Seriously, this the The Best Granola. Capitalization and everything. I guess that technically the superlative is subjective, so maybe a better way to describe this recipe is Amanda's Ideal Granola.

Ingredients:
4 cups rolled oats
1 cup slivered almonds
1 generous teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon coarse salt (less if you're using table salt)

1/3 cup coconut oil, melted
1/2 cup sweetener (I use 1/4 cup brown sugar + 1/4 cup maple syrup)
1 teaspoon vanilla
scant 1/4 teaspoon almond extract

Preheat oven to 350F. Mix dry ingredients in a large bowl, with the help of a preschooler if one is available (someone needs to sneak a small, unspecified number of plain oats into his/her mouth in order for the proportions to be just right). Mix wet ingredients - I like to melt the coconut oil in my Pyrex measuring cup, then add just enough brown sugar and maple syrup to make 3/4 cup of total liquid, so actually just a little less sweetener than called for above - then add the vanilla and almond extracts. Pour over the dry stuff and combine. Spread into a thin layer on a 1/2 sheet pan. If you have a Silpat or similar device, this is an excellent application for it. Place in oven and turn heat down to 250F, or as low as your oven will go. Stir every 15 to 20 minutes, till the granola has reached optimal golden-brown-deliciousness, about 45 minutes to an hour. Feel free to mix in some chopped, crystallized ginger at this point... yes please. Once cooled, this will keep in an airtight container for longer than we've successfully left it alone, so at least 3-4 days? But I'm guessing at least a week, if your household is more disciplined than ours.

Well, I managed to power through the miles-long bindoff in two sittings last weekend, no small portion of the credit for which goes to my mom, who was in town to "visit" (read: help wrangle the boys/help me maintain my sanity). Fellow knitting enthusiasts understand that occasionally getting a project off the needles goes a long way toward feeling like oneself, especially after a major life change like adding an extra human to the family. Substitute the appropriate vocabulary for your particular brand of nerdiness as necessary.

The yarn was spindle-spun singles, from my first bump of Loop fiber. I purchased it at Rhinebeck 2014. I'm counting 15 months from fiber to FO as a win. The spinning experience was lovely until I got down to about the last quarter of it. I pulled from the center of the bump and had been dragging it around with me for months, so by the time I got to the outer layers of fiber they were pretty badly compacted. I chucked the very last of it, much to my chagrin. Despite the wasted bits, the finished yarn still clocked in at about 900 yards. As for the pattern, I semi-followed Stephen West's Bolting, which was pleasantly mindless and very customizable.

Specs:
Pattern: Bolting by Stephen West
Yarn: About 900 yds handspun singles, light fingering-ish weight. Fiber from Loop; merino-bamboo-silk; colorway Mums.
Mods: Kept on knitting the zigzags till my yarn was almost gone - got through 11 altogether. Shortened garter st section to 6 rows. Knit a light fingering weight yarn on US 5s; pattern calls for worsted weight.

The mittens from last week are finished and photographed, yay! I still need to edit the photos and get down to business on pattern layout, but that's for another day. Next up on the WIP-cracking docket: a gigantic Bolting knit from about 900 yards of a handspun Loop bump - my first and hopefully not last. I didn't even let myself walk into the Loop booth at Rhinebeck this year because I wanted to get this beast off the needles. It's finally down to just the bindoff and I can't wait to see what it looks like in all its fully stretched-out glory.

Did everyone catch Tin Can Knits' 12 days of free patterns leading up to Christmas? I think the Lowlands pattern is my favorite of the bunch, and one of a couple that I actually snagged. Per usual, I treated the pattern as more of a loose suggestion. I used it to knit a large leftover ball of One Lupine's Rangeley - a nice, hand dyed woolly-wool - into a beanie with some extra slouch. (Side note: if you're ever in Bangor, check out One Lupine - it's a gem.) I love the way this pattern worked with a variegated yarn, and I'd love to try it out with handspun.

Specs:
Pattern: Lowlands
Yarn: 150 yds Rangeley from One Lupine
Mods: Lots. Used a US 6 for the garter brim, and knit only until it fit snugly around my head (fewer rows than called for). Used a US 8 to pick up more stitches than called for (88?), and knit till it was a nice slouchy length. Improvised spiral decreases at 8 points.

The time has come for some WIP management. First up, this pair of nearly-completed colorwork mittens that I began knitting over a year ago. I must have run out of steam sometime in late winter or early spring. Actually, this isn't an abandoned project that I feel all that much need to beat myself up about - I would have been in my first trimester with Max, dealing with a very cooped-up two-year-old, and working to complete two sample sweaters for designs that came out this fall. Nevertheless, time to get moving on these - maybe in time to republish the design this winter (the original pattern,
Rheinfells Mittens, was published in Interweave Knits, and the rights have since reverted to me). Onward!

A long-overdue rebrand is nigh. Finally.