Saturday mornings are for the farmers’ market. I thought my nascent cardigan might look fine reposing among the fresh produce and, for the sake of the composition, the bottle I saved from the best wine I’ve tasted since the Brunello we brought back from Montalcino in 2003.

The Red Russian kale went into an experimental Indian-esque dinner in the following way: I sautéed half a yellow onion in olive oil, added a can of chick peas, then stirred in some chopped fresh ginger, a Murchi curry blend (I went a little overboard and it wound up pretty hot – a couple of teaspoons would have done the trick), a handful of unsweetened coconut shavings, and a dash of hot pepper flakes. I removed the kale “backbones” and roughly chopped the leaves, then threw them into the mix. At this point I needed some liquid to keep it all from sticking. There happened to be some apple cider (sweet, not hard) in the icebox, so I poured in a slosh of that. Then I noticed our growler from the local brewery was in there, too, and still had a glug of flat pale ale in it. Into the pot it went, to counteract a little of the sweetness of the apple juice and deepen the flavor a bit. As soon as the kale had steamed it was done. I shaved a little ricotta salata over the plates to serve it, on the theory that the mild, salty cheese could stand in for proper paneer. It turned out pretty tasty! I often cook this way, starting with a good fresh main ingredient and improvising based on what happens to be in the cupboards. Sometimes the result isn’t what I could hope, but mostly it works out well. And luckily my husband is a good sport about it (not that he has an alternate choice, unless he cooks himself).

We also bought raspberries, and unfortunately Mr. G figured he could dispense with their little boxes and pour them all into a plastic bag. The fragile little beauties promptly squashed each other and I knew they wouldn’t last out the day. We ate a bowl each, and then I made freezer jam. The half a cup of mashed raspberries left over went into a fruity cocktail each:

I adapted an internet recipe and it came out a bit too strong and too sweet, but here’s what I’d do next time:

half a glass of crushed ice
1/4 c. mashed raspberries
1 Tbsp. sugar
1 measure light rum
a slice of lemon

Yum!

Today the chard, spinach, courgettes, and summer squash will join a trio of eggplants in a couple of pans of lasagne. One will be for us and a friend who’s coming to dinner; the other we’ll freeze for our friends who just brought home their beautiful new son.

Meanwhile, the Tour continues, and so does my progress on the yellow cardigan. If this piece of knitting has its equivalent of the Pyrenees, that’s where I am, right along with the cyclists. Two more rows and I can put the sleeve stitches on waste yarn, but those rows are awfully long. The Alps will be the part where I have to pick up stitches and work a 1 x 1 ribbed edge around the whole body, but luckily I’ve got a couple of flatter stages in between to race down the rest of the cropped torso. Overall, I’m feeling good about my chances for the maillot vert!

Of course, there’s going to be a major interruption in my focus on this piece. Pro riders are required to report their whereabouts to the team leadership even during the off-season, so I’ll follow suit: on Thursday I’m leaving for Meg Swansen’s Knitting Camp in Wisconsin, and I’m perfectly giddy with anticipation! I may have to put down the yellow cardi for a couple of days, but I intend to be knitting constantly for four days. And I’ve got a project in my head that will employ the techniques I need to work on at Camp without sacrificing the French connection – stay tuned! I’m off to wind the yarn I have to pack and do some weeding before the sun comes fully over the trees to bake me.

July means several things to me: my birthday and the years’ worth of memories of elaborate treasure hunts, games on horseback, camping, and astronomy that go with it; the reliable start of halcyon summer in the Pacific Northwest; evenings outdoors enjoying the long light (though twilight comes much sooner in Portland than in my hometown) fresh produce from local farmers; and in recent years, the Tour de France.

When I probe for the origins of my obsession with the world’s greatest cycling race, I come up with the confluence of nostalgia for my first trip to France in 1998, a bleak city winter in New York, and my husband’s foray into triathlons. I think it was in 2005 that we discovered you could find video archives of previous Tours online, and I think I was the one to suggest teasingly to Adam that watching Lance Armstrong power up an Alp or two might bring his training sessions on the stationary bike to a new level. Before I knew it, I was ensconced on the couch (at an awkward angle; there was no room in our tiny apartment for the couch and the bike to face the computer at once) with my knitting, totally absorbed in the new world coming through the small grainy picture on the screen. The drama of the mountain stages, the cat-and-mouse in the peloton pulling back a breakaway or setting up a sprint finish, the beauty of the French landscape (my imagination ably filled in what the video quality left to be desired). The titanic rivalry of Armstrong and Ullrich, the death-defying descents, the colorful commentators and tifosi. I was hooked. When one year’s footage was over, we went back to the previous year. Soon I was watching the stages alone when Adam was working late. We didn’t have a television for that summer’s edition, but by 2006 we’d moved to Portland. We settled in our new house on July 4th, just in time to meet our cycling neighbors and learn that the bike store where they work would be showing the live Tour coverage at 6 a.m. each day. I got up extra early the first morning and made fresh ginger scones to share with the diehards who stopped in before work. Then I mesmerized them with my drop spindle while we all watched the race unfold.

To my dismay, the Bike Gallery stopped screening the Tour after that first year. But by 2007 we’d inherited a television, and I could stumble down in my pajamas, brew some coffee, and leave the door open for the neighbors to come join me. If the stage wasn’t over by the time I had to leave for work, I’d catch the end of the prime time coverage that evening. And always, knitting was bound up in the experience. Of course I joined the Tour knitalong as soon as Debby told me it was in the works. Last year, I translated a French pattern and set myself the task of completing a complicated cardigan during the three weeks of the race.

And this year? I have to keep the details of my project under wraps, as it’s for publication. But I’ll tell you this: it’s a vintage-inspired cropped cardigan in an unusual lace pattern, and it is every bit as yellow as the maillot jaune. It’s like buttercups, crocuses, daffodils, and Cheetos in a blender. I love it unreasonably. Maybe I’ll show you a little corner of it here and there, just to be a tease. It’s only five inches long and already I’m fantasizing about wearing it in Paris some spring with a voluminous skirt cut like it’s 1959, strolling the hidden gardens, reading on park benches, devouring daintily nibbling pastries at sidewalk cafés. Or maybe lurking in a slinky dress in a dark bar with a glass of absinthe, conjuring the ghosts of Degas, Picasso, Hemingway, and Toulouse-Lautrec, because it’s a versatile little number. (I’m not convinced absinthe would be all that pleasant to drink, but just say it aloud: “glass of absinthe” – what poetry.) Or best – and most realistically – of all, cycling the streets of Portland. If I can only find some wicker panniers for my Bianchi Milano, I’ll be able to pretend I’m a stylish French girl riding home from the market with produce and baguettes. And just think of all the knitting I could stash in the bottom.

Ah, the summer cold. Living, viral proof that life is neither fair nor dignified. I’ve managed to succumb to it on the last day of school two years running, thereby wimping out on the nocturnal faculty revelries that traditionally follow graduation. Since I don’t feel much like getting out and doing things, it’s fortunate that I’ve got endless table-top entertainment in the form of my mother-in-law’s rotary cutter and a big stack of newly washed fabric:

I’ve been merrily pizza-cutting squares for the Leafy Snowball quilt: the genius of the Leafy Snowball quilt is that it’s all squares, but ends up looking like circles – perfect for a beginner like me. I made one last run to Mill End, and now I think I have all the colors I need, save for a few more solids to form the diamond shapes in between the “circles.” I still need to sew the binding onto the Lap Quilt before I’ll let myself start playing with the arrangement for the Leafy Snowballs in earnest, but since the rotary cutter is on loan for a finite period, I feel justified in forging ahead with the cutting. Besides, my parents were here to visit over the weekend (Happy Birthday again, Mom!), and my mother was riveted by the rotary cutting action. Both my craftsperson parents like to see a particularly useful tool doing its bit. And while I made a few wobbly cuts at the beginning, I’m wielding the thing with confidence now. I may need to get my mother-in-law a new blade before I give it back.

Speaking of sewing, I finally got a picture of the Bend-the-Rules Denyse Schmidt (good catch, Véronique!) oven mitt in situ:

But any cleverness I might have been feeling about this has now been erased by the fact that the Charming Handbag Knitting Bag I just made from Bend-the-Rules Sewing has now flown out the door to be Katrin’s birthday present without posing for a single picture, in progress or finished. One big forehead smack for me coming right up. Go say Happy Birthday to Katrin – you should see her spanking new blue elephant ink! (Well, maybe in a week or so when it’s all healed. In the meantime, take my word that it’s really cute – I mean tough – and that the girl is a rockstar and barely flinched even for the ouchy over-the-tailbone parts.)

And now I’m off to down another mug of tea and summon the energy to go frisbee the dog.

Debby’s comment on the last post gave me the right analogy as I head into a weekend of insanity: Mr. G flies east on Sunday night to begin Best Manly duties for my brother, so there’s packing and cleaning and organization to do; an herb garden to plant with our neighbors; dog care to orchestrate; wedding gifts to plan and buy; absence from my job in the face of a huge looming project completion to prepare for; a fundraising run for Room to Read to participate in. Oh, and the Ivy stole to finish.

Four more rounds to knit on the edging, and then the beastly crochet chain to finish it all off. Debby and I share a love of knitting while watching professional cycling, so when she told me to dig into my suitcase, I knew exactly what she meant. Commentator Phil Liggett loves to say, when a rider hits the slopes of a tough climb at the end of a grueling day in the saddle, “He’s digging deep into his suitcase of courage now!” So into the suitcase I go, my friends. I should have some pictures of this life-sucking beauty for you by the end of the weekend.

Meanwhile, the weather couldn’t be less conducive to knitting. We’re taking aim at 97 degrees today (that’s 36 degrees for you Celsius folk, and much hotter than usual for May in Portland). The kids at school have been lobbying all week for their favorite hot-weather PE game, Drip-Drip-Drop. It’s like Duck-Duck-Goose, except that instead of tapping your friends on the head as you make the circle, you’re sprinkling – and then dumping – water on them. It sounds much more appealing than picking up the cashmere (thank goodness it’s laceweight – if Saxton and Marika lived in the southern hemisphere I could be knitting a Wedding Anorak or something). I got up extra early this morning to water the more tender plants and to sew the hem of my new sundress so I’d have appropriate garb to weather the stickiness while I knit like mad this evening.

So look out, world: I am turning a pedal in anger now! Bring on the mask of pain! I will not crack!