Documenting Everything & Desserts

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Happy Happy Happy New Year!!!!!

Imagine me tossing a handful of glitter and sparkles in the air because that's what I feel like doing this year!

2012 is the year I want to document everything. I just feel really positive about it for some reason. I want to give it my very best and see what becomes of it. I'm taking part in #JANphotoaday which is super cute and fun. Karyn mentioned a 365 app and I'm doing that. I don't always have time to take a "real" photo but I still want to do something! Plus I love the look of little instagram photos printed out. Cuuuute!

I'm also doing Project Life. I keep a very big & detailed journal but this year I want to do something small and sweet and special. I bought this library drawer and each day I'm going to add a card to it. I've been chopping up all my scrapbook paper into cards and collecting little bits of things. I want it to focus on the positive and inspiring tiny tid bits of daily life. Are you doing project life this year?

Our sock party is coming along great except...I'm not loving my pattern. And I feel terrible because it's the pattern I picked for us all to work on! I think today I might frog & pick something else. But I am *loving* the yarn, it's a Pigeonroof Studios and it's so dang cheerful! Very bright pinks and neutrals!

I hope you guys are ready for Dessert of the Month! I'm kind of dying, our amazing pal Stitchy Stitcherson has tested the pattern and has been sending us photos of the stitched up desserts and O M G! You guys want IN on this project! They are small desserts that are KAWAII and EASY but full of ADORABLE details. I got a piece of 32 count gray linen...with GLITTER!!!! I ordered here & hope it comes soon, I'm anxious to start stitching!

The Dessert of the Month Club is on sale until the 10th of January for $10...after that the price goes up to $16.95! We can do gift memberships too, so if you want to include something for a swap buddy or bloggy friend, let us know!

I'll give you a hint about the first Dessert, he'll be zooming to subscribers inboxes on the 5th..he's tiny...he's booze-y...and he's bubbly. That's it! My lips are sealed! In order to know what he is and to stitch him up, you have to subscribe!

See you soon!

2012 Dessert of the Month Club!

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HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!!

The Pumpkins are so excited to announce the newest club...DESSERT OF THE MONTH!!! we've been debating what our new club would be, we had a blast with fruit of the month!

You can sign up between now & January 10th for only $10! That's 12 pdfs! After the 10th the price will rise to $16.95! And you don't have to make them into a sampler, they could be tea towels or bookmarks or sewn onto pouches. I heard that Ashleigh may be doing each one separate and framing them. I'll be doing mine traditional sampler style so I can frame it for my kitchen, adorable right?!

The first pdf will be sent to the inboxes on January 5th! eek!

Chop & I are eating french bread pizzas with veggies and brownies. Best way to start a New Year!!!!! Hope yours is GREAT!

ps: best part of dessert of the month? super sweetness that's calorie free! ;)

colors I love & knitting

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I've been mulling over these colors for weeks. Linen, beige, dusty brown, grey, hot pink, rich wine, burgundy and bits of white. I can't stop thinking about it. Piles are forming all over my sewing room. Websites of fabric are bookmarked. Sketches are drawn on napkins. EQ has some blocks saved. My friend Sarah sent me some scraps that work PERFECTLY with these colors.

I  keep coming back to these little piles and sketches, thinking about a full sized bed quilt and it's like "Amanda...do it!!" "Make it your winter goal." "Start collecting more neutrals" "Work on bits & pieces each day!" The little creative voice in my mind is like...GIT R DONE. (also, the little creative voice in my head wears plaid shirts with no sleeves apparently ;))

I'd like to do a lot of improv piecing with a few little tiny traditional blocks pieced in. I'll send it to the amazing Lindsay to work some magic...then I'll turn and top stitch it. I'm totally smitten with quilts that are turned lately. I love how clean the edge looks and how it feels more playful. I did it with my neutral quilt & I'm happy as a clam with it.

Starting in January I'm going to work on it a little each day. I'm going to start with one of my favorite blocks- churn dash, and create around it. Just work with the stash I have and see where it takes me. And maybe treat myself to a few little bits, my neutrals are surprisingly low ;) Or swap with some pals!

 

I finished knitting The Age of Brass and Steam Kerchief with my favorite yarn. and I'm pretty obsessed with it. I know it's going to be a wardrobe staple. A very fast & fun knit! Only a few episodes of Leverage ;) And! It's going to be PERFECT for next fall. It's a very fall-ish color.

 

We are starting our sock knitting in January & I'm REALLY excited! If you want to knit socks with us, you are more than welcome! So far it's Kayanna, Angela, Amy and we are bullying Megan into making socks. It's going to be pretty laid back, just a month of sock knitting, I think we are using Pomatomus but Angela is making ribbed socks, so really, any sock goes :) We are keeping track of our projects via instagram & twitter. I'm using pigeonroof yarn & I think I'm going to get a skein of Madelinetosh so the toes are a different color. I'm kind of (very!) excited. I got a ball winder for Christmas and it'll arrive next week, I'm trying to hold off balling my yarn until then. Because the last time I made a giant mess.

It's almost New Years! I'm feeling very excited about 2012. It's my last year of my 20's and I want to make the most of it!

See you in 2012!!!!

Fresh Thoughts

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Did you have a nice Christmas?

I totally did! I'm so looking forward to 2012, are you?

This week I want to get everything done. Outstanding swaps, outstanding emails, cleaning, organizing, planning. I want it all DONE.

I want to start 2012 fresh. I want to start it focused and positive and excited. I have a few little goals in mind, I'll share them once I put them on paper. I'm doing a fun knit-a-long starting the first week in January with some cute friends, we are knitting Potamous socks! I've planned a new quilt for our bed. The Pumpkin's will be starting a brand new club (I'll blog about it soon! or sign up for our newsletter and be the first to know!)

Some neat things:

SewMamaSew interviewed me for Reflections + Predictions which was rad! (full confession, I got their email and was like WHATT! THEY KNOW WHO I AM!?)

I got a skein of sock yarn from a shop called CakeWalk Yarns, it is SO awesome! My skein is called Peppermint Bark. I'm kind of into pink this past week. With lots of neutrals of course ;)

One of my Christmas gifts was this mug! I hope it arrives soon! I have the hugest crush on it! (again...pink!?)

I love this knitting needle holder Megan made...I think once my knitting needle set arrives I'm going to sew it a fancy case!

I played around today with the aurifil 12 wt with some machine quilting...it is love.at.first.sight. I can't wait to share with you the little mini I was playing around on!

All of the yummy foods of Christmas have done me in. Tonight I'm making a veggie loaded chicken ginger soup. So excited! I feel like I'm going to have to have light meals for a month to detox all the sugar I've been consuming. But it is so hard to say no to marshmallows!!!!

Happy Holidays friends!!!

Chop's Birthday & Aurifil Thread

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Yesterday was Mr. McPorkchop's birthday! I threw him a little party to celebrate. I'm big on birthdays. My birthday I try to drag out as long as possible, I start reminding people in March. Which doesn't sound crazy until you learn that my birthday is in August. It's not that I want a zillion presents, but more because I love celebrating. Anything. Had a good hair day? Party. Got a quilt in a book? Party. Got a big wholesale order? Party. Taught a successful class? Party. Went a whole week without buying fabric or yarn? Party! (at the fabric/yarn shop ;)) jkjkjk! (kind of ;))

But I have a feeling when your birthday is so close to Christmas...you get kind of screwed. Pardon my harsh language here but really. Combined gifts because the person obviously remembered Christmas but your birthday? Not so much. Christmas cards that say Happy Birthday. No way! Not for my ChopChop! So I spent the day yesterday making him a perfect birthday. I made chicken enchiladas, a funfetti cake from scratch, a quilt, some decorations. He got home from work and was promptly fed about 90 pounds of food. And tonight we are going to a local restaurant! woo woo!

Chop's Birthday Cake Recipe As adapted from Fannie Farmer Cookbook & my mom ;)

Makes two 8 inch round layers

1 ¾ cups cake flour (minus 2 tbls if you don't have cake flour & are using all purpose) 2 tsp baking powder ¼ tsp salt 10 TBL softened butter 1 cup sugar 3 egg whites – aprx ½ cup 1 ½ tsp vanilla (clear if you want a pure white cake, paste/standard extract if you don't mind an off white cake) 1/2 cup cold water 1/4 cup jimmies (I like a lot. You can use less :))

Heat oven to 325. Grease the bottom of the cake pans. Add a circle of parchment paper to each pan. Grease the parchment.

Sift dry ingredients in a large bowl. Cream the butter and gradually add in the sugar. Beat until blended. Add egg whites one at a time, mixing one minute in between each addition. Stir water & vanilla together. I used vanilla bean paste and my cake turned out off white, if you use clean vanilla extract you'll have a perfectly pure white cake. Alternate between adding the water/vanilla and the flour mixture to the creamed sugar. Once combined fold in jimmies. Separate evenly between two cake pans and bake at 325 for 20-25 minutes using a tooth pick test. Mine was done at 18 but our oven is slightly cranky.

For the frosting I used this Classic Buttercream and it'll be my new go-to frosting recipe.

We had a super fun night! And I had a cake for breakfast. So that's how my day is going so far ;)

In other exciting news, I'm one of Aurifil's 2012 Designers! Super neat right? I'm really excited to work with their 12 wt thread...and...my month is OCTOBER. mmHMMM!! You know I'll be stitching up something crazy cute & Halloween-y! Or Autumn-y! Or Kawaii! It's top secret until then. Each month I'm going to work on my fellow designers blocks & blog about them, I love the group of ladies, each one has a totally unique style and I know everyone is bringing something rad to the table!

You can (and should!) quilt-a-long with us! You can win aurifil thread by entering your photo of the blocks we work on into the flickr group!

I'm hoping since Pam and I have months close to each other we can get together & work on our projects at Starbucks! woo woo!!!

I'm off to finish up a zillion last minute projects so I can take a few days off! woo woo!

This Week:

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I'm pretty excited for tomorrow. It starts a new week. A new week that involves Chop birthday (the 21st!) and Christmas. This week:

My lemons started to ripen!

I made a giant veggie lasagna!

I had a mega baking day with my mom!

I finished knitting a sock!

I worked on some of my cross stitch!

I daydreamed about creating something rad from this pile of fabric!

I'm ending the week with a date with Chop...scrabble!!!!

Can you tell I'm in love with Instagram? It's a free app for iphones and ipads, if you have it, let's be friends! comment with your name so I can follow you :)

If you are looking for a last minute gift, check out our Hoop Travel Bag, or maybe Snow Globe Cutie, or even Playful Mr. Fox!

I hope your upcoming week is fun & inspiring :) (and filled with candy, chocolate, cookies, pie...really whatever yumminess you are cooking up for the holidays!)

Neutral Thoughts

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20111214-134614.jpg This morning I was knitting, waiting for coffee to finish brewing & the sun to warm our backyard enough so I could do yard work when I realized I'm obsessed with neutrals. Like, can't get enough. I'm subconsciously surrounding myself with them.

My favorite quilt. My current favorite sweet; Hershey's Hugs with their sparkly gold wrapper. My knitting, Pigeonroof Studios in Winter Birch. My wish list of a Le Creuset oval roaster in Linen or Dune.

I find it's all I want to create with lately. And it's making me use color very deliberately & sparingly. I'm kind of day dreaming of turning the remainder of my neutrals into a bed sized quilt. With puffy wool batting. Doesn't that sound cozy? I just love these shades & tones, it's very calming & reminds me of winter light. It's very sunny here but kind of a milky soft sunshine. Does that make sense? I've tried to photograph it but it's just not working!

Do you find you are obsessed with a color scheme? Like when you look through your pinterest or Flickr, do you see a color theme? I know certain friends remind me of certain colors, Karyn is blue, Katherine is soft creamy yellow & PKM is red!

Mexican Hot Cocoa

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One of my favorite things during the winter is Mexican Hot Cocoa. I like it very spicy and very chocolate-y and a vehicle for lots of mini marshmallows.

I really like using Tyler Florence's recipe as a guideline and then jazzing it up.

While the milk is warming, I make a little spice bag and add one or two dried chili peppers, a pinch of red pepper flakes, Saigon cinnamon (Costco has this in giant containers REALLY affordable!). Let the bag sit in the milk while it's cooking and the flavors will blend together. I love steeping milk with different flavors! (this is also how I make flavored yogurts) Of course you don't have to use a spice bag, you can just strain the milk afterwards but I'm lazy ;)

Hope everyone is staying cozy!

Neutral Quilt

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Over the past two weeks I've made myself a new lap quilt. I didn't want a throw or something to cuddle up with Chop in. Just a lap quilt. Something I can have on my lap in the car. In front of the fire. While I sew. For traveling. Small was my ultimate goal. I had made this one with that intent & sold it to someone who totally fell in love with it two weeks later, since then I've missed the feel of a small lap quilt. I'm embarrassed to admit that it took me this long to finally sit down & make a new one!

I've been scrap happy this month and finding immense pleasure in sewing with the tiniest bits of things that are really special to me. I decided that this quilt would be scraps only. Not cutting into fat quarters. No buying new fabric. Just using scraps and being inspired by my home places board on pinterest.

I'm drawn to very open, clean, minimal homes with a cozy feel. But not impersonal feeling modern homes. And apparently things that are european, especially dala horses. I really want one! Like a nice white ceramic one. Or a pine one. ANYWAYS. I picked scraps that I felt conveyed this cozy intimate feel, my favorite Japanese linens, some special Japanese tone on tone fabrics from Karyn that I couldn't bear to cut up. That was my other rule. No cutting of the bigger scraps. I wanted to leave them intact so I could get the most out of them. I used a scrap of my favorite house fabric from Ink & Spindle which made me feel SO EXCITED but SCARED. I'm glad it's there. Once I started sorting through my scraps I realized a few things:

  • I had lots of fabric with houses & homes on it. I love love love little houses!
  • I had lots of fabric that is playful, kawaii-esque. And I want more more more!
  • I love fabric with TEXT on it.
  • I love love love international themes on fabric. France, Sweden, Japan, Russia...
  • I finally used some TRIM in a quilt! I collect trim and mostly it just marinates in my stash. I used a Shinzi Katoh cat trim I bought a spool of last year.
  • I had lots of fabric that reminds me of my friends. I have lots of fabrics from Karyn; who is one of my closest friends-I'd say almost 1/2 of the fabric is from theworkroom, Amanda sent me some scraps that are in here and I'm totally loving getting to know her better via instagram. One of my favorite cream fabrics is from Ashley, it's like little bear paw quilt blocks!

I added a secret message within the quilting...be cozy & content. Often when I'm sitting down "relaxing", my mind is racing of things I "should" be doing, so this is my reminder to myself to be content.

While sorting my scraps I found a small piece of plain linen left over from a pouch. I thought it would be fun to try and cross stitch on it so I took one of the trees from the L*K pattern I'm working on and stitched it onto the linen but I had NO idea what I was doing, somehow it's only the size of a quarter. But I *love* it. Unfortunately I didn't finish off one of the ends properly so one of the stitches is coming off :(

While rummaging around I found a bunch of tiny hsts I'd made from kokka robot fabric & shot cotton. I've always wanted to have a zig zag quilt but don't really want to make one. Weird right? So I pieced a small (2x4inch) zigzag into this quilt and pieced the other hsts randomly through out.

I loved Claudia's perfectly pieced cross in her Swiss Pixel Quilt but I don't own any red fabric (true story! crazy right???) and if I did own red fabric, I'd be paranoid of it bleeding on my quilt (as a side note this is the first time I used a color catcher!) so I used my favorite Lizzy House Castle Peeps fabric to make a cross. I like it because the candle sticks remind me of a winter night. The rest of the back is Heather Ross FFA2 Purple Moons, I had a chunk left over from an older quilt so it worked PERFECTLY! I quilted it at home in a simple stipple in my favorite King Tut thread that variegates from cream to linen to off white to pale gray.

I'm super glad I made this. It's kind of like a little treasure, lots of special out of print fabrics, it's neutral so it'll always match everything in our home and it crinkled up beautifully. AND! I even pieced in some selvedge! Normally I don't save mine but I had some from a piece of Megumi Sakakibara fabric that was TOO sweet to not include! I feel like I could show you guys a zillion more photos but I don't want to bore you :)

I hope everyone had a nice Thanksgiving! I finished knitting my hat & one mitt. I bought myself a skein of Tosh in Glazed Pecan that I've ALWAYS wanted the day after Thanksgiving and I hope it arrives soon! I've been listening to this a lot this morning and it's very sweet! I'm working on a Maple Leaf Farmer's Wife Block & debating making a Bear Paw...even though the book doesn't have one. SPEAKING OF BOOK, I've LOST my copy. I have no idea where it's gone too! I have all the files on my laptop but WHERE IS MY BOOK! oi!

Thankful For:

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Happy Thanksgiving Friends!!!!!

Tomorrow is TURKEY DAY! woo woo! We are having a low key and relaxing day around here. I've been working on a lap quilt for myself. It's made out of...

you guessed it...

more scraps! I'm hooked and it feels GOOD. I've completely used up every single linen and neutral scrap I had. I'm now adding in bits of very special fabrics and just piecing a little bit each day. I can't wait to finish it and show you guys! And I can't wait to finish it so I can have a warm lap ;)

I haven't farmed yet this week but I'm thinking maybe on Friday I'll make a block. It's hard to concentrate on sewing when everyone is home because I'd rather be hanging out with them! But I'm making progress on my cross stitch & Kristi sent me the PERFECT green! thank you!!! <3 And I started my hat (Tosh Erin Hertitage, I love this yarn!)! But before I finish any of those things I NEED hand warmers! Chop & I were out last night & my fingers were FROZEN!

I'm feeling thankful for a lot in general. An amazing husband. A great family. Supportive friends. Good food always. Exciting projects. Jam. Linen. Pinterest. The color gray. That a new Muppet movie comes out tomorrow. Eggnog. Really, I'm thankful for EVERYTHING. I'm not hard to please. I just like cozy things, great people and the roof over my head. And I'm appreciative for it all.

Have a great week friends!

x x x x x xing

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It was nice to hear about everyone's WIPs yesterday. I think the general feeling is that it's ok to have a tons of projects going at once and I should frog Damson. I'm going to let it marinate over the weekend & see how I feel about.

Yesterday I started a new cross stitch. This is called Snowy Day, by Lizzie*Kate. I do feel funny blogging and working on another companies cross stitch patterns when I co-own one of the cutest cross stitch companies out there. But sometimes when you work on creative stuff all day long for work, you want to just work on something for FUN and MINDLESS, without any ulterior motives than to just sit & stitch. Makes sense right? Also, I'm using a skein of Weeks Dye Works "Whitewash" that PKM sent me and is BEAUTIFUL! I want the Pumpkins to design patterns using these neat hand dyed flosses, they are kind of pricey though ($2 compared to Cosmo at $1 or DMC at $.60).

I swear, November should be called Scrapember  here around Casa de Porkchop. I've been sewing with my very favorite bits and pieces, using up every last scrap. I *love* it. I bet you guys are getting tired of me talking about these scraps! So, long scrappy story short,  I made a new project pouch yesterday.

Here are the details:

  • Scavenged zipper that I had cut too small for a previous project.
  • Measures 9x6 inches.
  • Fabrics: FFA2, Shot Cotton, Cross Weaves, D2, Greenfield Hill, Liberty of London, Hometown.
  • 4 inch star.
  • Scrap silk batting.
I wanted to sew something kind of sweet & special but not start something "new". Like, I didn't want to cut into fat quarters or buy anything or really think too hard to be completely honest. I just sewed up some of my favorite scraps and backed it with my favorite Denyse Schmidt. I know everyone is all hullabaloo about Flea Market Fancy being re-released but I love Greenfield Hill way more! Library Stripe is so perfect!
I wish I had miles of the fabrics I used in this pouch. Seriously. They are my favorites and the colors I love to sew with.
I got a skein of Madelinetosh Erin in Faded Calico yesterday, I'm hoping to cast on for Crooked Paths soon! I'm not sure how flattering the color will be against my skin but I'm hoping for the best. I want a cozy knit cap!
What are you guys doing this weekend?

Tales of WIPs

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How many WIPs (works in progress) do you have right now? No seriously. Think about it for a second! Here are my WIPs:

This is my Lizzy*Kate ABC Halloween. Kristi & I are stitching along together! I just took it out of my frame and rolled it for storage until next Fall. It's going to be a long term project, like work on it each year. I think it'll take me til 2013. I assumed it would be EASY but it actually requires a lot of concentration for me. And I get REALLY excited to work on the colored parts, then lose interest with the black words.

This is Damson. My absolutely 100% least favorite WIP. Like, I think daily about frogging it but I think I'm like 45-50% done and it nags at me. Do I finish it? Frog it? I don't think I'd even wear the finished shawl at this point because I'm so not into this project. Plus it's kind of dainty looking and that's not really my style. I think I was just REALLY eager to knit with this yarn & assumed I could finish it pretty fast! (WRONG!)! (pigeonroof studios original sock in ghost orchid if you are curious!)

This is my FAVORITE WIP, Daybreak. I can knit a few rows while watching TV and feel like I actually am making progress. I love the yarns, Shibui & Koigu. I had picked a third Koigu for the the last bit, a drab olive but now I'm thinking I'd like to try something different...maybe a peach? a bright pink? either way, I love this and I know it's going to get worn a lot! But I kind of don't want it to end because it's a really relaxing and fun knit.

These are Log Cabin Socks, they are for Chop as a combo birthday/Christmas gift. I'm running low on yarn, I think I'll be able to barely eek out the rest of this sock. He tried them on a few nights ago and they fit so that was exciting! I'm knitting these along with Kayanna, who's making them as a gift too! I like working on projects with blog friends, it's encouraging!

Here are my two hooped projects. One is my Thanksgiving cross stitch that I have officially torn a hole in the linen trying to fix a slub, I might mail it to Kristi & see if she can fix it (I haven't told her this yet, lol). And then my long term embroidery project! This is from Flora, I sent her a flickr mail asking if it was ok if I embroidered her October desktop and she said it was fine. Woo Woo! I love working on the teeny tiny details. It's like blackwork but with a mustard pop (which makes it not blackwork at all ;)) I can only embroider during the day, my eyes are struggling at night...haha. Old lady right here!!!

The only quilt I'm currently working on is my Farm! I just finished binding a baby quilt. And I made a cute heating pad cover a few weeks ago (I can share it if anyone is curious).

I like having a few big long term projects that I can come back to and work on, plus some small/easy types. I feel blah if I have too many projects going on at once that don't make me happy (like right now with Damson!) and I feel guilty buying things like yarn. I don't feel guilty buying fabric because I use everything I buy, I'm not hoard-y, but yarn, I feel like I need to have a pattern & needles ready to go.

So how about you? Any WIPs? How many projects do you work on at once?

Farmer's Wife Quilt-a-Long

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Woo woo!

Farmering! Farmering! Farmering!

This week taught me something new! Y Seams. And wow am I BAD at them. Faith has a nice tutorial I used and I'm pretty sure if I had just winged it myself I would have had a coronary. Do you guys know Faith? She's a popular quilter and pretty cute and has a sweet sister who went with her to Sewing Summit!

I know my block isn't perfect so I'm going to sew it again soon. I shouldn't have used that middle fabric, it's an older Japanese fabric (I think Trefle?) that is a waffle weave- think thermal shirt fabric but thin like double cotton gauze. It was a little tricky to work with! But I'm SUPER glad I gave it a try. I like this quilt because it's helping me learn new things for sure!

My blocks this week are:

Whirlwind, Homemaker (with the y seam) and Single Wedding Star. I'm up to 55 blocks! I love seeing them all stacked in a pile. It makes me feel EXCITED.

I'm thinking about switching out some of the blocks. I was exploring EQ7 this morning and saw some blocks I'd LOVE to have in my quilt but I didn't have enough to justify making the king sized quilt (that's 145 blocks!) If I swap out any blocks I'll post the foundation pdfs so if you wanted to switch out a block you could too!

Here are some Farm related things I find inspiring:

You really should check out the pool, there is SO much inspiration in there!!!
This is my kawaii laptop...haha! I found the icons here.

Have a good Wednesday!

Kansas Star

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I'm in love with this block, it's called a Kansas Star and without the burgundy border, it measures 5x5 inches. It was so fun to piece, it's made using more scraps from Farmer's Wife blocks, a favorite Robert Kaufman Cross Weave plus a bit of Essex Linen. I'm totally hooked on making scrap minis right now, they go together in an afternoon & I can play with various bits and pieces to create something fun & unique! Plus I can practice fun quilting styles.

And! I got new toasty socks today! woo woo! warm toes!!!!

 

 

 

 

{*~First Frost Mini~*}

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Woo Woo!

So Amy, who I mentioned previously is super cute, is hosting a sew & tell all about mini quilts. To be completely honest with you guys I had to ask her what that meant, she kept talking about link parties. That was a hot topic at Sewing Summit. Link-y Parties. I'm not hip and Sewing Summit taught me a lot about the internet. Haha! ;) But she explained it and it's cute! From what I gather, you add your link and then everyone can go around and see all the mini quilts! You know me, I'm into anything involving minis!

Amy asked me if I'd take part & I of course said YES! And you can do it too! I was worried I was late but apparently you have until tomorrow and some very nice folks have offered some sweet gifts! You can read all about it here! And before anyone says they don't have time or fabric or whatever, you can do it. I made this today in a few hours from scraps of scraps. Mmmhmm!

Here we go!

It's called First Frost Mini!

Here are the details:

I keep a coffee tin that I covered in scrapbook paper next to my sewing machine. When I foundation piece my Farmer's Wife block, I toss the remains from the blocks into this tin. So these are scraps of my scraps from my blocks! Each square was a scrap that I cut to 2x2 inches and made into a nine patch (Pam & Tracey will be proud, I pressed my seams to the side ;)) , added a little coral-y border too and finished off with some shot cotton in my favorite color. These are some of my very favorite fabrics, I'm literally using the smallest bits & pieces lately that I can't bear to part with but HAVE TO USE RIGHT NOW. Each fabric is special & has a place in my heart, dorky, but so true! It was exciting to use them and it's winter-y but still autumn-y, like the first frost of the year! I love rounded corners on quilts right now, I'm glad I did it on this little mini. Extra special!

The quilting is a free style- free motion. I didn't mark it, just made a loop-y doodle pattern. I got a new foot for my Bernina that I'm really enjoying, #15 if you are curious! The tension isn't perfect because I quilted it just on the top & batting, no backing. And my machine is now a lint-y mess. Big shock ;) The thread is King Tut, it's a pretty variegated cream/beige/gray. It's backed with Puti de Pome flannel. I found this gold and white glitter ric rac in a package of Christmas decorations from the garage, but you can buy glitter ric rac at JoAnns now, it comes in three colors. I might have bought some a few nights ago ;)

The quilt measures 9x9 inches. I think that's everything?!

So drop by Amy's blog, say hi & link to your mini! And! You can add it to this new quilt flickr mini quilt pool!

 

Woo Woo! Happy Saturday :):)

{*~Farming!!!~*}

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It's been pretty busy around Casa De Porkchop lately!!!

I taught a holiday canning class in Redding at That Kitchen Place that was a total blast. I love love love teaching cooking classes, especially canning. We made honey brandied pears, cranberry orange walnut compote, spiced pumpkin butter, vanilla vodka and mexican hot chili cocoa. I made them a whiskey plum crumble to snack on while we cooked. I really want to blog more about food things but I'm not sure where to begin! I generally cook 90% of our meals from scratch, recently I've been cooking wild game (!!!!), I've been doing some canning for Christmas gifts,  I wrapped about 150 lbs of deer meat & discovered ducks in Chop's lunch box. That's a LOT! Haha! Tonight I'm making Swedish Meatballs with the cranberry compote I canned...nom!

I'm really content sewing in the kitchen. I get to look out the window and it feels more relaxed. I can see the woodstove, I can keep an eye on whatever I have cooking and my ipod dock is on the kitchen counter, so it's working out nicely. I do HATE daylight savings though! I need sunshine! And lots of it! The whole sun setting at 5:30 is cramping my style. So I'm trying to sit in front of the windows and sew. It went from being 80 degrees to 60 degrees in like, 2 days! But I'm so not complaining about the cooler temps at all. I can bake & can all day long without the kitchen being 150 degrees ;)

The Chop & I celebrated two years of marriage on the 30th of October! I debated blogging something mushy & awkward but he's already terrorized enough by me ;)

So! The Farm! Let's chat about it! I have 52 blocks done! Woo Woo! That's all of them above! wowzers! Not the greatest photo, I know. Two of the blocks I'm going to redo because I hate the colors. The 18 blocks in separate photos are all new. They just feel GOOD to work on. I listen to my favorite music, drink this new Target brand cinnamon decaf coffee I discovered with oodles of pumpkin spice egg nog and chop into my favorite fabrics.

When I say favorite fabrics, I mean fabrics that I've been holding onto 5x6 inch pieces of for years. I'm not going to lie, it's kind of emotional! I'm chopping up fabrics I've had since 2005 that I know I could never again be able to buy! I want to use them in a project I know I'm going to love and I've accepted that this quilt will be an heirloom. Some of the seams are so teeny tiny in order to use these scraps that I doubt I'll ever wash it and I'll most likely use it as a coverlet and turn it down each night instead of sleeping under it.

There's a lot of exciting stuff going on right now that I should note:

I'm pretty sure I'm forgetting something but that's ok ;)

{*~Confessions of The Shy Farmer~*}

in , ,

Hi guys!

Shy Farmer McPorkchop here!

It's true. I rarely pop into the flickr group. I forget to blog my blocks. I get shy.

I think because when I look at everyone's blocks, they are so uniquely THEM. Some are matchy matchy from one line of fabric. Some are all in their favorite colors. Some are just solids. But each person's blocks are so great and mine are just..unique. I sew my blocks with whatever I feel like sewing with that day. Whatever story I feel like telling. Whatever color combo comes into my brain that day. So my quilt is totally not cohesive and ALL scrappy crazy fussy cut wildness. Which is kind of scary. (ok. very scary)

I've always admired the girls who are SO cute and well put together and classy, but that's not me. At all. I'm a little more rough around the edges. And I'm 100% a-ok with that but for this quilt I'm feeling SHY about it. I see Camille & Angela's blocks and they are so sweet, totally perfect and beautifully pieced and I am like I WANT TO BE SWEET & PERFECT LIKE THAT!!!! But that's just not me. I'm a goober. I'm like "let's throw all these fabrics together into this one block and run with it".

And so I was shy! It IS intimidating being a founding member of this GIANT quilt-a-long. So see, I'm just keeping it real over here. I'd be lying to you if I said it wasn't intimidating, there are SO many talented folks sewing along with us. I mean, it's pretty outstanding.

The thing that kind of jolted me back to reality was at Sewing Summit so many people would come up to us and be like "I'M A BAD FARMER!!! I'M BEHIND!!!! MY BLOCKS AREN'T PERFECT!!!!" It was like, true confessions of quilters.

And of course my automatic response was "WHO CARES! ITS YOUR QUILT! SEW WHEN YOU CAN! HAVE FUN WITH IT!" Because that's my nature.

But WHY WASN'T I TELLING MYSELF THIS?! Who knows. Either way, I love these blocks! My quilt is totally not perfect, two of my blocks are only 6.25 but that's ok. I'm rolling with it. And you should too. No more being shy!!! Plus, I'm very glad I got to spend time with Angela because guys, she is amazing. Seriously one of the sweetest people I've ever met. I want to hang out with her like, ALWAYS. And if I'm a less shy farmer, we can work on our blocks & encourage each other & I don't feel like I have to hide from her...haha.

Here are some of my current blocks:

They are: Northern Lights, Storm Signal, Friendship Star, OneWho'sNameICan'tRemember&I'mLettingMyNeighborBorrowMyBook, Homeward Bound, Snowball!

The moral of the story is, I'm going to keep farming, you should farm too & I finally was able to buy eggnog this week. That is so exciting!!!! OH and!!!! I'm on ravelry & actually using it. So let's be yarn pals. ;)

 

{~*Grump-Over*~}

in ,

I'm going to go ahead and say two things: I'm a bad blogger.

I am so grumpy that Sewing Summit is over. I'm referring to it as a Grump-Over. Like a hang over. But extra grumpy.

Each time I sit down to write about it I realize I just CAN'T put it into words. It was the most fantastic fun. I got to meet everyone online who I truly adore and then I got to meet all sorts of new people who now I want to hang out with daily but can't because they live a ZILLION miles away. To make matters worse, I updated my iphone and somehow LOST all my photos. I think about Sewing Summit and I kind of want to cry. If you know me, you know this is very un-Amanda-like, it takes a lot for me to be really emotional but I LOVED SEEING YOU GUYS. And it bums me out that I can't just pop over to their houses to hang out. Dorky? Yes. True? TOTALLY. I am the most blessed girl to have all these lovely & talented ladies as my friends. SRSLY.

Plus, to be completely honest I have this terrible fear I'm going to leave someone out and they will hate me. So please don't k?

I miss these girls:

 

(the above awesome photos are from Karyn who I miss every.single.stupid.day)

(Don't even get me started on how much I love this girl!!! Farmers Wives FOREVER!!!!)

(Karyn took this one too ;))

My class! eep!!!! I seriously couldn't be happier with how it came together. My goal was for it to be interactive & positive, I didn't want to just LECTURE away to a room full of bored people. I decided to be myself 100%, follow my heart and just tell everyone WHY I make minis. Why they are great. Why they inspire me. How to make small patchwork easier and less intimidating. I brought a bunch of samples, some done, some not, just to show everyone that we ALL start some where. I wanted people to feel like when they left, they wanted to go home and sew a mini. And that it didn't matter your budget, time, space, etc, YOU COULD DO IT. Minis can be WHATEVER you want them to be!

Confession time guys!:

I'm not a hip blogger. I don't complete a zillion projects. I don't make money off my blog. I always forget to tell you guys stuff. I have a bunch of quilts, FW blocks, knit things, etc I haven't shown you because I guess I forgot? I take photos with my phone and not my camera lately. I'm bad at looking at other blogs & commenting. I'm slow at swaps and emails. I don't always have the newest, fanciest fabric, nor the budget to buy it all up with. I'm not perfect at piecing, quilting or binding. I don't know the latest & greatest quilt on flickr. I don't sew what is trendy or rad. I just do my own thing, in my own little world, blissfully unaware of everything around me. Until Tracey is like WAKE UP AND ADD THESE CUTE FRIENDS TO FLICKR! (She doesn't really yell at me but she does show me her cute friends & because of that I knew an additional 5 people at Summit ;)) I was walking around Sewing Summit completely CLUELESS to 70% of what people talked about, which was slightly awkward but I'm pretty sure no one minded.

But I do love to sew. I do love to create. I sew what I personally love. I smile when people leave me comments and meeting people in REAL LIFE who knew who I am..SURREAL. My goal was to walk up to pretty much everyone, introduce myself and shake their hand. It's just my nature to be polite and open. So many people were like "I KNOW YOU!!!!" AND GAVE ME THESE GIANT HUGS or a certain CluckCluck told me "Of course I know you, you inspired me to make jam!" HOW DOES THAT GIRL KNOW ME? SHE'S FAMOUS! My little mind was blown. No joke. I got to meet freaking Camille & Bari J. I got to meet my Toronto other halves. I got to meet my amazing Midwest girls. I got to meet other cute tattooed girls who quilt my quilts & make 40 quilts in a freaking year. I got to meet Erin & Amy who worked their BUTTS off for this all to happen. I got to meet the sweetest Florida girl who has been the Frosted Pumpkin Stitchery's biggest fan. I got to meet someone who I have been internet friends with for five freaking years. THOSE ARE THE FAMOUS FOLKS!

Ok, back to this. I finish my class and my phone is flipping out. So many amazing tweets, so many kind emails. so.much.good.stuff. I almost cried. Instead I had some beer & a cheese burger and my first fried green tomatoes. And now each day people are tweeting that they are making minis. Sewing and having fun. Being part of the community. Loving quilting. THAT IS WHAT I WANT. I want to be part of THAT community. Even if you didn't go to Sewing Summit. The community where it doesn't matter if your blog is sponsored, if you complete one quilt a year or one every ten years, if you sew with fancy fabric or cheap stuff, where it's not cut throat, where YOU can be YOU, I can be ME and we can support EACH OTHER. Sewing Summit was SO POSITIVE AND ALL THAT AND MORE. I think it's important we see each other! Look at each other in eye! Give each other hugs! Jump up & down in fabric stores! Eat candy with each other!

While I was teaching, it was like watching light bulbs go off above everyone's heads in my class. To see the gears turning. To hear you laugh, see you smile, have you share your mini quilts. It was unreal. You asked questions, you shared ideas, we talked about how to display your minis, I teased you for being German (poor Claudia who later gave me CHOCOLATE!!!) and it was just plain GREAT. I sincerely hope everyone left feeling motivated, confident, excited and passionate about quilting.

I couldn't have done it without you. Without your comments, your support, your tweets, your kindness, your hellos, your offers of tea in bed. It's true. You guys are my cheerleaders & pals.

 

xo