Heavy Equipment

Remember Tonka trucks? What fun for young children! Especially the yellow construction equipment (forget those plastic toys).

When we took our trip to Florida in February I drove past the US Headquarters of JCB Construction Equipment. It was a pleasant diversion to look at the display of equipment on their grounds. I drive for a few hours with my family sleeping and hoping the good radio station I had going would not give out on me.

That's when I came upon a giant's landscape with giant boy's toy trucks artfully arranged to show off what each piece of equipment could do. I thought it looked like a fun place to get some photos, but I opted instead to keep both hands on the wheel and let my family sleep.

On the drive home I had another opportunity. These photos, taken at speeds somewhere between 65 and 75 mph, do not begin to do justice to the real thing.

The sight broke the monotony of the road and kept me going safely till Rick woke up from his nap.

Two Complete Projects

At last! The Pomatomus Socks are finished and I was able to show them off to my extended family for a few minutes on Sunday. They are a work of art indeed. I'm not sure I did them justice, but I did learn a lot in knitting them up. I still need practice in keeping my stitches even with lace. I had the biggest problem keeping an even tension when beginning or ending a needle with a yarn over. Somewhere after a toddler sweater and a man's sweater I have another pair of socks in my knitting queue. These, like the Pomatomus, were also designed by Cookie A. I found them with the help of Dances With Wool, who led me to this website. I was wowed by the designs! Lover of knee-socks that I am, I had to try one. I bought this Milicent pattern and I'll see how I can handle it, um, er, hopefully before summer's end ??? -- Who knows how long the "Tangy" toddler and "Complicated" man's sweater will take me.

Also over the weekend it came to my attention that Honey needed some pajamas. She has been sleeping in her clothes all this time. I found this pattern by Dawn Adcock on the web. The pattern was very clearly written and easy to follow.
I was not sure I'd have enough bits of yarn to complete the project in a solid color so I made the skirt and collar in gray. Honey, and the Artist were both pleased.

As a follow-up to my tribute to Tribe fan John Adams, I heard on the sports news this morning that Mr. Adams and his drum were being flown to Milwaukee for the Cleveland Indians home-away-from-home games against the Angels. As Indians announcer Tom Hamilton would say, "How About That!"

Maple Taffy

Babette of Babette's Feast posed a question in my comments the other day, "Do you make maple sugar snow ala Laura Ingalls Wilder?"

Let me answer her and tell you all that the Artist has been asking for me to do this nearly every time it has snowed for the past year and one-half or so since she first read about it in Wilder's Little House in the Big Woods.

The descriptions in the book were not enough to direct me, so I found this Wiki page to provide more specifics. Then we were off and running.

The Artist filled my stew pot with fresh clean snow. This was a heavy, wet snow. I hoped that would not matter. The stew pot had to wait outside. I didn't know how long it would take the syrup to boil down. I unsealed the bottle of real maple syrup I was hording in the pantry for some undetermined special occasion. The Artist and the Engineer learned the difference between real maple syrup and the plastic bottle of imitation syrup in our refrigerator.

I located my candy thermometer, the implement in my kitchen that suffers from a most extreme neglect, and attached it to a small sauce pan. Let the heating begin.
I was afraid of the syrup boiling over so I let it heat slowly. It is a good thing the pot of snow was waiting outside. I congratulate myself that I kept the bubbles constant but always within the pan, thankful for the mess that didn't happen.At last the consistency was right and the Artist and I spooned dollops of steaming hot syrup onto the dense snow. They quickly hardened and cooled so that we could pick them up, fold them into bite-size bits, and pop them into our mouths.

Rick and the Engineer were waiting in the next room, peeking into the kitchen. The Engineer, curious about what we were doing on the kitchen floor, resisted eating at first. When I firmly commanded he try a bite, he found "It doesn't hurt me!" and asked for more.

The candy was exquisite because we had made it ourselves. It was something I had been curious about ever since I first read Little House in the Big Woods when I was around the Artist's age.

In another section of the book Wilder describes Ma making the taffy from a combination of maple syrup and molasses. This sounds delightful to me, but the rest of my family is not as enthusiastic for molasses. Is there anything better than molasses on fresh home made waffles?

Aside: We learned the taffy will not keep. We placed some cooled pieces on waxed paper and set them aside for later. After just a few minutes we noticed they had all melted into puddles. I was not going to collect and boil those little puddles again, so we ate the remaining candy immediately. Maybe colder, drier snow would have been better?

SnOwpening Day

That's what they called it. Indians flagship station WTAM host Mark Schwab took some photos.

This is what the grounds crew faced when they arrived at Jacob's Field this morning. Those hard-working folks got the field snow free and looking like this for the pregame festivities. John Adams is out there, as always, under the 'W' in the Budweiser sign. The game started. Then more snow came. This photo shows the crew clearing snow with leaf blowers for the fourth or fifth time today. After several delays, the game continues like this. At one point during a snow delay a fan is arrested after entering the playing field to make a snow angel. That's probably a first. The announcers are hoping to make it through the fifth inning as the Indians are leading at the moment. Lets hope the injuries already sustained by the teams braving the snow today are not serious. Bring out the orange baseballs! It is supposed to snow the whole time the Mariners are in town.

As the hours wore on the game was called (one strike away from being an official game. Hargrove knows what he's doing!) I guess it was Opening Nay, and the Indians 4-0 lead is all for naught.

Beating the Drum

This is the exciting opening day of a new season for the Cleveland Indians. As I write, the grounds crew is scraping ice from the outfield. The Artist is outside trying to catch the big snowflakes in her mouth.But all is well, John Adams and his drum are at Jacob's Field. The new season is up and running, and the hearts of the fans are warm. Click on the link!!! This is a special photo.

I love to hear the interviews on the radio with Mr. John Adams. He has been bringing his drum to Indians games for the last 34 years. He attends about 80 home games a year to cheer on the crowds these days. In the days when there were no crowds he led the drumbeat for the faithful few.

Take and Eat

Tonight we rejoice as the Artist partakes in the Lord's Supper for the first time.

What is the benefit of such eating and drinking?

That is shown us by these words, "Given and shed
for you for the remission of sins"; namely, that in the
Sacrament forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation are
given us through these words. For where there is
forgiveness of sins, there is also life and salvation.


How does the Sacrament impart such forgiveness
of sins?

By His words "Given and shed for you for the remission
of sins" Christ has placed the forgiveness of sins into the
Sacrament, and there He offers, gives, and seals it to all
communicants. These words, therefore, are the chief
thing in the Sacrament.

Questions and answers from Luther's Small Catechism, 1943; Benefits of the Lord's Supper and question 317.

Plodding Along

I used to move along fairly quickly on my knitting projects. Not any more! Perhaps because I have taken the difficulty of my projects up a notch (or two) I am not completing things as quickly as before.

At the moment, I think every project I have planned is labeled as "tangy" or has the "complicated" warning. Another factor is the step up in quality control, inspired by Dances With Wool, that I'm endeavoring to hold myself to. Other contributors include my trying to get to bed earlier this year than last year, and I'm keeping up with my treadmill workouts.

I'm nearly (but not quite) to the point on the Pomatomus socks where I can begin the toe decreases. Then the socks will speed along. So I'm looking ahead to what I will tackle next. I have this Trellis toddler sweater in the on-deck circle. More swatching to determine needle size is needed.

Aside: I've seen a few of these Trellis sweaters on various blogs. My yarn is a creamy white, similar to the color pictured on the link to the Knitty.com site. I'm not sure what kind of buttons to use here, but I'm leaning toward wooden ones. Any suggestions?

After that the line-up contains a toddler Sky and Leaves sweater from Thumb Knitting. This one has directions I don't understand. I can see myself using lots of practice yarn trying to get that one right.

It has been months since I asked Rick to pick a color for, Amhra'n Gra', his next sweater. Long enough, in fact, for me to save the money to buy the yarn, order it, and receive it. How much longer will these plans languish in my knitting queue?

The most distant item I see on my horizon is another pair of knee socks, they are so far in the distance they are still like a dream. But the Millicent knee sock pattern is in a pile of papers on my desk waiting. They are shown in bright pink in the link. I think I'll use a bright burgundy.

The Artist's pink bunny is coming along. The ears are ready to attach and the tail is somewhere in the pale pink ball of yarn waiting for the needles to craft it.