Preserving Comes To A Close
Now that I am done with my canning season...(no, really, I'm done now)... I can finally cook like a regular person. The funniest thing about putting up so much food is that you really don't have time to cook regular meals. Your entire kitchen gets taken over by huge boiling pots of blanching vegetables and your bowls all fill up with fruit for peeling. Although putting food up starts in mid summer, it really doesn't pick up until harvest time when all the best produce is piling high on the farm wagons. This is also the best time to be eating fresh produce. So it's funny to have been putting up so much good food but to have eaten so little of it fresh, right now, while it's the best time to eat it all.
This week I intend to cook broccoli in every way possible: steamed, cream of broccoli soup, stir fry, and quiche. I want to make swiss chard quiche too while we still have our own fresh eggs. Hens often stop laying in the darker months when the light hours are at their shortest. They also tend to stop laying when molting which all of them are bound to do soon. Though I have to say their timing isn't so hot what with the nights getting so flipping cold already. Not a good time to be naked poultry.
Yesterday I spent some time back on the ice pack and heating pad. My back is still feeling weak. Wouldn't it be amazing if some day I didn't have back problems? I don't think you ever go back though, once it's started going to pots. Since I didn't think lifting things in the garage was a smart thing to do I ended up doing some hand stitching while in bed and then felt I needed to give my quilt project a HUGE boost, so I spent a couple of hours machine piecing. I love hand stitching but it's got to be said that machine piecing goes a hell of a lot faster and seeing as I've got a limited amount of time to do home projects, it's a relief to see blocks come together fast.
I'm going to share pictures of the blocks I have so far, of course. But all my real quilting friends out there need to understand that quilting is the one craft I let myself have fun with without making myself feel I must apply museum quality skills to. My corners often don't match up. Things go wonky. I don't let myself do this because of a failure to respect quilting as an art, I have the deepest respect for quilters like Monica and my Aunt Lin who make the most amazing pieces of art and whose points always match, whose stitching is gorgeous every inch of the way. No professional quilter is going to entreat me to help them with projects as they do Pam who not only works on other people's projects like Elizebeth's booth projects for quilt shows she shows her work in. It takes great skill with a needle to achieve such meticulous and gorgeous results.
I could apply such skill. I could. But I'm not going to. I choose to save quilting as a craft I can let my hair down for. I choose to approach quilting from a haphazard angle, see how it all comes together. Enjoy the wonkiness that inevitably ensues when you don't plan it all out ahead of time. It's play time without restrictions. I like the organic mistakes that occur when you play it all by ear (or eye, as the case may be).
I'm getting excited because I have never wrapped myself up in a quilt I've made on my own. Three babies out there in the world have been wrapped in my stitches, but I want to curl up in my chair with a full size quilt made by me. I may just tie the first two full size quilts off for expediency. Winter is coming and it's getting cold in our house. Making blankets is one of the oldest and most important homesteading skills. Sarah has a cabinet full of quilts she's collected and I want that too. If someone is cold just send them to the cabinet for a quilt.
I suppose I ought to have just put a picture of my quilt on this post. But I haven't taken them yet and didn't plan to talk so much about quilts.
I have an idea to do a food quilt. All fabrics with food on them. Before that I need to do a Scottish quilt for Philip. I haven't got the idea very clear in my head yet but obviously it will involve plaid. We love plaid. I want to make a quilt that reminds us of the time we've spent in Scotland. Possibly the best time in our lives. We walked the ragged wet icy hills in the highlands and were never so happy! I love traditional Scottish symbols such as thistles. I don't actually know if I like them because they're Scottish or if I like Scottish things because they celebrate plaid, fresh scones, thistles and ale. All things I loved before I ever set foot on the highland hills. Does it matter?
Time to go start my day with a brief and innocent trip to the quilt shop.
Note: The absolute most crazy thing is to have not included my friend Angela in the skilled quilters line up because she is another lady with some fierce needle skills and you can just bet all her points match. The problem is that we actually rarely talk about quilting and a lot more about writing. So I've come to think of her in such a different context. Sorry Angela!!!!.
This week I intend to cook broccoli in every way possible: steamed, cream of broccoli soup, stir fry, and quiche. I want to make swiss chard quiche too while we still have our own fresh eggs. Hens often stop laying in the darker months when the light hours are at their shortest. They also tend to stop laying when molting which all of them are bound to do soon. Though I have to say their timing isn't so hot what with the nights getting so flipping cold already. Not a good time to be naked poultry.
Yesterday I spent some time back on the ice pack and heating pad. My back is still feeling weak. Wouldn't it be amazing if some day I didn't have back problems? I don't think you ever go back though, once it's started going to pots. Since I didn't think lifting things in the garage was a smart thing to do I ended up doing some hand stitching while in bed and then felt I needed to give my quilt project a HUGE boost, so I spent a couple of hours machine piecing. I love hand stitching but it's got to be said that machine piecing goes a hell of a lot faster and seeing as I've got a limited amount of time to do home projects, it's a relief to see blocks come together fast.
I'm going to share pictures of the blocks I have so far, of course. But all my real quilting friends out there need to understand that quilting is the one craft I let myself have fun with without making myself feel I must apply museum quality skills to. My corners often don't match up. Things go wonky. I don't let myself do this because of a failure to respect quilting as an art, I have the deepest respect for quilters like Monica and my Aunt Lin who make the most amazing pieces of art and whose points always match, whose stitching is gorgeous every inch of the way. No professional quilter is going to entreat me to help them with projects as they do Pam who not only works on other people's projects like Elizebeth's booth projects for quilt shows she shows her work in. It takes great skill with a needle to achieve such meticulous and gorgeous results.
I could apply such skill. I could. But I'm not going to. I choose to save quilting as a craft I can let my hair down for. I choose to approach quilting from a haphazard angle, see how it all comes together. Enjoy the wonkiness that inevitably ensues when you don't plan it all out ahead of time. It's play time without restrictions. I like the organic mistakes that occur when you play it all by ear (or eye, as the case may be).
I'm getting excited because I have never wrapped myself up in a quilt I've made on my own. Three babies out there in the world have been wrapped in my stitches, but I want to curl up in my chair with a full size quilt made by me. I may just tie the first two full size quilts off for expediency. Winter is coming and it's getting cold in our house. Making blankets is one of the oldest and most important homesteading skills. Sarah has a cabinet full of quilts she's collected and I want that too. If someone is cold just send them to the cabinet for a quilt.
I suppose I ought to have just put a picture of my quilt on this post. But I haven't taken them yet and didn't plan to talk so much about quilts.
I have an idea to do a food quilt. All fabrics with food on them. Before that I need to do a Scottish quilt for Philip. I haven't got the idea very clear in my head yet but obviously it will involve plaid. We love plaid. I want to make a quilt that reminds us of the time we've spent in Scotland. Possibly the best time in our lives. We walked the ragged wet icy hills in the highlands and were never so happy! I love traditional Scottish symbols such as thistles. I don't actually know if I like them because they're Scottish or if I like Scottish things because they celebrate plaid, fresh scones, thistles and ale. All things I loved before I ever set foot on the highland hills. Does it matter?
Time to go start my day with a brief and innocent trip to the quilt shop.
Note: The absolute most crazy thing is to have not included my friend Angela in the skilled quilters line up because she is another lady with some fierce needle skills and you can just bet all her points match. The problem is that we actually rarely talk about quilting and a lot more about writing. So I've come to think of her in such a different context. Sorry Angela!!!!.