Two-fer Post: Spontaneous Soup; But First, Some Stitching! {Gail}

I’ll start with stitching progress lest you think we’ve become just a cooking blog! I am almost finished with the little crazy quilt block I started on my snow day at Sam’s. You might remember it here. I'm new to this CQ thing and a little hesitant as you might notice: no beads, ribbon embroidery, layered stitches… yet. I feel I am about 90% done with this block. I thought I was all the way done, but it seems to be missing something pink on the left. The ribbon across the top is held down by little *-shaped snowflakes to help keep late January perspective ;) This will become a card, possibly I will keep it for myself – there’s a surprise… I love that little birdie; it makes me smile!

Oops!  That ribbon on the right isn't supposed to be tucked under the mat.
Once the stitching is secured to the cardstock permanently, it will lay atop.
I can see all sorts of ways to assemble the bottom papercrafty section!

And next: I “souped” tonight, with no prior plan. As I was browsing The Cookbook during my menu planning process (yup, I have one) I realized three things. One, I didn’t know what to make for dinner (HAVING a plan doesn’t mean it always works :P); two, there were green beans that really needed using; and three, our 300 Sensational Soups book probably had a recipe that would solve both problems!

 Sure enough, I came across Garden Vegetable Soup, which uses green beans and corn as well as the expected carrots, onion, and tomato. What it didn’t use was celery which you will see anyway in my photos, as I was sure I saw it on the list originally. That means either it spontaneously disappeared from the ingredients (uh-huh) or reading all those soup recipes just had me a little distracted! Hmmm…  

In the plastic bag at the right:

frozen roasted corn from last summer's ears.

Please do not let me forget to do this every summer!

Didn't end up using the celery after all.



Red fingerling potatoes from
my Full Circle Produce box.
They have an interesting golden gleam.

Tonight I skipped the photos of onions frying in the bottom of my stockpot and the whole assembly process because it’s very simple and I’m sure you’ll see plenty of onions frying during the next 3 years of our project ;)  

For the soup, sauté said onions, add most of everything else, simmer, add the rest of everything, simmer, season, and you’re done!  

By the time I chopped and added, chopped and added, things were simmering along quite well, so I set the timer for the first simmering session and left the kitchen, where the beans and corn sat waiting.

Trim and cut the green beans to short lengths,
convenient for fitting on a soup spoon.

Once the timer went off, lucky for me my son was standing right there in the kitchen as teenage boys are likely to do near dinnertime. HE added the beans, corn and parsley, and turned the heat up. After I finished Pinning a few more things ;) I wandered back into the kitchen and it was soup! A bit more salt and we dished those tasty veggies up!



It smells so good and fresh!

The  roasted corn added a nice sweet summery flavor to each bite!



Have a bite!

Have another!

A word about the stock I use. Soup makers and chefs say it all the time – you have to have a good foundation of tasty full-flavored stock/broth. I really love these Kitchen Basics stocks! They are good enough to heat and sip from a mug by themselves. They’re packaged in aseptic containers so that you don’t get that metal flavor you sometimes do, and 4 cups in each package means you aren’t endlessly opening cans. Because their pour spout closes, if you only use a partial package you can just refrigerate it (I write the date it was opened, right on the pkg with Sharpie); use it up by cooking some rice in it if nothing else (freeze the rice if needed – that’s so handy!) Kitchen Basics stocks are either low or no salt added, so you can control the sodium content and saltiness yourself. We LOVE them! We keep 1-3 of each flavor on our pantry shelf at all times: beef, chicken, vegetable, and sometimes turkey or seafood, too. You can find Kitchen Basics a lot of places, including *shock* military commissaries.

Mmmmm!

This Garden Vegetable Soup gets five thumbs up, not just for flavor which was simple enough to let the veggies shine (that’s three of the thumbs-up, from the soup eaters), also an extra one from the cook for how easy it was to make – it doesn’t get much easier than veggies and broth, salt, pepper, and parsley! – and the last for being such a virtuous healthy January recipe.

Even if it is February today.

Garden Vegetable Soup from
300 Sensational Soups

TAST Week 4 Cretan Stitch {Gail}

Now I'm starting to feel a little crazy! Like a Crazy Quilter, that is! I enjoyed learning this stitch -- between it and the feather stitch I finally feel like I can begin doing some authentic CQ seam treatments. YAY! Then my daughter's and my blog here can really go "crazy" with everything from soup (to crochet to scrapbooking to costumes) to... well, nuts if I decide to incorporate them in a CQ block. (hopefully someone remembers that saying, from soup to nuts?)

Once I did small samples of both open and closed Cretan Stitch, I was compelled to attempt something organic. Looking at various examples on the internet was so inspiring, and discussions of this stitch always mentioned leaves. So, I sketched then I stitched. Here are my first attempts on my doodle cloth.



I need practice, and/or possibly just different fabric, to do a better job spacing my stitches on the leaf. (click to enlarge) 
I started on the left, can you tell? ;)



Happy Stitching!
Gail

Pot Pourri of Crafting on a Snowy Day {Gail}

Snow in Western Washington State
not common; enough to stick is rare.
I love snow!!!

Yesterday I went to Sam’s house for the day, for a variety of reasons. Since I was travelling there, we decided to spend the rest of the day crafting – always a good choice! I left home armed with a knitting project I am working on. Actually, two. One is boring, and one needs my hands to be smoother than they are right now (time to concentrate on hand cream.) I also brought yarn to make a toddler hat that I can finish in a couple hours. I also brought a new cookbook to look through; got it for Christmas but only a few days ago! I brought some doodle paper, and my New Year’s Day Tote Bag, for which I finally purchased the orange buttons – they needed stitching on, plus I had rick-rack to make a flower for extra fun on the bag. I certainly could have kept busy, but aside from doodling there weren’t a lot of creative avenues there.

I had to stop at The fabric and craft store on my way, and while I was there I decided everything I had with me was just not going to do. Not for a whole day! Therefore, I made the well-thought-out, logical decision ;) to pick up a very modest assortment of NEW items for a NEW project to work on. Um, yeah, like I need a new project. Or more supplies. It must be the microscopic fibers floating in the air of these stores that interfere with all common sense I have. Anyway, I actually did a great job of choosing only what I needed for a little crazy quilt block to practice stitching on, plus I had a slew of coupons that needed using up, so it ended up costing very little.

… “costing very little” is relative, of course. I spent about $10-12. The actual project, finished, will use far less than 10% of everything I bought, but my stash of Crazy Quilting threads is expanded, I actually did need another embroidery hoop, and a few more fat quarters of fabric make so little difference in my stash that they’re practically invisible! That’s my shopping “after-action debriefing” (aka justification.)

Even though it was a snowy day and I had snowflakes on the brain, I found a bird print fabric that just sang of spring to me. (you'll see it below, hang in there) The colors are exciting. I could just see a tiny CQ block featuring one happy little birdie! But arriving at Sam’s, I got busy and put the embellishments on my NY bag so I could call it finished finally. Three buttons sewn on, then playing with rick-rack to create a frilly backing for the 4^th button took a while. I am really happy with the results! Then I realized I still needed to take the top edge of the bag back to the sewing machine for that brown zigzag topstitching. As soon as I post this, that’s my next task! By the time you read this, the bag will be done!

Next, I knit on the boring project for a while: a scarf made in 1x1 rib (knit one, purl one for you non-knitters) from a “star-of-the-show” yarn on very large needles. To make sure the yarn can show its stuff and the scarf is drapey, I am working this project very loosely. One of the needles fell out. The knitting started to come apart… but I am NOT starting this scarf over (again.) So I hung in there and fixed it, then followed my self-imposed policy of knitting a while longer after fixing a problem; it’s like getting back on the horse after you fall off – If I leave a project with frustration, I’m likely to ignore it for a long time. After 2 more rows (woot – 28 stitches… ) I put it down and got out my new stuff! The feeling was akin to being excused to recess in first grade – whooo hoo, let’s go play!

I fiddled around with the fabrics, decided the little CQ block would be a card front, Sam cut a window into a piece of adhesive backed paper for me, I took a snapshot of my arrangement.

 

Basted patches in the hoop;
blanket stitching along one seam to start.

Then I started snipping and basting. Soon I had a CQ block in the hoop ready to stitch on. After one row of blanket stitching we decided to go to dinner and then I had to head home before travelling got ugly. But still, I definitely had the thrill of creating something fresh from those fabrics! You’ll see the finished block in a few days. Really!

She still has my new soup cookbook. That had to be said, so it is on the record. I want it back. Sam, if you make something from it before I do, then you must share at least one serving for a tasting! OK? OK! Your mommy says so.

So, Sam, what did YOU work on?

Happy January, all! If you are a stitcher, happy stitching!

Gail

Wordless Wednesday: TAST 2012 Week 1 Fly Stitch {Gail}



Fly Stitch.   (Second try at the  photo -- I'm learning!)



Gail