My first Dresden

I made my first Dresden Plate for the latest round of the Invite Your Partner swap on Craftster. My partner had some on her Pinterest and one of her comments on it was that she thought a pillow would be nice for that design. Done and Done! She liked purple, green, and blue, and to start with I was pulling fabric in all of those colors, but then realized I could easily pull together 20 different green prints from my stash without expending too much effort. Not sure if I should be proud or ashamed of that

I used the Easy Dresden Ruler to make these, and it was definitely very easy! A nice neutral dark gray for the backing, and I was pretty pleased with how it all came together. I did a ton of quilting on it, more than I usually do. Initially I was going to do more quilting in the gray (outside the Dresden) but I stopped with just one line and decided I liked it that way.

ETA: Here's two close-ups of the quilting that my partner took. I couldn't find mine.

Since making this one I've made two more dresden plates with holiday fabric. I'm going to finish a third one and make a holiday table runner!

Phoenix Quilts Charity

Phoenix Quilts is dedicated to sending quilts to people who have lost their homes in the wildfires. We're talking 750+ quilts! I think this is a wonderful project and want to get some of my quilt tops finished and sent out! I need to get some things wrapped up around here before I send in my commitment!

Would you like to help too? Phoenix Quilts

Craft Blocked!

No, I haven't lost my crafty mojo due to a drying up of ideas, but because I've been super busy with other things (mainly, taking care of my nephews) and my sewing room being torn up. My brother needed my sewing room table back to fit in his new, smaller house, so I am currently needing to clean the room to fit in the large computer desk which he gave me. Meanwhile my sewing machine and current project(s) are living on my dining room table, but I haven't touched them for over a week.

I've also missed the last many, many quilt guild meetings, which bums me out, but by Thursdays I just feel exhausted, and if the weather is bad (per usual in Portland), I definitely don't want to do down and fight for parking in the Pearl. And, even though this is my third year with the guild, sometimes my social phobia rears its head and I freak out about going.

What am I "working" on? So many things! Most importantly, two baby quilts for my cousin and a crocheted ripple afghan. I'm also pattern testing a crochet pattern for a friend, and have a swap going on C-ster that I am making a dresden plate (my first dresden!) pillow cover for, and also maybe a mini quilt and mug rug. Ok, making my list has actually gotten me excited about my projects again, and make me want to get in and clean up my craft room so I can get back to making!

Here's one block from the second baby quilt. The first one just needs to be basted (my least favorite part of the quilting process), quilted (second least favorite part) and bound (my fave part, along with piecing!). I have two blocks done, and most of the Half Square Triangles completed. I may need to make some more as I get near the end, but I ran out of some fabric so am going to wait until I need it to see which ones I need to cut. Or I might decide to put some solid large squares in at that point. Or giant HST? Who knows!

Novelty Fabric Swap!

I think I mentioned a couple posts back that I am running a Novelty Fabric FQ Swap over on Craftster. Our Gallery is here if you want to check it out. Click on "show images only" to filter out posts that don't show sweet fabric goodness.

The way this swap worked was that I partnered people in groups of four, and each person bought 1 yard cuts of 4 different fabrics, and cut them into Fat Quarters, and then sent one FQ to each of their partners, keeping the fourth set for themselves.

So far, I've received some awesome fabrics from two of my partners!

I love the deer fabric! It's awesome!

100_5086 by maremare312, on Flickr

100_5087 by maremare312, on Flickr

And the hand-dyed fabric!

100_5088 by maremare312, on Flickr


The penguins are too sweet, I will have to hide this from my youngest nephew or he will want to "go night night" with it.

100_5090 by maremare312, on Flickr

100_5089 by maremare312, on Flickr


We're already talking about another round of this swap, possibly with holiday fabric as the overall theme. If you might be interested, be sure to create a Craftster account now if you don't have one already, as you must be a member for a month before you can sign up for a swap.

Cheesy Broccoli Veggie Soup

I made this soup the other day and it's pretty good. It's a tweak on the regular broccoli soup I make, which is just broccoli, but for this batch I added other veggies. To start off with I chopped up 4 big crowns of broccoli and their stems. Since everything is going to get pureed later anyways, it doesn't really matter the size. If you have a little helper who wants to attempt to further chop it up with his butter knife, he can have at it! Also, when I told him that broccoli isn't good to eat raw, but is much better cooked, he ate quite a few pieces and declared them "yummy" just to spite me. Joke's on him, he just ate a ton of raw broccoli!

Cheesy Broccoli Veggie Soup
This was a giant pot, feel free to halve the recipe for a normal sized pot.

2 T oil
1 large onion, roughly chopped
5 medium carrots, chopped
3 stalks celery, chopped
3 cloves garlic, pressed
4-5 crowns broccoli, chopped
4-6 potatoes, peeled and chopped (optional, leave out for lower carb, I usually put these in but not this time)
1-2 Tablespoons bouillon powder or paste. I love Better than Bouillon and used Chicken flavor

black pepper
red pepper flakes
8 ounces shredded cheddar
4 ounces shredded gouda
1/2 cup half and half or heavy cream (optional, I'd probably leave it out next time)

In large pot, saute onion and celery in oil until fragrant. Add the rest of the vegetables and water to almost cover. Don't add too much water, I did this time and was disappointed in the runny-ness of my soup. Add bouillon paste and stir well to dissolve.

Bring to simmer, cover, and reduce heat. Cook for 20 minutes or so or until all vegetables are fork tender.

Take the soup off the heat and place on a stable surface. Using your stick blender, blend the soup until it is the consistency you like. I like mine very smooth! Add cheeses and return to heat. Add black and red pepper to taste. It shouldn't need any salt from the bouillon and cheese, but taste for salt too. Add cream just before serving if using it.

Optional: crumbled bacon, chopped ham, chopped parsley and/or sour cream for serving