And so it begins ...

I rushed home yesterday to make it back in time for the start of Little Squid's oboe lesson. With the later start time required due to his participation in the school play, I managed to walk into an absolutely empty and clean (thanks Maria!) apartment. It was so quiet that I tiptoed around for a few minutes, not wanting to disturb the peace. I had a glorious 15 minutes before Little Squid arrived, followed closely by his oboe teacher ...

About an hour later I was beginning to wonder where my other child was. I knew where Mike was, and that he might not be back for hours -- but I thought my older child was at chorus rehearsal. A few minutes later, she called. She was rowing. Which was where Mike was. So, since she was with her father, she figured she didn't have to call. Neither thought that I would be worrying ...

And so it goes.

Below, a repost of my last post. Only 2 more days to vote for worthy causes and this one is currently on the edge of getting the funding. As of this posting, it is at #9 which could go up or down, very easily. Help it go down enough so that it is guaranteed the funding. Thanks!

***

The following post is a shameless appeal for help. It may take the form of guilting but, if you persist and decide to help, note that the help will cost you less than one minute per day for the next 19 days. Seriously!

The Boys and Girls Clubs across the country provide a safe place for kids to hang out after school. They provide all sorts of interesting programs and many Clubs also provide meals.

The Boys and Girls Club of Schenectady is trying to build a new playground. They have applied for a grant from Pepsi. The catch is, this is a popularity contest. The ideas that land in the top 10 at the end of the month will win the funding.

Right now the Craig Street Clubhouse of Schenectady is in the top 15 or so. Your vote, each and every day, can help propel them into the top ten. I've been promoting this idea on Facebook for the last 10 days and have watched this project climb from 44 to it's current place. Yes, I am affiliated, kind of, with the Club -- my brother works there.

I work with the kind of kid that this club serves. The tales my brother tells mesh so very closely with the tales of my own students in East Harlem. Kids who go home to an empty apartment because their parent is working. Kids who feel unloved. Kids who have nowhere else to turn. All these kids want is a safe place staffed by people they feel they can trust. In some places schools serve that need -- the stairs outside my office a often crowded late into the evening with kids who have no place else to go to safely socialize. The Boys and Girls Clubs provide a safe, supportive environment.

Please take a minute out of your day, today, tomorrow and for the rest of April, to vote for the idea linked here. And peruse the offerings in the other funding categories. The Boys and Girls Club of Monroe, Iowa is looking to build a community center. And there are so many other worthwhile projects in other funding categories. But vote for Craig Street first!

Good Things for Kids!

The following post is a shameless appeal for help. It may take the form of guilting but, if you persist and decide to help, note that the help will cost you less than one minute per day for the next 19 days. Seriously!

The Boys and Girls Clubs across the country provide a safe place for kids to hang out after school. They provide all sorts of interesting programs and many Clubs also provide meals.

The Boys and Girls Club of Schenectady is trying to build a new playground. They have applied for a grant from Pepsi. The catch is, this is a popularity contest. The ideas that land in the top 10 at the end of the month will win the funding.

Right now the Craig Street Clubhouse of Schenectady is in the top 15 or so. Your vote, each and every day, can help propel them into the top ten. I've been promoting this idea on Facebook for the last 10 days and have watched this project climb from 44 to it's current place. Yes, I am affiliated, kind of, with the Club -- my brother works there.

I work with the kind of kid that this club serves. The tales my brother tells mesh so very closely with the tales of my own students in East Harlem. Kids who go home to an empty apartment because their parent is working. Kids who feel unloved. Kids who have nowhere else to turn. All these kids want is a safe place staffed by people they feel they can trust. In some places schools serve that need -- the stairs outside my office a often crowded late into the evening with kids who have no place else to go to safely socialize. The Boys and Girls Clubs provide a safe, supportive environment.

Please take a minute out of your day, today, tomorrow and for the rest of April, to vote for the idea linked here. And peruse the offerings in the other funding categories. The Boys and Girls Club of Monroe, Iowa is looking to build a community center. And there are so many other worthwhile projects in other funding categories. But vote for Craig Street first!

Squid on Wheels: Jamaica Bay

The weather report was for a lovely, clear day with highs in the 70s. So we set out to circumnavigate Jamaica Bay. The first indication that we'd made a bad choice was when we could not see most of the Verazzano Bridge as we approached it ...

It started out chilly and got progressively chillier and damper with absolutely no views of the bay due to ground level fog.

We kept saying ... "it will be better on the next turn." But it wasn't. With each turn it got colder, windier and damper ...

On the other hand, we got to stand on the Gil Hodges Memorial Bridge for 15 minutes listening to fog horns and waiting to see the boat emerge from the fog -- which it did, mere moments before reaching the now elevated bridge opening. And then we got to witness and feel the elevated section of bridge (think like an elevator, not draw bridge) come down. Very cool! Made the ride totally worth it!

Back on the Road

After yesterday's glorious weather we woke up raring to go on a family breakfast ride.

O.k., not all of us woke raring to go. A certain teen actually had to be woken up ...
The first part of our ride was fairly quick and uneventful, ending at the Brooklyn Fairway where we chowed down on apple fritters, muffins, hot chocolate, coffee and tea on the patio. We were a bit chilly because we had all managed to underdress just a wee bit.Properly fed, we then pedaled the short distance to Ikea -- to discover that they did not open for another 45 minutes. That led us to look for and find 2 geocaches. Yea!

Returning to Ikea, Mike went in and restocked our supply of lingonberry juice concentrate. And chocolate.
Now that we had secured life's necessities, Mike was eager to play with the geocaching mode on his new phone and was quite amiable to more caching. All told, we attempted 7 caches and found 4 today, bringing our total to 150. Not-So-Little Squid and I have declared a goal of at least 200 caches by the end of the summer. This means that we may actually have to cache outside of Manhattan and Brooklyn.
While approaching the site of our third cache of the day, we skidded to a halt when we spotted this:

These folks are building bamboo frame bikes. Cool!Over all, a good day. 23 miles over 4 hours with lots of stops for caching.

More Dish Towels

I've been admiring Dave's weaving and absolutely had to try one particular pattern. So, I threaded the loom in a straight twill, alternating white and blue cotton.

Unfortunately, to get the pattern to come out the way that I wanted, I had to beat very firmly, resulting in a rather stiff fabric. (look at the bottom 20 inches)
Then I started playing with different tie ups. The last one (on the left and at the top) is my favorite. It has a nice drape and looks really cool.

I also really like the second from the left but I ran out of white 14 inches in so it will be more of a dish cloth then a dish towel.

Next up, baby blankets!

Squid On Wheels: First Ride of 2010

Notice, if you will, that we are all now riding Bike Friday folding bicycles. Little Squid was upgraded and brought into the fold yesterday, so today we had to do a quick shakedown ride.

Go Squid!

What do Squidlings do on a Snow Day?

They build snowpeople! Which, unfortunately, were knocked down just a few hours later by some anonymous jerks.

Snow Day Redux

Yup, for the second time in a month, we have a snow day. We'll ignore the fact that the last snow day was off by a day (we should have been off the day after and not the day of).

Plans for the day? Maybe to weave off this warp that has proved to be a challenge.
There have been broken warp thread galore, threading issues and the challenge of weaving off a 39 shot repeat. The challenge there is that I keep getting interrupted and lose my place in the pattern. Despite all these issues, however, I love how it is coming out.

The yarn is some that has been marinating in the stash for 10 years or so. The weft is a slubby, loosely spun yarn, the warp, a nice wool two-ply that keeps breaking.

Next up on the loom, some more blue and white cotton for, I think, baby blankets. I have some cotton of unknown provenance that has been marinating in the stash for even longer than the wool above. My only questions are: is it thick enough for baby blankets and ... what pattern?

Just Strolling Along ...

Schacht did not ship my stroller at the same time as the loom. Why? I have no idea but the good folks at The Woolery were on top of it even before I emailed them and the stroller arrived last night.

This morning, with no warp on the loom to worry about, I tackled the stroller installation.

Forewarned by Dave, I paid close attention to the pictures and gave up early on interpreting their badly written instructions. (I also kept Dave's post on the subject open on my laptop near at hand.)

After a minor misstep or two, I was finally on the right track. With the assistance of my fabulous husband, I managed to get everything together in about half an hour.

See?
Just a note to the folks at Schacht ... wouldn't it make more sense if there were a notch at the bottom of each brace instead of a slot? This is something that we may attempt to "remedy" with the dremel tool. Just not now.
And this? Look closely at the "middle" bolt. It snapped off as Mike was putting the nut on. I'll hit home depot tomorrow and replace it. Can't blame the manufacturer for this one and not worth contacting them for something I can get easily right here.

And there you have it, a loom on wheels. Something to make my downstairs neighbor a little happier as I fold and unfold the loom. It also now makes it possible to easily bring the loom into the living room should I so desire. But not out on to the terrace. Navigating the narrow door is still a bit more effort then I think I want to tackle right now even though I LOVE weaving outside.

Back to threading my third warp!

I'm going to have to figure out ...

... what to do with all this fabric!

Just a taste of the latest to come off the loom. Better pictures after I wash both sets of yardage.

(Tho most of this is a scarf for Little Squid who chose the pattern, helped warp the loom and wove a fair amount of the yardage.)

Point Twill threading on 4 shafts -- I've ordered a book on 8 shaft weaving and it should arrive on Monday.

First Efforts

A 3 yard sampler of twills and tabby-twills.


I threaded the loom with straight twill draw on 4 shafts (let's pretend that I have the language down) and played with different tie-ups and patterns. We did about 3 inches or so of each pattern or until we got bored of it.


We? Yeah, the kids took turns too. Especially Little Squid. He's taken to weaving like a Squid to water. He's enjoying it so much that the next warp is a scarf for him. We will thread the loom in a point twill and he will either pick a single pattern or we will weave it as a scarf-sampler.

(For all those weaving mavens out there, please excuse our wonky weaving. It was our first effort and still needs to be washed, cut apart and hemmed into usable, if interesting, dish towels. Hey, I believe in everything being used, even one's first efforts if possible. The sett was probably too loose for the yarn that I used and there are other issues but hey, we had fun!)

Loom Love

Yes, yes I have spent the entire day setting up my new loom.


Why do you ask?

Love Letters

I had absolutely no intention of writing a Valentine's Day post but then I started clearing out space for my loom. In the space where the loom will temporarily reside was a box of mementos taken from my mother-in-law's apartment after her passing several years ago. There are pieces of my father-in-law's stamp collection and a bulging envelope of cards and letters.

Poking through it, I grabbed a small handful of the correspondence and took them into the living room to peruse. On top was a letter from my father-in-law to my mother-in-law the summer before he began full time employment in 1956.

As I finished reading the first one aloud, Squidette commented "I've never seen a real love letter before, just read about them in books."

Pictured below is the original letter. Transcribed below are the contents for your enjoyment.

Dearest!

I received your wonderful letter today & am, of course, happy you miss me as I miss you.

Today I ordered a new pair of frames: charcoal gray shell for the upper half & silver rim for the lower half of the frame. Thus do you bend me to your will.

I visited H & R tonight for a hot dog supper & received an unsolicited opinion of you (I never solicit opinions about you). Quoth H: "Renee is a lovely girl." Quoth I: "I know it."

So you see my days have been uneventful, being composed of errands or visits. But I am glad for tasks to do to fill my time so that I have less time to think alone & long for you. I enjoy whenever the conversation turns to you & me because that is a topic I am very interested in. Yet I don't want to make a pest of myself & act like a lovesick youth who bores everyone with talk of his love. Personally I like to think about you, about things we've done & about our future. I am so very happy that our relatives get along well together & we with them, because altho this is not a matter of paramount importance, harmonious relationships will make life less aggravating than it might be.

My eye doctor yesterday reminded me of how he had, 2 years ago, predictied how a trip away from home (at Columbia) would make a big change in my life and when I retrospect concerning this last semester & of the things accomplished in so short a time I feel amazed. I am thankful & happy & joyous & overwhelmed & satisfied & everything else that we're together & each other's. I can recall how I used to be afraid, at one time, that you would have another date & turn me down. Yet years ago I foresaw that when I would fall in love that everything would go smoothly, & it has.

I miss you, yet I don't mind missing you because whenever I feel sad I know that in a few days I'll be in N.Y. & seeing you.

I feel a bit nervous & uncertain about working. I suppose this is due to the novelty of the situation, just as I was nervous & uncertain when I was about to begin at Harvard & Columbia. I know that there are millions of persons who would love to change places with me because of my potential career & wonderful fiancee. I wish I could tell you how much I love you but words are not counters of feeling but only express thought.

Love,
XXXXX,
Marvin

(If you look at the pictures at the bottom of the last page of the letter, the first one is a frowny face and the caption reads "me without Renee" and the second one is a smiley face and the caption reads "me with Renee")

First Left to Brooklyn

I have noticed that my commute is somewhat quicker if I manage to stay out of Brooklyn ...

(I'll wait while you all come to the realization that I have a 5 mile intra-boro commute that involves no bridges or tunnels or even, most days, highways.)

And on to our tale ...

This morning I dragged myself out of bed a bit earlier than usual so that I would have extra time to clean the snow and ice off of the car and still arrive at work on time. No, biking was not in the plan.

I did the usual ... shower, dress, dry hair ... and skipped the make-up figuring I'd steal some time and do it at work. After dressing in flannel lined jeans -- mom-style jeans -- and my uber warm Sorel boots (work slacks and shoes in my tote), I carefully made my way out to the car. Carefully, I say, because as nicely as the walks around our Co-op are cleared, the parking lot is a mess of ice and snow.

Picking my way across the lot I was suddenly jerked from my snow induced stupor as I realized that my car was not covered in 5 inches of snow/ice/ick but was mostly cleaned off ... and my husband was putting the finishing touches on it.

(You can all go "awww" now.)

So I did what any self-respecting wife would do (and could legally do, in public, in a parking lot, in freezing weather), I offered him a lift to work (he was going to take the subway). Hey, he saved me 20 minutes of freezing labor.

I carefully navigated my way out of the parking lot, taking only 5 minutes to actually get moving after spinning the wheels a bit in the slush (thank you oh tub of 12 year old kitty litter that lives in my car for just such an emergency). Cautiously, because the streets, while not horrible, were still rather slushy and I had not yet had sufficient caffeine, I made my way to the hallowed edifice that is Stuyvesant High School and dropped off my fabulous spouse and, making a U turn, headed off to work.

On the rare occasions that I drop Mike at work, I then head south, down West Street and through the tunnel that loops around the bottom of Manhattan and leaves one heading North, up the FDR Drive. This was my intent this morning.

I quickly got into the left lane and looked carefully for the signs indicating the tunnel. And when I didn't see them, but did see altered traffic patterns due to the construction at Ground Zero, I took the first ramp to my left. I figured that I was already past the Brooklyn Battery Tunnel entrance.

I figured wrong.

Yes, I wound up in Brooklyn.

Oops.

But I still got to work early.

And I still have a wonderful spouse.

*** And my loom is still delayed in a FedEx warehouse in Middletown, PA due to the weather.

Snow and Song

Today we had something totally unprecedented ... a snow day announced at 11:00 a.m. the day before the storm. No kidding. That said, here in Manhattan, the storm was rather unremarkable except for it's exceptional ability to get one wet. After standing for a mere hour in the snow while Little Squid sledded with friends, I was totally soaked. As in my parka was dripping and my double layered glove-mitten combo had soaked through to my skin. Good thing the kids threw in the towel when they did.

Meanwhile ... the squidlings performed last week, turning their annual violin recital into the Squid show. The highlight was this clarinet-oboe duet.

Yes, I did say it was a violin recital. There were 5 other kids who all played the violin -- as did my offspring. Want to see?

Little Squid Solo

Little Squid - Squidette Violin Duet

Squidette Solo ... Squidette Solo ... Squidette Solo ... Squidette Solo (it was an entire sonata and could not be uploaded to Youtube in one piece)

As for my loom (because I know it is as much at the top of your mind as it is on mine ... (yeah, right)) ... it is held up due to the weather and is currently paused somewhere in Pennsylvania. It was supposed to arrive in the area tomorrow but that just is not happening. Oh well, I couldn't arrange for delivery before Monday anyway ...

Cest La Z

Cest La Z is the latest addition to my blogroll. Penned by my fabulous spouse, it is currently addressing issues in Computer Science education with a, so far, single departure towards biking.

Mike is trying his hand out with blogging and we only ask that you give him a chance to figure out his spacing issues -- something to do with the script he is using to upload his text.

Mike has been tooling around cyberspace since he was in high school -- where he learned to program big IBM machines with punch cards. He and I were some of the earliest cyberdaters as we spent long hours chatting from our college computers -- his at home and mine in a computer lab on campus and later from a "dumb" terminal in my dorm room hooked up to a 200 baud modem that I had to stick my phone handset into.

He's taught computer science for most of his almost 20 year teaching career and has seen trends come and go. Opinionated and strong minded, he fights for what he believes is best for his students -- and given where so many of them have wound up, it works.

So go check him out -- but don't give up if computer science education is not your thing. I suspect that, come summer, there will be more travel, biking and history on tap.

Cest La Z!

One Ball Down ...

I spun 11 skeins of the background color for Mike's new sweater. Each skein averages about 200 yards of sport weight yarn. The piece below measures about 13 inches (it looks smaller due to the curling that I didn't bother to eliminate for the photo). It has used, so far ...

ONE ball of yarn. Just a hunch here, I think I may have enough yarn for this thing ...

(And the entire sweater will not be this boring, just the back and arms. The front has some seriously exciting intarsia going on.)

A tale of Two Sweaters ...

One finished!*

And one begun!**

* Sweater for Little Squid. Generic Basketweave pattern stitch using the guidelines from Ann Budd's The Knitter's Handy Book of Patterns.

**Sweater for Mike. Hand dyed, hand spun, roughly sport weight yarn. Construction guidelines will be from the same book, pattern will be one-of-a-kind. Look for the finished product sometime around October.

Yogurt

I've been looking for something really deep to post about and even had a huge monologue going on last night as I was trying to fall asleep. Unfortunately, it was all about work stuff which I really can't post about. Sorry! Let's just leave the work stuff with this: there was a public hearing regarding the fate of my school last week. It goes up for a vote on the 26th.

On the home front, I'm still plugging away on Little Squid's sweater -- front, back and right arm are done. Left arm is about halfway up his forearm. My rigid heddle loom is now clear of weaving and the final product will be run through the wash tomorrow. And I've started spinning the alpaca-merino blend that I bought at Rhinebeck.

I've also made some yogurt.

You may remember this post where Little Squid and I experimented with frozen yogurt using our homemade product. We never did master it but hey, that's what next summer is for. Right?

Meanwhile I have continued to make yogurt every week or two using the same method. Recently I've seen some posts on other blogs raving about a Crock-pot method of making yogurt.

I studied it, thought hard about it, and decided that I will stick with my method. It is fairly simple and only requires about 2 hours of my time depending on the temperature of my kitchen. In cooler weather the cooling processes occurs much more quickly then it does in the heat of summer.So, for those who are interested, this is my adaptation of Harold McGee's yogurt making technique as originally published in the New York Time on April 15, 2009.

***

First, heat the milk to 180 degrees Fahrenheit. I do this by heating about 12 ounces milk at a time on high in the microwave for 1 minute (in a 4 cup measuring cup) and then dumping it into a pot on the stove with the flame at a medium setting. (I make a gallon of yogurt at a time. You can easily make less.)

While it is heating, I monitor the temperature and twiddle my thumbs. This is actually why I microwave the milk. The one minute intervals keep me interested enough that I do not walk away and then forget that I have milk heating.


Once the milk reaches 180 degrees it is time to cool it. I do this in two or three or, when making 2 gallons at a time as I do during the summer, 4 bowls.


During the warmer weather I surround the bowls with reusable cold packs to help it cool faster. I also stir it frequently to increase the amount of milk that comes in contact with the cooler parts of the bowl (and the air).

When the temperature of the milk reaches 120 degrees, I take yogurt that I've set aside from the last batch (2 tablespoons of yogurt for every quart of milk used) and mix it with some of the warm milk to thin out the yogurt.



This yogurt-milk slurry then gets mixed into the warm milk and the mixture gets put into a large container. I use a gallon Tupperware pitcher that we've had forever.


The pitcher gets a lid (I have no idea where the official lid is these days) and then gets wrapped in towels.


Usually I use three towels but this time I used four -- one underneath the pitcher to insulate it from the cold counter. Our kitchen was really cold.


Then the wrapped pitcher of pre-yogurt sits on the counter for about 6 hours, more or less. More if you like it tarter, less if you like it more naturally sweet.

The neo-yogurt then chills overnight in the fridge and is ready for eating in the morning.

I, personally, take it one step further and strain the yogurt in a HUGE fine meshed strainer that we got at a restaurant supply store. Mike cut the handle off of it so that the strainer, sitting on top of a storage container, fits in the fridge. Half a gallon of yogurt fits in the strainer at a time.

One hour usually makes it thick enough for my taste but you can strain longer if you want. Half of the last batch strained overnight by accident. It is incredibly thick and smooth and luscious!

And there you go. A gallon of milk costs between $2.39 (Costco) and $3.50 (Whole Foods 365 brand). A quart of my previous favorite yogurt, Greek Goddess, costs $5.99 at Fairway -- more elsewhere. A gallon of milk makes 2.5 to 4 quarts of yogurt depending on how much you strain it. Monetarily it makes sense but that's not why I do it.

I do it because it is too easy and too good not to.The only down-side is the cleaning of the pan. The stuck on milk can be tough to clean with a regular sponge or dishrag so I use this curly thing. It gets it right off and then I toss the curly thing into the dishwasher to get all the milk-curd crud out. Hey, it works.

Goals: Update #4

Done! All of the goals that I posted at the start of break have been accomplished.

• Little Squid now has new, warm mittens
• Papa Squid has a big sack of homespun sweater yarn
• and we finished the puzzle.

In addition:

• I'm almost done with the woven scarf(?) (might be 2 or 3, it seems to be taking forever!)
• I built another airlift hydroponic system
• I made a fresh batch of yogurt
• I figured out how I'm conducting my last 3 weeks of classes
• I graded the papers that I brought home
• I played lots of Wii with the kids and Mike
• I played a few board games with the kids (and Mike)
  
• I slept until 7 or (gasp!) later almost every day
• I started a major cleaning of the kitchen which will ultimately lead to a paint job during either February or Spring break (I'm taking it in small chunks so it is not too overwhelming. 15 - 20 minutes a night of serious cabinet and wall scrubbing.)
• and I ordered a big-girl Loom.

My goals for the next month are:

• To spend lots of time at work making sure that the student programs are ready to go on February 1.

That's it. I really can't put anything else on the list with that looming. Oh, and maybe warp my loom once it arrives at the end of the month. (Like that won't happen!)

I'll try to get some pictures of the yarn posted later, and maybe the yardage if I manage to finish it off.