sunday scribble: the news …

Posted on September 12, 2010 by imadeitso
knitting zen

© imadeitso, 2010. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to ana at imadeitso.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

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easy recipe: pear crisp

Posted on September 10, 2010 by imadeitso

the recipe is directly from kraft.ca and i only modified it slightly (used less sugar, more lemon, omitted whipped cream).

we were recently gifted a basket full of beautiful home-grown organic pears, fresh off the tree.

organic pears in a basket

it’s nice to go shopping for ingredients when i know what i’m going to make. but i also like when the ingredients available inspire the hunt for a good recipe… i decided on a pear crisp, since i’d never made one before and it had been a long while since i had made a sweet dish…

pear crumble recipe on paper

i peeled and cut the pears into chunks…

bowl of pears cut into chunks

preheated oven to 375 F / 190 C.

  • zested a lemon to give about 1 teaspoon of peel
  • squeezed the juice out of the lemon (about 4 and a half teaspoons)
  • (and yes, i did use the leftover lemon and rind to do this :-))
  • mixed 1/4 cup granulated sugar with 2 tablespoons flour and 1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon
  • added pears, lemon zest and juice and tossed til pears were coated.
  • spooned into 2L casserole (vintage pyrex optional, but recommended, hehe)
  • in another bowl, mixed brown sugar, remaining granulated sugar, flour and cinnamon.
  • cut in butter (i used two knives, but a pastry blender would work too) til it formed coarse crumbs.
  • sprinkled this mixture over the pears.

adding crumble to the pear

  • added sliced almonds on top and baked 40-45 mins until the topping was golden brown and the pears were hot and bubbly. the kitchen smelled incredible…

pear crisp in a vintage pyrex casserole dish

a few notes:

  • the lemon makes the recipe! it gives it a subtle tart edge.
  • the almonds add texture and are so flavourful when toasted.
  • i try to ease back on the sugar in recipes. the pears were ripe and very sweet, and i used about 3/4 of the recommended amount of sugar. (the amounts listed above are from the actual recipe)

brown sugar in a measuring cup

i could probably have used even less, it came out quite sweet. delicious though. i think it would go very well with a dollop of vanilla ice cream. you know…since i cut back on the sugar and all.

pear crisp on a plate

pears are in season here, and i think i’ll be going to the farmer’s market this weekend to see what else is fresh and available. i love this time of year for the market. and for family with generous trees!

© imadeitso, 2010. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to ana at imadeitso.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.
Posted in in the kitchen | Tagged , , , , | 10 Comments

keeping mistakes

Posted on September 9, 2010 by imadeitso

this photo, first shared here, was a mistake:

last petal

i did only a couple of things correctly as i went to take the photo:

  • turn camera on.
  • turn macro setting on.

check and check! :-)

here’s what i did incorrectly:

  • forgot to turn flash off.
  • put finger partially on flash. (oops)

both of which led to that neat effect. no other retouching done, other than putting those rounded corners and my watermark on the image. the photo was actually taken during daylight and it would have looked like this if i didn’t make those mistakes (my 2nd attempt at the photo):

last petal light

i like the first version better.

last petal dark

i think i will aspire to this quotation…

“Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep.” – Scott Adams
© imadeitso, 2010. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to ana at imadeitso.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.
Posted in pixel shaking | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 8 Comments

pressing pause…

Posted on September 7, 2010 by imadeitso

before the sprinkler spouts water at the splash pad…

feet sprinkler

before the last petal falls…

last petal

as the bus pulls up on the first day of school, before the kids go on.

school bus first day

© imadeitso, 2010. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to ana at imadeitso.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.
Posted in pixel shaking | Tagged , , , , | 13 Comments

did you make that?

Posted on September 3, 2010 by imadeitso

if the words below look familiar to any of you who have been with i made it so from the beginning (you know, five whole months ago), it’s because it was on the sidebar of my first design for this blog. while shifting things around, it got lost along the way and i just found it now. so i’m blowing the dust off this one, and sharing it again. enjoy… (and at the end, let me know if you’re a quiet creative, or one that shouts about all you’ve done, or somewhere in between. i’d love to know!)

~ana

did you make that?

music to a crafter’s ears.

it’s a funny thing.  sometimes we work so hard on a project.  like knitting a sweater, for example. each tiny stitch knit with quiet care and dedication, a simple motion repeated over and over again, thousands of times, to create a final piece.

white knit yarn sweater

we’ve ignored the strange looks we’ve received while practicing our art in public; we’ve justified to ourselves that handmade is worth far more than something that can be bought at the store with far less time and money expended; we’ve persevered when things have gone wonky, and we unravel and knit again, marching on strongly.

we usually enjoy the journey but more honestly, we dream of the destination, when we stitch the last stitch, snip the last thread, and weave in all the ends.  when we have something to show for our time, our creativity. our dedication.

we wear it. we admire it.  we feel warm in the knowledge that we made something out of nothing, or at least, out of something that barely resembled what we have made.

we have created!

but then, we wait.

and hope.

because we dare not scream for the world to hear about what we’ve done. no, that would detract from our gentle creative process.  but if anyone looked closely, that little smirk on our faces would give it away in an instant.  oh no, we wait. to be asked. to be given permission to share. it’s better that way. we wait to be asked those four sweet little words…

“did you make that?”

© imadeitso, 2010. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to ana at imadeitso.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.
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