit in the waste yarn.  Resume knitting.  (This is what is happening in the photo.)

You can make the heel at any point after you've knit about an inch down from the waste yarn.  I like to do forethought heels fairly soon thereafter, so I can try the sock on to get the foot size correct.  What you do is carefully unzip the waste yarn and gather the resulting stitches on 2 to 4 spare dpns, or a circ.  You'll have - in this case - a count of 24 stitches for the upper edge and 23 for the lower edge.  (You can cheat that missing stitch in easily when you start the decreases, so not to worry about it at all.)  Now make a standard toe.  Yup.  Proceed exactly as if you were knitting the toe for this sock.  Exactly.  Work a decrease at each end of the upper and lower sections every other round until you are at half your original amount.  (In this case, 12)  Then work decreases at each end of both segments until you're at 8 sts per needle.  Graft 'em like you do a toe.  You'll want to tighen up the join area - you may have little holes on either side, a common occurance with an easy fix.

And do I have a photo of the finished heel?  Oh, please.  Why are you even asking?

In Which there is Whining

Unless you want to see a picture of the CD the tech gave me after my MRI, I got nothin' to show from my visit to the imaging center. 

Hammy has been unusally evil, and Doc sent it - and me, of course - off for an MRI.  If it develops that there is nothing highly evil going on, the next step is time with a TENs unit and massage.  I'm kind of excited about that.  Pain relief and massage.  Please!  Yes!  I want!

Otherwise....  The Unknown.  Do not like.  Do not want.  Am scared of.

And meanwhile, the hamstring is sooooooo tender and painful.  Gentle stretches hurt.  And day to day stuff is killer. 

Pushing the vac or sweeping is very uncomfy making.  When something drops on the floor, there it is.  I say to it, "Be at peace, annoying little widgit.  No one will molest you.  You may lay on the floor until I see if the kid down the road feels like coming over and picking you up."  The dropped widgit tends to just lay there and say nothing.

I can sew, but not for very long at a time.  Pushing the foot pedal results in a mild hamstring stretch.  Apparently living results in a mild hamstring stretch.

My little pal Gershwin

keeps me company and makes soothing little crooning sounds.  That's nice.  And my DH, the lovely, lovely man, drives me places, picks up stuff off the floor, and says Comforting Things.  (He can't vacuum, he has 2 bum knees.  Apparently we were not home when the guy from the Extended Warrantee Office came around.  We didn't get one.  It was a bad move.)

So just pet my head and tell me nice things.

And.....drum roll please...the socks

Here we go!  The yarns and the patterns are united and the Spring into Socks Club begins.

 

 

 

Spring into Socks Overachiever Sock Club

Here it is! My sock of the month club...for 18 months.  There are socks for me and socks for DH.

So there they all are, ready to be paired with their patterns and um...socked away.  For future reference.  Most of them are ready to go.

Oh, look.  One is trying to escape...

Spring Into Socks

Ha!  I named my personalized use-the-stash sock club.  I named it Spring into Socks.  Um, cuz, you know, it's spring. 

(Wow, I originally typed Sock of the Moth Club.)

We could still have snow, but it looks springy.  I saw people in shorts today at Walmart.  (Is that not the official sign of spring?)  And the poor foolish apricots are blooming.  They have no brakes apparently.  It warms up, they bloom; it snows, there are no apricots.  This is a frequently repeated theme, so apparently apricots have short memories.  Which is fine.  So do I.   I forgot I was supposed to be writing about socks.

Now I named the sock club, I've been rounding up yarns and patterns.  DH pointed out that I'd rounded up only girly yarns, so tomorrow I'll dive back into the stash after some manly yarns. 
 

Meanwhile, here is a daffy-dill: