The Feast

Oh My!!! The time between Christmas and New Years should be called 'The Feast'. This is the only time of the year where basically almost everyone eats non-stop. Chocolate, turkey, chocolate, turkey buns, treats, turkey soup, dessert, ... 

Looking back, 2010 has been a year of change for me. So keeping with the continuity of change, prime rib instead of turkey and strawberry shortcake instead of pumpkin pie. What a treat!

My sister brought this delightfully tasty crunchy salad that she found at Cooks.com instead of orange-pineapple jelly salad.

CAULIFLOWER-CASHEW-PEA SALAD from COOKS.COM

Combine ingredients:
1 c. chopped cauliflower
1 c. diced celery
1 (10 oz.) pkg. frozen peas (thaw in fridge overnight)
1/4 c. diced green onion

Salad dressing: *
1 c. Ranch dressing
1/2 c. sour cream

Add as garnish or mix in: **
1/2 lb. crisp-cooked bacon, crumbled
1 c. cashews added

Chill.

* we only used half
** added just before serving


CLASSIC STRAWBERRY SHORTCAKE Serves 6.
from Kirkland Signature Whole Strawberry Bag

2 cups flour
1/4 cup sugar
4 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
Dash nutmeg
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup milk
2 eggs, separated
Additional sugar

2 1/2 cups whole frozen strawberries
1 cup whipping cream, whipped and sweetened

Sift flour, sugar, baking powder, salt and nutmeg into large bowl.
Cut in butter to resemble coarse meal.
In bowl blend milk and egg yolks with fork.
Stir into flour mixture to make a soft dough.
Divide dough into 6 portions; form into balls.
Pat balls out on greased baking sheet to 3-inch circles, moistening fingers with egg whites.
Brush cakes with egg whites. Sprinkle with sugar.
Bake in preheated 450 degree oven 10-12 minutes until golden.
Remove from rack; cool.
Sweeten strawberries to taste.***
Halve the cakes horizontally.
Fill and garnish with strawberries and whipped cream.

*** I put the whole strawberries into a large bowl to thaw. When the strawberries were slightly thawed I sliced them then let them completely thaw in fridge. Because strawberries are already sweet, I did not sweeten them. But, I made a rum sauce to pour over the strawberries.

Layered: top to bottom
Strawberry
Whipped cream
Rum sauce
Strawberries
Top of shortcake
Whipped cream
Rum sauce
Strawberries
Bottom of shortcake

Rum Sauce Serves 6. Created on the fly
1/2 cup butter - Melt on medium heat in sauce pan
1/2 cup sugar - Stir in sugar
1 cup water - Carefully add - there will be spitting and splattering
Milk - Approx 1/4 to 1/2 cup
Butter rum flavoring or Rum - Add to taste
Cornstarch - Approx 1 1/2 Tablespoons - add gradually until thickened

YUMMY YUMMY YUMMY!!!

Merry Christmas

Reorganization Continues

The reorganization continues very slowly but surely. Have now gone through two 3 cu. ft. moving boxes filled with WIPs. Work In Progress sounds so much better than UnFinished Objects.

For many years I had no intention of completing the quilts. They were part of my thirst for knowledge on techniques. When I started quilting, for the second time, I became a sponge. Classes here, classes there, and more classes everywhere. There was and still is so much to learn.

Also in the boxes were some of my first block of the month designs. The 2 star quilts are same pattern. One is country, the other is contemporary. If you look close at the quilt on the right side, you can see the odd green piece. I said to Donna, one of my testers, wouldn't it be cool to put lime green in some of the blocks. I was thinking inside the box, a center or corners. She was thinking outside the box, only one piece anywhere in the block. How ingenious!

For the last couple weeks it's been nose down and pedal to the metal. One would think that these quilts had to be done for Christmas. Completing borders, making regular backs, making art backs, getting ready for the longarm quilter.

It was fantastic to use fabrics from the stash. Particularly, the ruler fabric without having to cut it up. A few more meters gone!

And to use 9 of the left blocks, that didn't make it into a previous quilt, for the back of a table topper.

Then, there is this very old round robin row quilt. The quilt began with the bargello. You remember the Bargello? I had a fat quarter color run that worked perfectly.

The next person thought the bargello looked like the northern lights, Aurora Borealis.













Now, take the bargello row apart and put it around the top of the quilt.  Voila, the northern lights!

Add the bottom row. Carol, a geologist, said it was a cross section of the geological formation under my house. At the time, thought it was cool because I had also studied geology. Wasn't going to use this row but when some of the medium brown was cut off, excavated, it worked perfectly!

Notice how the trees have moon glow from the silver lame moon in the previous row.



Inner Border - Only top and both sides. No bottom inner border.
Outside Border - navy with gold stars sewn at an angle to a navy with light blue hi lites.

A perfect work of art!



Lunar Eclipse 2010 Winter Solstice

Watching the 2010 winter solstice lunar eclipse was fantastic!!! My sister, the shutterbug, sat up to watch it in another part of the city; I set my alarm clock every 10-15 minutes to look out my window. Unfortunately, the moon clouded over just after total eclipse and I didn't see the red moon. However, the snow was reflecting the red color. Way cool!!! These are her photos and this is a You Tube time lapse of the Lunar Eclipse in Calgary by another person in Calgary.

Side Tracked, Again!

It's so easy for me to get side tracked from reorganizing. No, haven't finished the Hallowe'en quilt. Yes, am still reorganizing.

Found this block all cut and ready to piece together. Better finish it before pieces go missing. It's the last of 12 blocks from Traditional Pastimes Freebie 15.

Corner trees are rotated so that they point around the outside of quilt. Row 2 column 1 block is a basket on it's side. Now what to make for alternate blocks? Yeah, play time in EQ.

I skipped some steps in EQ. The block pattern works but the center color isn't quite right for me.

Audition fabrics from the stash.

Voila, another quilt for Victoria Quilts!

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Whirlwind Day Escape

Yes, just as the title says, I escaped to Ottawa, Ontario, Canada for the day from Calgary, Alberta, Canada.

Back in the late 70's, I took a 50 minute flight to Nisku, Alberta on a 747 to meet my DH and spend the weekend together. Besides being 5 miles from Edmonton's International Airport, Nisku was then a wide spot in the freeway where people in the oil patch accumulated at the beginning or end of their weeks in the field.

Anyways, there were only 7 passengers on this huge airplane. So when only 4 of us were getting off I asked the flight attendant where the plane was continuing to. Amsterdam! Okay! How do I stay on the plane and continue to Amsterdam?! Ever since then it has been in the back of my mind to jet set to Amsterdam for the day.

Okay, so Ottawa's not Amsterdam, BUT, what indescribable fun it was to fly there, tour for 4 hours and fly home.

Itinerary:
- fly to Ottawa;
- 20 minute bus ride to downtown - buses have their own bus only road system;
- picture of my initials on ornament in Fairmont Chateau Laurier
- walk across the Rideau Canal - getting ready for winter Rideau Canal Skateway; (Note to bucket list: skate down the Rideau Canal)
- visit Canada's Parliament Hill
- purchase souvenir key chains for Christmas ornaments
- fly home to Lucky.

Welcome to Ottawa
Initial Ornament	Rideau Canal
Canada's Parliament Hill +5 and raining	Souvenir Key Chain Christmas Ornaments

Lucky -
"and where have you been?"

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Reorganization continued

I now believe the saying - it gets worse before it gets better. The floor gets more and more cluttered as the shelves are organized. It looks worse and more daunting than in the beginning. Will I ever see ...!

This fabric folding is too much for the brain. Not that it's hard, but, that the brain is in design overdrive. Put these fabrics together and create this quilt, put these fabrics and create this quilt, put these fabrics ... Stop the wheel I gotta get off!!! Whew!!!

For someone who is not into novelty or floral fabric there sure is a lot of it. Okay which fabric fairy put them in the stash and let them multiply!? What to make out of the Hallowe'en fabric? See how well the 1 meter pieces blend together. This has to be a 2 fabric quilt because the fabrics are so busy. Now, what color to use for the second fabric. Lime looked good but liked the way black made some of the Hallowe'en fabric float. Use not 1 black but many blacks.

Next, which block(s) to use. Let's make it simple. Squares vs triangles. Triangles more work but way more interesting. Quarter vs half square triangles. Okay, half-square triangles easier. What size triangles? Trail and error with the ruler. Don't cut just audition size. 3" looks good.

Size? A large lap / not so long twin size quilt, about 60" x 75", is just right. Doesn't take so long to make, isn't huge, lots of room to snuggle under. Finished 12" blocks = 5 x 6 block quilt : 1 block = 16 half-square triangles : 30 blocks = 480 half-square triangles, OMG = 240 squares cut from each of the 2 colors (hallowe'en and black) cut into triangles and well stirred. The 60mm rotary cutter works well for mass production.

Well, this got me out of reorganzing. Now to dig out the sewing machine from under the reorganizing. LOL!

Backyard

The backyard is a winter wonderland right now with inches of snow covering everything. Branches bent over from the first wet snow are now holding onto the 48 hours of light fluffy flakes. The addition of bird feeders creates a magical world for bird watching.
Suet in the willow bird feeder has attracted a male Red-Shafted Northern Flicker.  They are in the woodpecker family. His beauty is his spots that look like  batik fabric and the beautiful red under wings seen in flight.

main view from computer

Winter

Hard to believe 2 days ago it was 11C / 52F. It's been snowing for 2 days now. First night snow started melting and as the evening cooled the snow turned to slush and then to ice. During the day snowing continued and temperatures went down. Driving and walking were done with caution. This morning, roads were and still are plugged. Tried to drive to swimming, but, ended up driving a circle around the community on the main roads and ending at home. Every street, thoroughfare was plugged. So my exercise of the day was shovelling the driveway and sidewalk. Now -13C / 8F

Mugo pine snow ghost	Steam off the water
Canada Geese waiting for the storm to end
8" of snow - day two
Day two
Sparrows at feeders
Birds between branches