The Shades of Gray

  Dreary, damp, sloppy wet, cold...you get the picture!

We have been inundated by the wet stuff this weekend.  It's not over yet.  The creeks are beginning to overflow their banks.  It's a miserable time to travel.

But travel we did.  Not that far in miles, but a cultural world away.  Our friends Chuck and Willa went with us to Harrisburg, PA to the Asia Mall.  This is a small strip mall featuring all Asian businesses, including several restaurants, a gift shop, a video store, a nail and beauty supply store and a large Asian grocery.

We had a lovely lunch at the Thai restaurant.
Chuck and Willa are studying the menu trying to make some serious decisions.

For appetizers they chose a chicken satay with peanut sauce and some spring rolls.

I chose several appetizers instead of getting an entree.  The spring rolls were delicious.  The little round dumplings that look like pot stickers were quite yummy.  The tofu would have been rather bland without the peanutty sauce.

Zip ordered chicken with vegetables in a sweet and sour sauce.

I thought Willa's eggplant dish was the best!  And look at the colors!  Love that purple eggplant with the green and orange and the sauce was to die for.

We decided to pass on the dessert and go to the bakery for take-home treats.
I've had the fruit turnovers on a previous visit.  They are wonderful!  I like to live dangerously and get some totally unfamiliar pastries like the yucca dessert that looks like custard pie.  They also have some savory meat and rice pies that are wrapped in banana (or plantain) leaves.  All are interesting and good.

The grocery is one of the largest Asian food stores in the area.  It's one of my favorite places to stock up on cooking supplies.

They have a huge selection of canned goods, sauces of every kind, candies, cookies, teas, fresh vegetables and noodles.  Oodles of noodles!

And there's fish.  Dried, frozen, pickled and fresh fish swimming around in large tanks.  They will butcher them right on the spot to your specifications.

We managed to make a dreary day into an enjoyable outing!

Now we are home with the woodstove warming our chilly bones. 
Zip is strumming away on the guitar and I am planning to do some knitting.  I have one sleeve on my sweater almost dome.  This is the cardigan that I'm doing with some other ladies from the Knitting at Large blog.

  So far it's been fun and fairly easy.  I wonder if I have the skills to manipulate those intricate cables.

The book is called Knitting Plus (by Lisa Shroyer) and is an excellent collection of sweaters especially designed for the larger woman.

The pattern we are knitting is by Kathy Zimmerman who is a designer who has a shop in Ligonier, PA.  I hope one of these days to get out there.  I hear it's a fantastic place.  It will be a lovely drive when the warmer weather arrives.