To Market To Market

Today begins the Eat Real Fest in Oakland. D and I are going on a special date to the Foraging and Canning Exchange where I will be trading off these jars of peach jam for (hopefully) something a little more exotic....or something savory. We have enough jam in this house to last us a decade or more!


I used the Perfect Peach Jam recipe in the Ferry Plaza Cookbook. And the recipe says it will take about 1 hour, but it took me about 3. So, I will probably just stick to the Certo recipes from now on (wham, bam, throw in some pectin and boil, thank you mam!). The jam I made is quite delicious, but if you gotta life to lead, maybe this isn't the recipe for you....lucky for me...

There is also an ice cream social tonight (which I wouldn't miss for the world, especially on this particularly hot day). And over the weekend there seems to be tons of cool stuff going on. Depending on how tonight goes, I may try to go for a few hours before work tomorrow.

See you there? Toodles!

In a Pinch Notecards

My good friend just got engaged! Yay! So I made her these little notecards until the official "invitation suite" arrives. Because you never know how soon you'll need some joint stationery.


I made 2 (very sophisticated) variations.


I'm probably breaking all kinds of wedding etiquette. Although, I do know you're not supposed to use a joint monogram until after you're married - but that's all I know...and if nobody else knows, who cares?

The envelopes and cards (and inspiration) are from Paper Source. The fabric is from Purl. I might be a little bit obsessed with Paper Source these days. Maybe when I change careers again, I'll be a greeting card designer...*sigh*

Pretty [Yucky] Cake

See my beautiful cake?

This was a dry, awful, cardboardy, took-one-bite-and-tossed-it-in-the-garbage cake. But boy was it cute. :)

Rekindled

Finally starting something new...


we'll see if I have the momentum to complete it in a timely fashion.

Frogs and Snails...

...and Necktie Onesies... that's what little boys are made of.


(and double-decker bus onesies with matching burp cloths)


My friend is having a new baby soon, so we have to make sure he's well-dressed when he arrives.

Welcome to the world, little man!

The NEW New Favorite Thing

Shishito peppers.... yummmm!

They're a Japanese pepper that are generally mild, but about 1/10 are hot. Not too hot, but you'll need a drink of water to cool yourself off.


We like them....a lot. Can you tell?


We tried our hand at making them ourselves. Not too shabby! Just tossed them in some olive oil and cooked them over a hot pan, tossing, and garnishing with gray salt.


I could probably eat these all night. Next time you see them on a menu, I recommend you give them a go. (You can get them at the Alembic in San Francisco if you're really curious)

Lemonade Quilt Complete

Here is the finished product, and me gusta mucho!


I big-zig-zagged all the seams, as an experiment. And while I like the way it looks on top, it looks even way cooler on the back against the charcoal linen.


Speaking of which...I used the lightweight linen on the back as an experiment also. Peapod was closed all week, so I had no choice (well, ok) but to use what I had on hand, and the linen was the only thing I had that was wide enough and that "worked" for me and this quilt. It would have been the perfect size, except for the large rectangular chunk I cut out of it for another project. No problemo - and so the birth of this patchy little surprise on the back. In fact, it would have looked lame without it - so everything's worked out in the end.


I've busted some stash, kept myself busy, maybe made some wedding decor (who knows?), and I'm feelin' satisfied.

Now I need a real lemonade.

My New Favorite Thing

I went to the Goodwill to drop some stuff off, you know, because we're trying to downsize? Well, I accidentally spotted (pun!) this, and couldn't leave without it! Do you just love it?!

I don't really even drink coffee, much less tote around a giant carafe of it. But say one day I do, won't I look great doing it??

31.5

D has a late December birthday that is always a bit difficult to A) celebrate properly and B) separate from Christmas. So, we decided that we would try a new tradition of celebrating his 1/2 birthday.

I made him a carrot cake using this recipe and it's pretty heavenly if I do say so myself. I also got him a mandoline (the slicing kind, not the musical kind). I can't wait to have potatoes au gratin and all things julienned!

Happy 31.5th (?) birthday, D!

Grillin' Like a Villain

D is my grillmaster.


We bought a big bag of eggplant at Berkeley Bowl (the REAL Whole Foods) for $1. D doesn't even like eggplant, but he grilled me the entire bag. Is he not the greatest?

Amazing how many veggies I can take down once they're grilled. I dipped them in a little lemony, garlicky, yogurt sauce (Greek style) & I don't think they even lasted 3 days. Yipes. Oooh, so good. Can't wait to go back.

Inspired Stripes

Someone said these magic words the other day, "lemonade in a mason jar" and immediately, I wanted to build our entire wedding around that very image. Whether or not that actually happens, I was inspired to make this quilt with those colors (the green is the mint sprig in the lemonade, duh...or maybe it's a mojito).

I've been in a stripes phase, and I'm not sure I'll get out of it, but I can't help but feel like my quilting has regressed a bit. Whatever, I like fast, simple projects. I still need to find a proper back for it, but surely I will show you the finished product.

Doesn't it make you want to sit on it with a big ol' icy lemonade? Aaahhh.

Miss Maile is Two!

This little stinker, lover of "toffee" and "popo titis" (coffee and a purple blanket called titi), had a birthday last weekend.

She got a new birthday outfit to wear when not in her birthday suit...so that means she probably won't wear the outfit most of the morning.

I made a simple little skirt with matching appliqued Old Navy shirt. I replaced the belt on these Old Navy capris with the same coordinating fabric. Muy cute-a!

Happy Birthday Maile!

Making Mozzarella

I know I've been pretty absent lately - and the truth is there's been very little crafting (nothing crafted = nothing to blog). Mostly I've been working, visiting family, nesting, and obsessively researching wedding stuff. No plans of yet, but... stay tuned.

I did make a little time this morning to make some mozzarella. Once you get your hands on some rennet, it's quite simple. (I found mine at Rainbow Grocery in San Francisco - otherwise, buying it online costs 5x the cost of the actual product...so instead I drove around for ~5 hours looking for the stuff to avoid a $6 shipping fee. Possible exaggeration.)

The book from whenceforth the recipe did cometh (look it up, it's totally proper English):

stir and warm up your milk and citric acid (yes, something I actually had lying around):

It will start curdling a little, but nothing compared to the clumping that happens once you add the rennet:

You actually don't have to stir fast and furiously, this is just how it looks when you turn your flash off:

See such clumpage?

You ladle it out, squeeze out the water, microwave it, squeeze, stretch, repeat until you get something like this. Wear gloves, it's hot!

Voila! His and hers mozzarella balls. Mine is the twisty, D's is the roundy moundy.

It was a little rubbery and not salty at all. Next time, I'll do a little less squeezing/pulling and a lot more salting. But a quick, satifying activity always makes me happy.

Miss B's Baby Blanket

My friend is having a baby girl! So I made her a girly blanket to curl up on, make a fort under, turn into a "boat" along which she can line up her stuffed animal passengers and save herself from hot lava....you know, the usual.


I'm in a stripes phase right now - can't get enough.


I can't wait to meet her!

Helado

I moved this past weekend (world's worst activity), and so I thought it a great time to accumulate another bulky appliance - an ice cream maker! I had wanted one for so long...


And while I should have been packing boxes, I decided that it was much more fun to make brown butter salted pecan ice cream (I made that up).

Anyhow, I used up excess ingredients in my pantry, so, it was sort of like packing.

Guess What?

It's a breathtaking view, isn't it?

Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!

Onions...It's What's For Dinner

Yes I did just eat 9 onions for dinner...but they're called "calçots" and they're my new favorite thing. We first learned about them on the Spain - On the Road Again series. And now I've noticed them on menus all over the place. (I never did see or eat them when I was in Spain, however)

Basically, they're grilled green onions (I broiled instead). I'm sure they taste better dipped in aioli or romesco-esque sauce, but I just used olive oil and salt and pepper and they were delicious. And while I ate them as my main, they're more of an appetizer.

As a sidenote, the onions came from our friend, Bill's, garden. He has this giant garden that my mom and sister (and I, when in San Luis) raid on a regular basis. This year, we decided to "sow" what we "reap" and so we spend the morning helping Bill in his garden by raking and tilling and staking and trellising and shoveling and maybe eating a couple strawberries and learning alot about making a garden (not that we were total novices, but...). Already growing were artichokes, onions, brussel sprouts, sweet peas, and strawberries. I got a big bag of fava beans from Bill's father-in-law, which I forgot in San Luis (drats!! I know my dad will do me proud with those beans).

Man, it was fun, rewarding work. I can't wait to see what we did to his garden - yipes!

Savannah Sites

Some of my favorite photos from Savannah:

Maybe this one will turn into a quilt someday...

Back in the Saddle

My absenteeism is due to an awesome east coast adventure to NYC, Philadelphia, DC, and Savannah. Photos forthcoming (maybe).

It took me a couple days to get back into the groove of life. Luckily, I still haven't had to go back to work yet so I have some time. I only started sewing again today.

Firstly, my little train-lovin' guy is turning 4 in a couple days! He needs a proper shirt for the occasion, especially since it happens to be National Train Day and the party will be at the train station. Remember when I got this fabric last time I was in NYC?


And while we were in Savannah, I was inspired to make this:


The town has recently been overrun (in a good way) by the Savanna College of Art and Design. They had this store just for the students to sell their art. I was inspired by these pillows, which have hand-embroidered chairs on them (got the ol' wheels turning, that's all I'm sayin'). And I was going to hand-embroider the bicycle, but For whatever reason decided to try machine free-motion embroidering instead. I kinda like it. Of course, it's not in a pillow form or anything at this point - I just got excited to blog about it.

It needs something though...like tassels dangling from the handlebars or a basket with flowers or something. Ideas? Maybe I'll make a few more. It literally took me 10 minutes to make. Gotta love that.

Ok, nap time. Stay dry out there!

Pillow Revision

These pillows are much better than my original attempt/vision. Well, these don't even really look like my 2nd vision either. I start out with one idea and the end product is usually quite a bit different. I banned rulers (a challenge for me) and pinning (not so much) from the initial piecing process.



I think I got the reddish/rust color right this time. I found it in some napkins I intended on embellishing from Crate & Barrel 100 years ago (they were never actually embellished).

I love how they turned out! I feel so Gee's Bend about the whole thing - using a mix of already-have (red, chocolate, linen, and teal corduroy) and new (white linen/cotton). I hope she likes them too!