Finished

OMG. It's done and it's gorgeous. See below.

All hand crafted by my father in law who is a genius with wood. Still kinda reeling at how crazy wonderful it is.

This weekend I went down to see Jili and hang out with her because it's been too long. We had a really great girls (ladies? women? all girls to me) brunch and time passed too quickly, that's how fun it was. I was actually shocked when I saw it was past two. There was such lively debate and sharing of ideas, we need to do this more often.

And later? Jilian and I went on the yarn crawl. Yes I know, this is too obvious, we always go yarn shopping. I'd never been to Dublin Bay so Jilian and I went. I looked around a little bit and stated "I don't see anything I like yet." Jilian looked at me like I was crazy and told me "Look harder". And dudes, I found it. I've been wanting to make this:

Pictures are from the Twist collective website.

But I fell in love with the color and texture of the yarn used in the sample for the pattern. This only became an issue when I tried to find the yarn, and holy crap, it was no where. The yarn is Lorna's Laces shepherd worsted in the color echo. It was originally made in the green line but that has since gone defunct, but even finding it in the regular worsted is hard enough. But they had it. And the kicker? They had exactly enough to make it +1 skein. Bought them all. And because of the yarn crawl it was 10% off. Not only did I not have to buy different dye lots when a few possibly became available online but I also didn't have to pay tax (why I love Portland) shipping or handling. I was so happy I wanted to sit down in the store and start on it even before it was wound into balls.

The moral of the story? When Jilian tells you you aren't looking hard enough? Dude, she's right. Look harder. :)

Someone needs to calm me down.

Probably one of my best traits is how I get amazingly excited over the smallest of things. Remember that post about cheese? Also I can't ever buy one of anything (small, price wise), I've tried. It's at least two if not three. I honestly can't stop myself. Like how Safeway has started carrying Harry and David candles. You know, the big ones that normally cost $25 for, wait for it, $12. I got three. Honestly can't help it. They smell amazing and did I mention they're $12? I'm also on a candle kick lately so that's my justification.

P.S. I'm thinking about going back and getting more. I haven't bought the peach one yet.

I am however very proud of myself because I stopped at the stationary store tonight and I only bought one package. My insides were freaking out over all the amazing cuteness and really funny ones. But I was good, I restrained myself. I did it by reminding myself that I want it only to have it, and that's really not a great way to justify something. Sometimes I think I need a parent around.

And vitamin C drops. Really? (I mean come on now Sarah.) I still can't find the watermelon ones. I desperately want them and I am completely deluded into thinking that they taste the same as the jolly ranchers watermelon.

Look!

This is what my father in law is making for me. Isn't it awesome! I'm so excited!! He's really talented with woodworking and he is making it off pictures I took. I'm the only one who gets one. :)

Did I mention I was excited?

Sorry the video is so crappy.

Cheese

Because I found some cheese this morning that made me very, very happy.

I am very picky about my cheese but definitely no connoisseur of it, in fact I think I am quite the opposite. I really only like mild cheeses. I know that whenever someone offers me a piece of cheese that has a really funky name it's probably going to taste the same. I don't like eating mold, I mean I guess I wouldn't mind if it was disguised as something else. But really look at that sentence, can you disguise mold to taste like anything else? I don't think so. I feel like I'm eating someone's basement and that's gross.

So I only like mild cheeses that have barely aged. This is kind of weird as that I don't like milk but I'm way more than willing to eat milk that has barely set up as a solidified object. Probably one of the hardest cheeses to find that I like is Manouri cheese but I can from time to time. A grilled Manouri, beet and marinated artichoke sandwich is pretty much to die for.

But one cheese that I never thought would be hard to find is Muenster cheese, but maybe because it was just so integral to my childhood. I remember grating it and putting it on top of Lavosh and melting the cheese until it was all bubbly. It's probably one of my favorite nostalgia foods.

So a few weeks ago I thought, I know I'll go to the store, get some Lavosh and Muenster cheese and have that for dinner. I was super excited. So you can imagine my disappointment when the closest I could find was Port Salut cheese which was way too soft and a little off in taste so it ended up making me more disappointed than if I hadn't found anything similar at all. I acutally bought two hunks of Port Salut in my excitement because I had convinced myself it was exactly the same with just a different name.

Please look at the pictures below. Port Salut is blobby, white and orange and Muenster is hard and can stand up in it's own. These are important differences people.

So this morning I had a desperate need to stop at the store for food for lunch this week (sorry for the many tangents). I was picking out some hummus and out of the corner of my eye I saw it, creamy yellow in the center and the crisscrossed orange on the outside. I kinda freaked out inside, and bought three.