These are my blocks for the do. Good Stitches quilting bee - they will make up our May quilt. Such a simple idea and a clever way to use up little fabric scraps. I think the finished quilt is going to be lovely, don't you? I keep meaning to get outside with my (borrowed) camera to take pictures of the garden. For the first time in 11 years of gardening I have a really productive garden. Nothing about gardening has come naturally to me - I now have a library of organic gardening books which I consult before planting every vegetable. Seems there is more to gardening than sticking seeds in the ground and hoping the varmints don't get them. I've been mixing up fish emulsion and stirring in bone meal, turning the rotting vegetables into the compost pile and all kinds of other stinky organic things, and it is paying off. Hooray!

Spring has also brought us a wealth of new chickens. A few months ago I picked up a box of 39 day old chicks at the post office, which were divided between us, my dad, and my urban-farmer friend Jessica. Then we noticed that 4 of our hens had gone missing. After last year's baby chick surprise, we figured they were off sitting on secret nests of eggs, and so far we have been right about two of them. Crazy Red Hen laid a clutch of eggs in an old box in the garage and hatched out one baby chick. I'll spare you the details, but let's just say that if you are going to hatch out a baby, don't do it in a box in the garage. Her sister, Crazy White Hen laid a clutch of eggs in the attic of the barn. We only discovered her there because Brett thought a rat was scrabbling around up there and barged in on her ready to attack. Fortunately the intrusion wasn't enough to convince her to leave her nest, and she has hatched out two super tiny little blonde chicks. So far so good on those little guys, but I'm not sure how she is planning on getting them down from there, or how she was planning on feeding them. As it is, I have to make sure she is supplied with food and water since they are not on the ground to find these things themselves. *sigh* Needless to say, my chicken chores have vastly increased. After I make the usual check of the old flock (food, water, gather eggs, make sure no eggs have been eaten, socialize a bit), then tend to Egg Eater Hen (she is quarantined since when she is with the other hens she eats their eggs), I check in on our mail-order chicks to feed and water them, play with them to ensure they grow up gentle and friendly, and make my way to the garage to make sure Crazy Red Hen hasn't done anything, well, crazy, and try to cheer her up with a handful of scratch. Then I scale a precarious stack of scrap wood and tools into the barn attic, heave up the floor board under which Crazy White Hen is nesting (and I do this at great personal risk, since she is ready to attack me at any minute, being unaware that I am the only thing keeping her and her babies alive) to give them food and water that I have hauled up with me. Yes, all of this is done with a 6 and 3 year old in tow, asking questions all the while. I love having baby chicks but sure wish we had some functional mothers taking care of them. I have more and more appreciation for those homesteading women - taking care of a farm is hard work!

Pea Soup

I made this soup tonight, courtesy of Martha Stewart. It was delicious, but best of all, every ingredient was harvested from home. The peas and lemons came from the garden, the stock was home-made, the eggs from our chickens. It feels so great to live off the land! We paired the soup with open-faced trout sandwiches; the trout was caught by my father-in-law a few days ago. A fresh, delicious spring dinner and a nice way to wrap up a sunny weekend.

Can I blame my blog neglect on the fact that I've lost my camera? Hm. I'm sure you've been just as busy as me - it seems like spring brings a huge burst of activity every year. I've been working on lots of custom orders (the photo above is of a plush mini blanket I made - I had forgotten how fun those are to make!) and finishing up my first quilt for do. Good Stitches:

I posted the photo of the pieced front of this quilt months ago and have been feeling guilty every since for not finishing it. I'm sure I broke some sort of quilting bee rules by taking so long to finish it. I do love how it turned out - and it is huge! Last night we gave it a test run (before washing it of course) and Brett, both kids and I all fit under it comfortably. I'm excited to send it off to the charity we support. Here's the back:

I was determined to use only fabric I had on hand, which is why it looks kind of disorganized. But I'm happy about how it turned out. I'm already excited about my next turn to head up our quilting efforts - I'm in charge of the June quilt. And I promise I won't take so long to finish it this time!!! I have all kinds of sewing ideas rattling around in my head and the itch to start something new. This usually results in me buying lots of fabric and stashing it away in my sewing cabinet for when I have time. I got a shipment of Kona solids today - time to stop shopping and start sewing!

Some things to consider :

1.) What is the opposite of a donkey?

2.) What if our face was on the back of our head?

3.) What if we Swiffered the back yard?


Ah, the mind of a 3 year old...


(Answers: 1.) a Wonkey; 2.) we couldn't see where we were peeing; 3.) the chickens would be happy)

Almond milk and almond four

Today I feel very proud of myself - not only did I make my own almond milk, but I made almond flour too! I made the milk following instructions from Diet, Desserts, and Dogs, an awesome blog full of recipes for people dealing with various food allergies. I couldn't find the recipe again when I went back to look for it, but it is super easy. Just soak 2 cups of raw almonds in a pot full of water overnight. In the morning when they are nice and plump, drain and rinse them, then put in a food processor with a fresh 1 3/4 cups of water. Blend the heck out of it, then, working in small batches, wrap up blobs of your almond mixture in cheesecloth and squeeze out the "milk." This almond milk is much thicker, richer and sweeter than any almond milk you can buy at the store. In fact, it is more like cream. I think I will water this batch down just a tad to make it last longer and make it a bit less rich.

After squeezing as much juice out of the almonds as I could, (and my hands are SO soft now - a pretty great and unexpected side-effect of the whole process) I put the remaining meal on a baking sheet. Then I baked the whole lumpy soggy mess in a 250 degree oven for several hours. I was just winging it at this point, so my instructions are to take the almond meal out now and then and feel it to see if it is dry. It will get kind of crunchy, but that's ok. When it is all dried out it will still be pretty coarse and lumpy. You could save this "almond meal" as-is if you want (I have some in the freezer from my last batch of almond milk) or you could put it in a coffee grinder to get the fine texture of almond flour. There - nothing went to waste! And while it would probably be much easier and less messy to just go to the store and buy almond milk and a bag of almond flour, then you wouldn't feel so proud of yourself, would you?

Now in Organic!

Well, I finally got my act together enough to photograph the organic sandwich and snack bags I made about a month ago. These cuties have been sitting in a safe place waiting patiently for their photo shoot. Isn't the lamb print the most adorable thing ever??? These are from the Modern Whimsy line designed by Laurie Wisbirn for Robert Kauffman's organic line. So now, in addition to being lined in completely food-safe 100% cotton unbleached muslin, you can get your fabric snack and sandwich bags in an even earth-friendlier option. So far I've listed the pouches in the vine and lamb prints, but have all of these fabrics for you to choose from:

I love how these all coordinate with each other. It is definitely a more girly line of prints - wouldn't you have loved opening one of these every day when you sat down to lunch as a kid?

I'm still offering the snack and sandwich bags in the Half Moon Modern prints, but am starting to have a hard time tracking down more fabric (thanks so much for all the orders!). If you like what you see, please vote for my reusable snack and sandwich bags in the Handmade Olympics - voting ends on the 27th. Thanks!

Things that are yellow

There's nothing quite like pushing promising zucchini seeds into the garden dirt on a warm spring afternoon and then feeling those tell-tale droplets on your face and arms that tell you your three year old is urinating on you from the tree fort.

The flowers he and his brother picked for me almost made up for it.