• Around home - Blog - Kitchen

    T Tuesday: apple days edition

    Happy Tuesday everyone! This past weekend is one I both love and hate each year. It’s the weekend we help pick apples at our neighbors house. They have 5 trees that are HUGE!! As in you need an extension ladder huge.

    apple days

    (This is just a 6 foot ladder…)

    Some of their family comes over as well as several of us neighbors. We spend  the morning picking then bring our bags of apples home and usually the afternoon or next day processing.

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    This year we didn’t make time for processing over the weekend. Everyone was going here and there it seemed. Sleepover, Manhattan choir fundraiser, fabricating and 3D printing in the garage and of course, leaving time to watch our Vikings play the Packers (the big border battle) in the inaugural game in the new stadium…SKOL Vikings! Our Vikings won-BTW!!!

    On to Monday…this was my morning view complete with coffee as fuel for the day ahead….

    apple days

    Normally I process in the garage for more room but since I was doing it solo I brought the garage can inside.

    apple days

    After hours of peeling I had every extra large container I own full of sliced apples.

    apple days

    As well as a stock pot full cooking down to sauce. And the dehydrator with 6 trays loaded.

    I ended up with 7 quarts that I canned…

    apple days

    The rest went into gallon freezer bags to be made into sauce at a later date.

    apple days

    As you can see by this photo it was now after 3pm and I was exhausted,

    apple days

    I also managed to get two loads of laundry washed during that time.

    apple days

    So my grand total for the day was: 7 quarts apple sauce canned, 2 quarts in fridge, 4 gallon bags of prepped apples in freezer, and a quart bag of dehydrated slices.

    So like I said when I started…apple days…I have  a love/hate relationship with them.

    Today I’m going to have coffee with some friends then likely come home and can a few pints of diced tomatoes…or else pull up the garden and do the tomatoes tomorrow before the next round of rain.

    What are you doing today?

  • Blog - Crafts - Creativity

    T Tuesday: scrap quilt edition

    Thanks for joining me today for T stands for Tuesday with Elizabeth and the gang. I missed last week completely and for the life of me, I can’t even remember what kept me from my weekly post!!! Oh well…on with the show!

    scrap quilt in progress

    I’ve been sorting through my bins of fabric and separating out all the long strips and random shapes to be cut down for my new string quilt project. This pile is 70% blues as I was collecting them for a little boy quilt over a decade ago.  After ironing, I cut each piece down to between 1.5 and 2.5 inches wide.

    scrap quilt progress

    I am piecing the quilt using paper squares with a white strip down the center to serve as a design element in the completed quilt. I’ve used a gluestick to adhere it to each sheet so they are ready to go as I sew. I just eyeballed it so they won’t be perfect but I’m ok with that. It is a scrappy quilt after all.

    scrap quilt in progress

    I shortened my stitch length so that the paper gets perforated and is easy to remove from the fabric once trimmed.

    scrap quilt in progress

    I have a nice little stack of them already.

    scrap quilt in progress

    And look how fun they are going to look when sewn together.

    scrap quilt in progress

    Colorful and scrappy. The other really fun thing for me is that it will be sort of a memory quilt or perhaps fabric journal of previous projects, clothing I’ve salvaged and reminders of people who have passed on but a little part of them lives on for me in the fabric as a memory.  Now just look at that, I’m getting all nostalgic.

    Since this is a post about quilts on T stands for Tuesday, I thought it was a good time to share a bottle of wine my in-laws brought over. I remembered to nab a photo at the very last glass.

    barn quilt wine

    It’s called Barn Quilt Red. This winery is one of three in a small town west of here. The soil must be good for grapes out there. This wine gives a nod to the barn quilts of Carver County.

    barn quilt wine

    The barn quilts are really cool. I haven’t seen all 24 but the ones I have seen are really cool. In fact I think I have a photo of one here on the blog somewhere…hmmm….must look now….here it is!

    rural landscape 1

    This one can be seen from the MN Landscape Arboretum.

    Anyway…more sewing, ironing and cutting,,,not necessarily in that order are in store for me as well as the standard household duties.

    What are you doing today?

  • Around home - Outdoors

    T Tuesday: cats edition

    Last week for T stands for Tuesday I had wanted to share a video with you. I am 99% sure it will work but first I want to give you a little back story.

    We have a stray cat that keeps coming around. It’s really friendly to a point…such as it rubs itself all over you but if you pet it “improperly to its standards” it will spit at you. I have yet to figure out if its a boy or girl or if it still has front claws. Close inspection is definitely not allowed with this one.

    pumpkin

    Look at it’s funny tail. It’s curly like a pug dog. So weird and cute at the same time. We’ve taken to calling it Pumpkin for the gender neutral name. We do feed and water Pumpkin when he visits usually once a week. It comes when I call to it so it makes me think that it has a home but for goodness sake…keep it inside then.

    Marvin is an inside only cat so these two have only met through the window screen. I think Pumpkin wants to be friends….

    [KGVID]http://www.halleshobbies.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/catmeeting.mp4[/KGVID]

    We’re thinking about building some sort of shelter for it as we are not sure if this cat has a safe and warm place to overwinter. Since Pumpkin is quite feral and possibly belongs to someone we hesitate to bring him in as well as the fact that we know nothing about his health.

    We are in search of another kitten though. We’ve visited a few and fell in love more than once. Who can resist a fluffy, playful kitten?!?

    I’m battling a sore throat currently…more tea with honey and lemon is in order.

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    What are you doing today?