Canning Summer

When I was small, the signs of the changing seasons were less artificial than they are now: rather than the arrival of the Target back-to-school ad, the emergence of box upon box of canning jars from the basement heralded the impending close of summer. My mom was a thorough and thoughtful food preservationist, canning bushel upon bushel of beans, tomatoes, and apple sauce while pickling cucumbers in a variety of ways and still finding time to make raspberry jams for the cold weather ahead. At eight years old, canning season annoyed me. There were all those jars to be washed. The water bath made the house unbearably humid. My mom's temper would flair as she attempted to balance preparation for all these different processes. It was a trying time but one that seemed to fade into the background as we ate from these stores throughout the winter.

After some reading, I decided this would be the year I tried my own hand at canning. Armed with my grandmother's phone number, thirty pounds of tomatoes acquired at yesterday's farmer's market, and brand new canning jars, I began the process this morning.

Thirty pounds of tomatoes doesn't look all that intimidating at first. In fact, at ten this morning, I was still convinced that I had scored a great deal: thirty pounds of tomatoes for ten dollars. Thirty pounds of really lovely looking tomatoes from an organic family farm. Three hours later, after peeling all thirty pounds, I was thinking otherwise.

Don't let this picture fool you: I had a large stock pot and another smaller pot filled with these tomato quarters. The LeCrueset happened to be the most photogenic. I love that pot. Is it wrong to love a piece of cookware?

On to Sarah's, where the actual canning would take place. We've made the decision to make this an annual event, having helped her with her tomato canning last year. Along with our friend Yi-Ching, we began boiling jars, simmering lids, and filling said jars with what seemed like a never-ending supply of tomatoes. Thankfully, despite the balmy weather elsewhere, it was a relatively cool day here in Indiana and we were able to throw open the windows and the doors to make our task bearable.


In the end, I canned eleven quarts and six pints of tomatoes, all destined for dinners of chili and spaghetti and just general yumminess. My gram managed to talk us through how to can in the oven, which totally revolutionized our system, allowing us to get through all of my own canning along with all of Sarah's in a little over four hours. Not horrible considering how much we actually put into containers.

The side of my brain that love statistics and numbers is screaming that today probably wasn't all that economical. The money spent on jars, produce, and energy as well as time probably outweigh the money I would spend buying cans of tomatoes at my local market. There is a certain satisfaction in knowing where these jars of red deliciousness come from, that I spent an afternoon with my friends, laughing and telling stories, storing these away for fall's savory soups and winter's thick sauces. It was delightful, though I am thoroughly exhausted. My muscles hurt from yesterday's strength-training class (even my neck - unsure what that means...) and my hands smell like tomato.

Hopefully, I will be able to stay awake long enough to watch the new Mad Men... It's a goal.

5T :: 8.21.09

5T :: 8.21.2009
Originally uploaded by LimeGreenOctopi

Things off to better homes this week:

2 photo frames, donated to Goodwill.
2 CDs, donated to the Friends of the Library store.
1 knitting gauge, donated to my LYS for use with school kiddos learning to knit.
1 HP bookmark, donated to Goodwill.

The Books! They Have Arrived!

The first box of books for this semester's classes arrived this morning. It doesn't look like $200 worth of books does it? Such a small stack and only representative of a portion of two classes.

I also need to start thinking about buying clothes, even though I have to giggle a bit at the thought of going school clothes shopping at the age of twenty-eight. Giggles aside, an inventory of my closet reveals I have very few articles that actually fit me after last fall's weight loss meaning that I need to invest some money in new trousers and shirts. Given the strict budget, I have to be more than thoughtful in color combinations and individual pieces, which has never been my strong point. Perhaps there is something of a list floating out there on the Internet: the neccessities of a guy's wardrobe.

Let's Face This Night and See It Through

I'm a little obsessed with this song, Skeleton Boy, from the UK band Friendly Fires. Like constant rotation on my iPod kind of obsessed. Great video as well - a bit creepy but overall just plain fun.

Jumping the Pumpkin

School starts up in two weeks; I keep referring to this fact in order to remind myself to spend these waning hours of summer doing fun things, things I may not have time to do once my nose is stuck in piles of books and my fingers are flying across the keyboard writing papers. Yesterday, I feel, was a good use of time, engaged in some crafty goodness for the little ones in my life.

Up first: the candy corn hat. Quite a few of my friends have babies and these small knit candy corn hats are irresistible as well as a quick, quick knit. I think this hat encompassed a whole hour and a half of mindless knitting while watching season two of Mad Men. I did deviate from the pattern a bit: rather than k1p1 ribbing, I made it a k2p2. I like the look of the k2p2 ribbing much more than the k1p1 - simply an aesthetic change. Another aesthetic change was to finish the hat after the k1k2tog decrease; when knit according to the pattern, the hat becomes really pointy. I wanted the top of the hat to be more rounded and finishing after that particular decrease accomplished the task.

This is a great project to use up odds and ends, should one have bright yellow, bright orange, and white yarn in their stash. I did not but collected said shades in Plymouth Encore Worsted at my LYS. I used so little of the yarn to make this one hat, I'm thinking one skein of each will be enough to make seven more. Or, at least, I hope.

Also: Why was I convinced that orange was the base color of a candy corn? Where did that come from?

Next: A trick-or-treat bag, or at least the prototype I will use to construct more later on. I've slowly but surely been spending some time in front of the sewing machine in order to build some skills. I was sick with mono when my classmates had sewing in Home Economics and my mom didn't think it wise to teach me, even when I asked. Hence, I've been reading, reading, reading, and attempting a few easy-peasy-lemon cheesey patterns. I had thought I'd found one such pattern in Lotta Jansdotter's Simple Sewing - a tote pattern I figured would make a great tote for holiday-inspired candy gathering. I purchased fabric from the local Joanns, cut out all the pieces, ironed on interfacing, and prepared for an hour or so of sewing the next day.

Perhaps it's my lack of sewing schema or just a lack of comprehension period, but the directions lost me. I can read learning theory and have it make perfect sense but can't seem to follow directions for a simple tote bag. Epic fail on my behalf. Also: the interfacing I purchased wasn't so great, not adhering to the fabric completely and causing some issues with the sewing machine. So I improvised. Using some of the measurements provided in the book, I made the above tote: fully lined and reversible, ready for trick-or-treat goodness. My sewing skills still are not those of Adam, but I managed through a quilt top and now a tote-like bag. When can I start sewing coats and such?

I also managed, in course of yesterday, to make a pot of chicken noodle soup (to use up a stalk of celery - it made sense in my head when I woke up yesterday, but seems silly now) and a peach pie, which will be enjoyed tonight with vanilla ice cream. Not a lot of creating today, however: I have a syllabus that needs to be polished and at least three rubrics I need to write.

School starts in two weeks.

5T :: 8.14.09

5T :: 8.14.09
Originally uploaded by LimeGreenOctopi

So I started doing the 5T thing and stopped, mostly because I went on vacation and then did the whole move thing... attempting to get back in the swing of it...

Things off to better homes:
Acrylic yarn :: donated to LYS for use in a classroom.
Cell phone :: given to a friend who goes through a lot of cell phones.
Charger :: yes, I'm counting it as an item this week. It went with the cell phone.
Pinnacle Video Converter :: listed on Amazon.com for someone else to utilize.
Electric Insect Swatter :: donated to Goodwill; someone will think this is cool.

Waning Days of Summer

I've been baking up a storm, slowly but surely working my way through the baking section of Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything. The latest project: cinnamon buns, which were stickily delicious and forced me to engage in an extra half-hour on the elliptical yesterday.

I'm procrastinating, wishing and hoping that a slew of baking will slow down the onset of the school year. I had my first "not prepared for the first day of school" dream last night, a reminder that yeast will make bread rise but will not make the hours pass any more slowly. I'm teaching two, taking four this semester, which may very well change before the end of the day. Two of the classes are in my minor, gender studies, while another is dissertation proposal preparation; the fourth is a class in online content analysis through our School of Library Science. When scheduling in the spring, I was counting on only teaching one section this term. With two, I'm unsure I can manage such a schedule and actually learn something in it. Online content analysis may be going to the wayside.

I'm looking forward to returning to teaching, despite the fact my syllabus has been chopped up into pieces. This will be the third year I've taught this class and finally feel like I have a grasp on how I want it to go, what I want to change to make it a better class for both my students and for myself as an instructor. I'm introducing a memoir project through which I hope to walk my students through both the writing workshop structure and process writing. I've mapped out concepts to be covered throughout the course of the year. I hope this will alleviate some of the pressure I feel to cover everything in the fall and then flounder a bit in the spring. I'm also hoping that this will more authentically connect assessment and methodology for my students. We shall see.

All of this, of course, relies on finishing actually writing the syllabus and then working through all of the assignment sheets and rubrics for grading. Syllabuses (just as correct as syllabi) are never simple and this current one just seems overwhelming...

The Light, The Light!

Even in the wee small hours of the morning, the light in this house is amazing. It absolutely floods this place all day long. This, alone, makes leaving the old apartment worth it.

The House of Whelmed (and Womenly Wiles) is shaping up; we still haven't hung artwork in the main living areas, but with one Roomie preparing to begin data analysis and the other Roomie working diligently on her dissertation proposal, the energy is currently best spent elsewhere. In the meantime, I continue reading non-required text, baking, and knitting up holiday gifts. School begins in nineteen days. I'm attempting to avoid this fact.

Baby Sweaters, Craigslist, and Settling In

One of my roomies is leaving for the weekend, which made me think that I would prepare some sort of baked good for her this morning before she left. So I gathered up baking ingredients last night and threw together a dough for cinnamon buns, allowing it to rise overnight so I might put the buns themselves together this morning. The alarm goes off, I get up, consult the recipe book, and realize that I made the wrong dough. The dough I made is for regular-type bread, which would make for some funky cinnamon buns. As soon as I post this, I am off to Dunkin Donuts to buy something sweet to send her on the road with. Drat.

Really, though, living in the house has been good. The third roomie has arrived home from Taiwan and we've managed to work with and around each other really well. There's a decent amount of space in the house, so it's not as though we are ever tripping over one another, which may be helping the "wow, I now live with two people" thing I've got going." It's good, this move into the house.

Also good: I met the Craigslist chap for coffee yesterday. Not a crazy, actually pretty interesting. I just hope I didn't babble too much... I'm a babbler in new social situations. I'm hoping there will be more coffee with this guy in my future. We shall see.

And the cute goodness above? That's the baby sweater I knit while on vacay in Michigan for my friend Emi's impending little person. I like to call it Baby's First Smoking Jacket. I'm a little in love with it, actually. It was a one day knit, moving pretty quickly on big needles, and I am absolutely in love with the color of the yarn, which reminded me of pickles. Who doesn't love pickles? I think one of my favorite features of the sweater might be the buttons, which my aunt gave me: vintage little Big Mac buttons from an old shirt of my cousin's. The perfect caramel color to complete the look. Adorkable.

Alright - off to Dunkin. While there will not be cinnamon buns this morning there will be sweetness. And bread.

The Big Move

I always find packing to be strange: all the things of one's life neatly put away in boxes and checked against some master list, totally betraying the chaotic and insane everyday reality. However, for just a moment, my life looks really neat and tidy in the back of this truck.
Until it explodes all over my new space. In my defense, I managed to move the contents of an entire apartment - kitchenwares, furniture, and all - into this room. Well, almost all. I had to put the couch in the kitchen. It was an impossibility it would fit in this space without ripping a hole in both space and time.
There are some lovely things about moving into a new house: the smell of newly painted walls, sparkling new appliances, and the knowledge that you are the first in the memory of this home to wash dishes in the sink or do laundry in the bathroom. These are beautiful things. Some of the less attractive things about moving into a new house: the lack of carpeting on move-in day. Due to the rain we'd been having, the carpet layers hadn't been able to complete their task. Thankfully, the bedrooms were complete but the living room and stairs were still bare. Move in day was a dance, both the carpet layers and the moving crew shuffling around each other.
But look at the light. It streams into every window of this house. Just lovely. I want to scoop it up in a mug and drink it with my morning coffee. My favorite part: the orange door. I live in a house with an orange door. It's going to be a good year.

Pics from the Vacay

Daycation, All I Ever Wanted...

Amidst a hectic class schedule and proposal preparation, my friend Anne and I decided we needed a daycation this weekend. We jumped in the car and headed for Chicago, Illinois, partially to celebrate Anne's birthday with a walk through of the Harry Potter exhibit at the Museum of Science and Industry.

No road trip is complete without a dose of caffeine. We got on the road early and resorted to McDonald's, being unable to locate a Dunkin' Donuts on our route. Caffeinated = smiling.

We made a stop in Gary, Indiana at Michael Jackson's home. It's a small house in a town that rivals Detroit in terms of rust belt devastation, but it was fascinating how it was constructed into a shrine for someone who was able to move up and out of his situation. Sadly, those gathered were there to mourn Jackson's passing, leaving stuffed animals, writing messages on boards, and leaving poetry.

I love the aesthetics of the font here. Yeah, I'm one of those people.

The front of the Museum of Science and Industry. Note the large Hedwig banner - it was all Harry Potter, all the time. Interestingly enough, the exhibit was housed in a tent external to the building. It was a lovely day, albeit windy (hence, the Windy City), so the tent swayed to and fro, adding to the experience of walking through Harry's wizard world. Also of note: no matter how big of an HP geek I am, there will always be someone who eclipses me. This makes me happy.

Our tickets for the exhibit were timed, so we wandered through the exhibits for a bit. There were these huge Lego sculptures of famous buildings throughout the museum, totally feeding into my childhood love for the building blocks. I was tempted to purchase a Lego kit to build the Sears Tower in the gift shop, but resisted. The Lego Architecture series is pretty sweet, though.

Anne shows off her Nebraskan roots with her ease around the cows. We learned more than we could ever have hoped about the dairy industry in Illinois, including the way to milk a cow. Thankfully, there are no pictures of this.

Since this was our daycation, there were specific words we could not say: dissertation, research, pedagogy, framework, literature review, etc. Another one of those words? Foucault.

No photography is allowed in the HP exhibit itself, but the 1962 Ford Anglia used in Chamber of Secrets was on display in the main concourse. We took it as a definite photo opportunity.

After the museum, we drove into downtown to meet Colleen, AD, and their adorable twins. Did I mention the perfect weather?

Once parking was secured, we headed out to Taste of Chicago. I'd never been, but it was both tasty and fun. the ticket system was a little strange, but when in Chicago, do as the Chicagoans do. James, one of Colleen's little ones, eyes me as we walk back to our cars after a long day. A great daycation, exactly what was needed to push through the last two days of class (check) and this final paper (currently working on). So close to a small amount of summer freedom!

Knowledge Never Sleeps

... and, apparently, neither do I. After a quick four-hour nap, I'm back up and at-'em, attempting to make sense of Marx, neo-Marxist theory, and critical theory (little c, little l - it makes a difference, trust me). Ironically, I may have found my new favorite place to study: the Kroger. It has free wifi, a Dunkin' Donuts with free refills, plenty of electrical outlets, and plenty of opportunities for people watching.

Silver Linings

Great fountain, right? My classroom at IUPUI overlooks the square this fountain is in and, off in the distance, you can see Indy's downtown. I'm not overly thrilled with this second summer class: it's, essentially, six and a half hours of my day, every day, for the next week and a half. That doesn't include the reading time. It's a lot of review material, repackaged in pretty interesting ways. I'm on the fringes of burn out and pessimism is creeping in. In hopes of heading it off, there are lots of bright spots:

* Grad school is hard, but it is also a priviledge. I am so fortunate to be able to do what I do. I seriously read and write all day long and this is amazing.

* And it's made me smarter. The fact that I actually understand the content of this new class and can explain in the simplest terms possible the complexities that are theoretical frameworks is pretty awesome, despite lots of confusion around me. I like synthesis.

* I will have a two week break in July. It's coming. I need to hang in there. Harry Potter comes out that first weekof break and the Chihuly exhibit's at the Flint Institute of Arts. The second week will be spent with the aunt and the uncle, lounging about their lake house with non-required reading and plenty of knitting.

* The dissertation proposal is a bear; writing is difficult and the synthesis of ideas in a way that is clear and purposeful makes the process all the more murky. However, it's interesting to see my ideas come together in cohesive ways. As mentioned earlier, I've actually learned something these past two years.

So, yeah, all is not as blah as I sometimes allow it to be portrayed. Life is good.

Cereal-Covered Donuts

These are donuts with cereal on them. Apparently, they're a hit as these are the third incarnation I've seen at my local Kroger store. I can't help but find them hilarious, wondering what the marketing impetus was behind them: are they attempting to cater to those people who spend a good amount of time in the morning pondering, "Cereal or donut? Cereal or donut?" Are there many of those people? And why does the thought of a cereal-covered donut make me want to barf just a little?

Also: donut or doughnut? Oh, so many questions.

Amazon.com Bitterness

Bitterness
Originally uploaded by Klis

If Amazon.com and I were dating, this would be about the time we would be seeing lawyers behind the other's back and squirreling away assets.

Normally, I love Amazon with the pages upon pages of stuff - nowhere else on the Internet is it possible to engage in such random Internet shenanigans involving such a range of material. I tend to turn to Amazon for textbooks, primarily because the books are usually in stock and I'm able to situate them in relation to other books dealing with the same topic matter. Additionally, none of the independent bookstores in the area deal in textbooks and the IU campus bookstore is run by Barnes and Noble. So, yeah, I order my textbooks from Amazon.com.

I placed two orders this summer for books - dense, highly-priced textbooks about educational theory that would soon be filled with notes and tabs and thinkings as the summer's classes progress. In the first order, one of the books arrived with cracks in the spine, as though the book had been bent. I returned it easily enough and Amazon sent me a replacement within four days.

The second order, however, arrived two weeks after it was supposed to, despite being listed as "in stock." When it arrived yesterday, I hurriedly opened the package, the class having started earlier that week, only to discover that this book suffered a similar fate: not only was the spine cracked but there was a dent in it as well. I examined the box, which was devoid of dents, and came to the conclusion that this book was shipped out of their facility in this condition.

I have no issue with books that suffer from bangs and dents; what I have issue with is paying brand-spanking-new prices for a bang and dent book, especially when it's a textbook costing upwards of sixty dollars. Who was possessed with the thought that this book would be alright to send out as a brand new book? And, having received two shipments of books with cracks from Amazon, I have to wonder whether the quality control at Amazon is beginning to slip. Perhaps these two experiences were just outliers?

Come on, Bezos, get it together!

5T: June 19, 2009

5T: June 19, 2009
Originally uploaded by LimeGreenOctopi

I came across this idea in the Rearranged Design blog. Five Things is simple: once a week, you rid your life of five things you no longer need or use. Taking a photograph provides some validation: these are five things that are no longer taking up space in your life. The trick is not to throw said items away but rather find them places they would be happier; simply because they are not enhancing your life doesn't mean they won't enhance someone else's.

With a move looming on the horizon, I figured it would be a good time to start editing the collection of "stuff" I move with me, so here's where I'm starting: two Fiesta bowls in a color I don't actively collect (I remember them being on a really good sale - but what good are they if they don't fit in with anything else?) and a GRE prep book that I'm shipping to my friend Lee. Not only is she a collector of the shamrock Fiestaware but preparing for her own GRE. Nice. Vegetarian cookbook and Squirrel Nut Zippers CD are off to the Friends of the Library book store. I have the funniest feeling I will be making many more donations to that place before the summer is through.

The interesting thing is now that these items are out of my space, I'm actively looking for other things to get rid of. This could be addicting.

The Perils of Television

I blame my fear of sewing on Lifetime, Television for Women.

Back in the day, also known as the late-80's, early-90's, Lifetime was a fledgling channel airing reruns of made-for-television movies. Lots of them, spanning decades of stories of babies swapped at the hospital, terminal illness, and workplace drama. On a day home ill from school, I happened to catch just a snippet of one such movie. The plot went something like this: there's a sewing factory employing deaf women who spend a lot of time hunched over their machines, sewing while simultaneously working for workplace safety. The five minutes I happened to catch found one such woman sewing through her fingers; she stands up and begins screaming but - lo and behold - works in a factory that employs women who are deaf. No one notices her for a good three or four minutes, by which time both she and I are freaking out.

The image of that large, industrial-sized needle going through her fingers has stuck with me much longer than I imagine it sticking with any other rational person. It's the self-imposed bully that keeps me from sewing, at least until recently. I borrowed a friend's machine to attempt a quilt top for another friend's baby shower. It's something I've wanted to try for a while so I screwed my courage to the sticking place and attempted, the fruits of which is above. It's something of a hot mess, really. Adam, I am not. I think the pattern was a little much for a first time out; there are a few blocks that are not a standard size, hence some of the zigs do not match the zags. I'm debating whether I want to get batting for this top or buy new fabric and start over.

Regardless, I made it through an entire project. With all my fingers un-sewed. I almost wish I would have watched the end of the movie - perhaps the woman had a happy, sewing ending? It could have alleviated years of mental sewing anguish.