Books and Food

 Read any good books lately?  Something saucy and juicy? Or maybe a story that is sad and weepy?  How about an adventure on the high seas? 

Recently, I was thinking what food to serve along with a good book discussion.  Well, that means two or more people should read the same book—nope!  Hold onto your hat,  why can’t you fix couple of dishes that celebrate a certain book topic and share your thoughts on the book you’re reading?

Now reading  Midnight at the Blackberry Cafe—

here is my menu: definitely Blackberry pie for dessert.  Since this book is set in Alabama—how about A take off of cafe food— biscuits,  crispy hash browns, pancakes, ham in red-eye gravy, eggs, sweet potato hash, green beans, fried green tomatoes, corn, bacon, chicken-fried steak,  fried chicken, mashed potatoes, collard greens and grits, roast chicken, hot chocolate, potato salad, chocolate fudge cake, succotash--it would be easy to fix a menu for this book.

This book takes place in France--what a menu I could come up for this dinner!!  

• Boeuf Bourguignon.Bouillabaisse.: This Provençal dish is an elevated take on the catch of the day. ...Tarte Tatin. ...French onion soup. ..Escargot. ...Chocolate soufflé ..Crepes. ...Salade Niçoise.
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• I read this book at night--it's a light story about two English sisters, who are living together and take in older gentlement, who is down on his luck--some laughs on each page.
• Oh joy, what a menu with this one--Full English breakfast--sausages, back bacon, eggs, tomatoes, mushrooms, fried bread, and beans. and of course, big pot of tea!
• or an afternoon tea consisting of light cakes, scones and sandwiches. Traditional sandwich fillings are often cucumber, smoked salmon, coronation chicken or egg mayonnaise. But they should always be served with the crusts cut off - and Tea!
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  A Greek Island tour!  Ahhh!  Delicious Mediterranean food!  Greek salad ( tomatoes, onions, cucumbers, black olives, feta cheese,bell pepper!). Beef shish kebabs, pita bread, hummus, 

  Baklava for dessert.  
  This book is interesting because we have visited Mykonos to do Greek isles tour.  
  
  
• As I was thinking about food and books, I came across a blog that puts these two things together--Cook The Book Club--and there are others that talk about books and food as well--
• I'm off to listen to Midnight at Blackberry Cafe while preparing dinner--it’s a southern evening of fried chicken, mashed taters, green peas and for dessert—blackberry crumble. 

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Some Assembly Required!

 

What?? Is going on here?!!  

Hopefully, I can keep up with this mess!

Definitely looks confusing!! all it takes is some assembly required—and a brain that will keep things straight. 

Attention! Please! 

There are four different projects ongoing here—when you have everything cut and ready to sew, why stop sewing on one project especially when you can sew one after the other??

It’s called leader-ender!

There are the 1/2 squares that are borders for Peaceful Paths--red and white.

Then there are the pieces for the Heart Quilt—it is slow work cutting 1.5” strips and sub cutting into 2.5” sections

The turkey squares will make a nice table runner.  I was gifted Dresden pieces—didn’t know what to do with them , finally settled on turkeys! The center pieces were from a panel fabric, just perfect for a fall runner

While cleaning out a basket, I came cross the squares - side pieces—all that was needed was center 4.5” square—patriotic top for sure

In the bin was this!! More small pieces!  

Onward we go as we do “ leader-ender” sewing! 

 

Sundry Items

The days dwindle by--seems like yesterday we were in January and look up--here it is mid March!!

We all seem to say "where did the time go?"

I know where our time went--keeping good thoughts for baby JD, his mom and dad, my mother, our daughter who was in hospital for 10 days and friends who are on a different life path.

Yes, each day dwindles down to a precious few minutes we can cherish.  

I must tell you about a young man we met--he came to look at our HVAC unit (sad--but, it needs to be replaced--unhappy face!)  Anyway, he told us of his family event, which wasn't extreme but it was unfortunate--It was time to share!  and share we did!  We both put our faith in the good Lord!  That's how we make it through each and every day!! It was a chance to celebrate our trust in God! 

 Remarkable--how HE puts the words in our mouths to say what is needed in those times !

Anyway, that was an aside to this blog!

The Lucky One sponsored by Fort Worth Fabric Studio has posted the second clue to the mystery--

I'm excited that this will be a table runner!!

The clue was easy peazy!  I used greens from my stash!  This is the start of year long project--Brown headed daughter has always requested table runners--I'm on the first one for the year!!  YAY!

I'm stacking up the blocks for Pat Sloan's Childhood Memories Quilt along.

She has plenty of others to keep your attention

Another one bites the dust from Sewcialities 2  from Fat Quarter Shop Jolly Jabber,  I try to keep up to date with these blocks as they drop each week, but so far I'm behind two weeks. This will be patriotic top.

Peaceful Pathways Anew!

Peaceful Pathways have been renewed!  

I've been looking at this plastic bin sitting in my stack of many plastic bins--I can see some red fabric and white fabric.  How long has it been sitting there?  Oh, ages, I'm sure--at least since 2011 or before.

Opening the bin, I find a partial top--Hence, Peaceful Pathways by Esther Aliu.  At one time, I was a member of her BOM club.  She is the most awesome designer of lovely quilts!  Her work is beyond my scope of expertise for sure.  

But, this one BOM captured my fancy! 

Yes, I want to make this!  It had embroidery and piecework--that would be fun to do!

You can guess what happen though--yelp! I ran out of interest--

Opening the bin, I found I had all the embroidery pieces and some of the piecework along with the instructions.  And look!  how many 2.5" half square triangles were finished??

Seemed to me, most of the hard part was done so

all it took was to open the box and renew my desire to finish

Peaceful Pathways

Why not?!!  We had just had a wonderful retreat to refresh

our journey --this is the perfect way to complete that feeling or Anew!

I just needed to put the parts together--and I decided it would be easier to do by hand stitching--especially with all those stops and starts

Love this Biblical verse--almost every wedding these verses are recited by bride or groom.

The middle was complete--just place all those odd shaped pieces along the sides

see those 1/2 square triangles?  That took alot of time to stitch--

and I found all the triangles I needed to complete the other border--

Center all together and all the borders sewn together--just go from there!

 

A Little More Zen

Years ago I turned to Zentangles as a way to relax and refresh my brain.  Then, things got in my way and I put those aside and went onto something else

Now!

I'm back at zentangling!

Gathered my supplies--shading pencils, micron pens, artist's tiles, snubbing point

We're ready!

There are many patterns to learn--you can find them on Instagram, Youtube, Facebook, etc.

There are online couirses, newsletters

Free lessons is good!  When I first learned, we had a speaker who walked us through the first sessions. 

What is a Zentangle? 

"The Zentangle Method is an easy-to-learn, relaxing, and fun way to create beautiful images by drawing structured patterns. We call these patterns, tangles. You create tangles with combinations of dots, lines, simple curves, S-curves and orbs. These simple shapes are the "Elemental Strokes" in all Zentangle art. These patterns are drawn on small pieces of paper called "tiles." We call them tiles because you can assemble them into mosaics."

Here are a few of my tiles, past and present

From different angles, you'll see unique features of the line drawings

These are simple line drawings--easy to follow

relaxation in all senses!

 

Retreat to Refresh!

Recently, we took time to refresh our bodies and souls--we took a little retreat to the beach area.  Our family had been sailing through life--no cares, no worries--oh, there are the little hiccups that we all exprience, but when our precious great grandson was born with his birth defect--we all felt somehow disconnected.  Granddaughter and hubby spent every spare minute in NICU with little JD; family members rallied by their side.  Then an unexpected text came from the brown headed daughter--

"I'm in ER with shortness of breathe and a-fib!  Don't worry, I'm doing fine!"  Not so fine for us, she lives in Colorado!  She is doing fine now, after tests, meds, week stay in hospital--of course, she is doing fine--we had the line of prayers going for her!

Aside here--do you get unlimited prayers?  Or is it like my mother said--"don't pray too much--you'll use up your prayer supply!"  Oh Mother!  How wrong can you be!  This is another topic to discuss at a later date.

Our great grandson is doing better; brown headed daughter is doing better--I'm just waiting for the third thing to drop--saying is 'it comes in threes!"  Anyway, our elastic band of stress had been stretched to it's max and we needed a breather, a retreat to refresh.  

The beach is..................................................................awesome!!

Here is what we saw in one section of the beach:  Yarn bombing!  How exciting to see works of art on the beach--

The Bollards were decked out in the finest of wear!  

Fanciful creatures

whimsical animals

sea monsters

girlish characters 

plain and colorful

Stunning beauty

Happy faces

and super people

and the lone cacti on the desert sand!

If you can make a plain lonely bollard look happy and adventurous. then any stump could be made joyful with some yarn and imaginations!

On your next trip to retreat and refresh, look for the awesome feature that are man made and the

wonders of God's creations--you can find these features in the most unusual places.

 

February Review

It's that time of the year again!  Sewing for charity!  Fat Quarter Shop is offering this beautfil pattern--

designed by Cory Yoder

The first step was posted February 28--I'm on board to sew another beatutiful quilt top and give to

charity.

And for other things sewn in February-- I present the following:

Pat Sloan's Sweet Childhood Memories--patterns appear each week, so I'm trying to keep up with each weeks sewing--for this top I'm using my scraps stash--and boy! do I have a big bin of those scraps!

Sew With Me is my red blocks to sew--this is the second block in the 2023 season.  Easy to sew!

Another block in the Sewcialites 2 prsented by Fat Quarter Shop.  This will be my Patriotic quilt--there are several designers involved in this quilt along. 

A Quilting Life offers another quilt along--another reason to use up my stash bin.  Why is it that I can never use up all the scraps in that bin?  It just seems to multiple!!

Some knitting is involved too in February--

I'm finishing up another Musselburgh hat designed by Ysolda

I use the “pouch” to hold my yarn.  This is a great way to use up small amounts of yarn.

I don't know what it is about this pattern, but it's so addictive to knit and that is all it is--Knit!

Also, working my way through the months with Kitchen Sink Shop--she presents a free dishcloth pattern each month with a yearly theme.  

This January pattern

February pattern

I'm using my handspun cotton to create these lovely gifts for friends and the best part of 2023--her theme is Cookie Delicious-ness!  Recipes included!