Dresses and Tops

I didn't sew at all during June. I decided I needed to clean out and reorganize my closets and dressers (yes, plural, because what husband wouldn't want to sacrifice closet and drawer space for his wife?).

So, on the Fourth of July weekend, I was ready to go. I had bought this pattern, and really wanted a pink dress from it. But, being a little afraid, I first tried it in this white eyelet I bought last year. The eyelet was a great bargain, 14 yards for about $25 (and I had always wanted white eyelet dresses). Of course, I have so much left over that it can be used as a trial run for just about anything. My dearly beloved hated it. Truth be told, I am not wild about the center front seam in the skirt, which doesn't really show in this picture. But I'll probably never wear it.
Then, I had bought McCalls M6078 top pattern, and was really excited to try it. This top is actually a hunter green, but the flash washed it out. Sadly, hubby hated this, too, because the fabric is fairly heavy, so the drape of the neck isn't that pronounced.
So I made this pink and white striped cami from a pattern I first tried in April. At last, something I could wear (and could zip out in an hour).
Then I made another, from identical fabric that had a blue and white stripe. At last, I was feeling better, with two successes for the weekend in my closet.
So, back to the McCalls, with this white stretchy rayon knit. I liked it pretty well, and wore it with a red skirt, blue shoes and my blue shawl. It was 4th of July, after all! Of course, I forgot to take pictures.
Then, I cut this dress and jacket combo out of the pink windowpane fabric I'd wanted to use with Butterick B5350. I just loved the fabric too much to risk a dress I wasn't sure I loved. And I decided to make a little shrug from the same fabric. I've made this jacket in the winter, always lined.
I didn't line this one; instead, I finished the raw edges with seam binding, then stitched or blind hemmed it in place. I think this is called the "Hong Kong Finish", and that's what I'm going with, because it sounds so fancy and all. I wore this to the eye doctor's office, and garnered several compliments. That's always nice.
Although I ordered 3 yards of this fabric from Fabric Mart, I got very close to 4 yards. So there's enough pink left for another sleeveless dress. Maybe this weekend or next I'll make a princess seamed dress from a pattern I know, love, and use often for knit dresses. And at least I got something out of my weekend's work!

Book Review!

Have you ever seen the Masterpiece Theatre production of The 39 Steps? It's grey, gloomy and exciting. So, when I found the book among this set of mystery novels I'd purchased from the used book sale, I became very excited.
Thor was excited, too. He was just reading a different book. Thor's a thinker.

THE 39 STEPS
by John Buchan
copyright 1915

It's World War I in London, and Richard Hanney has been back in London for 3 months, his father having moved the family away 30 years earlier, when Richard was 6 years old. Every night, he dines in his club and passes the evening there; he has become bored and considering moving again. One evening, an American named Scudder follows Hanney into his flat. Scudder has staged his own death in his flat, located in the same building. Scudder explains to Hanney that he knows of a German plot against Britain, and he is being pursued to kill the knowledge. Sure enough, after 4 days in Hanney's flat, Scudder is murdered; when investigators arrive, Hanney flees out a bedroom window with Scudder's evidence to protect himself. The chase leads through England and Scotland. Fast paced and exciting, the book has a very satisfying conclusion. The book was only about 120 pages long, and I read it in about an hour. It's a highly enjoyable step back in time, and highly recommended.

And there was little food involved in the book, but this is last night's dinner (just to prove I'm still cooking). And because a picture of just a line of books isn't very interesting.

Hope you all have a great weekend!

Cool Down Thorsday!

How does a giant dog stay cool on a hot summer day?

With low calorie frozen treats, of course. The uninitiated call them "ice cubes".

After chomping, you have to chase all the little ice chips around the floor.

Just be thankful you don't have to see the slime all over the place.

Happy Thorsday, everyone!

Chocolate Strawberry Cupcakes

Yes, "Chocolate" and "Strawberry" in the same thing. I knew that would get everyone's attention.

I wanted an easy dessert for the hordes on Sunday night. Everyone loves chocolate cake. I also had some strawberries that were begging to do something other than gallop full speed into my mouth. And so this idea was born. Use complicated recipes or simple substitutions, as you wish. After all, it's summer, traditional vacation time, and you shouldn't work too hard.

1 recipe chocolate cake batter (use this recipe, or this one, or a box. It's all good.)
1 pound strawberries, sliced thin, stirred with 2tbsp sugar
1 cup whipping cream, whipped with 1 tsp vanilla and 1/4 cup sugar (or whatever whipped topping you love)

Pour the cake batter into 12 greased coffee or tea cups. Place on a baking sheet, and place in a preheated 350F oven for 22 to 27 minutes, until the cakes test done. Cool completely. Using a pointed knife, cut a cone out of the center of the cupcake, and lift out. Spoon 1 to 2 tbsp whipped cream into the cake and replace the cone, pushing down gently so it oozes around.. Put another 1 to 2 tbsp whipped cream on top of the cake, and spread it out. Spoon some strawberries on top. If desired, put a touch more whipped cream atop the strawberries, sprinkle some colored sugar on top for decoration, and serve.

All of your chocolate fiends who also enjoy strawberry shortcake should really scarf this down. I know that mine did, even the picky eaters!

Garden Tuesday: Future Grapes

Yes, folks, there's great hope in my little corner of the world that we'll have a bumper crop of grapes.

I just hope the birds don't eat them before they're ripe enough for us.
Happy Garden Tuesday, everyone!

Risotto With Corn

I'll bet you thought I'd forgotten how to cook, right? Nope. Just not much different food going on around here these days, with the circus that is my life this summer. Nothing dramatic, just busy.

So, I found a recipe for risotto made with corn in my paper last week. And I thought I could do that. Of course, you know full right and well that it's been made a little easier by me, your favorite lazy cook. So, risotto made with corn is different, but it did meet with approval from the hungry hordes.

RISOTTO WITH CORN

olive oil
1/2 cup chopped chives or green onions
2 cups white rice*
4 to 5 cups chicken broth
2 cups corn, pureed in the food processor
ground black pepper
1/2 cup grated parmesan cheese

Heat the olive oil to a simmer in a large pan, add the chives or green onions, and saute 2 to 3 minutes, until soft. Add the rice, cook and stir another 3 to 4 minutes. Add the 1 cup of the chicken broth, and stir well. Cook until most of the broth is gone, and stir in another cup of the broth. Repeat with the third cup of broth. With the fourth cup of broth, add the pureed corn and pepper, stir well, and continue simmering, stirring occasionally. Add the fifth cup of broth, if necessary, and stir in the parmesan just before all of the liquid is absorbed.

*Note: the recipe called for Arboria rice, but I didn't have it. I also have the impression it costs an exorbitant amount per pound, and I'm too cheap to lay out a lot for starch. Just sayin'. It didn't tell me explicitly to stir the rice constantly, as most risotto recipes do, so I didn't, and it was fine.

Ryan spent the meal playfully whining about my habit of putting weird things in his rice, but Dan deemed it pretty good. So, as Ryan was rinsing his plate, he offered one last complaint about yellow and green things in his rice, so Dan got his low velocity air soft pistol and shot Ryan in the butt. Yes, I let the boys play with airsoft pistols, and even shoot each other while doing so. Before I did, I shot myself in the leg. It stung pretty well, but the boys don't wear skirts, and don't shoot each other from 2 feet apart, so there's no harm. And most of the time they do this out in the yard, wandering around in the fresh air and sunshine, so I have no gripe there. And when Dan bellows, "I'm defending my mother's honor and cooking!" who can argue?

Hope you all had a great weekend!

Book Review!

I told you that I read old books, so you won't be hearing about the summer's bestsellers here. But you might just find something to check out of the library, under the approving smile of the librarian who's tired of hearing requests for the perpetually out-of-stock stuff.

Taylor Caldwell is one of my favorite authors. Her books are never action packed mystery thrillers or whatever else sells. Instead, they all seem to be set between 1870 and 1920, in Massachusetts, New York or Pennsylvania, and are all about a slice of life there. I had actually never read this one before I found it at a book sale for 50 cents in April - how could I have gone wrong with it?

TO LOOK AND PASS
By Taylor Caldwell
c. 1973

According to the first chapter, this is the story of the life of Dan Hendricks. It's set in a small town in Northwestern Pennsylvania between approximately 1890 and 1920. It's also the story of our narrator, the son of the town doctor, who becomes the town doctor himself, Olivia and Beverly. The story follows our four main characters through life from about age 12 through Dan's death at about 40, with varying degrees of detail. It's a long, gentle story which rambles, but draws the reader in. The reader loves most of the characters and sees one as despicable from the outset of the book. As I said, it's not exciting, but it is engrossing.

Happy reading!

On another happy note, Dan went out last night. This morning, I found a new electric kettle on my kitchen counter. What a wonderful son I have!

Out With the Old, and In With.....

...the Ancient.

My electric kettle has decided that 100 to 120degrees fahrenheit is the perfect temperature for tea water. Sadly, my tea disagrees. So, I've ordered a new one. In the meantime, I'm using....

....purchased in 1977, this was a hot ticket for college bound kids. You could heat up water for tea, cocoa or instant coffee, cook less than 8 ounces of pasta, and cook soup or other canned foods. You couldn't beat it with a stick.

Sad to say, it's only 400 watts, so it takes like 10 minutes to heat the water for a cup of tea. Amazon, you'd better have UPS moving soon!

It's Thorsday!

I wonder if they're going to share whatever they have with me? Hmmm?

Maybe I'll just lie down to wait.

Happy Thorsday, everyone!

In Which I Pretend I'm Bilingual.

Before the story begins, you need to understand that the Hispanic population of this area is maybe 2%. Then there's a group of migrant farm workers from Mexico who move from the strawberry farm to the pumpkin patch to the turkey farm, and probably a few places in between. And then there's my lawn service, owned by a guy innocently named Melvin. Melvin has an all Mexican lawn crew. And they work very hard.

Most of my lawn looks great. But, this year, our lawn service has been mowing the 20 foot square area just outside the kitchen with a weed wacker. It's not going all that well. Ryan has been taking Spanish in school, so I asked him if he could look up a couple of words and speak to the lawn service on my behalf. Nothing doing, responded Ryan, unless I wanted him to ask them if they sing well or where the library is. Glad to see that high school language courses are as useful as ever. (I took 6 years of French. I could introduce my dog to you, even now, and tell you that he is a good dog. Also a highly useful skill, don't you think?)

So, it was up to me and my dictionary to figure out how to speak to the nice Mexican man.

Hola! (I have this one down pat.)
No habla Espanol! (I know this one, too. Not for nothing I spent the summer of 1975 in California.)

Then it got tricky.
Tiene una cortadora de cesped pequena? (This should mean "Do you have a small lawn mower?") Evidently the sentence was understandable, because he nodded vigorouisly and said something enthusiastic.
Por favor, usa a la cortadora de cesped en esta area? (Pointing at the 20x20 area, and hoping that this did approximately translate to "Please use the small mower here."). He responded, "Si, Senora," trotted off, and came back with a hand mower, beaming. "Bueno!" I cheered, giving him the thumbs up sign.

Then he pointed at Thor and said something fast and long and Spanish. "Esta Thor!" I chirped. "Esta Bueno!"

"Good Bye, and Gracias!" I added. So my weedy little piece of lawn got mowed properly, and I pretended I could bumble through a tiny Spanish conversation.

The Garden on the Fourth

So, we set out last night to light the traditional fireworks. The sky had just a touch of color left. Can you see it in this picture? Here's a lightened view, just in case. I love the profiles of the trees at night.

And the little guy started us off with Roman Candles, with some help from Dan. Thor stayed inside where it was safe from the booming noises.
Hope you all had a wonderful weekend!

Miscellany for the Holiday Weekend

Our neighbors to the north are celebrating Canada Day today. I wish them all a happy holiday weekend!

Monday is our Independence Day holiday. We're just kicking back and taking it easy. Our oldest daughter is home until Tuesday, because her bar review course doesn't resume in Philly until Wednesday. Of course, Thor's encouraging us all to follow his fine example and do plenty of napping.
(It isn't that easy to draw stars with colored sugar. So you'll have to put up with a spotty blue field on my cake flag to start the holiday weekend.)

I've spent the last several weekends brutally cleaning out my closets and dresser drawers, reorganizing everything, giving each of my girls a huge armload of almost new clothes from when I weighed 15 to 20 pounds less (and was much younger, of course). Lawyer daughter was particularly thrilled to score 3 suits and 2 blazers. As for me, I was particularly thrilled to be able to rearrange everything and now find it. Sewing may recommence this weekend. And a trip to Joann's for the great 99 cent McCalls pattern sale may well be in order.

Other than that, I might venture into the sunshine for about 4 minutes (gotta avoid the sunburn!). Maybe I'll get around to a book review tomorrow or Sunday. And I might just take Thor's suggestion for a nice nap.

Happy Independence Day weekend to my American friends. Happy weekending to all the rest of you!