Ireland Highlights

It was a wonderful trip to Ireland. I cannot possibly tell you about every experience, but for a while I'll share a few of my favorite things....like our visit to Killary Sheep Farm. These little snippets of our trip will not be in any particular order. Just trying to hit the highlights.

The little lamb in my arms was only three days old.

We really did get up close and personal with the sheep.

We watched the sheep dog, guided by voice commands, bring the herd in.

And the sheep were soon safely in the holding pen.

A few of our knitters took a turn at sheep shearing.

And in minutes, this one was minus his (her?) wooly coat.

Then we were invited to a centuries old farm building for tea and biscuits 

with the farmer and his mother, who was there to greet us and to pour tea.

For sure. This was a favorite day.

This was early in our trip. We had such a good time. And it just continued to get better.

Looking For Leprechauns

Pattern:  Piper's Journey, by Paula Emons-Fuessle

Yarn:  Berroco Folio, Bells of Ireland colorway

Needles:  size 6

For most of my life I've wanted to go places and see sights that I knew about only from books and movies and television. But life has its own plans and that never happened like I had imagined when I was in college. No regrets, but that little dream never completely faded away. So when I was presented with the opportunity to combine my knitting hobby (that I dearly love) with a trip to Ireland, with a group of knitters, I said, "Put my name down." At that point the list was for those interested in getting more information. I'm not sure I actually thought I'd go on this trip.

But my bag is packed and in a few days I'll head off, across the sea, on an adventure of a lifetime. It's a small group of knitters, some whom are world travelers and others like me who have stayed closer to home. We will see the sights, of course, including some of particular interest to lovers of yarn. And we will knit. Yes. There is a knitting retreat at the end of the trip, complete with a pattern designed especially for this group by Helen Stewart of Curious Handmade. Helen will be with us for those days. And the pattern will be knitted with yarn custom dyed especially for this pattern by an Irish indie-dyer. 

So there will be no more blog posts until I return. My away time will be a little longer than the knitting trip because it all runs together with a piano recital, high school graduation and a dance recital. But this traveling grandmother will be back here in about a month. 

Say a prayer that we will have a safe trip. And say a prayer for healing for Paula, of Knitting Pipeline, who planned this trip many months ago. But instead of leading us on this adventure as she intended to do, she will be at home recovering from surgery. The surgery is part of her treatment for ovarian cancer. We knitters will miss her terribly because she is our friend, teacher, mentor, tour guide and den mother all rolled into one. 

The shawl, pictured above, is one of Paula's designs. In her honor, the knitting travelers have each knitted this pattern to wear on this trip. Wearing her design will be like having her with us in spirit.

PS...Baby Girl asked me to look for leprechauns while I'm there. "But DON"T BLINK, Mimi! DON'T BLINK!!!"  "If you see one and you blink they will scoot away."  "Oh, and would you take a picture of one for me? You know you'll need to be quick, don't you?"

Pork Chops And Hay Season

Tangy Sweet Pork Chops

Do you ever forget about recipes you've made? Even the ones you really liked? That happens around here more than I'd like to admit. This slow cooker recipe is one I've made several times, then it drifted to the bottom of the recipe rotation.

But Wednesday nights mean handbell practice for me. I get home about 7:30, so supper needs to be ready when I walk in the door. That could be leftovers. Sometimes I'll pick up something on the way home. And on days when I plan better, I'll put something in the slow cooker like I did yesterday. And for whatever reason, this recipe popped into my head when I was making a grocery list.

I made the side dishes mid-afternoon, too, just after I put the chops in the crockpot. So we only needed to fix our plates when I got home. It was easiest to put a helping of potatoes and apples on the plate and warm them before serving up a hot pork chop, instead of warming up the entire bowl of the side dishes. The broccoli? I zapped a little fresh broccoli in the microwave while I was pulling out plates and such. It's not my favorite way to cook broccoli but it was the quickest. Understand that we are a household of two, so if you are feeding a large family, you might need a different plan.

This is one of the easiest recipes ever. The sauce is only slightly sweet. It isn't spicy if your family likes it tame. I imagine you could add some heat (red pepper flakes?) if you wanted to jazz it up. But this suits us fine.

TANGY SWEET PORK CHOPS

4-6 pork chops, with or without bone (about 2 to 3 lbs)
14-oz. can jellied or whole berry cranberry sauce (I've used both)
12-oz. bottle chili sauce

Place pork chops in slow cooker.

Empty cranberry sauce into a bowl and microwave for 20 seconds at a time to melt it enough to combine with chili sauce. (It took mine about 60 seconds total.)

Stir cranberry sauce and chili sauce together.

Pour over pork chops. (I lift up each chop to let a little sauce run under.)

Cook on LOW for 7-8 hours or HIGH for 5-6 hours.

This time I used 4 thick, boneless pork chops. Each chop weighed about 8 oz. And 5 hours on HIGH was fine in my slow cooker. They were done and fall-apart tender. 

On a side note....I looked up this recipe when I decided to make it. It's been on this blog before. The first time in 2013 during hay season. Then three years later in 2016, in hay season. And wonder of wonders, here we are three years after that and guess what? Daddy-O has started cutting hay again. (It's four steps—cut, tedder, rake, bale.. And that is a several day process, which is repeated throughout hay season.) It's that time of year again. Total coincidence. But isn't that interesting?