Category: Monthly Review

Monthly Review
Crafty · Monthly Review · Sewing

Monthly Review

LSiehLeave a comment

Here’s to another month! January flew by as usual. We had a lazy first weekend in February. Fancy spent most of her time playing tug with the Husband and her rapidly shedding rope toy, or snoring on my lap. She did not move for much of anything. She was not interested in the puppy bowl, although she was a little confused by the puppy squeaks. She squeaked her ball a lot though, in protest of us watching other pups.

I think I’m off to a good start with sewing. I’ve been working on a bunch of projects and I made some things that I needed and finished a bunch of projects from the UFO box.

This project takes care of both of those categories. I made some hot pads for the kitchen. One has a loop and one doesn’t. They came out a little small, so we’ll probably use them for trivets.

They were easy to make, but not too pretty on the other side. Yikes.. The binding was too big.

I have also started a new rainbow quilt. I’m not counting this one against my total. It’s technically for an old project that I hadn’t started yet.

I swear to finish something big soon. My quilt tops are stacking up. If I don’t finish some, I’ll have to get a bigger tote. I’m considering just backing everything with fleece. I have batting for a bunch of them, but not all.

So for UFOS I have made 13+ tea wallets, the hot pads, a Christmas zippered pouch, the evil fairy bag, and the library bag.

For new projects, I made a self-drafted tunic and the castle shirt.

I have also added two more quilt tops. Well, partial. They aren’t sewn together yet. They are also rainbow, since I apparently can’t do anything else. I think I’ve decided on this block for the pastel rainbow one. I found a cute white on white floral to use for the center of the blocks. I may need to make a few more of the scrap blocks depending on how the layout looks. I also have the chevron one in the featured pic.

Man… sometimes admitting the things I haven’t finished yet makes me cringe. I don’t normally put stock in negative self talk for motivation, but apparently sometimes it works. I’ll be working on some backed up projects for sure this month.

I’ve done much better in food terms this week. 15 new recipes and 12 new cookbooks. Hits were the lamb, the cinnamon ice cream, the Parmesan crusted chicken, and the Gordon Ramsey noodle and mushroom dish.

The hotpot was also a hit. It was a fun dinner with bonus noodle soup!

Misses were the pho (smelled like “lamb and feet”) and the pie contest apple pie. Not too bad for the month.

Goals: 

Sewing/crafting:

– Make the dragon dress

– Fancy up my work clipboards so I don’t get them mixed up with the office ones.

– Fully finish a quilt.

– Sew a pair of leggings! (Eek! Sewing with knits!)

Food goals:

– Use the InstantPot

– Try a new breakfast recipe

– Try a new lunch recipe

– Meal Plan/Pantry shop

– Make more ice cream! (Yes, I know it’s winter, but ice cream!)

I will also try to snuggle this puppers more to her standards. She feels sadly lacking in the snuggle department… You can plainly see she’s terribly sad about it. She probably also needs more treats. I mean, how could we resist?

I think I’ll take her current example and take myself off to bed. Have a lovely, restful night!

Yearly Recipe Review
Monthly Review · Recipe Roundup

Yearly Recipe Review

LSiehLeave a comment

Here goes my last review! It will be back to regular posting for the rest of the week.

The Husband’s favorite recipe was the Thai Sweet Hot Duck, hand’s down. I’m a little nervous to make it again for fear I will mess it up!

We might have it for Valentine’s Day though. We never go out, just eat a fancy dinner at home.

My favorite new recipe was the coconut veggie curry.

It was so comforting. I need to investigate more veggie options for my lunches.

The French onion  grilled cheese sandwiches were also a surprise hit. Messy, but delicious.

I liked the marshmallow ice cream, but the Husband didn’t. We both liked the chocolate ice cream.

I did make two really good chocolate cupcakes, the blackberry ones and my birthday cupcakes.

I normally don’t really like chocolate cupcakes, but these recipes were really moist and delicious.

Of course, the dragon bundt cake was delicious and I was excited to use the pan. It wasn’t too bad to clean or get the cake out either.

Fancy liked all her treats. I couldn’t tell which one she liked the best. She does get so excited when I pull out the frozen sweet potato sticks. 🙂

Misses were the chicken risotto, a couple of stir fry experiments, and the cheese and mushroom souffle.

I used a total of 113 new cookbooks! My idea of sections went a little wonky because there were multiple recipes in each section that I wanted to try. Overall though, I did use new cookbooks and recipes in the spirit of the challenge. I have a bunch of cookbooks left to use.

There are a few cookbooks that I think I may need to just get rid of. The Microwave Chinese Cookbook scares both of us, so it will go. Basically, any cookbook that doesn’t make me want to cook with it should probably go. There’s no sense in holding on to them, if I won’t use them. It’ll make more room for new ones! 🙂

What I learned: 

– Trust my instincts. I know how to cook and bake and if something doesn’t look right, it might not be.

– Up the spices! We like a lot of flavor. Part of this might be to measure things out for a little bit to make sure I’m eye measuring correctly.

– Have fun with it! Play with my food/recipes more.

– Try new things.

– Meal plan. Even if it’s enough meals planned for the week, but not assigned to the specific day.

– Involve the Husband. He can learn to do more of the prep and try new things as well. Plus, it would be fun to have some help.

Goals: 

My goals aren’t that different from last year when I started the blog. I’m debating adding some more social media and trying to grow my readers, but it makes me a little nervous. We’ll see how I feel in a little bit.

So here are my overall goals for the year:

– Take pictures of everything food related. Figure out my photo editing.

– Meal plan consistently.

– Try new techniques.

– Have a Chopped themed dinner party, even though it’s slighty terrifying.

– Actually measure my own recipes, so I can recreate them.

That’s probably enough goals for the year. I don’t want to get too crazy with planning. Let me know if there’s anything else I should do differently, or more you’d like to see!

Stay tuned for a regular Wordless Wednesday post! Have a great day!

 

Yearly Review- Canning and Gardening
Canning and Preserving · Gardening · Monthly Review

Yearly Review- Canning and Gardening

LSiehLeave a comment

Hello again! I thought I would separate out my canning list from my recipe list to try and make it not so long. I probably have one more review post and then it will be back to the normal posting schedule.

We were going to go to the zoo today, but I woke up with a sore neck and shoulder. Too much relentless partying! 🙂

Canning Review:

So I wanted to get more canning done than I actually was able to do. I still have the whole canning tomatoes in the freezer. I think I’ll just chop them up and use them whole.

Here is what I did get canned this year.

Apple sauce, two batches from The Ball Blue Book. I have no pictures of the second one for some reason. One batch of applesauce was canned and one is in the freezer. The Husband only likes the second one. The first one was too smooth. It works very well for cooking though and I like it, so all is not lost.

Tea Blends! I’m going to count these as canning because they are in canning jars. I made them for my vending event and when they didn’t sell, my craft ladies  happily snapped them up for Christmas. It was so much fun to put them together and I still have a bunch of the materials, so I would like to make some more up for me as well.

Pickles from The Art of Preserving. I didn’t like this recipe, but the ones with extra garlic went over very well. I will try more pickles with a different recipe for next year.

I also had my first burst jar in the canning pot. It was scary, but not as messy as it could have been.

Rhubarb marmalade from Taste of Home Canning 2012. This was delicious. I quite enjoy it on toast and on yogurt.

Strawberry Marmalade from Taste of Home 2012. This is also delicious and I like in lots of different ways.

Rhubarb BBQ sauce from the An Oregon Cottage website.   I liked this, but it’s possible the Husband is allerfic to rhubarb, so I haven’t used it since. This was a freezer recipe, it was too low of a PH level to safely can.

Strawberry Lemonade Concentrate from Ball Canning online. This is lovely. I wanted to make some blackberry as well, but didn’t get to it. I have some blackberries in the freezer, so may try it. The Husband likes it with Sprite. He was excited to have our own lemonade.

Gardening Review:

My herbs did very well. I was able to move the rosemary plant inside even though it got caught in a snowstorm.  I was excited by how pretty this picture looked and it was also exciting to get to cut my own fresh herbs for foods. My only problem was keeping them watered enough. My work schedule was not conducive to watering schedules.

Strawberries! I waged a war with the squirrels and the ants to get some strawberries for us. We actually got a bunch this year and I’m hoping the plants will survive to be used next year. They are protected in the garage.

We got one zucchini! I brought it up with us when we went up to visit my parents and we had it sautéed with other veggies. Sadly, the plant didn’t survive much after this.  It was not happy in a pot.

Gardening Goals and What I Learned:

Next year we need to get the raised bed set. Now that we know how much work it will be, we’ll set aside a gardening weekend early. We’re thinking of putting raised planter boxes by the garage with berries in them. Perhaps the ants will not get them this year after all.

What I learned was that consistent watering needs to be a priority. Also, learning what is up with my tomatoes to stop end blossom rot would be good. I can’t stop it, it seems, but am hoping that when they are in an actual bed with tomato cages they will be less prone to it.

I am not good with cucumbers either. The only one I got this year was bitter and inedible. Blech.

Canning Goals: 

Try a pomegranate or wine jelly this winter. Put aside a few full weekends for canning. Prep everything one day and can the next.

Learning: Smaller goals? Make sure I have the time to properly deal with my produce.

I hope you enjoyed this review. It’s a good feeling to have these things prepared to use in the winter time.

 

Yearly Review- Sewing and Crafting
Crafty · Life Posts · Monthly Review · Sewing

Yearly Review- Sewing and Crafting

LSiehLeave a comment

It has been a crazy year! I switched jobs twice, lost my serger pedal, but found it yesterday (!!), made a dress in 5 hours, found a favorite dress pattern, and used up an entire notebook.

I’ve watched multiple seasons of weird British shows (Death in Paradise, Doctor Blake, Great British Baking Show) and some Project Runway. Also, some action shows like The Flash, and Wynona Erp, much to the Husband’s dismay. 🙂

My space is getting organized, slowly but surely.

All my larger scraps are now housed in two containers. I have a shoebox style container full of tiny scraps as well, but they get lost if they are in with the bigger pieces.

Umm.. there’s a slight chance I need to stop saving scraps, or work exclusively in scraps for a bit…

I made about a million tea wallets, which does help with the scrap piles. They’ve also been selling a lot on Etsy all of a sudden. My tea wallets are in a brick and mortar store as well, Hawthorne and Vine, which makes me more confident when trying other avenues in the future.

My Etsy and vending events went decently well. I’ve been better about posting to Twinflower Fancies and am investigating other options for advertising.

One of my favorite clothing makes for the year was my Dita Dress, otherwise known as the “5 hour dress.” I did make some modifications to the pattern,  but got a ton of compliments on it from complete strangers. It’s very exciting to say “Thanks, I made it!”

We discovered that Fancy is not a fan of my dress form unless it is dressed. Silly dog.

I also made two other versions of my strawberry dress, after finally remembering which pattern it was. I like them all, but was so pleased at how the lace worked out on my rose dress. I think it’s my favorite. I wore it in my professional head shot for work too. 🙂

Quilt-wise, my absolute favorite quilt was this rainbow one for a friend’s baby.

I love this quilt. Maybe that’s what I can use my scraps for! I’ll make a version to keep. It does use tiny pieces if I make the 5 inch squares first. Plus, I’m fairly certain I have some extra black squares somewhere.  The Husband is shaking his head at me and suggesting that I should maybe finish the projects I have started for other people first… Silly Husband, deadlines are for other people… (He’s probably right though.)

I also took a huge leap and made the pictures for my office. I was nervous about putting my almost non-existent drawing skills out for display, but was inspired by someone who repeatedly makes me draw things to “help build my confidence in drawing skills.” In the end, I’m glad I ended up choosing the songs and images I did. I’ve had positive responses from people and take pride in embracing my space as my own.

I found a source for my quilts, since they don’t meet Project Linus requirements. My friend has an OT room for kids with emotional disturbances and they will be getting some of them. I have one completed and two tops waiting to be finished.

I used 7 craft books. I added a few more in the process, but have tried to pull patterns or books that I am not using to be donated. I actually was able to connect through the bellydance world with a high school sewing club and they will be getting these items. The box of fabric I had for them is getting bigger and bigger. I’m excited for it to go to kids who are just getting into sewing.

Overall, I completed 67 total projects. This did not include actual numbers of tea wallets. I lost track somewhere in one of the rushes. If you know any tea drinkers, send them my way. I’m sure I can find one for just about anyone.

And what did you learn? 

Things I’ve learned from this year is that I don’t really like working with paper very much, despite having a bunch of scrapbooking stuff.  There is not one paper project on this entire year of blogging. I’ve brought a bunch of it to my office and most of it will probably make its way there.

I need to have a firm hand with the supplies that I keep. I have random craft supplies, Christmas ornament supplies, and beading supplies that I rarely use. Is it really worth having it take up the space, when it could go to someone who would use it?

Organization is my least favorite part, well, along with ironing, of the whole process. Losing my serger pedal is the perfect example of the reasons why I need to get this under control.

Do you know where it was?

It was staring me in the eye from behind a box of elastic and hidden by my thread boxes. The thread boxes that I go to every time I need new thread… that sit next to my sewing area in the basement. That I swear I searched. I’m a bit annoyed with myself to say the least.  My dad is going to say “if it was a snake, it would have bit you” when he reads that.

I may make this picture my background screen on my Ipad if I’m having trouble getting to the organization bit later. Maybe it’ll shame me into actually doing it.

Speaking of actually doing things, here’s my yearly goals.

Yearly goals: 

* Continue blogging both successes and failures.

* Be more involved in the online sewing community for support and growth.

* Continue to develop my Etsy store.

* Learn to take better pictures.

* Learn to use (and not be scared of) the serger. It dishonors my friend’s memory to have it just sit there and not use it.

* Get halfway through my UFO boxes.

* Donate items I am not using/that don’t work for me.

* Be fearless with new projects and techniques.

Whew. That’s a lot of words. Here’s a new cute sleeping dog picture, if you’ve made it this far.

I hope you’ve enjoyed coming along on my journey with me! I know I’ve learned a lot, maybe I have inspired you too!

Here’s to another year of creativity and adventures!

Monthly Review And Recipe Roundup
Monthly Review · Recipe Roundup

Monthly Review And Recipe Roundup

LSiehLeave a comment

Sometimes when my baking projects don’t quite turn out like I think they should, I make up little stories. It helps me cope. 🙂 This one was a Christmas Eve series of texts to Kayla when the bread got a bit out of control.

To set the scene: I decided to make a new recipe for what I thought was probably nissu. This recipe was for Pulla from the Scandinavia cookbook. It called for currents, but I left them out. The measurements were all in metric and I forgot I had a kitchen scale that would measure in metric, so it took a bit to figure things out.

Here’s the first picture:

This is where it started to go a little wonky. This is my biggest Pyrex bowl. Before the rise had happened… After 8 cups of flour…

This is the dough after the rise:

Also where my texts started to get a bit silly…

“After the rise, the bread overlord demanded a warm oven…”

“Too scared to disobey, I complied with haste, in hopes that it would spare the household.”

Kayla thought it was pretty funny, but she wasn’t the one being menaced by bread gone wild. The Husband was no help, he welcomes our bread overlords. 🙂

The recipe said it “served four” and I’m not sure who it thought I would be feeding. Ice giants? Trolls? It made a ton of them!

Mmmmmm….. the rolls were delicious. They are all contained now and less menacing after being frozen.

I didn’t cook a lot this week, due to the holiday, but we did have the traditional Christmas Eve meatballs. Eric and I have added buttered noodles to our tradition and I like it.

These were just beef meatballs. Since I know where to find ground venison now, we generally add that too, but I wasn’t able to get to the store. We’ll have mixed ones for the party though. We also had salad with them.

I also figured out that although the peppermint truffle filling was a failure as truffles, it makes a great ice cream sauce. We had brownie sundaes and I made mine a peppermint one.

I also used a Roasted Garlic Chicken freezer meal, which we both enjoyed. My stomach objected to something extremely violently though and I wasn’t able to eat any of the delicious leftovers. The Husband had it as leftovers and was fine, so it was just my stomach being weird, I guess.

Now for the monthly review!

Food Review:

I made 17 new recipes and used 4 new cookbooks. I used four family or my recipes. We had a good track record of eating leftovers. I did horribly at actually making breakfasts and lunches.

Hits were the peppermint sugar cookies, the garlic chicken for the Husband, stuffed Italian meatballs, the GF chocolate Orange cookies, and the Mexican Hot Chocolate Crinkles.

Misses were the garlic chicken for me, peppermint truffles, and the chewy chocolate cookies.

I’m sure I’m forgetting something, so if I figure it out, I’ll post it.

Food Goals: 

-Use the spice grinder and kitchen blow torch. 🙂

-Try to use at least one new cookbook a month.

-Make more tea blends and drink more tea!

-Use the InstantPot.

Craft Review

This month I made 4 hot pads, listed three new items on Etsy, sold 10 tea wallets, organized a little, and made two table runners. I started my Christmas skirt, but it still needs a lining and a cover for the rough zipper ends.

Craft Goals: 

– Finish two quilts from my stack of UFOs.

– Deliver the Rainbow Snowballs (When will it leave my house?!)

– Finish the second OT quilt and mail them off.

– Make a dress.

I have navy fabric ordered that has white baby dragon silhouettes and little gold crowns on it. It needs to be a sweet little dress with a gold Peter Pan collar and slightly puffed sleeves. It makes me giggle to think about it. My kids at work will love it, especially the little girls who think they are princesses. 🙂

I also really need to organize the basement and come up with a system to keep it organized. Hopefully I’ll find my serger pedal while working down there.

We’re possibly having family for the Epiphany party and want to be able to show off the whole house. The basement is a disaster from my fabric spread, the Legos, and Fancy’s proclivity for shredding cardboard. We also just found evidence that there may have been rodents nesting under the dryer at some point before we owned the house. We haven’t seen evidence of any there now, but need to get things sorted to make sure.

If you don’t hear from me by Monday night, send help… The bread overlords may have banded together with the fabric piles to take us down.

Also exciting news, my blog is almost a year old! I’ll be taking most of next week to review the good and the bad that went on this year. I’ll be splitting it up in sections, otherwise I think it would be way too long.

Let me know what you like reading about and if there are things I should change. That’s what the new year is for after all!

Monthly Review
Monthly Review · Uncategorized

Monthly Review

LSiehLeave a comment

It’s hard for me to believe it, but I’ve been writing this blog for 11 months! 11 reviews, multiples of 11 of new recipes, and probably about 11 craft projects completed. 🙂

Fancy has found 11 new places to nap, most of them in spots where we would like to sit or were previously sitting.

She’s also making new noises. We thought we had a quiet dog, but when she wants something that is not the case at all. Lately she has decided the coffee table makes the perfect launch pad to the couch. We’ve shut that one down quickly. No jumping on tables for her. This is her after getting yelled after one of those times.

So this month wasn’t a strong sewing month, although we did get two big organization projects done. We organized the cookbooks and the pantry area downstairs.

I also finished my Rainbow Snowball Quilt! It hasn’t made it to its new owner, but is completed finally.

I started a tunic, but got confused by the directions and put it away for a little bit.

I also started a new rainbow quilt. This one may have a home, but I have to measure it when done first. I can’t have sibling rivalry going on over my quilts.

It looks like I may only have finished one sewing project! Yikes! I need to get on that. Here’s a sneak peek of super secret Christmas projects to make up for it.

These two will be together. The next two are just pictured together, they will be separate projects.

This one was a complete impulse buy, but it was on clearance and I wanted it. Who doesn’t like winter walrus?! I will probably make myself a Christmas apron out of it. 🙂

I’ve also found several Christmas flamingos, one of which is this Welcome flag.

The neighbors thought they would escape flamingos at Christmas! Ha! Silly neighbors!

The Husband has not yet agreed to the large light-up scarf wearing flamingo for the yard, but if it’s still there for Target’s 70% off clearance, it’s coming home with us. 🙂  It’s possible I have a flamingo problem.  Send Legos for the Husband so he’ll be distracted and won’t notice additional flamingos!

Food-wise, I did better with meeting goals. I used 7 new cookbooks, a couple of new techniques, and 24 new recipes total.

We had 4 misses. The squash tasted bland and wouldn’t flambé, the shortbread was a weird texture, the souffle tasted too processed, and the seed cake was too dense and dry.

Hits were the French Onion Pot Roast, Fancy’s pumpkin pb treats, the Creamy Chicken dish from Natasha’s Kitchen, the Chocolate Banana Muffins, and the beef stew with barley and carrots.

This month I want to try to get the Husband a little more comfortable with cooking a few dishes, so I can leave more things for him. I also want to keep trying some new techniques. I’ve been hinting strongly for a kitchen blow torch for Christmas. There are creme brûlée yogurt parfaits to be made!

Craft goals for the month: I would like to focus on finishing Christmas presents and also making some household items, like potholders and seasonal table runners. I have Christmas and Thanksgiving fabric. Perhaps a table runner will encourage me to keep the table clear!

I would like to make at least one clothing item and finish a UFO, but that might be a back burner goal, depending on how Christmas goes.

I’ve also got to collect info for my year review! It’s exciting and scary at the same time.

All the 25 Days of Cookies recipes will be included in the weekly Recipe Roundups and will have their own post sometime after Christmas. Tonight I made no bake pb bars and glazed ginger hibiscus cookies!

Now it’s off to bed. I have a sleepy dog and a long day tomorrow!

Monthly Review And Recipes
Monthly Review · Recipe Roundup

Monthly Review And Recipes

LSiehLeave a comment

Another month gone by! I’m excited to be getting into the holidays and to be finally being down to one job. My current plan is to transfer everyone by The end of December. So far I’m on track. My Fridays are going to be Etsy and errand days. And blogging, of course. 🙂

I made two new recipes this week. One was good and was very good.

1- Gershwin’s Greatest Gumbo from Musical Feasts from the Detroit Symphony Orchestra.

I have no pictures, since we ate this on Halloween. I do have a picture of some of the leftover Halloween candy. We only had about 30 trick or treaters and two Costco bags of candy…

The Gumbo had Cornish hens and smoked gouda chicken sausage. I would switch to smoked turkey sausage instead. The gouda sausage was a little weird. This was delicious though. It had a little kick to it. We will make this again. We had it over rice. It made a perfect meal to have on a cold night.

2- Scalloped Potatoes and Ham from A Quilter’s Christmas by Louise Stoltzfus and Dawn Ranck. 

This was eaten while I was at work, so no pictures. I had a few bites when I got home. The Husband said it was a little soupy, but tasted good. It didn’t originally call for that, but I just threw some sliced ham in it. I would make this again.

Now for my monthly review. I made 20 recipes. 9 were new cookbooks or internet recipes.

We had a couple of hits, the gumbo, Fancy’s dog treats, jerk chicken, and the cuban steak.

Misses were Dad’s bread method and the Hungarian Beef Stew.

I tried using Dad’s method for my new technique and will try it again. I made some more frozen meals to keep and they have turned out good so far.

Crafting wise, I made my goal of finishing an item of clothing and my UFO goal on one fell swoop with my flamingo pjs. They are so cozy!

I also made my elephant bag, but couldn’t bring myself to sell it. It needed to be mine.

I also started Nanowrimo this month, so my challenge will be getting my writing done as well as maintaining  sewing and cooking. I foresee a lot of crockpot meals this month.

So to explain Nano, the point is to write 50,000 words in the month of November to end up with a short novel. I’ve attempted this before and only “won” once.  This year’s novel is a Steampunk novel involving political intrigue and magic. Somehow while writing yesterday, cowboys showed up. It was weird, but it kind of worked out. I think. It’s going to be interesting to see where it goes.

So my goals for this month will be a little smaller, due to Nano. I plan to still keep the 2 new meals per week. I also want to try cooking something familiar with a new recipe.

Sewing goals are to find my serger pedal and to try sewing with knits. Also, to finish one of the quilts that I have tucked away.

Now, I have to go get the dog off the bed. She snuck into our bedroom while I wasn’t looking. She likes to steal blankets and pjs and snuggle them.

Oh, and make word count. Wish me luck!

Monthly Review
Monthly Review

Monthly Review

LSiehLeave a comment

Sometimes we need a little reminder of the beauty in life, while tragedy surrounds us. I took the featured picture while stopped (yes, Mom, completely stopped) in traffic one day after work. It certainly made my commute a little better.

I briefly lost my notebook with all of my recipes, notes, and craft lists in it, but it was in my work bag.  I’m going to need a new one soon, this one only has a few pages left. Should I make the next one all fancy, with different kind of paper, like graph paper and ruled paper? I should probably just use one of the many half filled ones I have lying around here.

So I have the backing for the Rainbow Snowball Quilt! It’s brown dog themed fleece, since it is going to a home with dogs. I will finally get it finished in the next few weeks.

I completed a quilt for my OT friend and have one more quilt top that is destined for her too. I’m going to send them together.

I made a dress! I took a chance and added lace and it turned out really cute.

Four more hip wraps are done and waiting for Ooky Spooky vending.

I tried some new color pairings with the hip wraps and I love them. Hopefully other people will love them too!

The lyrics are on my second office picture and they are hanging on my wall. A third one is simmering in my head too.

The words say “I’m holding on. Why is everything so heavy? Holding on. To so much more than I can carry. I’ve been dragging around what’s keeping me down. If I just let go, I would be free. Why is everything so heavy?”

I did clean a little nd then got side tracked by fabric and now need to clean again. I have problems cleaning while I’m sewing. Fabric gets put in a pile and it’s much more fun to keep sewing rather than put things away. I was able to sneak some fabric into the laundry though, so now I can get to the projects.

The top two will be dresses or skirts, the Minions are supposed to be matching pj pants or shorts for the Husband and I. Yes, we’re dorks. 🙂

For food goals this month, I didn’t use any new ingredients, I don’t think. I did make spaetzle for my new technique. It was a lot of work. My arms got steamed and tired. It tasted good though.

I also made a new muffin recipe for breakfast and made chili specifically for lunches. I did pretty well meal planning.

I used 7 new cookbooks, five family or my recipes, and made 20 new recipes overall.

Hits were the roast chicken, Fancy’s treats, and the tortellini Stroganoff.

Misses were the stuffing. It was too dry for the Husband.

We had so much chicken this month that the Husband got sick of chicken. He’s typically fine eating the same thing for a while, but this was too much. We’ll try some different proteins this month for sure. We might even try some meatless dishes!

Fancy had a big month and met lots of dogs and people. She had lots of playtime and got a few new toys to chew on.

She also cuddled a lot. She’s definitely a people dog. 

Sewing Goals for next month are to make at least one clothing item, one item from the UFO bins, and finish a wedding quilt. I also want to work on some more bags for Etsy and vending.

Food goals are to try more meatless dishes and get creative with breakfasts. Also, to continue to make the freezer meals for long days.

The Husband has his play pretty much all month, so our dinner schedule might be weird. We’ll both still need lunches though.

My garden is on the verge of dying. I had a hard time keeping up with the watering when it was so hot. I also didn’t realize I should have been plucking blossoms that wouldn’t have a chance to mature first. Next year I will know. My herbs are still growing though, so that’s good.

Fancy is demanding walks by jumping off and on the couch, so I have to go get her out before she takes out the furniture. Have a good week!

Monthly Review
Crafty · Monthly Review

Monthly Review

LSiehLeave a comment

Since I am having tea with some friends on Sunday, I thought I would go over my monthly review a few days earlier. I had a bit of a hiccup in my crafting and baking time, due to the paperwork problem, but did pretty well at getting things done.

According to the Husband, I just need a few more cooking techniques under my belt to be ready for Masterchef. He thinks I can get them done in a month or so. (I’m hoping his play will start needing him soon and he’ll be distracted.)

Fancy is hoping I stop messing about on the computer and make her some biscuits and give her more snuggles. We’ve all got dreams…

Meanwhile, my dream is to find my serger pedal so I can start learning how to sew knits and can make myself all the tunics I need. This means cleaning the basement completely. Maybe this weekend I can unpack and reorganize a few more boxes.

So in terms of craft goals, I had set some category goals last month, with only two firm projects. My office art is mostly completed. I need to add words to my “Heavy” picture, but the first one is done and at my office.

I washed the backing fabric for the Rainbow Snowball Quilt and plan to tie it on Monday, when my whole day is free. I also plan to work on my Ren Fest costume on Monday, but we’ll see how much I get done.

I made a pretty dress with pockets! I have gotten several compliments on it whenever I wear it. It needs a neckline fix, but is still wearable.

I made many tea wallets for Etsy, just have to take pictures of all of them and get them posted. You are probably all sick of seeing pictures of tea wallets, so I’ll spare you this time. 🙂

I am slowly working on the basement. We are planning on getting new shelves to give the Husband a way to get his Lego boxes off the floor. Fancy likes to lay under his table and gets a little snappy when we try to get her off the boxes. No new updates since the last big organization effort.

I still haven’t figured out how I want to store the fat quarters, so for now they are still in shoeboxes in the trunk. It works, it’s just not the nicest looking way to do things and I think standard sized boxes would be better.

I didn’t finish anything from the UFO pile, but have hip wraps earmarked for Ooky Spooky, so can maybe catch up then. My teen group requested a pj party for our last session, so I am going to try to get my flannel flamingo pants done by end of September.

I did make two new hip wraps! They are pretty awesome, if I do say so myself. It’s an edgier color scheme than I normally use, so I am excited to see how they sell. I really want to keep both of them, but will have to just make myself one to wear there. Perhaps I can even use it for my costume piece for my own dance.

Here’s the first one:

It has a repurposed belt as an accent and has black and white skulls on the other side with 4 tassels. 

The second one has more embellishments and no tassels. It has black fringe along the bottom and a chain piece along the top.

I almost broke my needle while sewing the chain piece on. There’s only about an 1/8 of an inch for the needle to go and one of the links was just a bit too far over. Both machine and needle are okay, but I definitely need to change my needle.

Food wise, I did not do so well. I don’t know what it was this month, but food did not sound interesting at all.

I used 9 new recipes. 3 of them were also new cookbooks, Cooking from the Gourmet’s Garden, Retro Pies, and The Vintage Tea Party Year. I made 9 recipes by my methods and used 4 recipes from Pinterest or elsewhere online.

Hits were Rack of Lamb with Potato Puree (My Italian Kitchen, Luca Manfe), the Rosemary Bundt cake, and the    sweet cream ice cream from Cooking Classy.

I also made a really good apple pie following a recipe from Retro Pies, by Linda Everret. It has sugar and cream brushed on the crust, which the Husband enjoyed a lot.

Misses were my homemade chicken soup. It came out a little weird and watery. The chocolate cake was not moist enough for me either.

Food hasn’t been a priority lately. I haven’t really wanted to eat, which makes it hard to cook. We’ve been eating the freezer meals that I put together a few weeks ago and that has helped. I’m not sure how to motivate myself at the moment beyond the bare minimum. Any ideas for getting out of a food rut?

The Husband did get me a beautiful Boos cutting board for our anniversary, which makes me want to have cheese plates and other things we can display on it. It’s so pretty!

Maybe exploring some options like that might help. Sometimes the thought of doing all the work to cook is what stops me.

Here are my goals for the month, before I get too philosophical on the subject of food.

Craft Goals:

*Finish at least one UFO project

*Rainbow Snowball Quilt

*Finish Ren Fest costume

*Clean/organize basement

*One item of clothing

Food Goals:

*Try one new technique

*Try a new ingredient

*Meal plan

*New breakfast or lunch recipe

 

Speaking of food, I should probably go eat lunch and get the dog out for a walk. She whined until I got up this morning, ran around like a crazy dog, and then went right back to sleep. Silly dog..

Have a great holiday weekend! Hopefully it’s relaxing and fun!

Monthly Review
Monthly Review

Monthly Review

LSiehLeave a comment

I have made 75 tea wallets this month. I went a little crazy. What’s also crazy is the fact that my scrap boxes look very similar to when I started. I need to get my already started quilts done so I can start making some more.

These are waiting on the last threads to be cut. It’s my least favorite part. Some of them will also need buttons.

I got tired of having nothing to report on for my craft goals this month, so worked pretty hard to get them done. I still need this darn Rainbow quilt to be done, but may be able to get the fabric washed tomorrow.

Crafting and Sewing Update

So my completed craft goals for the month were to figure out a wallet and a coin purse, organize the basement, and fix something from the mending or finish a UFO project. Some of the tea wallets were actually in my UFO bag and I fixed a skirt where the elastic had snapped.

I found a stash of wallets that I made when I was first sewing for Etsy, but had decided they weren’t as professional as I would like, so haven’t sold them. I pulled a black one made from a shrunken sweater with a daisy print fabric and daisy embroideries on the front. It’s not too big and looks cute.

I also made a zippered coin purse from some scraps from a shirt. It gave me an excuse to use a tiny 4 inch zipper.

It’s lined with the same material. I have so many zippers right now and really need to make some zippered bags for my Twinflower Etsy store. I have a bunch of weird colors though, so hopefully I can find enough fabrics that match. It would be terrible if I had to buy new fabrics after all! Well, the Husband would think so at least.

This is the skirt that I fixed. The elastic popped while on a work trip a few years ago and it got stuck in the mending pile. I finally pulled it out, picked a few stitches and re-threaded the elastic.

Such a simple fix and I just never did it. Now I can wear the skirt again and it will be even more appropriate since I work with kids.

My office art and clipboards were two things that I only got partially done. I lost my Modge Podge in one of the moves and will need some more before I can collage the clipboards.

The office art is drawn out, but I haven’t quite decided if I like it. One of the songs I had picked out, “Heavy,” is by Linkin Park. With Chester Bennington’s recent suicide (the lead singer), I’m debating the wisdom of having the song in my office. The song itself talks about not holding on to things you can’t change and recognizing that you need to leave some things behind. It’s a beautiful song and sparked a few discussions in my teen group, I’m just not sure if I should have it up right now. I can see both sides. On one hand, the song itself can be inspiring, but it now is connected with someone who died by suicide. Maybe I will still make it and put it up in a few months. This piece will have a stick figure trying to support a globe on it’s back with the words in the globe. It will either be oil pastels or collage pieces with cool colors.

My second song, “Brave,” by Sara Barellis, is one that I have wanted in my counseling office since before I had an office. It talks about saying what needs to be said and being brave. For a little while every time I had to do something big, the song would be playing on the radio. 🙂 This one will have a stick figure shouting the chorus. It will be warm colors.

Garden Update

Most of the garden is growing well. I’m still waging a war on squirrels and they are still winning. Here are some garden pictures.

These are the “mammoth” jalapeños. They still aren’t what I would call mammoth…

Green Peppers

Roma Tomatoes

Cooking Update

I used 12 new cookbooks and 25 new recipes. We had one family recipe and 4 or 5 recipes/methods by me. That’s a lot of food. How did we eat so much food?

Hits for the month were the Gold Beach Burgers, the Korean BBQ ribs, the Greek Grilled Chicken, and the Shrimp Scampi. Most of the ice cream recipes were also hits.

Misses were the Slow Cooker Soy Citrus Chicken, the Garlicky Baked Chicken Thighs/Drumsticks, and the carrot puree.

We had at least two new recipes per week and I made lots of new ice creams. I made two last night actually! This week’s recipes will be posted later.

Goals for next month: 

Sewing wise, I am relaxing my goals a little. I’m picking general categories this month. Sometimes I don’t want to work on the things I’ve picked. The only firm projects are the Rainbow Snowball Quilt and my office art.

Categories:

Clothing item, Etsy stock, and UFO/mending pile.

Continue to organize basement.

Get new storage for small pieces of fabric.

Garden Goals: 

Dry herbs for a tea making party in September.

Food Goals: 

Continue to make 2-3 recipes for week.

Try new ice cream recipes.

Use new recipes for Anniversary party.

Get freezer recipes made up in freezer.

It seems I may have a busy month ahead of me. I think I’ll join the puppers in a good night’s sleep.