A nice evening with good friends

So last night a bunch of us went to Tequila Bookworm for a nice dinner and a good time. Accordion Guy was entertaining Richard “Just a Gwai Lo” Eriksson, who was visiting from Vancouver. Liz and Rannie and Paul and Eldon were there too. We were really entertained with stories of the place where one of us (I’m not saying who) works. There were lots of laughs when Liz and I misunderstood what each other was talking about and for a minute there she thought I had “done it” with a certain girl-friend of mine. It was pretty funny and for the record, no, it’s not likely to happen. We laughed a lot anyway.

Before that I stopped at the Knit Cafe to check it out. It was their Stitch ‘n Bitch night and I met some nice women, but I left early since I was going to dinner. The Knit Cafe is quite a small store but has enough tables to fit a good amount of people. It also serves coffee, tea, some cakes, juice and organic soda. It was a nice experience and I might go again soon to knit there.

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It’s a long way to Village Yarns

I went to Village Yarns this afternoon. It is really far away, a ten minute walk from Islington Station. Not really worth the trip for a downtown gal like me, but I wanted to go anyway to check out the store.
I was glad to see that they carry several lines of Filatura di Crosa, those yarns are beautiful. They also have a lot of Colinette, but they didn’t want the Giotto in the colour that I wanted. Their book selection is really good but laid out in a bit of an unfriendly way, more like a library. They have a couple of medium-sized tables for their classes.
It was a little weird to have to ring the bell to get into the store, I have heard or read about it somewhere so I wasn’t surprised, but I didn’t like it that much. Even to get out someone had to unlock the door for me. Not very welcoming.
I didn’t like that the prices for the yarn are on totally unseeable places, I couldn’t find the price for most of the yarns that I was looking at and had to actually ask twice. That’s not very good. They said they were expecting “price cards” to get soon because they had moved all their yarn around, but can’t they just print them? it’s not as if they’re anything special. The Naked Sheep and Lettuce Knit are more beautiful places to go and get inspired.
In general the women were friendly and asked me right away if I needed help, I said I was just browsing. It was a bit disappointing to go all the way there and not find anything “special”, though I liked that they have a couple of “kits” prepared with patterns and yarns for some projects. They also have some patterns written down for certain items they are showing on the display.
I signed up for the newsletter in case they have a sale and I also got a chance to say that I don’t like the layout of their website that much, especially how if you click on anything it will show up in the frame.
I ended up just getting a pair of 9mm Brittanys. I can’t for the love of god find a pair or 9 mm bamboo needles, I’ve been to 4 places in town already. So I just got the birch needles.
I might not go back all the way to Village Yarns unless there is a sale or if I am looking for something specific and I have called before and I am sure they have it and they don’t have it in any of the places downtown (or more central) like The Naked Sheep, Romni or Lettuce Knit, of course (check out the website for Lettuce Knit and you’ll see that Megan wrote my name and everyone else’s because of the baby blanket we knitted for her).

Tomorrow I may drop by at The Knit Cafe on Queen and Ossington before going out with some friends at 7.

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Easter weekend

It was really nice that I felt like I was having a long weekend, and not a weekend that is long. What’s the difference?, my dear readers might ask. On a long weekend you get to hang out with friends, have a good time while on a weekend that is just long it can get tedious and you may have not many things to do.
On Thursday Glenn invited me over for martinis and we watched some Duran Duran videos (they are coming to town, I might go to the ACC and see them after all these years! I just realized it’s at the same time as my book club meeting so I guess I’ll save the 60 bucks) and ate steak and a delicious pasta that he cooked.
Friday I cooked Mexican style eggs (recipe a pictures to be posted soon) and Mark came over for brunch. Later I did some laundry and cleaned up the apartment and had time for knitting and just relaxing. I made a mushroom garlic chicken and took pictures that I will post on Garlicster soon.
Saturday I volunteered at the hospital and then I went shopping. I bought Hollywood Knits because it has a great pattern for a sleeveless turtleneck using GGH (Muench) Trikolore yarn. I decided I am going to rip what I had made of “my own design” and just use a pattern for that yarn. I might just get the Colinette Shimmer 5 later and make the top that I was planning to adapt from the pattern book that I have. Banana Republic was on sale and I got some stuff. Later I came home and ran to the gym where Mark was waiting, we had a nice workout. After cooking a macarroni and cheese for dinner (real macarroni and cheese, not your usual Kraft Dinner) I was invited to watch Roger Dodger at Mark’s. It’s a good and entertaining movie, I recommend that people watch it. Then we played some pool and it was just a nice time that we had.
This morning I went for brunch with my new friend from Chateau Mont Choisi. First we wanted to make it to Cora’s Breakfast and Lunch, but there was SUCH A LINE UP that I really didn’t want to wait. So we walked up to Milestones and had BELLINIS, yay! We then just hung out at Chapters and went to Caban and HMV.
It has just been a fun and relaxing weekend spent with friends and having a good time.

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How to eat a mango

The first step is to go to Kensington Market, to the produce store on the corner of Nassau and Augusta and get nice mangoes.

This is the special mango fork. I brought it from Mexico because I couldn’t find it anywhere. I even went to the St. Lawrence Market to this place that has every fork you can think of… every fork except a mango fork.

Stick the longer part of the fork into the core of the mango.

Slice the two “meaty” parts of the mango and scoop them with a spoon to eat them. The core part of the mango shall be eaten like a “mango on a stick” (after removing the skin, of course).

The Naked Sheep

I was not feeling well yesterday and took a sick day from work. I started feeling better at about 3:00 but I thought it was too late to make it to work. So last night I went to the Stitch and Bitch session at The Naked Sheep. I had a really good time and enjoyed meeting new people that like knitting. I met Brenda and Tanya and Donna and Noelle and Lisa and Sandra and some other women and shared a few laughs. I may drop by some other time soon, but maybe after the Queen Streetcar is running again, it is stopping on Kingston Road and then you have to take a bus because they’re working on the rails on Queen St. just before The Beaches. Actually it was fine on my way back because I took the bus and the streetcar was waiting for us, as soon as we got off the bus the streetcar picked us up and we continued on Queen St. But on my way there I had to wait for hours for the bus to come after the streetcar dropped us on Kingston and Queen.

My projects are going very well, I started a baby hat from a kit that I bought from Needles & Pins in London Ontario, it is the Baby Beret from Debby Ware. My colleague from my new job is expecting a baby in May and I wanted to give her a little present (OK, mainly what I wanted is to knit something for a baby, isn’t it cute?). I also started a sleeveless top with Rowan Cotton Tape and I have done some good advance on it. Lastly, I started another sleeveless top (again, I’m the queen of the sleeveless top!) to be knitted with the GGH Trikolore that I got on sale from Lettuce Knit, I designed the pattern, adapted from a pattern for Colinette Point 5 (I had to adapt it because it has a totally different gauge and different needle size so I made up my own pattern). Pictures to come soon.

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Found on Queen St. and Jarvis.

Click on image if you want to see it more clearly. (OK, I was going to say “click on image to enlarge” but didn’t want to risk being asked something like “enlarge what?” or “I clicked on the image and my thingy didn’t enlarge”, or something like that.)

Huevos rancheros

Here are the ingredients. Note that even if the refried beans and the salsa are from a can, they are a Mexican brand. You can get them at Dominion or Loblaws, so no need to go to Perola’s or to any other specialty store.

The first step is to heat the oil really hot, and fry the tortillas one by one. Be careful not to make them hard and crunchy, they only have to be fried enough to support the “filling” they are going to have.

Then fry both eggs sunny-side-up.

Finally, put the eggs on top of the tortillas, pour the heated salsa on top and serve with a side of refried beans.

Voila, exquisite (and authentic) huevos rancheros.

Knitting materials

So we went to The Naked Sheep on Queen St. East yesterday. The store is really nice, the yarns are beautiful and I got a couple of things, including Rowan Cotton Tape for a sleevless top. So yes, I am the sleevless top queen, I love them, and they take less to make than sweaters with sleeves. I am glad to report that we were very well treated at The Naked Sheep and I’m definitely going back. I may drop by for a Stitch ‘n Bitch session soon.
After a quick bite at Gabby’s we took the Queen Streetcar to Romni Wools. I was a bit reluctant to go because of previous so so experiences for me and bad experiences for some of my friends. Then again it’s one of the biggest yarn stores in Canada and definitely the biggest in town so it’s always good to visit. I am pleased to inform that Norma was there and she was really helpful with some questions that I had about Colinette yarns and yarn substitution. I really had a good experience yesterday and I am glad that I left feeling like I want to go back someday. I think it’s better to visit the store about 40 minutes before closing time, because it appears to not be as busy as it’s been the other times I’ve visited the store.
So now I have yarn and needles and materials for about 4 or 5 projects, and today I signed up for a knitting lace class at Lettuce Knit in April, I’m excited about making a lacy scarf, we’ll see how it turns out.

Hello?

I took pictures of huevos rancheros so I could post the instructions on how to make them.
I went shopping with Kelly and took pictures of all the yarn and the knitting books I got.

Last night I tried to upload the pictures and “bloggerbot” from Hello by Picasa was not responding. I thought it was busy and I waited until this morning.

Again it’s not working, I cannot seem to upload my pictures, my post will have to wait.

Is anyone else having the same problem?

St.Patrick’s Day Celebration

It all started when I went to the Toronto Free Gallery on 660 Queen St. East to see Rannie‘s and Jon‘s exhibit. It was a lot of fun and I loved the pictures. Everyone was there, and even though I arrived just past 7 and left just after 8, I had the chance to see Liz, Carla, Graig, Emma, Eva and Jacqui. More people showed up later but I had to leave because I was going to the St. Patrick’s Day Celebration at the St. Lawrence Market!

We arrived at the St. Lawrence Hall at around 9:30 and lined up for about 20 minutes. While Mark was at Harvey’s, these guys came over and asked me if I wanted a bracelet, the one that they give you when you leave but are planning on coming back. Of course I said yes so I didn’t need to pay the $10 dollars cover. Good thing Mark went to Harvey’s or they wouldn’t have approached me and given me the bracelet!
They played U2’s All that You Can’t Leave Behind between bands all night. There were about 800 people and there was a stand where you could buy oysters, but we were too late, because they stopped selling them at 9:00. When we got to the coat check they said that they had too many and weren’t taking any more, even if you paid the $2.00. We approached the stage and I saw that PJ was around, of course he was the organizer of the whole thing. And with all those Irish people around, I even ran into the only authentic Irish person that I know (he’s really from Ireland). It was a lot of fun seeing him, because I haven’t seen him since I changed jobs.
When Mark got distracted getting a bottle of water (can you believe it? he was drinking water on St. Patrick’s Day!), two more guys approached me and wanted to buy me beer, but I was holding a whole pint, I couldn’t get another one, at least not then.
The music stopped at 12:00 and from there we went to Fionn MacCool’s, but of course there was quite a long line-up and after 15 minutes of waiting and watching fat drunk guys being stupid in the beer tent (the line-up was to get into the tent, not even to get into the bar), we decided to go to the Bier Markt. And oh was it a good decision. There were having a band from Nova Scotia that played Irish-like music and of course they have Dos Equis on tap and I love it. We stayed there till just before last call, when TWO MORE GUYS were trying to chat me up, but I was definitely tired after this older woman with sexual preferences different than mine had already approached me before. It was like pick-up night or something, guys (and some women) were on-the-prowl!
We stopped at Pizza Pizza across from the Flatiron for a quick snack and we got home at around 2:30, I am kind of comatose right now, and I only woke up because I had to go to the dentist this morning, if I had to come directly to work I would totally have been late this morning.
Overall it was a really fun party, I don’t do this that much anymore.