Can it drizzle snow?

I just looked outside and was surprised to see it was snowing. Our thermometer says 8 degrees right now. Outside. Inside it says 61. I would crank the heat, but yesterday The Grand Lunar mentioned how high our heating bill has been. Yiiiiikes. So I've decided to wear my fleecy sweater thingie and blankets, if I need to. 60 always seems so warm in the late spring. The kids are begging for short sleeves and no jackets. Why is 60 degrees so much colder in the winter?

So the snow coming down is falling almost straight down, small steady flakes. If it were rain, it would look like a steady drizzle. I haven't seen snow drizzle before, but it looks like that's what it's doing.

My poor birds are out of food, thanks to the squirrels. Apparently mine developed a taste for cayenne; the recommended spicy additive to the bird seed only seemed to deter them for the first half of the first batch. All that's left out there is thistle, I'm guessing that's because it's harder to get out of the feeder. But 8 degrees and snowing doesn't bode well for them. I keep waiting for better weather to refill it. I like being able to see the birds (and squirrels) out my computer room windows, but it means I have to tramp all the way around the house in the snow to refill it. Isn't that so very sad?

We've been having a lot of starlings visit recently. I'm not fond of starlings due to a few bad experiences in our old house. They're eating the buckthorn berries, pretty much picked the trees clean. I'm not sure if that's good or bad, I read somewhere that buckthorn berries aren't very healthy for birds. But then again, if they're obnoxious birds, maybe that's not so bad, after all? Although I hope they left enough for the cedar waxwings who come in the spring and get drunk on the rotting berries. They're always nice to see. Well, except for the ill behaved inebriated bird behavior and all. Just joking, I've never seen them behave too badly. They've never hazed each other or mooned us, anyway.

I made pancakes today. I've never been a great pancake chef, but making low fat vegan pancakes always makes me nervous, I've made some major flops. But today I bravely tried again, using Susan Voisin's recipe. The only changes I made were to multiply the recipe by 3 (I am feeding a crowd, after all), reduce the salt (as we're trying to limit sodium), and ... um ... oh yeah, I used 1 T. flax seed, ground, instead of the Ener-G egg replacer. I used King Arthur White Whole Wheat and a little (oh yeah, that's four changes, LOL) whizzed oats for a bit of the flour. A scant cup of oats, instead of the last 3/4 cup flour.

I was disappointed in my non-stick griddle, though. My first batch I tried with no oil at all, and they stuck and scrunched something awful, one flopped all apart into a gooey mass. What's the point of a non-stick surface if you still have to grease it? And the cooking spray always leaves gummy residue on non-stick and ruins it. What's that about? So ... I used a little butter. Yes, real non-vegan butter. Only a little. And I used it for the kids' batches, and didn't re-grease the last ones that I'm saving for The Grand Lunar. But when the butter's gone, it's gone, and I'll have to use a little oil, I guess.

Anyway, to wrap up this overly-long ramble, the kids liked them! They really liked them! Thanks Susan V. ! I think I'll just stick to this recipe now, not try any others, if I've got a whole grain, no added fat pancake recipe that they like. BusyHSMom, didn't you once say you had a good whole grain pancake recipe? Is it low fat vegan, too?

OH! Doh! I almost forgot to tell you knitty folk out there! I tried my hand at double-knitting. Iliacat, Moogie, and I had been discussing how it might or might not be done, and I decided just to try it. I didn't do a great job, I found it very hard to keep the tension on two yarns, and I'm pretty sure I got them twisted wrongly a few times and caught a stitch on the wrong side of what I was doing, but overall I got the idea. Here's the pix of my not too clever, not too great sample. A good learning piece, if nothing else:

I have a Valentine's gift I'm working on - ahem - planning to start. When I get that done I have given myself permission to buy bamboo dpns and green yarn and learn to make me some socks. That's the plan, anyway.