At this time of year, there are only thoughts about gardening.  Spring is not far away when we can put our thoughts in action.

One of my favorite spring flowers is the poppy.  The colors are so beautiful.  Unfortunately, it doesn’t last too long.  But, there are other beauties that follow.

The bud of the poppy is exceptionally beautiful.  It looks like a quilted picture.  On the theme of choosing flower colors for quilts, these are some of the fabrics that I pulled from my stash to make a block.  Maybe, by next week, I can show the block made with these colors.

When the poppy bud opens, it is a brilliant orange with a very deep purple center. I would never think to put these two colors into a block.   These colors, along with a multitude of greens makes a very different block than the bud block.  

 

 

If I make flower blocks each week, I would eventually have a very pretty sampler quilt.  Do I really need another long term quilt?   Now that I have this thought is in my head, I probably will.  I could put it together with making all the blocks in Kimberly Einmo’s book.  I need to stop thinking and get to quilting.

Have a happy quilting day.

Kimberly Einmo is my favorite teacher.  I use her flying geese and jelly roll ruler in a lot of my quilts.  She also writes an article for the AQS magazine.  Someday, I intend to make all of the blocks in Kimberly’s book.  The blocks are different sizes and use her rulers to make them.  I wonder how many quilts I can make when I make all the blocks.  It would use up a lot of scraps.  This would probably be my next long term quilt.

This quilt was made in a class at the Vermont Quilt Festival.  Dave LaValley from the Bittersweet Fabric Shop provides Janome machine for the class.  It is much easier to sew in a class with a machine that you are familiar with.  There is a lot of twisting and turning of the blocks in this quilt.  A design wall was definitely needed to arrange it.

Kimberly designed this row of the month wall hanging for AQS magazine.  I didn’t use her colors and it is a much different quilt than hers.  It was necessary to have an accurate 1/4″ seam as the block sizes were different.   If the measurement was off, the rows would not be the same length.

I do have another wall hanging from a class with Kimberly.  It is in my stash of UFOs and will be finished someday.

Happy quilting

Good afternoon

Gaa-Barge #2

I first make fabric with tiny bits of scrap fabric.  After laying the scraps on a base,  I overlaid it with tulle.  I auditioned several colors of tulle until I found the right one.  Then I free motioned black leaves over the made fabric.  I cut the new fabric into circles and cut the circles in quarters.  Laying the quarter circles on a square of blue, I stitched it down.  After sewing the squares in a sixteen patch, I sewed around the made fabric with a close, black zig zag.  The whole piece was then stippled quilted with silver thread.  It looks like a church window.  It’s amazing what can be done with very tiny scraps that should be thrown away.

Happy quilting

A long Term Quilt is one that I work on a little bit at a time and will take a long time to finish.  I might work on one a few minutes a day or just pick it up to work on when I feel like it.  They will eventually get finished.

I have finished the Canadian Women 150 quilt.  It was started in December 2016 and finished in February 2018.  I made three blocks a week for 50 weeks.  The quilt was hand quilted in two rows of twelve blocks and then the panels were sewn together.  The interesting part of this project was the stories of 150 different Canadian women,  The quilt has been inspected by Miss Molly, my quality control inspector, and she has deemed it fit to sleep under.

I am working on a Grandmother’s Garden quilt which I inherited from my mother.  She had pieced twelve blocks and basted paper on several hexagons.  There were no instructions on how to put these blocks together, but after a time, I figured it out.  I also bought some fabric that look like the era of the fabric that she had used.  The quilt is hand pieced. It is the quilt that I piece when I go to meetings or friends houses.   I keep the pieces in a bag with the thread, etc. so that I can pick it up anytime I’m ready to go.  My friends are asking me how many more blocks, when will it be done.  I think that I should make it a priority and finish it.

Even Miss Molly says “Get it done!!”

 

 

Happy quilting

Good morning.

What is a single serving?  It would be different for a young, active person than for a person who spends the day at the computer or sewing machine.  Everyone should judge what their personal single serving is and find what is just right for them.

When I started single cooking, I also downsized my pots and pans. It make it much easier to cook smaller when the pots and pans are small.

 

Some of my favorites are  a set of covered glass dishes that can go in the oven, to the table and then to the freezer if there are any leftovers.

A  7″ pie plate will make a small pie that is just right. You could make many different kinds of pies with the very tiny pie plate. Little doughnut bakers can be used for doughnuts, molded jello or little cakes.  The metal pans are just right for a meat loaf for one.  With several of these pans, I can make a regular size meatloaf and freeze several for a later date.

There will be less leftover when cooking in the small crock pot.   The large crock pot isn’t used very much, but I do use it when I take something to a pot luck dinner.  I made the most delicious small pot roast in the small crock pot.  The gravy was yummy. Some of the left over pot roast and gravy were placed in the freezer to warm up some night when I didn’t feel like cooking.

By the way, the most important appliance in the kitchenfor single cooking is a freezer.  Leftovers can be frozen, labled with content and date.  If you cook for two for a month, you can eat free for the next month by freezing half of the meal.  Not all meals can be frozen.  Some dishes are better heated up in the regular oven than in the microwave.  Experiment to find out which is best.  If you use only part of a can of tomato sauce or paste or anything else, freeze what you don’t use in ice cube trays.  Then pop them out and place in a freezer baggie.  Then you will have just the right amount for your recipies.

Here are some examples of my other small dishes.

 

 

 

Portion control is very hard when cooking for one.  We were taught to clean our plate so we tend to eat more than we should.  I have even downsized my dinner plate.  If I’m still hungry or it is really good, I can go back for a second helping.

Enjoy your day.  Keep quilting and cooking.

Good morning

This week’s finished UFO is an easy one.  One of my favorite little quilts to make has an embroidery in the center with two borders.  The center is stippled quilted and the borders have a feather stitch.  I practice different fillers on the center   background.  They are great littl pieces to practice different stippling patterns.

I don’t know why I made this embroidery.  Just a practice piece or trying out new threads?  It will go in my gift box to await a new owner.

Hsve a great day.  Keep quilting.

Good morning.  A few years ago,  I made a mission statement.  I would take cut off scraps, any fabric from the waste basket or floor and make a litle quilt.  I would make one each week for a year and add them to the series even if they were bad. I woud call the project “Garbage to Gaa-Barge.” It was so much fun, I became know as the lady that robbed waste baskets at classes.  Fellow class members started putting their scraps on my table and wondering what I was going to do with them,  This worked well for 32 weeks and then gardening took over my time.  This year, I will finish the project and have all 52 quilts.  The first one is 18″ x 22″  It is made with triangles cut off when sewing and flipping corners.  Each little red square has eight pieces.

This little quilt is just right for a doll quilt.

Have a great day.

Good morning.  The snow has stopped.  I am plowed out.  All is well.  Today, I’m going to show you some quilts that I have made in the past.  I hope that you enjoy them.

This is a Hunter’s Star made with Deb Tucker’s Rapid Fire Hunter’s Star ruler.  Several years ago, my Maine chapter of the Pine Tree Guild challenged us to make a red and white quilt.  I searched for days for a pattern and came across a picture of a red and white Hunter’s Star in one of my books,  It was just what I wanted.  Deb’s ruler made the blocks accurate and the star points met perfectly.

This is a beginner and ender quilt.  It has 2″ squares that I sewed together before and after piecing something else. Sewing beginners and enders prevent the machine from eating the fabric. It seems as if a queen size quilt was pieced with no effort. One of my daughters admired this quilt and received it for Christmas this year. I still have a big bag of 2″ squares and may start another one,  If I orient the squares differently, it will look like a different quilt.

I needed a quilt that went with a wall hanging and the red room.  This quilt is so easy to make.  Squares are sewn together in a pattern.  A template is rotated to cut each new square and they are sewn together in order.  The best part is that the cut off pieces, if kept in order, can be cut and a smaller version of the quilt can be pieced.

Good morning.  we are supposed to have a big snow storm today, so it is a great day to sew and quilt.

I have four quilts that I have been working on a little at a time.  Eventually, they will be finished,  Canadian 150 is ready to sew the binding down.  It is a big quilt and will take several nights to complete while watching TV at night,

I once said that I would never, ever make a Dear Jane quilt.  When the Guild started a Dear Jane Club, they invited others who could work on whatever they wanted,  I was working on a Grandmother’s Flower Garden quilt (more about that in a later post) and decided to join the club.  It would be one Saturday morning a month visiting with friends.

The club was having so much fun talking about Dear Jane and shareing tips, etc.  They mentioned that the quilt shop had two Dear Jane books left.  I left the meeting, went to the quilt shop and bought one.  I am hooked.

Then I bought the EQ Dear Jane download from American Quilter.  It has so much information.  – Tips on how to make each block.  – Printouts for paper piecing – colored pictures – which blocks are easy and which blocks are hard. It was easy to use as I have used EQ 7 and the files were the same.

As it is a long term project, I decided to start in the middle and add each row around the center. Each block would be hand quilted and finished in the pot holder method.  My Maine chapter of the Pine Tree Guild had a class with Wendy Canton Reed (The Constant Quilter).  Wendy taight this method and had actually make a Dear Jane this way. By using this method, the quilt could be finished at any row.

For each row around the center, I print the pattern, tips, and any other information about each block.  I choose fabric as close to the original from my stash, making sure that I have enough for the back as each back is the same color as the top. The printouts, fabric and batting are placed in baggies. That way, I can pick a baggie and work on what is inside at home or at a club meeting.  I store everything including thread, scissors, etc., in a plastic craft box in a tote bag and just have to pick it up when I want to go to a meeting.

Dear Jane will take a long time to finish, but the journey is most of the fun,

Have you ever wanted a little sweet after a meal or had someone drop by for tea or coffee and had nothing to serve with it?  Making a cake would take time and then you would have a big cake to eat.  There goes your plan of a diet. Here is your answer.  The 3-2-1 cake.

Purchase three cake mixes.  One must be Angle Food and the other two whatever you like, yellow, white, lemon, strawberry, etc.  I used a white cake mix and a chocolate cake mix.

Place half of Angel cake mix into two containers.  I divide it by scooping mix out with a 1/2 cup measuring cup and placing every other cupfull in oposite containers.  Depending on the cake mix, it will be about 1 1/2 cups for each container.  Or you could measure the whole mix and divide by half.

Divide the other two mixes in half.   Place half of each cake mix into containers with the Angel food cake mix.  The other half goes back into the box for now.

Shake containers to mix cake mixes.

To make the cake – Place in a mug –  3 Tablespoons mix   2 Tablespoons water Mix with a fork and microwave for one minute.

To make the cake extra special, you can add one to two teaspoons of yummy things.  Cherries with chocolate cake.  Blueberries with lemon cake.  Chocolate chips and nuts with white cake. Different spices, coconut, dried fruit. Anything that you have in your cupboard.  It does take 2 -3 seconds longer to bake with add ons.

What to do with the left over mix.  You could make a one layer cake or cupcakes or you could bake cookies.,……..

Basic recipe for cake mix cookies

This is for the leftover mix in the bag, not the combined mix for cake.

4 Tbsp olive oil    1 egg   1/2 box of cake mix  mix together.  Place by Tablespoons on greased cookie sheet and bake at 350 for 10 minutes. You can add yummy things as above.

Ashley’s favorite yummy cookies – To the basic recipe for white or yellow cake mix, add 1/2 c raisins, 1/2 c chopped dates.  1 1/2 tsp cinnamon, 1/2 tsp. nutmeg and 1/4 tsp ginger.

I bought a little cookie scoop and it makes the cookies all the same size.  It looks like a baby ice cream scoop.

Have a great day .

Enjoy your cookies and cake.