Fit to Flatter and Revelations!

I'm a long-time listener of the Stash and Burn podcast.  I'm not always current, but I do listen eventually.  In episode 127 Nicole interviewed the author of a new book, Fit to Flatter, Amy Herzog.  It was an interesting interview, and Amy also talked about her new Craftsy class of the same title.  I pretty much bought it right away, and I must say it's been quite a learning experience.  I plan on buying the book shortly.

I feel like I've always understood the math and construction techniques needed to adjust sweaters to fit, but I've not quite known what those adjustments should be for myself.  I certainly have resisted the need for waist shaping (as I am nearly as straight as a person can be) with a fair dose of animosity towards those preaching in the Church of Waist Shaping, as they nearly always have a lovely hourglass shape.  Amy preaches waist shaping, but recognizes that not everyone has a waist and makes recommendations that are realistic and practical for me.  Also, Amy's approach to picking a size and making adjustments from there has been something of a revelation to me, although it makes perfect sense and I'm not sure why I wouldn't have thought of it before.

I'm very excited to knit a sweater with this new information, although I do have a few in progress already.  My question is: do I knit a completely fresh sweater?  Do I rip out one that I never wear and fix it?  I'm not sure which is more compelling.  Using stash is a good thing, but so is using a sweater that is languishing as moth food in the back of my closet.

Discuss.

BTW, I have enjoyed the two Craftsy classes I've taken.  I like the format and support materials around them.  I am not a person who needs a lot of teacher-student interaction, so for me these are almost as good as a class taken at Stitches or the like.  They have some very good teachers providing the classes now as well, and I highly recommend them especially for classes that you will not have access to in real life any time soon.  For example, someday I will take Shirley Paden's class on sweater design.  I don't think she's ever come to Stitches Midwest (my main source of knitting classes) and Craftsy is cheaper anyway.  Win - win.

Neither Fast Nor Easy

I'd put this on Facebook,  but most friends wouldn't understand.

After nearly finishing the body of this sweater I realized that I made a mistake when dividing for the sleeves.  Instead of ripping it out, or leaving it alone, I pulled out the two rows where the mistake happened, and now I'm grafting it back together.  Yes, this is a row of seed stitch I'm putting in.  I'm not sure which would have been faster: this way or just re-knitting.  This is a pain!

Be the Match!

Do you know how easy it is to be a bone marrow doner these days?  I didn't, until a co-worker's son did it, and I learned all about it.  Waning are the days of painful injections into your hip bone.  Now it's more like a mega-blood donation.  No sedation!

Also, it's super easy to get on the registry.  Just go to www.bethematch.org, and give them some information.  If you qualify, they send you a kit and you send them back some cheek DNA.

Here's my kit, ready to send back.

Cheeky!

It was easy too.  Just swab the inside of your mouth, put a bar code label on the stick, and secure it in the foam bit.  Then do the next one.  It was kind of like a little craft project, and you all know how I love craft projects!

Go!  Do it now!  It's really such a small inconvenience to save someone's life.  I hope I get a call.

Admittedly Righteous Indignation

I have something to get off my chest, because I seem to be the only one who's noticed what's going on.

This month, for my book club, we read Amor Towles' "Rules of Civility".  Many many people love this book, including many of the people in my book club.  It was a fine read, and the story line interesting.  (If you feel this way, or plan to read the book, stop reading this blog post now.  Live on in blissful ignorance.)

However, it is is an historical fiction, and host to inaccuracies galore.  Many people couldn't give a crap about whether it's accurate or not, but to me it was glaring and distracting and totally broke the spell that an historical fiction should cast.  So here they are, the things I noticed (which certainly can't be all of them, I put no effort into finding things, they just stood out to me):

1.  Cooking sherry is not drinkable, it is full of salt.  If it was drinkable they wouldn't be able to sell it in grocery stores without an ID, and during prohibition, which it was.
2.  Cheesecake was not a popular (or unpopular, for that matter) dessert in 1938.
3.  Women did not wear pants in public in 1938.  They certainly did not wear jeans in New York city in 1938.
4.  Few people in 1938 had showers, and people did not bathe daily at that time.  Only the rich who had built their houses since the 1920's had showers, and many people did not feel they were appropriate for women.  Showers were associated with athletics, and therefore, men.  It is very unlikely that Katey lived in any building with showers during 1938.

Ok.  Those are the ones I remember right now.  If someone else had pointed these things out anywhere else on the interwebs and I had found them, I would have felt like I was not the only one.  But since I am, I feel I should say something, even if it's here on my quietly ignorable little blog.

It is possible that I am wrong, but if the author is counting on little-known exclusions to general rules, he should include them in the text.  For example, he could have mentioned the day's attitudes toward bathing and how Katey differed and was lucky enough to live in a newly-renovated building with modern conveniences.

Inception of a Specialty

For a person who loves to cook, I don't cook very often.  Occasionally, however, I get inspired and I not only cook, but come up with something new.  My friend Nancy had a party yesterday, and when I woke up, I didn't know what I was going to bring, but I slowly put together an idea as the morning progressed.  One of my favorite flavors is caramel, and strawberries are very in season.  I wanted to make a trifle, and I used Cold Stone Creamery's Strawberry Blonde as inspiration.  So here's what I did:

One of the ingredients in the Strawberry Blonde is graham cracker crust, so I made one.  I used one packet of crackers (4.5 oz.) and one stick of butter, along with 2 tablespoons sugar.  I used my toaster oven pan, because who wants to fire up the oven when it's 100 degrees outside?  The ratios came from Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything.  Next time, I'll use less butter.  It came out a little too crispy, and not so much cracker-y.  It was still yummy, though.

The next step was to cut up the strawberries.  I bought two pounds, and as I washed and hulled them I set aside the ones that seemed most round and the same size.  The little ones, the big ones and the weird double-wide strawberries got cut up into quarters and sixths.

All of the trifle recipes I read included some liquid to pour over the pound cake, so I combined some marsala and sugar, and heated it to dissolve the sugar and cook off the alcohol.  I let it cool a bit and poured it over the strawberry pieces in an effort to draw out some of their juices before assembling the trifle.

 Had I imagined this dessert a bit earlier, I would have made pound cake, but I didn't, so I had to use Sara Lee pound cake.  I cut it into chunks, and made a layer in the bottom of the bowl, cut sides out.  I could have cut the crust off, but with the caramel flavor central to the piece, I figured I'd leave it.

 Next step: I poured the liquid off the strawberry pieces, and poured half of it over the pound cake.  Then I put down a layer of strawberry topping (half a Smuckers jar) over the cake.  Preserves would have worked just as well, but I had a jar of topping already.

Next came the strawberries: halfed berries lined up against the edge of the bowl, then half of the cut strawberries went in the middle.

Then came about a third of a jar of caramel topping, and two cups instant vanilla pudding, topped off with half of the graham cracker crust, crumbled.

First round of layers complete!

Layers repeated, and ready for whipped cream to finish off!

If I had to do over again, I'd do a lot of things differently.  First, as I mentioned before, I would make the graham cracker crust differently.  Secondly, I'd cut the cake in triangles so I could make a more complete layer, and I'd make the layer shorter (the bowl was really filled to the top!)  I would skip the cake-soaking thing.  I know a lot of trifles include it, but this thing just got soupy, and fast.  Next I would not use four cups of vanilla pudding.  Maybe if I made it myself, but otherwise, I'd use part pudding and part whipped cream or something to lighten it up.  It took two cups of liquid to cover up each layer of the strawberries, but it was heavy and rich.  Also, I wouldn't forget to take a picture of the finished dish with the pedestal and whipped cream on top, ready for serving; it did look pretty.

Not bad for a first try (and first trifle for that matter).  I can't wait to try it again, but I need an occasion including 30 - 50 of my closest acquaintances to eat the thing; it is heavy!