Icebox Cookies

Day 138: For want of anything better, today I am going to share with you my mother's recipe for "Icebox Cookies." Please note that these are called "Icebox Cookies" and not "Refrigerator Cookies" because they come from an era when powered refrigerators were not the common household appliance they are today. Foods were kept cold in an icebox which had to be replenished with ice on a schedule determined primarily by local weather conditions. The iceman came 'round to the door like the milkman, bearing his wares for a fee. Our household was one of the modern ones, keeping up with the Joneses with an electric fridge, but the name "Icebox Cookies" was destined for posterity. The dough, chilled so it can be sliced easily, makes these cookies simple to prepare. The mapleine gives them a unique taste, so close your cookbook on the "refrigerator cookie" page and try these instead.

3 cups sifted flour
3 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1 cup shortening
1 1/4 cup dark brown sugar
2 eggs
1/2 tsp. mapleine
1/2 tsp. vanilla
1/2 cup walnut or pecan pieces

Cream the shortening with the brown sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs, mapleine and vanilla. Sift flour with baking powder and salt. Add flour mix to moist ingredients and combine thoroughly. Add nut pieces if desired (pecans are my favourite for this). Divide dough into two parts and roll each into a log. Wrap each log in wax paper and chill in the icebox/fridge for at least four hours or overnight. Preheat oven to 400 F. Slice dough into thin rounds (a little thinner than 1/4"). Place on ungreased baking sheets and bake for 10 minutes or until the edges start to brown slightly. These are a crisp, yet tender cookie, and dunkable if you wish.

Varied Thrush

Day 137: This morning, I have a flush of thrush, probably half a dozen who dart quickly out from the sheltering branches of the contorted filbert to grab seed scattered by the other birds, and then back again before I can train the lens on them. Like the Towhees, they seem to prefer feeding on the ground, at least when there is snow. Also like Towhees, they search for food by digging their front talons into leaf litter or soil and then hopping backwards to turn it up, sometimes using their beaks to assist in moving larger leaf debris. Peculiar to the western states from Alaska to southern California, Ixoreus naevius is alone in its genus. The first half of the binomial ("Ixoreus") means "mistletoe," and refers to the fact that Varied Thrush eat the berries of that plant.

Snow Birds

Day 136: The term "snow birds" has been a source of confusion for me for many years because when I first heard it, the speaker was referring to the group of people who head south for the winter. Some years later, I heard it applied to the skiers who flock to the slopes and lodges, indeed quite the opposite of the initial definition I had learned. That said, I'm sure you will agree with my definition of "snow birds" upon seeing these images. These four species (Dark-eyed Junco, Spotted Towhee, Steller's Jay and Black-capped Chickadee) are among the most common in my yard when the white stuff is on the ground. And yes, that one curved twig is by far the most popular perch. If the weather forecast can be believed, we're due for more snow every day for the next week. Have fun, you snow birds!

Picking Mushrooms

Day 135: I've been picking mushrooms without setting a foot outside! "Pick" in weaving terminology refers to one pass of the shuttle, and of course that's the context here. Since I was still trying to work my way through a pile of red thrums, Amanita muscaria was a good candidate for using them up. I tried to be as botanically correct as krokbragd limitations would allow, and although I wasn't able to depict the annulus without the stipe being too tall, I did include the volva (cup) which is characteristic of Amanitas in general. After getting these off the inkle, I warped up with a generic "little brown mushroom" somewhat suggestive of a Boleta. The red thrums are history now, but I have eight yards of warp measured to be hung on the bonker as my next project, hundreds of little Amanitas anxious to erupt.

Where Do Jeans Go When They Die?

Day 134: A week or two ago, I took a sorting fit and after cleaning out my t-shirt drawer of all the shirts with frayed necklines and small holes, I cut the usable fabric into 1" strips for rag rugs. However, when I opened the box labelled "rug strips," I discovered it was almost full. A full box is unforgiveable. It was time to recycle some of the material into rugs.

Now I like a heavy, stay-in-place rug in front of my kitchen sink or as a bath mat. Handwoven rag rugs are ideal for the purpose (the store-bought ones are limp and wrinkle up under foot). The rug strip box contained several gallon Zip-locs of prepared strips, including two bags of denim bits, more than enough for a couple of rugs. There was only one problem: nowhere to set up the table loom, which is my preferred loom for rug weaving. After serious consideration of the options, I moved my sewing machine back out to the kitchen where it can live under the table until called upon, and set up the table loom on the desk in the Loom Room, which now truly lives up to its name, occupied as it is by the floor loom, the table loom and two rigid heddle looms currently not in service. I threw all the denim strips into a big heap, mixed them up good, and now I'm drawing them out one by one to weave into rugs. I warped for three, two of which will be denim. The third will probably use up some of those cut-up t-shirts. This is where old jeans and t-shirts go when they die, folks!

Oh, Canada!

Day 133: When a Canadian friend saw my krokbragd rangers design, she said, "Classic Mountie outline. Taller boots." The suggestion immediately appealed to me. The RCMP uniform is arguably the most recognizable in the world with its belted red serge jacket, high riding boots and Stetson hat. The jodhpurs had to give way to design feasibility, but that was a small sacrifice and easily overlooked. I already had "sample" lengths of red warp left over from a previous design failure, and although it meant tying a lot of ends I wouldn't have needed to tie if I'd measured the warp directly from the cone, it was a good way to put them to use. Two Mounties in, I said, "Oh, they're adorable!" Having this design on the inkle and sheep on the bonker gave me the opportunity to run a different kind of experiment. Careful scientific analysis shows that over five minutes, four times as many passes can be made on the bonker as on the inkle.

Grumpy Doves

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Day 132: Although Mourning Doves are capable of entering a state of torpor similar to that exhibited by overwintering hummingbirds, their circulatory system is not as well-developed as that seen in many other non-migratory birds. Consequently, Mourning Doves are more likely to lose toes to frostbite. One hypothesis suggests that this susceptibility may be a by-product of the birds' expanding range. The species' physiology has not yet adapted to the colder northern climates. Mine are certainly not happy with this morning's snow. They have been sitting in groups on the fence and phone lines, heads pulled down between their shoulders and feathers fluffed out to trap body heat. Nighttime temperatures are forecast to drop into the low teens this week, making it rough on the pigeon-toed members of my yard flock.