Pretzel rolls

On August 1, 2021July 29, 2021 By CarynIn Bread

Next experiment: trying a pretzel roll recipe using Heritage Wheat Bread Flour Mix from Sunrise Mills. My husband found a recipe here. I knotted the buns by rolling a section into a rope, then doing a simple overhand knot and tucking in the ends. I was apprehensive about boiling the rolls, but it worked just fine! I used a slotted spatula to lift the rolls from the boiling water, rather than tongs. I baked them longer in the oven, to get a deeper color, and I think I would even add a few more minutes because the rolls were still very soft. Yummy though. Oh so yummy.

Fungi sends love

On July 31, 2021July 27, 2021 By CarynIn Fungi

Wild mushroom in the backwoods with a message of love

Aw. A little mushroom love. I found this mushroom with its brilliant white heart as I tromped through the back woods.

Shh, I’m hiding

On July 30, 2021July 27, 2021 By CarynIn Garden, Wildlife

I was looking around my melon vines for more potential melons, and spotted a little green tree frog snuggled into a leaf. He is a very welcome garden inhabitant! Go get those bugs, buddy.

Diamond Willow Needle

On July 29, 2021July 24, 2021 By CarynIn Craft

I was combing my tool stash for a nål (needle) to make smaller nålbinding stitches and found an old hand-carved diamond willow needle. My great-grandfather carved all sorts of things from diamond willow, so our guess is that this is one of his works! It had been sitting in my knitting box for quite a while, so I sanded it up a little with 400 grit sandpaper to smooth the unfinished surface. Although I’ve been partial to semi-flat oblong nåls to this point, I found making stitches with the round needle worked well. I’m learning a new stitch called Dalarna, which was used to make milk strainers in Sweden (https://www.en.neulakintaat.fi/75). I like the way that the stitch makes a fabric that appears woven on one side. I’m practicing with commercial wool sock yarn, not my own spun yarn, until I get the pattern firmly in my fingers’ muscle memory.

Return of the frogs

On July 28, 2021July 24, 2021 By CarynIn Uncategorized

When we first moved here, there was an army of baby frogs in the summer; tiny jumpers here, there, and everywhere. In the intervening years, we have seen less and less little ones, but a fairly consistent number of adults. When the snake ate the Gulf Coast Toad from the backyard, we stopped seeing any toads by the back door (so apparently it was just one toad that hung out on the doorstep asking about tea). Now, we are seeing younglings again! Not an invading hoard, but toadlets here and tree froglets there. I picked up a water dish to dump the June bugs and realized not all the critters were insects. A little green tree frog regarded its situation for a moment before hopping off. Maybe we will also get another threshold toad (although I have not missed shooing a toad from the door).