Pizza and Flowers! May 26, 2009

I have been super domestic the past few weeks – I’ve been spending my time cooking, baking, gardening, and spinning. I actually have two super delicious pizza recipes that I want to share with you.

1.) Homemade pizza! This is seriously one of the most delicious things I’ve ever made. I like to top it with roasted garlic, olive oil, spinach, mushrooms, and mozzarella cheese (no tomato sauce!). I also made a version with pepperoni and green peppers in place of the spinach and mushrooms that was really good too. The recipe is really simple – it just takes a few minutes to mix up the dough. Then you leave it alone to rise for an hour or two and roll it out and add toppings, and bake it for just 10 minutes! I have a feeling I’ll be making this a lot in the future – I LOVE pizza!

Recipe from foodjunta.

2.) Vegetable pizza. This isn’t really pizza in the traditional sense. It’s actually a base of croissant dough, which is topped with ranch-flavored cream cheese, chopped veggies, and shredded cheese. It is really simple to make, and amazingly yummy. I ate it for the first time when the cook in my sorority house made it for dinner, and I had to look up the recipe so I could make it at home!

Recipe here.

In other news, I have successfully kept a plant alive for over six weeks! My aunt gave me a potted pansy for Easter, and I have taken such good care of it that not only is it alive, but it is actually blooming! This might not seem so impressive to some, but I have a horrible black thumb that keeps me from ever successfully growing anything. Plants wither and die as soon as I look at them. This flower is a triumph for me, and it makes me smile every time I walk past.

As far as spinning goes, I have been working on a new yarn series that I have big plans for. There is more information to come later about this project, but for now I’ll leave you with this hint…

Back! February 16, 2009

It’s true, I’m back! I’ve actually been doing a lot lately, both fiber-related and otherwise, but I’ve been too busy to post about any of it! Don’t worry though, because I’m back now, and hopefully I’m here to stay!

I dyed some of the most gorgeous roving ever the other day. Here’s a picture I took of it, even though it looks much much better in real life. The colors are just so rich and deep – gold, royal purple, and navy. I’m planning to start spinning it up tonight – I can’t wait!

I also bought some roasting pans from Target to use for dyeing roving. They were $11 each, but in the long run they are going to be so much cheaper (and more eco-friendly!) than using disposable aluminum pans. Plus, for some reason I find them really cute!

This weekend I celebrated Valentine’s Day, which is one of my very favorite holidays. One of my pet peeves is when people claim that they don’t like Valentine’s Day because it’s a “Hallmark Holiday”. Sure, it commercialized and a little bit silly. But it’s fun, and a perfect day to celebrate love in all of its forms.

As a Valentine’s Day treat for my boyfriend, I whipped up a batch of these White Chocolate Oreo Balls, otherwise known as the easiest and most delicious dessert ever! Here’s the exterior view, which is not particularly impressive:

And the interior view. Mmmmm:

Here’s the super-simple recipe:

White Chocolate Oreo Balls

Ingredients:
1 package of Oreo cookies, crushed
1 8-ounce package of cream cheese, softened
2 bags of white chocolate chips

Directions:
1. Mix Oreos and cream cheese.
2. Form mixture into balls about 1 inch in diameter, chill.
3. Melt white chocolate.
4. Roll Oreo/cream cheese balls in white chocolate.
5. Place finished balls on waxed paper, chill.
6. Eat! Yum.

I get by with a little help from my friends… November 5, 2007

Midterms are over! I survived! And I’m pretty sure I passed everything with flying colors, with the possible exception of astronomy (also known as the bane of my academic existence). Man I hate astronomy.

Anyways, in spite of midterms, I’ve managed to get a little crafting done lately. I finished a scarf that I’ve been working on for a while – and by finished, I mean I finally wove in the ends on a scarf that had been done for about two months.

Doesn’t it look nice though? I think I’m going to take a few better pictures and then list it in my Etsy shop.

Speaking of Etsy, I looked back at my October goals that I set at the beginning of last month, and I don’t think I was too successful in achieving them.

October Goals
*List 20 items – nope, only listed 6.
*Create 4 new yarns – spun two yarns, but only got around to listing one.
*Sell at least one yarn – nope.
*Sell at least 4 items total – nope.
*Blog at least 8 times – only blogged 4 times.
*Write a bio/shop announcement – hey, I did do this! Hooray!
*Keep up with 30 Days to a Better Shop – partially, I’m a little behind but I did OK.

I know I’m not selling a lot on Etsy, but I realize that’s because I’m not listing/promoting enough. I’ll try to work harder at it this month, so my November goals are going to be the same as my October goals were (minus the bio/shop announcement thing). Hopefully this time I’ll get closer to achieving them.

November Goals
*List 20 items.
*Create 4 new yarns
*Sell at least one yarn.
*Sell at least 4 items total.
*Blog at least 8 times.
*Keep up with 30 Days to a Better Shop

On to happier things – here’s a not-really-new yarn. I spun it a long time ago, and I’m pretty sure that I posted it a while back, but I took new pictures of it and listed it on Etsy so I’m going to blog about it again. It’s called Sea Glass.

This is actually one of the earliest yarns I spun, and I’m amazed that I created such a balanced, lofty single with so little practice! I’m not even sure I could do that now! I haven’t spun many singles lately, and I’d forgotten how much I liked them. I’ll have to start doing more. Anyway, I love this yarn a lot, and I’m hoping it goes to a good home.

I’ve spun up two yarns from some superwash merino mill ends that I bought a while back, but I think I’m only going to end up posting one because I really don’t like the color of one of them. I’m setting the twist on the pretty one tomorrow, so I’ll hopefully be able to take pictures and blog about that spinning experience in the next few days. I also have a brand new method of making paper beads that I’ve been experimenting with, more on that coming soon!

Have a wonderful week!

Fall is Here! October 17, 2007

And in the spirit of fall, a few friends and I went apple-picking the other day. And then…we baked a pie! From scratch! I was super-proud of it, considering that an apple pie is by far the most complex thing I’ve ever attempted to cook. Luckily my friend Beth is a good baker, so with her guidance we were able to make a successful pie.

Before baking – can you see the little apple we stenciled on top?

Just out of the oven.

Ready to eat! Yummy.

While I was home for Fall Break, I dyed up the rest of my merino roving! I’m so excited to spin this stuff.

Green, pink, and purple – looks kind of like a flower garden, huh? I really love the purple dye, I need to use it more.

Shades of blue – you can’t tell, but it actually gets a lot darker than this picture shows. It has parts where it’s a really deep bluish-purple. I’m really excited to see how this spins up as a two-ply, I’d kind of like to do a series of 2-ply yarns with varying shades of one color.

I’ve been obsessed with this tutorial on making paper boxes for the past few days. It’s the coolest thing ever – it really works! Go check it out.