Hockey Night in Alberta

Well hockey fans, tonight is the night. What night? you may be asking yourselves. This is it, the first regular season showdown in the Battle of Alberta!! Although our Flames whooped the Oilers pretty good in the pre-season we're now playing for points, so the stakes are definitely higher!

In honour of the occasion my boys (all decked out in their John Deere aprons!) and I got down to business this morning and baked up some of their favorite (well...okay mine too!) chocolate chip cookies! There's still plenty of time to whip up a batch for the game tonight, or for any other occasion, or maybe just because you're like me and love chocolate chip cookies!

Chocolate Chip Cookies

3/4 c butter, softened

1 c brown sugar, packed

1/4 c sugar

1 egg

2 t vanilla

2 c flour

2 t cornstarch
1 t baking soda

1/2 t salt

1 1/2 c chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Cream together butter and sugars until smooth. Add egg and vanilla. Stir in flour, cornstarch, baking soda, and salt. Stir in chocolate chips.

Drop by rounded tablespoon onto greased baking sheet.

Flatten slightly and bake for 8 minutes, until edges are golden.

Cottage Cheese Crescents

This is a recipe from my Nana, whenever I taste them it brings me back to her kitchen helping her make them. She always keeps some on hand in the freezer to share with whoever might stop by. My boys love them, and if I happen to step out of the room while they are cooling I might just come back to find them all gone!

Cottage Cheese Crescents

1 c butter

2 c cottage cheese

dash of salt

2 c flour

4 t milk or cream

1 c icing sugar

Bring butter and cottage cheese to room temperature. Beat with paddle of stand mixer until well combined. Add salt and flour and beat until smooth and elastic. Cover and refrigerate several hours or overnight.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Divide dough into 4 equal parts. Roll each part into a 6" circle (about 1/2"thick). Cut each circle into 8 wedges, and roll up each wedge starting at the rounded edge. Place seam side down on an ungreased baking sheet, curve slightly, and repeat with remaining dough.

Bake 30-40 minutes until nicely browned. Cool on racks.

Combine milk or cream and icing sugar and drizzle over cooled crescents.

Stockings

Wow, I'm really getting into Christmas mode. I found the book Knit Christmas Stockings! by Gwen Steege and as I was flipping through it I decided to make my baby girl a Christmas stocking. I used the recommended Tahki Cotton Classic, and I am so happy with the way it turned out! I haven't blocked it yet, but I was so excited I just had to take some pictures!

My oldest son now "needs" a new stocking, because he just has "an old yucky one from the store." I've currently got a few projects on my needles, and one that I'm still spinning the yarn for. I'm hoping to have them all finished by Christmas.... hopefully I find the time to make a couple of stockings for my boys!

Beer Sweater

My family draws names for Christmas. The deal is that you buy a gift for whoever you draw, but you have to make something for everyone else. This can make for quite an experience Christmas morning. Last year we had styrofoam ball chickens, flowers made with forks that had been welded together, sock monkeys, soap, etc. This year I've been a little more on the ball, possibly due to the fact that I'm not pregnant and having to deal with morning sickness, so I decided to make practical gifts. I've finished the mittens for my sisters, and was thinking about what to make for my brother, finding a gift to buy for an 18 year old guy is hard enough, but trying to figure out something to make him is next to impossible. I was searching Ravelry for ideas and I came across the Beer Sweater. Perfect for my younger brother, won't his friends be impressed that cares so much about his beer that he has a cute little sweater for it?


The best thing about this project is I started and finished it in one afternoon. I used up some leftover yarn in my stash, and I've got another Christmas "present" finished! Thanks for the pattern Melissa!

Road Trip

My family and I recently got back from a road trip to California and New Mexico. We had 5 days of non stop driving, which meant lots of uninterrupted knitting time! First I finished off a pair of mittens for my sister for Christmas.

The pattern is Yellow Harvest from Vogue Knitting's Fall 2008 magazine. I used the recommended Manos del Uruguay yarn, and loved it!! I really enjoyed using the handspun, single ply yarn, and ended up buying more after I had finished these for an upcoming project! I really liked this pattern, (even though I'm not crazy about bobbles) and I found that it knit up quite quickly!

After those mittens I completed mittens for my other sister, also a Christmas gift. The pattern for these is Green Autumn (Druid Mittens) by Jared Flood and can also be found in Vogue Knitting's Fall issue.

For these mittens I used Jamieson's Shetland Spindrift, which was okay, I wasn't crazy about the yarn. I found that it broke quite easily, there were a couple of times that it broke while I was looping the yarn around my needle. The other thing that I found about this yarn was that the first skein I used didn't quite complete the first mitten. I was halfway through the thumb and had to break into the next skein. The second skein finished the first mitten, and the entire second mitten, with a little left over at the end. I'm not sure about the length difference, the tension was the same throughout, and I undid and used my sample guage... Despite my not being crazy about the yarn I love the pattern, and am very happy with the finished product!

2 Christmas gifts down, many left to go!