I Dream Of Sushi

The first time I ate sushi was 15 years ago when my husband took me to the now-defunct Hotel Nikko Christmas party in Chicago. My husband worked there as a waiter before he started law school. This was one of the best company Christmas parties I’ve attended. The hotel turned over its immense ball room to its employees—giving us lots of room to do the electric slide. Tables groaned with appetizers, including what looked like a mountain of sushi. I nervously popped a Sake roll in my mouth … and fell in love.
After all these years, it never occurred to me to make sushi myself. The sheets of seaweed, or nori, look so brittle, I thought they would crumble when I attempted rolling rice and fish into them. But my cravings finally got the best of me, so I gave sushi-making a go last weekend. I cooked and seasoned the sushi rice and spread it out evenly on the nori. The delicate smell of the seaweed dampened by the rice made my mouth water. I added some crab meat, cucumber and avocado to the middle of the sheet, held my breath, and began to roll it into a cylinder with the help of the bamboo mat. It turns out nori is sturdier than it looks because when I removed the mat, I was pleased to see it had stuck together to make a plump California roll.
And now, Jenny, the winner of my sushi set giveaway, can have her own sushi-making adventures! Please email me your address so I can send the set to you.

Snow Day Activities

Here’s a fun web site for young and old alike to visit on a bad weather day. Jigzone.com has hundreds of free jigsaw puzzles you complete online. Each puzzle can be customized to have just six pieces or up to 247 pieces. My sons couldn’t get enough of this web site last Sunday when it was too cold and snowy for them to be outside for very long. And the best part was I didn’t have to nag them to pick up the puzzle pieces after they finished.

Receiving--And Giving--My Favorite Things

Last Saturday I received an unexpected treat. A scarf, hand knit in mohair by the lovely Hokgardner, arrived in the mail. I won the scarf in a giveaway she did a month ago. It snowed eight inches in Denver this weekend, so I got to try it out right away. The scarf is my new favorite thing—it felt like a layer of down as I trudged through snow to get Ethan to school this morning.
Now I’ve got a giveaway for you, consisting of another of my favorite things—sushi. I constantly crave sushi, probably because my kids would never step foot in a sushi restaurant. Plus, I’m hesitant to buy sushi at grocery store since these packages do not list whether the Sake is made from wild Alaskan salmon (good) or farmed salmon (bad).
I’m starting to think maybe I should satisfy my sushi cravings by making it myself—that way I can feel good that the fish I’m eating, such as wild Alaskan salmon or Albacore tuna found off U.S. Canadian shores, isn’t overfished or high in mercury or PCBs.

If you, too, are so inclined, enter my giveaway for a sushi deluxe set, courtesy of CSN Stores. From counter stools to luggage, this online retailer of home and office goods has more than 200 different online stores to meet your shopping needs.
The sushi set consists of:

• one bamboo sushi rolling mat;
• one bamboo sushi rice paddle;
• one three-step sushi maker;
• two dipping sauce dishes;
• and two chopstick rests.

To enter, leave a comment on this post stating your favorite sushi restaurant—mine is Kotobuki in Chicago—by Saturday, November 21, midnight mountain standard time. The contest is open to U.S. residents only. I will announce the winner on my blog Monday, November 23. Good luck!

The Name Says It All

Maybe it was the fact that my husband and I are hosting Thanksgiving dinner and need more seating—or maybe we just needed some retail therapy—but a couple of weeks ago we bought a new couch for our family room. We got a big, comfy leather sectional that has a recliner on each end—my husband’s primary requirement.
This couch replaces a 20-year-old one my husband bought in college. It’s a couch so worn out I’m too embarrassed to show you a photo of it.
I didn’t realize my husband and I were the only family members excited about the new couch until after the movers delivered it. “Come try out the new couch!” I said to James.
“No,” he said. Instead he went into the garage, where we were keeping the old couch until the person whom responded to our Freecycle ad for it could pick it up. “Aren’t we going to keep Couchy?” he asked, resting his head against the back of the old couch.
Couchy? Who is Couchy? Oh, you mean that decrepid thing? “No, someone else is going to take it,” I said. “Now come in the house and try out our new couch!”
“I don’t want to sit on Mr. Couch,” James replied, sulking.
Until that point, I didn’t realize that James was losing a friend. Couchy didn’t mind if he and Ethan jumped up and down on its cushions. It also didn’t care if they got Goldfish crumbs all over it, or spilled juice on it. They could take Couchy’s cushions off and build forts with them any time.
Mr. Couch, on the other hand, won’t put up with any of that nonsense.

A Worthwhile Freebie

I usually cringe when we get “free” toys with fast-food kid meals, but this one won me over. Meet “Pirate Tot,” a swarmy looking stuffed tater tot that James got with his Sonic Wacky Pack kid’s meal. For some reason, James renamed him French Fry. The other morning, James woke up looking for French Fry, so he could carry him around along with his usual stuffed-animal posse of Eppa, Panda and Blankie. It looks like French Fry is a keeper.

Slipping Past The Issue

I promise to teach Ethan how to tie his shoes ... as soon as he grows out these slip-on ones.

Taking A Knitting Gamble

Sometimes, fixing a knitting mistake can take more time and money than it’s worth. That’s what I found out when I turned a hat into purse.
A few weeks ago, Ethan asked me to knit him a hat. Since I have currently started more knitting projects than I have finished, I wanted a quick knit. I chose a pattern I saw on A Friend To Knit With’s blog —a chunky knit beanie, because it looked like it could be knit in an afternoon.
I was right. I knit the hat on Sunday and Ethan wore it to school the next day. I felt like a fiber arts genius.
Until my husband told me he took the hat off of Ethan’s head when he got in line at school because he looked weird in it.

“That hat is for girl,” he said. “It’s too short to be a boy’s hat.”
“What do you mean—it’s a basic, unisex hat,” showing him the picture on the pattern.
“Then why is a girl wearing it?” he asked.
I realized then it was futile to argue with my husband about appropriate attire for his sons. Now what was I going to do with this hat, plus the three hanks of blue Classic Elite Aspen that I was going to knit into hats for James and my husband?
I logged onto ravelry.com, and amazing web site for knitters and crocheters to share their projects. I searched for projects that used Aspen yarn, which is like knitting with dreadlocks. Maybe that’s why I couldn’t find many projects for this yarn. I really didn’t want to make a giant scarf with it. My best bet was this free pattern for a purse.
I didn’t love the purse’s wooden handles, but I did like the cable pattern. Plus, it is 17 inches wide, which is good because big purses seem to be everywhere.

Before I could start, I had to order more supplies—a circular needle, fabric to line the inside the purse and the handles—for a total of $41.37. The purse knitted up quickly, and I got excited about using it.
But the excitement changed to anxiety as I ran out of yarn before I got to the last row. The last thing I wanted to do was order another hank of yarn for $12, including shipping. I also didn’t want to abandon the purse—those handles would forever haunt me if I didn’t do something with them.
I couldn’t bear spending another dime on this project, so I took the cheap way out. I unraveled a hat I made for myself with a gray hank of Classic Elite Aspen and used it to knit the last few rows. My knitter’s fantasy of impressing folks with this purse blew up in my face. No one is going to believe I got it from a boutique with that gray yarn peeking out from the bottom.

My husband would love for me to quit taking these knitting gambles, but I’m just too addicted.