Except for a stroll around the neighborhood with Mom and Chappy, I’ve been home, puttering, all day.

  I started by making Blueberry Corn muffins for Mom. It was going to be either that or blueberry pancakes . . . her choice. (Blueberry scones were off the list because she’s “saving” that for Espresso Love on MV next week. She adores their scones, even more than mine.)

  I also baked some bread. This is the Grapenut Bread recipe from the old Daggett House B&B on Martha’s Vineyard, which makes some of the best toast ever. (So good, in fact, it’s almost a crime to eat this bread any other way.) The Daggett House, of course, is no longer an inn, but is now a private residence once again, but at least the bread recipe lives on.

  Then, we started emptying the kitchen. We’ve got one week to get it totally empty, but needed to get at least some of the cabinets clear now. (If it were solely up to Mom, we would have emptied everything today except perhaps a single saucepan and a couple dishes and forks, but, really, there’s still 5 days that we need to be able to use the kitchen! I think we’ve emptied out enough for right now, don’t you? The table is 3/4 full and the one wall is lined with filled boxes.

Who knew a kitchen could hold so much??

Speaking of food and kitchens and mothers, check out this hilarious excerpt from “More” magazine: an essay by Ruth Reichl called “Becoming Your Mother.” Very funny!

  There is one sad thing in the kitchen, though. Back in 1987, when I was in college, my parents visited me on my semester abroad in London. Mom was captivated by the exit signs in the Tube (or, subway, as we Americans would call it). And so, she bought this sticker, and it’s been on our kitchen door ever since. Only now, the door is being replaced, and the sticker will be history. She doesn’t know that she would have wanted to put a new sticker on the new door, but she’s kind of sad about having to see it go.

So, really, it’s kind of a somber Mother’s Day in our household. Let’s all have a moment of silence for the near-empty kitchen cabinets and the “Way Out” sticker, shall we?

(pause)

Thank you.

As to knitting, I did the hem on my “Nothing but a Shirt” last night, only now I’m not so sure . . . I’m thinking the gauge is still a little too big. Especially if it’s going to expand when I wash it! This, for me, is the frustrating thing about sweaters–they have to fit. Mathematically speaking, that shouldn’t be a problem. Number of stitches divided by gauge per inch equals size. Should be simple! In fact, I even enjoy figuring out the math for that. And yet . . .

. . . And yet, I’ve had problems fitting the last few sweaters I’ve knitted. Either my gauge has been off as I knitted (despite test swatches at the beginning) or worse, the gauge changed when I washed the sweater to block it–extraordinarily aggravating! And how can you plan for that kind of irregularity? Even the Calmer swatch the other night–it was exactly right, then I washed it, and it bloomed and stretched a quarter inch. If my sweater’s going to do that, how do I account for that? What if it only expands a quarter inch over 8″ instead of the 4″ I swatched? Or if it doesn’t stretch at all? How can I know?? And if the Back on my needles right now is looking like it might be just a little too large (despite having checked the gauge and picked the mathematically-appropriate size to knit) . . . what do I do if it stretches, too?

How does one adjust for variables beyond one’s control? I can only pass so many sweaters on to my niece! (She is the current owner of my Audrey sweater, which looked beautiful, but was just a little too clingy for my waistline and looks much better on my niece’s trim figure.) Planning–much as I hate to admit it–can only take you so far.

• Tags: Baking, General • Permalink:Sunday in the Kitchen with Debbie //