Guess what I was doing on my weekend vacation . . .

Stewed tomatoes and tomato vegetable medley: 23 pints, 10 quarts.

Bread and butter pickles: 21 jelly jars, 5 pints, 2 quarts.

Times I washed my hands: 274

Times I washed dishes: Lost count!

The left over veggies were chopped into bits and layered with salt for chow chow. I've never made this before, but will use the same vinegar / sugar / spice combination for bread and butters.

The Ball Blue Book has a recipe entitled "garbage relish"! It includes everything left in the garden such as green tomatoes, peppers, onions, etc. You'd chop it up and make relish with it.

Maybe folks still do. But, since I don't care for relish, I'll try chow-chow. Same principle, different brine recipe. Things can get interesting in my kitchen! Wanna come for supper - LOL.

Here's Dolly wondering just when, if ever, I'm going to leave the kitchen.

Since the rain came, I did not get any more exterior painting done as planned. Nor did the pup get a bath, but there's always next weekend.

Oh wait, I've ordered 2 more boxes of tomatoes . . . ut oh.

Until then, keep stitchin' . . .

Contrary to the east coast,

our weather was picture perfect on Saturday, so we loaded up the coolers and set off for . . .


the Mennonite Farmer's Market in Delano, Tennessee.

This is one busy market in the middle of pretty much nowhere off of a road called Needle Eye. (I know you'll love that.) The trick is to be there when they open as shelves empty fast.

The homemade bread was delicious. The plums, tomatoes, peppers, and cantelope were so fresh and crisp they sparkled.

Driving home I took pictures of the beautiful Ocoee Gorge, home to the 1996 summer Olympic competition. The river was full of rafters and boy was it a lovely day for it.

The board on top of the bus is to hold the rafts. They go and pick up the rafters at the end of their run.

By Sunday evening, I had processed 7 quarts and 15 pints of tomatoes, onions, peppers, thyme, and basil. Chopping everything by hand made for a long day, but it will be worth it when the snow flies.

Despite the busy weekend, I stayed tuned to Yahoo news and thought often of all of my east coast friends and family. Thank goodness, everyone is safe and well.

Until then, keep stitchin' . . .

From the left upper corner, page 74,

of the book, "A Gallery of Amish Quilts" . . .

comes yet another basket block idea. This one uses 10 HST's per block.

I began by sheeting up a 16" x 19" piece of blue and red. Then drew out a grid of 2-3/4" squares. (If you're not familiar with the technique to speed sew HST's, please e-mail me directly.)

This is my test block and I'm still working out the kinks, but I'll share all of the measurements next time.

Until then, keep stitchin' . . .

A teeeny tiny bit of

sewing is going on in the studio today.

Thank you Susan for sharing this lovely pattern. It's a great way to play with color combinations using a minimum of fabric. And when I say minimum, I mean just that. The center bars are cut 1" wide and 6" long. Starching fabric before cutting out any pieces is the key and really simplifies assembly. I changed the pattern a bit and added corner squares to mine.

Here's Dolly playing jungle dog. I'm not sure if she is looking for turtles or Tarzan.

It's cooling off slightly here with a high of 90 today, but 86 tomorrow. Ya-hoooey.

Until then, keep stitchin' . . .

STOP the presses!

It's time to begin a new project.


Just shove those 47 other baggies, tops, and UFO's to the side and join me won't you.

Windham website was kind enough to post this free pattern.

http://www.windhamfabrics.net/images/project/baltimore_square.pdf

Download and start your motors. All we need are 16 favorite fabrics. Wooo hooo.

Until then, keep stitchin' . . .