Hearts Full of Joy

nancy's quilt

i wanted to make a fun, cheerful quilt to be a comfort to nancy during her chemo, surgery, radiation, etc.  i made one for my mom 6.5 years ago when she was fighting breast cancer too. my mom's was intricately pieced to form a pattern of hearts.

for nancy i chose an eclectic assortment of bright novelty prints (featuring two of my loves, asian and vintage - i love to mix the two) from our shop and my own fabric stash, cut large squares and pieced them together. i wanted simple quilting that added some curve and flow to angular squares. i'm happy with how this quilting turned out and how quickly it was done. i quilted during the byu/utah football game, which i wasn't as happy about - good thing the quilt meant more to me than the score of the game!

oh! there's my toe! didn't notice that until it uploaded...funny!

it's harder to choose fabrics that look good together, while making them look random, than it seems. i love the process though, and i adore working with gorgeous and interesting fabric.

one thing i should have done differently is adding another row to the length - i didn't think about the fact that she is 6 feet tall until it was quilted, but designed it for a person about my height - 7 inches shorter!

i also sent nancy a jar of red clover flowers that i picked and dried this summer. they make a tea that is supposed to work wonders on cancer.

 

well, of course i can...

i love to can. and i'll tell you why.

canning has always been a way to save money, be thrifty, and a way to prevent waste - preserving garden produce that would other wise spoil before it was eaten - or, in other words, provident living. and i do love provident living. it seems to be in my genes.

today there are even more reasons to can, at least as i look at it. when i can, i have control over what goes into the jar - so there is no msg, no high fructose corn syrup, no articficial colorings or flavorings, no chemical preservatives. and i control the salt and the sugar content. i love that. and i am generally using my own home grown, organic, non gmo produce - hooray!

there is also a great deal of satisfaction that comes from making a dinner mostly from things i have canned myself - chicken, black beans, salsa for example. and a happy feeling when my kids prefer my applesauce over store-bought, and when they get excited about helping me with the process.

finally, it is a way of making cooking last. i like to do things that last, which is one of the reasons i love to cook and sew. i tend to not feel that way about making a birthday cake, or even a wonderful dinner. i work and work, and then it is eaten and gone. but with canning, i can see the rows of shiney jars on the shelves, and i know it will last...at least longer than tonight's dinner.

....oh, and i almost for got one of the most important reasons - it tastes better than store bought - delicious yumminess!

a sampling of this summer's canning:

roasted tomato sauce, dill pickles, pickled beets, french cut green beans, pickled banana peppers, and mandarin (or sweet & sour) sauce.

 

i hoped for bumper crops of green beans and tomatoes this summer, and we got them (to be honest, i prayed, and my prayers were answered). we followed the expert gardener in our neighborhood's advice, and never watered our garden once, even though it was hot and dry - not raining for a month and a half. he was right - it gave us an amazing tomato crop. i never imagined i could fill as many jars as i have. i've lost count, but it's much more than 100.

this summer i've canned (asterisk means it's a first time for me to can it):

strawberry jam

dill pickles

*japlepeno jelly - we usually make crabapple jalepeno jelly, which we like even more, but we had huge amounts of jalepenos that were going to go bad, and our crab apples won't ripen until next month.

green beans - 46 quarts, all french cut

beets & pickled beets

tomatoes

*tomato juice with 5 vegetables (V5 juice)

*roasted tomato salsa

*roasted tomato sauce - base for pasta sauce and tomato soup

*sweet & dill pickle relish

*mandarin (sweet & sour) sauce - 21 quartes!

*pickled banana & jalepeno peppers

 

and i'm looking forward to canning:

green tomato salsa

green enchilada sauce

green tomato ketchup (?)

green toamto chutney (?)

apple juice

applesauce

 

last fall i looked for ways to use the huge amount of green tomatoes that we had, and now green tomato salsa is our family's favorite salsa we've ever had. it's amazing what you can find on the internet. the friend who recommended the sweet & sour (thank you!) also gave me the green enchilada sauce. i will report. and i am interested in green tomato ketchup and chutney recipes that i've found.

my two absolute favorite new canning recipes from this year are:

1 - roasted tomato sauce - lexi found this and recommened it. i can't say enough good about it - our house smells like an italian restaurant while it roasts with the balsamic vinegar, olive oil, and garlic. here's a link:

http://goddesshobbies.blogspot.com/2009/08/preserving-food-roasted-tomato-sauce.html

(i love this girl's blog!)

2 - mandarin (or sweet & sour) sauce. a friend recommended this, and i am in love. i've made three batches for a total of 21 quarts. and each time i've made a batch, it perfectly filled 7 quart jars (the numer of jars that fill a canner). that never happens. it's the perfect recipe. here's a link:

http://idahofergusonfamily.blogspot.com/2010/09/sweet-and-sour-sauce-for-canning.html

 

i'm also enjoying this one, because we have a bumper crop of banana peppers. it is a little too sweet for me, next batch i make i will cut the sugar at least in half. but it is easy and fun (and very pretty). i added a few jalepenos into each jar i made. it's a very small recipe. i tripled it and filled 6 pint jars:

http://www.food.com/recipe/sweet-pickled-banana-peppers-17254

 

if you have favorite canning recipes, i'd love for you to share!

 

 

 

cleaning green

three of most favorite things to discover are ways to simplify my life, ways to save money, and ways to improve my family's health. and when i discover one thing that helps me do all three at once, it is something i just need to share. so, here are some great links with helpful hints about cleaning your entire house and solving household problems with nothing more than  vinegar and baking soda. both are inexpensive (much less expensive than icky chemical cleaning products), both are healthy (unlike the nasty chemicals in most cleaners), and they are very simple to keep stocked.

clean your entire home with baking soda & vinegar, from mother earth news

8 household uses for vinegar, from circle of moms

10 more household uses for vinegar, from circle of  moms

mother earth news points out that you should check the label on tehe vinegar you buy to be sure it's made from natural products (grain, wine, etc), rather than petroleum (yides! i didn't know that was possible!)

i'm excited to get scrubbing!

 

 

 

a cat in the hat dress for my little one

gracie & i had a blast creating this dress for her to wear to preschool! mia & noah even joined in the design process. we used fabrics from the "Dr.Seuss" collections by robert kaufman fabrics, that we carry in our shop here.

we planned on "Thing 1 & Thing 2" fabric for the sleeves, which i would have liked better, but i forgot when i was cutting....and didn't remember until they were sewn and serged in place.

i used "Little Girl's, Big Style" again, tweaking a pattern. i am just loving this book, and want grace to slow down in her growing so i can keep using indefinitely:

amazon.com suggested this book for me (thank you amazon!), and it is such a bargain. with free shipping, it costs about what one or two patterns would cost, but is full of patterns that can be made so many different ways and combined for even more looks - just wish there were some fun boy patterns too.

the dress turned out fuller than i expected. if i use this pattern again (i'm sure it will), i will take out some of the width.

 

 

 

dear cancer

Dear Cancer,

We have met 3 times before, and have lost 2 beloved family members to you.

But we do not fear you.

You cannot take anything that God doesn't want taken.

You can create positive change that God does want in our lives, if we allow it.

We are better because of our unwanted experiences with you.

We pray that this outcome will be like the one we have had with you, and not the other two.

We put all in God's hands and trust Him far above any power you have over us.

Sincerely,

Our Family

 

...my facebook status from August 23rd.

a bump in the road

what a week this has been! tashi flew to utah to start her new life at BYU (very emotional for us all to let her go, and sad to see how hard it was for the little ones), and as my mom picked her up at the airport, she called and told us that my brother's wife was waiting for a breast cancer biopsy result. this was almost eerie, because last year on the same day, my dad found a lump under his arm, and i got the call that he had cancer just as i was dropping lexi at her college dorm for the first time. both diagnoses, last year and this year, happened at my mother's birthday, which has been very difficult for her.

also this week, our littlest started pre-K, and brock started a doctorate program several states away. he traveled there this week for one round of classes, and he will travel there 2 more times this semester. he was accepted to teh program in may, but we have been waiting for news of a fellowship to determine if we was going to do it or not. he left on wednesday, still not sure of the fellowship, but it has come through. we also had visits from lexi & bear, on their was back to SVU (southern virginia) after their summer in california, and brock's parents. and our garden is producing faster than we can keep up with it, so there has been lots and lots, and lots, of canning, which i love, but we're tired - emotionally, physically, and mentally.

there has been roller coaster news about my sweet sister in law, but things are looking better than at first. my brother has started a blog to follow their journey:

A Bump in the Road

 

my sister lost her husband to bone cancer when he was only 25, my mother survived breast cancer 7 years ago, my father died of neuro-endocrine cancer in april, and so this is our family's fourth time around. we are very hopeful and i do strongly believe there will be a positive outcome.

buster the adoption kitty

buster (or bustard), our adoption kitty, is alive and doing very well. we thought his growth would be permanantly stunted, and that he would forever be a small cat, but he is catching up with the older kittens, and looks like he will be a huge tom cat.his head and paws are already larger than theirs. he is planning to travel to virginia with lexi and bear when they come through on their way back from california.  you can read buster's story here.

here is gigi (the wonder cat), feeding him in the box she would take him to alone, so that he could get a chance to eat without competition fromt eh bigger kittens.

and here he is with the other kittens.

cahokia indian mounds

cahokia indian mounds is a fascinating and little known world heritage site in illinois. other world heritage sites include the great wall of china and the pyramids in giza. we've been planning to go for 3 years, and have driven past it several times, but never made it a destination until a few weeks ago.

it was fascinating, and well worth braving the record-breaking heat wave that most of the central and eastern us was experiencing to explore. the photo above shows the largest mound, which has a foot print that is larger than the largest pyramids. there was once a huge, thriving, well-developed culture that built huge earthen structures here in north america. cahokia is just across the mississippi river (to the east) from st louis, missouri, near collinsville, illinois.

it was a much more strenuous climb to the top of monks mound than our kids make it look in this photo, especially in the extreme heat.

you can see the st. louis skyline, incuding the arch, in the distance from the top of monks mound.  but now that i've uploaded the photo, I'm not seeing the arch...., it's there, i promise!

we forgot to get a photo of one of the most interesting remains at this site, a giant lunar calendar that has been named "woodhenge". it wasn't discovered until excavation for a freeway project in the 60's. it is a huge circle of giant wooden tree poles that line up with the solstices and equinoxes. this trip has opened us up to the little-known, and even at least somewhat covered up, cultures in ancient north america. it is becoming quite a controversial topic, but there is quite a bit of evidence coming to light that there may have been a purposeful mid 1800s governemnt "cover-up" of the artifacts and evidences of how highly developed the ancient peoples here had once been, because it didn't fit in with the plans for american expansion and domination of the native peoples. john wesley powell figures prominently in this supposed cover-up. i can't say for certain if it is true, but it is interesting.

grandma & grandpa came with us, and seemed to enjoy the day as much as we did.

we finished up at the st louis arch, and finally made the trip to the top. (here are the kids at the base of the arch.)

view of downtown st. louis from teh top of the arch.

the "pettiskirt" lesson

over a year ago, i found this fun pattern & kit on etsy, and thought it would be a delight to make for my little one's 3rd birthday. well, it wasn't finished until after her 4th birthday. and i'll admit that this situation (finishing projects much later than anticipated) happens frequently at our house, this case was special. i could never have imagined the hours and hours i would spend gathering layers and layers of fluffy fabric. i lost track, but i would guess at least 15, maybe more. and i'm not a novice seamstress....and this is is "short" version, with only one layer of ruffles.

it wasn't worth it.

it goes against my grain to say it, but if you are tempted by the fluffy and feminie offerings in this lovely shop, go ahead and buy the lovely ones they have already made for you.

i love to sew, and i didn't love this. at all.

it is a cute result, but not worth the effort. i got much faster and smarter as i sewed, and sewed, but it wasn't smarter or faster enough. i can hardly even stand to see her wear it. she does love it though, and loves me for it. but she would love it if i had bought it too :)

the simple life

doing domestic, thrifty, and down-to-earth things makes me really happy. and i'm glad it does. i recently had a sweet elderly lady in our neighborhood bring me a lovely antique dresden plate quilt to mend so she could give to her grandaughter. it was a simple fix, and although i didn't really have the time, i was happy to do it for her. then she said something that rubbed me a little wrong, "i come form a long line of southern women who would just as soon have someone else do it for them, so i'm having you do it for me". it almost made choose not to do it. but as i thought about it, i felt gratitude that i come from a different line of women...the "i can do it, or at least i'll give it my best try" type of women. i treasure that heritage, because even though it isn't the easiest way of life, it is satisfying.

this summer, for the first time, we have been harvesting and drying our own herbs. after drying, we vacuum seal them in canning jars - i love this new discovery, vacuum sealing in jars - we can preserve so many things this way - chocolate chips, rasins, nuts, grains, even granulated things, like salt, -and they last for 20 years or more. the photos above shows kale (green leaves), calenduala (orange, similar to marigolds), and echinaccea (pink cone flowers). red clover flowers and japanese shiso are in the jars. i hope to use them to make healthy herbal tea and other fun concotions. shiso is also wonderful sprinkled on rice - furikake, as the japanese call it.

i also really love hanging my laundry to dry. i love feeling the sun shine down and the breeze blow on my and my alundry as i hang it, and the wonderful feeling of saving electricity, and lengthening the life of our clothes. i even enjoy color coordinating the laundry as i hang it....making lovely color patterns and combinations - when i have time. it must be the quilter in me.