Rainforest

Last Friday Sarah and I ran off to Costa Rica. It's a trip for work, but we flew down early and squeezed in a few days of fun in the sun rainforest.

With only 48 hours to burn, we decided splurge on one of Costa Rica's eco-lodges for the first day. It was a great decision for our situation. Our schedule was packed, from the the night hikes to the early morning bird walks and afternoon tram rides through the canopy. We had a private guide, Leo, that accompanied us on every adventure into the forest, naming plants, describing the symbiotic relationships between plants and animals, and of course pointing out the poisonous snakes as we passed.

It's rare to see a tree in the rainforest without moss and epiphytes growing on its bark. This weight can be dangerous for the trees because it makes them more vulnerable to falling over in the wind. But the tree above? It's bark remains free from growth because it contains nutrients that are beneficial to red squirrels. The squirrels scrape off bits of bark and in doing so keep the tree clean.

Snakes? We saw pit vipers a-plenty. The two snakes above are actually the same species, but they come in three different colors ~ green, brown, and yellow. The little green guy was perched on that leaf outside our cabin for the first day, letting us check in with him whenever we passed.

And it wouldn't be a rainforest without ants. There were army ants, leaf-cutter ants {our faves!}, and then there was this little ant colony that was made of mud on the underside of a palm leaf.

The lodge had a butterfly house. We peaked our head in one morning to see these guys feeding on bananas.

Near the back of the house, cocoons are hanging as the larva matures.

We were lucky enough to stop in the house later in the day just as three butterflies were drying their wings before their first flight. The blur in the photo below was a camera shy butterfly that decided to take off as the shutter closed.

The reserve was filled with a maze of trails that took you into the thick of the jungle. But remember, only a fraction of the rainforest species stay near the forest floor; the canopy is a different ecosystem with its own mix of life. The reserve's aerial tram took us into the mid and upper layers of the canopy for a closer look.


The tram was the brainchild of a US scientist that wanted a non-invasive way to study the upper canopy. In the early days of this research, scientists would wait for trees to fall before they could study was was living and growing up their. Unfortunately within a day or two of falling, organisms on the tree were already making their way back into the canopy, making the precision of this work difficult.

The tram was built using low-impact techniques. All materials {except for the large support poles} were transported into the rainforest on foot or by hanging cables so that the weight of the materials would not disturb the forest floor. The poles holding up the tram were installed by helicopter so that they would not have to clear a path through the forest.


This is the rainy season in Costa Rica. Of course, it's not raining all the time. Usually just one or two showers a day. It's enough to keep most tourists at bay, but here's a little secret ~ the flights are amazingly cheap, the hotels have openings, and sometimes, you're lucky enough to be the only guests... that was our situation at the lodge. We had the whole place to ourselves, and it definitely added to the secluded experience. Of course it is funny when you're the only two in the dining area...

The soils in the rainforest are extremely shallow. Between the high level of rainfall and heat, organic matter breaks down quickly and the nutrients are washed away. This creates intense competition for nutrients, and causes the trees to produce a shallow and relatively small root system. There is also competition for sunlight, so trees grow tall and straight relatively quickly. Between the shallow roots and fast growth, the trees are not very stable. Some species use buttresses to increase their stability.


Many of the bright colored plant parts that appear as flowers are actually leaves or bracts. Leo told us that the common name for the plant below is the chicken feather plant.


And that, minus the three-toed sloth that we saw (!), was how we spent our daylight hours in the rainforest.

A weekend spent outside ~

Saturday

Sunday

Friday Links

Finally, the switch was flipped, and we're excited to start cooking up some fall dishes.

Sarah baked a wheat-free sweet potato pie {link soon to be added!}.

Guests were coming for breakfast on Tuesday, so we baked this almond poppy seed bread {the recipe makes two, so you can give away or freeze one!}, and this apple buckle. Have you ever baked a buckle? They are like a fruit-filled coffee cake. Perfectly moist with a crumbly, nutty topping. So easy to bake the night before and have ready for guests. They recommended serving that one with sweetened sour cream, but a dollop of plain yogurt works well too.

Working our way through the sweet potatoes, I made some curried lentils and sweet potatoes on Wednesday. This we have been eating with a dollop of sour cream.

Next week? We're thinking about apple crisp, some pumpkin {squash} risotto, and the swiss chard and sweet potato gratin {we have a lot of sweet potatoes!}.

The photo at the top of this list? It's the most delicious quiche we've cooked up in a while :: mushroom, leek, and arugula! I sautéd the leeks and mushrooms in some butter until the leeks were translucent and the mushrooms cooked down to my liking. The arugula was chopped up and added it to my milk, egg, and cheese mixture {I use about four eggs, 1/2 cup of shredded cheddar cheese and about two cups of milk?}. The mushrooms and leeks were added to the pie crust first, then I poured the milk mixture over it and topped it with another 1/2 cup of shredded cheddar. And yes, I cheated with the store-bought crust. That's what happens when you have a last-minute idea that's too good to ignore on your way home from work.

Are you filling up on sweet potatoes and apples too?

Fuse Update

I finished this sweater in April, and then it went in the closet until this week when there was a definite fall chill in the air. So after a full day of wear, I thought it was worthy of a little update.

As I mentioned in the first post, the drape of the front panels is a bit funky, but as Flossie pointed out, it's likely the result of blocking it flat rather than on a dress form. So, that's something that can easily be remedied once I borrow that dress form :-).

Lucky for vest-loving me, between the nice big/doubled cowl neck and the fitted sleeves, this sweater perfect for vest wearing. There's no need for a scarf, and there's no extra sleeve fabric around the shoulders that would bunch up and make it uncomfortable.

Unfortunately, I realized yesterday that it is getting too dark too quickly for our long after-work hikes... and photo-shoots. Not the best photos. And do you see the ghost in the photo below? That's our best distance shot.

Finally, it's teaberry season! If it's dark and we're still not back from our hike, don't worry about us ~ we're just competing with the bears to gobble up the berries.

Sweet Potato Harvest

Saturday Sarah and I woke up early to drive out to our CSA farm and help with the sweet potato harvest. It's not often that we're up and out early enough to drive through the fog in the valleys or see the dew on the spiderwebs.


At the farm we got to meet the Sally and Polly, the horses that pulled the harvester through the field. As they passed, the soil was turned and the sweet potatoes were brought to the surface for us to sort.

The potatoes were sorted into piles of unblemished "firsts" and blemished "seconds". The seconds were broken, nibbled on by mice, or had gashes from the harvester. Once the seconds are cured {left out in the sun to dry a bit}, they will be as good as the firsts and nothing will go to waste.

After a couple hours of work, we all sat in the field and ate a few baked sweet potatoes before bringing home half a bushel... and now we're planning a week of sweet potato meals!

Stasis!

Seeing that dirty carpet at the top of the blog is all the motivation I need to post again. How about something easier on the eyes?

Just in time for fall it's Stasis! The pattern's from one of the awesome Brooklyn Tweed collections. It's written using the Loft yarn, which is a bit pricey, but sosososososo so perfect and worth the investment for a sweater that I hope to have around for years.

I used their barn owl {tan} and old world colors {blue with flecks of reds}.

I'm often substituting yarns, which can sometimes be a mind bender when you have to adjust the number of stitches or rows to get the right size, so it's really nice to use the yarn called for a just blindly follow the pattern {almost}.

My only adjustments to the pattern were to knit the sleeves and body a few inches longer than suggests. As my physics teacher pointed out in 10th grade, I have a low center of gravity {shorter legs and a longer torso than average}, which he said made me a good player on the soccer field. With that tidbit, I find that I'm always knitting patterns longer than written to cover my long bits.

This was my first time knitting stranded color-work for a sweater, and I found the instructions in this pattern really helpful. I followed all of their needle guidelines {using a larger size for the color-work portion}, and I was mindful to keep things in that area loose.

The sweater's mainly knit on size three needles, which seems crazy small for a whole sweater, but it's a nice change of pace to produce a thinner sweater that still warm. And since there's no design or pattern work occurring in the torso, it's really easy to zip through a lot of length in a sitting. I called this my Tour de France and Olympic sweater, because the long plain knitting complimented evenings in front of the TV.

And call me crazy, but I want to keep the size three needles out and start on another one right away!

Ack.

A humble hi from the house with {previously} dirty carpets {we bought a steam cleaner and Sarah left us a message}.

It's been a while. I think we got caught up in the largest case of end-of-summer doldrums that ever existed. We've been lazing around, taking too many naps, eating out too often, and generally trying to avoid the start of the school year and regular schedules. But it's here, so we're setting our sights on fall with it's crisp weather, apple picking, and big pots of soup.

Goodbye to summer with it's crazy bugs, outdoor concerts, and mushroom-covered forests.

Next time :: a new sweater