Twist & Shout

Just a quick update that I finished the Twist and Shout dress for Maegwin.  It was in the Interweave Knits Summer 2012 issue and a really quick knit.  I used some Blue Sky multi cotton that Mom got at a yarn store closing sale and never got around to knitting.  It is so sunny and fun and Maegwin loves it.  She tried it out on the trampoline and it was a fun photo shoot.





We also had a visit for several days by a hawk.  As you can hear in the video above, we have tons of cicadas this year.  He was rooting around in the potato patch after we harvested so I'm wondering if he is eating cicadas?  You can see the tree to the right which we lost this year to Emerald Ash Borer beetles.  We have another equally old one that will probably die by next year.  So sad to see trees around here dying to this invasive bug.  :(



We got about one large bucket's worth of potatoes this year-not as good as we were hoping for but honestly better than expected given how much the plants were ravaged by the groundhog.  Maegwin had a great time finding them and putting them into the bucket.  This morning she was lovingly cradling them in her nightgown.


In other news I'm currently in a fight with the insurance company about them charging me beyond my out of pocket max for my sinus surgery. Things are pretty tight while we have to pay on a bill that we don't know whether or not we will ultimately owe. We've been making our grocery bill be under $100 each week and it struck me that you all might want to know what kinds of tasty stuff you can make for such low cost. We're still having lots of yummy food but always packing lunches and I have oatmeal for breakfast each morning. Last week we had:

• homemade pizza (I've been making olive oil dough that we also use for focaccia) 
• focaccia with broccoli and hummus 
• rice salad primavera 
• fresh tomato farfalle with sweet corn and basil (thanks Mom and John for those 14 ears of sweet corn you gave us!) 
• soycatash and mashed potatoes 

I took pesto-potato fritatta for lunch all week. Yummy!