angry chicken

another bonnet? Yup.

Sade's birthday is tomorrow and I have been making gifts for her in the evenings after bedtime, which is only mildly successful with Liddy waking up every 45 minutes. I was able to make a new bonnet for her. I am in love with this style, more of a cap really-- a bonnet with no brim. I know I have seen this style in a bunch of the vintage children's books that we have, but I could only find this image here at the moment. It's from one of our favorite books, The Story of the Snow Children.

So, this cap is lined with plaid flannel. The outer fabric is wool left over from Sadie's little red riding hood cape from 2 Halloweens ago. There are leaves down there anchoring the satin ties in wool felt. I just used my bonnet pattern and left the brim off. I really want to make one in brown for Delia, but I have a feeling she will insist on blue.

I'd show it on her, but I haven't given to her yet. . .I can't believe she is turning 5 tomorrow! I am nervous and I don't even know why. I have all these silly things I want to write about, baking bread, ideas about starting an herbal apothecary (only kind of joking) and a sudden obsession with whole grains, but I just can't focus. I am too excited for tomorrow. She is cool as a cucumber, of course. I have a feeling this will be our life story. Ha!

swoony.

 

I am drooling over these new autumnal items over at the Little Fashion Gallery. Good Lord this online shop just takes my breath away. And the photography is stunnings, with lots of detail shots. Sigh. Look at this Puritan beauty. Maybe I can get the girls to dress up as pilgrims this Halloween.

Adult sizes please?

Lovely vintage children's chair

I look at this and I just think-tomato sauce. Within one minute. But still. . .

For the boy I don't have. I love my girls, you all know that. I'm just saying. . .for the little boy I almost took home with me from the park.

book review - Last Minute Patchwork + Quilted Gifts

I ran to the door today to rip open my signed (!) copy of Last Minute Patchwork + Quilted Gifts  It's awesome, you guys. Really and truly, please buy it. I was so happy to see the projects of Kathy's and Hillary's around blogland, but was so curious to see the other projects as well. . .

and they are just splendid. Lots of quilt projects in this book that are the perfect mix of modern and traditional. Having just received the book today, I haven't had a chance to make anything from it yet, but I surely will. These pin cushions are on my list first thing. Joelle writes an informative intro about color, provides a very useful techniques section in back, and lists resources that are sure to hurt your wallet--in a good way.This book is just full of pleasing simple projects perfect for making in multiples, and things just look better in stacks, don't they? This will be perfect for dealing with my stash of scraps I can't get rid of.

I have to give a huge shout out to Joelle and her sister, Jennifer, for all they have done with the amazing purl soho online shop and their blog, the purl bee. The purl bee is one of my favorite blogs--it's so much more than a shop blog. They are incredibly supportive of fellow crafters and the craft blog scene and share tips and tutorials that really rock. And when I am searching for some cool images, I always check out their flickr favorites, which never fails me. How they find all this stuff, I have no idea. Thanks you guys! And thanks Joelle, for writing such a wonderful book. Come out west for a book signing!!

 

mackin' good y'all.

The pumpkin muffins got made and they are crazy good. I changed the recipe so much however, I am posting it here. It's much healthier, less sweet, but still really yummy.

chocolate chip pumpkin muffins

1 1/2 cup flour
1 1/2 cup whole wheat flour
2 teaspoons baking soda
2 teaspoons baking powder
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon cloves
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
2 egg whites
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
2/3 cups apple sauce
1/3 cup vegetable oil
1 can (15oz) pumpkin
1 1/2 cup chocolate chips

Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees. Mix flours, spices, and all the other dry stuff together. In a different bowl mix the eggs, oil, applesauce and pumpkin. Add the dry stuff- to the wet,then stir in the chocolate chips. Bake 20 min. A clever commenter yesterday suggested dropping this batter by the tablespoon on sheet to make soft cookies (cook for 8-10 minutes) and I think this is brilliant.

Frikken yum. I do have to admit that I got a bite that tasted like baking soda yesterday and it was nasty. I think it was just a pocket of soda. The weird thing is, I have had that same taste in my mouth all day today too, but I haven't had any muffins. . .so I am tasting metal for no reason (isn't this indicative of something?) I'm not going to do any research on this because it will freak me out. Thanks for all your eye makeup remover tips, no blindness for me!

autumn!

I was going through old blog photos while setting up our new mac (!!) and found this Halloween display from last year. . .I am getting excited to bust all this stuff out soon. I actually am wearing slippers today. I love it when the weather really turns.

We had our first apple cider of the season yesterday to celebrate the beginning of autumn. The girls were excited, but didn't even sniff at the cider. No marshmallows, you know. Next we are going to make these pumpkin chocolate chip muffins with some substitutions, like applesauce instead of most of the oil and less sugar--I will report back. I need to try some woodland crafts like these outstanding ones from Country Living but my velvet ribbon stash is terribly low. I need to remedy this very soon.

In a random search for a decent non-creepy eye makeup remover I found using grapeseed oil works just fine and I picked up a $4 bottle last will last a looooong time. I haven't done a ton of research on this, so if anyone knows if this causes blindness, give me a shout-out.

fiber gifts and a galette.

Okay, so the apple dumplings didn't get made, it involved time and two hands and more butter than I think was necessary, so we settled for our favorite stand-by, the apple pie--easy style (What do you call this? Galette? Tart? Dumpling?) and is was so good, Pete and I got all weird about it and ate it in about 6 hours. It's not really good the next day so we figured the scarfing was for a good cause. Just use your favorite pie crust recipe with your favorite apple combo in the middle, baked on a sheet. I am not sure why it's so good. Melissa and I have discussed this before, maybe it's the way it bakes without a pie pan? The crust is way better than a typical apple pie, which is also outstanding in my book, so that is really saying something.

Here's Miss Liddy in the lovely sweater that Amanda made her. It's so soft, perfect for fall. Her notes on the pattern and such are here.

And this amazing number for Lydia is from Alicia, of course. The angora is to die for and can you see the sweet fabric covered buttons there? it's also dreamy soft and fits her so well, with a little extra in the sleeve for turning up.

And a lovely bonnet knitted by a lovely friend, and I believe she also used a pattern from the same book as Amanda's sweater, Last-Minute Knitted Gifts, By Joelle Hoverson. (right, Joy?)

How's that for some more killer handmade love, huh? Amazing. There is more. . I am bad at photographing it all, but I will. Now that the weather is turning it's such a treat to put these lovely knits on Liddy. I just love patting them, pat-pat-pat. Thank you friends, I feel like Liddy has all these fairy godmothers floating around out there., making sure she's toasty warm in the forest.

Okay, another list of thoughts (Please tell me someone else remembers Hank's Thoughts from the Larry Sanders show, which might possibly the best show ever, although it ended, like, 10 years ago or something.)

1. I want to knit or crochet something like this hat with this matching scarf. I might use this free pattern here.

2. Homemade Halloween costumes and the fickle minds of 3 and 5 year olds.. wait, this needs it's own post.

3. I have figured out that on a given day, the hardest thing I do is try to feed my kids and get them out of their pj's. I don't try hard on the pj thing, so it's just making food. It's the baby-and trying  to make food with one arm. I am really feeling the 3 kid punch now a days. Yes, I cherish it, and all that, but you know what I mean.

4. I am no longer reading Crime and Punishment via e-mail. too weird and computer-y. I love books too much, but I still think it's a cool idea.

fairy houses.

The girls made this fairy house last week inspired by the wonderful book Amanda sent them. They are in love with building these now, as am I. Pete tried to play with them when he got home and they are a tough crowd. I guess he didn't help in quite the right way and got yelled at, poor guy. The terracotta pot house was deemed "lame."

We found some acorns from the park to play with. Gluing the caps on here. . .

and then they saved some for caps for these acorn fairies. They live in the fairy houses. I am not sure why they are sad, but many are. The girls were very adamant that most of them have sad faces. I used a mechanical pencil for drawing the faces to avoid the dreaded sharpie+clothespin doll=bleeding problem and it worked like a charm. It reminded me of that story I heard about how NASA spent a gazillion dollars and years of research to make a pen that could write in zero gravity and the Russians just sent their cosmonauts up with a pencil. Ha!

last week stuff and it's getting colder

We are still getting some tomatoes, but it hasn't been a stellar season. Under watering on our part combined with some temperamental heirlooms have made it a so-so crop this year. I roasted all these for a soup.

I am still doing my "new dinner 2 times a week" thing. Here's some Cuban black beans with brown rice (instead of the traditional white) and some fried bananas. The brown rice was great. I cheated here and just opened a can of Trader Joe's Cuban black beans and added some kick. It was a great super fast dinner. It wasn't from Every Day Food, but I am still using that as a guide each week. So far so good.

Sadie's new hat. I started it at the beach a bit back. It's just a circle, with increases and then decreases until it fit her. No pattern. My first crochet project. Well, my second. . .the first is now a small scarf for dolls, not Lydia's baby blanket, as planned. But now I have some great yarn to use up, so I got that going for me.

Random bits:

-We are thoroughly enjoying Season 2 of Entourage on Netflix.

-I am reading Nature Girl, by Carl Hiaasen and also thoroughly enjoying it.

-I am having Crime and Punishment sent to me, via e-mail from DailyLit, 3 times a week. I love physical books, so this feels totally sacrilegious, but love the idea of reading a classic after dealing with e-mail burn-out. We shall see how it goes, but it's cool so far. (site found via Blueprint)

-I need to make apple dumplings right away. Apples are here already and Honeycrisp are what I just picked up. I want to try the Martha recipe (9/2007, pg. 59, can't find it online right now.) I am rationalizing this as research, so I don't feel bad when I eat all 4. It's a pastry crust baked around an apple that's been filled with raspberry jam, walnuts and cinnamon. Gawd.

KnitKnit -- Book Review

It's new craft book season again-woohoo! I am a total craftbook junkie (big surprise) and I just received this book last week and haven't been able to put it down. Now, I'm not a big knitter . .more of an almost big knitter. In my head, somewhere in the future, all I do is knit and crochet. I can see it clear as day, but it's not where I am right now. I do go to yarn shops often, read knitting blogs and magazines all the time, and knit an occasional pair of booties and hat a few times a year. But I love knitting as a craft very much. I also love the crazy arty line that gets blurred between art and craft and what knitters bring to that. Enter KnitKnit

In the into, regarding her knitting zine KnitKnit, which is also the title of this book, Sabrina Gschwandtner writes ". . .KnitKnit became the name of a zine, a new art project, and a way of exploring the link between knitting and fine art practices like sculpture and performance." Wow, I am so into that. I will say here that I have never heard of the KnitKnit zine and only recognize about 2 of the 27 artists profiled in this book, which makes it all the more thrilling to me to have so much new info to be inspired by and research.

This is a beautiful book--big and heavy with a wonderful matte finish cover and gorgeous photos, but what really gets me is the lengthy and detailed artist profiles. Reading about the artist's past, education, successes and thoughts about fiber and knitting as a medium is what I keep going back too. They aren't short profiles, we really learn a lot about these people, and they range in age, nationally, gender and experience. Each artist profile is followed by a knitted project with directions and some are totally out there--really fun and incredible. Like knitted boxing gloves, a slipcover for a chair, a metal and mohair belt, and a huge fiber glass teddy bear. Huge. But, the book is also full of more accessible projects as well, it's definitely a book you can knit from--a very arty one. Maybe not the first book I would personally pick up to knit from but the patterns aren't why I like this book so much.

I keep going back to the profiles. It's fascinating to learn the arty back-stories of Joelle Hoverson and Erica Knight, 2 names I already know and admire, and new names to me like Aimee Hagerty Johnson and Cat Mazza. This history of how an artist got to where she is now and the process of creating is a treasure-and to get it in this great format, with knitting patterns to boot, is a huge bonus. I really dig it.

non sequiturs.

Thanks for the bonnet pattern love! We are moving kid speed around here, but all of them will go very soon.

I made these green cords for Sadie. She is tall, much taller than the average almost 5 year old. The heart knee patches are for her now, 4 almost 5. . .it's crazy that we have an almost 5 year old. She seems so old sometimes, but most of the time not. She started reading last week. It freaked us out so much, we starting crying. She kept at it for over an hour, right before bed and she couldn't sleep all night. We haven't brought it up to her since, just trying to play it cool. She needs no pressure and I hate to have her perform for anyone, but man, oh man, it was so cool to experience that with her. I am so happy we were both right there when she started. It's like watching someone do a Rubik's cube. . .incredible. It was a game for her. She said she wanted to go to "reading class" and then, after establishing that she was "Lucy" and I was the teacher "Clara" she just went for it, slowly but surely.

Here are some car pillows. As requested by both girls. The yellow fabric is from superbuzzy, the others from my stash, I am 99.9% sure from Cia's fine shop.

It's been a rough few days. Lots of adjustments with family life, my work, and the 3 girls. I'm not sleep deprived, but my brain is soft. Very soft. I get so frustrated when I make mistakes and have a paper trail (or e-mail trail) to prove it. God, my e-mails to friends lately have been seriously impaired. And that's even after I proof-read.

I have been trippin' because I read somewhere recently that the baby on Nirvana's Nevermind album cover is 17 years old! Good god can that be right?? Okay, really, this freaked me out so much. That album came out and was on heavy rotation when we got our very first place. I lived with my now husband and a good friend, and I remember it so well. It was our second year of college and we had our first real kitchen, and our first real parties, and I was thrilled to do so many things for the first time--like buy a cool shower curtain.

Fall gets me excited for needlework and I have been really itching to try a blackwork project and bought a lovely book about it I will post about soon because it's so amazing. I was reading up on the history of black work, and thank god for The Tudors on Showtime (Grammie has Tivo) because I knew all about the main players involved. That hottie Jonathan Rhys Meyers makes it pretty easy to stay focused on the show too--but where is the naked? Not enough for my taste, I mean come on! And I shouldn't be writing any of this because my husband is a total hottie too, but you know what I mean. So, I do like Johnathan, but Clive Owen, not so much. Weird huh? Because they look sort of alike. Sort of. But Clive does look hot here, I will say that.

gettin' bonnity

 

After a series of odd mishaps, user errors, and bad luck, The Bonnet pattern, (as originally published in Mailorder #2) is finally here! It comes in 3 sizes; baby, child and adult and is perfect for keeping little ears warm this fall. You can see photos of the bonnets made up over here on the flickr mailorder club. I find it especially thrilling to see so many adult sizes made up.

When I first designed this pattern, I never thought it would be so popular, but I also didn't realize how hard it is to find a basic, non-poofy, bonnet pattern. This is close fitting and very sweet--hope you like it!

Bonnets for everyone! You can get your very own pattern right here.

food stuffs.

We braved the new IKEA last week on a Friday night at 7:00 PM. The restaurant was packed with families, the $1 kids dinner is quite popular it seems. We skipped it and then ended up with cinnamon rolls at the impulse buy cafe on the way out. The girls were pretty excited to see the kids play area with the ballroom, but when we got there, 10 blue shirts were gathering up all the balls. There had been a "potty incident". The girls found this fascinating and hysterical, so that was the topic of conversation for the rest of the night. We came home with 3 different types of preserves among other things. I have a weakness for jams.

Sunday, I made crepes. I need to watch it here. Crepes are so easy to make and can be savory or sweet--I could eat them for every meal. These are just jam, lemon, butter, and powdered sugar. Oh man. Recipe here. Now, teflon really freaks me out, but I do have one teflone pan, just for crepes. Has anyone tired it in a non-teflon pan? Curious if it works out okay or if it turns into to a swearing-in-the-kitchen type thing.

Thanks for all the amazing dark greens recipes in the comments a bit back. I am keeping up with my 2 new dinners a week. I am really happy, I was getting so burn-out on fixing the same stuff week after week. So here's some details:

--We made this spinach/basil pasta last night, very similar to the great recipe that Stephanie suggested. Yummy. The kids eat it plain, but at least they saw it served.

--Pete and Delia made these peanut butter granola bars from the same everyday food as above and they are super good. More like a yummy version of a Cilf bar, soft, not crunchy.

--The black bean and butternut squash enchiladas I made last week were right on time. I didn't roll the tortillas, just layered with the filling. I needed to make this with one hand, so that's what happened.

So, my new rule for cooking right now is I only use old Everyday Food issues, from the month we are currently in, and have to make at least 4 dinners/recipes from one issue before I look at another. I have 2+ years worth but stopped getting them a bit back because they seemed to get repetitive. I love the old ones though, Pete can make anything out of them, and they seem really well tested. So, that's my new plan. I have a ton cookbooks, but I need to focus and have to set some parameters if I really am going to do this. Plus it makes it more fun.

nice ink.

I have gotten some really nice Bend-the-Rules Sewing ink lately. This one here is from the newest Sew Simple magazine. It's a great issue with a really helpful section on sewing with knits--worth checking out for sure. If you click on these images, you can see bigger photos that I think you can read from, if you have super-human vision.

And here's a nice-shout out from the fine folks at Country Living. Their October issue is always my favorite, Halloween being my favorite holiday and all. They have a woodland inspired craft project in this issue that is making me all nutty (sorry) that I need to try as soon as it feels less like summer around here. I need to go foraging for sticks and moss right away.

And back in July, a nice blurb in the Arizona Republic showed up. I never know when Bend-The-Rules Sewing will show up in local papers, The Stuffed Squirrel was kind enough to let me know, thank you!

I also got tiny mention in the newest Blueprint (You can see it here, I'm #56, and wow, I never realized how much of their magazine you can read online.) I'm thrilled, especially because I am getting increasingly stalker-ish and weird about this magazine and their blog, Bluelines.

Thanks you all! And don't forget to check out the amazing creations over at the Bend-The-Rules Sewing flickr group. The discussion topics are brimming with tips and good links, too.

act fast!

My favorite needlework shop of all time, The Twining Thread, is closing it's doors. I am so so sad. Joey, the wonderful owner, has taught me so much over the last two years and her selection is outstanding. She is selling everything 50% off, so I bought up a storm, while feeling quite vulture-ish.

If you ever wanted to try needlework or if you need some supplies-order now!! She only carries the best and you will never see prices like this again for this quality of merchandise. The books and hoops, threads and needles, hand-dyed linens and crewelwork, are all to die for.

There are only a few colors left, but all my wool felt for craft project comes from here too. Bye Joey, thank you for all your help and good luck to you!