Pumpkin Seeds

Halloween brings jack-o-lanterns, and jack-o-lanterns bring pumpkin seeds! I bought 2 large pumpkins this year because the grocery store had a wonderful deal - buy one get one free. Carving is never an art at our house, although we have made some decent looking pumpkins. I am amazed and somewhat envious at some of the incredible pumpkin designs I see; rest assured those will never be produced here. With my usual inability to decide, I dithered and debated over what my pumpkin would look like. My husband went at his immediately, knife in hand.

We never carved pumpkins when I was growing up, my mother carefully painted a face on our solitary pumpkin because it would last longer than one that was carved. It makes sense, total sense, but I must admit nothing can substitute for the glow of a real candle (none of those fake battery substitutes here!) inside a jack-o-lantern.

But the real treasure is the seeds! I had tried a number of pumpkin seed recipes early in our marriage. Most involved cleaning the seeds of all pulp, soaking in water (salted or not)for a day, all in all a very long, tedious process. Then I discovered The Victory Garden Cookbook! Marion Cunningham's recipe for pumpkin seeds was a revelation - extremely easy, not overly salty (unless you wanted them that way) and delicious! This is NOT the way the book writes the recipe; it is my own restating.

Pumpkin Seeds (from the Victory Garden Cookbook)

Remove seeds from pumpkin. Discard all major stringy pulp, but do not wash the seeds. Measure.

For every 2 cups of seeds, add 2 Tablespoons of mild vegetable oil and 1-2 teaspoons of salt. (I find 1 t salt is more than enough). Mix together, then spread on a lightly oiled baking sheet.

Bake in a preheated 250 degree F oven for 75 minutes. Watch towards the end so they don't burn (remove them earlier if burning seems a possibility).


Obviously, rescale the recipe to the amount of seeds you have - for 1 cup, cut the recipe in half, and so on.

Bringing in the Leaves!

As September draws to a close, the time of harvest is upon us. I always think of the hymn "Bringing in the Sheaves" - "we will come rejoicing, bringing in the sheaves!" Since frost warnings are starting to appear, it is time to cut down my basil plants and harvest off all the leaves. I wait all summer, denying myself the pleasure of fresh basil until this time of the year. Since my basil crop isn't the largest, owing to a shady yard, I wait until I get as much growth as possible then harvest it all at once. I'll make pesto today and freeze it. I love homemade pesto, so today I will indeed "come rejoicing, bringing in the leaves!"

Thrifty Music Stand Bag

Since my last folding music stand case vanished somewhere, it was time to make a new carrying bag. I have found that the leg of a pair of old pants is ideally suited to the purpose. The last bag I made was from the unripped leg of an old pair of jeans. Not having any old jeans lying around this time, I went to the thrift stores. I wanted durable fabric - either a bottomweight (duck, canvas, denim, twill, poplin) or a wool. These olive green wool pants at only $1.00 matched my criteria.

I was able to open up the leg seam on the outside of the hem for the casing. I zigzagged across the seam at the ends of the opening to reinforce the seam and keep it from opening up more.

Because these pants are capri length, I had to use part of the actual body of the pants. With full length pants you can just use a leg.

First I cut apart the pants down the center body seam. I didn't bother cutting off anything else (like the waistband or zipper) because that can be done easily at the end.

Leaving the outer leg seam intact, I turned them inside out & straight-stitched a new seam just below the hem casing on the center body side of the bag. My seam was stitched down an imaginary line stretching from the hem to the waistband; I really didn't care if my seam was perfectly aligned - as long as it wasn't too narrow for the stand, it was fine.

Put the stand inside the bag, leaving adequate room at the hem for closure. Mark where the stand falls on the bag and add an inch or so. Sew a seam across the bag at that point, from side seam to side seam. This is the bottom of your bag.

Trim off all the extra pant fabric, leaving 1/2" around the seams. Turn the bag right side out.

Thread a cord or twill tape through the casing.

What to Do?

What to do?  I need a new reenacting handiwork project.  The problem is, I am not really in the pure state of "in between" projects.  No, that would imply I have either completely finished whatever I was working on or had utterly abandoned the last project.

Neither statement is true.  I have a pair of socks I am knitting stuffed away in my knitting bag, languishing at the "pick up stitches on the heel" stage - at least that's where I think I am.  My gut is afraid I have progressed past that and have dropped stitches somewhere.  These will be lovely socks - when I finish them  - I dyed the wool with shag bark hickory husks.

Then there's the Norwegian Morning cap I started with a Civil War Knit-along.  The cap itself is knit and I'm very happy with it.  I have to crochet the edging - and crochet is not my favorite handiwork.  I have to look up the stitches every time.  I've been avoiding starting - the perfectionist thing again, I think, but there is a realistic fear of botching up a nice piece of knitting. 

But our next Civil War reenactment is just around the corner, and it is one that not many civilian reenactors attend, which leaves me up to my own devices.  I need to have a new project to bring with me!  I like having busy hands while I am there, especially because it gives me something to talk about with spectators.

So, with great resignation, I practiced the crochet stitches I need for the cap trim, only to find out that I don't have the correct size hook.  Of course I practiced on a heavier weight yarn using a larger hook, since the project uses lace weight yarn.  Today I will purchase my hook.

I also looked up the KAL (knit along) instructions for the knit undersleeves.  Since I was planning on knitting those in white fingering weight wool, I have the materials I need.  Sadly, I am in the Knit After or Knit Behind stage - the blessed ladies of the KAL are 3 projects ahead of me.  Of course I know I could just jump right in  with the current project, which is double knit wrist warmers, but I already have a pair of wrist warmers.  Not double knit, but I would rather work on the undersleeves at this point, since I have no knit ones. 

Perfectionism

As I sit here and face my brand new, shiny, and very empty blog, I am forced to confront my perfectionism.  I can attribute this feeling of "what in the world do I put out there?" to blogblock, which is more than just writer's block, since it involves choices of font, color, and format, but in all honesty, blogblock is only a small component of my fear.

Sitting here, I am forced to confront my perfectionism. Perfectionism is such a double-edge sword.  On the one hand, I tend to do things well, I expect myself to do things well, and I am not satisfied until I have achieved or surpassed my expectations.  I prefer to accept this rather than a half-hearted attempt.

On the other hand, perfectionism blocks me from attempting or sharing my atempts with others because I just might not be good enough.  I have let opportunities, job possibilites, and carefully bypassed other exciting options because I am painfully aware of my lack of perfection.  Although I am optimistic by nature, I am forced to realize that I only see the percent I have missed - I may be 95% ready, acceptable, but I only see the missing 5%. 

It is wearisome carrying the burden of your own and others' standards, especially since you don't know what others are expecting of you.  What will others think?  How much will I imagine what others are thinking?  If we are honest, most of the time everyone is too busy with his own life to worry extensively about ours.  In those perfectionist moments, I still feel those imaginary eyes scrutinizing, criticizing, expecting...

Recently I was trying something new in public (one of the worse of all possible scenarios for a perfectionist!) and a friend told me I needed to allow myself to start out badly so I could grow better.  It shocked me - allow myself to do something badly? Fail? - and in public?   "Try" is such a non-perfectionist word - "do it right!"  is more the way I tend to think. (As Yoda says, "there is no try"). No, that's not quite accurate - trying is acceptable in private where noone can see!

Yet, I wonder how many things I have missed because I might not be good enough to succeed or be the very best right from the beginning. 

So, I have decided to try.  I know I will backslide extensively.  But -I would prefer to not pass up opportunities.  I want to give myself the grace to grow, to make mistakes, to start over. Perfectionism can be like a packet of seeds held on the shelf, not planted, waiting for just the right weather, soil conditions, & time - until the possibility implict in the seed withers and becomes a "might have been."