{Yarn Along} Which Project?

I pulled out the Mock Croc Socks, which I'd set aside halfway through the heel flap. That shouldn't be a problem, but after twenty minutes I was feeling tortured. So I pulled out the squid and spent a couple of hours knitting plain stockinette rounds. Not sure why, but wrestling the squid was a lot more fun. And I've got the latest pair of socks for when Hubby is home because I just can't bring myself to explain why I'm knitting a giant squid. 

The next two pairs of socks are chosen. This yarn's been in my stash for years, but I couldn't lay my hands on it until this week because it was hiding in forgotten knitting bags. I'm really loving my yarn stash these days. Sooner or later, a pretty new colorway will catch my eye -- and I'll totally be able to justify it because this year I'm making a much needed dent! 

Kicked to the Curb has been out for a a while now, but I just got the chance to buy a copy and read it.(Mostly because the author, Joanna Campbell Slan is guest posting for me tomorrow and I wanted to be able to say something about the book!)  I've been wanting to read this one ever since she started posting pictures of her dollhouse miniatures on her facebook page and motivated me to pull my own dollhouse furniture out of the attic.  A new character in the series makes miniatures, but they aren't a major element in the plot. The mystery deals with the theft of some historic photographs that Cara Mia is displaying at The Treasure Chest and a body found in the trunk of a car abandoned behind the Gas E. Bait across the street. It's a fun series, and I can't wait for the next book.

For more pretty knitting projects to drool over, check out On the Needles at Patchwork Times.

Quiltville Challenge Update

It's starting to look like I'll meet Jo's challenge and have a Quiltville quilt finished in time for the reveal. 

I counted. And I counted again. And I'm still 22 bowties short. Frustrated isn't really the word for it, not when I didn't find out that there was a problem until I'd assembled the bowties into 12" blocks.

Here are the options I can see --

1) Make 22 more bowties and take apart a bunch of the blocks to scatter the colors evenly through the quilt.

2) Make 22 more bowties and carefully choose the fabrics so that they'll be varied enough not to look weird.

3) Make 2 more bowties and have a finished quilt that's six inches narrower than the original plan.

The first two options would never happen, so I'm going with the third. Or, I suppose, I could make enough bowties to make the quilt a lot bigger and then it would all blend together.

I'm going to go for a finished, slightly smaller than planned, quilt.

The Garden Party is Coming Together

Can I admit something? I really have no urge to finish this project anytime soon, because I'm having way too much fun with it. When I do decide I've got enough blocks, I'll lose my excuse for embroidering all of these crazy little patterns. Or not. There are plenty of ideas on Pinterest for using odd bits of vintage embroidery. 

I've added a lot of blocks since the last time I laid them out and took a picture. At least two -- Number Seven and the Market Day bird -- were nowhere to be found when I did this layout.  The donkey turned up as soon as I had the rest of the blocks stacked up.  The bird will make an appearance. If she doesn't, I just might make another one because I love the block that much!

This post is linked to Design Wall Monday.

What is YOUR best work?

In last Thursday's post, I wrote about my Great Grandma and a newspaper article that called her apple head dolls her best work. Ever since, I've been wondering what set of standards you use to pick someone's best work.  Is it the hardest one, the one that's the most technically perfect, or the one with the most pieces?

Ten years ago, I would have said without hesitation that this was my best work. I've stitched other larger cross-stich designs, but this one is framed and was the easiest one to grab and photograph. The pattern, in case anyone is interested, is Ironwork Gate by Graphs by Barbara & Cheryl.

I've made quilts that I absolutely love, lots of them. Over time, quilts that were my absolute best work have been replaced by others. Some of those "best quilts" have been completely forgotten until I went to pull something else out of a closet and saw them again. My best quilt tends to be whatever I've just finished.

And then there are a few things that I just can't explain. Like my Endpaper Mitts. It's hard to see the colorwork in this picture, but it's there. And I got gauge, so they fit. But today I couldn't do colorwork to save my life. This is my one and only success.

And there are the lace shawls. A few of those could definitely qualify as "best work."

I think that there's some luck involved with what turns out to be our best work once all is said and done. Maybe it's just what survives the years, what our loved ones still like after all that time, and what conjures up the best memories.  So what's your best work?  Weekly Stash Report  Fabric Used this Week: 0 yards Fabric Used year to Date: 17 1/2 yards Added this Week: 0 yards Added Year to Date: 102 3/4 yards Net Added for 2014: 85 1/4 yards Yarn Used this Week:  0 yards Yarn Used year to Date: 6675 yards Yarn Added this Week: 0 yards Yarn Added Year to Date: 4210 yards Net Used for 2014: 2465 yards
This post is linked to Patchwork Times.

Running Away With the Spoon

This must not be the same spoon that the dish ran away with. Or maybe it is. He does look kind of annoyed with her, doesn't he?

Let's Make Baby Quilts! {11/7/14}

Let's Make Baby Quilts Linky Party Rules: 
Link directly to your post or specific Flickr photo. Your post can be about a baby quilt that's finished, or in progress, or you can be writing about what you have planned,  as long as it's about baby quilts. You're welcome to link to baby quilt posts that aren't brand new, but please don't submit the same post or picture more than once. I'd love it if you linked back to my site, either with a text link or the Let's Make Baby Quilts! button.

Her Best Work

I've posted a lot about my Great Grandma Walters and the things she made.  

If my math is right, this photo and the accompanying article about Grandma and her apple dolls  ran in the local paper in 1976. I would have been about four years old.

"A glass display case houses some of her best work, a family of apple-head dolls."

THAT is the case I've been telling you about -- in this post, and this one and probably a few others. Except a case doesn't describe it -- it was a built in hutch with glass doors and I can't tell you how much I wish that someone had taken a picture of it somewhere along the line, because I'd love to compare my memories with what what really in there.

The doll in Grandma's right hand? Here she is almost forty years later:

Look at her little hand beaded necklace. And the gloves. They're masking tape. Masking tape! We fuss about getting the right supplies for our projects, or hear how we need this that or the other thing. And Grandma was using masking tape, which I never even noticed until now.

Her shoes, according to the article, are made from bits of an old glove.

The dress was cut "by guess and by golly." I think that might be my new favorite phrase. It totally describes how I work on a lot of my own projects.

I do question whether this is her best work. It wouldn't be my pick. I'd vote for the painting, or the creepy red riding hood doll, or that little ittt-bittty-teeny-tiny crochet doll dress, or maybe one of a dozen other things that haven't made it onto the blog yet. And that's what the family still has, half a century (or more than a century, in the case of the painting) later.

My favorite quote from the article:

"I pick up ideas here and t'other place. I do anything that I fancy. It all keeps me busy."

I want to be like Great Grandma.

{Yarn Along} The Red Book of Primrose House

Those socks I've been complaining about? Now that it's getting wet and cold and I've had to swap my favorite pair of sandals for the tennis shoes I can barely stand, I'm really appreciating having hand-knit socks to wear!



I really liked Pru Parke, the heroine of Garden Plot. In the second Potting Shed Mystery, The Red Book of Primrose House, I loved her.  The transplanted Texan has finally found the job of her dreams as head gardener in charge of restoring the grounds of  an eighteenth century manor house, but the project is plagued by sabotage. One of her workers is found murdered, and Pru is sure the police are following the wrong trail.

I don't have to like a character to enjoy reading about her, but Pru is just neat. She's older than most of the heroines in the cozy mysteries I read, but never makes a point of her age. She definitely never complains. Instead, she's competent and hard-working, which makes her easy to root for. There's also a sweet romantic element to the books that I hope will continue through the series.

I've also been getting caught up with the Hope Street Church Mysteries. The Graves of the Guilty is a little grittier than the previous two books, with Cooper putting herself into more dangerous situations as she investigates a series of murders. The Root of All Evil weaves three unrelated mysteries together into one intriguing storyline.

For more pretty knitting projects to drool over, check out On the Needles at Patchwork Times.

Design Wall Monday - Chocolate Covered Cherries

I'm really liking this quilt, especially now that I've found more brown fabric in my stash. If my counting is right, I should have enough brown and red pieces cut for the entire quilt. 

I really hope my counting is right!

This post is linked to Design Wall Monday at Patchwork Times.

Not Quite What I Was Shopping For

But that's okay. If I can back five quilts for twenty-seven bucks, I'm not going to complain! Especially not since two or three of those quilts are ones that I'm currently working on and actually needed backing for.

We'd gone to the thrift store looking for flannel shirts to finish off the Halloween costumes. I was not looking for fabric. It was the ongoing quest for hot iron transfers that made me detour to that end of the store.

I will never ever understand how thrift stores price things. They had fat quarters and half yard cuts for $1.99 and these pieces, ranging from four to six yards, for $6.99 and $9.99. The biggest piece of yardage was the least expensive one. They're all from Joann's, so it's not a difference in fabric quality.

And, since Teenage Daughter's Halloween costume used up the last of my muslin, I broke down and bought another bolt. Better to have it on this year's numbers than next years, I suppose.

Weekly Stash Report 

Fabric Used this Week: 0 yards
Fabric Used year to Date: 17 1/2 yards
Added this Week: 44 yards
Added Year to Date: 102 3/4 yards
Net Added for 2014: 85 1/4 yards

Yarn Used this Week:  100 yards
Yarn Used year to Date: 6675 yards
Yarn Added this Week: 0 yards
Yarn Added Year to Date: 4210 yards
Net Used for 2014: 2465 yards

Where There's a Will There's a Way

As soon as I finished that pair of dogs with the cross-stitched collars, I knew that I wanted to get to work on this lamp. 

I found the pattern at Value Village and almost passed it up because I didn't like the idea of mixing cross-stitch with my embroidery.  I think the problem was that I hadn't seen it done and couldn't picture the finished results.

The package was still factory sealed. When I opened it up, there was only the faintest trace of transfer ink left on the sheet. I didn't pay much for the pattern, but that wasn't the point. I wanted to stitch that lamp!

I did try using the iron on, but there was just enough ink to wreck a piece of white muslin. Then I copied it as darkly as the printer would do it and traced with the iron on transfer pencil. Because, come Hell or high water, I was going to stitch that lamp!

Now I want to do the jars of mushrooms, but I'm not looking forward to the copying and tracing routine and I seem to have misplaced my special magic pencil.

Let's Make Baby Quilts! {10/31/14}

Let's Make Baby Quilts Linky Party Rules: 
Link directly to your post or specific Flickr photo. Your post can be about a baby quilt that's finished, or in progress, or you can be writing about what you have planned,  as long as it's about baby quilts. You're welcome to link to baby quilt posts that aren't brand new, but please don't submit the same post or picture more than once. I'd love it if you linked back to my site, either with a text link or the Let's Make Baby Quilts! button.

Do YOU have Extra Sensory Perception?

The boys found this at an estate sale last year and I just couldn't say no. Because I'd never seen anything like it and just look at those graphics!

It seems to be complete. Or did when we bought it. I've fished a few cards out from under the couch cushions over the months.

And just in case I was worried that my boys might be experimenting with real psychic abilities...

This post is linked to Vintage Thingie Thursday, Thriftasaurus, Share Your Cup, Ivy and Elephants, We Call it Olde, Savvy Southern Style, Thrifter Maker Fixer, Coastal Charm, Thrifty Life Thursday

{Yarn Along} He doesn't look quite evil enough....

The pattern is Monkey With Miniature Cymbals from Knitmare on Elm Street: 20 Projects that Go Bump in the Night by Hannah Simpson. He's been on my to-knit list for months, one of those projects I'll get around to when I've got the time and am in the right mood. I've chosen yarn from the stash, changed my mind, chosen different yarns...and then with Halloween week just around the corner, I grabbed what I had and cast on.

I wish I'd taken a picture of the disjointed legs and arms and ears and cymbals. It was hard to believe that this was going to come together into anything at all.

This is the first time I've used safety eyes in a stuffed animal. I thought they'd be complicated, but they really aren't, not even wrestling the little post through both layers of knit fabric. I'd planned on using black buttons, because I'm cheap and this is a "from stash" project, but I was at Joann's anyway to buy muslin and  decided to see what they had. I'll be using these again, if only because there are four more pairs left in the package.

While I was cleaning out the sewing room, I unearthed my copy of Skeleton Crew. I've got vivid memories of bring a copy home from the library just after it came out, and reading The Mist in the back of my Dad's car while he was in buying a new prop for the boat. This time around, I only took  time to reread The Monkey and Gramma, but those got me in the mood to reread the rest.

I also read A Haunting Is Brewing: A Haunted Home Renovation and a Witchcraft Mystery Novella. It's a fun, atmospheric Halloween novella that brings together the characters from the Witchcraft and Haunted Home Renovation mystery series. Life-sized dolls coming to life in the attic of the dollmaker's old house? Of course I was going to read that one!

For more pretty knitting projects to drool over, check out On the Needles at Patchwork Times and Work in Progress Wednesdays at Tami's Amis. For more finishes, check out Sew Much Ado, Finish it Up Friday, Can I get a Whoop Whoop?,  and Freedom Fridays, Wonderful at Home, Make it Monday and Inspired Friday.

I Counted

I counted all of the bow ties and figured out that I was a hundred short. Then I found a few more that I'd pieced as leaders and enders and not put away with their friends, and I cut fabric and pieced a few more, and found a few more.

If my math is right -- and that's a big IF -- I need to cut and sew 31 more blocks. But I won't really believe that I have enough until the quilt top is assembled.

I can do this! I'm so glad Jo motivated me to pull these out and set a deadline.

The Art of Eating Through the Zombie Apocalypse {excerpt & giveaway}

When the folks at BenBella Books invited me to participate in their blog hop for The Art of Eating through the Zombie Apocalypse: A Cookbook and Culinary Survival Guide and share an excerpt with my readers, you just know that I jumped at the chance.

This is a FUN book!  More than three hundred pages of zombies and food preservation and preparation tips....and gardening and composting and fermenting and hunting tips, along with other titles that the author recommends if you want to learn more about a subject.  I've been carrying this book around the house for days, at the same time trying to keep it out of sight because once my oldest boy sees this one, he's going to snag it. Not a bad thing, since there's a lot of information in here that will be useful with or without a zombie apocalypse.
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Eating Out of Your Cupboard

Alas, it’s been days since the initial outbreak started, and those damn zombies are still picking at what’s left of the living hors d’oeuvre platter beyond the four walls of your safe and well-fortified domicile. Plus, the power has been out for a while now—all the fresh food is long gone save for some onion, garlic, and a couple of sad potatoes.
Welcome to carb country. Unless you have a locavore’s personal stash of preserved or canned summer bounty, chances are you’re going to be surviving on a lot of starchy fare until it’s safe to go outside again.
As you will see in the following pages, there is quite a lot that can be done with the common North American pantry staples like flour, dried pastas, rice, canned proteins, beans, vegetables, and fruits. These recipes are simple and easy to prepare (some of them ludicrously so), and focus on very simple ingredients that most people keep kicking around in the cupboard—meaning there is lots of room to add or amend based on your own pantry stash.

No-Knead to Panic Bread

1 x 1 ½ -lb. loaf, or enough for 2–3 Hungry Survivors

It’s another day of being completely consumed by the rise of the undead, so why not soothe your troubled soul with the rise of a dead easy and absolutely delicious bread?
Bless Jim Lahey’s hopefully-still-living soul for developing this recipe. You may know Lahey, owner of New York’s Sullivan Street Bakery, for the no-knead bread revolution he kicked off via food journalist and author Mark Bittman in the early aughts— it took the home-cooking scene by storm and spread almost as quickly as an undead plague. His approach makes use of a long rising time and a very wet dough where gluten molecules are mobile and free to align themselves naturally (rather than relying on kneading). Translation: it takes a while, but requires no bread-making skill or specialized knowledge and virtually zero work.
The versatility of bread goes without saying. It makes a mean companion to Mental Fruit Lentil Soup (page 86), but can be schmeared, topped, dipped, or sandwichized in any number of ways—raid your cupboard and experiment.
This recipe is adapted from “No-Knead Bread” in Jim Lahey’s My Bread: The Revolutionary No-Work, No-Knead Method, an excellent book to have on hand for a variety of zpoc-friendly no-knead breads.

Requires:
1 small bowl
1 large mixing bowl
1 mixing spoon
Plastic wrap
2 clean cotton kitchen towels or other clean breathable cloths
1 large, heavy pot or other oven-proof vessel, with lid

Heat Source:
Indirect, Ammo Can Oven or other Oven Hack (page 44)

Time:
5 minutes prep
14–20 hours mostly unattended rising time
45 minutes baking time
30 minutes cooling time

Ingredients:
¼ tsp. active dry yeast
1 ¾ c. plus 2 tbsp. warm water
Pinch of sugar
3 c. all-purpose or bread flour, more for dusting
1 ¼ tsp. salt

Method:
1. Proof the yeast by mixing it with 2 tablespoons of warm water (not hot!) and a pinch of sugar in a small bowl—it is ready to use when the top is foamy, about 5 minutes.
2. Mix together the dry ingredients in a large mixing bowl until blended. Add water and any wet flavorings (like honey) and mix until well combined. Your dough will be wet and sticky.
3. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap if available (you can write the time down on the plastic with a marker), and one of the kitchen towels and pop it in a now nearly useless microwave or other dark spot to rest at least 12 hours, preferably 18 hours. The dough is ready for the next stage when the surface is bubbly.
4. Lightly sprinkle a work surface with flour and fold your dough out onto it. If using any add-ins (see Variations), sprinkle them on top of the dough now. Sprinkle the dough with a small amount of flour, then fold it over on itself two times. Loosely cover with plastic wrap and let it sit for 15 minutes.
5. Cover a kitchen towel with a generous amount of flour. Dust your hands with flour, and sprinkle just enough flour on the dough to prevent it from sticking to you, then shape it quickly into a ball. An imperfect zombies-are-breaking-down-my-defenses ball is just fine.
6. Place your ball seam side down onto the prepared cloth and generously dust the top with more flour. Cover the ball with a second towel and let rest for 2 hours.
7. Half an hour before the 2-hour mark of the second rise, set up your Ammo Can Oven for 450°F (see Judging Temperature, page 47), then place the oven-proof dish with the lid inside to preheat.
8. After the two-hour rise is complete, carefully remove the hot pot or other vessel from the Ammo Can Oven and, after removing the lid, plop your ball of dough into it, seam side up.
9. Bake, with the lid on, for 30 minutes. Remove the lid carefully, then bake another 15–30 minutes until nicely browned. Let cool for about 30 minutes before eating.

Variations:
• 2 tbsp. honey (added at beginning with water), 1 tbsp. of fennel seeds, ½ c. of raisins, and cornmeal for dusting
• 1 small potato (peeled, diced, sautéed until browned), ½ small onion (minced and sautéed until soft), and ½ tsp. dried dill
• ½ c. olives, preferably jarred but canned work too
• 1 medium apple (peeled and diced), 1 tsp. cinnamon combined with 1 tbsp. sugar

Giveaway 

The publisher has offered to send a copy to one of my readers (US or Canada addresses only, please.) To enter, just leave a comment on this post before midnight on Halloween. 

F, G, H....K

I was going to make my Little Letters blocks in order, but I jumped ahead because K is one of the ones I was fussing over. 

That gives me nine blocks out of twenty-six. I think that's farther than I got on the first incarnation of the alphabet sampler quilt! I used the postage stamp squares as leaders and enders, so I made some progress on that one too.

This post is linked to Design Wall Monday over at Patchwork Times.

Not Knitting at the Pumpkin Patch

Last Sunday was our annual trip to the pumpkin patch. The kids and I leave the house early so we can get there shortly after they open (because otherwise cars are backed up onto the highway waiting for parking) and stay until they're all exhausted. Because if I'm going to splurge on wristbands for the activities, I'm going to let those boys (and their sister) do as many slides and mazes and runs down the zipline as their little hearts desire.

It makes for a loooong day, but it's only once a year.

The weather was gorgeous and the crowds weren't too bad this year. I only made one mistake -- putting my knitting back on the couch instead of putting it in my purse just in case. Because while the kids were doing their thing, I spent hours sitting on damp hay bales. They two youngest are old enough that they don't need me to go through the lines with them, and they'd rather do the mazes alone. So I leave them at the entrance and wait at the exit, then sit there while they do another trip or three through the Realm of Darkness.

I should have brought my sock. You can only people watch for so long, and you can do that while knitting ribbing. Why did I convince myself that it would be bad mommying to bring it along? I knit at karate and speech therapy and everywhere else....

Would you knit at the pumpkin patch?

Weekly Stash Report 

Fabric Used this Week: 0 yards
Fabric Used year to Date: 17 1/2 yards
Added this Week: 0 yards
Added Year to Date: 58 3/4 yards
Net Added for 2014: 41 1/4 yards

I'm not counting the seven or so yards that Teenage Daughter used for her Halloween costume, but it's out of the stash. It was meant for quilts, so it did get counted on the way in, but that was last year.

Yarn Used this Week:  0 yards
Yarn Used year to Date: 6575 yards
Yarn Added this Week: 0 yards
Yarn Added Year to Date: 4210 yards
Net Used for 2014: 2365 yards

This post is linked to Patchwork Times.

Carving Pumpkin Cookies

Once upon a time, I could make chocolate cookies and barely check the recipe on the bag of the bag to make sure I mad my measurements right. Having kids seems to have eliminated that ability. Either they sucked the remembered recipes from my brain, or going so long without doing it made me forget.

Now days, fresh baked cookies are a once-in-a-blue-moon thing that require special circumstances. Like these cookie cutters that I found on the clearance shelf at a big box store last November.

Teenage Daughter was looking for marked down T-shirts and the boys were trying to talk me into anything with blood or teeth when I saw these. If it's not clear from the picture, that's a pumpkin with different mouths and eyes and noses.

There was no UPC code, no label, no trace of what it was or might have cost. I was debating how much time I could spend in line at customer service trying to buy them when there was no way to tell what they actually were....the woman at the checkout line scanned one of the boys cookies-in-a-spooky-tin an extra time and said that was good enough.

I need a different sugar cookie recipe next time, one that won't make the faces spread and the eyes and mouths close into winks and smirks. And I need to make a much bigger batch because the boys saw what I was doing and wanted to cut their own faces. (That sounds a bit wrong when I re-read it....they wanted to design their own faces....on the pumpkins. That's better!)

I'm also thinking these would make good quilting templates for something like my Pumpkin Carving quilt. I did  some Googling and it looks like these are the Nordic Ware Jack-O-Lantern Cookie Cutter Set.