Quilting with friends

Quilting with friends is always lovely and often very helpful! Recently Anita helped me to spray sandwich my wonky star quilt. Not only that but when I started this quilt she let me and Eline go through her scrap boxes to find fabric for this quilt and we found a lot! It appears that her scrap boxes were filled with scraps from another bee member, Irma, so her fabrics wound up in this quilt as well, as did some scraps from Jantine. Great fun to work with friends’scraps!

 

And last week was a lovely, quillty kind of week.

 

First, on Saturday I went to Petra’s shop again. Hadn’t been there in a long time and as usual the place was full of inspiration.

 

Then on Tuesday, I went over to Emma’s, (quilt)friend/almost neighbour for a morning of sewing. She is working on the Robin’s Nest quilt, so beautiful. I admire her, not only because her work is so precise, but she has a quality which I lack: she finishes one quilt before starting another………no ufo’s at Emma’s!

 

 

That same evening it was bee night at my place. Unfortunately three ladies could not make it but still lots of different work around the table.

And the next day a friend came over from Heemstede for an afternoon of sewing. Like me she has had a period of several years without quilting and recently took it up again. She is taking the applique course at The Sampler, with great results.

 

Having friends over is a nice opportunity to try some baking again, I made these: sour cream pop cookies.

They are like soft cookies and they were yummy. I used this recipe, but without the frosting. And for the ‘shortening’ I used about 75 grams of margarine.
The cups and spoons measurements mentioned in this recipe are the regular American sizes.

 

I got my sets over 25 years ago when a friend brought them from the US for me, at the time it was impossible to get them over here, but maybe these days they can be bought at  good cookery shops in The Netherlands also.

That was my week and it was nice one, how was yours?

Phyllis







The good and the bad

Yesterday fellow Feathergirl Hubertine and myself had a chance to see our  Feathergirl projects together as finished tops:

My Jacob’s Ladder top was already sandwiched with the help of quilt friend and fellow bee member Anita at her terrace (it was a bit windy, so we needed some boxes to keep everything from flying away), she has become an ace at this and her help is very much appreciated, Hubertine’s quilt will follow at a later date

 



 

 

 





Anita has no blog, such a shame, she makes wonderful, beautiful, mostly modern quilts and many of them too…

 

The granny squares are coming along nicely too, I am enjoying making them very much

 

 

I needed the distraction of this crochet project because a few weeks ago a strange spot behind my left ear was diagnosed as skin cancer and had to be removed promptly. That left me looking like this

 



Last week, luckily, I got the all clear, it was all removed, so after my appointment at the clinic I treated myself to a nice latte at nearby Pierre’s in Rotterdam, to …. exhale………….

 



My new found love for crochet seems to have an effect on Hubertine, she has now started her own granny square project, so yesterday we shared a nice afternoon in the garden with balls of cotton yarn, crochet hooks and fruit shakes

 



The afternoon was followed by a healthy, slimline dinner, I made a recipe I found at David’s blog (click for the recipe) not so long ago and which has become a favourite our household since: prawn curry in coconut milk:

 

 

This weather may hold for a few more days, enjoy it!

Phyllis



 





New blocks and a visit

This week I finished blocks 7 and 8 of the King George III quilt.

My blocks (or rather circles) so far:

Then, at the Blogger’s Bee in February Hubertine and I were invited to visit the their weekly bee again, so that’s what we did one evening last week.

At the Bloggers Bee I also met Rennie for the first time and we have mailed a few times since. In one of those mails I promised to bake her a banana bread (which I had also made for the pot luck lunch at the Bloggers Bee) so this was a good opportunity to make good on my promise. Since Yvonne had invited me initially months ago and was also the host I of course could not arrive without making her one as well, and while I was at it decided to make a third banana bread for the other ladies to enjoy that evening. Phew!

I promised to put the link of the recipe on my blog, you can find it here.

There is one thing I add to the recipe: 50 grams of chopped walnuts for some extra bite and I always put 5 walnuts on top before I put it into the oven.

Waiting at the bee were the gifts Shannon made for the participants of the Bloggers Bee, but which unfortunately arrived too late for that, lovely crochet flower brooches. Such a nice gesture from Shannon, this is the one I chose:

The evening was great, lovely ladies (and two very well behaved dogs), nice projects, laughs and a glass of wine. More on this evening here.

Hubertine showing off her quilting skills at the bee.

Thanks ladies for your hospitality and also Shannon for your gift, it was a fun evening!

Phyllis

On a diet? Look away now!

Earlier this week some girls of my bee came over for a day of sewing and trading holiday stories.

I thought I’d make them a real American treat,

Peach Cobbler!

I found some recipes on the internet and made my own recipe by mixing them up into one recipe and doing what was simplest (simplify, simplify, that is my attitude towards cooking), so here is my Peach Cobbler recipe.

I used American cup sizes, but if you don’t own these, I weighed the items,  the Dutch/European equivalent is in brackets.

Ladies on a post-holiday diet, look away now!

100 gr of butter
1 cup of sugar (190 gr), I used fine sugar
1 cup of self-rising flour (125 gr)
1 cup of milk (200 ml), I used low fat, because that’s what I had in the fridge
1 large tin of halved pieces in syrup (822 gr)
pinch of salt
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp cinnamon

Preheat oven to 190C/375F (I have a fan oven, if you do not you should probably heat your oven to 200C). Drain and slice up the peach halves. Put the butter in a glass casserole (the one I used is 18 x 28 x 5 cm) and put it in the oven for the butter to melt. Make sure it does not bubble or burn.

Mix the sugar, salt and the self-rising flour in a bowl with a (wooden) spoon, then slowly blend in the milk and the vanilla. Keep stirring until the lumps have gone, then pour this mixture over the melted butter, do not stir anymore! I know it looks really strange at this point, but it will turn out fine (also at this point you can see why you should stay well clear of this when you’re on a diet, allllll that butter & sugar!).

Divide the peach slices evenly over/in this mixture, sprinkle a  little bit of cinnamon on top and put it in the oven for about 30-40 mins. As this will be different with each oven so start checking after 30 mins how your cobbler looks. When it looks like the picture above take it out, leave to cool for a few minutes and spoon it out to serve in small bowls. It should be served warm and if you want to live really dangerously, some vanilla ice cream slowly melting on top of your piece of cobbler will be just the thing!

Enjoy!

With the weather being nice to us, we had a lovely day working on our projects, in Anita’s case, showing the projects done during the holidays, honestly, the speed at which she is turning out quilts, she puts us all to shame, and her quilts are time and time again so original and colourful!

 

See who is trying to get everyone’s attention?!

Jantine talked about her trip to the Birmingham Quilt Festival, Hubertine worked feverishly on a  s e c r e t  project, Sandra stopped by with cute, cute Charlie, who has grown so much over the summertime! And Irma, Lilou and myself just chatted the day away….

It was great seeing each other all again, a nice kick-off for a new quilting season!

 Phyllis