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Apple Canning Party!

October 5, 2009 at 2:12 am | In Cookery | 2 Comments

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What a delightful day. Liz and Eleanor joined me for apple canning. We made two different kinds, even! Apple Wedges with Red Hot Cinnamon Syrup and also Apples with Dried Cherries and Golden Raisins. We did have a bit of trouble with our initial batch-three jars leaked and didn’t seal!! The Ball guide assured us to try again with new lids and we did and it seems ok. The thing about canning is it’s quite nerve wracking because you really don’t know how it went until you eat it months later and see how you feel! But based on the look of the jars? Beautiful. And the smell? Delicious? Clark remarked “It smells delicious in here. The smell is just drifting to my nose.” Indeed it was. Cinnamon, red hots, cloves, and hand picked apples. The kids ate some of the extra cooked in syrup apples and they pretty much gobbled them up.

It was so nice to have people to do this with. Instead of being a slightly tedious project, it was fun to have kitchen companions and other hands to help. Plus, with Pookie there we had our very own photographer. You must check out her awesome pictures here. Especially because I’m inadvertently channeling Betty Draper in one of them. I think I look quite fetching! So not as many pictures here as usual because frankly the ladies at IPB did a great job taking pictures and describing the process. Here is their post about today.

Tomorrow I’m going apple picking again, and I think next up is a big batch of applesauce.

Gasp! I just realized that one of my categories is “Cookery”, a term I employ because it’s a library thing- a quirky little subject heading that everyone needs but usually only librarians know. Well guess what? The Library of Congress has announced they are changing it! Modernizing! No longer will it be “cookery”, now it will be “cooking”. But it shall live on as cookery here at Sew Buttons.

I Will Never be a Daily Blogger

October 4, 2009 at 1:29 am | In Cookery, Family, Sewing, Wildlife | 1 Comment

I’d like to think that I’d cook something or create something and immediately have a photo and a little write up, but that’s never going to happen. I like watching tv after the kids are in bed far too much to write every night (though I do actually think about it every night). This also explains why I am not finishing (or starting) sewing and other projects as much as I might like to. Which brings me to a a few cooking highlights from the past week:

Last week we went apple picking, which was a true autumn delight. (Oh, first we visited Denise and her new baby and she loved the quilt.) We picked many huge apples of the Macintosh and Macoun variety, as well as a whole bunch of delicious peaches (I was suspicious of such late peaches, but they were juicy and sweet.)

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What to do with all these apples? Well, the next day I made an apple pie, of course. And if I amy compliment my own baking I will just say that it was fantastic and I made a delicious crust.

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For dinner I tried a new butternut squash soup recipe. This was a squash and white bean soup and the seasonings were unusual (not in and of themselves, just for this soup) and spicy: cumin, cloves, cinnamon. Of course I used one of our squashes. Look what a nice color-they were definitely the success of our 2009 garden.

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Tomorrow I have plans to can apple slices in a red hot cinnamon syrup. Can’t wait to see how it turns out!

Here’s a neat spider web pic I forgot to put up last week:

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Two nights ago it was 5 o’clock and I didn’t know what I wanted to make for dinner. I feel like 5 is the “time to decide” time because I aim for dinner to be ready at 6/6:15 and if we’re having brown rice or something that needs to bake I figure it needs to go in by 5:20. Anyway, I decided I wanted fish and am pleased to report a pretty fabulous dinner was on the table quite on time. But what was best about it was that I made a dinner that was a childhood favorite. I didn’t have a recipe, but it turned out delicious. In fact, it was better than I remembered. Which either means it was just better than I remembered, or the way I made it was actually better than my mom! Clark called this “Fish Muffins” because the dish gets made in a muffin tin. When I was a kid that was also the appeal to me. So novel! Dinner in a muffin tin! Here’s how I made it:

Sauteed mushrooms and the 2 small shallots I had, as well as a green pepper from the garden. Took two pieces white bread out of the freezer and toasted them and the chopped them up. Took all the frozen shrimp I had (about 5 or 6) out of the freezer, ran them under warm water, chopped them up and added them to the pan. When they were cooked I put the sauteed stuff, the bread crumbs, a drained can of crabmeat, some lemon juice, and Old Bay Seasoning all in a bowl and tossed it around well. Meanwhile, I had been defrosting some frozen tilapia fillets. So, you take a piece of fillet and wrap it in a circle in a muffin tin. I used my giant muffin tin so it didn’t make a solid cup, as it would if you used the smaller muffin tin. Then fill the center with your mixture. Drizzle a little bit of melted butter over the top of each and then bake until done. I think I did 400 degrees for 15 minutes. It came out great!

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As for sewing, well the fifth expected baby arrived over a month early this week, so now I have that gift lined up as well as another gift for my cousin’s baby (born the preceding week.) I did not work on those thing today, though, instead I finally got around to making Clark his flannel pants. The fabric is a lovely soft flannel, not of a pattern I would have chosen, but he is in love with it–army green airplanes against a cloudy beige background. It’s a very military looking pattern and he just has not clue at all about camouflage or soldiers or anything like that, he just loves the planes. After the last disastrous pants I made him (I think I sewed them upside down so that the inseam ended up being like 8 inches long) I was kind of worried about these. But they came out great! He put them on immediately and wore them for the rest of the afternoon and to bed. I didn’t get to take a good picture of them close up, but here is playing in them:

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So there’s the big catchup. Tomorrow is canning and I know I’ll have great pictures because Eleanor will be our photographer for the event!

Circus Baby Quilt for Michael

September 26, 2009 at 12:10 am | In Sewing | 2 Comments

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Today I visited my friend and her new baby, Michael, which meant that last night I finally finished off this quilt. I had made proper bias binding out of one of the fabrics on Sunday, but didn’t get around to putting on until last night. I’m very pleased with how it looks overall. There are definitely some flaws, but it is soft, I think the fabrics are really appealing, I love the backing, and I just think it’s quite cute for a baby blanket. This is pretty much the same style quilt as I made for Tabitha, except hers was made with a charm pack of precut squares. These squares I cut myself and I am frankly surprised and thrilled they came out even!

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Congratulations, Denise and Bill!

Welcome to Fungus Fairyland

September 25, 2009 at 3:32 am | In Botanical Photos, Funky Photos | 3 Comments

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Check out this beautiful mushroom spotted at Clark’s school this morning. I was so taken with it that I went back this afternoon to photograph it. I just couldn’t get over the way this spongy little plant had literally burst through the solid moss. See how it has just torn right through it? I mean, how fast did that thing grow?? I’m under the impression it basically shot up through the ground overnight. It is just too perfect and adorable–just the sort of mushroom one expects to have fairies living under. I didn’t see any fairies, but I did manage to catch these creatures in the act of hanging around this fungus.

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This specimen is clearly a fairy table:

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And this is “yellow golf ball mushroom”:

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And in case you had any doubt that these bizarre looking things existed millions of year ago…

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Next time you’re outside take a look around and you just might see some magical places right at your own feet!

Creatures

September 25, 2009 at 3:18 am | In Wildlife | 1 Comment

Seems like recently I’ve taken some photos of creatures in and around the house that I’d like to share. The other morning while it was still cool and misty, we had a visitor to our backyard–this lovely six point buck. Now, where we live deer are far from unusual. In fact, our road seems overrun with them. Great families of them brazenly walk around in people’s yards in broad daylight. For some unknown reason (our dog?) they rarely come to our yard. This one seemed to notice us watching him from our kitchen window, but was not bothered. Isn’t he handsome?

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Yesterday I heard that a black bear has been spotted in two places within a couple of miles of us. I hope I do not see it.

At the playground the other afternoon one of the climbing structures had this lovely spider climbing around his web.

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Last night this big praying mantis was above our door.

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A sure sign of fall arrived yesterday–lots and lots of stink bugs (we call them “shield bugs”) all over the house. For some reason the children love to see them, but I am less thrilled!

Fall Begins

September 18, 2009 at 5:22 pm | In Big Green Froggie, Family, Wildlife | 2 Comments

I’m looking forward to yanking everything out of the garden, but there are still loads of green tomatoes all over the plants. Plus one green bell pepper. And lots of white birds egg gourds. And two small watermelons that I doubt will amount to anything (after all, it is mid-September.) While I was in there the other day I was startled to find myself face to face with this lovely:

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As Paul said, “You can see why a plague of these would be frightening.”

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This week was an exciting one for us as Clark started his second year of nursery school. He’s going three days a week this year and happily he loves school and is never reluctant to go or part with me (but is happy to return home, which is nice.) I admit to enjoying the chance to have a little time alone with Tabitha on those mornings. We putter about and play together and it’s very nice. Here we all are on Clark’s first day:

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This morning I was out by the pond checking out the cattails and I was surprised to see this small frog sitting in a plant. he appears two toned.

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When I was a kid I recall lighting cattails and calling them “punks.” I’ve been wanting to do that with ours and see if my memory of it making a nice smell is correct or not. I picked one apart and had indeed forgotten just how soft the inside is. When I look at this I think it looks just like the fur of my dear beloved rabbit, Hazelnut.
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Paul and I have been watching Mad Men and I am fascinted by Betty Draper and what being a mom meant in that time and place. I love how beautiful and put together Betty looks and sometimes wish I had that glamour in my day. But let’s be honest, I’m happy I can wear jeans every day! Also happy that I don’t need to feed and bathe my kids and put them to bed, all before my husband comes home and I have to serve him his own separate dinner in a beautiful setting.

Tote Bag!

September 10, 2009 at 6:39 pm | In Sewing | 7 Comments

I just finished my latest project and had to immediately take pictures and post about it. This is a tote bag that my friend Jen and I made together (that is, she also made it and we did the steps together, coincidentally we also used the same fabric.) This turned out to be fairly simple. Probably the most time consuming part was ironing on all the fusible interfacing. Basically you make one simple bag, sew on the straps, make another bag for the lining, stitch it together, and turn it inside out. To provide a little extra structure there is a fabric covered piece of cardboard placed at the bottom.

This and That

September 10, 2009 at 1:27 am | In Big Green Froggie, Botanical Photos, Chickens, Gardening, Sewing | 2 Comments

I’ve been so slow about posting lately (I have quite a backlog of books to do over at The Last Book I Read), but I suppose in part it’s because I’ve been doing a lot of sewing and hobby stuff lately, dealing with a mysterious fever Clark had (swine flu? Lyme disease? It went away and he’s fine), and throwing myself into the change of season. I’m so ready to embrace apple picking, jean wearing, apple eating, and so on. Clark goes back to preschool next week and he’s quite excited about it, as am I for him.

So here’s a rundown of pictures of note and such. First, another bee top for Tabitha. It turned out too large, but since it is summery I decided not to alter it, but to save it instead for next summer. This was my first time making real pleats, which came out pretty well.

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In progress: sewing a tote bag

In progress: baby quilt for my dear friend’s baby, who was born today. I’ve got the top and bottom tied together and am going to embroider today’s date and the baby’s name on it now and then bind it. Here’s the top after it was pieced together:

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The change in sunrise/sunset and daylight hours is very apparent in the chickens’ laying behavior. During the summer (and as recent as 2 weeks ago) by 9am all 9 eggs would have been laid. However, now they are laying much later in the day and I didn’t get all the eggs today until mid-afternoon. One of the ladies:

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Our ladies, by the way, are completely people friendly and always on the lookout for treats. They run up to cars that pull in the driveway. If you call out “here chick chick!” one will run and then all the others will follow. If you are sitting on the front porch, one or two might hop right up there to see what’s going on. They are a delight.

Cooler days are very pleasant for Big Green Froggie-he’s been spending quite a bit of time out on the patio. He was in the pond, though, the other day when a hen fell into the pond! The hen turned out to be fine-I ran outside and scooped her up and wrapped her in a towel.

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We saw some interesting fuzzy caterpillars yesterday.

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Check out the teeny tiny grippy feet that help it hold on to this thick piece of grass:

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And here is Tabitha making the face she does when she says “Nooooooo” Ever since she finally started saying Clark’s name (“Clark-Clark”) she says it all the time. It’s especially funny when she says “Clark Clark No!”, as she is here. By the way, neither of us has ever said “Clark-Clark”, so I don’t know why she does.

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In the front the squash plants have run amok, reaching out like a sash across this tree:

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What’s neat is the tiny tendrils that reach out to whatever they can and grab on, holding up this big vine and its big leaves and blossoms:

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Here is Clark standing next to a very tall…plant. I am holding out hope that it is going to be a beautiful flower (I did plant a lot of seeds here), but I think it just might be a spectacular weed. The other tall plants are zinnias. The black thing behind the plants is our new composter, which Clark won at the Somerset County 4H Fair! Very exciting. We are thinking that by having it closer to the house (and it doesn’t smell, so why not?) we will be more likely to empty our compost into it daily.

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