Wren's Nest

Tea Towel Swap Idea and more yummy desserts!

Happy Monday! Last night I made this yummy tart from the recipe on the Cream Puffs in Venice blog. So far, I've had great luck with the recipes from her. This one is so summery and pretty (my crust got a little wonked when I took the tart pan out after baking the crust, but we saved it and it looks ok - not as pretty as it could have). The filling is heavenly! It is my recipe of the week this week, so give it a try. She also has a really pretty apricot tart featured on her blog - that's next in my fruit dessert line-up. On Friday, we grilled peaches and had them with homemade ice cream - wow! really good and so simple!

On the tea/dish towel note, I was thinking of putting together a tea/dish towel swap where I would partner people up and they could send each other 2 dish towels, the story behind the towels and a recipe. Since I know this is crazy time for many people with back to school thoughts starting, I would start it on 9/1 and have you mail your items on 10/15 (giving you 6 weeks). You could send a vintage
towel that you had or found at a thrift shop or flea market OR you could buy a new one and embellish it with embroidery, crocheted edging, iron on transfers, whatever. You just couldn't buy a new, undecorated one and send that. Anyway, before I got too much further into the idea I just wanted to put it out there to see if there is ANY interest at all - I know it's a little while away, but I thought that would give everyone time to think about if they want to do it and time to make or find what they'd like to send to their partner.

If you are interested (you're not committing at this time - it's just for me to see if there are enough people to try it), please either comment or e-mail me at [email protected]. I hope some of you want to participate!! I think it could be a lot of fun!

Well, off to do more applique (for other people), but I may have a quilt (of my own!) to share later this afternoon that just came back from the machine quilter - I'm picking it up from my friend today. Enjoy your day!

Beautiful Sunday

OK, I am finally doing a Beautiful Sunday post. I kept meaning to and then I'd get an idea in my head of what it should be and then we'd end up not doing whatever I thought we should be or it was too hot to go out and do anything, blah, blah, blah (excuses, excuses). Then I realized that anything that makes me happy on a Sunday is really the idea - it doesn't have to be a big excursion or anything like that. So, it's the little things. This morning, my husband made breakfast and brought it to me (egg and Canadian Bacon in an English Muffin), sliced peach and coffee and the NY Times. Perfect! I just hung out and enjoyed it (after I took my picture). Plus, breakfast is on a new little plate he surprised me with last night - he'd been at the store and seen some of these cute plates and thought I'd like them, so he bought me 3. They're lovely!! I don't know what the rest of the day holds, but this was a nice way to start.

Thanks for all the nice welcomes to Marshmallow - she really appreciates them (and my daughter was so excited when I showed the comments to her and enjoys the fact that her hamster is famous!).

Meet Marshmallow

Marshmallow is the newest addition to our family (which includes 5 people, one dog -who thinks he's a person, 2 rabbits and one fish). She is my daughter's new baby hamster. The picture is of her in her cage because we can't hold her for a week so that she's not traumatized by the move from Petco. Meg had a lovely little hamster named Pudding, who passed away about 4 months ago. Meg had her for a little over two years and her death was hugely traumatic - Meg handled it really well, but it was incredibly sad because she was the sweetest little creature(her name was Pudding because she looked like chocolate and vanilla pudding swirled together and her ears were brown with white polka dots). She never bit, was always just happy to play. I had a real soft spot for Pudding. She's stand up on her little hind legs and look like one of the Brambly Hedge mice. Marshmallow is very sweet too - she's light grey and white with little black shoe button eyes (and also looks like she could be wearing an apron and appearing in a Brambly Hedge book). We don't really know her personality yet, but hope she's as sweet as Pudding - of course, she needs to be herself! Meg has been reading fairy stories to her so that she'll get used to Meg's voice. It's very sweet. She's also set out a countdown to when she can hold the hamster. Here's to Marshmallow and a happy healthy life with her new family! (of course, as a hamster I can't imagine there would be anything better than living with a 9 year-old animal loving girl who reads you fairy stories).

Getting Spoiled!

Well, I am getting spoiled - almost everyday I have a special little something in my mailbox. Yesterday when the mail arrived, I had a gift from my sweet on line friend, Lauren. She sent me a beautiful package full of many of my favorite things! She sent a lovely nest, great almond scented oatmeal soap, yummy lip balm (which I am having to hide from my daughter) and the sweetest bird notecards, which, I almost ordered from Paper Princess last week! How did she know?? Thank you Lauren - I love it all - really so thoughtful of you!!

To stay in theme - I had ordered this precious little sign from Amy Rue and it arrived too! I'll be putting on the door of my studio/workroom (when I have one, when we finally remodel!) Right now, it'll have to hang somewhere in the dining room where I work now.

What a nice way to end an afternoon - little gifites and packages full of lovely, nesty things!!

Happy Mail!

Wow - I love this blogging thing because I have met such nice people and been exposed to such cute things and swaps and everything that I never knew existed before! I went down to Los Gatos yesterday and visited my friend, who I have been friends with since we were 9 and it's always so great to spend time with her and her boys (who my kids adore). So after a fun morning and afternoon, we came home and my kids got the mail and said - wow mommy, we got a lot of packages. (OK, two of them are from the school with 9 gazillion forms to fill out for Welcome Back Days in August- UGH!). But one was from my Vintage Button Swap partner(she is on the ball, I tell you - I have not sent my package yet) and it is all these wonderful vintage buttons, PLUS, this great vintage rick rack, two wonderful fabrics and a beautiful handmade card. Thank you so much Amy!! The fabrics are a 30's fabric (which I also used as a background for the pictures of my next treats) and the other is a great eyelet-y fabric that reminds me of pinafores my grandma made me when I was little.

I also received this fantastic package from Vicki's very talented daughter Grace who makes the most amazing teeny tiny goodies and sells them at their etsy shop - and even the packaging is adorable. I'm breaking out the old dollhouse furniture because I think that I have a baker's rack where these can sit (I'll post it if I can find it!). These are just so beautiful and the detail is truly amazing (and they look so real that my little guy asked if they were to eat!). Lovely mail!(Well, this is a pink post, isn't it!)

Japanese Craft Books

Hi Ladies - I have received many questions about ordering from Yes Asia and since I've only done it once, I'm probably not the best person to give advice. I went back to their site and I know that I clicked Books and then Japanese Books and from there, I may have gone to Crafts or I may have done a search by title since I knew one of the books I wanted. The book titles I got are:

Design collection for kids ISBN4-529-04204-9 and
Point ISBN4-277-31148-2

I had originally found Design Collection for Kids at Kitty-Craft, but when I went back, I couldn't find it again, but I knew the name (or maybe I searched through the 8 million craft books at Yes Asia, who knows, when I get my mind on something, I can't give up until I find it - scary, I know!). Yes Asia doesn't charge shipping if you buy more than $25 (which isn't hard to do). The Kitty-Craft site is really cute, though. I also found some really cute wool felting and needle felting books on Kitty Craft, so I'll probably order those soon since these books were so nice.

Good luck and enjoy you books!!

Doozy of a morning

Well, it's good I have some nice things from yesterday to share because this morning has been a doozy! My husband left for NY at 5am, so I hung out a while and then went back to sleep - to be woken up by my oldest son telling me that we have an ant problem. I must say I've been wondering when those little creepy crawlies were going to try to invade, but why, why is it always when John is not home (the same thing happened last year). Not that I can't handle it - I had the ant spray out faster then you can imagine (actually I used window cleaner, but whatever works...). Then, I come back to bed for a little blogging, with my coffee and proceed to spill the REALLY hot coffee all over myself (and the bed). So, off to the washer with all that. Not sure how bad the burns on my legs are, but I guess we'll figure that out at the day goes along. It really only hurts when I walk. That on top of some weird, kind of bad little things that happened yesterday, all I could really do this morning is laugh (hysterically, yes, but it's better than crying!). OK, so enough of the self-pity party - on to the really good stuff from yesterday!

I did finish hemming my skirt and wore it yesterday evening - very sassy with that little flouncy ruffle on the back. I also made 3 new tomatoes - not Roma, the round heirloom-y kind and I really like how they turned out. Sorry for the kind of weird colors, my camera doesn't seem to be reading them right (especially the red).

The absolute BEST thing yesterday, which I was so excited about that I almost posted twice yesterday, but decided to wait is that I got my Japanese craft books for YesAsia! I didn't expect them until August, so it was a really nice surprise. Here they are:
They have so many beautiful ideas in them and are so cute I can hardly stand it! I'm so excited and can't wait to start embroidering. I tried to take pics of the pages I especially like, but kept getting a glare, so I'll try later today. I don't even know where to begin with the projects, there are so many. There is a really cute journal cover made of a striped tea towel (it looks like( embroidered with a girl walking her dog. Just the cutest! I'll get going on those as soon as I finish all my applique for everyone else - I'm meeting with my friend today who has two projects for me to applique for her and, bless her heart, wants them done by Aug. 4. Yikes! So that's what I'll be doing for the next couple of weeks.

OK - more ants have arrived, so I'm off...

Monday, Monday

Another boiling hot day here in Northern California. It was actually aboaut 113 here yesterday and is supposed to be a cool 106 today, but all of a sudden we have humidity. Yikes! So, we are trying to keep cool and do some fun stuff in the house. I am planning on trying to finish 2 projects.
One is an applique block for a block of the month that I am doing for the shop sample. I'm sure they'd like it at some point - this is block 6, they have the first 5 and I'm not sure that I can be the person to finish the whole thing. I am a pretty fast appliquer, but these take a long time (this block is actually one of the easier ones). It's a beautiful quilt called Vintage Valentine by Verna Mosquera.

This other project I started when it was still early spring and raining and cold and lovely! It was a class my friend Janis taught. It's a cute skirt with a ruffle in the back and even some little crystals attached with some cool melty wand thing. (I'm not really a bedazzeled kind of gal, but these were pretty subtle and I gave in to the pressures of the class - just a few crystals, though). (You'll be so kind as to ignore the wrinkled state of the skirt! Please!) I really just need to hem it - so maybe, just maybe it'll be finished today, but then again, those little softies from my new Wee Wonderfuls book are calling to me. My friend's little girl just turned one, so I'm thinking she really must have one and, you know, what's a new week without a new project... Hmmm, maybe this is why I have so many incomplete projects laying around!

Well, time to get those kids set up with a project or two or 20 to keep them busy and happy. The happy part, of course will involve some form of eating pretty much all day. Last night they made homemade ice cream with John - YUM! It was really so much better than the kind you buy! So maybe we'll try a new flavor today (if I have the ingredients). OR, I could just sit here and watch Knitty Gritty on DIY - my new favorite show...

Lemon Bars and Roma Tomatoes

Thank you so much for all of your great inspirational ideas - I'm amazed by the kindness of all of you taking the time to give me such great support. I have come up with a couple that I've made and have more in store...Sandy from Art Tea Life had the great idea to use the Lemon Bars with Blueberries theme from my Recipe of the Week. I used that to make this little lemon bar pincushion out of wool (yellow on top and tan on the bottom for the crust with rick rack on the sides, a wool leaf and needle felted blueberries) and for the pattern may include some embroidered lemon patterns for a tea towel and maybe a small table runner or something in those great yellow and blue-ish colors.

Since I make many fruit and veggie pincushions, I made this funny little Roma tomato to be part of a larger group of tomatoes, eggplants, carrots, etc. I made a couple of tomatoes (large and cherry), but those are at a shop and I forgot to take pictures (silly me!). I still need to bead the sides of the Roma, so I'll do that and make my vegetable medley and post that when it's done.

In the mail yesterday I got these cutie buttons from Thimble's button of the month - aren't they the cutest little mushrooms you've ever seen? I also got my book from Wee Wonderfuls - with the patterns for sweet softies, which are always fun to make.

So you were all right - inspiration is everywhere - I just needed some gentle reminders to look!

Summer Time Blues

Whew! It's hot here and I am not a hot weather person! It makes it almost impossible to get anything done. Couple that with having 3 kids home from school (or rather driving 3 kids around to friend's houses or picking up other kids to come here, sports camps, etc.). I seem completely incapapble of finishing anything! I need to get my motivation back! I have things I need to make and many of them are sitting here almost done, but I just can't quite finish...I have my little pincushion rounds and the birdie

pincushions in their nests, but I haven't finished gluing them in (a really small step and easy, but everytime I go to do it, something happens and then I end up just not feeling like dealing with it). I need to come up with a pattern idea for release at the Houston quilt market and a project for my friend's newsletter. Do you ever just seem to have run out of original ideas? What do you do to get motivated and moving??? Any helpful hints would be greatly appreciated!! Thanks for all the nice feel better thoughts yesterday - those migraines just stink, but I feel better today! Enjoy your afternoon!

P.S. After reading about Project Runway on these blogs, I watched two last night and WOW - I am hooked! On the first one, I knew that lady was toast when she couldn't work the machine, but in the 2nd one, I was sad about Malan (especially when he said he was ashamed and had never had many friends - geez! They should have gotten rid of the mean girl!).