angry chicken

a quick little note. . .

mailorder #2 is sold out, thank you all so much!

mailorder subscribers:
I have been alerted to a breach of security which has resulted in a mis-scrambling of one of the secret codes. Please make the following change:

the code on the "child brim" bonnet pattern should read 24-78-20-36-69.(***second correction, ahem. please forgive me, members.****) Please update and proceed with cation. Once you crack this, it can be redeemed king pod later this weekend.

Tie one on:
The aprons are due late today or tomorrow with the new theme sometime this weekend. All the ones I have received so far look amazing thank you so much!

The barfing virus is back:
we have 2 barfing babes again, and  barfing mama, (during the mailorder sale, no less!) so I will be a bit slow with the new apron  gallery, returning e-mails, getting the code page up on king pod, all that. . .don't worry, the new mailorders  won't be delayed a bit, already have them packed.

. .okay, need to rest.

little elf shirt

I made this shirt for Sadie and am so happy with how it turned out. I saw ths idea on craftster about using freezer paper to make a iron-on stencil and it worked like a charm. I am having a hard time finding the tutorial at this moment, craftster is being slow, but you can find it with a search. Here's what I did-

I traced a silhouette and then cut it out with an x-acto then ironed it on the shirt. Then, this is the key I think, I ironed on another piece of freezer paper on the inside behind the elf, so the grain of the fabric couldn't shift and the paint couldn't soak though the back. I used fabric paint (Jacquard) and sort of dabbed it on. I let dry over night, heat set it, and we are good to go.

I know you can gocco this type of thing, but goccoing on fabric freaks me out. It's so quick, either it works or it doesn't and makes me crazy. If I thought I were going to do a lot of shirts with the same design- gocco or a silk screen would be better, but for one or two shirts, I love this method. The stencil isn't reusable, so you would have to cut another, but it only took about 5 minutes. Now I need to stop myself from doing this to everything in the hamper.

and here's my plug, mailorder #2 is on sale now over here. . . .

yellow with a bit of blue

While looking through all my back issues of MSL for Easter ideas I was completely struck by this ruffle spread-wow oh wow. These are from April 2001.

Oh, I want this room so bad. And it so won't ever happen. Pete officially has put the kibosh on girlie bedroom stuff. Thank god I have two girls I can inflict this on, because good lord, I love it so much! I want the matching beds for them just like this. Must do this quickly before they develop their own tastes (Joking. . . sort of.)

I should submit this as corners of my home. ha. Really, I want it to be a corner of my home! But, it's not even a part of a corner of my home. We do have the ducks.

A quick sketch to make me feel better, so I will stop obsessing. A quilt design? I'm not sure, I'm not real big on symmetry, but I had to get some of this yellow with blue out of my head. . .maybe it needs a ruffle and then I can breath easy.

Tie One On aprons are due soon (saturday) and my kingpod e-mail is down (hackers!!) so if you are having problems try this e-mail: matern(at)comcast(dot)net. thanks!

easter at my fingertips

Easter is coming so soon. It's usually such a big deal here and the decorations are normally up by now, but this year I am a bit behind, and you know that is O.K. (I'm saying this in a Stuart Smalley voice. does anyone remember him? I am dating myself, for sure-but man, I'm not that old!) This lovely glass bunny container is from target and I think was $1.99 or something ridiculous like that.

I like to dig out all my old MSL mags during the big holidays and I was wasting a lot of time flipping through ads, etc, when all I wanted was to find the article on Easter egg dying with nautral dyes from god knows when. Hello Martha Dex at the amazing craftlog. All I had to do was type in "dyeing eggs" and there it was. I use MarthaDex quite a bit. It's especially pleasing to me because I do have all my MSL all organized (anal) so it's super easy for me to find all the articles. Thank you again maitreya, and I still need to send you some early MSL weddings.

Now I'm going to go back to look up all the Easter stuff. So much more my speed at this moment than, um. . .  standing up. Tomorrow is Monday? gads.

my favorite cook book.

The weather is slowly changing (right?) and so I pulled this off the shelf, my favorite cookbook, The New Vegetarian Epicure, by Anna Thomas because I always like to cook newish things that sort of reflect the seasonal change. That sounds so noncommittal, but so is our weather. My mother-in-law gave this book to me 10 years ago, when it was a hard back with a completely different and much better cover. Anna also wrote the Vegetarian Epicure in the 1970s. Don't confuse that one with this one. The old one is wonderful and so 1970s vegetarian--very dairy heavy. It's dated now, but in a great way-the cover art is awesome.

Being a vegetarian, I am used feeling left out of most cook books (except for the desserts) or having to fend off the abundance of tofu and meat substitutes that are in a lot of vegetarian cook books, which is exactly why I usually steer clear of them. When I got this book, Pete and I had just graduated college and moved to Seattle and I was so anxious to set up a kitchen that didn't remind me of college food (mac and cheese from the box and ramen) and this book made a huge impact on me.

I still use this book so much and I have adapted so many recipes from it that I often forget they came from here originally. Like when you quote a movie so long you forget where that phrase even came from? This book doesn't have a ton of recipes--it's not  huge. And it's tastes are really specific; with some Italian, Lebanese, Polish, Asian, Indian, French, Jewish,  and Mexican all rolled into one.(Not all in the same dish.) No lightweight flavors here, it's got gusto. I think the only thing it doesn't cover is down-home-style American, which is fine because I have so many books that cover that type of food anyway-except this book does have THE apple crisp (which mailorder borrows heavily from, with some minor tweaks)

I love cooking. And I really love cookbooks. I'm the type that reads them in bed. I have a whole ton of them and try not to buy more, but I usually do buy about 2 a year. But this one, it's hardly even a cookbook to me. It's more like "my cooking book." I think this book is what taught me how to eat. Not with a bunch of text talking about slow food and all that (that's all good and well, but really, I just want the recipes). And what is so cool is I rediscovered the bit in the middle about feeding kids. So many years went by when I ignored that part completely, because I didn't have any- and now I read every word. Anna also has a newsletter and a new free recipe every month here.

here's the Easter Brunch Menu, which I want to make this year:

-spinach, green garlic and mushroom pie
-beet salad
-onion and thyme flan
-roasted asparagus
-Easter baba
-gypsy mazurek

I love hearing about people's favorite cookbooks, the whys and history-do you have any? If you blog about it let me know and I will add the link here. And check the comments! great suggestions!!

-lazy jane
-plum street
-wise craft
-creative kismet
-touch the spindle

And yes, angry chicken has a new look. And, no, I wasn't looking right at the new denyse schmidt fabrics when I drew this, but I do see the obvious similarity. . .and I need to re-organize more-my categories are out of control, and I will add a new, much shorter, but monthly rotating blog-roll, cause there's too much good stuff out there!

already here (almost.)

Hello!
Next week mailorder #2 will be for sale. Already? Yes! I realized Easter comes so early this year that for those of you who would like to make the bonnets for that particular holiday will have to get crackin' sooner than later-so Thursday, March 30th around 6:00pm (PST) the single issues will be available. I will send out a 2 reminders to the mailing list, so don't worry about writing it down. You can get on the mailing list over at king pod.

For this next mailorder issue you will find in your red envelope:

-Small paper project (gift tags and cards)
-The official mailorder secret handshake illustrated on a card with a matching envelope template
-A professionally printed recipe card
-The mailorder sewing project-the bonnet in 3 sizes
-A secret word (to be redeemed for funny money)
-A secret subscriber only code to unscramble (using your decoder ring) also awarding you a prize.

Mailorder #2 will be available as single issues only (so you subscribers can just relax, and yes, yours will be mailed out early) and there will be about 150ish single issues available. The price is the same ($10 + $2 shipping paypal only) except for international. I really took a beating last time on shipping, so I have to raise it $1, so it will be $15 total, sorry. (And obviously, international subscribers don't have to worry about this.)

Thank you for your attention,
Your mail order secretary.

better. . .

we are feeling better around here-thank you all so much for you sweet well wishes. It really made us feel better! I won't go into details, but this bug was bad. in that way. you know, so I can't tell you how happy I am we are up and running again.

I got a surprise package from Sally on Saturday and holy mary and joseph-this book, among so many wonderful things, were inside. Wow!! Thank you so much Sally! She tucked in the sweetest hello/get-well card and stationary and gift tags she designed herself-so nice. I almost started crying! These patchwork coasters saved me yesterday-I started some immediately, which took my mind of the nausea, and boy, um, inset corners are hard. Yeah, I had that "I'm not a real quilter" moment. You can see the result here-not bad, but took a long time and I need to practice.

 

Sally blogged about this book here (more and different photos) I have converted these books for so long-why don't we have fabric here with more words? I think that's part of what makes these projects so cool. . .

Okay-this make me crazy-loco. The minimal style photo the with crazy patchworky runner (or mat, what should I call it?) so good. so very very very good. Gosh-this package was almost worth getting so sick for! (I am insane) thanks again sally!!

sick town, usa.

I've sent this card (hipstercards.com-cool free e-cards!) to my whole family-We are all sick in the worst way (stomach flu, migraines, you name it) and papa, the super-hero, is taking care of all of us. Our off-white sofa is no longer off-white. nuff said.

the bunny (who is earnest)

The time between dinner and bathtime is mama's special time so I save the best projects for this window (and promise myself I just won't look at flickr, but actually craft.)  This was made from the wee bunny pattern from the genius Hillary, thank you so much. He needs a friend because he is quite distraught, as you can see. There are some more photos here of him still looking sad and confused and slightly stunned. I love my (I mean the girl's) wooded veggies and eggs.

So, I didn't win the bloggies for best craft blog (make won, and congrats to them!) I think being nominated was so cool and honestly, there was no way I was gonna win, you know? But I can say I was a "nominee" ,j ust like Oscars, forever and ever- and how annoying will that get to everyone around me? Milk it, baby!

green cookies

I made shamrock cookies this weekend from the cooky book. I looked (and looked and looked) for a shamrock cookie cutter and found none. I didn't actually go to where they would have one, you know, like a kitchen shop or the decorate shop. Too far and too crazy with the girls. So I made them using the actual instructions in the cooky book. Roll the balls, press them flat, and make the stem. They are a bit bulbous, looking at them now. They actually look almost gross. But, I am happy to say they are tasty as all get out (sugar cookie with a hint of peppermint flavoring) They are really light green, which I think adds to the almost gross factor. I think at a certain point if you are going to color something, you just need to go for it. Just make it green, you know? You can see how nicely they are shaped in the book there, and how mine don't look that way-but there's only one left, so there you go.

The sun came out today and I am thrilled. I really needed this Monday to be sunny. Not too much else to report. I screwed up 2 mini oven mitts to match the aprons, they are now in the trash and I am getting mailorder together to try and sell the last week of this month. . .next on my list is this bunny, cause dang, how cute is that?!

**update** not sure what I was smokin'-why didn't I think of the heart shaped cookie cutters or spritz? (such good tips in the comments) I have both! hmm-might have to try again, and here's the link to get that sock book from last week-thanks mari!