Get Dressed, Ye Married Gentlemen

Misheard holiday lyrics....

http://www.snopes.com/holidays/christmas/humor/mondegreens.asp

Get Dressed, Ye Married

The Back Side, The Outside, and The Up Side

Commenter Bedstemor remarked on the Hardanger cloth under the Pewter Santa in the Chocolate Mead pic from yesterday's post. She mentioned that she had a piece done in blue and white (sounds gorgeous) but the openwork border was coming apart. She asked what she did wrong. My guess is that she did nothing wrong- it's the nature of the beast (especially if little fingers start picking at the edging). Case in point: the back side of that same piece of Hardanger embroidery. I really do need to do something with it, before it all comes unraveled (accidentally or otherwise). (I'm not sure of a solution either- Fray Check would work, but that seems like cheating. Any suggestions out there?)

It's above zero this morning, calm and beautiful. The 6" or so of new snow is a soft blanket right now, but as soon as the wind comes up, it's going to become *interesting* again.

The upside of not knitting sweaters for anyone this Christmas, is that I am done with my Holiday knitting! In fact, I made an extra handspun ribbed hat for a guest who had no gifts under the tree (these are his school colors). And I have time to work on the Aunt Helen Valkyrie Socks, which I will probably finish today, though I have a bunch of cleaning and cooking to do in prep for tomorrow's influx of family and company. Of course, that just means that I am in danger of adding items to the Christmas Knitting List, because I can't leave well enough alone. Is two days enough time to knit a sweater?

Knob Hats and Extreme Weather and Chocolate

My son loved his little felted gear shift skull knob cover. I would have wrapped it up for Christmas, but he asked for one last Winter, so it's more a Last Year's Late Gift than a current one. At any rate, it's getting a workout, given that the thermometer read -18 (F) this morning, without the wind. It is supposed to be above zero by supper time tonight, which will feel positively tropical, though we're also supposed to get 6" of new snow. Sigh.

Back in '05, when we were in our winemaking heyday, I had something of a Mead Obsession, fermenting assorted 1-gallon batches of meads using local honey, and then making larger batches of the ones we really loved (like Blackberry). One of the gallon experiments was a chocolate mead, made, I kid you not, by fermenting unsweetened cocoa powder with honey. I chiefly remember how much that sucker foamed, overflowing my small fermentation bucket. I had to transfer the gallon batch to the 5-gallon bucket just to keep it contained. I also remember how difficult it was to name the wine- Meads are honey based wines (using honey rather than sugar for the yeast food). Pyments are grape/honey wines. Melomels are fruit/honey wines. Metheglins are spice/honey wines. Cocoa Powder isn't a spice, and it's not a fruit, and it certainly isn't grapes. But a chocolate mead isn't plain mead either. I finally went with Chocolate Kiss as the name. Unfortunately, Chocolate Kiss was no more than okay when we bottled it, so I crossed it off my list, put the bottles away and forgot about them.

I remembered them last night and had a glass. Omigod! The chocolate scent. The slight citrus undertone. The wonderful choc aftertaste. The beautiful dark amber color. We sweetened it a lot, so it's a dessert drink, and we won't ever want more than a glass at a time, so that gallon will last a bit, if we're careful. But now chocolate mead is on the ever lengthening list of wines I have to make so that 3 years from now, we don't have to ration them.

(btw- that's a little bottle, not a giant wine glass. And I did the Hardanger Embroidery sitting under the Pewter Santa- the design ended up in a magazine, but I don't remember which one).

Decorate A Gingerbread Cottage

http://www.jennybharris.com/activities/home/sweethome.htm

Kill Da Wabbit

(and if you don't get that reference,

you didn't spend Saturday mornings in the 60's watching Bugs Bunny)

I have finished one Valkyrie sock (worked with the Aunt Helen Variation texture). It's totally gorgeous, and I finally got a scan that showcases the little ridges properly. I love this pattern, and of course, I love this yarn (Twisted Fiber Arts, Playful, Valkyrie colorway with coordinating heel and toe yarn).

The Merlot went into the carboy this morning, for secondary (anaerobic) fermentation. We won't start another wine until after everyone goes home (we're having a wonderful housefull next week). One of the bad (or is it good?) things about making wine again, is that it reminds us that we really enjoy drinking our homemade wine. We cracked open a bottle of Cherry Almond Melomel (Melomel is a mead- a honey based wine- made with fruit) and were blown away by it. I only made a 1-gallon test batch in '05, and it's been ageing ever since. Unfortunately, I can't just produce a 3 (or 5) gallon batch of 3 year old Mead. And I can't even make a brand new Cherry Almond Melomel right away because I am going to start a batch of Blackberry first (our absolute favorite). Meads take longer to ferment and clear than sugar-based wines, but oh... they're worth the wait.

On the weather front- trust me, it's better to stay inside. The wind chill is something like -35(F), and Driftzilla is taking over our front yard. BRRRRRRR

Sexy People

Remember last January, when I posted a terrible formal portrait taken of my family in the late 70's, courtesy of our bank, and had a contest to caption the shot?

Well, here's a site with nothing but those kinds of pictures. Venture forth, and remember the abominations of the past : http://www.sexypeople-blog.com/