behold the cold!

I've picked out my next quilt project and the cutting has begun!  I'm making a slightly more modern version of this quilt:

I'm leaving out the heavy border frame and using light, happy colors:  pure white and Kona Cotton Curry, my favorite mustard tone.

I love walking into my office and seeing a big pile of it at my cutting station!

The design is made up of 2.5" squares bordered by flying geese and tiny solid blocks.  Put together, each star block is only 4.5".  I've learned that I do NOT enjoy making flying geese, but I'm hoping that I'll be able to stay the course on this one.  I want it to be bed sized, so I've got a lot of stars to make!

I also reverse-engineered a quilt design.  It's called Round and Round and I'm quite proud of myself, because math is not my forte and I've always been a faithful follower of patterns, not an improviser.  These 18.5" blocks are a somewhat confusing composition of half square triangles and solid blocks.  I  eyeballed the quilt online and sketched it out on paper...

...and then made a rough mock-up with some hated fabrics.  That's why I keep these guys around!  It was really tedious, but the block sizes are big, so you wouldn't have to make very many.  This is definitely a future project.

And boy, do I have the fabric for it!  Most fabric is limited edition, with a one-year run.  I try to buy on sale (I'm a sucker for the Fat Quarter Shop's Daily Flash Sale), but if I see something that I love, I splurge.  Since I seem to prefer scrappy projects, these varying sizes, colors, and styles will really come in handy!  And this doesn't include the 2.5" mini charm squares that I'm hoarding!

Quilting aside, I've started a small knitting project.  Any knitting, even Portuguese, has been incredibly painful, so I've continued to seek out different methods.  I think I've finally found an English/throwing style that works for me, although I'm still struggling with tension.  I'm doing a simple stockinette stitch cowl to work out the kinks.

I'm also outside as much as possible!

Even though the groundhog says that we'll have six more weeks of winter...

...it's rapidly warming here in the South.  It's going to be 65 by the end of the week!  So we hike, hike, hike.  It's wonderful to be out in the fresh air, seeing the wildlife...

...and enjoying little pops of beauty wherever we look.

Sometimes we see the remnants of little dramas that have played out in the night.

The chilly walks are invigorating, and then we can cuddle up in our quilts!

Long live winter! 

Our November Color Wheel

I love the colors of autumn in the South.  You've got your traditional reds, browns, yellows, and oranges...

But you also have unexpected splashes of pink, white, and green.  The camellias are just starting to bud out, and what beauties we have this year!

Lovely creamy orange ginger lilies are still holding up their heads...

...and we've got more nice spheres of white all around our front door.

The fir trees are setting up their cones, which are light green, all over the yard.

We even have a few late-season zinnias still producing!

Somehow these odd blends of colors go together well and produce a very pleasing appearance in our late November yard.  And those branches of yellow leaves on our driveway?  I picked them all up, of course, and made big bouquets.

It's especially nice when the late-afternoon sun comes slanting in the windows...

Love!

I haven't had much time for crafting lately.  This is my busy season and I'm generally working 9 hour days (or longer) on my business.  However, I gave myself a day off this weekend and made a quick and festive plaid pillow in about 30 minutes. 

I will post a tutorial later.  I'll be making plenty more of these!

I've also been baking like crazy!  In preparation for Thanksgiving, and some extra for Todd's office, I baked about 7 batches of cookies, 2 loaves of pumpkin bread, and a plate of cheesecake bars in the past week alone.  Our freezer is fairly bursting!  I haven't had any myself, though...not one single bite.  I'm not there yet, but I'm officially nearing the end of my "six weeks of no sugar" plan, and I'm ready to wax philosophical about it. 

I've always been crazy about sugar.  I love to bake, and sweet treats are my favorite.  I crave sugar all the time, and in the past have tried to limit my consumption to a few servings a week, although that tended to grow when I was cranky, tired, busy, or stressed.   I noticed that I gained weight this past spring and early summer, and I knew there was a direct correlation between the amount of sugar I was eating and the number on the scale.  I have always been too afraid to limit my sugar - what else is left?  What about my baking? It's just too hard!  I'm fond of saying, too, that I don't want to live in a world where I couldn't have a cupcake when I wanted one.  Six weeks, though, seemed manageable. 

I stopped eating all sweets - cupcakes, ice cream, candy, pie, cookies, bars, syrups, etc.  I allowed myself 1 TB of honey a day and WHATEVER ELSE I WANTED THAT WASN'T SUGAR.  I had tried to be relatively low-carb before, but now I embraced them.  Oatmeal every day!  An occasional sandwich...with bread!  Roasted potatoes!  I didn't really miss the sugar because I so enjoyed my meals.  I had other pleasant side effects to help me along:  I suddenly started having higher-quality sleep.  No more waking up at 3 a.m. and reading for an hour - I slept all the way through the night.  I had more energy and felt better.  A weird but definitely welcomed side effect was weight loss.  Sugar triggers me to eat a lot, so take out the trigger, and my eating naturally moderated.  I lost 8 pounds in 5 weeks, doing nothing different except removing sugar from the equation.  I bounced back up a couple of pounds recently, but I realized that my desire to eat has become so quiet, and I've been so swamped with work, that I've been forgetting to eat like I should.  Not eating enough + regular vigorous exercise = weight gain.  I'm happily eating an extra 200 calories today!

With all of these wonderful discoveries, will I ever go back to sugar?  Oh, yeah!  My six weeks are up on Thanksgiving and I plan on having several cookies and a big piece of pie.  But I won't stay on sugar.  I've decided to live one week on sugar/three weeks off sugar every month.  I'll have a few days a month when I can get an ice cream cone, have a brownie, and make a big cookie sandwich dripping with homemade buttercream filling.  I'll have a week where I won't sleep as well, won't feel as well, and won't perform as well at the gym.  Then I'll have three weeks where I will.  I think it's a nice, tidy ratio and I look forward to putting it into place after my Thanksgiving week!

Happy eating!

I'm Lichen This

Ever since the weather's improved, Todd and I have been thinking about finding a new place to hike.  We miss Eagle Creek in Indianapolis...it was a huge, beautiful park with many different trails, and we never got tired of hiking there.  Unfortunately, there are only 2 parks within 30 minutes of our new house, and they're both small and sedate.  Driving an hour will take us to the Blue Ridge Mountains, though.  We found an interesting trail called the Foothill Trail that begins in Oconee State Park.  We decided to give it a try.

Once we reached the park and started hiking, I was surprised at the lack of vegetation.  At this time of year, I was expecting some early woodland flora, but the trail mainly held remnants of last year.

Dried leaves...

Dried grasses...

...and old pine cones.

It was a nice walk, though. 

 We saw many different types of trees and observed the interesting barks...

The path was leaf-covered, but under the leaves we saw lots of small, flat stones.

We took a closer look.  The stones were sparkly and reminded us a bit of mica.

There was some green.  These plants were sprouting up everywhere, en masse.  They reminded me of wild ginger but weren't quite the same. 

Ferns were growing...

A few branches were leafing out...

Small starts of trees were showing, too.

But my very favorite discovery?  Large patches of moss and lichen.  Now, although they may seem like the same thing, they're very different.  Lichen is a fungus, while moss is a plant.  They're both beautiful in their own way, of course. 

I used to think that moss was green and lichen wasn't, but of course there are many varieties of green lichen, like this fruticose lichen:

This shag moss is a nice shade of green...and reminds me of shag carpet!

 I love when moss sends up stalks.  Their tips contain spores, which help the moss spread more easily.  They look like tiny alien landscapes, I think.

Lichen spikes too.  When I saw these pale grey lichen spikes, I named them "corpse fingers".  Now, I know I'm addicted to The Walking Dead, but looking at them, doesn't the name seem appropriate?

I did some research, though, and found out that they have an even cooler name than "corpse fingers":  Lipstick Powderhorn.  When I moved on to the next patch of lichen and saw a more mature group, I saw why.

The ends of the stalks look like they've sprouted big, red lips.  So cool!!!

Since the weather's been turning warmer, I've changed my baking a bit to be more season-appropriate.  What says spring like lemons?  I bought a bag of lemons at the grocery store and decided to make lemon curd...especially since I found a microwave version.  Now, I'm not a baking snob and I'm all for workable shortcuts.  I've been making my pudding in the microwave for years.  Last year, when I was gnashing my teeth over a coconut cream custard that would not gel on the stove top, it was a virtual lightning bolt to discover that I could skip the stove top and go straight to the microwave.  It gelled instantly, of course.  Even with this knowledge, I've never thought about making microwave curd.  I was skeptical when I found the recipe.  But...it worked! 

Microwave Lemon Curd
modified slightly from allrecipes.com

3/4 cup of lemon juice
1 tablespoon lemon zest (from about 3 lemons)
3/4 cup sugar
3 egg yolks
1/2 cup butter, melted

Directions
Whisk the sugar and the eggs together, and then stir the rest in.  Microwave in one-minute intervals, stirring after each, until mixture thickens slightly.

Now, some people reported that their mixture thickened after two minutes.  It took about 8 intervals before I noticed a slight thickening, and I was sure the curd was ruined.  I decided to go ahead and refrigerate it, though, just in case.  Miraculously, the curd firmed up nicely.

I baked a quick, 'rustic' batch of scones...

...and made the best, brightest snack I've had in a long time.  It was amazing...I 'curd' you not!  (Too far?)

It is absolutely delicious and so easy to make.  I hope you'll give it a try this week!