A Bit of Reading and a New Purse

There will never, ever be another purse like this one - at least not in my future.  I'm afraid I bit off a bit more than I could comfortably chew with this design. Recessed zipper, curved bottom, curved top, internal zippered pocket - simply too many elements in one bag. If I'd only made the top perfectly straight across everything would have been fine. It was that curve along the zipper line that threw the lining off and made me crazy.

I like lots of pocket in my bags. This one has a nice, large one on the outside, plus three smaller pockets and that zippered one on the inside. 

See that upward curve at the outside edges where the lining meets the black zipper. Essential, but such a pain,

A peek at the inside lining under construction.

I've read two excellent historical fiction books during the past two weeks, and I'm just getting into another. I'd been on a waiting list at the library for all three, and they all arrived at once. Three war stories in a row, but each one so very good! I've enjoyed the gift of several lovely late nights curled up in my reading chair followed by more than one sleepy morning. 

The Latest Reading: 

"The Nightingale" by Kristin Hannah.  This was set France during the WWII occupation by Germany. Like "The Winter Garden' by the same author, it's a story of two sisters separated by age, temperament, and a broken family. In "The Nightingale", the older sister's husband is a French soldier, and she is trying to keep her daughter and herself safe and alive during the occupation.  The younger sister joins the French Resistance and takes enormous risks to defy the Nazis.

"Orhan's Inheritance" by Aline Ohanesian. This is an account of the lesser known genocide - the murder of thousands of Armenians living in the Ottoman Empire during WWI. This year is the 100th anniversary of that event. It's a beautifully written and very moving story that moves back and forth between the years of WWI and the 1990's.

"All the Light We Cannot See" by Anthony Doerr is the book I have just begun reading. So far, I've been very impressed with the author's wonderful use of language and the development of the two main characters, a blind French girl and a young German soldier.

We're enjoying another gorgeous 
autumn weekend on the prairie.

I hope your week is filled with beauty and wonder.

A "First Christmas" Wall Hanging and a Few Lessons

fIt's been a year of exploring new ideas and experimentation. The latest "first" is finally complete.

"First Christmas", 17" x 23 1/2"

It seems like I've been working on this project for months, and in some ways I have been.

Last year, on one our quilt shop hops, we happened upon some stained glass quilts that were different from any I'd seen before. Making and working with the narrow bias tape needed for curved shapes on stained glass quilts is a daunting prospect that scares many on us away from these projects. The curved and detailed shapes of these quilts, however, were outlined with ready made fusible 1/4" bias tape. The seed for this wall hanging was planted that day. And it grew and grew.

I spent most of my spare time in September working on the design for this quilt and locating the right fabrics. The actual construction went surprisingly fast, but, oh my goodness, did I wind up doing things the hard way! It was a new experience for me, but that's how we learn. Every new step is a lesson, and those missteps become the greatest lessons of all.

New Learning

Lesson 1: Sometimes it's best to forego the nonstick applique pressing sheet and fuse appliques right onto the fabric.

I'd thought that it would be so much easier to center my applique onto the gold background oval if it was all in one piece. Normally that's very true, but lifting a large applique in one piece when it's only held together with thin strips of bias tape is just a wee bit tricky. More than a wee bit, in fact. More like almost impossible.

I've written the pattern to show an alternate, much easier way to get everything nicely centered. It involves folding the gold fabric in quarters and pressing light fold lines to guide the placement. Those folds coordinate with guidelines in the pattern. Next time I'll start out this way.

Lesson 2: A rectangle of fabric with a big hole in the middle doesn't like to lay flat.

I didn't want the dark blue fabric behind the gold to alter its color. I had found a perfect piece of soft, golden yellow batik in my stash, but it was barely large enough for my needs. My local quilt shop didn't have anything similar that I liked, so I was being super careful.

Instead of trimming the blue out from behind the gold when it was attached, I decided to cut the oval out of the blue in the first place and then lay it over the gold. But the blue became totally misshaped when I laid it on my work table with that big hole in the middle. In the end, I adhered it to a muslin foundation with quilt basting spray, then I tucked the yellow behind the blue fabric. The double thickness of fabric was too much, but I couldn't remove the muslin until I'd finished stitching the bias tape down. Again, I've written the pattern with an easier option for construction.

Lesson 3: If I ever make this quilt again, I'll either leave the darker blue decorative free motion stitching off the sleeve or I'll add it in with a machine stitch.

Mary and Joseph lived in an area of the world that has always been known for beautiful embroidery, so I thought it might be appropriate to show a bit of embroidery on Mary's sleeve. I'm afraid my level of skill and a dull needle on my sewing machine didn't allow me to accurately reproduce my vision of the embroidery in free motion quilting. It's just "okay".

Lesson 4: Taking a risk and experimenting with a brand new idea was not a mistake!!

Once again, I find myself promoting a product, but this 1/4" fusible bias tape is really excellent.  It molds easily around even small curves. I was worried about fitting it smoothly around the baby's head, but it worked beautifully with practically no effort at all.

This isn't available in my local quilt shops, but I found it easily on eBay.

Once the tape is fused with a hot iron, it needs to be stitched in place. A straight line of stitching on the edge of the tape looks great, but I chose a machine hemming stitch.

Black thread on black bias tape doesn't show in photos, so here it is on regular yellow bias tape.

Will I make another stained glass quilt? 

I've just ordered two more spools of fusible bias tape, so I am prepared. 

Just in case.

My hubby has decided that this is my "masterpiece". He's such a devoted fan. He's even chosen a special place to hang it so he can admire it every day.  Have to love that man. 

Finishing up a Project and Enjoying a Gorgeous Day

It's a stunning day! The temperature is perfectly autumn, the sky is bright blue and the trees are just beginning to change their color.

No matter how hard I'm trying to finish up my stained glass quilt, I simply couldn't stay indoors all day. I took a bit of time off from hemming and decorated my little front porch seating area for October - nothing fancy, just a few pumpkins to add a bit of color. 

I put the summer chairs away and brought these up from the back patio. Every time I passed by the big walnut tree this little squirrel took time out from his nibbling to scold me. I think he was warning me away from his walnuts. Can you see him hidden there in the shadows?

I didn't do any baking or make any more soup this week, but I did cook up that 20 pound box of tomatoes to freeze. I now have 12 pints of yummy cooking tomatoes in my freezer. I'm tempted to buy another box this Sunday, because I can go through it awfully fast. 

My big turkey roaster was absolutely full! 

If I'm ever going to get this pattern finished, I need to get back to my hem stitching! 

Not far to go now. 

Not far at all to go. 

:)

And then, my grandson dropped by for dinner! 

What a perfect day!

Wishing you a glorious October!!

A Rocking Story and Another Pot of Soup

All afternoon I rode across the prairie, galloping on my trusty steed, chasing down the bad guys and singing off key. I was four-years-old living in the land of make-believe, but in the real world of grownups, the prairie was my Uncle Gail's front porch and the steed was my cousin Tom's old rocking horse with the chipped paint and the scraggly tail. It was the first time I'd met my cousin and the first rocking horse I'd ever seen. I never got over my love of that horse or my admiration for my wonderful big cousin.

From Utah we went on to view the wonders of the Grand Canyon that summer. I know I was there because somewhere downstairs I have a photo, but from that entire trip I only remember Tom and his wonderful rocking horse.

"Let's Rock"

While making this newest pattern, I relived the thrill of the front porch adventure in the form of fabric and thread. I hope you like "Let's Rock" half as much as I do.


Lentil Soup with Curry

This week I made two soups, lentil soup and chili. I must have been in the mood for beans this week - possibly due to my impatience for cooler weather. The chili is a very basic recipe, so I'll share only the lentil soup recipe with you this time. If you don't care for curry, you could use cinnamon or Worcestershire sauce to spice up the lentils.

It started with a pint of mixed, chopped carrots, celery, and onions from Trader Joe. 

Ingredients

• 2 cups chopped carrots, celery, and onions in about equal portions
• 2 T olive oil
• 2 medium potatoes cut in 1/2" cubes
• 3/4 cup lentils
• 15 oz can of chicken broth (I used the last of my frozen homemade chicken broth)
• 3 or 4 cloves garlic
• 1/2 tsp turmeric
• 1 - 2 tsp curry powder
• salt and pepper to taste
• 3 - 5 cups water
• a squeeze of lemon juice (It's easier to add more than to remove too much, so add just a bit at a time, tasting to make sure it's just right for your taste buds.)

1. Lightly sauté the chopped, mixed vegetables and the garlic together in the olive oil.
2. Place all ingredients except the lemon juice into a slow cooker with 3 cups of the water.
3. Cook on high 4 hours, turn setting to low and continue to cook until the lentils and vegetables are tender. Add water as needed.

My freezer is stuffed with soups right now, but I know I'll be adding to the variety as time goes on. I'm missing some basics, like chicken noodle, and I'd like to try some new recipes, too. If you have a favorite, please send it to me and I'll publish it here on my blog. My email: klee2strings@gmail.com

Have a fabulous week! 

Happy stitching, everyone!

Two September Recipes and a Project Photo From a Friend

First things, first. Hannah sent me a photo of her final block for this year's quilt along. Isn't it lovely? The fabrics are so cheerful and bright. Beautiful work!

I haven't done any actual stitching for the past several days, but I've made headway on some ideas. Both are inspired by the upcoming holiday, but I won't tell you much more.  No sneak previews this time around!

One project will be symbolic and very, very different from anything else I've ever made. This will be something that my grandmother would have loved. The other project is inspired by a childhood memory. That one has taken on a mind of it's own. I was going to make a mug rug, but it's turning into something else. Wish I knew where it's going.

The weather has turned cool and autumn-like again for the last couple of days, and it's put me in the mood to cook and bake whatever I can from local September harvests before warm days return for awhile. Today it was soup for lunch and cake for my afternoon snack. 

Veggie Soup

First off, I made a huge pot of vegetable soup. It's one of my usual soup recipes - raid the fridge and throw it in the slow cooker. Most of this went into the freezer in single serving containers. It will keep for several months. My hubby doesn't care much for soup, but thanks to the microwave, I can have instant soup for lunch whenever I like.

This is what went into it this time.

Ingredients:
2 tbsp olive oil
1 medium chopped onion
1 sliced zucchini
1 sliced yellow zucchini
1/2 sweet green pepper, chopped
1/2 sweet red pepper, chopped
4 cloves minced garlic
About 2 cups chopped, cooked tomatoes (fresh or canned)
8 oz canned tomato sauce
15 oz chicken broth (mine was homemade)
1/2 cup frozen corn
1/2 cup frozen baby lima beans (peas, green beans, or other vegetables would work as well)
1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley
2 T chopped fresh basil (dill, rosemary, or thyme can be substituted)
2 - 4 cups water
Salt and pepper to taste

Instructions:
1. Place tomatoes, tomato sauce, chicken broth, garlic, herbs, salt and pepper, and 2 cups of water into the slow cooker. Turn to high.
2. Fry onions in one tablespoon of the olive oil until lightly browned. Add to the slow cooker.
3. Lightly sauté zucchinis and peppers in the remaining tablespoon of oil. Add to the slow cooker.
4. Cook four to six hours, or until vegetables are tender, adding water as needed.
5.  Add the frozen vegetables to pot and cook for another half hour. 
6. Serve.


Apple Cake with Strudel Topping

This is so good - moist and filled with fresh apple goodness. I like it best warm, but it's wonderful chilled as well. I've actually combined two recipes. The cake is a variation of a recipe from King Arthur Flour, and the topping is from an old farm cookbook in my cupboard. The cake will keep for several days refrigerated, but I'm planning to wrap individual pieces in plastic wrap and freeze them in a freezer bag. Not that I have much left to freeze. I wound up sharing almost half of it with my neighbors. The rest, though, will keep for at least a month. 


Strudel Topping

1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup uncooked rolled oats
1/3 cup flour
4 T cold unsalted butter cut into small pieces

1. In a medium size bowl, toss the first three ingredients together with a fork.
2. With you fingertips, blend in the butter pieces until small clumps form and the butter is well incorporated, about 2 minutes.
3. Refrigerate until ready to use.

Cake

2 1/3 cups flour
1 2/3 cups sugar
2 tsp baking soda
3/4 tsp salt
1 1/2 tsp Apple Pie Spice (I used 1 tsp cinnamon, 1/4 tsp cloves, and 1/4 tsp allspice)
2 large eggs
1/2 cup softened butter
4 cups peeled, cored, copped apple
3/4 cups walnut pieces

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Grease and flour a 9" x 13" pan.
2. Mix all of the ingredients except the apples and walnuts together in a large bowl.
3. Beat until well combined. The mixture will be very stiff,  and possibly crumbly.
4. Add the apples and nuts, and mix until the mixture become a thick batter, somewhere between a cookie dough and a brownie batter in consistency.
5. Spread the batter in the pan, smoothing the top with wet fingers.
6. Sprinkle the strudel topping evenly over the top.
7. Bake 45 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. 


Wishing you a super September week!

New Toys, Part 2: Constructing the Styrofoam Wreath.

After two weeks of work, almost 300 photographs, and a ton of fun along the way, the wreath is finished! It turned out exactly as I had envisioned it, and that's the biggest surprise of all.

The photograph looks like it was taken in winter, but it was actually almost 90 degrees and humid out there on my porch.

These little toys are so very versatile! I attached them to a styrofoam wreath with long pins,  but I can see them used in so many different ways. I wish I had time to sew some different uses, but there is only so much time in a day.

These are just a few of my ideas:

• Attach the toys to a ready made evergreen wreath. They would only need some little plastic or metal loops sewn to the back. Bits of wire threaded through the loops would attach nicely to the evergreen branches. 
• Using the same little loops attached up at the top of the ornaments, the little toys would be wonderful tied onto a Christmas tree with pretty bits of ribbon. 
• What about replacing the traditional bow on a package with a cute ornament? 
• Stocking stuffers for older children!
• I'm even visualizing mug rugs or Christmas stockings with fusible web appliques made from the templates

The pattern contains all the details for sewing the ornaments, so I'll focus on preparing the wreath in this blog post.

The Wreath

Any size or shape of styrofoam wreath would be fine for this project.

I started with a plain white 16" styrofoam wreath. I chose one with a flat top rather than one that was rounded. First, I wrapped it in a 2" bias strip from 1/2 yard of green fabric. Then I used an entire roll of sheer 2 1/2" green ribbon to wrap over the cotton.

 Wire based garland sections with holly, pinecones and evergreen came next.

I placed these on the wreath and used 5/8" sheer green ribbon tied on the back side of the wreath to hold these pieces in place The ribbon allows enough flexibility to allow positions to be altered here and there as the ornaments are attached.

I added some purchased pinecone decorations and a few small glass balls to lend color and variety to the arrangement. 

The toys and additional glass ball ornaments were added last. Long pins with pearl heads worked beautifully! I hooked them into the back side of the toys and then poked them into the wreath. 

In only one week, fall will officially arrive.  

May your last week of summer be wonderful!

New Toys!! Part 1

I worked almost exclusively on this one project this past week. My sewing room is a disaster, but I'm so excited that the wreath of little stuffed toys is absolutely finished!

There are fourteen stitched pieces in all. Two stars, two hearts, two tiny presents, a pair of mittens, a pair of candy canes, one gingerbread boy, one snowman, a stocking, and Rudolph.

The pattern for all the stuffed toys will come out next week, and I'll show you more about how I made this in next week's blog. 

This weekend I plan to enjoy our first couple of autumn-like days. For the first time since June I'll turn on the oven and bake up a couple of batches of goodies. We'll have zucchini bread, peach cobbler, and blueberry muffins by Sunday. Summer isn't completely gone, but my freezer will be full of homemade snacks and desserts. 

Have a beautiful weekend!!

A Burst of Sun in Fabric

Inspiration can come from anything. Or anyone. The trigger for the Sunburst Table Topper came from the planting done by one of my neighbors. The bright golds and orange colors are absolutely perfect as summer draws to a close.

Sunburst Table Topper 

I wouldn't have thought of this design at all if the neighbor hadn't planted a long, long row of sunflowers right next to the sidewalk. They grew and they grew until they were well over 10 feet high and topped by huge golden blossoms with dark brown centers. Every day as I've walked by I been compelled to stop and see what these fascinating plants have been up to. The golden petals have faded and are now dropping as the seeds ripen into black gems.

There was also a need for a small table topper. This one is only 18" in diameter. There's a little round cabinet in our family room that desperately needs a new topper. A Christmas topper has been sitting on it all summer because I have nothing else the right size. Spilled water soaked into it sometime during the winter and ruined the wood. It went undiscovered for several days, but that by the time I found it permanent damage had been done. I'm a bit tired of looking at poinsettias for months on end, so a new topper was definitely in order. Poinsettias will get their turn again soon enough.

As long as I was making something new, I chose to work on some brand new techniques. I'm always up for a challenge, and I've never made Dresden plate blocks. My experience with hexagons is limited as well, but the combination of those two patterns seemed perfect for my little burst of sunshine. I had a lot to learn!

I had originally thought to make this as the top portion of a square or octagonal block. Then I discovered that the pointed ends of the Dresden plate sections are made with the edges already turned under and completely finished! This wouldn't need to go onto another piece of fabric for background. Nice!

I'm getting ahead of myself just a bit, though. Let's start with the hexies. Lovely hexies, pretty hexies. Must they be stitched together by hand? It's so tedious! So I got out my handy dandy invisible polyester thread and set my machine for a very short, very narrow zigzag stitch.

Then I pushed those little basted hexies tightly together side by side and connected them the easy way! This was fun! In on the left, in on the right and done.

I liked this so much that I skipped the hand applique, too. I connected the hexies to the inner Dresden plate in the same way I'd connected them to each other. Then I used the technique one more time to sew the inner Dresden plate to the outer one. Not totally invisible, but definitely close. A word of warning, though. If you do this, make sure you get polyester, not nylon invisible thread!

I may have made a mistake in the cutting of the pieces. I should probably have cut the outer Dresden a few inches up from the bottom of the template. As it is, there is some fabric wasted when the excess is trimmed off. I decided to leave it like that, though, because the centers of the two Dresden plates line up perfectly and it's much easier to center the inner ring on the outer one. 

Now we get to the finishing of the table topper. This is where I was getting ahead of myself. In order to have those points at the outside of the topper I needed to make some alterations in how the batting and backing were attached. 

The batting had to be cut smaller than the quilt top.

The backing was trimmed just 1/4" larger than the quilt top all the way around and the inner points were clipped back to the batting. 

Unfortunately, not all hand stitching was eliminated. But, it seemed like a great tradeoff. Stitching around the outside was nothing at all compared to all the applique I might have done by hand!

Finished!

Wishing you many golden days as the weather grows cooler. 

Just Playing Around

This really has been a week of playtime.

Yesterday was my birthday and I spent part of the day at school giving book talks to three classes of fifth graders. It's one of my favorite things to do, and made for a lovely birthday activity. The children all sang "Happy Birthday" for me, and my teacher friends gave me a lovely vase of cut flowers - which I accidentally left in the classroom! I'll run back today to pick it up. 

The kiddos wanted to know how old I am. I usually just answer, saying that I'm too old to care if people know my age, but the truth is that I've never quite grasped why that was an issue with some folks. I told them and enjoyed watching their mouths drop in surprise. Anything over 30 seems ancient to them. "You're older than my grandmother!" one child gasped. I used to tell my students that I was born the year after the Pearl Harbor attack so they could do some research and figure it out for themselves. In actuality, I was born almost nine months to the day after that event. Now, what should I make of that tidbit?

I actually have done a bit of sewing this week. Not much, but some.

The Sunburst table topper is almost finished. I hadn't worked with Dresden plates before, and they are so popular right now. It was past time to get on board and learn the ins and outs of something new, so I doubled them and put two in one design. Just for good measure, I threw in some hexis. May as well do it all in one piece, don't you think? Along the way, I most definitely learned a lesson or two! More about that later when I have the table topper completely finished. 

Here it is as it was a few days ago. 

I've been fiddling with Christmas ornaments, too. As I said, I'm just playing around right now. Something on Pinterest caught my eye and I was off.  As always. 

As for Pinterest - my goodness! I went through my boards, rearranged lots of stuff, and deleted over a thousand pins. Then I got to the cookies and candies board. Big mistake! I should have just deleted the whole board without looking! This was the result.  We used to make similar little stovetop goodies when I was a teenager. I cooked them one day, but had to give them all away to the neighborhood children the next day. Too dangerous!

Yum!! Cocoa, milk, butter, peanut butter, vanilla, and oats.  

The next day my sweet son brought me chocolate covered cranberries. Sometimes a person just can't win. I can almost see the pounds adding on. 

Back to the sewing brainstorm from Pinterest: If you've been following my facebook page, you may already know that a new batch of little stuffed ornaments will be coming soon. I'm just getting started, and this project is taking me waaaay back to when I was eight or nine years old. I tried to make little stuffed toys by hand. I hadn't quite grasped the idea that seams take up space, so they didn't come out right. It didn't really matter. Lopsided with stuffing pushing out from gaps in the seams and all, I loved them anyway.  Thank goodness it's working a whole lot better now than it did on the first go-round.

What next? A snowman? Hearts? Hmm...

 Happy September, everyone!