11 Years Later...Sadie's Baby Quilt is Done

Sadie just celebrated her 11th birthday. Here is the quilt that I started before I was pregnant with her and then worked on during most of my pregnancy. Yup, I finished it last night.

It's a Dresdan Plate quilt...very popular in the 1930's. It's hand pieced and hand appliqued. That means no sewing machine and lots of hours of work. I cheated and then machine quilted it. Then it sat in a box for about 4 years before I put the binding on. Then it sat for another 2 years until last night when I finally finished hand sewing the binding.

There's a stain on it where I spilled Chinese food on one of the blocks when I was working on it. For some reason I couldn't get enough Chinese food when I was pregnant with Sadie. Since we were living in Germany at the time, it was a frozen Chinese dinner from the commissary. I washed the quilt today, but the stain didn't come out. Oh well. It's done.

No More Cold Tea

I made this felted tea pot cozy and love it! It really does keep your tea from getting cold too quickly.

No jokes about knitting cozies for things. This is actually really practical and cute.

Easy Does It

Ellie played hooky from school today and we baked a cake in her Easy Bake Oven. Frosting and all.

It looked nothing like the picture on the box, but it made a great breakfast.

Best Chicken Soup

My kids can eat this soup every night. If you ask them what they want for dinner...this is it.

In a large pot over medium heat, melt 1 TBSP of butter. Cook 1/2 cup chopped onion and 1/2 cup of chopped celery until tender, about 5 minutes.

Pour in 4 cans of chicken broth and 1 can of vegetable broth, 1 1/2 cups egg noodles, 1 cup sliced carrots, 1/2 tsp dried basil, 1/2 tsp dried oregano, salt and pepper.

Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer for 20 minutes before serving.

That's Ellie and Ginger in the picture. No worries, she's an egg layer and not a fryer.

Home Ec Master

One of my students in my Tuesday night knitting class told me she got her MASTERS in Home Economics.

I asked her if she ever used her degree for anything specifically home ec related. She taught at the junior college for awhile and now she sells houses.

Drapes

I finished the first 3 panels with the Ralph Lauren fabric. I think they are awesome. I did inverted pleats at 4 1/2" apart. They are going to look great in my client's house. Too bad the curtain rods aren't here yet.

By the way, never order anything from Smith and Nobel. They take forever and the quality is poor considering the price of the rods. Also, their website is less than user friendly. You're better off sticking with Pottery Barn or Restoration Hardware. Same price, better quality, quicker service.

Love these drapes.

Fabric Hunting

It's really hard for me to pay full price for fabric. Even when other people are paying for their own fabric when I do a project for them. So I spent 4 hours driving around San Diego on Saturday looking for fabric for people.

I had great luck at Home Fabrics. They always have good prices, but the manager was willing to cut me a break on some gorgeous Ralph Lauren fabric. He gave me an extra 40% off if I would take the whole roll. So I ended up getting $20 a yard fabric for $7.50. Ended up with 35 yards, but it will look great as drapes in my client's house out at Pismo.

Had worse luck at Calico Corners. They only had 10% off, but the client insisted that she wanted that fabric. It ended up be $19 a yard. It's funny that people don't worry about spending $500 for their fabric, but they question your labor charges.

The next stop was another Home Fabrics where I found the green fabric I've been looking for since November. I bought 17 yards in November at another store in Pittsburg, but need 10 more yards. I've been looking for this fabric everywhere. So, when I found it I was excited. My heart was racing. When I unrolled it to look at it...it was completely damaged. Totally unusable. Ugh! I've promised to find this for a client and I can't find it anywhere!

Home Fabrics is one of the best places to find good cheap fabric. I totally scored on the Ralph Lauren fabric. Yeah! I win.

What's For Dinner?

I hate 3:00 because that's when everybody keeps asking what's for dinner. This was lasts night dinner, chicken and dumplings (Sadie's request). Kind of made it up, but it turned out great.

Which leads me to ask the question...where have all my cooking class participants gone?

I teach cooking to foster kids and their parents. It's part of their "life skills" curriculum. Foster or adoptive parents have to take so many hours of classes to keep their state license. The class I teach is a Saturday morning interactive cooking class where the kids learn to plan and make a simple meal. It teaches them to cook and also its a chance for the foster parent to bond with their kid. And its TOTALLY FREE. Last week we made roast chicken with potatoes, steamed vegetables, fresh lemonade and a berry crisp for dessert. I had 1 foster kid (a 16 year old girl) and her foster mom.

What kills me, is that these kids aren't going to be adopted. They will branch out of the system at 18 and be on their own. Cooking seems like a basic skill they would need. Why don't the parents bring them to the class?

Don't get me started. I think all kids should be learning to cook in high school. It's so easy to learn the basics and be able to throw together a meal. Better for you than eating out and a lot cheaper.

In an effort to attract more people to my class I named February's classes "One-Pot Meals for Busy Nights" and "Making Great Meals for Less". I'm running out of ideas to get participants!

Red and White Quilt

I haven't quilted in so long. I forgot a few things, but my red and white is done.

When I was in college, my aunt and uncle gave me a book about quilts and this was one of the quilts in the book. Square in a square. I did this top at least 4 years ago (probably more like 6 years) and never finished it off. But now I'm done and I can cross it off my unfinished projects list.

I heard that quilts are back in style for decorating. So I hung it in my workroom.

2nd Finished (almost) Item Today

These drapes are finally done. I think I will sit and mess with them a little more tonight, but basically done and finished. 8 huge drapes for a client's living room. I started this project months ago, but finally got all the fabric bought at Thanksgiving. Got them sewed before Christmas, but had to wait forever for the rods to be shipped. Then I had to wait for the client to be back from vacation. Now, finally on Tuesday we'll see them up.

That picture represents a lot of work, but I'm happy with how they turned out. Plus I found the fabric way marked down.

Finished Items

I finished an "I Love Lucy" pillow for a client today. It turned out pretty cute. I'm not a crazy fan of the show, but her 13 year old daughter is. I think it's perfect. It measures 26"x26" and I stitched the show logo in the middle. Finished it off with some hot pink ric-rak and voila! I think she'll be happy.

Kitchen Cushions are Done

After living in this house for 4 years, the kitchen nook cushions are finally done. Maybe now someone should paint the table leg.

The Joy of Lists

A new year makes me want to make lists. I LOVE checking off done items on my lists. It makes me very happy.

Ok, I have millions of ideas in my head and its very hard because there just isn't enough time to do everything I think of. Yeah, I'm serious. I have not just good but great ideas all the time. I start a lot of them and then get distracted by new great ideas. I actually have a storage unit that is filled with unfinished great ideas. Maybe part of this is an illness...but I digress...

SO, for the new year I have decided to pick 4 unfinished projects that have to get done each month. One project from each of my home ec genres. Knitting, clothing construction, quilting and home dec sewing. I also have thrown in a bonus project. If I get all 4 done, I get to pick one old idea that I never started, but own all the stuff to do it. Only then can I start anything new or buy the stuff to do anything new.

My January projects are: my red and white square in a square quilt, my gold cardi, the kitchen nook bench cushions and finally a dress from a Japanese pattern magazine. My bonus project is a custom shoe caddy for the closet.

My list is made and posted on my workroom wall. Ready to get checked off.

Classes Start Tuesday

Christmas break is over and we're back to school this week. The adult ed knitting class I teach starts up again on Tuesday. With all the state budget cuts, I guess I'm lucky I still have a class to teach. We all got letters from the principal about class size and minimum attendance. So, I have to have at least 20 people sign up and at least 20 people show up each week. We will have to take 80% pay if we don't make those numbers.

I don't have a problem with sign ups. I have 21 pre-registered and usually can count on at least 5 more the first night of the class. The problem is attendance. How do you get people to keep coming back? I can average 15, but 20 is a lot.