Have Case, Will Travel

I would like to introduce a new companion of mine, J. Jr. 

The weekly take down, haul around, and setting back up of my Bernina was not working well for either Bernie or me.  Being 20 years old, Bernie likes staying comfortably situated on my sewing table, and the fact that she is all metal made it a challenged for me to carry her around.  Thus I have been looking around for several months for a basic, light-weight machine that was well made, but reasonably priced.  Our local Bernina dealer has recently begun carrying Juki for their lower end machines for those very reasons.  After doing a little test drive at the store, I brought J. Jr. home with me.  

Along with a lighter machine, I have also been searching for a good cart to make transporting easier.  There are a lot of sewing machine tote/carts out there, but often there would be comments on breakage of the handles, or those that did get good reviews would also be quite expensive.  My search led me to a very inexpensive option that I am liking very much.  It is an early Christmas gift from my dear husband, so I would like to introduce Wheels:

We had our first real trial run this week and I am quite happy with how things went.  There is a little difficulty getting things in and out of the car, since there are no real grab handles, but, for the cost, I can work with that.  And when at home Wheels and J. Jr. park nicely under my cutting table. 

 
Here's to happy sewing wherever I may be!


P.S.  I did a little tweaking on my chicken echilada casserole recipe and my husband and I agreed that it was just right.  I updated the recipe on the earlier post.  

A Touch of Fall

I hope everyone enjoyed a happy Thanksgiving.  Our celebration was small this year, but nice nevertheless.  

This is the time of year I wistfully remember the glorious fall color we enjoyed the few years we were on the East Coast.  Consequently I am eager to enjoy whatever color we manage here in the South.

I hope the crepe myrtles we planted in our back yard look like this some day:

 

Don't think I would care to meet the squirrel that would enjoy these acorns in a dark alley. :-)

         

As we head toward Christmas I pray that each of you will have a peaceful and joyful holiday season.

It's a Wrap! (or shawl, as the case may be)

Here is my first triangular shawl and I think I am in love.  Shawls and scarves give me the same sense of freedom in design that quilts do--opportunity to play with design and color without having to worry about fit.  While I still haven't figured out all the mechanics of increases and decreases with shawl making, once I get a handle on that the design possibilities are exciting to think about. 

The other thing I love about shawls is that in this season of life where I experience my own personal heat waves during the day, the idea of having something I can toss on and off is very appealing. 

This pattern is called the Textured Shawl Recipe and is modeled by my lovely daughter, Ms. P.

Thus the allure of shawls greatly influenced my recent yarn purchases at a local fiber festival that my daughter, daughter-in-law, and myself attended this past weekend.  It was a great time of fibery fun--lots of lovely yarns and rovings, spinners and weavers, and cute alpacas.  We also took the opportunity to visit a favorite yarn shop, where the shawls continued their call to me.  

Here are the treasures I brought home:

This is a lovely wool/silk blend by Brooks Farms, one of my favorite yarn producers.  They only have their yarn available on line or at fiber festivals, so their booth is always a must.  They had several beautiful shawls made up from this yarn that were quite inspiring, so I am looking forward to finding the perfect project for it.

                                     

Next is another wool/silk blend that I will use to make a striped shawl, alternating between the neutral color and the variegated yarn.  Noro makes wonderful color transitions in their yarn, so it will be exciting to see how the colors play out. 

Thirdly, I escaped from the shawls' siren call for a moment to get another pretty variegated yarn to try a faux version of fair isle.  Rather than using several colors of yarn, faux isle uses one solid and one variegated yarn to create the color changes.  I am pairing it with a very enticing alpaca handspun that Ms. P brought me from her northern adventures this summer.  
Since color work is most easily done in the round, my first project here will be a hat.   

And thus concludes the latest of my wooly tales with promises of knitting adventures ahead. 

 

It Pays to Listen to That Little Voice

Recently our son and daughter-in-law came up for a visit with their two boxers.  I had needed to do some baking, so I had a bag of flour sitting on the counter waiting to refill my canister.  As I got the house ready for their visit, I thought to myself that I should probably move the flour, but got busy and didn't get to it. 

Note:  Exibit A

One morning we left to go watch our son in a cyclocross race.  We had a little surprise when we got back.

The scene of the crime:

The mug shot (guilty but not remorseful):

 

Note the white paw print on the carpet.  Next time I will pay attention to that little voice when it tells me to move something. :-)

 

An Unforeseen Consequence-A wooly tale

Once there was a woman who took up knitting and discovered the wonders of wool.  While reading some knitterly items on-line, she came across a discussion on making felted wool balls to use in the dryer.  She liked the idea of an alternative to softener sheets, especially since they seemed to multiply like rabbits each time she used one and would turn up in the oddest places.

Off she went to order some natural colored yarn and soon had four lovely wool balls.  The first experiment was with drying sheets and they helped wonderfully in keeping the sheets from balling up on themselves.  "Very nifty," she thought.  Next came using them to dry her white load of clothes, and again she was pleased with the results.  

"I will make four more balls of pretty colored yarn to use with my medium and dark loads of clothes," she thought, and she did.  So much did she like her little wooly balls that she decided to make even more to use for Christmas gifts.  

Then, one day she noticed that her knit work pants were feeling a little prickly.  Alas, her little wooly balls were leaving wooly fibers in her clothes.  Sadly she went back to chasing dryer sheets around the house, and wondered what to do with all her little wooly friends.  

Remembering an idea she saw for storing leftover yarns from knitting projects, she bought a nice jar for them to live in and placed them in her guest room where they could entertain her visitors.  

She still wanted to keep using her first wooly balls for her sheets so she decided to give them nylon jackets and hopes that that will keep the prickly fibers at bay.

And they all lived happily ever after. 

Meet Bernie--A cotton tale

Please meet my good friend, Bernie.  I recently realized that she and I have been working together for about 20 years.  While we have done a fair amount of modest garment sewing, the thing we most love to do together is make quilts, and she and I are keeping quite busy with projects recently.

A few months ago, I joined a group of quilters at a nearby church that we have since begun attending.  The group has actually been around for a good number of years, and along the way, ladies have left partiality completed projects or donated fabric to the group.  The stash of UFO (unfinished objects) and fabrics is beginning to overwhelm the supply cabinets, so the group is focusing on finishing up some of these projects.  The quilts then go to seriously or terminally ill members of the congregation.  Bernie and I are having great fun working with these ladies.

Here is the current UFO I am working on at home.   

We also make flannel baby blankets for the local crisis pregnancy center and work on personal projects.  Since several of the ladies are new to quilting, we will also pick a block pattern that we will each make using some of the stash fabric. Those of us who have been quilting for a while can then help teach those who are less experienced.  Those blocks are then put together in a quilt. 

Good work, good fun, good fellowship--Bernie and I are smiling together.

Sprouts--Welcome to the neighborhood

Around the first part of September a new grocery store opened not too far from us.  Like a mini-Whole Foods, Sprouts carries organic and natural produce and products.  Happily it carries most of the soy products I use because of my husband's allergy to dairy products.  Two especially great items are a soy cream cheese and soy sour cream, both of which have enabled me to add back some favorite recipes to our menu.

In keeping with the food theme, I wanted to share a recipe I am working on.  It is a cross between King Ranch Chicken and chicken enchiladas--something less fussy than enchiladas, but with most of the flavor.  The ingredients in parenthesis are ones I would use if diet allowed.  If anyone gives it a try, let me know what you think.

Chicken Enchilada Casserole

1 cup chicken broth
1/3 cup onion, chopped
1  4 oz. can chopped green chilis
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1/2 teaspoon cumin
(1/2 teaspoon chili powder)
1 1/2 to 2 cups cooked chicken, cubed

4 oz. sour cream 
1/2 cup water
2 tablespoons cornstarch

8 corn tortillas, torn into quarters
(1 cup grated cheddar cheese)

Combine first 8 (9) ingredients in a skillet and heat until lightly boiling.  Stir in sour cream, and simmer.  Combine 1/4 cup of water with 2 tablespoons of cornstarch and stir into sauce until thickened, but do not let it boil.

Layer half of the tortillas in a shallow casserole dish.  Spoon half of sauce over tortillas. Sprinkle with half of the cheddar cheese.  Repeat.  Cover dish with foil and bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes.

 

The Humble Whisk--thankfulness for useful tools

As I was making waffles this past Saturday, I thought about how much I enjoy my set of whisks.  My parents brought me the set from Italy several years ago.  While they are not tools I use everyday, I do enjoy having them when I mix batters.  A feisty elderly woman I visit in the nursing home shared her disgust with me over the "wire thing" the activities director was having them use to mix a cake batter.  Give her a big spoon, thank you very much, and she would get that batter mixed.  Her comments made me smile inside.  How we like our particular tools!

What a predicament when a favorite tool starts to wear out and we can't find a replacement.  My cooking spoon gets used most everyday, and it is looking worn (especially considering that it is probably at least 40 years old--thanks, Mom, for passing it down to me).  Another like it just can't be found, though.  It is plastic, making it suitable for my non-stick skillets.  The end is flat, so it is ideal for stirring, and the spoon shape lets me use it for serving our meal.  I just don't know what I will do when it finally bites the dust.  

So, a salute to all those gadgets that make our everyday activities easier and more enjoyable and the people that created them!

Simplifying Communications

Here I am, dictionary at hand (Does that word really mean what I think it means?), joining the thousands upon thousands in the teeming world of blogging.  Keeping up communications is always a challenge, so, while my preference is for writing e-mails, I know with life picking up its pace for me recently that my letter writing is going to be more limited.  Hopefully this blog will help fill the gap between letters and let me stay in touch with those that time doesn't allow me to write personally. 

First, a bit of an introduction for any poor soul who happens to stumble upon this blog along the way: 

Mine is a quiet life, but I am learning that there is adventure to be had in the ordinary day to day things.  Here will be tales of quilting exploits, knitting discoveries, the occasional cooking experiment, and perhaps even some travel recounts as my family ventures to far off places.  So, to those I know and love, and the occasional passerby, welcome to my every-day world.