Moving Along on the BQM

I'm working on the backing for the Burger Queen Mystery Quilt. These are extra blocks - the blue stars were my original block but I decided that the blue should be the background not the stars; the 3" star blocks were extras - somehow I miscounted; the circle in a square block is made from leftover pieces. Those triangles were not easy to cut and I don't want to waste any. So I am going to incorporate these five blocks into my pieced backing.





This cool print was planned to be the border on the front but I decided that it didn't look so good. I left it pinned up on the design wall for a good two weeks hoping it would begin to look better. But that didn't work this time so I've decided to use it on the back. Right now my plans are to set the above blocks at various angles with this print filling in around them. There probably won't be quite enough so I will use the blue from the front border and a gold print all around. I have plenty of both.


I still don't know how I'm going to quilt this baby. One of the group members suggested quilting with the back on top but I'm not that experienced a machine quilter and am a little afraid of going that route without a good all-over print to guide me. I have the book Quilting Back to Front but I just don't think I'm ready yet.

Meet the Goats

I went to the LDS Family History Center this afternoon to order a microfilm for my Stout family research and when I left I heard a rustling coming from the edge of their parking lot. Of course I had to investigate, and this is what I found. Four goats foraging, two were eating grass and two were nibbling on the bark of some small trees.



We have some dried up corn still on our cornstalks, so we are going to ask the goat owner if he would like to have them. I don't think they would be much good in the compost bin anyway.







This is the third time I've planted microgreens and I haven't managed to actually put any on the table yet.
I'm not even sure how to use them or if we will like them. Supposedly they are being used in the finest restaurants and, being as they are the plant stage just past sprouts, they've got to be healthy.

The first two time I planted them I didn't get to use them when they were ready and then it was too late. To tell the truth, I'm so used to having a couple of months between sowing and harvesting, that I forgot about them. I planted these in the greenhouse on 9/18 and this is the amount of growth just five days later. Most seeds haven't even sprouted in five days! This time we are going to eat them. This week. Guaranteed...


The Burger Queen Mystery quilt has its borders. The rust border is 1", the 2" middle border matches the stars and the 3"outer border is a different fabric from the background but the color is close. I ran out of the blue basketweave, unfortunately because I really love it. Now to plan the backing.

Knitting and Quilting

That's what I've been doing lately.

The Mystery Stole 4 is moving along nicely - I completed Clue 2 Friday, the day Clue 3 was released; I started Clue 3 on Saturday evening and knitted about 10 rows before bed. I thought it was going really quickly and that I'd finally progressed to the point where I would be able to keep up with a knitalong. Then I realized that all these clues will need to be done a second time for the other half of the stole. Some of the knitters are doing both halves at the same time but I thought that might be too confusing for me, especially with having to learn to knit with beads. Oh, well. At least I've learned some chart tricks, such as writing in the number of stitches when there is a long run of knit, and highlighting the symbol for a stitch and also all those stitches. That really helps when there are both left-leaning and right-leaning decreases. I'm highlighting the ssk in orange and leaving the k2tog alone. I've also rescued a metal bulletin board from the grandchildren's toy box and am using it for my chart. I cut a magnetic strip the length of the chart, attached a piece of ribbon to the sticky side and use that to mark my row. All of this really speeds the process. There aren't any beads in Clue 3 so it should go even more quickly.

Friday evening the granddaughters arranged my Burger Queen Mystery Quilt blocks for me and I sewed them together on Saturday. Today I added a 1" rust-colored inner border; still need to add two more borders before the top is finished. I'm still planning to piece the backing - need to keep using that stash!

Back to Normal

We've been back home for almost a week but I'm just now feeling that the trip is really over. I think it takes a while to come down from that feeling of being free, with no responsibilities. When I was still working, the job brought me down immediately, but now I can sort of coast in.


The garden was well taken care of while we were gone, even though the temps were close to 100 for several days in a row. Our neighbor watered regularly and our daughter and her family came over every weekend to do what needed to be done. The green beans appear to be pretty well finished. I think this is way too early for them to give up, so today I picked every bean I could find and tomorrow I will give them a good watering and some fish emulsion. Maybe I can bring them back for another month. The tomatoes are flopping all over the place which makes it hard to pick them. But they are producing like crazy and we should have enough to supply the family as well as the freezer. The figs are ripening slowly. We get a few every day and they are really yummy. The zucchini are still poking along but nothing like they did a couple of months ago. We pulled up the cucumbers and most of the lettuce before we left, so we are reduced to buying lettuce until my new crop is ready.


On the knitting front, I've finished Clue 1 in Mysterystole 4 knitalong. I know I already have two unfinished lace projects but this one has beads and I just couldn't resist it. I found the beads at Sun Country Gems in old town Albuquerque on our way home. I've never knitted with beads before but it's actually quite easy. These 29 rows only took me 3 evenings. What a difference from the Anniversary shawl - one row takes about an hour, assuming I don't have to correct a mistake. I'm hoping to get caught up with Clue 2 before Clue 3 is released Friday, and then stay caught up, using any extra time to work on the Anniversary shawl. The Spring Surprice shawl will just have to wait until these two are finished. It is by far the most difficult and I should be a much better lace knitter by the time I go back to it.

Today was the first time I turned the sewing machine on since we got home. I finished the extra blocks for the Burger Queen quilt and now they are waiting for the grandchildren's next visit. I don't do random very well so I'm going to have them arrange the blocks in a 4x5 rectangle, then I will sew them together, add the border, and they'll be ready to baste and quilt. Actually, I will probably do a pieced backing to use up even more of my stash. That's the same stash that was somewhat enhanced by visits to four quilt shops in Missouri and Arkansas. But that's another story...

Fritters on Friday

Thanks to "Carolyn in Ohio" from the Stashbusters Mystery Quilt Yahoo group, I have a new recipe for Zucchini Fritters. I had never eaten fritters but, I've got to tell you, these are really good! KAS did the video; she and her sister anxiously counted the fritters and were a little upset that I didn't get the 20 specified in the recipe. I guess I made them a little bigger than they were supposed to be.



The results were better than hoped for. The girls wolfed them down and even my Mom, who rarely asks for seconds, had a second helping of these.

Green Beans for Dinner

This was our green bean planting on July 7. The plants were racing towards the top of the trellis but there was no sign of any beans. Every day I would go out and search with no results. When they made it to the top and there were still no blossoms, I was beginning to think that maybe I should be topping them. But then, one day last week, there were a few blossoms, then more; finally, last weekend, there were some itty-bitty beans.





Yesterday I deemed them large enough to pick and found these magnificent seven. We put them in the fridge to wait for enough more to make a meal. And today I did a really thorough search and did find enough for a small serving for each of us. I steamed them for a few minutes and they were tender and yummy. If past experience is anything to go by, we should have more than we can use in another couple of weeks.



The Week 4 clue in the Burger Queen Mystery Quilt was published yesterday. This time it's 3" blocks - lots of them! I have been reading one of Judy Martin's scrap quilt books and she uses her bias square ruler to make half-square triangles. I bought one years ago but have never actually used it for a quilt, just played around with it a little. So I decided to try it to make all these 1.5" hst's. I don't think it saves any time but it does make them easier to handle. The easiest thing would be to use the Easy Angle ruler and sew the triangles together but I don't think my elderly hands could manage such tiny pieces. I probably should learn to paper piece!

More Apricot Content

This is an Apricot Upside-Down cake. It was supposed to be made in a cast iron skillet but none of my cast iron has been used in such a long time that it all needs to be cleaned up and seasoned again. So I used my square Pampered Chef dish and inverted it onto a small cookie sheet when it was done. Worked very well and we had it for dessert tonight. Really good! I used Blenheims from our own tree. We still have quite a few that are not yet ripe, so we'll probably be eating them for at least another week. Meanwhile, the older apricot tree now has some ripe fruit. I'm not sure what variety it is, possibly Moorpark. But the fruit is quite large, even though we didn't do any thinning. Very tasty as well, but of course not as good as the Blenheims.

I picked more lettuce a couple of days ago. We only planted about 2 square feet and we are getting more than we can use. The Arugula has started flowering but the leaves are still edible. I usually throw in a few Basil and spinach leaves for variety. After I wash them, I store them in a plastic box in the fridge and they keep fresh for several days. We always have clean greens for salads and sandwiches. I haven't tried using the Arugula flowers yet but I hear they are delicious on salads.


The grandcats stayed with us last weekend while their family vacationed in Napa. Luke quickly found a nest in my fabric shelves. He was so careful - didn't disturb anything, didn't even shed on the fabric. What a great cat! Meanwhile his brother Duke disappeared under the bed in the sewing room. He surfaced occasionally to hiss at us and presumably to eat and use the catbox, although we never saw him actually do either.

I've been working on Clue 3 of the Burger Queen Mystery quilt. This week it's 6" blocks, thirteen of them, so it's taking a while. At the same time, I'm still sewing four-patches and split 9-patches for the Orange Crush Mystery Quilt. Also working on the Ballerina baby quilt.

Friday was Pie Day

Our neighbor brought us a box of their Blenheim apricots so a pie had to be made. The recipe I used called for Minute tapioca, a cup of sugar and a bit of cinnamon and nutmeg. The crust is a plain one but made with lard instead of shortening. We switched because of the trans fat issue but now that I read the lard label, it also has hydrogenated fat in it. DH doesn't like crust made with butter and neither of us likes the taste of the reformulated shortening, so I'm not sure what to do at this point. Maybe I should just use whatever, figuring that we don't eat pies very often, so it shouldn't make much of a difference.


The box of apricots was still not empty, so I made this apricot salsa to put on the grilled chicken. It also has red sweet pepper, a hot pepper (Fresno from Mom's salsa garden), cilantro and lime juice. I also put in a little chopped red onion that I found in the fridge. I like the crunch it added.


These are the blocks I made for the Burger Queen Mystery quilt. The blue is my background fabric and the flowered is my focus fabric. I originally misunderstood the directions and made the block on the right side. I really didn't like it much so, when I found out my error, I did the one on the left. I liked it a lot better and I now have 5 twelve inch blocks and 5 nine inch blocks and am waiting for the next clue. I may use the other blocks on the back of the quilt. Or maybe in a scrap quilt.

I'm also working on a scrappy mystery quilt called Orange Crush. This one is now over, so I have all the clues printed out, although I am still working on Clue 1. That one involves making 150 4-patches and I'm doing those as "leaders and enders" while sewing other things. So Orange Crush may take a while.

Fabric Choices for the Burger Queen Mystery Quilt

The flowered fabric is my focus fabric and the other two are candidates for the background. I am leaning towards the blue but it may be too directional. I had originally picked a different focus fabric but I don't have three yards of that one.