Black Friday

I went out for Black Friday. This is never a wise choice and I am not really sure if it is always worth it but I wanted to make one quick stop. Around 10:30 I ventured to JoAnn Fabrics just to pick up some fabric in hopes that it would be on sale. To my surprise the store was packed and I mean insane. Really... JoAnn fabrics?!?!? Everytime I have visited over the past month I was thinking the store was on its way out as all I heard were crickets as I walked the ghostly aisles. I had no clue that so many people were obsessed with buying fleece. Women and men were walking around with bolts of fabric towering over their heads while attempting to dodge everyone in their way only to actually hit everyone they pass. I guess the $1.77/yd sale is what did it for them. I was a bit disappointed that the felt wool that I was wanting to buy, that is mega expensive, to make a jacket/vest thing, you will see soon, was not on sale. As I sized up the line to cut my wool I took a number and gulped as I was 15 people back. I then began to wonder around the store and thought it may be more amusing to stand around the cutting area and watch these crazy ladies manuever their bolted up carts. So to the cut area I returned and remained. I don't know if I've laughed so hard in my head in the longest time. There was one lady that just walked around and smiled and said "pillowcases" to everyone she passed as if they were asking and wondering what she wanted all that fleece for. What a joy it was!

Today,

I finished my Rosemary labels.

I started making Christmas gift labels.

Friends-giving

Brandon got a free turkey from work so we donated it to our friendsgiving that we had last night. I cooked my first ever turkey and was so surprised as to how it turned out! So good! It was packed with herbs from the garden and a mirepoix. Our new oven cooked it perfectly with a nice crispiness on the outside and tender juicyness in the center.

We decided to wear matching outfits of purple and an orange neck tie. My gray skirt I had made earlier in the day.

Soup

I've been making soup everyday for lunch. I just open of the fridge and see what is at hand and create. I love soup because it is so simple to make and packs so much flavor. Lately I try to pack as many vegetables into each soup as much as possible! I love how the veggies speak for themselves in the dish and no more than broth, salt and pepper were added than the veg.

Take a look at the other day:

1. celery
2. carrot
3. turnip (my new favorite veg in soups)
4. tomato
5. green beans
6. potato
7. onion

For added flavor I added in the garlic and parsley.  All of these ingredients made me one bowl of soup.

Beaujolais Nouveau!

Yesterday I woke up pumped and ready for the day!

Beajolais Nouveau....

To ring in the day I collected some ingrediants at hand to make a Provencial soup that I had made once before that has a lot of layered tastes. Unfortunately we did not have basil, which I was hoping to find to make a pistou with. I'm letting the soup cook low and slow all day to bring out the most flavor.

Beaujolais turned out to be a great event! We got free aprons, ties, wine and snacks. People were festive all about in their berets and the wine was flowing. At Vintage I got a flight of three and at Tria I had the most flavorful Beaujolais Blanc! Now that was a keeper and will be added to the top of the list of my favorites.

Project update

So I have already blasted a few things off my list of projects!
I've finished all the work with my vanilla extract, am about halfway done my quilt, I made my skirt with my mood fabric and have crossed off making pajama pants. I didn't find any fabric that suited my taste. I was looking for that red and black checkered flannel that I can only picture hunters wearing. I desire to get that since Brando's such an outdoorsy boy and it would suit him well.

So what is left??
1. print rosemary labels (If the printer has new ink!)
2. finish my quilt
3. tailor my clothes that have been starring at me yearning to be worn for about two months now.
4. oh yea, and my level II certification.

Time to buckle down and meet my Christmas deadline.

In my head I've added other things to the list which is deadly and not the point of the list. These are looming things that should be top priority but are the least fun things to be done!

Some swirling ideas include compiling my list of gluten free christmas treats. The recipes will have to be tested one day as well to see if they are worthy. I bought more skirt fabric for more skirts. There are many more but this is what comes to the forefront at the time.

I wish washing my car was on the list. That poor sucker only gets washed about once every three months. She has been so dependable these past almost three years. I should treat her will a little more respect!

Too much time!

I spent way too much time in the sewing room today! My body became so sedated that when I got up to leave the room I think I was in shock. When I went to run I was all out of sorts. I had been too inactive so I need to develop a new sewing planning. I will have to do it in chunks! But with all that said I made a lot of progress. I finished half of the quilt top which is now the size of a single sized bed.

It doesn't look that large in the picture but believe me, it is already massive! My plan tomorrow is to complete the rest of the triangle rows and then hopefully by the end of the week sew them together. In the mean time I need to be thinking about some French inspiratio for is Beajolais Nouveau on Thursday! If you don't know what that is, it's just the most wonderful time of the year.



Restaurant 1! This is me at the event last year. You can see behind me is a man drawing caricatures. All of the staff was dressed in their finest french apparel sports Beajolais scarfs and handing out puff pastries. This was the first  wine I tasted from the flight complemented with escargot.  Outside was an accordion band (Katie maybe your uncle was playing)!

Fabric, fabric, fabric

 I bought three new fabrics yesterday to make new skirts. The first one was such a success that I wanted to make a few more. JoAnn Fabrics was having a major sale so it was the perfect time. I bought a silk, knit and jersey. I am real excited to use work with the jersey and see how it turns out. This is the fabric Coco Chanel started out with as her clothing line boomed during the war. Jersey can look just as nice as anyother fabric but is much more comfortable! 

I made a lot of progress on the quilt!

This is a few of the rows. They are only placed next to one another and not sew yet. I put in a solide 5 hours today on it and hope that I can do the same tomorrow. As the weather is getting colder, it is much easier to stay inside! Along for entertainment was Amazing Race in the background with a bowl full of carrots drizzled in olive oil. I can put olive oil on just about anything. I just love the taste!

1000 Pyramids...

I just realized that my quilt is called "Thousand Pyramids" alluding to the fact that I have to cut out 1,000 pyramid triangles to then sew together. Was I thinking?

Actually, mine only has 651 since I'm making it for a full bed. Today I finished cutting all of the triangles and rendomly sorting them so I can quickly sew the rows together. I am not sure how quick quickly will be.

This pictures doesn't look like there are many triangles, but boy they never ended!

I also made some gluten free, egg free oatmeal raisin cookies. I died! They are the tastiest, non sugar laden gf oatmeal cookies I have had! Here is the recipe from the beloved gf goddess where  I get much insperation. I altered the first section to have less brown sugar and more honey.

On a Roll!

Well I have already completed three items on my list. I guess when I really put my mind to something I can get it done.

I finished all of my vanilla tags. I love the copper bows that I  tied the labels with! (Thank you www.stylemepretty.com for the label template!)

I also completed my skirt with the Mood Fabric. It took me less than two hours to complete and I love it! I will be purchasing more fabric shortly to make many more of these skirts! I will post pictures tomorrow of the skirt.

Projects!

SO I've been away from the blog for a while. I have also been away from the farm for a while! As my body and brain finally feels settled I have decided to set a goal of completing all my projects. I am the master at beginning projects but not finishing them. My goal is to complete all of my projects by  Christmas, so with the new year I can begin new ones.

As I clear the cobbwebs in my brain as to what is started and how much is done, I have a lot to finish!

1. Put tags on all of my homemade vanilla jars
2. Send vanilla jars to friends :)
3. Tag all of my homemade rosemary salt jars
4. Send salt jars to friends :)
5. Finish my beautiful green tree quilt, that I can't even say is 10% done, even though I've already invested hours into it.
6. Tailor all of my dresses and blazers that I can't bare to get rid of just because they aren't fitting corretly right now.
7. Use my Mood Fabric (oh yea, Project Runway) that I bought over a year ago to make a skirt, or two.
8. Make Christmas flannel pants for Brando and I.
9. Onto the boring stuff, complete the paperwork for my Level II teaching certification.

This isn't an enormous list but a lot to be completed!

I will be excited to update my progress as I get this list done!