Heavy Heart

Its been a difficult few weeks but this amazing post and a few other things are
keeping my spirits up.

This song makes me sad but happy too. At the end of the day
I just want someone to come home to.



♥

恭禧發財

Happy Chinese New Year!


In honor of the new year I whipped up some Chinese Almond Cookies.
Apparently you are supposed to use lard to get the traditional taste...
I've made these a little healthier by substituting
some whole wheat flour and almond meal.

Chinese Almond Cookies

A brittle but sturdy cookie with strong almond flavor. Many bakeries place an almond in the center, but in Hawaii (the birth place of my mother) they place a small red dot instead. I did a variation of both.

Adapted from here

1 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
3/4 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 cup almond meal
1 cup sugar
1 stick unsalted butter, softened
1 large egg
1 teaspoon almond extract
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
whole almonds, for decorating
red food coloring for decorating

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Line baking sheets with parchment paper (optional).

Wisk together dry ingredients in a small bowl. Beat the butter and sugar in an electric mixer till light and fluffy, about a minute. Add egg and extract, beat till smooth. Mix in dry ingredients until a dough forms.

Roll dough into 1 inch or 15g balls. Flatten with fingers and press almond in center or red food coloring.

Bake for 12-15 minutes rotating pan half way though. Cool on wire rack.

image via here

Oh, Jeff!

Seriously? How do the people at Jeffrey Campbell do it??

Cleata via Solestruck

Side Note

Taking a break from my real work here's some things I've been eying...

...in my usual shades of black and white...

Oh, oops I just bought some over the knee boots...

From top to bottom:
Keepsake Dare You Dress via NastyGal but can be found here
Shakuhachi Alligator Up Down Dress via 80s Purple
Keepsake Next in Line Dress via NastyGal
Jeffery Campbell Fiona Boots via I Don't Like Mondays

The beginning-ish: Yarn

Finally!

I present the first installment of my project
Made in America: From Fiber to Fabric

Yarn
The Beginning-ish

All textiles knitted, woven or felted begin with one thing: yarn.

This first part of my project is to learn about yarn.

Over the course of four days I traveled through New Hampshire, Massachusetts and Vermont to visit and talk with people who know all about yarn.

Let me tell you a little bit more about my project:

While sitting in my Systems Ecology lecture about Globalization my ADD caught up with me. As my mind wandered off to the world of lace, hounds-tooth, cashmere and sleeping on clouds of fluffy skeins of yarn, it dawned on me to consider where exactly all the bags and drawers of yarn my hoarding genes have led me to accumulate over the measly four years I have been knitting come from. How far do my fiberful indulgences travel before I can whip something up on my needles and mail it off to a friend. And at what (the environment?) and who's (child labors in China?) expense am I able to indulge in this warming hobby?

After class I proceeded to race home and read some yarn labels. I discovered this: majority of the yarns in my stash hail from two places, Italy and Peru. (But, as of late I learned that labels only list where the yarn is spun not necessarily where the raw fiber is from).


With the booming movement for local foods and the push to move away from factory farms and mono-cultured agribusiness this got me thinking about domestic sheep farms. Which led to one big question, with the countries ever growing demand for meat, what is happening to all the wool?

Hopefully most people understand that wool is a nautral bi/waste product from sheep. (And I should note that not all sheep meant for eating produce good wool for spinning...) But granted, there are millions of sheep slaughtered in the country each year producing thousands of kilos of wool, yet there are only a handful of mills and American sourced knitting and weaving yarns available.

Why?

A bunch of forms and paperwork later, this project was born. As I continue my research there are many different pieces to this project both from the production of textiles (agriculture, spinning, milling) and social/economical/environmental concerns. I hope to continue this project for the rest of my life working with producers and consumers alike to bring economic and environmental sustainable practices to an industry with so much potential.

Procrastination

(Pictures coming soon... I swear...)

But before then, check this out:

Mason Jar --> Travel Mug

Genius.

I ♥.

Now all you need is a cute hand knitted sleeve.

images via psfk

.........well.......

Well, aparently I am a terribly blogger.

Though I'm not sure how many people there are out there

who really read this to disappoint...

Needless to say my trip was absolutely phenomenal!

I met some of the most amazing, hardworking and dedicated people.

Each place I visited continued to awe and enrich me.

I have about a zillion and a half pictures to share.

Not to mention so many cool things I learned about wool, yarn and mills.

More to come! Very soon I promise!

(really, I swear I will post pictures.... Right after I make this whole lemon tart...)

Weaving

~ 14 feet of purple heaven
12 hours
5400 yards of Harrisville Shetland
Purple Haze & Blackberry

8 thread herringbone, 15 e.p.i.
woven on a Harrisville Designs 36" four harness loom

Garment in progress.

New Years Resolutions....

I usually don't make New Year's Resolutions,
however there is so much exciting stuff happening in my life
it would be a shame for me not to try to update this darn thing more.

So here's to starting the new year off
with a good breakfast
and a post.

More to come.