We celebrated the new year with a fantastic feast of egg rolls, spinach dip, and black-eyed peas. DH did most of the cooking, but I helped by rolling the egg rolls and toasting some italian bread for the dip. The egg rolls were wonderful and crunchy and especially nice with duck sauce. We did the recipe as is, except that we used a bag of cole slaw shred instead of chopping cabbage and carrots. I love that DH's mom has a tradition of making these on New Year's Day; it's a tradition I'm very happy to continue. The spinach dip was pretty good, especially after we added the crushed red pepper, although Emeril's recipe still tops my list. I like spinach dip with artichokes and LOTS of jack cheese. And you can't beat black-eyed peas for comfort food. DH made the recipe pretty much as written except he omitted the tomato sauce. We had a really nice smoked ham in the freezer and the fatty bits made the beans really tasty.
As far as crafts go, I got a lot done this afternoon. One of the things you have to do before you start a quilt is wash and press all the fabric you're going to use. This is important so that any shrinking happens before you cut quilt pieces instead of after, potentially making them the wrong size. Also recommended is stitching the raw edges of your fabric before washing. To my newbie self, this seemed unnecessary, but after pulling balls of tangled fabric and string from the washer and cutting them to bits just trying to separate them, I can vouch that this indeed important. (It's also a great way to finish off spools of thread that are not enough to do anything else with.) So I got out all the fabric for the duvet cover as well as the quilt I have planned for my daughter (project #3), and spent naptime running basting stitches down all the raw edges of the fabric. Some of them I stitched together at the edges to save time. Seeing all the fabric sewn up next to each other is exciting and I'm ready to see what it looks like when I start to piece it. In all honesty, I don't have a plan for my daughter's quilt but looking at the fabric this afternoon gave me some ideas. I'm thinking a pattern of different size squares... for the moment.
I also got a few more rows done on the scarf for my daughter (project #2). I worked while I watched Tristan and Isolde
last night, and a little bit this afternoon between sewing and making egg rolls. I started it just before Christmas using a partial ball of white acrylic baby yarn left over from the baby blanket I made while I was pregnant.To do list: continue knitting rows on scarf, investigate patterns for daughter's quilt and make a decision.
No comments:
Post a Comment