Wassail Anyone?

Wow  it  has  been  forever  since  I have  Blogged !   But  I  maybe   doing  more of  it  since  I have    had  to  downgrade  my  podcast  account   and   apparently  I  talk  too  much  LOL!   But  don't  worry  I  will  return   next  year  with    the  podcast!   But  until then  I  thought  I  would   bring  you  some   great  Yule  recipes and  a  little  history.    Wassail  anyone.......

Wassail's   was   originally  an  apple  orchard   fertility   ritual    the    name   wassail   came  from  a  the  Anglo -Saxons  which  translates  to   hail  or  salute . The   ritual    was  a matter of   saluting the   trees  and  what   would  happen  is  that  they  would  be   sprinkled  with  a mixture of    eggs  and   apples  to  which  wine  or  ale  would  be  added. By  consecrating  them   this   way  it  was  believed     to   increase  the    apples  that   grew  the  next   harvest.

       
                                              Crock pot  Wassail                                
                                                (drinkable)
                                makes  10  servings 

                       8 cups  apple  cider  or  juice
                     2  cups  cranberry   juice
                    1/4  cup   sugar 
                   1 teaspoon  all spice
                   3  sticks   cinnamon
                   1  orange 
                   25-30  whole cloves 

Turn  the  crock pot  to  high   and  mix  the  apple  cider  and  cranberry  juice  together    stir  in  the   sugar  and   all  spice  then  add  the    cinnamon sticks   stud  the   orange  with   the  cloves    toss  that  in    cover  the  pot  and   cook  for  1  hour .Change  the  setting  to  low  and  let    it   simmer  for   3  more  hours  then    enjoy!

    This   can  easily  be  turned  in  the   ritual  wassail  of  old    just  let  it   cool     blend  in  some  egg    and  wine   and     go  outside  and   start  your   ritual 


  Wassail  not   your  thing   well  how  about  some  nice     Hot  Buttered   Rum?





                                                   Hot  Buttered Rum
                                                 makes   6  Servings 
                                         1  quart  apple  juice 
                                       1/4  cup  (1/2 stick )  of  butter 
                                       1/4 cup   extra  dark   corn  syrup 
                                                      Nutmeg
                                      1  ounce  dark  Rum  (optional)
                                        Cinnamon  sticks

                                            pour  juice   into  a  pot   ass  butter  and   syrup   stirring  constantly    while  until  the   butter  melts   and   the  mixture  is   steaming   hot      DO  NOT  let  this  come  to  a  boil!    Pour   into large  mugs  sprinkle  with  nutmeg    add  Rum  if  desired     serve  with   cinnamon  sticks 

Curl up   by  the  tree or  a  fireplace  with  some  knitting  and    enjoy!

Happy Holidays !

I am Ready!

So I was out today not only to pick up my mother's birthday cake but to get paint as well as rubber mallet (suggested by the ashford spinners group) for my spinning wheel which arrives in 3 days! but then I got to thinking (cause this is me ya know) what if I needed a screwdriver? then I looked down and saw a pack of allen wrenches well what if I need those? and so.My tiny shopping list turned into this ........ I am ready!



I also added to my stash last week as you can I have stepped out of my zone and gotten reds and pinks. The skein on the bottom left is monkeypal in peppermint ice cream which is 420 yards and a merino nylon blend, The top skein is Spud and Chloe in red hot and its 248 yards of wool and silk, and I last but certainly not least the bottom right is ..............Bugga in tomato frog 450 yards. I have to say that I really didn't understand the hype about Bugga but omg its like butter.


And finally this book has been released and I have gotten it! The Book is called KnitWit 20 fun projects for beginners and seasoned knitters
While I love all the patterns in this book and want to make them all, these three stand out as my favorite

Really I have no clue how that got there...honest ...........it is October after all l ;)

The Big Announcement

As many of you know I have made the decision to leave Labyrinth house publishing to pursue the rest of my career with with a new publishing company. Since I feel that I have not been given the same treatment as the other writers the company employs. I have heard many rumor as to why the company has not promoted my book as it has others but until the full truth is known that is what they will be rumors.

In the meantime I have decided to move on My new blog will be found here AlexandraRose.ning.com as well as updates on Welcome to Silver Rose and all my future books. It will also be home to my video cast out this month!




On a Happier note I did finish spinning the sea wool
Which came to total of 392 yards! I think that is the most I have ever spun. I just may get those handspun socks I've been wanting!




And there it is the first sock from the frogged bakersfield yarn that everyone thought would make a great sock. And of course you were all right this yarn was destined to be socks and has knitted up lovely I am still knitting on the second sock (which I started yesterday). I think this pattern is wonderful and will also be great for my handspun.

Just Catching Up!

A few months ago my laptop which was 5 years old died taking my entire life with it (sad isn't it?) so when I bought a new this is what I got a Dell mini isn't it cute!


And small! I use my little Wedge bag to measure it

My next to the last Loopy Sock kit came in and I love love love this one ! The yarn is yummy and the patterns are now in my must knit pile and I love the lotion bar!
Lastly down the street from me there is this house and since they took the porch off its been bugging me . Yes there are a lot of houses like these where I live and when I say a lot I mean one on every,but there is just something about this one that I love. I think its because its has that haunted look to it and I don't mean the ghost kind I mean it looks like it has history of some sort, anyway the day I took this picture they were cutting down the overgrown dead tree in front of it.


And when I saw that my first thought was because they were going to tear it down so I asked if one of the guys were the owner one of them was and I asked to take the picture he asked why and I told him " because I just love the house for some reason" I think he thought I was nuts but he let me take one then told me to come back in 6 months because they were remolding the entire building (I guess he didn't think I was too crazy after all!) I seriously can't wait to see what they do to it and maybe get a peek inside !



Just a reminder that Saturday is the Big Day I'll be at Borders in Monroeville Pa From 2-4pm if your in the area stop by and say hi!

Book Signing !

Its here! In cause you haven't heard or picked up your copy yet. My first Book Welcome to Silver Rose is available where ever books are sold.





Saturday September 18th I'll be at the Borders bookstore in Monroeville Pennsylvania for my very first book signing!

I'll be there from 2-4 pm
hanging out and signing books


I hope to see you all there !

Sock obsessed !

So I have finally done it! I have made a wearable pair of socks! and maybe it took me seven months to do it since it was my purse knitting , but there they are!

And they fit!
Of course I did have a set back (or several) and the major one happened with the second sock,I was almost done when I decided I didn't like the heel and ended up frogging it . That did not end well for me as you can see.


I thought I was going to run out of yarn. But as you can see by the above pictures I didn't. and below is what I have left.



Those being done (finally!) I caught the cast on bug and not just any cast on bug I have the need to cast on more socks!
Those will be plain vanilla socks



And I blogged about this yarn not too long ago and thanks to everyone who commented these will become anklet socks! (and my new purse knitting )



Since I have thought of nothing but socks for the past 2 weeks I started flipping threw my sock books and landed on this . These are from Wendyknits toe -up socks for everybody aren't they pretty? The first thing I thought of after saying " I have to knit those" of course was I don't have any yarn! (which is untrue of course), the second thing that came to mind was I don't do cables and yet these make me want to learn. I think I'm becoming sock obsessed.

Tarot card review

Okay so awhile back I got the Madame Endora's fortune cards. I wanted to work with them a little before jumping right in and writing about them . So upon opening the box which holds 48 cards you will see a mix of fairies, Celtic, and Egyptian style cards which for me it has a little of everything I like!


Normally I never do any of the spreads in that are in the book, I go by the 3 card spread (I know I'm lazy!) but there is one called the seekers fan (shown below) which I found interesting and so I use that for this deck.


Once turned over to read the spread looks like this

What I love most about the cards is that they can be read one of two ways from the book which gives more detail about the card's meaning or you can just read the bottom of the card for a quick reading which would give you good cause to meditate on. This deck is in my top 5 favorites and I would recommend to anyone .




Okay so remember the Bakersfield shawl? well since it didn't turn out they way I had hoped and after blocking it twice the yarn still curled up so I figured I had two choices I could

A) throw it out

or

B) try to unravel it and save the yarn to make something else

As you can see the yarn wound back up with out any trouble. Now to figure out what I am going to do with it ! Anyone have any ideas?