What's for Dinner?

Yes, I'm still here, thanks for the emails/Rav mail! I've been a bit blue since my holiday. I'm missing the sights and sounds of the trip as well as new and old friends met on my journey. Not surprisingly, I was inspired to blog today because of food. Summer (and oh yeah, it's fully-achieved Summer here in Florida) always reminds me of my first, amazing crab salad enjoyed long ago; the savory fish, crisp celery and flavors of tarragon & chives. I knew I had to make it today but wasn't exactly sure what to have with it. As fate would have it, Giada DeLaurentiis cooked these awesome little corn cakes with smoked mozzarella and chives on her show today. The damn things had all sorts of trouble staying in one piece but regardless, they were yummy right from the grill. They look burned in the photo but trust me, they were not! Make them, you won't regret it!

Last week, I organized the stash and dare I say it to you lot, I actually tossed some yarn in the trash. It was mostly cheap, crappy stuff and a bunch of those tiny, sample skeins that I never know what the hell to do with. What's left is some lovely stuff and surprisingly, sock yarn plays a much larger role in my stash than I ever expected. I also have some incredible silk blend roving so if anyone is so inclined to spin it for me, please raise your hand! My dream of being a spinner has long passed but I didn't have the heart to ditch this stuff especially since I bought it on my first trip to Rhinebeck! Click to biggie the photo, it's gorgeous stuff.

I'm knitting a small, lace project and enjoying it...mostly because I had to frog it the other night and actually got the needle back into the stitches. It's patterned on both sides, no all knit or purl row and for me to get the needle back into it was less likely than the recently, expected rapture! I was so proud and then so pissed when I realized I needed to actually frog two additional rows. Nightmare! It's sitting next to me now, taunting me but so far I've been able to resist it's song. ;-)

Otherwise, I've been swimming away and trying not to kill myself from either exposure to the sun or the carcinogenic ingredients in sunscreen that is slathered on my pasty complexion day and night! The pool is already like bath water and I'm, as always, dreaming of snow. And it's only the beginning of June, that rapture thing is definitely a no-go, right?

Let's see, what else is there to catch up on...

I huddled up all the WIPs and laid them out. Two were immediately frogged, what was I thinking even starting them. The remaining 9 projects were placed in order of like/importance. I have promised myself to work through them for the remainder of 2011. As soon as I made this promise to myself, I fell in love with a crochet technique and ran out to buy yarn for a new project. I didn't say I expected success with this plan. As it turns out, I don't crochet well enough for this project so for the time being, the yarn is going back. And we're back on track!

I suppose what all this is leading up to is there should be some finished projects in the near future! What's everyone making these days?