This recipe has been given a run twice in two weeks and as it’s super easy and delicious, I thought I should give it a plug. As there weren’t any ingredient substitutions, I don’t feel comfortable reproducing the recipe here — the Hokey Pokey Biscuit recipe can be found here on the Taste website.

The first batch was just as described in the recipe, sans fork marks. For some reason, I associate one set of fork marks with yo yos, and two sets of fork marks with peanut butter biscuits. As such, fork marks would have been an very much a baking faux par in this kitchen.

The most recent batch, shown in the photo above, also included chocolate on top. Originally, I was going to dip half of the biscuit in chocolate, but was a little too lazy. Instead, I put a chocolate melt on top before baking, which seemed to turn out all right. It’s worth noting that the dough was barely wider than the chocolate melt – these suckers really do spread out when in the oven.

Next time, I’d like to expand on the chocolate idea a little by splitting the mixture and putting cocoa power through to make Hokey Pokey marble biscuits. That’ll be at least a couple of weeks away, as they’re so delicious I can’t stop at one and end up feeling like a glutton!

The four days off at Easter makes this place a hive of productivity. It’s not stressful like the Christmas holidays are and the weather is much more conducive to productive work. This Easter, I was determined to finish off all the major knitting for my Tyrolean Cardigan. Good Friday I sat down and knit and knit and knit and knit and faffed on Ravelry and then knit some more. Finally, yesterday afternoon, the second sleeve was cast off, folded it up and put it with the pile of Tyrolean Cardigan parts ready for blocking. At this point, I was feeling rather chuffed that I had finished something within the completely non-binding non-verballised timeframe.

Then I blocked it and marvelled at how nicely the stitches had settled the pieces were pinned out. It was then that something seemed amiss with the front pieces. No amount of pushing and pulling would make them look like mirror images of one another. Turns out one is 5 rows shorter than the other.

Normally I’d try to fudge it and hope that it’d look alright once it was seamed up, but it doesn’t seem possible in this instance because the bobbles draw too much attention to the discrepancy. Luckily my dufferism only occurred at the cast off and decreases for the neckline, so it shouldn’t take too long to fix. To be honest, I’m not sure how I managed to muck it up like that, but by golly it’s a good lesson in carefully checking over measurements before gleefully casting off and loudly proclaiming ‘Finished!’.

I finished embroidering my little Dutch girl last weekend. She’s a bit wonky in places, but I don’t mind. It was my first attempt at embroidery and I’m pleased I stuck with it to completion.

I have another tea towel sitting on my desk, ready to embroider. The set that the Dutch girl is from, Loopsies’ Pretty Maids set 1, also has sweet girls from Bavaria, Russia, Poland and France. I can’t decide which one to choose next!

In other news, my partner had an iPhone/iPod touch program released in the iTunes app store this week. I was very hesitant to mention it here, and to’d and fro’d about whether I should say something. Ultimately, I’m very proud of him and the program he’s created and released, so I shouldn’t be embarrassed to say something on my blog, my personal space. It’s a program I’ve helped with from the word go, and I’ve been using for my knitting projects since December. So, if you are a knitter and an iPhone/iPod touch owner and are looking for a row counter, please consider Knit Counter or its free counterpart, Knit Counter Lite (both links to iTunes).

In both versions, you can have as many counters as you like, link counters together (good for if you’re knitting something with pattern repeats) and put in increase/decrease alerts for projects where you have to increase or decrease periodically (eg. if you’re knitting sleeves). You can have as many projects as you like for Knit Counter, and just a single project for Knit Counter Lite.

I’ve ended up rabbiting (excuse the pun, with Easter and all…) on a lot more than I intended to about the program. Full details can be found on his site, or on iTunes.

There’s still a long way to go, but I feel a lot better since destashing never-to-be-used yarn and ripping out never-to-be-finished projects. It’s so easy to stop once you get that initial sense of achievement, but I have to make sure I stick with it. To that end, for every new knitting project I start and finish, an old one needs to be finished up. This is to make sure there’s a bit of variety in my knitting diet, but also to make sure I keep clearing out stash and unfinished projects.

My new project is a vest for my Dad’s birthday.

I borrowed one of his vests for measurements and am using this pattern (rav link) as a guide. The pattern uses a 5 ply yarn whereas I’m using a 10 ply (stashed Lincraft Balmoral Tweed). The miles and miles of stocking makes for good tv or conversation knitting, as it requires minimal concentration.

I’m not sure if it’s the right motivation, but being able to chew through stash yarn is really making me want to motor through this project. If this enthusiasm keeps up, it should be finished in plenty of time for Dad’s birthday at the end of next month.