It All Started

It all started with a banana.

Three bananas, actually.  Three bananas that were at just the right stage of ripeness for banana bread.

I was going to make some banana bread.  However, when I dragged my mixing bowls and stuff out, there was no room on my cluttered cabinets to even mix up my bread dough.  You know how it goes.  You get the mail and set it down to deal with it later, only later never comes.  By and by, things stack up.  That's what happened in my kitchen.

I did an arm sweep to clear enough of a spot on the counter to make my bread, and said to myself, "Self, this kitchen is getting out of hand.  You really need to clean it up."  As soon as my bread was in the oven, that's exactly what I did.

After about an hour's worth of work, I had all my cabinets cleaned off, scrubbed, and organized.  I got so excited to show you, that I took this picture before I realized I still had a sink full of dirty bread-making dishes.

A few more minutes, and the dishwasher was unloaded and reloaded, and the hand wash items were drying next to the sink.

Having a clean kitchen makes a world of difference.  Now I'm all ready for my Thanksgiving cooking.  I'm not going to make a big meal, since it's just going to be me, but I am going to cook the turkey the plant gave us, sweet potato casserole, strawberry jello salad, and stuffing with giblet gravy.  Plus a pumpkin pie for dessert. 

I'm going to try something different with the turkey this year.  I love the taste of it, but my turkey always ends up being as tough as boot leather.  This time, I'm going to try cooking it in a slow oven for about 6 hours and see if it turns out more tender.  I'll let you know how it goes.

All right, enough about my kitchen.  I also did another red baby hat.

This one is leftover dishcloth cotton.  I have a little more cotton left -- maybe enough to make a couple of preemie hats.   I had to run back into town this afternoon, because I didn't realize I was almost out of dog food until I went to feed my dogs yesterday and the scoop scraped the bottom of the bin.  Yeah, my dogs are spoiled.  They think they have to eat every single day.  What's up with that? 

While I was there, I picked up a skein of Caron Simply Soft.

I also ran across this Mainstays basic yarn.  It's acrylic, and it's really soft.  Plus it's only $1.97 per skein!  I ought to be able to get a bunch of baby hats out of that. 

Speaking of hats, I got my beret off the plate.

It is now marinating in the gift drawer, which is getting really full.  I have a feeling lots of people will be getting knitted gifts for Christmas in another year or two.