Mrs. Gardner's Egg

Last week while Julia and I were in eastern Massachusetts, we took a day trip to Boston with my sister Laurie. We went to one of my favorite places in the world - The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. This is only the second time I have visited this lovely place and it was just as wonderful as I remembered. It was great to show Julia around.

Built at the turn of the 20th century, the building resembles an Italian palace. There is a large courtyard in the center full of plants all year long. There's a lovely mosaic in the center of the courtyard. As you look up to the glass ceiling you view the four floors of the building full of windows and little porches. In April, blooming nasturtiums cascade down the walls of the courtyard.

The museum is full of paintings, sculpture, decorative art including furniture, ceramics, silver and more. There's so much to look at and it is all so accessible. It's a big place so the thought of living there doesn't enter my mind but I could move right into one of the large rooms! There are lovely stone columns all over the place carved from different kinds of stone.

The rooms and hallways are painted in dark colors that really speak to me - a dark royal blue, crimson red, and deep green. The art and furniture looks wonderful against it. There are no lights on the artwork so it does make it difficult to see everything but the atmosphere far outweighs this. In 1990, thirteen works of art were stolen from the museum. They have left the spaces empty with little cards explaining what happened. It is kind of eerie and odd. Needless to say, the guards are very cautious of each person who enters a room.

If I am not mistaken, Mrs. Gardner left specifics in her will that everything should remain as she placed it. Her collection from all over the world happily co-exists together in this lovely place. I read a wonderful book about Mrs. Gardner and how she collected all these things. "The Art of Scandal" is sadly out of print but you may be able to pick up a used copy. It's a fascinating look into a very interesting woman's life with art.


In one of the glass cases, Laurie spied this wonderful ostrich egg covered with silver. It's quite bizarre and fabulous all rolled up into one - kind of like the Gardner Museum is itself! Makes me wonder about who made this!

Put this place on your list if you ever come to Boston!

The Winter that Won't End

It's the end of February - where has time gone? We got yet another snowstorm dumping six inches on our little part of the world. The snow was so heavy, it was really hard to move. As you can see, everyone is getting tired of winter - even the sign up the road is leaning with the weight of all the snow.

Evidently it's a record for the most moisture in a February. Normally, our neighbors would be sugaring by now but the bitter cold seems to be here for at least a few more days.


When the sun finally came out the other day, the trees looked like they were covered with cotton balls. Against the blue sky it was pretty breath-taking.


The lambs are really growing quickly. Easter is early this year (March 23rd) and so we are preparing to sell the ones which are the right size at the livestock auction over the next few weeks. There will be buyers from different states in the Northeast who will truck them to slaughter houses with standing orders. We never know where they end up but we know someone will be enjoying them for Easter dinner.


Many of our neighbors are getting low on their hay supplies. Luckily, The Farmer put up quite a bit of hay last season and it is still waiting in the fields to be fed to the sheep. Picking the bales out of the field is tricky though since the snow is so deep. It is hard to get the tractor to the bales safely. I think The Farmer is getting a bit weary of the winter snows - it just makes everything more difficult - feeding hay and grain, watering the sheep, and spreading bedding to try to keep the sheep comfortably housed. He's ready for spring!

But we're in for another storm tomorrow night! Wow!

More CREATIVITY from The Reynolds Family

A few years ago when my book Kids Embroidery came out, I did a class and booksigning at The Blue Bunny in Dedham, MA. (The illustration here is one I did for the book and it is shows children from around the world in embroidered costumes.) Owned by the Reynolds' family, the store is all about creativity and learning for children of all ages. The kids who attended made a little bookmark and learned quite a few stitches. It was a fun afternoon.

When I go to present these events, I usually learn more than I teach. I was fortunate to spend some time talking with Janet Reynolds and she shared with me her family's needlework traditions. The timing was perfect - it was just before the photography for Colorful Stitchery.

She told me about her favorite aunt who lived in New York City. The aunt, who was quite prim and proper, had a special tablecloth which she used for every dinner party she hosted. The color was a lovely shade of silver grey. Before each guest left the table, she asked them to sign their name on the cloth with her special graphite pencil. After the dinner party, she stitched over the signature in a matching silver grey floss to help her remember her friend and the meal she shared.

When Janet and Paul began throwing their own dinner parties, Janet carried on with her aunt's tradition. She purchased an off-white cloth and started building her own dinner cloth memories. I boldly asked her if I could share her idea in my book. She volunteered her cloth for photography. How very exciting for me to be able to share their special tradition with my readers! Here's a shot from far away.


As you can imagine, Janet and her husband Paul have many friends who are illustrators and artists including Paul's twin brother Peter. What you can't see from this photo is that lots of the signatures have little quirky illustrations next to their names. Janet stitched the names in many different bright colors and it is so lovely. She says the only downfall is she can't wash the cloth until the signature has been stitched! Janet stitched the signatures in the simple outline stitch which works nicely for swirly cursive lettering.

Thanks so much to Janet for sharing this project with me. It was so nice to see her again last week at their store The Blue Bunny in Dedham, Massachusetts.

p.s. If you live with young authors and illustrators, be sure to check out this link to The Hutch, the Reynolds' new literary and art magazine for children. They are accepting submissions now!

The Blue Bunny and Peter H. Reynolds

Last week was Julia’s winter school vacation. We headed off to Dedham, MA to visit my sister and her family for a couple days. It’s nice to have family close enough to visit. When in Dedham, we always try to visit a wonderful children’s book store called The Blue Bunny. It is owned by the Reynolds family and managed by Janet Reynolds. Janet is the mother of three boys and she juggles her family and store amazingly. The store is packed to the gills with books for kids of all ages and lots of fun toys – both educational and silly. They have a lovely studio room where they teach classes for children and adults.

Janet is married to Paul Reynolds who runs the company Fablevision, an educational and media company dedicated to learning of all kinds for people of all ages. Check out their website – there are lots of activities that are fun for everyone – young and old. Paul is a wonderful personality full of ideas and enthusiasm which seems to just bubble out of him. Fablevision is located atop the Children’s Museum in Boston which we have to explore. His twin brother is Peter H. Reynolds, author and illustrator of The Dot, Ish, So Few of Me, The North Star, along with illustrator of the Judy Moody books and a staggering number of many more children's books. His books have been translated into many languages - he is a giant in the children's book world.

Julia is a persistent kid and she had decided that she was going to meet Peter H. Reynolds on this visit. She marched up to Janet and asked about him. Janet said he was in the local area and she left a message on his phone for Julia. She looked at all the books - and kept hoping Peter would appear. Her persistence paid off and Peter arrived happy to talk with Julia. He was wonderful - he whisked her off to a little table at the back of the store and sat and talked and drew with her. She was mesmerized. I was overwhelmed at his generosity. It was such a great day and treat for both of us.


Do you know Peter's book “The Dot”? It is a kids book about a little girl named Vashti who thinks she can't draw. She goes on a little journey and learns a lot about herself and what she can do. When I teach knitwear design, I often hear similar comments from knitters - I then try to help them realize that yes, they can design too. I think I'll bring my copy of this book the next time I teach. The Dot was followed by Ish about a little boy who thinks he can't draw. It's a lovely story. We picked up the last of the trilogy of books in this series - So Few of Me and Peter signed it for Julia. I love these books - they speak to so many people - young and old - and if you haven't seen them yet - check them out.


Thanks so much to Peter, Paul and Janet Reynolds - this visit was the highlight of Julia's school vacation. And thanks to Paul Reynolds for taking these photos with his cellphone and emailing the memories to us!

Susan B. Wonderful

I don’t buy too many knitting books – I always look with interest at all the new titles when I visit yarn stores, B & N or Borders. And these days, there are literally tons each season. By the time a book is published, I usually have heard about it from a colleague or fellow author and I’ve got a good idea of which books I am planning to buy. Honestly, I barely buy a knitting book anymore. And If I don’t start weeding out some of my old books to donate to the local library for their book sale, I don’t know where I’m going to put any new ones. I do have a hard time discarding knitting books.

When I do find myself at a giant bookstore, which is rather infrequently, I grab a stack of the newest knitting titles and take them to the children’s section so Julia can look at what she wants to. Every season publishers bring out so many books that is is very hard to keep up. This is how I found Susan B. Anderson’s first book Itty Bitty Hats. The subtle but beautiful colors on the cover and the spiral binding caught my eye. It was with great interest that inside, the book didn’t disappoint me – it was jam-packed with cute little hats with interesting trims. There was even some crochet and embroidery on the hats which always wins me over. I guessed that it was going to be a big seller because of the cuteness factor, incredibly sweet photos, cute babies, and really clever projects. Finally a book that I wanted to buy.


So it has been a great pleasure for me to spend time with Susan at both TNNA in January and this past weekend at The Knit Out. Susan is just as nice as you would expect from looking at her books. This weekend after my talk at The Textile Center, we went out to dinner. I told her that when I first saw her book I said to myself, “Who is this new designer? Where did she come from? Where has she been hiding?”

I found out that Susan has been happily living in Madison, Wisconsin with her husband and four children for a long time. She designed baby clothing and hats professionally before her latest venture - writing knitting books. I read her blog every time she posts (thank you Feedburner) and am constantly amazed at how enthusiastic she is about knitting and how much she knits beautiful colorful projects.

I asked her how she got into writing knitting books and she told me that it was by luck. She wrote up a rough book proposal, tucked in a little hat project and sent it off to Artisan – the publisher of Kids Knitting (which I illustrated). In a very short while, she found herself with a book deal and started knitting.

Her second book Itty Bitty Nursery came out last fall and is just as good as her first. I’m a bit crazy over knitted toys so I really enjoy looking at all the super fun projects in this book. Of course, being a chicken farmer makes me a bit partial to these polka dot chickens. Are they just the cutest little things? Makes me want to knit some up – if only I didn’t have to work on my own stuff right now.


I asked Susan how the heck she got so much knitting done. She let me in on her secret – she gets up ridiculously early in the morning before her family stirs and knits and knits and knits. Maybe I should try this – although I’ve never been much of a morning person. My knitting tends to get done later in the day.

Luckily for all of us, Susan is working on yet another book so stay tuned! It was really fun to spend time with her at the Knit Out and share knitting stories. She really is as nice as her books would suggest - which is very refreshing. If you want to learn more about Susan, I highly suggest listening to the two interviews (episodes 46 and 64) with her over at Craft Sanity.

Me at Craft Sanity

I had the pleasure of speaking with Jennifer Ackerman-Haywood - the Creator of the Podcast Craft Sanity a couple of Saturdays ago. What a lovely woman - smart, out-going, and doing a really good thing for all things crafty.

Jennifer just posted our interview on her site. It's podcast #70 for her. Click on over and listen to our conversation. There's even a free pdf download of my potholder pattern from my book Colorful Stitchery. Enjoy.

Click here for Craft Sanity Podcast #70.

The Knit Out 2008

I’m back from the Mall of America and Minnesota. What a whirlwind, to say the least! Out to dinner Thursday evening with Karen from Needlework Unlimited and Karen, the former owner of Three Kittens. We've all known each other for a very long time so it was fun to catch up on each other's lives and "As the Yarn World Turns in Minneapolis." On Friday, I spent the day with Nancy Kleiber, the local Westminster Fibers sales rep. Nancy and I visited Amazing Threads in the morning where I did a booksigning and met some wonderful enthusiastic knitters who had already bought my Julia yarn which the store had received only the day before. Lovely shop with great selection of all different kinds of yarns.

After a quick lunch, we spent the afternoon at The Yarnery in St. Paul. What a great bunch of women – both employees and customers. We had quite a crowd – everyone oooohing and ahhhing over my samples from Kristin Knits. I’ve known one of the managers - Theresa Gaffey for over 20 years so it was fun to catch up with her and hear about her son Tommy. Then I was totally overwhelmed to see an old friend from my college exchange days at Oregon State University. Sandy Olson, who is a member of the Textile Center, saw my photo on the poster about the talk I was giving. She couldn’t come to the talk but she surprised me by showing up at the store. Hadn’t seen her in 30 years! Wow – what fun. The girls at The Yarnery gave me this lovely chicken kit designed by Marie Mayhew, a local designer who does some incredibly cute things like felted snowmen, Easter Eggs, and pumpkins. You can order them on their website here. How thoughtful they were – especially knowing that I raise chickens.

After a quick stop at the hotel, Nancy escorted fellow author Susan B. Anderson, Amy Greeman (Storey’s Director of Publicity) and me over to The Textile Center to set up for the evening talk. What a great space – the knitters, quilters, weavers, felters and fiber artists of Minnesota are so lucky. We had a bit of technical difficulty – the projector wasn’t compatible with my MacBook Pro. Luckily, Robin who reads this blog and who I met at The Yarnery was at The Textile Center early. She and her husband Daniel saved the day. She called him on his cell phone and he ran to his office to pick up his IBM-ish laptop, brought it on over and then configured it to work with the projector. I had my slides on a flashdrive and except for starting a little late, all was well. There were over 75 people there – isn’t that marvelous? Everyone was so sweet and friendly and seemed to have a good time. Thanks so much to the Textile Center for hosting the event and to all of you who came! And thanks to Robin and Daniel for saving the day with their technical abilities.

I met up with the rest of the Storey crew for breakfast – Pam Art - Publisher, Deborah Balmuth – Editorial Director, Amy, Susan B Anderson – Author of Itty Bitty Hats and Itty Bitty Nursery, Melissa Morgan-Oakes – Author of 2 Socks at One Time, and Edie Eckman – Author of The Crochet Answer Book. Off we all went to the Mall of America – none of us really knowing what to expect. The crowd of knitters and crocheters was overwhelmingly huge – long lines snaked past booths as people waited to pick up all the free stuff the different yarn companies and publishers were giving away. I did a couple demos on color and embellishing and participated in two author forums on the main stage hosted by Vickie Howell who I had never met before either.

My friend Candi introduced me to the most famous author at the place - Debbie Macomber of The Shop on Blossom Street fame along with zillions of other books. I signed a copy of my book for her – how cool – she is evidently very fond of my work – who would have known? I tried to be witty. She was there with her cousin and they were meeting and greeting all her fans. And boy does she have fans! What a totally lovely, gracious woman oozing sincerity. How awesome to meet her.

The highlight of my day – the thing I had heard about and was most excited about seeing on my trip – was the big contest for the World’s Fastest Knitter! This was just wild – I can’t remember all the names of the contestants (sorry guys – I missed the introductions). There were six women – all from other countries, including Lisa Gentry from Germany, Wanneitta Precord from Canada, Miriam Tegel from Holland, and Hazel Tindall from the Shetland Islands off of Scotland. It was quite something – they had 3 minutes to knit as many stitches as they could. They all used straight needles and the same yarn. Before they began, they pulled the yarn out to check for breaks and knots. Then they were off – knitting away. It was fun to watch each knitter’s techniques. Wanneitta from Canada was a “crotch knitter” holding one needle between her legs. Miriam and Hazel were “pit knitters” holding one of their needles in their armpit. It was the best out of 3 timed trials. Hazel won each trial with Miriam just behind her. Each knitter’s speed increased with each round. Hazel was the victor and won the crown of “World’s Fastest Knitter” once again knitting 262 Stitches in 3 minutes! – she had won previously at the big stitching festival at Alexandra’s Palace in London in 2004. As I watched Hazel I was amazed – her fingers barely moved – the yarn just seemed to knit itself.


Sunday there was more of the same – meeting and greeting and teaching and talking and signing books. I met so many friendly appreciative knitters who have enjoyed and knit my designs over the years. I also got to meet so many of my blog readers in person face to face. Spending time with my fellow authors was a blast – sharing stories and getting to know one another. Working so solitarily as we all do is a challenge and now at least we can catch up via email and by reading each other’s blogs.

Sunday afternoon, Susan, Melissa and I were waiting in the lobby for our ride to the airport (that's the three of us below). On my way to the restroom, who did I almost run into but Hazel Tindall – the newly crowned “world’s Fastest Knitter.” As I turned the corner, there she was wearing a little Fair Isle bolero with a bobbled edging. I couldn’t help but introduce myself and make a fool of myself which I think she found quite amusing. Melissa, Susan and I got to spend some time asking her questions about how she learned to knit. It was a lovely end to a fast and furious, knitting packed trip which I will remember for years to come. Here's a fun article about her win.

I want to thank Storey Publishing for asking me to participate, Amy Greeman for taking such good care of me and The Craft Yarn Council for organizing and sponsoring this fabulous event. Thanks to Nancy for driving me and the girls from Storey around and helping to organize the booksignings at the stores. Thanks to Kare for giving me the lead on the venue for the talk at The Textile Center and to Margaret Mitchell for believing knitters would come.

I bet I’m one of the only people who has spent the entire weekend at the Mall of America and didn’t buy a thing except a few cups of coffee, some lunch, and a kids knitting book called Knitting with Gigi which is by the way a very cute how to knit book for kids written by Karen Thalaker who was also there with her husband and four kids.

Who would have thought that learning to knit at the age of eight would have taken me to this fun weekend – how amazing. Thanks Mom for putting those needles and yarn in to my hands.

Kristin in Minnesota at the Textile Center

"Come one, come all" as the saying goes. On February 15, 2008, I'll be doing a talk titled The Joy of Color at The Textile Center of Minnesota. I'm really happy that the folks at the Textile Center of Minnesota are hosting the evening. Information on the location and time is on the sidebar of this blog.

To spread the word, can you do me a favor? On my website, there is a PDF file of the poster shown at left. If you can, print it out and post it at your local grocery store, church, community center, or where ever you think knitters, quilters, and stitchers may see it. The more people who come, the more fun it will be for all of us. There will be door prizes and I'll be doing a booksigning. I'll have knitted samples from the book too. I can't wait to meet all of you!

Download the poster by clicking here.

If you can't come to this event, I'll also be at Knit and Crochet Out at the Mall of America on February 16 and 17th. Click here for information about this event.

Note to regular blog readers: This post is dated so that it will appear at the top of my blog until the day of the event. For new posts, see below.

Happy Valentine's Day

To celebrate Valentine's Day on the blog, I knit up a couple of Valentine swatches. After all, it is hard to share chocolate in cyberspace, no matter how lovely the photo.

I cast on about 32 stitches and then followed the Fair Isle charts working in the round on double pointed needles. Then I sewed and cut the steeks. After, I embroidered each swatch while enjoying the snowy, rainy, sleety day snug inside our little farmhouse with Julia reading a book by my side. I picked up the stitches around all the edges and did mitered garter and reverse stockinette stitch ridges in different colors.

Before:

After:

This one has duplicate stitch on the swatch and some whip stitch embroidery on the border.

Before:

After:

This one has chain stitch, running stitch (over the chain stitching), and french knots.


I think it's amazing what anyone can do to transform a piece of two color Fair Isle with a bit of embroidery. I hope you try it one day!

Enjoy your day and may it be filled with lots of hearts.

February Winter Goes On and On

More snow, sleet, and freezing rain here. If it were colder and all snow, we would have had a heck of a blizzard. It's the kind of day you just want to stay inside all day - which is what Julia and I did with the exception of feeding the chickens and trying to lure in the elusive guinea fowl which just don't want to be back in the coop. I have a feeling there may be some kind of bird territorial issue going on and these three have decided it's easier to stay outside.

Thanks for all the comments and interest in the "lard project." This weekend, I did a pizza rustica recipe from Nigella's How to Be a Domestic Goddess book. It's similar to this one here on her website. I've never been very good at rolling out pie dough and Sunday was the same. The thing was a mess - broken pieces everywhere. So I just patched it up and placed it in the springform pan. I used half lard, half butter. The top looked like a nightmare when it went in. I sloshed some eggy-watery mixture on top and in about an hour, the disaster transformed itself into a beautiful golden pie. I swear it was the lard. It was an amazingly flaky and light pie crust.


But boy, was it rich. Luckily, we had picked up some blood oranges and grapefruit for fresh squeezed juice. The tartness of the citrus set off the richness of the pie. And you can't beat the color for the winter doldrums.


I've got so much of the lard though that I'm trying to give it away to local friends. So far, I've only found one friend, Maggie who is a chef at our favorite local restaurant Hope and Olive, who is interested. I'll deliver her a pint and I'm sure she'll do something magical with it. I think everyone else thinks they will gain 10 pounds just by looking at it and having it in their refrigerators. If all else fails, I know my chickens will love it mixed with their daily rations.

The other day, I told you how I fed the chickens the leftover bits from the lard making project. It's basically pure fat and with the winter they have been through, I knew they could use some. I hadn't gotten an egg since early December and darn it if I got three the next day. Must have been just what they needed, along with the longer days, to get them going. It was killing me to have to buy eggs at the grocery store. They're back in production mode.

I'm off to Minnesota in the morning. I hope to meet some of you there either Friday night at the Textile Center or at the Mall of America over the weekend. Here's a priceless picture of Julia on our walk the other day just as a snow squall was beginning to fall quickly around us.

White, Black and Gray

We're in the midst of some very cold weather with more snow predicted for this evening and tomorrow. Sunday it was just other worldly on our hill. We had a fresh couple of inches of snow and in the morning, it was so foggy and eerie, you could barely see the trees across the field. It was like something out of the movies.


Our poor Border Collies Phoebe and Ness are getting tired of not doing any official work. We can't take them to the sheep because it would be mass chaos - mama ewes stamping their feet, baby lambs trying to run and escape these creatures they have never seen before.


The dogs take their herding heritage seriously. The only thing they have had to herd since December are the chickens and guinea hens. There is a path deep in the snow where they circle around the pen when it is feeding time.


A couple days ago, three of the guinea fowl escaped. I have been trying in earnest to recapture them but they just don't want to be enclosed any more. They are definitely ready for spring. They have been sleeping high up in a maple tree. I leave the pen open all afternoon hoping they will return to their roost. Last night I thought I had success. But no, this morning, they're still out. At least it gives Phoebe and Ness something to think about and look after. They can't catch them but now they are busy.


They have given me a chance to capture some nice photos of them against the gray and clouded skies and with our snow covered hill behind. I truly love these noisy, wild and wacky looking birds.

Sometimes Nothing Seems to Happen

I've been looking at these colored vases all winter long - they've added a bit of color to my life since there has been snow and ice outside since December. Since I've been enjoying looking at them so much, they seemed like they should be added here too.


Did you ever have one of those weeks where nothing was accomplished? I feel like I just lived through it and I'm trying to salvage the last few minutes before the weekend starts. Between my family visiting for a couple days, half day of school for Julia, an appointment in eastern Mass. and a snow school delay, my working hours evaporated. Now it's Friday and I'm frantic.

I did a bit of organization yesterday and posted lots of swatches on this bulletin board - ideas I have been working on for my upcoming book. They’ve been shoved away in a plastic bag, staying neat. But honestly, neat and me don’t work. If it isn’t out where I can see it, develop an idea, visually remember it, then forget it – it might as well not exist. That’s the way I work – I’ve got stuff all around. Most people would think it is clutter. It is so not-Martha == nor sleek post-modern 50’s style. Forget that stuff – it doesn’t work for me. At least I know this and know how to deal with myself – my particular quirks and needs.


Next week is the big week at the Knit Out in Minnesota. (They have finally posted a schedule for anyone who is interested. I’ve got to get stuff ready to fly out on Thursday for the whole weekend. Yikes – presentation at The Textile Center (I hope someone comes). Booksigning at The Yarnery in St. Paul on Friday afternoon (see my sidebar). Other visits to yarn stores in the local area. The Knit Out at the Mall of America on Saturday and Sunday. It should be a fun week.

Then it is back here for Julia’s week of Winter Vacation. Another week evaporates.

I’m feeling rather stressed out about how I can get everything done. I've got a book deadline looming, yarn company and magazine editorials to do and so many projects to design I can't even think about it. Somehow it will all work out. But right now, I can barely imagine how. I’m sure you too feel this way sometime. But at least everyone is healthy and for that I am thankful. The other pieces will fall into place – somehow, some way. My best plan is to make a list and check the stuff off. At least I feel like I accomplished something, checking off the list, that is.


Here’s a photo I took yesterday of some little lambs on top of a bale of hay. They sure love to climb. I can’t believe how fast they are growing. Some of them are positively huge. More are being born each week – although it’s one or two every other day or so. This photo seems to help me put everything in perspective. It will all get done - somehow - some way.

Enjoy your weekend.

Backfat or Not?

Maybe some of you remember that I raise pigs every year. I get the piglets in the early summer and we take them to harvest (or slaughter) in very early winter. This year I raised three pigs and I have been trying in earnest to cook all the different cuts of meat so they tasted exceptional – thereby doing justice to the animals i raised.

This is much easier said than done. I’m a self-taught cook and not a chef by any means. Every year, I ask for cookbooks for Christmas. My go-to books this winter are Bruce Aidells' Complete Book of Pork and Michael Ruhlman and Brian Polcyn's Charcuterie: The Craft of Smoking, Salting, and Curing. We’ve also been reading mainstream books about raising food -- including Michael Pollan’s The Omnivore’s Dilemma and Barbara Kingsolver’s Animal, Vegetable, Miracle. The Farmer and I know we are living a life these two authors probably would love to live – raising our own meat in a good and respectful way. Perhaps you too have read these books – they were both on the bestseller’s lists for months.

Taking care of the animals, once they are slaughtered and in the freezer, is different from feeding and caring for them daily. It starts out with the order at the slaughterhouse. The butcher asks me lots of questions which I just hope I answer correctly. Not that there is a right or wrong answer. My answers though will determine how I cook the meat and fit it into our daily schedule. It’s different than going to the grocery store and picking up a pork loin.

The butcher, with his New Hampshire Yankee accent, asks me questions: Chops – how thick? Loins – how many ribs? Shoulders – fresh or smoked?; Do you want your hocks smoked or fresh?; Hams – fresh or smoked? Hams – sliced, whole, or half? Bacon (or belly fat) smoked or fresh? Do you want the feet?

Over the past few years, I have figured out how to answer him by trial and error. I’m slowly figuring out how to cook different cuts to make them taste the best they can. There are lots of parts of a pig, once slaughtered, that most American people never deal with (the French on the other hand have a use for everything!). I am taking it as a challenge and learning as I go – similar to experimenting with a new knitting technique such as fair isle or lace or cables. It’s a fun way to spend a cold winter season – reading, planning and cooking.

Every year, the butcher asks me “Do you want the fat back?” I, of course, with my waste not - want not philosophy, have always aswered “yes.” I am inheretly frugal. Although not a Yankee by birth, I seem to be picking up lots of my adopted New England's traits. When Julia and I pick up the pigs (or pork as we now refer to them), there are enormous slabs of fat attached to the skin of the pig plopped atop of the banana boxes loaded with perfectly wrapped loins, shoulders, and ribs. The hair has been shaved from the skin – but they look like they should – the skin from the animals I have been feeding for five or six months.

When I get home from the slaughterhouse, I stuff all it in the freezer. Slowly, I work my way through the pile of meat over a few months, moving aside the backfat each time I have to dig for the perfect roast. The past few years, after months of moving the backfat around, I have given up and fed it to the chickens.

I’m proud to say that this year, this didn’t happen. For the past few weekends, I have been working on my “lard project.” When I began, The Farmer was not at all startled. In fact he was encouraging. He told me that there was always a large square box of lard in his refrigerator when he was growing up. His mother did make the most amazing pies and evidently her secret ingredient was lard.

I have persevered. It started out slow. For my first batch, I followed the instructions found in Bruce Aidells' Complete Book of Pork and cut the fat up into tiny 1/2" inch squares. It wasn’t easy – I had to use surgical scissors to hack through the skin. Then I baked it at 350 degrees until it smelled done and there was lots of liquid in the bottom of the 8” sided pot I used. The tall pot is essential - so that the fat doesn’t burn and catch fire in the oven. But honestly, that cutting into small pieces was a nightmare. It took so long, I cursed my way through it. The fat cooked slowly and started to smell a bit like roast pork. When it was done after a few hours, there was a large amount of clear liquid in the bottom of the pot and lots of mighty crunchy bits of pigskin or "cracklings" floating around. We shared them with my chickens after tasting a few.

This weekend, with the advice of my friend Kay who owns a bakery and is a chef, I cut the backfat into pieces about 4 to 5” square. This was a huge timesaver. When the fat was rendered (that is the proper term), I strained the liquid through a fine sieve into some canning jars and stashed them in the fridge wondering what I was going to do with all of it.

I made some oat biscuits substituting the lard for butter weight for weight and they were really flaky and tasty. I’m not much of a pie baker but I think I’ll try some crusts for chicken and meat pot pies this winter.

Do you have lard-y memories of earlier days? What were the favorite recipes your grandma cooked with lard? I’ve got a bunch of it and I’ve got to cook my way through it somehow! Any help will be greatly appreciated.

Here are some good lardy links to read if you are interested.
From Food and Wine: Lard - The New Health Food
From The Seattle Times: The Real Thing

Kristin Knits Knitalong, Flickr Pool, & Ravelry

About ten days ago, I wrote this post to find out what you all thought I should do about getting my book more visible on the web. I was overwhelmed with all the good ideas you had. Everyone had their own opinion about what would work best for me - some overlapped. In the end, I did everything you all wanted so there will be places for all kinds of cyberknitters to post projects from the book.

First up - A brand new Kristin Knits Knitalong! hosted on Blogger. With the help and technical expertise of my new friend Helen, here's the link. If you like to participate in Knitalongs, this is the place for you. Helen will be adminstering it and I'll be poking in to look around daily. There's a button you can take too (although for the life of me, I can't get it to appear on my sidebar). Thanks so much Helen.

Secondly - A photo group on Flickr titled "Inspired by Kristin Nicholas." I've put two lonely photos up there but please, add as many as you want. These projects can be projects you have made from my book, from designs I have had in magazines, whatever! And if you already have pictures on Flickr that would relate, please add them here.

Thirdly - There is a group on Ravelry moderated by my friend Diane. It's called Kristin Knits and there are all kinds of projects popping up over there. But as you know, unless you're a member, Ravelry isn't open to everyone just yet, only members.

I'm really excited about all of these new knitting sites. I can't wait to see what you make and create. It's amazing how passionate all the knitters are out there and I feel so fortunate to be included in a growing community. I'll keep on trying to inspire with my designs and knitting.

And if you haven't figured out how to do any of this yet, just email me a photo with your project and the name you want it posted under and I'll add it to both the Knitalong and the Flickr pool!

Atlantic and Pacific Memories

It's been a bit short on the knitting content here on this blog this past month. As you can imagine, lambing season takes over our lives. Although I'm still knitting and designing, I can't post any current projects because they are going to be in an upcoming book I am working on. I've also been doing quite a bit of designing for Nashua/Westminster Fibers for their upcoming Fall 2008 pattern collections.

When I work on a book, I put a lot into it and come up with all kinds of ideas. Books have a certain amount of pages and everything must fit according to a formula - aka "book layout and design." This part really drives me crazy because my content, that I worked on, wrote about and conceptualized in my head often gets dropped. But those are the breaks. I often save the ideas and can try to add it to the next book project if it fits. And then there is my blog which is the perfect vehicle for showing ideas that get cut.

From reading this blog, you know that lots of my ideas come from nature and observing. So it was with the colorways of both of the Atlantic and Pacific socks. (This pattern is on page 84 of Kristin Knits.) I wrote a lovely little passage about this inspiration and it got cut to two short sentences. I'll let you in on some of it here.


Over the years, I have lived on both coasts of the USA. I went to school at Oregon State University on an exchange program in 1978-79. I was one of a large number of exchange students from all over the USA and parts of the world. Most of us weren't there only for school. Mostly we wanted to explore the incredibly beautiful state of Oregon and the Pacific Northwest. OSU was where I met The Farmer - he was on exchange from UMass and I from University of Delaware. We all would venture to the Oregon Coast (Corvallis was only about 1 1/2 hours from the coast) and spend time on the beach and eating clam chowder. I am pretty sure beer and coffee was also involved. I can still remember the amazing sunsets like they were yesterday - purple, fuschia, orange, gray blues. They are marked on my mind and I hope they never leave. I don't have a photo of these days but you can see what I am talking about here on this "beach camping website." Those sunsets inspired the socks on the polka dot legs.

About ten years later, my friend Sally invited The Farmer and I to her home on Swan's Island - a small island off of Bass Harbor "down east" in Maine. I had never been to an island in Maine before. We both fell in love with the everything on the island - the people, the colors, the freshly caught lobster, the smells. We've been going back ever since. Last summer I wrote about our trip here and here.


So that's where I got the color ideas for these socks. I am really happy with the way they turned out. I had intended them to be shown on a man and a woman but we didn't have an available male at the shoot. But there was a little person and her mom (not me and Julia in case you are wondering). Luckily I had brought a bunch of Julia's tights with me and they were the perfect accessory. We plopped the mom and her child on a table in this lovely gray room and here's how they look. I do so love the photo and how the legs are intertwined. Kevin Kennefick did a great job.

There will be some big news next week about something a new friend and I have been working on. Stop back at the beginning of the week!