[March 23: I was just looking at my calendar and was confused to see an empty spot for the 10th. I’d written a post — what had happened? I don’t know. But here is the post that was scheduled for 1:39 a.m. that day that didn’t publish. -sprite]

Earlier in the week, I was feeling under the weather — mostly just exhausted and irritable. Tonight, Rudi had the same thing, so he went to bed early (a wise move, since he has to be in Pennsylvania at 7 a.m., which his body thinks is 6) and I spent the time working on my sock, watching an episode of Agatha Raisin, and listening to the end of Geekerella.

Next up on audio is either resuming Creative Quest or starting A Boy Called Bat (Kare, did Marshall ever read it and if he did, does he think I’d like it? If he didn’t, no worries…) or Aru Shah and the End of Time. Or, you know, something totally different.

The beginning of March may herald college basketball playoffs for some, but for many sock knitters it marks the start of Sock Madness, the springtime sock knitting competition.

The first pattern, Smock Madness, dropped on Sunday and I began knitting Monday evening. (I’m not feeling overly competitive right now.) The first round will end in ten days on the 17th, by which point I hope to have a complete pair of socks that will enable me to move forward into the next round. Yesterday evening, I knit for a bit next to the outdoor fireplace at Glen’s, which is what you see above. I’m a little further along now.

On the reading front, I have nothing new to report. I’m still working on Geekerella and Early Riser. I picked up Marlon James’ Black Leopard, Red Wolf at the member sale over the weekend at Rudi’s request. He’d heard an interview with the author on NPR while driving home one weekend and was really excited by it. I’d put a hold on it at the library, but since we both want to read it, it made sense to buy a copy.

Head over to As Kat Knits for more knitting and reading posts.

Today was Mardi Gras, the final celebration before the Lenten season of self-deprivation and self-improvement begins. Historically, because people wanted to use up their stores of things they were going to give up starting on Ash Wednesday, it is traditionally a day of consuming baked goods, particularly deep-fried ones, like doughnuts.

In the United Kingdom, it’s pancakes that get celebrated, and Rudi and I decided we like that tradition. I’m only meh about traditional pancakes (except during blueberry season, when I’m all in), but really like crepes, so that’s traditionally our Mardi Gras meal of choice. We opted for spinach and cheese this year.

I mentioned over the weekend that my folks had given me an aebleskiver pan for Christmas, which I had yet to christen, and this seemed like a good time to do so.

Aebleskiver are poofy Danish pancakes that are cooked in a cast iron skillet with indentations for frying up Munchkin-like pancakes, often filled with fruit or jam (or served alongside it).

The dough, which calls for separated eggs, took me a while to make, in part because we’d already used a bunch of dishes to make the crepes. But I got it made (whipping egg whites with my mixer is so much faster than by hand!)

The recipe I was using said to put a tablespoon of dough into each indentation, add jam, and then top with a second tablespoon. “Scant” is probably a word I’ll add to that, because the first batch, which went to Rudi were even more overflowing than mine:

The instructions also said you should use two skewers to pull up the pancakes and flip them over in their little nests. I didn’t have skewers, so I used fondue forks, which were fine. Chopsticks also probably would have worked. Primarily, I forgot the first rule of pancake flipping, which is to wait for those little bubbles at the edge to indicate it’s time to avoid a big mess. And then I didn’t recognize that it was going to be a little messy regardless, and just to sort of poke any extra bits into the indentation to let them cook into the poofs. And maybe to turn them again 90 degrees to account for any dough not quite done because of that.

Rudi doesn’t love raspberry seeds, so his were filled with strawberry rhubarb jam. Mine had raspberry rose jam, which made mine smell heavenly. I’m excited to experiment with some other fillings in future batches. I have some thick chocolate raspberry sauce in the fridge that could work. The other recipe that came with the pan suggests you can put pieces of apple in instead of jam, so that should be fun, too.

Top with powdered sugar and enjoy while warm. I think when we cook up the rest of them (because we don’t actually participate in Lenten abstentions), I’ll make some sipping hot chocolate to enjoy with them. I think that will be perfect.

Sorry for the late post. I dozed off in the midst of writing last night and forgot to hit publish…

This evening I hit up the member sale at Politics and Prose, one of our local indie bookstores. In addition to having an extensive book selection, they are the best place in D.C. to buy cds, with a dedicated music buyer who curates their collection. I’m always bound to find interesting things in his suggestions, and I’m usually willing to take chances on what he recommends. Tonight, I came home with a British artist, Yola, who just released her debut album, Walk Through Fire. This is the second track, “Ride Out in the Country”:

I’m looking forward to listening to the rest of the album tomorrow.

I’ve started a new audiobook and am loving it:

Geekerella, by Ashley Poston, is absolutely adorable. It’s about Elle, who lives with her stepmother and two stepsisters. She works in a vegan food truck, The Magic Pumpkin, and runs a fan blog for an old sci-fi tv series that’s about to be rebooted. Teen soap star Darien has been cast as the lead, Prince Carmindor, a character he adored and identified with as a kid, but his agent (who also happens to be his father), demands that he whiff the expert trivia question on morning tv for marketing purposes. They’ve started an anonymous texting conversation and while the characters are rather one-dimensional, I’m still enjoying it.

On the print front, I’m still working on Early Riser. So far, it’s predicated on a sense of dread, which does not make me want to speed through it, but there’s a love interest somewhere in the pages ahead, so I’m hopeful that it will pull me in yet.

My sock got wonky, so I’ve ripped it back to the picking up stitches point. I can see what I did wrong and hope to be able to fix that, now that I’m paying attention. (I was knitting it during Jasper Fforde’s author event, so my focus was divided.)

I finished the sixth strip of my lightning shawl and have determined I don’t have enough yarn to knit a seventh strip. I have a call out on Ravelry for the 10 grams I’d need to finish, but I’ll block it in the meantime to see if I feel like it will work without it if need be.

Sock Madness begins this weekend, so stay tuned for a new work-in-progress next week!

Head over to As Kat Knits to see what other folks are crafting and reading.

I think it was very nice of Jasper Fforde to publish a book to match my shawl-in-progress. I suspect I will be done with the book first, because I am nearly certain I have enough yarn to eke out a seventh strip so am going to go for it.

I am also reading this graphic novel adaptation of Anne of Green Gables, done by Mariah Marsden and Brenna Thummler. The illustrations are amusing and they manage to include most of the phrases we all love, but it’s missing the flavor of the original text. But it also moves really quickly. I only started it last night, but am already to the scene where they jump on Aunt Josephine.

I’m down to the last 45 minutes of The Woman Who Smashed Codes. World War II is over and William and Elizebeth are trying to figure out how to proceed with their lives during peacetime. He doesn’t die until 1969, so they’ve got some time to enjoy each other’s company. I hope they’re able to do that…

Head to As Kat Knits to see what else folks are reading and crafting.