So much to tell, but not time for pictures!

We have been very busy around here, so busy that I have forgotten to take many photos!  But here is what I have...........

First, Dory felt very left out of the last post as she was not mentioned or photographed.

Now this is not a good photo because it was dark, but this is one of Dory's favorite places....on top of the piano.  She especially loves it because of the quilted piano runner on there.  She doesn't like to jump up onto things, but enjoys this spot because she can get to it from the back side through the stair rail and so, doesn't have to jump.

Here she is posing on a quilt that Pam delivered after quilting!  I texted this photo to my mom and she commented on what a beautiful quilt I had made.  I said, "Mom, this is your quilt!"  She had forgotten it (when you make so many, you kind of lose track).

Pam did a beautiful job on the quilting.  She finished the quilting and delivered it to me the same morning...........yes, it was still smoking!  Kidding!

My parents were down to visit on Friday and Saturday.  Cousins Pam and Susie came up Friday and we had a nice lunch and then put up sweet corn.  Yes, I truly know how to provide quality entertainment for my guests.  Mom, Dad, David and I started a game of Hand and Foot that evening.  Sarah took David's spot on Saturday morning to finish the game, and Mom and I whomped them.  Quilter's Rule!!!!  On Saturday afternoon, I made a double batch of sweet pickle relish and another batch of dill pickles.  I think I am done "pickling".  Well, I know I am done as you can no longer find jar flats in Saline County.  We may have to take a road trip this weekend to see about finding some more.  David asked about pulling the beets and I said they were best left in the garden until jar flats are found.  

We have been enjoying family time preparing supper together in the evening.  Monday evening we did tacos.  Sarah made flour tortillas from scratch (had to dig out an old 4-H project recipe).  I was rolling them out while she cooked them and  taco meat.  David cut up the green onions and cilantro, and we had the most excellent meal. 

Last night Sarah made "Herb's chicken".  This recipe is simple.  Go out to the deck and snip some herbs.   Mince the herbs.  Rub chicken breasts with olive oil, garlic, and the herbs and grill them.  David did the grilling since he was already grilling tomatoes, corn, jalapenos, peppers, and onions for salsa.  I was peeling peaches for dessert.  Of course we also had sweet corn.  After supper, David helped me make a batch of grilled corn salsa and a batch of smoky salsa.  Lunch today is pork burgers, sweet corn, chips and salsa.  Isn't summer wonderful!  And no photos were taken of any of it!

Putting up sweet corn is on tap for today's project.  We got it shucked and silked last night.  Sarah is mowing the yard this morning, and I'm getting my haircut this afternoon (going to the beauty shop, not letting David return the favor of a haircut).

Some sewing has also happened.

I have 13 of the Christmas Village houses done.  This is the same pattern as the previous Village quilt, just done in Christmas fabrics and a nighttime background.  I have done some fussy cutting on the doors and chimneys.  There is a snowman in the doorway of the first house in the middle row, Snoopy is dancing the night away in the 3rd house on the top row, and Santa is in several doorways.  He's also stuck in the chimney of the 3rd house on the bottom row..............must have drunk too much spiked eggnog and tried to go up sideways!

And, I have finally added a border to the original Village quilt.  That was the last of my monthly sewing goals for July, so I'm ready for August!

Christi

Sewing Room Antics!

I've found myself with lots of company in the sewing room of late.  I think Sarah is truly getting bored.  She wanted to work on a section of her BB-8 design quilt on Saturday and then as it progressed decided we were going to finish it off!  She doesn't show a lot of emotion, but I think she's secretly proud of this.  We are now talking about backing fabric and I think she has "ideas" about the quilting.  We'll see what progresses.  I would really like to have her get interested in another quilt project to give her something to do.

Charlie (above) and Wicket (below) have fallen in love with playing in the sewing room.  If you let them in the back door, they bypass the food dish to go running up the stairs to play.  If you are on the main level, you can hear them romping from one end of the room to the other!

Catnip mice and yarn balls are so much fun!

 Cici has registered a complaint with the complaint department about the interlopers in her sewing room.  It's no longer the nice quiet peaceful place it used to be!

 Her complaint fell on deaf ears when photographic evidence showed she could still sleep on the cutting table just fine!

She's just protecting her favorite scraps from the interlopers!

My recent sewing efforts yielded a finish!  This cute little wall hanging is all finished.  It was the Temecula Quilt Company's Stay-At-Home Sampler that I started in March.  

 And some more buckets!  These are the last I plan to make.  The one above is the large size and the elephant fabric is actually denim.  The one below is the small size and the first time I used the circles for the handles.

And kitchen work is ongoing.  I was blessed to have a fellow quilter invite me to pick blackberries.  David and I showed up with a couple of ice cream buckets and she informed us we didn't bring enough buckets.  As I started picking, she said, "Christi, just put that bucket on the ground and use both hands or you'll never get done!"

We came home with 3 gallons of berries.............

They were the prettiest, biggest berries I have ever seen.  I almost forgot to snap a picture!

And cucumbers were dropped off at my house which were made into more sweet pickles.

I'm planning another batch of dill pickles later this week.

I spent last night after work peeling a dishpan of peaches from my in-laws.  They sent over jars and sugar to go with the peaches and asked for some peach preserves.  I made 2 batches (which took all of their sugar and then some, and used all but one of their jars) last night, and I still have a dishpan of peaches left.  David was taking the preserves and empty dish pan back today and is supposed to ask if they want more preserves, or if they want the peaches peeled and cut up for the freezer (or per Sarah, if she could just eat them!).  It was a sticky mess in the kitchen.  I had so many splatters on my shirt that I kept sticking to the edge of the counter.  The other day, Sarah complained that her sock stuck to the floor where I had dribbled the sweet pickle solution on the floor.  That mess was cleaned up and now there was another.  After I had the dishes done, the counters cleaned, and a clean shirt; but before I got the floor cleaned, David brought the bar stool and his hair clippers into the kitchen for a hair cut.  Once that job was done, I needed another clean shirt, and now there were little silvery gray hair clippings in the sticky peach stuff on the floor.  The loose hair clippings were swept up, and then I called it quits for the night.  Hopefully someone will mop the floor while I'm at work today!

Christi

Weekend Warriors

It's that time of year..........always something to can or freeze!  I did 13 pints of pickles on Friday afternoon.  Then on Saturday, it was applesauce time!  We use Lodi apples which are a summer apple that is only good for applesauce.  It makes the best applesauce in my humble opinion.  Issues we faced this year - our upright freezer quit working AGAIN!  We just had it repaired about 3 weeks ago.  So, I was faced with having to can the applesauce because there is no freezer space available since we had to empty the upright and cram everything into the other freezers.  We have sacrificed ice cream twice now.  The first time, the containers were mostly empty, but this time I had just bought more ice cream...........talk about a brain freeze!  Apparently it's not our summer to have ice cream.

We did half the apples on Saturday afternoon and got 24 pints.  We were then counting pint jars, and discovered that we only had 24 left (including the 2 boxes I had begged from my in-laws).  And I still want to do more pickles and beets and maybe a few green beans if we get enough.  So, the decision was made on Sunday morning to put off making more applesauce until Wednesday and hope the freezer was fixed by then so that we can freeze it.  (Can you tell that we were still exhausted from the first go-round and putting it off wasn't really that difficult of a decision?)  

In the efforts to create freezer space, a whole chicken was thawed on Friday and David cut it up Friday evening with the assistance from Sarah who was watching a youtube tutorial about how to cut up a chicken.  So, we had fried chicken on Saturday for lunch.  Once you've made the mess of frying chicken, you might as well go ahead and do applesauce in the afternoon while the cooktop is still a mess!  We rewarded ourselves with my favorite summer meal on Saturday evening.  

BLT, cucumbers and onions in vinegar, and sweet corn!  David's cousin told me that I had 2/3 of the trifecta when I had a wild turkey breast and mushrooms in the spring - the missing component was crappie.  I consider this the trifecta.  We purchased the sweet corn called Coon's Choice.  It was very sweet.  Our sweet corn should be ready in a week or so (hoping the freezer is fixed!) if we can beat the coons to it.  David has trapped 11 coons, 1 possum, and Boots the kitten (twice).

On Sunday, we smoked a couple of slabs of ribs (again trying to create freezer room and some leftovers for the coming week).  I had to work on Sunday afternoon and evening for an event that no one else could do.  

Other fun activities of the last week were a trip to Columbia to the dentist for a followup for me.  Sarah went along and then we spent some time looking for things for her apartment.  

She is working with one of my piano students on robotics.  The fair is this week and they worked on his robot to show at the fair.

Sarah also helped me organize some 1.5" squares from my stash.  She found sets of 4 matching ones and 2 matching ones so that I can use them in a project.  

We also worked some more on her quilt design.  This is BB-8 from Star Wars.  

You may remember BB-8 from a 4-H cake decorating project about 4 years ago.........

I'm enjoying working on the quilt with her much more than I did decorating a cake!

I also finished cutting everything I needed for this Sha La La quilt pattern that my sister had picked up for me from The Stitch in Jefferson.  

Here are my pieces laid out.

I also recently finished this ironing station to use in the basement when I sew.  

And I completed the first 12 blocks for the Jelly Snowflake Quilt Along that The Fat Quarter Shop is doing.  It uses half a jelly roll and some background fabric.  I'm all caught up on this one now.  I like having this design wall right behind my sewing machine in the basement.  

I've been sewing in the basement some.  I can watch TV while I sew there, usually Heartland, since I'm still slogging through it.  Lizzie hasn't seen much action lately and she is such a good machine.  Also, Tucker, my 301 is in timeout right now.  He has been acting up and not sewing right.  And, Lady Vi, my Viking is working, but I have duct tape keeping the pressure dial for the presser foot in place.  She needs to make a trip to the shop as well.  So many things needing repairs.........freezers, sewing machines, what's next?

All in all, it was a long weekend, but much was accomplished!

Christi

Summertime This and That

June was black raspberry season at our house.  

We picked.............. 

and washed............. 

 and picked...........

and made jelly.  I actually ran out of jelly jars and ended up using a couple of pints.  My dad and Jackson, the jelly lovers in the family, were the recipients of the pints. 

I have also made dill pickles and canned green beans.  I'm hoping to have enough jars to make it through the summer.

 David smoked some bacon from the last 2 pigs that were butchered.  We were so happy to reach the end of June and finally have all the pigs gone to market.  New little pigs will arrive on the 16th!

 A trip to Joyce's Fabrics in Pilot Grove yielded some nice blacks and grays for the stash.

 I picked up my mom's Jewel Box Stars quilt from the quilter.

I finished the binding on this quilt.   I have even napped under it already, so it works!

I finished piecing this quick little baby quilt.  It's a pattern called Moda Love.  

And I finished the binding on my Laundry Basket Quilts Mystery Quilt - a - long.  I love this quilt.  I can sleep well under it!

I participated in another quilt-a-long with Sew Sweet quilt shop.  This is called Flea Market Mix.  I made it from scraps I had and focused on rich fall colors.  I had mine finished in about 3 days.  It was a quick sew.  

Sarah and I will be judging exhibits at the county fair next week.  We got the information letter in the mail and Sarah put it on the frig..........low enough for Cici to read!

Stay tuned for more project updates!
Christi

4th of July Resolution!

I know you are supposed to make New Year's Resolutions, and I did resolve to blog a little more faithfully, but obviously that hasn't worked out.  So, I've decided to try a 4th of July Resolution.........to do more blogging!  

We spent our 4th of July weekend (left Thursday, returned on Sunday..........the longest we have been away from home in a couple of years or more!) traveling to IOWA (went way far out there didn't we!).  It was my nephew's high school graduation party on Saturday afternoon.  We got there Thursday evening.  We helped decorate and set stuff up on Friday (I managed to escape a couple of hours to visit The Stitch, a quilt shop that was having a SALE!!!!  More later on my purchases!).  Then we attended Jackson's baseball game in the evening.  It was a hot one, but they WON!!!!

He had quite the fan base there to watch.  Saturday was Carter's turn............

His graduation had been held the weekend before with just immediate family allowed to attend.  We watched it on Facebook.  Here is my picture of the computer screen as he walked across........

And then we posed our graduates for some photos......  Carter was a high school grad, Sarah was a college grad.   

With us and then with Grandpa and Grandma Barber.

The reception was in the garage and front yard and there were lots of people.

Carter's awards.........mostly for sports, and there would have been many more if the track season hadn't been cancelled this year.

He will be attending the University of Northern Iowa and competing in track.  

 Here are the UNI bucket and face masks I made for him for graduation.  He really liked them and put one of the masks on but wouldn't let me get a photo.  I lined them with t-shirt fabric (my t-shirt, so told him I'd always be close to him).  I found UNI fabric at a quilt shop in Iowa Falls.  I'm told it's the only shop in the world that sells it.

This is the quilt my mom hand quilted for him.  I pieced it.  We've had it done for a few years, but had no idea that the red, white, and blue theme would be so appropriate for his 4th of July reception.

My sister had rented a soft serve ice cream machine to have with cupcakes.  David was reading the instructions for the ice cream machine.  It was delicious!  So were the cupcakes.

My sister hadn't done any laundry for a week, so I managed to get 7 loads done on Saturday..........towels, sheets (back on beds for those who were staying Saturday evening), clothes.  Poor Jackson was waiting for the t-shirt he wanted to wear and it was in the last load.  I finally got it out for him.  He wanted to show his big brother (he's actually taller, though) support by wearing his purple UNI t-shirt.

We headed back to Bethany Saturday evening to stay at Mom and Dad's.  Then home on Sunday.  Sarah made it to a fireworks stand to buy some fireworks to shoot off last night.  

It was good to be home.

Christi