Quilting Shop and Hop

My friend Susan and I recently took on the daunting task of the largest Quilt Shop and Hop either of us has ever been on.  Twenty-two stores took us 3 days which we combined into 2 trips as we stayed overnight once.  It was a blast and you know, it actually had it's exhausting moments.  We traveled from Galena all the way East to Arlington Heights together, stopping along the way....Gotta Have A Dream To Make A Dream Come True!

What treasures we found!  And so many quilt stores we never would have known of.  They were so excellent I am going to share the list here!  It's a three month shop and hop ending September 30, 2011.  You can still do it!

http://www.northernillinoisqiltfest.com/

We are both hoping we win a prize from one of the stores.  What a moment when we realized that IF we do win something we have to drive back to the store to pick it up.  Yikes!

No problem though.  Susan told me about a fiber store in St. Charles called "A Fine Line".  They were closed when we were in town but it sounds fascinating.  Check out http://www.afineline.org/.  Sounds like they have a very interesting Holiday program.

Pieceful Gathering Quilt Shop - Fox River Grove
Quilt in Joy, Huntley
Sewing concepts, Woodstock
Hopscotch Square, Woodstock
Material Girl Fabric Shop, Crystal Lake
Sunshine & Shadow Quilt Shoppe, McHenry
Acorn Quilts, Rockford
Lucky 2B Quilting, Rockford
It's for Quilting, Rockford
Quilter's General Store, Rockford
Quilter's Haven, Rockford
Phat Quarters, Galena
Quilter's Destination, Arlington Heights
Prairie Shop Quilts, Batavia
Sewwing Concepts, Carpentersville
Basketcases Unlimited, Clare
Judy's Quilt N Sew, Hampshire
Leaf River Quilt Company, Leaf River
Thimbles, Lockport
Prairie Stitches Quilt Shoppe, Oswego
Harvest House Quilting, Plainfield
Sew Generously, St. Charles
Sawdust & Stitches, Elkhorn, WI

Just received dresses for my granddaughters from my friend Tanya.  Want to check out more?  Google "Palmo Originals".  Great fabrics and reversible!!!!!!

 20 Months old now!  What a charmer.
Standing in front of the Zinnia Garden that is beautiful this year.

Fiber Day With Liliana

Look what we did at Fiber Day.  Poor little Liliana, my new granddaughter.  I just couldn't wait to get there and set her inside Sherryl's basket of yarns.  I'm thrilled that my grandkids will know what a spinning wheel is.  Wonder if they'll ever be interested in knitting, spinning, crocheting....

We'll see!

And I have to enter an updated pic of Cara!  She is just as sweet as pie.  They are both very calm and happy children...so far.

We recently had 15" of rain in less than 12 hours in Galena.  I've included some flood pics as well. We just had a little water in the restaurant and about 2" in the movie room.  Nothing compared to the rest of Galena.  Desoto Hotel had over 4' of water in their kitchen.

Made a lemon cake from scratch for the guests.  I think the box mixes are better than a scratch cake.  Or I'm doing something wrong. 

By the way...those online hotel finder sites - everyone that has used it to book at the Stillman inn has paid more than what we charge.  Think twice before using them. 

Mom and Me Corn Relish

I am so blessed with the time I've been able to spend with my Mom this summer.  What a pleasure she is to have around!

I always like trying new things and getting Mom involved makes it even better!  This visit we made Corn Relish.  Not only did we make it but we did a little research on what "relish" really means.  Is it a dip, a spread, a condiment?  Of course we are most familiar with hot dog relish but surely it must be more than that. The best description we found was that it is something between a sauce and syrup that adds flavor to a dish. It usually has vegetables chopped up but could include fruit as well so it's usually chunky. 

Did you know "relish" is the French word for "salsa".  This relish/salsa was an absolute perfect match with the honey-lime chicken we made together.  Oh my gosh!  Glad we made 7 pints of it! 

I think it's not fair to the publisher to just post the recipe here.  You'll have to either buy the book or call me up! There you go, a good reason to call Bernadine!  Oh, the flowers came from our gardens.  Zinnias and a Teddy Bear Sunflower.  What a summer!

That's my nephew Ben.  He was here too!  He wants to be a meteorologist.  He is great help around the inn especially serving breakfast. 

Master Knitter Wannabe

So of course now that I've heard about the Master Knitters program on my favorite podcast, Knit Misadventures, Ihave to give it a try.


My Spinning Wheel


I ordered the level one course and it showed up in the mail just three days afterwards.  I thought I'd have a month to warm up to the idea more!

So, it feels pretty intimidating but I'm gonna give it my best shot!  So, some accountability would be nice! 
 

Some inspiration

This course is offered by "The Kniters Guild Assocation" (TKGA) if you would like to reserach it for yourself.  I think this progam will help me to fine tune my knitting skills.  I've been knitting, crocheting, tatting, macrameing, rug hooking, etc. since I can remember.  I don't even remember the moment I actually learned to knit but I do enjoy it.  It wasn't fashionable to knit when I started and certainly not in my teens.  There were very few patterns or books at the time.  Most patterns were for babies.  Now, oh my goodness, the variety of books and supplies never ends and it is considered way cool if you knit. 

So, off we go.  I'll get my little notebook together and look through my stash for some yarn that qualifies for the projects and BAM!

Liliana

Ladies and Gentlemen
Drum roll please
Grandma Fabulous proudly presents - Granddaughter #2
Princess Liliana!


Born 7/14/11 - 7'14oz  20" Lots of hair!



Aint She Somethin!  As beautiful as my daughter Becca for sure! 
Becca did a great job delivering her without an epidural.  A strong and mighty and powerful woman she is.  I've never seen her look more beautiful than when she was delivering Liliana. 

Becca, you are my inspiration! I love you so much. You are going to be a fabulous Mom!

Love, Mom

The Dark Side

Oh yes, she has finally gone over to the dark side. Her friends kept insisting that she needed to learn to knit. Crocheting since she was ten is fine but she needs to broaden her horizons, be more creative. She needs to be able to "speak" in knitting terms so she can understand her friends when they talk about knitting two together or passing over a slip stitch or using the million different ways to cast on.

So, she started on a pretty scarf pattern. She cast on, stitched till she was blue in the face and still had to tear it out several times! Did she persevere - yes, because her friends love her and would not steer her wrong - but not with that pattern! She looked over a variety of repeat knit patterns and decided to just do a scarf out of that - a simple lace to make a small scarf. It worked!!! She is actually knitting, the stitches are coming out evenly, she has not had to tear it out and the scarf is looking pretty good!

Does she still favor crochet - of-course! It is easy, fast and has so many options for a variety of fabrics that it will continue to be her top choice. But, now that she can knit a little, she can indeed broaden her horizons and be more creative and enter into knitting conversations with her friends:-) The dark side is not as dim as she thought it would be!

Todays Jam

I found a recipe for Peach Lavender Jam.  Since I'm into Lavender right now I thought this would be perfect AND the peaches looked great.

I had a few problems so if you have any ideas please share!


The recipe came from "The Complete Book of Small-Batch Preserving" by Ellie Topp and Margaret Howard..  In a canning magazine I have it suggested boiling the peaches until the skin broke (approx 30-60 seconds).  I boiled for several minutes and the skin never "broke".  Then I was to dump them in a bowl of ice water for 1-2 minutes.  The did not peel easily at all.  I know I tried this once before and it worked, don't know what went wrong this time.





Peach Lavender Jam
2 tbsp dried lavender flowers
1/2 cup boiling water
4 cups finely chopped peaches (5-6 medium)
2 tbsp lemon juice
6 cups granulated sugar
1 pouch liquid fruit pectin

Place Lavender flowers in a small bowl. Pour boiling water over flowers and steep for 20 minutes. Strain and discard flowers.  (Later I added Lavender extract)

Combine lavender liquid, peaches, lemon juice and sugar in a very large stainless steel or enamel saucepan. Bring to a full boil over high heat and boil hard for 2 minutes, stirring constantly. Remove from heat and stir in pectin. (I did this and it never thickened. I re/boiled the finished jam the next day until it geled so the liquid pectin was in it while I boiled this time)

Ladle into hot jars and process for 10 minutes.

Makes 6 cups

So, it sounded easy but as you see in the red it didn't work for me until I reboiled the fruit with the pectin in it. 

Now it looks and acts like it should!!!!:)

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