I have been going so fast lately that I have tried to make the most of the past few days "off" (although is it really a day off if you spend 5 hours in the kitchen -- even if you love cooking?). We started off with a leaf garland (yeah, I know that the blog holiday train has already left autumnal decorations far behind, but I loved the idea (via Blair via Pink Trees with templates from Martha) & I'm playing catch-up), cut, painted + glittered by me, strung under the direction of my three year old. We're happy with it, though the fall/winter holiday season is always the one time of year that I feel the lack of a waiting-to-be-decorated mantel in the house.
Thanksgiving morning I made apple waffles. I am not a huge waffle fan, myself, but the family likes them & I do love the process of making them. The waffle iron is such a mysterious machine to me, & I always hold my breath a little when I open it, sure that the batter won't have spread or the waffle will stick or etc.
The waffles, while tasty, are probably not really worth showing off, but I didn't get any other food pictures until after we'd already eaten our dinner, & a leftover bowl of gravy is just not that visually appealing. I make a pretty excellent vegetarian Thanksgiving: our main dish is this thing the kids call "Thanksgiving bread," based on an old Vegetarian Times recipe & which is basically seitan, topped with stuffing, wrapped in puff pastry. It's delicious & centerpiece-ish & such a festival of wheat that it could take out the gluten-intolerant at ten paces. We do all the sides, too, but for me it's really the Thanksgiving bread that makes it a harvest feast.
Since then, I've been getting the kitchen ready for the new appliances that are coming tomorrow (trip to Ikea the day after Thanksgiving: not as bad as you'd think), visiting the cat at the vet (post-op recovery from suddenly discovered urgent situation: she is crabby but doing very well for being 14), going to the fabric store (line: longest ever, plus then I had to defend the idea of using corduroy for curtains to the checkout guy), & actually getting another project crossed off my list.
This is the little red skirt that's been hanging around unsewn for a while. Once I gave up on my original plan to do a contrasting-but-still-red border, I wasn't sure what to do with it until I saw Sally's appliqués mentioned on the CRAFT blog. Thus, me at Joann on Saturday, longest line ever, corduroy debate with checkout guy. This was my first experience with Wonder Under, & while it worked perfectly well for what I had in mind & I knew, thanks to Sally's post, to expect some fraying (which I'm seeing already after applying & stitching it), it does make me wonder if the people who use it for art quilts have some special anti-fray techniques when using it. (Edited to add: after running it through the wash for the first time, I'm seeing some softening/slight fraying of the edges, but overall the design is holding its line much more cleanly than I was anticipating.)
I wasn't really sure what I was going to do with the appliqué idea until pretty late last night (while watching bad cable movies. Has Donald Sutherland ever been in a conspiracy theory movie where he doesn't turn out to be one of the conspirators?), & it took me a good long while to pull together the right fabrics for the look I had in mind. I love it when I've got the time to sift through my fabric collection, waiting for things to click into place. Today I've got a big colorful mess to clean up & a slightly calmed sewing yen (Blair, I'm right there with you on wanting to start a new quilt), which seems like a good way to close out the weekend. Tomorrow later tonight, back to work.
the skirt is so cute! turned out great. when in applique doubt - go for circles! :)
and thanks for the link to the leaf pattern - that'll save me time next year when i finally do the leaf garland!
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Posted by: amy | October 09, 2010 at 02:04 AM