Craft-A-Little

I know that I still owe you some pictures on my last post!  I finished a lot of things!  I really need to get my electronic situation worked out!  Anyway, I have some things that I want to update you on- even though there will be no picutres in my post again. 

• First- I have joined in the Joy in the New Year Challengethat Jaquie is hosting.  I am excited!  I will put my list of what I need to accomplish up in the next couple of days.
• There is also a give away over on the Flea Market Fancy Freaks blog- this is an exciting one since this fabric has been discontinued and is really hard to find!

• I got another book from the library- this one is is Artisian Bread in 5 minutes a day.  This one is on my Christmas list already and I haven’t even baked anything out of it yet!  I did buy a dough container and yeast today at the store.  So I will put my 5 minutes in today and tomorrow I will have fresh baked bread!  I plan on making some sandwhich bread- I don’t want to buy it anymore.  It is too expensive.  Especially since I like high quality bread. 

Ok- I have some knitting that I need to  finish by next week!  I had better get some work done on that while Little Helper is napping!

I had a fabulous weekend.  My husband, daughter and I did not leave the house once for the last 2 days and it was awesome.  We were somewhat limited by our new strict budget and the beginnings of potty training of Little Helper.(She spent the last 2 days running around in no diaper and no pants!  She seems to like it.  And she is doing a GREAT job so far- thanks for asking!)

Anyway, I had an extremely relaxing weekend.  I spent most of it in the kitchen which felt like coming home.  I haven’t cooked- really cooked- in a long time.  As far as my domestic hobbies go, my first love is cooking.  Over the last few years I just haven’t felt like I have had the time to really cook the way I used to.  I haven’t been able to experiment or try things new.  Or spend the day in the kitchen if I wanted to.  And I did!  I spent 2 days in the kitchen this weekend.  It was WONDERFUL. 

I started my weekend with plans to make gnocchi for the first time.  I also wanted to make eggplant Parmesan and vegetarian chili (2 things that I have made many, many times).  This would satisfy my need for experimentation and for using up some of my CSA veggies.  And I would end up with pretty tasty food and I shouldn’t need to cook this week.  Well- I am going to.  I am going to make some ribs in my crock pot on Tuesday.  Mmmmmm…

My gnocchi recipe came from a coworker.  I made some in culinary school, but hadn’t made it since.   I originally was going to borrow the gnocchi board from my coworker as well.  When I found out that they were $4.75, I purchase one myself.  We used forks in culinary school.  The board works way better.  And they look quite a bit better too.  Check them out!

Yes- those are my hands.  I should hand model.   

This was Saturday’s work.  I put them on a sheet pan and froze them.  Now I have  bag of gnocchi waiting for me to eat it whenever I am ready!  They do not have to be defrosted before cooking, so this is an easy weeknight meal.  Nice! 

I multi-tasked when I made the gnocchi.  I made the eggplant parmesan at the same time.  I use a recipe from Cook’s Illustrated and I love it.  I have made it so many times that I don’t even need to refer to the recipe anymore.  I do make more sauce than it calls for.  I like a lot of sauce. 

I usually get 6 meals out of this.  But my eggplants were smaller this time, so it is only 4.  Well, technically 5 since Little Helper had some with us last night too.  It is nice to get more servings because this recipe is a family favorite.  I will have some for lunch on Tuesday probably. 

Today, I made my chili- also a family favorite.  This photo was taken with my iPhone, so the quality is not nearly as good.  I am pretty proud of this chili.  It is a recipe that I consider my own.  And I FINALLY had all of the veggies that I needed from my CSA to make some.  So other than the beans, chicken broth, spices, and bugar wheat- everything in here is grown on a farm here in MN.  I am excited to have this for lunch tomorrow.

Now- I am saving the best for last!  I baked a chocolate cake last night and then made frosting today.  It was seriously awesome.  As I mentioned before, I got The Cake Bible from the library and I needed to try a cake.  Chocolate is both my husbands and my favorite, so that is what I picked.  I made a triple layer devils food cake.  It recommended a chocolate butter cream frosting.  I don’t really like butter cream frosting, so I don’t usually make it.  I had never had chocolate butter cream so I thought I would give it a try.  It is delicious.  I will be using this frosting in the future!  Now I need to do some reading to figure out which cake I am going to make next.  I only have the book until the 22nd- I have a lot of cakes to make!

I did do a little sewing.  I was working on some wonky house blocks for Bee Addicted.  I have one done and one almost done.  I plan to finish tomorrow night and hopefully get some pictures up soon! 

So- my second love- knitting is calling.  Knitting is one of the most relaxing things that I do.  I am going to knit and watch some TV with my hubby.  Goodnight!

Photography credit (except for the iPhone chili photo) goe s to my husband.  He has recently picked up a new hobby- photography!  I am excited to get some good family shots one of these days if it is sunny one day before it gets cold!

A couple of close ups so you can see my quilting-

The back-

I am LOVING how it is turning out.   I will only be a little sad that it will be too warm to snuggle up under it to watch a movie.  Oh well.  It will wait until fall I am sure! 

I had to ground myself from quilting tonight.  I had some work that I needed to get done (still not done yet!) before a 9 am meeting tomorrow.  I usually get into work between 630 and 645, so I do have some time in the morning and I am almost  done. 

Something else that is rather exciting to talk about is my fruit and veggie shares!  Here is what I got today…

MORE strawberries (LOVE THEM), 4 heads of lettuce, white radishes (what the heck do I do with these??), asparagus, snow peas, shelling peas (LOVE these), scallions, and more beet greens.  Also, 1 dozen fresh from the chicken eggs.  I still have 2 left from last week.  Good thing that I have bananas and they are ready to be turned into banana bread!

Here are all of my blueberries (well, minus the 3 pints that we have eaten since Friday!)

Did I mention that Little Helper liked the peas too?

I was travelling for work last week and didn’t get a chance to choose a fabric for the back of my quilt.  I did a little internet searching in my hotel in the evenings, but didn’t feel comfortable choosing fabric without having my quilt top nearby.  When I got home, I chose a fabric (Sprout from Erin McMorris’ Wildwood line) but no one had it in stores near me.  Well- the few stores that I sort of looked at didn’t have enough.  One place had 3 yards and I needed 5.  So that left me to the internet.  I ordered from uberstitch and they shipped SO QUICKLY!! 

Have I mentioned how much I like ordering from Etsy- I love how these independent shops package things they ship to me!  It’s like I got a present!

I ordered on Saturday and my fabric arrived yesterday- perfect timing!  Today I assembled the back!  I originally was only going to do one stripe of my front fabrics.  But I apparently can’t count and I didn’t measure the pink correctly.  Even though I did measure more than once before I cut.  But then I had enough of the strips and my husband suggested doing 2 stripes, so it turned into 2 stripes.  I do like how it looks quite a bit! 

Tomorrow I will have to start basting it for weekend quilting!!

My other stuff is that my first shipment of my CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) vegetables arrived this week!  If anyone is wondering what a CSA is, I will tell you.  It is basically buying a membership to a local farm and then each week I go to a pick up spot (it is about 5 min from my house) and I pick up a box of fruits and veggies (mostly veggies) that were grown at the farm.   I am also getting a dozen eggs delivered each week.  Anyway, here is what I got-

What did I find in my box, you ask?  Spinach, Radishes, asparagus, beet greens, radishes, rhubarb, shelling peas- did I mention radishes?

I washed the rhubarb, spinach, and beet greens before I put them away.  The strawberries, asparagus, and shelling peas have to wait until I am eating them.  I have had some strawberries- delicious!!

Question to all of you- what do you do with radishes?  I have a couple of ideas- sandwiches and salads- but I am not really sure of what else to do?  And how long can I keep them? 

I am excited to eat my fresh local veggies.  Unfortunately, I didn’t plan my food very well for this week, so I have only eaten strawberries so far!!  Don’t worry- I will get it together.  Tomorrow I am having asparagus or shelling peas- I haven’t decided yet.  And Saturday I want to make a brisket on the grill.  We will have the other then.  And a quinoa salad with radishes, black olives, feta cheese, and some lemon juice.  But I am pretty sure that will only use about 3 of my 1 million radishes. 

ok…off to bed.  goodnight all!