do. Good Stitches January blossom quilt

Remember back in january when I posted a tutorial for the "blossom block?" Well, all the ladies in my sewing circle sent me their blocks and here is what they turned into - doesn't it look great! I'm still surprised by how wonderful all these different fabrics look together. This is just the quilt top - I still have to baste and quilt this monster (it is HUGE!) then add binding... I'm daydreaming of how to piece the back. Maybe a few floating blossoms? Anyways, I was so excited I had to share this picture before the quilt was finished.

Yep

It's been one of those Mondays around here. All a little bit grawche. :)

Sampler: complete!

I finished my first hand-quilted project: the sampler I showed a snippet of the other week. This is really little, less than 12 inches square, but was the perfect size for practicing on. I think the end result is pretty charming - it looked really cute under my vase of Valentine's Day flowers. I used embroidery floss to do the quilting because I have a ton of it on hand in every color imaginable. I checked out some pearl cottons the other day and can see how working with those would make the quilting MUCH easier. "Popping the knot through the first layer of fabric" looks like an easier feat with the pearls. I created quite a few snags and weird pulls with all my knot popping disasters. And then I machine-bound it in a hurry, which resulted in a less-than-perfect binding, another thing that drives me nuts. But again, imperfection is good practice for me - it goes against my nature in what is probably a good way.



Now this imperfect charming little quilt is on its way to some dear friends - a house full of girls who I know have tea parties and pink bedrooms and all those things this quilt deserves but I cannot give. Hope you like it!

Broth

There is something so gratifying about a huge pot of chicken stock simmering on the stove. It makes me feel so industrious. This was my first time not using one of our own chickens to make stock - these guys were from Costco. My friend told me about the pack of two organic whole chickens for $25, and some quick math told me that would be a great deal if I used the carcasses to make broth. I cooked both birds at once and pulled ALL the meat off the bones - big job, but then we were set on meat for the whole week. And I ended up with 36 cups of broth in the freezer waiting to be made into soups or to cook quinoa in or whatever else I might think up to use broth for. I never use a recipe to make broth - just throw in whatever I have on hand. This time it was onions, celery, a few frozen chopped carrots left from the fall harvest, garlic, and a bunch of sage that was in the fridge. Easy peasy.

Clamshell Pillow

I'm taking Rachel's "Curves class" and finally finished my first project! (Consistent with my college career I put this off to the last minute...) If you get the chance to take a class from Rachel (I'm assuming she's going to have more) you definitely should! I'm having so much fun and learning tons of new skills, all from the convenience of my house after the kids go to bed! In this project I pieced clamshells, worked with linen, and sewed an invisible zipper closure, all for the first time. And I didn't have to use my seam ripper once! That is a testament to her teaching ability, because I pretty much always mess up my first few times when trying new sewing skills.



These are things I was definitely too intimidated to teach myself, so if it wasn't for this class I probably wouldn't have ever learned about placing a zipper. Actually, the tutorial for the zipper is available on her blog for free - it's great. I'm not sure if I would use this white linen again for a pillow since every little wrinkle in the pillow form shows through - I jammed a really big down pillow into a kind of small pillow cover because I couldn't stand to wait another day to see my finished result. The boys were super excited this morning when they woke up and saw that I had made a pillow for myself - what a couple of sweeties. I may not have any daughters, but I do have two sons who appreciate a hand-made pillow. :)

Questions I have answered today:

- Why don't roosters lay eggs?
- What if me and God went to Yogurt Land and He said "What flavor should I get?"
- If you only ate fabric for a long, long time, would you die?
- What should you do if a tornado blows the roof off of your basement?
- Is there Lightning McQueen Macaroni and Cheese in heaven?
- Why isn't dad's job to kill bad guys?
- Why can't we drive on the sidewalk when nobody is walking on it?
- What if we put chapstick on a vulture?

No, I didn't make any of those up. If you happen to have answers to any of these, I'd be grateful. :)

The best policy

Daddy: "Titus, I heard you went on a nice long hike with Mom today!"

Titus (smiling): "Yep. It was the worst part of my day."

Gotta love the honesty.