Dosas!

I decided to try making dosas today. Dosas are a kind of Indian pancake or crepe. My mom had tried them a couple of times, but always expressed frustration with trying to spread the batter before it clumped up. My first attempt showed me how frustrating that can be, so on my second one, instead of pouring the batter in the middle of the pan, then spreading it with the back of a wooden spoon (as the recipe said to do) I poured the batter over the whole pan. It worked! I got a nearly perfect 9 inch dosa! It was thicker than the ones in Indian restaurants, but it did cook very evenly, and it didn't have any big holes.

It was also quite delicious. I filled mine with curried red lentils, and DH had one with maple syrup. He also thought it was good, in fact he liked it better than the paper-thin restaurant ones! Sweet success!

Strawberry Swing

Okay, I'm probably one of the last people to find this. Actually, my mom found it. But I liked it so much, I thought I'd put it up here. It's the Strawberry Swing video. I planned to embed it, but that's disabled. :-(

And yes, I'm still alive and kicking. Sorry for the radio silence. Been busy elsewhere. Will probably continue for the foreseeable future. I'll try to post every month or so, though.

Worms!

I bought a pound of worms over the weekend, made a bed for them, and fed them. Now to just hope and pray they like their new home, multiply, and provide me with lots of castings for my strawberries (which are shooting out lots of runners and seem very happy)! Next project, lettuce. But that's probably a month or two in the future . . .

Update

Okay, I have become a sporadic blogger. Sorry. That's the way it's going to be for a while. Life you know . . .

Basically, things are much the same. I still volunteer at the farm. I'm biking a lot this summer, now that I can run errands easily with my panniers. What's new for this fall is that I will be teaching Religious Education for grades 3-5 at our church and training to be a volunteer K-3 music docent with Music for Minors. I'll probably start with the Kinders.

I'm more nervous about the Religious Education job than the Music Docent job--I get 2 months of bi-weekly classes before I get turned loose, and I only have to prepare 30 minute lessons with MFM. With RE I got a 4 hour orientation that was all listening to other people talk with no opportunities to practice. And I have to prepare an hour lesson for 2 weeks from now. Eek. At least in both cases I get canned lesson plans to start from . . .

And that's really all there is to say.

Re-Decorating

Or is it just Decorating.

Anyway, we finally got some pictures put up (some had to be framed first). The apartment looks more home-like now, although we are still in the long process of settling in, due to trying to consolodate two households. Maybe someday everything won't be quite so obviously "his" and "hers" . . . Well, I can hope . . .

Big Basin

Just got back from a camp out at Big Basin with some friends from church. It was a nice, short get-away. Campfire, sina-along, flashlight walk, mosquitos, redwoods and all. Very relaxing. Hopefully solidifying some friendships, & of course nice to be away with DH.

Tent now drying in the sun. Should bring it in soon . . .

Knitting

I've picked up my needels again. This time on a project that has both inspired and daunted me for several years. A friend was working on it when I lived with her 6 years ago (has it really been nearly 6 years? Wow.) and I got inspired. I finally got the book as a gift from my mom, somtime in the past 2 years. But still it was extremely daunting. It's aran knitting--lots of cables--very intimidating.

Then, last spring, I joined a knitters guild for a few months. At my first meeting, I felt compelled to apologize for my lack of skill, saying, "I only know how to knit and purl." One of the other members, bless her heart, said, "Then you know everything, that's all you need to know. The rest is just details." That gave me a lot of confidence.

So this summer, when I found myself waisting way to much time on-line, I decided to start knitting again, as a way to keep my hands busy while my mind wanders. It's working. It's much more relaxing and much less depressing that surfing the 'net, probably because there is a semi-productive result at the end of the day. So that's me right now. Knitting.