A Produce Extravaganza

      Happy New Year, blog land! I know I'm a little late but it's always better late than never, right? I'm sure I'm not alone in feeling like I've had a very busy past couple of months.  It feels good to get back to "normal", back in the swing of things, and back to blogging.  I'm sorry to say that my lack of blogging very accurately represents my lack of sewing.  But I realized last night that just because my blog has "quilt" in the title, doesn't mean I can only blog about quilting.  What an amazing realization, right? :) Can you tell my brain cells have been on vacation?
       So what have I been up to in my spare time if I haven't been sewing? I've been juicing, learning about juicing, talking to others about juicing, and completely changing the eating habits of our household.  My husband and I had the chance to watch a few documentaries that really opened our eyes to the importance of eating and/or juicing our veggies. (and fruits... er... fruit).   We realized how much processed food we were putting into our bodies and decided to make some big changes. It's been fun to do this together and we both are enjoying working on our new habits.  We joined a CSA (community supported agriculture) organization recently and just received our first delivery of organic fruit and vegetables last weekend. At 35, I'm a little bit embarrassed about my lack of veggie knowledge outside of the lettuce, tomato, cucumbers, zucchini, squash, onion and bell pepper world that I have lived in. This lack of knowledge leads me to ask questions such as "What on earth is a rutabaga?"  But I'm so excited about the adventure of figuring out how to prepare the pretty and nutritious things that will arrive in our CSA crate each week.

Here's a photo to show you how much tasty goodness arrived in the crate last weekend

So far we have baked the acorn squash, juiced the spinach, pears and one of the pomegranates and roasted the potatoes and rutabaga.   I looked like a crime scene after dealing with the pomegranate. Next time I will do the process with the pomegranate immersed in water. ;)

This is a "Rutabaga and Potatoes seasoned with Herbs de Provence" picture for your viewing enjoyment

The spinach that arrived in our crate was the very meaty Savoy variety.  I decided that juicing would be the best way to get the full effects of all the great nutrients in the spinach so we went through all of it in two juicing sessions. Last night I made a tasty pineapple, spinach, carrot, apple juice to have with our dinner. 

It turned out looking very green from the spinach but it tasted wonderful. 

My next challenge is a big one.  Collard Greens.  I have never had collard greens. (I can hear the collective gasp from all of the Southern blog readers.)  If you know of an amazing way to prepare collard greens that doesn't involve using meat or cooking the greens for hours until all of their nutrients are gone, please share.  :) I checked online to see what's coming in our crate this weekend and guess what! More collard greens for us. So I really need to get moving or we are going to have a major glut of greens in our fridge. 

After all of this healthy food talk, I thought I would leave you with something unexpected.  Cookies!

On New Year's Eve I turned my kitchen into a test-kitchen and did an experiment with chocolate chip cookies.  The cookie on the left is a store bought pre-made dough cookie. The cookie on the right was made from scratch. I think you can tell which cookie won. And here's a link to the recipe if you want to try them yourself.  Click here for cookies

Sneak Peak

I'm participating in a Christmas fabric swap right now with a great group of ladies and part of the swap is that we have to make something with the fabric.  We each sent 5 inch squares of modern Christmas fabrics to all the participants and I'm in the midst of using all these cool squares to make a fun lap quilt.  It is such a diverse selection of fabrics, I decided to add a lot of white to my quilt and I'm pretty happy with how it's turning out so far. Here's a little instagram shot of my progress thus far:

Book Giveaway Winner

Thanks so much to everybody who entered my book giveaway.  I chose the winner via random number generator this morning and the winner is Conny from Conny's Quilts!  I had a lot of fun finding out who your favorite authors were as I'm always looking for a good series to read. Congrats to Conny and I hope you all are having a nice weekend!

Book Review and Giveaway

When I was asked to review a mystery novel centered around quilting, I was excited because I love to read, I love quilting, and I love mysteries. It was also great timing because I had been on the hunt for some fun, new fiction. (The kind where your mind gets a little break from the stresses and details of your day and you get to take a little vacation for a few minutes.)  Since I hadn't read any of Clare O'Donohue's other books, I wasn't sure what to expect. I am happy to report that I was pleasantly surprised and really enjoyed reading the entire series.  "The Devil's Puzzle" is the fourth book in the "Someday Quilts" series which consists of  "The Lovers Knot", "A Drunkards Path", and "The Double Cross."
O'Donohue's writing style is suspenseful, fun and easy to read and really got me hooked.  The main characters are well developed and likable and I found myself quickly getting attached to them. Add in the suspense factor, and the love of all things quilting, and you have a recipe for hours of reading enjoyment.

SUMMARY:

Witchcraft in a small New England town typically harkens Salem, Massachusetts. However, amateur sleuth Nell Fitzgerald finds the upcoming anniversary of Archers Rest, New York drawing out the town’s own dark history of witchcraft, as well as that of its residents in "The Devil's Puzzle". Nell is thrilled when her grandmother Eleanor’s boyfriend plans a double surprise—restoring the rose garden of her old Victorian house, and a marriage proposal. However, Oliver’s plans are put on hold when a skeleton is unearthed in Eleanor’s backyard. Police Chief Jesse Dewalt launches an investigation, and for once, Nell vows to stay out of his way, instead focusing on organizing a historic quilt show as part of the town’s upcoming anniversary festivities. When clues lead to questions about Eleanor’s past, Nell is forced to uncover the truth. As the anniversary approaches, a chilling wave of vandalism strikes town hot spots, raising fears that witchcraft has returned, and revealing secrets that could change life in Archer’s Rest forever.

GIVEAWAY:
Have I piqued your curiosity? If you would like to win a free copy of "The Devil's Puzzle", simply leave a comment telling me who your favorite author is.  Comments will be open until Friday November 4th at 9pm PST and the winner will be chosen via random number generator.  Please make sure to leave a way for me to contact you in your comment.  Good luck and happy reading!

Note: I was given the book series to review for free but was not compensated for this review

Projects in Progress

One of the benefits that comes with not having our etsy shop anymore is that I have a lot more time to just have fun with quilting and crafting without feeling guilty for not working on something for the shop.  Can any of you relate? Anyway,  I'm really excited to be entering the Fall season with time to work on Christmas projects and gifts.  I joined a swap last week in which we are supposed to send five 5" squares of modern Christmas fabric to 9 different people.  I had a lot of fun picking out the fabric so I wanted to share my find with you. :)

Aren't these fabrics wonderful? They are part of Kate Spain's "12 Days of Christmas" fabric line.  I couldn't resist and purchased more than I needed so that I will have some left over after the swap.

Another project that I'm working on right now is my first ever embroidery project.  I'm working on a series of tea towels that I hope to have done by Christmas so I can give them as gifts.  Here's a look at how far I've gotten so far:

This one is called "Apple Basket" and I bought the pattern from Bird Brain Designs. 

I also wanted to give you guys a heads up that I'm selling my Husqvarna Viking Emerald 118 on eBay. I've decided to upgrade and go for a Juki so that I can work on bigger quilts.  Here's the link if anyone is in the market for a used machine: http://www.ebay.com/itm/290616132160

I hope all you northern hemisphere types are enjoying Fall so far.  We are having some cooler weather today which inspired me to do some baking, and I'm loving that the house smells like pumpkin muffins and brownies right now.  I'm counting calories so I won't be eating them, but my husband's men's Bible study group is sure to enjoy them tonight. :) Happy Fall! 

Store Closing Sale!

Our etsy shop closes tomorrow! Use the coupon code FREESHIP to get free shipping to the US for our last few items! Click on the logo below if you want to check it out. Thanks to everyone for your support over the past year.  I'm looking forward to getting back to blogging more and making quilts, too. :)

It was a fun experiment

After a lot of fun, a lot of fabric, and a huge amount of learning, my mom and I have decided to close our Etsy Shop.  We have had a great time being business partners and especially going to the wholesale shops and buying fabric. Buying fabric is one of the most fun parts of quilting, right?  As shop owners, we have gotten to "meet"  quilters from all over the world.  Shipping fabric to places as far away as Australia and South Africa made us realize that the quilting community is very far-reaching. I have learned more about our postal system in the past year than I thought I ever would, and I have also learned a lot about business taxes and the amount of paperwork required to maintain a small business.  When your hobby becomes your business, it takes on a slightly different form. After a year of experimenting with our business, we have decided that we want to transform it back into our hobby, with no strings attached. :)  I will miss the customers so much, and of course getting to purchase all the fabric, but I am really excited about being able to work on sewing  and crafting projects without feeling like I should be working on our business.  I'm also excited to get back to blogging more about the fun projects that I will now have time to work on.
         Since we are closing the shop, we are also liquidating our inventory.  We have lowered our prices on all of our fabric, patterns and pincushions in the shop, so if you are looking for a great deal, click the logo below and head on over!