strawberry-fig jam

Tags

handmade, jams

I finally found some more figs at costco of all places.  I was shopping there for the dinner party we held the other night and saw figs.  Visions of figs and creamy goat cheese with honey were dancing in my head…and then I thought about strawberry-fig jam! I grabbed four pounds (two for jam and two for the party) and away I went!

It is so simple to make jam, it’s ridiculous.  I trimmed up the figs and strawberries one afternoon while preparing dinner. The next day, during Sophia’s nap, I pureed the fruits and put them in a pot to bring them to a gentle boil.

While I was waiting on the jam, I worked on Sophia’s pillowcase dress.  I added the water, lemon juice, sugar and pectin according to these directions. I added a little bit more sugar (1/2 cup), since I tasted the blueberry jam and had wished it was a tad sweeter.  Not that I like sweet jam, but a little bit more would have been perfection.  After boiling for the correct amount of time – I tasted the jam and decided it was time to can.  I loaded up fourteen half pint jars that had been sterilized in the dishwasher – and put them in the water bath for 5-10 minutes.

By the time Sophia was up, the jars were filled with jam and just going through their water bath.  The sound of little pings! echoed through the kitchen.  What a lovely way to preserve the tastes of summer. And not to be immodest, but this is the best jam I have made yet.  The best.  Period. And the final cost per jar is just over two dollars.  I’ve continued to use the enormous amounts lemon juice and sugar I bought from the first jam making session (again, costco) and I doubled up the pectin this time.  Not bad at all…

these beauties are going to be fought over!

a pillowcase dress for sophia

Tags

handmade, sewing, sophia

After seeing the pillowcase dress made here by Making it Lovely, and here at Prudent Baby, I decided it was time to make one for Sophia!  First, I made a pattern based on the directions by Prudent Baby. (BTW, if you haven’t checked out these sites, I suggest you do.  They are full of all kinds of loveliness!)

I decided to us some fabric from my fabric expedition the other day.  It took a bit of time to make the pattern, because it just looked too much like  a triangle to me…but I went ahead anyway.  It was so simple to sew up – I completed most of it during one of Sophia’s nap and quickly finished the rest of it when she was up.

I elected to use bias tape for the ribbon, because that’s what I had.  Sophia and I looked at all my ribbons but none really went with this fabric. Sophia really liked untying the ribbon to take the dress off! She does this with her practice art smock as well…

Next time, I think I’ll make two ribbons instead of one and make a bow on each side.  Then sew the bows so little hands cannot untie them.  I also think the “j-shape” for the armholes was way too large and next time will make them smaller.  I really like the idea of using bias tape to line the armholes of the dress – so clever and simple!  Definitely going to use this trick on many other dresses!

My fears about the dress looking too much like a triangle were founded.  Next time, I’m not going to go for this sharp triangle look.  But as you can see, Sophia likes the dress.  It’s fun for petting Panda in and running amok.  Very cute indeed. Other than the few small tweaks I’m going to make, I am very much liking this dress and the ease in which is was made.  I bet it would be easy to size it up for older girls…hmmm….

I need to work on making some bloomers for Sophia. Now that’s she walking – she’s wearing more and more dresses, but I feel the outfits need bloomers.   Need to find a simple pattern…any ideas?

back patio dinner party

Tags

back patio, friends, parties

So, all the plans have been leading to this one event.  We’re done the repainting and recovering of chairs and cushions, and created some shade for the back patio. Saturday we hosted 20 of Jon’s new students and post docs with their families at our place.   As I was preparing the food for dinner, the sky gave an ominous rumble, but no rain. No clouds overhead either, just around the mountains to the north and east. We had one family cancel about an hour before dinner, so that brought our numbers down slightly.

For appetizers, we had fresh figs with goat cheese and honey on crusty bread, various cheese and crackers, and a veggie tray with ranch dip and hummus.  For dinner, we had sausages (chicken and pork), roasted veggies (which included eggplant, red bell peppers, mushrooms, and leeks), roasted potatoes, and pesto bow tie pasta.  Dessert was cheesecake with berries on the side (strawberries, blueberries, and blackberries), and a pureed berry sauce (of the same berries mentioned before).

The tables were set, drinks were ready, the music was playing, and patio lights were on. The beer was cold and there was lots of wine and pink lemonade and tea for those that wanted it.  People were mingling and chatting. Kids were having fun looking at the chickens and running in and out of the playroom. And drinking pink lemonade. The kids LOVED the pink lemonade.

We were sitting down at the tables, enjoying dinner.  I hadn’t lit the candles yet, because it wasn’t quite dark.  A few drops began to fall from the sky.  Everyone looked at each other and we decided it wasn’t a big deal.  More drops.  Harder.  We wondered if we could hold out – perhaps it wouldn’t last too long.  Sometimes, monsoon rains are like that – they began and quite very quickly. More and more drops fell from the sky – and harder.  Kids began crying – they wanted out of their chairs and inside!   We rushed the kids inside, and ran back out in the torrential downpour that began coming down. We had to bring the food and drinks inside!

Luckily, people were able to settle into the living room to continued to eat.  The kids just loved being inside playing in the playroom.  I’ve never actually seen every single toys and book on the floor before – and it’s still that way this morning.  Dessert was served and everyone helped themselves.  Those with kids left around 8 pm (one hour past bedtime) and those without kids were tossed out at 9:30 pm when I just couldn’t stay up any longer (and this was after Jon had been doing the dishes in the kitchen for over half hour at this point – a clear sign to anyone that it’s time to get going. Or maybe it’s just a clear sign to those with kids…I don’t know.  Maybe it wad rude, but I was too exhausted to care very much).  Anyways, a good time was had by all, even with the rains that interrupted our dinner alfresco on the patio.  We need the rain and most people understand that. Some new friends were made as well…

I didn’t get a chance to take more detail photos of the back patio all gussied up due to the rain…it will have to wait until our next party!    Many thanks to our friend who came through with a few extra chairs for us to borrow!!! We really appreciated it!

more of jon’s office

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fabric, jon, sewing

So, I was thinking the other day that there was something lacking in Jon’s new office.

It’s glaringly obvious to me…any guesses?

No, not another cat bed Panda! You already have one.  And a whole bed.  You don’t need another.

Yes – curtains! Unfortunately, Jon really likes the bright light, which he had in the arizona room before it became the playroom.  However, I thought I could make a compromise we both could love with.  With fabric found during this trip, I quickly made a pair of curtains. If Trinka scans in the window tutorial I sent her, we’d have instructions.  If not, no worries! I think people would find it hard to read my chicken scratch anyway!

Sheer and white, allowing light to come streaming through!  I hope he likes it! And when anyone stays over, they can shut the dainty curtains and pull down the blackout blind for complete darkness.

fabric love

Tags

fabric, sewing

WARNING: This post may contain excessive fabric!

So, I took a half hour the other day on my way to a meeting to stop at SAS, the local cheap fabric store that gets its wares from castoffs from big box and brand names stores.   Just to look around and see if I could find anything good.  Quickly. And you really have to dig through big boxes, some taller than me.  And sometimes you get lucky…

Oh boy did I ever!  Lots of great fabric by my favorite designers were found, as well as pretty fabric by those I don’t know well. And some not as pretty designs by those I do know…which are hard to pass up, but since the colors don’t appeal to me, I just couldn’t bring myself to get some of them. Even dirty cheap.

anna maria horner voile!

Some of the fabrics are destined for new dresses and pants for my little girl.

i'm thinking about a "pillowcase" dress

flannel - for a wintery dress for sophia

And, then I was really naughty and ordered some fabric from here.  I did have a reason…or two.  Like a quilt for a colleague of Jon’s who’s having a little girl soon. And a girlfriend who’s also having a little girl early next year.

baby girl quilt

baby quilt #2

And some fabric to make this super cute capelet ( a smaller version of a cape) for my niece for her birthday.

sedona loves her princess-types

And…

Well, I don’t really have a reason for one of the pieces, but it was pretty.  And flannel.

But they did have a flat shipping rate at the time. So there!  Sew many plans…I can’t wait to get started! But first, there are a couple of art smocks to finish…and the back patio too!

pesto zucchini lasagna

Tags

cooking, garden, summer

Merging my need for comfort food more often consumed during autumn & winter and the overwhelming amounts of basil my garden is producing.  One of the few items my garden is producing in abundance this year, sadly. Inspired after seeing this lasagna by KC and thinking – hey – a way to use up my extra zucchini and basil!

is there more?

back patio – phase two

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back patio project

Now that the chairs and cushions are mostly completed (with the exception of the one chair!), it’s time to make some shade.  Our neighbors up the road have this shade structure with four metal posts and two triangle pieces of shade cloth. After walking by many times, I finally went up and knocked on the door to get the name of who made the metal posts.  Our neighbors are very nice people (especially when answering the door on Sunday evening to talk to some crazy lady from down the road with a kid and a dog) and the posts were made by a local guy whose business is Kustom Steel. He came out to give us and estimate and promised delivery of the posts, installed, in one week.

Well, two days before delivery, Jon and I got to thinking that the shade cloth I was sewing was going to be pretty heavy and the posts probably would need to be taller to compensate for the sagging.  It was a bit late (the posts were already made and in the truck), but the guy was pretty nice about helping us out and not charging us much more to increase the height two feet to a total of twelve feet.  Thank goodness!

installation

two poles!

The poles were installed Saturday morning.  Gil brought his two sons to help with the installation – such polite boys! The hole digging was simplified through the use of a jackhammer and some post hole diggers.  I wish I had a jackhammer… After mixing some concrete and after making sure the poles were leveled – we have posts for our shade canopy! These posts will turn a nice rust color – which will be very pretty!

The shade canopy:

All week I worked on sewing 6′ by 24′ blocks together to make our shade canopy. The final size was roughly 24′ by 24′.  Jon and I put installed some grommets and tested out the canopy.  It was going to sag and, even worse, the canopy was tearing.  Down came the canopy, and we had to do some thinking.  We decided to create leather patches on either side of the canopy where all the grommets were going to be located.  Additionally, to combat the sagging, we made the canopy a bit smaller so it would be pulled taut.  The problem was, we had to guess a bit at the locations of some grommets and the final size.  Luckily, it all worked out.  The leather patches seems to be working great – we had a small storm the other night and everything held up fine. After installing all the eye hooks and attaching the grommets to the eye hooks, we have ourselves a shade canopy!

jon calls the shade covered back patio his "great room"

You can see the completely finished back patio beautification  project this coming weekend, once all the last details are done.

back patio – phase one

Tags

back patio project

So, the big back patio beautification project is just about coming to an end, with less than a week left to finish all the details. To recap, we have a beautiful flagstone patio created by Jon in time for our wedding four years ago.  We’ve held a number of outdoor BBQ’s on the patio, but the space seemed to lack something. Something like shade and a cohesive color palette.  So, with a BBQ planned for this coming Saturday, we (and by we,  I mean me – Jon graciously just goes along with some of my crazy ideas) gave ourselves a deadline to do something about it.

First, all the patio furniture needed an update in some form.  Chairs needed new cushions and some of the metal furniture was a bit worn and paint was peeling off. The plan was to paint these specific chairs, table, and plant stand the same color (i.e.: not rust or peeling paint). For fabric, I wanted to use fabric I’d already had.  The first choice had colors similar to the front patio – orange and green.  I decided to use the other fabric, bringing a few other colors (a floral pattern in red, green, gray, pinks) into the mix so that the back patio would have a different feel.

My helper put these cushions through a battery of tests to see how the fabric held up.  She has since decided they probably will do alright outside, but it would be better if they stayed inside for her to use.  For climbing.  Or drinking her milk.  Or just kicking back.  I probably ought to sneak these guys outside while she’s napping…even the cats have taken to lounging on them! (Note: I did have to evict a certain panda cat from the cushions to take them outside!)

The chairs (with the exception of one), the table, and the plant stand have been painted a vibrant green that is found in the floral pattern on the cushions.  Oil paint takes a bit to dry.  Even in our heat. Since you have to use primer if you actually want the paint job to last, the painting project has been a bit slow as a result. One table still needs a new oil cloth top, which hopefully will be found this week at the fabric store.

And that’s it for phase one!  Up next, creating shade!

a weekend moment

Tags

family, sophia

welcome to the world!

Tags

family, friends

A big welcome and congratulations goes to Anne-Marie, Kevin, and Lukas on their new arrival! Baby boy #2 (not his real name – they haven’t chosen one yet!) came in the early morning hours on Sunday.  He weighed eight pounds and 10 ounces and is 21 inches tall.  Everyone is doing well; we heard it was a smooth delivery – and in half the amount of time as Lukas! We hope to have more news soon!

What a cutie!  We can’t wait to meet this little guy!!!!!