small hands

A new crafty website is being assembled, set to launch tomorrow, February 1, 2006. I'm very excited about it because it promises to feature all manner of crafty goodness from some very, very talented people.



In February's Home Companion, there is an article about artist's studios, and it features Denyse Schmidt. Here are scans of the entire portion of the article about her:







I would love a light filled studio with this kind of space to work and store fabric. The only thing that would make it more perfect would be a fireplace.

Rest in peace Coretta Scott King.

Rest in peace Wendy Wasserstein.

The January 2006 Tie One On challenge was to make an apron out of clothing.

I had a bag of kids clothes going to Goodwill, but I didn't want to cut up good clothes that I know someone could use to, you know, dress their kids.

I had these pants that I bought from Ross for $4.99. They're size 24, so there was plenty of fabric, which was why I bought them; to make aprons or bags or something.



The floral fabric is from a tablecloth that was on sale at K-Mart.

Ten years ago today (ten!!!) I had my daughter. She emerged into the world warm and slippery like a baby dolphin.

It changed my life, my understanding of everything.

I am thankful and humbled by our happy decade together. She is my sweetest treasure.

I got two new books in the mail last night.

The first book is outstanding. It is crammed full of really fun images and patterns and it's very inspirational. I would recommend it most highly.

ISBN 4-529-04180-8











I am very disappointed with this second book. I thought it would be about quilting, or have some cool pictures of a quilter's studio. Instead it's a book about handbags which have quilting touches. So...the only thing to do is to get my money's worth is to make a bunch of the bags in the book. I would not recommend the book for purchase.

ISBN 4-579-11039-0











Both are from the fine folks at Amazon Japan.

Inspiration Monday

angry chicken has had some wonderful inspiration Mondays, so I thought I would borrow the idea.

I found these two images in the February 2006 Harpers Bazaar (with the delectable Salma Hayek on the cover):



I love this bouquet. I mean really love. I love roses and what pleases me most about this bouquet, beyond the abundance of roses, is the placement of a David Austin rose in the forefront, which it pops right out of the rest of the bouquet.




This quilt is hot!! There’s no way I’d allow a dog to sit on it–white, couture--but that’s just me.

Sunday was excellent. The sky was blue and clear, after a surprise rainstorm on Friday night/Saturday morning made cutting the grass impossible. I had breakfast and went to Mass and grocery shopping, then came home and mowed the lawns. I’m simple, but it made me so happy. Then I pruned and weeded a ton, filling the green bin to overflowing. The roses are starting to make new leaves and the foliage is gorgeous.

I was done in the yard by mid-afternoon, so I was able to sew and chill, and then make Sunday dinner.



Cookbooks:

Here’s the deal: most of the recipes I use I’ve gotten from copying cookbooks from the library, hundreds of them. They fill these six binders, as well as notebooks. If I had to name my top most used/valued cookbooks they would be:

The Best Recipe by Cooks Illustrated
Big Bowl Cookbook
Barbecue Bible
Fannie Farmer Cookbook
Doubleday Cookbook
Martha Stewart’s Pies and Tarts
Big Book of Casseroles
Staff Meals at Chanterelle
Spago Desserts

On the other hand, I recommend that you check out of the library cookbooks written by:

Bobby Flay
Charlie Trotter
Thomas Keller
James Peterson
Ina Garten
Martha Stewart
Marion Cunningham
Maryana Vollstedt
Wolfgang Puck
Emeril Lagasse
Jamie Oliver
Nancy Silverton
Julia Child
Cooks Illustrated
Saveur Magazine
Gourmet Magazine
New York Times
Williams Sonoma
Donna Hay
Lee Bailey
Paul Prudhomme
Jeffrey Alford
Alice Waters
Craig Claiborne
Dean and DeLuca

This is just a starter list and I recognize that leaving Mark Bittman off of it is heresy. What can I say?

Last night the children and I ordered Chinese food to be delivered. This is only the second time I’ve ever done so and I consider the delivery of Chinese food to one’s house a minor miracle. It qualifies because we ordered from King Dong* in Berkeley and they have fast delivery and the food is very, very good and spicy. On top of which, they give free vegetable spring rolls and they gave us a free calendar commemorating the Year of the Dog, with their menu on the back of it.

Proof that I am terribly, terribly old is how wonderously convenient I find it that I give my credit card number when I make the order and write the tip amount on the sheet the delivery man** has, and it’s done, paid for.

The kids ate enormously and contentedly.

Ordering in left me plenty of time and energy to clean up the house and sew a bit. My girl put all the leftover food in the refrigerator, without my having to ask. Excellent girl.

* The Beavis and Butthead crowd are quite fond of the name.

**Extremely handsome youth with the auburn hair favored in Japan.

Hi Claudia.

Thank you for the compliments about my kids and my blog.

I got the Japanese book from Amazon Japan. The ISBN is 483472235x.

Hi Siri:

I restored access to my archives. I’m still working on some issues in them.

Hi LBellatrix:

I am working on the cookbook list.

What a relief. I was struggling with piecing circles and it was going poorly/slowly. I thought I would experiment with paper piecing, just to have a bit of diversion, but I didn’t like the test blocks I was producing at all. And I’m a little stalled on a nine patch quilt and that was troubling me.

On top of which, folks were posting about their finished knitting projects, which made me slightly resent how long quilts take to complete (which is patently illogical).

Then I read this post. It was just what I needed. I opened my Denyse Schmidt book and got inspired by her yet again. Then I got started in a completely different direction and Oh Mama am I happy to be back in the quilting saddle again. Back to wanting to wake up early to get some sewing time in. Back to wanting to leave work early to get a long evening of sewing done.

These three days off have been very relaxing and restorative. Three days with my kids, talking and learning from them. It was intense, when they were bickering and demanding five different things at once. But we got to be home together and at times it felt like a clubhouse.

Not only did it stop raining, but the sky was clear and blue and the weather was perfect.

Oh joy!!

My son had a cup of coffee with me this morning, then we went out into the yards. I pruned and planted (four new rose bushes) and weeded and obsessed and listened to music and felt completely happy and satisfied. Sometimes a woman just needs to be in garden.



There is still much, much to be done, but I am so happy I got to do some of it today!



After four hours or so, I helped my girl with her report on Mission San Rafael Arcangel and we went grocery shopping. Right now a Spanish Chicken with chorizo and potatoes, from this cookbook, is roasting and making the house smell divine. After dinner, I'm going to take a long, hot bath.



Tomorrow is the Martin Luther King, Jr. Holiday. No work. Yay!

No gardening today.



Maybe tomorrow I can at least get some rose bushes in the ground.

I'm sewing, very slowly. I made this puffy heart in anticipation of V-Day.



It adds color to an otherwise gray day.

I went to see Brokeback Mountain last night.

Ang Lee is my favorite director, except for the Hulk, which was not good.

I’ve seen:

Wedding Banquet
Eat Drink Man Woman
Sense and Sensibility
Ice Storm
Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon

I’m also a huge fan of Larry McMurtry, who wrote the screenplay with Diana Ossana. My favorite of his books are:

Lonesome Dove
Streets of Laredo
Comanche Moon
Dead Man’s Walk
Anything for Billy
Zeke and Ned

The movie is very intelligent, very subtle, gorgeously filmed and deep.

Random Thoughts:

• Growing up in the San Francisco Bay Area at the end of the 20th century, I didn’t understand the closet thing. By the time I got to college, I was downright fed up with anyone I came in contact with in the Bay Area who was closeted. Seeing this movie, I get it.

• It was interesting how unappealing the heterosexual life was portrayed, though a lot of it was really about poverty, clutter, hard work (to make a living and raise children), and alienation.

• The scenery–have mercy it was beautiful, which Ang Lee knows how to do better than anyone. [Prince Charles told him after seeing Sense and Sensibility that he had no idea his country was so beautiful.] But it seemed to me to convey the message that we are on this planet for a short time and so how are you going to spend that time?

• It’s really cool to me that a Chinese filmmaker shows what a patchwork quilt the United States is, made up of very disparate regions, communities, and mores.

• I loved the use of the tent as creating/defining their world for a time. It also made me think of the unspeakably moronic phrase: God made Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve. This film is the story of Adam and Steve.

• Folks rave about Heath Ledger’s performance, but Jake Gyllenhaal did a job of work on this film. They both went there.

• There is a phase at page 360 of Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami which sums up the movie, for me:

You have to overcome the fear and anger inside you. Let a bright light shine in and melt the coldness in your heart. That’s what being tough is all about.

* * *
After the movie, I went home and watched Project Runway. I’m totally hooked on it and get so sucked in to the drama, cattiness and amazing creativity. My girl likes to watch it and sew at the same time. She gets completely inspired, though I would like her to recognize how much hard work goes into it.

* * *

The sun was shining beautifully this morning, but there is a storm system moving in. I can only keep my fingers crossed that I can get some time in gardening this weekend. I will, I will.

* * *



I found this picture in this book. I don’t like the rest of the book.

On the other hand, I’m completely enamored of this book.

I’ve been piecing very slowly, after a brief hiatus. My impatience with the slowness makes me think that maybe I have been overly prone to speed piecing; though the satisfaction of finishing a quilting project should not be underestimated. There’s a tipping point in my quilting projects, where I start by toiling and toiling, and then I can get a sense of the finished project and start progressing like a house on fire.

I hope to do an increased amount of quilting this three day weekend.

First though, an end of the week date with my BF.

It rained on Friday night very heavily. I didn’t quite realize it when I woke up on Saturday and just thought there was a lot of condensation on the car and the ground. I put on my jacket and Christmas moccasins and went outside to survey the lawn. Then I realized that it had rained and mowing was out of the question.

It changed the flavor of the morning anyway. No need to hurry out to the garden, as yard work was not on the agenda. I did cut a branch from one of my Evelyn roses and took it to Berkeley Hort to find out what was eating it.



Rose slugs. They were there on the back of the few remaining leaves. So.Dis.Gust.Ing. I got some slug killing spray and then headed for the library. It started pouring more rain as I ran inside the Piedmont Branch. Then it cleared up after thirty minutes and the sun came out.

I returned home and had a bit of lunch, then went out to do some pruning. My Jude the Obscure has been overgrown with wild grasses, so I had to cut it down severely to get to the root of the grasses.



It was a muddy and not entirely satisfying time in the garden, but it was nice to be able to do something and start planning and thinking about plants. Much pruning in the future, to get rid of all the slug damage. I must remember that in temperate Northern California I don’t have to hold back in the gardening just because it’s January. Alas, it is supposed to rain next Saturday too.

I am listening to Frederick Davidson reading What’s Bred in the Bone because I don’t feel like listening to the Alito hearings. I read it in college and it’s quite enjoyable to listen to.

I went to my mother’s house for a late Kwanzaa on Saturday afternoon. My younger brother’s fiancee wore a wonderful belt made of Japanese fabric that she got at a crafts fair. I showed her that I had used some of the same fabric in my parents’ Anniversary Quilt. Kwanzaa was wonderful as always, with incredible food and great company. My boy came home with me, to make sure my pillow was correctly hogged and I was pushed to the far corner of my large bed.

It was a restful weekend and I even had a short nap on Sunday afternoon.

I received these two Patchwork Quilt Tsushin magazines from equilter.

The first one is No. 116.










The second one is No. 119.

I just got back to the office from a dentist/teeth cleaning appointment.

Remind me that an 11:30AM appointment is not a good idea unless I go from home (2 miles away) rather than work (30 miles away). Mid-day traffic on 80 East is terrible and it will make me late.

This time the hygenist was very complimentary about the state of my teeth/gums and told me early on in the scraping that she's pregnant, so I got all excited for her and distracted with happy memories. That helped the appointment go better.

It's warm outside, but it's supposed to rain tomorrow. No, no, please. I need to cut the lawns. The kids and I went into the backyard yesterday evening and I felt that rush--of plans and anticipation to manicure and manage the vegetation, all lush and green and overgrown.

Rest in peace, Lou Rawls. I loved your music.

I bought this excellent book for $4 and it was mailed to me in a Frosted Flakes box. The box was sitting in my in-box, unopened, and apparently was the object of some laughter in the mailroom at work.

The sun has returned and just in time. It's so encouraging to have a bit of sun.

Returning to work is peculiar. I must remind myself that the shrill ridiculous claims from shrill and ridiculous lawyers will come to nothing in the end.

The children are back to school in fine form. My girl has started an African dance class, which she likes. This is her last semester on the younger campus. Where has the time gone?

I had forgotten how compressed the time is to get dinner on the table after work and school, when the children are hungry and want it immediately. Good thing I have recipes like sauteed chicken breasts, mashed potatoes and gravy, and peas, which I can whip up in 35 minutes.

Two more days then I can be reunited with my garden. It needs my attention. There are also the holiday decorations to pack and return to the attic.

I'm having some issues with my archives, so they're not available right now. Some, but not all, will be back later.

Back to work after 12 days. Eeep.

The new year started out well. The children and I went to Mass and then hosted a brunch with what my girl calls my “Mom’s Group.” Wonderful women and their daughters and really good food (including Lisa’s Cinnamon Rolls)* to start the year off right.

Staying home and putting things in order, I realize how many things I have that I enjoy and appreciate and don’t need more of. I vacuumed a lot, shampooed carpets, mopped floors. I didn’t do a whole lot of sewing, because circular piecing is slow.

I spent a whole day cleaning up my girl’s room, unearthing clothes and socks which I then washed, folded, and put away, and throwing out/recycling/donating a lot of stuff.

It’s been raining a lot, which makes me crave being in my yards and planning for Spring flowers and herbs. I’ve also got to figure out what’s eating the leaves on my rose bushes. Maybe this weekend it will be dry enough to cut the lawns and do some weeding.

Time off also makes me feel healthier. Before Christmas, I was drinking epic amounts of tea to make my throat feel better. Now I feel fine (knock wood).

There weren’t any days when I just slept and slept because I can’t seem to do that anymore. I didn’t get all of the cleaning and organizing that needs to be done completed, but I didn’t have to put on pantyhose either.

I am utterly mystified and disgusted by daytime television. When I was on 20 weeks of bedrest a decade ago while I was pregnant with my daughter, I read a lot and channel surfed a lot. Some of the same plot lines that were on soap operas then are still going on a decade later. The court tv shows, the cable stations that broadcast all these crime documentaries, the infomercials. Yuck.

I enjoyed the time with my kids, notwithstanding some cabin fever. They're growing fast.

I didn't make any new years resolutions, because I'm in control of my life all the time and I do what I want and don't do what I don't want to do.

* Recipe:

Lisa's Cinnamon Rolls

4 1/2 - 5 C (unbleached/organic, if doable) flour
4 t active dry yeast (2 packages)
3/4 C milk
1/2 C water
1/2 C vegetable shortening (part butter -- also, I use Spectrum's non-hydrogenated shortening -- it works very well)
1/2 C sugar (or rapadura, or ecocrystals, or turbinado)
1 t salt
2 eggs, room temperature

Measure 1 3/4 C flour into yr large mixer bowl. Add yeast and blend. Measure milk, water, shortening, sugar, and salt into saucepan. Blend. Heat until warm (about 120-130 degrees F).

Pour into flour/yeast mixture. Add eggs. Beat 30 seconds with electric mixer at low speed, scraping bowl constantly. Beat 3 more minutes at high speed, scraping bowl occasionally. Stop mixer.

Gradually stir in more flour (by hand) to make a soft dough. It will be rather sticky. Knead on lightly floured board or counter until nice an' smooth, about 5-10 minutes (it's good exercise!!). Cover with bowl or pan and let rest for 20 minutes.

Shape as desired. Here's what I do: I cut the hunk of dough in half, roll out one of the halves until it's flat and rectangular and large, brush it with butter, sprinkle it with a cinnamon/sugar mixture, add raisins (sometimes), and roll it up. Then I cut off the ends and cut the rest into 1" wide slices. They usually fit nicely into 2 9" greased cake pans. Then I put them in a warm oven (I usually warm it to 200 degrees for a few minutes, then turn it off) with a pan of hot water under them and a foil tent over them and let them rise for 40 minutes, or until doubled.

Bake at 350 for 10-12 minutes. You can ice these with powdered sugar icing (I usually do) after they've cooled off, but believe me when I tell you that they're wonderful just plain and warm outta the oven. Cool them on a rack. When they're cool, you can wrap them in foil, and freeze. Just warm them in a 250 oven for about 45 minutes and oooh boy, it's like you just made 'em.

Enjoy them -- the recipe is from a cookbook called Homemade Bread, published by the Farm Journal people in 1969.