Lazy Summer

...Emphasis on the LAZY.

I really am not getting much sewing done these days, but in my defense, I have still been staying busy. People have been coming in to visit from out of town, I'm going to the gym a lot, then spent half the weekend brewing beer and the other half taking care of a sick dog. Yay!

Then yesterday my boyfriend and I decided to drive the 3ish hours to Austin to hear and meet Patrick Rothfuss, an absolutely amazing fantasy author. If you even remotely enjoy fantasy, check his stuff out! Totally worth cramming in 7 hours of driving into a 11 hour period of time because he was so hilarious and charming. Here he is in all his glory!


Ernest Cline, another great fantasy author (or does he count as sci-fi?), stopped by the reading/signing and parked his DeLorean out front for everyone's enjoyment. Here I am full of enjoyment and coffee in preparation for the 3ish hour drive home.


But if we want to look at actual sewing, here is what I have accomplished. Most importantly, progress was made on my goal for the June edition of LYoF. I quilted the veins in the eyeball quilt and luckily I like the way they came out. I say luckily because I ripped and restitched three times before this point. Ignore the reference markings that will [hopefully] wash out.


I also started using my "Rapid Fire Lemoyne Star" ruler that had been sitting on a shelf since I purchased it on New Years day. It makes 8 point stars ridiculously simple. Don't ask what I'm using these stars for, because I have not a clue.


It is supposed to also make them fast. Once I practice a little more and and use it without stopping to read directions, it feels like it will be tremendously quick! But who cares about that, because look at these seams! Thanks, ruler!


On Sunday I was accidentally elected as Vice President of the local homebrewing club. I guess that means it is time for me to finally start wearing a name tag, huh? But my hesitation is not that I don't want people to know my name but in the hatred of a hypothetical plain white tag crudely bescribbled with "Sabrina". For over two years I have been talking about sewing a cute one, but it had to do with beer and designs like that are apparently rare. Then I found this beer at a Whole Foods in Austin yesterday.

Zomg! Art deco hop?!?! SOLD! Have yet to actually taste it, but it is chilling in the fridge. So I tried to brainstorm how quickly I would want to commit seppuku if I tried to applique all the teeny tiny bits. Maybe embroidery is the answer? I'm going to use the space where the beer name was for my name. I already got started stitching the outline. Mine is not that awesome, but maybe with some color it will be. Side note: I now want an art deco hop tattoo.


Then we have some cooking... Let's start with veggie pasta (no, really, the noodles are made of veggies) with more veggies, tons of garlic, and venison summer sausage.


Followed by a recreation of my favorite dish in Hawaii, green bean and spam stir fry with coconut rice. The recipe needs a little tweaking, so I'm not ready to share yet. Sorry.


Aaaand that's it. What have you been up to?

Coming off a Downton High

The past few weeks have felt like a whirlwind. Winter break from teaching has been flying by! I have been filling the time with sewing, cooking, and Downton Abbey! Zomg. Sundays are going to rock for a while!

Anywho, here is a quick recap of what I have been up to! First off we have coconut curry that was super tasty (recipe over here).

Then come the Swedish meatballs (recipe), homemade egg noodles (recipe), and lingonberry jam (from IKEA).


The imperial red IPA mentioned previously has finished fermenting and now all we are waiting on is for it to finish carbonating. I can't wait to taste the final product! So far it tastes like it might be my favorite beer we have ever made! Buuut, we also brewed some barleywine that is fermenting [like a beast!] at the moment. Check out all this hop sediment in the bottom of the red!


After Christmas, my boyfriend spent a day helping his BFF build a work bench so I decided to go on a fabric buying road trip! I visited Gone Quiltin' in Bandera, One Quilt Place in Fredericksburg, and Creations in Kerrville (all in Texas). They were all wonderful shops, but Creations felt like heaven!!! I spent over two hours there!!! I had not yet seen the incredible Frida Kahlo line and absolutely fell in love with it. I might have brought too much back with me, but it will get used.


I have also been working on some monochromatic EPP 8 point star blocks for a secret project.


I also made a chess pie following my great Aunt Cuba's recipe. This pie tastes like happiness and sunshine.


I have even made some progress on the houndstooth "quilt." I am using the " " because this is destined to upholster the cushion on my cedar chest. I am not too sure how to make the cover fit the cushion exactly but still be roomy enough to take off for washing. It will come to me!


Last night the boyfriend and I made some stir fry with lots of added veggies (recipe) and some insanely delicious coconut rice (recipe). This made for amazing leftovers today.


I also worked on a sample pattern for The Quilt Cottage. The owner and I are having a competition of sorts; We each picked the fabric for one version of the same quilt and are seeing which one came out best. I picked the fabric for this one because I do not believe Valentines Day should be confined to reds and pinks. If my BFF's new baby turns out to be a girl, I'm quilting this up for her.


Lynda picked the fabric for this one. I finished them both up today and will drop them off tomorrow. They both have their charm.


Lastly, I also finished a trivet for my boyfriend's BFF's wife. The fox is appliqued onto a dark tea-dyed muslin that makes me think of leather. The flying geese did not come out how I envisioned them, but that's okay; either she will like it, or she won't! :)

Winter Prep: Part 2

In between teaching and grading I have managed to fit in some much-needed sewing. The sewing has been much needed because the projects have had time constraints and for stress release since I have one student who is being a total jerkface. I won't talk about that because thinking about it makes me involuntarily grind my teeth. Instead I will focus on the sewing!

I finished the matching mustache tree potholders for my BFF and I. The piecing process was detailed over here. First off, here is the detail on the star. The thread is metallic so it sparkles a little!

Then there is a close-up shot of the mustache stitching. The photo is at such an extreme angle to show how poofy the mustaches came out! It looks like trapunto (which I have no idea how to do!). The accidental way I pulled this off was by using fusible web applique for the mustaches then by machine quilting around them but not on them. If you want the mustache templates I drew up, let me know and I can send them to you.


Finally we have an overall shot showing both of them. Mine is the one without the hanging tab.


Over the weekend my boyfriend and I were able to fit in some homebrewing! This is a batch of Imperial Red IPA. Yum! Now we just have to wait for it to be ready.


There was also some marathon cooking going on. First off we have these strawberry basil grilled cheese sandwiches which were delicious, though we doubled the basil to ensure we could taste it. The cheese was a little lost, so maybe stronger cheese next time. Recipe over here.


We also made some amazingly delicious caramelized garlic tart. Seriously, this was one of the most delicious quiche things I have ever tasted. It could totally use some veggies though, like spinach or asparagus. The recipe is from Martha Stewart but we didn't use puff pastry for the crust. Instead we used the olive oil pie crust recipe from Vegan Pie in the Sky, which you can find over here. Or you can just buy the book and learn the secret to my peach basil pie!


Oh my gosh, it is so gorgeous!

I broke all my rules and took on another commissioned t-shirt quilt. The only commissioned quilts I have ever done are t-shirt quilts, and the only t-shirt quilts I have made are commissioned quilts. Because of this, I don't know if I hate making t-shirt quilts or commissioned quilts. Anyways, here is the initial layout, which was too long and skinny.

So I added some sashing from leftover t-shirt bottoms to make it a little wider and came up with this for the front. Now I just need to quilt and bind it so that I can deliver it in time for it to be given as a Christmas present. 

On a happy albeit unrelated note, Finn, our betta is finally happy! We got him a heater and he loves it. Check out this incredible bubble net he made to show how happy he is! 

The last bit of marathon cooking was pork loin roasted with veggies and mustard gravy (recipe over here). Ooo, this turned out so tasty! Our piece of pork was smaller so it cooked up very quickly.


The last bit of holiday prep sewing I have been working has been really fun. For background information, my family is super nerdy and if you put us all in a room together, it is likely that we will start playing Dungeons & Dragons. Because of this, I have an assortment of dice, trinkets and pencils to locate and pack prior to any family function. I really wanted a small bag/pouch thing to hold it all in so it could be contained and more easily packed. While searching for an appropriate bag, I discovered that nearly all dice bags are drawstring which seems silly to me because dice and pencils can fall out the drawstring. So it dawned on me that I could just make a totally awesome zippered pouch!

I decided to use part of a t-shirt for one side (stay tuned because that is staying secret) and a super cool dragon for the other side! The dragon pattern is from the book Spellbinding Quilts which is full of incredible stuff (seriously, you need to get this book. It might as well be called "Harry Potter and LOTR Paper Pieced patterns). I shrunk it down because the original block size was huge. This resulted in so many teeny tiny bits that needed to be paper pieced. It took about 3 hours! Sheesh! Hopefully I can still finish this in time to play D&D for X-mas!

So this is what I came up with. I bought the green/gold fabric in Ketchikan, Alaska while on a cruise with my family. We totally played D&D on the cruise ship (which is not surprising since we have played D&D in Japan and Hawaii). The purple fabric that looks blue was leftover from a baby quilt. I promise it is purple. For some reason, my phone cannot photograph this fabric as purple. My boyfriend's phone can, but the picture wasn't as clear! The same thing happened when I used it in a baby girl quilt. Everyone kept giving me grief for using so much blue in a baby quilt, but it was purple in real life!!

I have the dragon sitting in front of me right now, and this is what the purple actually looks like. I promise! 

Anyways, hopefully I can finish everything that needs to be done in time for their respective deadlines. I am completely caught up on grading until I administer final exams and my students submit projects next week. Wow! I actually get a weekend!

Two Quilts: Done and Done!

Happy Fourth of July! Before I talk about quilts, let me share my holiday plans: My boyfriend and I are celebrating by brewing beer and making cheese. Yess! The feta is already draining, and the brewing will begin as soon as I finish this. [Must hurry!!] Here is the wad of feta draining in cheesecloth.

I finally finished two quilts that had been put on a back burner. They are a baby quilt and big sister quilt for the two kiddos of my friends, Jeff and Sonya. I had both of the tops finished a good while back, but was held up on the quilting because I couldn't find true white batting that I was happy with for the girl quilt. I could have used cream, but there is just so much white and it seemed better this way. I finally found some. Then I ran out of spray basting and no one in town stocked the kind I like. That was a huge ordeal.

But this week I found myself with everything needed to finish the quilts. So I finished them! Let's start with Ray's baby quilt. It is just a whole bunch of HSTs used to make a chevron/leaf sort of pattern. I usually try to make baby quilts bigger than normal baby quilts so they can be used for longer. This one is 49 by 56 inches. I love the way it came out. The picture doesn't show it, but those are not solids. I showed the fabric closer way back in this post.

I normally don't show off the backs of quilts, but I'm proud of these because the fabric for the backs came from my stash! I'm really trying to use up a lot of that. The colors look really off in this picture, because that incredibly dark stripe is actually a chocolatey brown, not black. Feel free to use your imagination.

Next we move on to Reese's (Theresa's) big sister quilt. I decided to make her a big sister quilt since she has been an only child for 5 years until Ray came along, and is doing a wonderful job of adjusting. Plus, I didn't know them when she was born, so she never got a baby quilt. Only my boyfriend and cousin (who introduced me to the happy family years ago) knew about this one! I used the Apple Crate pattern from Moda Bakeshop for this one, but used fewer block to made it smaller. The finished size is 56 by 64 inches.

Here is a photo of the back of her quilt. All of the fabric came out of my stash!

Since her favorite colors are pink and purple, I decided to use purple for the binding. Oh! Oh! The fabric for the binding for both of these quilts also came out of my stash! Woo! Stash busting!

Mmm, the colors in these two quilts really compliment each other. I just love the way they look all folded and stacked together.

I dropped off the quilts this morning. Baby Ray was asleep, but Sonya seems to think he will like it.  Reese loved her quilt and was already using it as a tent.

Am I the only one who makes quilts with the hope that they will be used as tents and blanket forts? I think the biggest compliment on a quilt is when you go to someone's house and the quilt that you gave them is showing signs of wear. I don't make quilts to sit unused and in perfect condition; I make them to get used!

Anyways, it is time for me to stop typing and to start brewing. In case you are wondering, we are making a clone of Jester King's Farmhouse Black Metal Imperial Stout. Here is a picture of the grain that was just added to the water to boil [in technical terms, this is call a mash].

I made the voile bag that the grain is in and it has held up through 3 batches of beer brewing, so far. If you are interested, I wrote about the bag itself over here.

EDIT: Just for funsies, I am going to include a picture of the beer, now that it is brewed and ready to ferment. In about two weeks, it will be ready to drink! Spweee!

WIP--1/22/13

**Warning!!** This post is absolutely random and covers so much random stuff including: quilting, gardening, homebrewing, teaching, mail, etc.

Lately, most of my time has been spent preparing for the upcoming semester that begins tomorrow. I am teaching five classes this semester: four astronomy labs, and one lecture/lab combo science teacher prep class. I have taught the astronomy labs for 3 years now (since I was in grad school teaching as a TA) so those are fairly easy for me to prepare for. The science education class is more difficult. I taught it last semester, but only knew I was teaching it 3 days before the semester started. Yuck. This time, I have much more time to prepare. I give you my completed syllabi (with contact info leaf-ed out)! Woohoo! 

I have also been able to fit in time to work on other things! Things like the amazing and hilarious hamburger potholder pattern. Cheese and patty are done. One bun just needs binding. One bun needs quilting and binding. Tomato, onion, lettuce, and pickles still need to be assembled. Clearly though, progress is being made! Woohoo!

I also had time to whip up a few wonky stars for a bee I'm in. One of our member is sick, so we are putting together a get well soon quilt for her.

Speaking of things that need to get well soon, my Brussels sprouts and broccoli have been infested with cabbage worms. I bought the stuff to treat it, then it started raining (which it NEVER does in South Texas) and I felt that it would be wasted effort to spray treatment in the rain. So when it finally stopped raining, this is what was left. So sad. All 6 plants look the same.

I sprayed the living daylights out of them all, and am hoping for the best. Worst case scenario, I rip them out and re-plant in the spring. No biggie. I also purchased some super fun heirloom seeds for the spring which I am very excited about.

I guess that is the therapeutic thing about gardening is that stuff dies. Sometimes it comes back (though usually not). Either way, you go on and try again or try something else. Eventually, it works out. Or doesn't, and that is okay.

I also finally finished potting everything on my front porch! So pretty!

Oh, yeah, back to crafting! February will be my month in Color Bee Shocked, and I have all of the fabric packing in envelopes and ready to mail. This photo shows the fabric selection.




























I also finished up a mini quilt kit and dcided to turn it into a pillow cover to sell on etsy. Available here, if you are interested. This is my first item on etsy, so I am pretty excited about it!! I really am not too fond of the fabric the kit came with (Moda Double Chocolate), but the pattern could easily translate into brighter, more modern fabric.

Ages and ages ago, I started working on a Twister quilt. If you remember from this post, I have a really hard time actually keeping quilts for myself, so it sat. As luck would have it, I believe I have found the perfect home for it! Bam! Incentive to start working on it again.

In case you have never made a twister quilt, you start by making a square patchwork quilt top like this:

Then you cut it up with a magic twister block template, and sew it back together. Once it is sewn back together, you get this incredible thing! Drastic improvement. Now that it has a purpose, I just need to baste, quilt and bind it. But I am going to hold off until they are closer to actually buying a house.

In news unrelated to quilting, I also packed up all of the leftover grain from brewing beer this past weekend. Yum! Well, yum to the beer. The grain is now for chickens. It came to about 12 quart sized bags. Chickens think this stuff is the most incredible thing on the planet. I am taking a bunch of it to my cousin, who will soon have 15 hens, and already has one rooster and a peacock. Luckily, every time beer is brewed, this magically appears in my freezer!

Finally, I am going to leave you with something super awesome! As you may or may not know, I collect postcards. [I also highly recommend Postcrossing if you, your child, your grandchild, or anyone you know would like to collect postcards.]

Anyways, a friend of mine recently went to South Africa for vacation, and I asked her to send me a postcard. Usually when I ask people to send one, they forget, so my expectations are not too high. Then today, the most INCREDIBLE postcard I have ever seen showed up in my mailbox! Ahhh!!! So exciting!!! She even went on a shark dive, which has always been my dream.

So, that is all of the random stuff I have been up to. How about you?