It’s been days since AC could chase his ball, days in which his blistered paw healed, a wound obtained by running on frozen pavement in cold temperatures as the field at the Snow Bowl is pretty much ruined for now. The ruts are deep and hard to negotiate when frozen or hidden under the snow.
So yesterday, I took AC to Barrett’s Cove to chase his ball in the parking lot—AND so I could spend some time outside in what was a warmer, sunny, beautiful day. We are all starting to smell spring in the air now. But spring does not bound in here in Maine; it crawls in, inch by inch.
AC was delirious with joy.
And you can see there is enough snow cover on the parking lot where AC would not be running on the pavement. Here’s a little video I took. Note that AC ”leads” the chuck-it throw. He almost took a walkabout into the deep snow on the grass—carrying his ball. If he dropped it over there, I’d have a hard time getting to it though the banked snow and then I’d have to negotiate the steep slope.
Today is very wet, but the air feels balmy. So far, I have hunkered down inside to do household tasks and to sew. AC is tolerating inactivity, though he asks to out for a run around the property off and on. The deer are very present today, and AC is sure it is his job to run them off.
The deer… They have broken into the protective burlap over a big rhododendron on the woods side of the house and eaten it back to some bare stems. They have been increasingly a problem in the past few years. I’m not sure why that is.
The roasted chicken is carrying me through today’s meals. Tomorrow I’ll plan on cooking something else that has carrying power.
First think yesterday, AC and I did the errands—after it warmed up just a bit. It was 6 degrees!!! here on the hill this morning.
On Fridays, I pick up my weekly dairy from Fresh Off the Farm.
But today I stopped by Hannaford’s first to get one of their organic chickens. I seem to be roasting a spatchcocked chicken fairly frequently this winter—about every 10 days or so.
On the way to FOTF, I stopped to fill up Girlie with gas—she was nearing the half-full mark. The bill was under $18, and I can’t remember the last time I topped her off. It’s been quite a while—several months at least. She is now plugged in so her battery will get filled up again. When I reviewed records during the tax process, I could see that since April 24th when I picked up Girlie (Toyota, Prime, Rav4 plug in hybrid), I have not yet spent $100 on gas. She plugs into a 110 volt outlet in the garage, and, no, I have not seen a big increase in my electrical bill. Plus, I got a $7,500 tax rebate on my fed taxes.
I had, on hand, a butternut squash from Hope’s Edge (local CSA) that also really need to be used. Roasted butternut squash cut into cubes and roasted is like eating candy—they are densely sweet and yummy.
And in short order, there was…food…for a Friday main-meal lunch…and for leftovers for supper, for Saturday, and probably Sunday lunch.
The wings and the drumsticks are my favorite pieces. I just gently boiled the Brussel sprouts, but when drained, I topped them with raw butter and some Penzey’s Sunny Paris.
For the butternut squash—which cooked alongside the chicken in a separate pan as the squash does not need as long a cooking time as the whole chicken (which using convection heat takes the chicken about 45 minutes). I check the chicken at about 35 minutes and baste with the pan juices.
***Roasting Butternut Squash***
Cut the squash in half lengthwise and seed it, then cut ”rings” of about 1 inch down the length of each half. Turn a ring on its side and slice off the peel. Cut each peeled ring into chunks and put these chunks on a baking pan covered with parchment paper for easy cleanup. (I have not used aluminum foil for cooking in about 20 years—it is toxic.)
Chop some garlic into fairly fine chunks and add to the squash. (Garlic falls into my category of ”there is no such thing as too much.”)
Herbs make this dish sing—and the best go-to herb for this dish is fresh rosemary. In the absence of fresh rosemary, use strong herbs or dried herb mixtures you like. Don’t use too much oregano though. It is the wrong taste for this dish; its strength would mask the sweet taste.
Sprinkle with salt—I like to use a little coarse ground sea salt. Go easy on coarse salt. And drizzle with a good olive oil. I use a spatula to mix all the ingredients.
Pop into the oven (350) and keep an eye out, especially if convection is used. When the cubes are sizzling and starting to caramelize, take the pan out. You can always pop it back into the oven for a few minutes to reheat if you need to. It usually takes about 30-35 minutes in my oven. Watch, as you don’t want the cubes to get too soft—so a higher heat and shorter cooking time works best. The convection makes the heat higher—so if you don’t have it, maybe roast without the chicken at about 400???
Cutting Up My Cotton+Steel/Ruby Star Society Stash
This fabric category in my stash needs to be USED. These fabrics WANT to be used. Over the years, I’ve made so many quilts using these beloved fabrics, but now I want to whittle them down and meld what is left into my regular stash.
So, I’ve been on a winter journey to take on this challenge, and I’m cutting deeply into this stash driven by the task of making a series of baby quilts for family members now having babies.
Here’s what my quilt room looks like right now as this BIG task takes place. I’ve set aside fabrics I can use for fussy-cut centers for the Churn Dash blocks I’m making (“Eye Candy” series) and bigger pieces that will be used in sashings, backings, and bindings.
The front of the longarm has mostly low-volume prints ironed and ready to cut.
But there are other low-volume fabrics in this bin below. The pink/salmon prints are going to go into another of the scrappy lap quilts I’ve making from 3 1/2-inch blocks. It will want to go to a girl (“Pot-Pourri 3”). There are three big fabric pieces in this bin and a stack of grey and cream/black prints. This bin used to be so full that I could hardly close the lid. Success!
The darker colors are on the longarm table—and you can see some of the colors have been seriously whittled down. More success!
This table below holds strips that will go into scrappy Churn Dash blocks (“Eye Candy” series)—and when I have leftovers from that process, I’ll cut those remnants into smaller squares. As I cut into the stash, I always cut some strips for this project table. Likely, there will be something made from 2 1/2-inch squares at some point. There are also 2-inch and 1 1/2-inch blocks happening.
I’ve posted already a modern quilt (“Whirlygigs”) that went to a new baby girl. And there was a recent post showing one of the scrappy lap-sized quilts (“Pot-Pourri”) and one of the Churn Dash quilts (“Eye Candy”) that landed in their forever homes.
This scrappy quilt (made of 9-patch blocks), ”Pot-Pourri 2,” is ready to be sewn into rows:
And then I’ll piece a backing and organize binding. This quilt will go with a Churn Dash quilt (“Eye Candy 2”) where the binding is almost done now. Here is a sneak peek of one of those blocks:
Meanwhile, LOL, I’m months behind on The Color Collective projects. But they aren’t going anywhere, and there is something really satisfying about heavily using these Cotton+Steel/Ruby Star fabrics all together rather than just folding them into the stash.
And…
Like many quilters working during the conditions of the virus, something sparked inside me that thought it was time to work with what I had on hand rather than buying more fabric. There are the monthly solid fabrics coming in for The Color Collective however… But there are projects designed for those, and I will get to them eventually. Meanwhile the big stash is NOT growing.
I woke to snow this morning—more than the scant 1-inch predicted and with very heavy snow fall happening. Snow was up to AC’s belly when he went out for his morning call of nature. I cancelled my scheduled much-needed haircut, but that will happen Saturday.
I have a fair amount of accumulated snow on the back deck now. But now the sun is out and the plow/shovel crew have come and gone. It’s good that AC and I had a long walk yesterday since I don’t like to walk him over wet roads that have a lot of salt on them. He’ll be on his own today for running outside on this property, though maybe we will take a ride in the car later.
BUT, back to this post, which also got highjacked by the snow—and I’m NOT complaining as I love snow.
***
AC doggie can’t do regular type dog treats as he is allergic.
He loves those hard-as-bricks yak-milk cheese chews that originated in Nepal. He gets about one a week, and it takes him a few days to devour one with off-and-on chewing sessions. When he gets one down to a nub of which I think he might choke, I throw that part away.
I found these sweet potato products about 6 months ago, and AC loves them.
The ”chews” are slabs of dried sweet potato that require him to do some heavy chewing—which helps clean his teeth. The “bones” are softer. He loves both versions. He gets a bone at night after his last trip outside, where he takes care of business and comes right back as he knows his treat will follow.
I order the sweet potato products directly from Gaines, and they have free and prompt shipping. I get the yak-milk bones from the Thrive online market where I have an account, but they are sometimes carried at our local Loyal Biscuit store.
I didn’t think when I wrote about AC’s new toys that the softer toy, an elephant, would be the longer survivor. But Elephant goes everywhere with him between floors, carried gently in his mouth. Elephant’s ears have some sort of crackly plastic that makes a sound that apparently pleases AC to no end. Elephant’s last leg is dangling by a thread, and his squeaker came out yesterday, but Elephant is clearly a hit. The stronger-made Frog didn’t survive the breach of his seams at all. The leathery chew toy is also going strong and is a favorite.
Members of my very first quilting “bee” from back in Virginia are on their annual winter retreat this week. They “adopted” me when I was a new quilter (1999) and taught me what I needed to know to have accurate blocks, for one thing. Our local Falls Church quilt group (part of the state guild) was large enough that members were placed into “bees” made up of smaller numbers, which did work to facilitate getting to know other quilters faster. My bee often met together outside the monthly big-group meeting.
These women invited me to go with them on their annual summer retreat in 2003, and I made my first grandchild quilt that week. I’ve kept an archive of all my quilts: this quilt was my 20th. I took a picture of the picture in my archive. That sweet creature is Miss Reynolds Georgia, my beloved rat terrier who lived to be about 16.
For many years after we moved to Maine, I flew back to be with these dear friends during their winter retreat week. And two visited me in Maine one summer shortly after we moved—and were able to attend the annual Rockland Lobster Festival, have a ride on a local windjammer that sailed out of our Camden harbor, and sight-see daily.
Back then, this small group (never more than about 5) would go on week-long retreats twice a year. Rosie Pilkerton has a timeshare that she would get for us in Williamsburg, and the winter trip was timed around the big Mancuso quilt show that is now held in the Norfolk area’s Convention center, having had to move years ago when the show got so big that it needed more space than that provided from many separate buildings in the Williamsburg area. What a treat those weeks of dedicated quilting time were.
I face-timed with my friends yesterday, and what fun it was to see their faces, to hear how they are and what they are sewing this week. It was a trip down memory lane, for sure. I asked them to share some of their quilt pictures, so I could share them with you. Rosie sent me several of what she called her ”covid quilts,” along with this picture of what she will work on at least some of this week—a pineapple block made with 1930s reproduction fabrics:
Rosie LOVES whimsical novelty fabrics, and especially those that reproduce 1950s-type images. You can look for those two loves of hers in the following pictures.
Paper dolls…
And a truly fun quilt:
I’ve never met a log cabin block I didn’t like, Rosie. How fun and colorful is this project.
It is fun to see the work of people who live in a different region than I do.
And Rosie has been quilting seriously longer than I have!!
FREE Border Creek Station Stash-Buster Challenge 2022
Friend Betsy Maislen sent me this link to an interesting FREE ”Stash-Buster Challenge” that uses 10-inch blocks.
It is intriguing…
Though I already have too many ongoing projects, I can see myself starting to make some of these fun blocks here and there. I always get enthralled with pulling fabrics for a scrappy block.
Here are a few Betsy has made—the pattern includes various layouts for these blocks. Sashing with corner stones—all in one color—form an interesting secondary pattern as well. I like the idea of a thin sashing in neutrals. The block centers and corner stones should likely be the same fabric. And you can see how the sashing with the red cornerstone would make a 9-patch that floats across the quilt.
I personally like the ”on point” settings—as I really like to see x’s in quilt blocks.
AC’s current crop of toys has long been reduced to shreds of their former selves.
Thursday when AC and I ran the errands, I stopped by our local Loyal Biscuit to replace his puppy harness as he had chewed the front strap into two pieces when he was a puppy. The strap has been held in place by duck tape for the past 2 1/2 years. It was time for a nice adult harness, since his chewing of inappropriate things seems to have stopped. He will be 4 next month.
I got the harness ok—a really nice one. But I also came home with the three toys you can see leaning against the green bed. The two flat toys (each with two squeakers) were left over from a package of five over a year ago. I hesitate to give him toys with squeakers as I need to be around to retrieve them when he gets them out of a toy.
The green frog is made of a really tough material, stronger looking than a heavy canvas. The tan ”bone” is meant to be chewed. And the elephant has some sort of plastic in the ears that crinkles. I assumed all of the toys would be dismantled in due order.
I set them up while AC was outside and let him in to see them.
It is clear that I am easily amused. He had all but one of the squeakers out while I ate lunch. I think there were 6 or 7 in all.
It is now Saturday, and we had a lovely snow day all day yesterday. I completely quilted and trimmed one of the baby quilts yesterday, and in a bit now I’ll go put on the binding and label. AC hung with me on his bed in the quilt room yesterday, but played with his toys when we went upstairs for lunch.
I think he loves the green frog the best. He carries it everywhere I go—up and down the steps as I move around the house. AC has some sort of rule that if he travels the stairs (up or down), he needs to bring a toy with him. That’s hound behavior I think. Or, retriever of some sort. Terriers don’t really carry things in their mouths all that much.
By yesterday, the toys showed his intense interest. As fast as I pick them up, he drags them out of his play bucket and puts them at my feet. I think his goal is to entice me to enjoy the toys with him—which does happen with his balls.
Uh oh! He breached Frog’s seams.
I’m eating lunch late today, Saturday, as I went out to retrieve my weekly raw cream and some kale for soup. I made the broth this morning—using the package of frozen chicken bones I defrosted over night and the fresh bones from the leg of lamb I cooked Wednesday. I’ve never mixed up bones—but the soup broth is really lovely.
As usual, I packed the developing soup with lots of veggies, and I added 4 chicken thighs as well. The kale almost didn’t fit, so I had to add it a little bit at a time when the liquid level dropped a bit while the veggies cooked. Finally all the kale melted down into the soup pot.
And here is my beautiful bowl of lunch-time soup—with the meat taken off one of the thighs that cooked in the pot.
While I ate, AC played with his toys. Elephant lost a leg, but the ears still crackle. And Frog’s seams have been breached further, and the squeaker removed. I used to restuff toy bodies and sew up the seams, but no more. It’s a total waste of time.
And now AC is taking a little rest in his bed. He was asleep until I walked over there with the camera. If I move, he knows it.
He’s rested now, and is ready ”to go” again. It’s time for me to pull off some of the soup for my dinner and to store the rest in the refrigerator. And to clean up the kitchen and make a cup of coffee to take to the quilt room—after AC and I take out the compost bin to the containers back of the garage.
Slowdown Farmstead, on Substack, has some lovely, lovely writing. Tara’s farm is in Canada, somewhere near Ottawa. Her post this morning was all about making and storing bone broths—a task she does in the summer and where she makes enough for the whole year. I learned two really interesting pieces of information I didn’t know: don’t make the broth in a stainless steel pot because it will leak a little of the metal, which can be toxic if you get too much over time, AND use glass bottle containers with NO SHOULDERS as they can and do break in the freezer—something I’ve had happen many times now. She mentioned a brand name of jars she has found work well.
My friend came for a visit, bringing Tucker doggie with her.
It was his second visit here.
He was still wary of this new situation, as a tiny, delicate doggie should be, especially when faced with a bigger dog.
Tucker is VERY vocal, as his owner demonstrates.
The other day, LIz and I walked a local, quiet street, and the two dogs recognized each other and went trotting happily along, both enjoying the outing. AC had a doggie grin the whole time.
Today it is snowing and will snow all day. I’m going to enjoy this gift of a snow day.
One of the baby quilts is on the longarm—so that is the task for today.
As you know I’ve been making baby quilts. Maybe I should say I’m making quilts for children.
I mailed these two quilts to my niece in Wyoming last week—for the new baby, but with the added notion that her existing three children might like to adopt these quilts first and that that was fine by me. They are meant to be used and loved. Niece Lucy has three children (a girl and two boys) and is expecting a boy in July.
The Churn Dash block quilt ”Eye Candy” is smaller—and is probably too small for these children to use. But ”Pot-Pourri,” it’s lap size.
The fabrics are all Cotton+Steel/Ruby Star Society from my stash. And I pieced the back from that stash as well.
I used the ”Check and Chase” pantograph by Lorien Quilting with a ”parchment” colored thread.
For ”Eye Candy” I fussy cut the block centers and used the ”Check and Chase” pantograph with a soft grey thread.
I had such fun choosing the block centers.
And, again, I pieced the back.
Lucy sent me this picture when the box arrived. My grand-niece Willa was present and liked ”Pot-Pourri.”
Soon, this picture followed.
Can I just tell you how happy I am to see this precious child love a quilt?
Now, of course, I have to keep an eye out for quilts for the two boys. After the current crop of needed baby quilts are made and mailed.
”Pot-Pourri 2” is on the design wall and ”Eye Candy 2” will go on the longarm today.
And I saw a pattern this morning that would work well for at least one of Lucy’s boys.
Louisa Enright's Blog 