Year of Projects: Week 11

    I'm actually updating on a Sunday for once!  I don't have too much to update, so it'll be short and sweet.  I had mentioned that I washed and blocked the Drops of Spring Mitts.  I got them off the blockers and took a couple decent pictures outside in good light.  So here they are all finished.

I used the smallest size of the three blockers.  The middle size stretched the fabric too much.  Blocking really evened these out and even though I didn't toss these in the dryer to spring the super-wash Mal Rios back into shape it sproinged back all on its own.

                      

I need to weigh these yet so I can figure out approximate yardage used, but my guess is its not really much of either of the three colors.  I hope to do at least one more pair of these.  I have so many little mini left-over skeins, its a great pattern to get those used up.

    I made homemade pizza on Wednesday.  I use this recipe in my bread machine for the dough.  It calls for a teaspoon of a spice blend.  I use old bay for ours.  I've seen that King Arthur Flour also makes some pizza seasoning blends and I plan on getting those to try out too.  The recipe blog mentions they use King Arthur Flour for bread recipes.  I second this sentiment.  I've used King Arthur exclusively for a number of years now at the recommendation of a former co-worker/ baker who swore by it.  It really makes baked goods and bread that much better.  I picked up Wellsley Farms pizza sauce the last time I was at BJs.  I usually use Ragu, Prego or even Great Value.  The Wellsley Farms is liquidier and has a chunkier texture than the other sauces I've used.  But, I was pleasantly surprised at the flavor.  It was almost smoky and had a nice tangy bite.  My husband, who is the pickiest eater in our house, also liked it.  I had also picked up some Belgioioso Fresh mozzarella to try.  It ran off the pizza, but was really tasty and my husband liked that as well.  

The one of the left is the fresh mozzarella, on the right is regular shredded part skim, low moisture mozzarella.  There's also Canadian bacon under the cheese on both.  We like to have the toppings under the cheese on homemade pizzas.  If they're on top of the cheese they tend to burn and when I put too much cheese on, which is always, the toppings tend to slide off.  I put my dough on parchment paper so it will slide off the pizza peel onto the stone.  The parchment paper burns because of the heat, but I haven't ever had it light on fire.  The parchment paper also protects the stone from getting all nasty.  They can absorb oil and other substances from the food and start to smell gross, from what I read before getting one.  Using parchment was one of the suggestions for keeping it in good working order.

I just have three more shifts left in this contract, then I'll be back in Syracuse, for the foreseeable anyway.  I'm looking forward to being on evening shift again, which is my favorite shift to work.  I got my swap assignment for the Halloween swap and I've formulated a game plan for the handmade item.  I need to order some yarn, because of course, nothing in my extensive stash is quite right for what I've chosen to knit.  Ah, the life of a crafter, eh.  

Until later.  Happy crafting!

-Q