Stache Buster

What did you think?

Stache - - - not stash!!!

Let's face it - 

no one wears one like Tom!

- it's all about the available follicular real estate between the nose and the upper lip - 

yup - it works fine for Tom!

 Why all this talk of the stache?

Hint:

"where's my stache?" from Alexander Henry

Love this fabric!

I saw it at Purl Soho two weeks ago and had to have it!

Why?

My daughter's boyfriend sports a significant stache

- Selleck-esque -

Quite impressive!

And, he's mighty proud of it, as he should be.

I'm pairing it up with this manly faux leather -

 It will make the perfect apron for him!

Stop by tomorrow for the finished project

or, a work in progress.

Love This Guy

My apologies first:

- saw this at another blog yesterday, but can't remember who to give credit to - 

lo siento!

I love this guy

- P. Nosa - 

after all, what quilter can pass up a guy quoted as saying - 

"it is my firm belief that all of life's questions can be answered with a sewing machine"

- - - swoon! - - - 

You complete me!

Get to know him - watch his kickstarter video

You can find lots of other fun 5 words or less sewing videos from P Nosa at youtube.com. 

 

Thanks P. Nosa!

A Day with Layers

It was a fun day yesterday - a field trip with my Layers group to Longwood Gardens - so inspiring - every flower gives you new quilting ideas. I'll admit, I don't know the name of all of these beautiful flowers, sorry. I've grown this in my flower garden in the past - love the spooned petals. Welcome spring! Ahhh, isn't nature perfect!

We were greeted by an amazing show of delphiniums - they are so majestic.

I tried for years to grow delphiniums in my flower beds, but I've had no luck with them - finally gave up. Very few flowers have the variety of blues that this plant offers up.

The buds are so architectural - as interesting as the flowers.

There were many flowers at the gardens, but the day was all about orchids - this is the final week of the orchid exhibit. Look at this beautiful cascading orchid in the conservatory.

For lack of a better name - orchid specimen A - the contrast of the buttery yellow with the plum is delicious, add the ruffle to fancy things up.

Orchid specimen B - tangerine and magenta - every orchid is so different.

Orchid specimen C - pink on parade - so feminine. I have are so many more photos - I'll share a few more later this week.

After the trip to Longwood we met at Terry's for show and tell. My friend Kelly talked me into purchasing pinch purse hardware at the Lancaster AQS Quilt Show last week - it was our goal to have one for S&T - mine is the one on the left, Kelly's on the right. Check out the Pink Penguin for directions. I added a ribbon tab using the knitting ribbon I purchased at the show.

Kelly's fabric selection has a lot of contrast - love it! BTW - I'm trying to talk Kelly into starting her own blog - she has such great ideas - encourage her please.

I used a vintage home dec fabric as my main fabric and an old Lonni Rossi Typo fabric as my contrasting fabric. Here you can see inside of mine - the opening is 4 inches (the pattern calls for a 5 inch pinch purse hardware - ours was only 4), and the length is 5 inches.

Already found a home for mine - I'm using it to stow my knitting notions in my knitting bag - it fits my scissors, needle container, row counter and my Pinocchio tape measure perfectly. How do you like the knitting bag - it's an Amy Butler pattern - the Madison Bag. I used a piece of my vintage barkcloth to make the bag - confession - I collect vintage barkcloth, can't stop myself. And yes, that's a brooch from my husband's Great Aunt Amy adorning the front of the bag.

OMG - this is my friend Christine - her S&T included a spoof on my method for containing my binding as I iron it - if you remember, I use my spray starch container and roll the binding onto it as I iron it. Spoof or not Christine - I think your method has a lot of merit, despite how ridiculous it, and you, looks. She's wound it around a paper roll and made a necklace out of it - - - I really think this would work great - opinions???

My Colorful Dreary Day

It was another gray and dreary day here in the mid-Atlantic region - enough is enough already. Into the sewing room and break out the color - my charm squares from the Kaufman solid collection - 48 five inch squares of their solid collection.

I'm working on a sample quilt based on a technique I've been experimenting with - I'd love to share it with you, but I'm not sure what I want to do with the technique in terms of publishing it. I love using charm squares with the technique - but all of these colors needed to meet the special guest at my rainy day color party - - -

GRAY! Using a strong neutral like gray can really make the colors shout. Think about it - a gray sky makes all of the colors of the landscape look alive.

I love working with solids - thing is not all solids are created equally. My favorite mass produced solids by far are the Amy Butler broadcloth solids. Take a look at the weaves below on the three sample fabrics. The gray is the Amy Butler solid - slate color - a nice tight weave, and a beautifully soft hand. The weave on the other two sample fabrics is visually different - the fibers are larger and the weave is not as tight, resulting in a stiffer hand to the fabric. The Amy Butler fabric is manufactured by Free Spirit - however, only in a limited color choice - - - Free Spirit - if your listening - MORE COLORS PLEASE!!!
Tomorrow I'm posting my St. Patty's menu just in case you want to cook along. Stay tuned - you're going to need Guiness and a nice Irish whiskey.

Do You Huck Weave?

Here we go again - another nor'easter is heading our way. Snow Fall Prediction:12 - 20 inches - did I mention our snow blower is broken - this is not going to be fun!

This morning as I was procrastinating - rummaging through a drawer - I found something I hadn't seen in years - my middle school home economics leaflet on Huck Weaving - copyright 1936! Honestly, I'm not that old - look closely, the reprint was 1964 - I'm not that old either!


Have you ever heard of Huck Weaving? Huck weaving tea towels is done on a special fabric - popcorn fabric - that is woven with an elevated weave. Using embroidery floss, you weave through the elevated loops of the fabric to create beautiful patterns on top of the fabric without any floss showing on the reverse of the fabric. It's a method of surface design - pretty sure that phrase, "surface design", was not part of the vocabulary in 1936. I learned how to huck weave tea towels in that middle school home ec class - and until a few years ago kept those two tea towels close at hand. The honey comb weave below was the design I selected for my tea towels. I used two shades of blue floss on a white towel - I'd love to show you a photo of my towels, but I've looked everywhere and they are no where to be found.

A few years ago I was in an antique shop and saw a pile of tea towels - you guessed right - they were all huck weave tea towels. I bought the whole pile of them. Over the years I've given away all but two of them as hostess gifts. I hope the recipients appreciate how unusual they are. If you're interested in huck weaving - google it - I found a number of interesting sites on line with free patterns and shops selling the popcorn fabric.

Dinner last night was so simple and so delicious I have to share it. We had turkey burgers stuffed with Shropshire cheese. Shropshire cheese is made in England and is a cross between Stilton and Cheshire - it's flavor is unmistakable. Simply use ground turkey breast to make the patties and stuff with the cheese. Sprinkle with salt and pepper and saute in olive oil until golden. I served it on a rosemary roll and topped it with caramelized onions - no ketchup for this burger - you want to enjoy the flavor of the Shropshire.

I was busy in the kitchen last night - in addition to dinner, I made a wonderful turkey, vegetable noodle soup - 5 quarts to be exact! I used a rich homemade turkey stock frozen from the holidays as the base, and roasted 2 meaty turkey thighs to anchor the soup. Greens are a wonderful addition to almost any soup - here I added kale - perks up the color and nutritional value.

Time to share my noodle secret. I hate mushy noodles. When making a noodle soup I prepare the soup to the point of adding the noodles and then chill the soup thoroughly. I cook my noodles separately - in this case playful noodle rings - rinse in cold water to chill, and then add to the chilled soup. This cooking method prevents the noodles from becoming mushy. Soup prepared in this manner freezes well.