Wizardly Cookery

Today I had the fun of spending time cooking with my friend Franky. She and I share a love of all things Harry Potter, so we had to try some recipes from her new Harry Potter cookbook.
She selected Pumpkin Juice, a favorite with the Hogwarts crowd and Knickerbocker Glory, a treat enjoyed by Dudley Dursley.
The pumpkin juice was a blend of three fruit juices mixed with baked pumpkin strained through a sieve…juice part was easy, but scooping the baked squash (we couldn't find pumpkin)  and sieving it required some persistence.
 

 
My friend Joanna joined us for part of the fun

We put the pumpkin juice in the refrigerator and took a break for lunch. Then we tackled the custard for the Knickerbocker Glory.
It was a basic custard recipe but required some kitchen skills like separating eggs (Franky’s way is easier than mine) cooking sugar, cornstarch and milk and adding the hot milk mix slowly to the beaten eggs. I had forgotten that the term for this is tempering.
While the custard chilled, we watched some football with Tom, (Franky’s team won, not Tom’s).
Then Franky prepared the whipped cream with my new Christmas present, a stick blender with a whisk attachment.

Next step: assembly. Ice cream in the bottom of the glass, followed by strawberries, jello custard, nuts, chocolate syrup and whipped cream. Can’t say I ever had jello and chocolate sauce in the same recipe.


We set the table, used crystal for the pumpkin juice and enjoyed our afternoon snack.

It was delicious

and clean up was easy

Beau - ootiful Soo - oop!

When I put this combination of beets, and carrots in the pot today, I couldn’t help but sing the Mock Turtle's song.

Beautiful Soup, so rich and red,
Served tonight with crusty bread!
Who for such dainties would not stoop?
Soup of the evening, beautiful Soup!
Soup of the evening, beautiful Soup!
Beau - ootiful Soo - oop!
Beau - ootiful Soo - oop!
Soo - oop of the e - e - evening,
Beautiful, beautiful Soup!
Apologies to the Mock Turtle and Lewis Carroll for adaptations.
It’s a dose of anti-oxidants, perfect for a winter evening, Beet, Carrot and Ginger Soup. After it simmered for a couple of hours, I whirred it with my new immersion blender. Yum!

Who says you can’t give a woman an appliance?

My new immersion blender is awesome! I made two soups this afternoon, and in a wink they were beautifully blended with very little extra clean-up. Move over Cuisinart, you have competition.


My husband is definitely not in the doghouse for giving me an appliance, as is the man pictured in this promotional for jewelry sales.

January Sketches

I’m being brave here in posting some very rudimentery drawings. But the sketchbook challenge is fun.  These are two quick sketches I did this week. The first one was a copy of a graphic that was in my newspaper, the second one was of some red threads I put on a table in my studio. When I finished the drawing, there was so much white space, I started drawing lines of stitches. I did the first one in a number 2 pencil. I did the second one in pencil, then colored it with red colored pencils.







I'm warming up for the January challenge sketch. The theme is "Highly Prized."

Do you know about Dover free images?

Every Friday the good people at Dover Publications send me the sampler for the week, showcasing their publications. I almost always get something fun from the sampler. Here’s an image I downloaded last week.

To quote a recent email, “There's a wealth of free samples from new titles to explore this week, giving crafters, designers, literature lovers, history buffs, and colorists hours of fun-filled activities. You can enjoy clip art of Japanese women and Wizard of Oz characters, excerpts from books about the Roaring 20s and slang, sample pages from four new coloring books, and more. “

Sketchbook Challenge

I have joined the sketchbook challenge beginning on January 1, 2011. I’ve got the book, now I just need the discipline! Mind you I’m a drawing school dropout, so perhaps an online coach and community will help me stay focused.

I understand that drawing is a learned skill,  so if learning to draw is  practice and discipline then I should see improvement. Right? I’ll keep you posted. If you want to join the challenge too, just click on the badge on the right sidebar.

Hail to the Chef!

Tom has become an expert with the gas grill and cedar planks. His crowing glory has been salmon cooked on a plank over a bed of herbs. Delicious!

To duplicate, soak a cedar plank in water for several hours. Preheat the grill to 375 degrees. On the plank, prepare a bed of fresh rosemary, thyme and lemon slices. Lay the salmon slices on top and sprinkle with olive oil and an herb or fish rub. Take to the grill  and cook for about 20-25 minutes or until salmon flakes easily.  We find we can use our planks several times.

Merry Christmas from Around the World

Here are some images from the New York Public Library digital collection.
Germany

France

Sweden

Poland

Spain

Italy (leave it to the Italians to get romantic)

Let it Dough!

Found this on Ricë Freeman-Zachery blog. It made me smile
A New York artist’s version of the creation of the world. Click on the picture to take you to the New York Times website.

In the sidebar of the NY Times website, you will find other examples of this artist’s work. I especially enjoyed Red Eye and Cables.

what I'm reading

A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens. This was a wonderful book. Even though I knew how it ended, I was spellbound for the last thirty pages. I may have to re-read Great Expectations. I was astonished to learn that Oprah had chosen those two books for her 2011 book list.

At Home by Bill Bryson could have been a lot shorter. It was interesting, but I've forgotten most of the interesting facts he wrote about. It was easy to pick up and put down.

Nature Girl by Carl Hiaasan, and Angels Flight by Michael Connely were audio books we listened to while traveling during Thanksgiving. It's easy to miss exits when you are in the midst of a mystery. Neither one memorable, but good travel companions.

Room by Emma Donoghue has the most unusual narrator of any book I've read recently. I don't want to give too much of it away, but the narrator is five year old Jack who has lived all his life with his mother in a single room. Very quick read that stays with you. I highly recommend this book.

Waiting for Snow in Havana and Waiting to Die in Miami by Carlos Eire are both fascinating books. I lived in Florida during the years leading up to and several years following the the Cuban revolution. Before he was deposed and went to live in Spain, the Cuban dictator Batista had a home in my community. For a few years I went to a private school which was also attended by Cuban children. I returned to public school in the winter of 1959 when armed bodyguards became a fixture at the school. Later in high school I became friends with two boys who were part of the Pedro Pan airlift. Between 1960 and 1962, 14,000 Cuban children left Cuba and their families for life in the United States.  Carlos Eire was one of those children and these two books tell his story of life in Cuba before the revolution and life in the United States after he left everything behind. Both are beautifully written books which I highly recommend.

Quick, inexpensive table decorations

I took responsibility for preparing the centerpieces for the children’s Christmas party this Wednesday night at our church. With a limited budget and even more limited time, I hemmed and hawed between the ready to plop on the table fake poinsettias and the gift bags to decorate and fill with tissue paper. I decided to go “arty” and decorated the gift bags with my motif for this season.  Each table will have three or four bags.

I never think about getting one of those Cricut products until I start cutting out 100 ornament shapes.

XEROX IS DOING SOMETHING COOL

If you go to this web site, http://www.letssaythanks.com/ you can pick out a thank you card and Xerox will print it and it will be sent to a soldier who is currently serving in Iraq. You can't pick out who gets it, but it will go to a member of the armed services.

How amazing it would be if we could get everyone we know to send one! It is FREE and it only takes a second.Wouldn't it be wonderful if our service men and women received a bunch of these? Whether you are for or against the war, our soldiers over there need to know that someone cares that they are away from family and friends.

This takes just a few seconds and it's a wonderful way to say thank you.

Mixed Media Christmas Collage

The tree is up, the cards are done, the shopping is nearly completed. I have a fun shopping trip and dinner with a friend coming soon, but it’s been too long since I’ve made art.
Inspired by Jenn Mason’s post, here’s a quick Christmas collage.


I used Christmas carol music sheets for the trees and embellished them by tying on gold jump rings, sewing on a fiber garland and adding tiny metal paper fasteners. For the night sky, I covered the black gesso with Payne's grey acrylic, with just a dab each of interference blue and iridescent stainless steel. While the paint was still tacky, I stamped some swirls which gave a bit of dimension. It was a fun project, and my first collage on a canvas board.

In the Christmas Spirit

We were traveling during Thanksgiving and came home with nasty colds. I’m feeling much better now, and the outside and inside of the house are now decorated.  Now it’s on to wrapping the gifts that are arriving after my online shopping spree.
In the meantime, I have been having fun cutting these gorgeous 5 point paper snowflakes from scrap paper. Photo is from the blog, How about Orange


click here for directions

Citrus season has begun

The new crop of oranges and grapefruit are ready, and so am I. Here’s our stash ready to share with friends and family over the Thanksgiving holiday.

Another thing I like about citrus season is the bags the grower gives me. They are great to cut up and use as stencils, rubbing plates, and other textural applications.

Happy Thanksgiving

I’m so enchanted by the images from the New York Public Library Digital Collection.

Enjoy the holiday!

Class at the Sewing Garret

Today I taught a class at the Sewing Garret, a quilt shop in Daytona Beach. We had a great time learning some basics of coaster construction, and making three different samples. I hope to be teaching another class on introduction to art quilting in January.


We did a bleach discharge technique which was new to most of the class. Lots of fun! For more information, click on the previous posts
coasters
bleach technique

My favorite painting product

Last year I took an online class, Color Beyond the Basics taught by Julie Prichard and Chris Cozen. I learned a lot about mixing paints, and I use the reference sheets I created every time I get out my paints.

One of the products I was introduced to was Acrylic Glazing Liquid. This stuff is wonderful. It does all the things Golden says it does in their product information sheet, but here’s how I use it.

1. Mix with acrylic paints to give more open time. Acrylic paints dry very quickly, glazing liquid mixed with the paint gives about 30 minutes of time to work.

2. Increases the transparency of paints. Mixed 1:1, you get the open time, mixed 10:1, your paints become transparent. Sure you can use water, but many paints separate with added water. The AGL gives great “brushability”.

3. Paint that has dried on your palette can be revitalized with a squirt of AGL.

4. Paintbrushes that have mistakenly been left to dry can be restored with an application of AGL. I had a $20 brush I thought was a goner, and AGL restored it.

5. Mistakes on your project can be erased with AGL.

It comes in both gloss and satin finish. I use the gloss because the satin finish has an ingredient that makes it somewhat opaque. The gloss is totally clear when dry.

Love it!

Great Days in the Studio

Yesterday morning the studio was brightly sunlit, and I began a painting project. In a previous post I wrote about how I use leftover paint to paint pages to use in later projects. I pulled out some of those pages and set them aside for further embellishment.

I gathered my supplies, paints, stencils and stamps.

I spent the morning, painting papers, and of course making some new pages with the left over paints.

I wanted a variety of colors in lights and darks, as well as bright and dull pages. Since my sketchbook pages are painted on both sides I painted both sides which doubles my options in using them.

I let them dry overnight and this morning I painted them with soft gel gloss mixed with iridescent paint. The soft gel makes them soft and pliable so they can be stitched by hand or machine. The addition of a little gold paint to the soft gel gloss adds a bit of sparkle and unifies the pages.

Alas, every good party must come to an end.

I’m working on a project using these papers which I plan to submit for publication. Yikes! I’ve said it out loud!

Completed coasters

I made these coasters to go with the new placemats and napkins I made a few weeks ago. Company is coming this week, so I am ready.

What I’m reading

I finished Freedom by Jeffrey Franzen. New book, lots of hype, but I liked it a lot. It was a very complex plot with lots of layers and recurring themes. Just what a great novel is supposed to be.

I took a break from current fiction and read The Good Earth, Pearl Buck’s Pulitzer prize winner from the ‘30’s. Excellent book, I understand how it has stood the test of time.

Ken Follett, World Without End is 929 pages of medieval history. This book has it all, sex, politics, back stabbing, black death, murder and romance. It was a page turner.

Loving medieval history, I couldn't help myself and started reading Ken Follett's companion to World without End, Pillars of the Earth. It was 983 pages long. More sex, treachery, concealed identities, and of course murder. The book culminates with the murder of the Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Becket in 1170.

Although I read it a couple of years ago, another medieval history novel was Year of Wonders by Geraldine Brooks. It's about a village affected by the plague that cut itself off from the outside world to prevent the villagers from leaving and infecting others.

For non-fiction, I read The Forger's Spell: A True Story of Vermeer, Nazis, and the Greatest Art Hoax of the Twentieth Century by Edward Dolnick. . Makes you wonder how many fakes are hanging in museums. Very good book.

Bury Your Dead, by Louise Penny. I do not recommend. It's about a murder investigation in Quebec. I don’t have enough background in Canadian history, especially Quebec separatists, to appreciate it. Don't know why I continued to read it except it had a mystery and I wanted to know what happened.

Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese. An absolutely splendid novel about complicated family relationships centered on twins abandoned at birth. Set in a mission hospital in Ethiopia and an urban hospital in the US, it was a fabulous book. Highly recommend.

Next up: A Tale of Two Cities. Charles Dickens classic about the French revolution. My sixth grade teacher read this book to us every day after lunch. I can remember the whole class being mesmerized by the story. Last year I read Anthony Trollope's The Way We Live Now, a loooong Victorian novel about greed, politics, power and financial ruin.

Eco Garland

No matter what the project, whenever I get out my paints, I also get out 5 or 6 inexpensive sketchbooks to paint pages using the excess paint. Paint is too expensive to throw away, not to mention the harm it does to the environment in washing it down the sink. So I use what’s left over to paint the pages, sometimes going back again to add stamping or textural techniques. I have no plan, not even a color scheme in mind.

This week, I coated some of the pages in soft gel medium mixed with just a bit of gold iridescent paint. I did this on both sides. Then I cut out Christmas ornament shapes. I used a decorative punch on the left over paper to make some stars and put them on with gel medium too. With the paper now stabilized it was easy to sew, and I knew it wouldn’t rip out. I used a zigzag stitch and sewed them together, punched a hole in either end and ran yarn through the holes to create a way to hang them.

Since the paper is painted on both sides, the garland is reversible.

I’m not finished with this idea yet. I see a lot more possibilities.

Happy Halloween

Anniversary

40 years ago today, Tom and I were married. From the photos we looked very much in love, we still are.

Happy Anniversary!

New Placemats and Napkins

The placemats and napkins I made a few years ago have become worn and stained. Time for some new ones. I started out to just make eight. When they were nearly competed I looked at all the white on them and started thinking about BBQ sauce spills and decided I would just use them when we had guests at the table. I used those four feature fabrics in all the placemats, but put them together so each mat is different. It’s a variation on the Lazy Girl pattern.

I had a lot of scraps left over, so I made these string ones for everyday use.

The napkins are two sided and serged with a rolled edge. I have a lot of bindings to hand stitch, but I enjoy doing that.

More Advent houses

Take a trip over to Lisa Cox’s blog spoonfullofsugargirls. She has posted a photo of my Advent houses. She’s the talented creator of the original pattern featured in Quilting Arts Gifts, and I was honored that she asked to post the photo on her blog. They have already left my home as a gift for Laurel and Jeremy. I just may have to make another set for me.

Mad Men

Tonight is the season finale of Mad Men. I am a fan. I love the sets, the clothes, the music, and of course, Don Draper. It’s the 60’s only better. The first time I saw it, I was reminded of the Broadway musical, How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying. In the early ‘70’s I had a part in a local production in Madisonville, KY. We practiced all summer and put on the show the last week of August. I was a member of the chorus and have never forgotten the number, “A Secretary is not a Toy.” Here’s a video from the 1967 film production.

Switching Gears

I recently made a list of things I wanted to accomplish in the studio. Some things are wet work, others strictly sewing machine and ironing board. Today I did some prep work with adhering paper to fabric.

I reworked some pieces that I didn’t like and made a couple of new ones in preparation for making more Christmas garlands, like this.

I’m thinking of making some of them vertical. I have some time to think about it because the next step is painting the paper and adding embellishments.

As soon as I get my studio cleaned up, and make sure my iron is ready to work with fabric, I’ll begin work on some placemats for Chez Clayton.