Fabric and Food

Hello Happy Quilters!  There's so many delicious things to share with you today.  Let's start with the new fabrics.  With so many new projects planned I needed a few of these.  A couple were impulse just because purchases but the rest were needed or so my obsessive fabric disorders thinks.  The first little cutie is Lori Holts Flea Market Jelly Roll purchased from our local shop, Back Door Quilts. This will go up on a shelf just so I can drool over it from time to time.  My plan was to use it but after bringing it home I changed my mind.  I designed a Christmas quilt that uses 2.5" strips and was looking for a bright Christmas themed jelly roll but sadly the local shop didn't have one that suited my picky quilty brain.  It was a lesson learned.  I love this jelly roll but I settled for something that didn't get me excited.  Oh don't get me wrong I love this jelly roll but not for the Christmas quilt.   

My next purchase from the quilt shop is going to shock most of you.  Believe it or not, the fat quarters you see here are not an impulse purchase.  They too were on my shopping list.  The plan for them is remake of one of my brightly colored quilts.  These will be put to use this week.  And another shocker is I'm excited to be working with them.  Seeing the same pattern in a different colorway is always fun.  Of course the finished product will be for Mr. Podunk.   The two yardage prints will be the background and the border.  They were not purchased from the local shop.  They are from Joann's.  My stash of creamy background is a fairly good size but they all seemed to yellow or white for this fat quarter bundle.  The background fabric is a lot tanner than how it showing up in the picture.

While at Joann's I had to take a look around and I found a print I just couldn't leave behind.  The plan was for one yard.  At the cutting table they offered me the remaining 3/4 of a yard at 50% off.    It was on sale to begin with so how could I pass up this great deal.  If your grabbing your purse right now headed to Joann's to grab some for yourself, look in the baby fabric sections for this fabric.

The last two fabric purchases were made online from Sew Yeah Quilting on YouTube.  I'm obsessed with this shop.  They have a brick and mortar shop in Vegas but have two weekly live YouTube sales.  Tuesday evenings are new to the market fabrics.  Saturday night is for older quilt shop quality fabrics at amazing prices.  $6 a yard!  These are 5 yard cuts.   The blue floral on the left was an impulse buy.  I love large florals for backings or borders.  I've no plan for using it anytime soon but it's there when the need arises.  The fabric on the right will be used within the next few weeks.  It'll be the backing fabric for the Christmas quilt I was talking about earlier.  I'm not in love with it and I don't think it's the perfect fabric for the quilt I have planned but for $6 a yd. it'll work.

I highly recommend Sew Yeah Quilting.  These three brothers are fun to watch because they love what they do.   It's not just the three brothers.  The entire family is involved with the quilt shop.  Their mom and dad, wife and kids, everyone pitches in.  They also have one video a month that is hilarious.  It's called "Will It Sew".   Every month they take suggestions from the viewers about how to abuse an older still working Bernina sewing machine and then see if it will still sew.  In each monthly video they also have a sewing challenge.   Most of the challenges require them to make a quilt block but there's a twist to what they can use to make the block.  Here's a link to the first Will it Sew Challenge video that got me hooked on watching these crazy quilting guys.   

When I can't be in the studio, the next best thing is watching or listening to others sewing.  Cooking and listening to YouTube quilting videos has become my new love.  This weekend I watched/listened to several of their videos while making Zucchini Bread.  I cook like I sew, assembly line cooking.  The first batch mix up and ready to cook.  Notice the food processor in the background full of more zucchini.   That's a lot of bread!

The first batch is ready to go into the oven. 

While they are cooking I prep for the next batch.  This would be so much quicker if I had more bread pans.  

Today I'll be making more bread and freezing it winter storage.  So as you can probably guess, when I went into town for fabric I also bought more bread pans.  This will cut down how many hours my oven needs to be on during 90 degree days.  Zucchini bread takes an hour to cook.  The longer my oven is on the more my central air runs.  It's cost effective to purchase more bread pans.  Electricity in the sticks is very high priced.  We pay about double of what I paid when I lived in the city.

Four loaves is all I made at this time.  One for Mr. Podunk and one for my dad, two for the freezer.  Today I'll cook bread until the shredded zucchini is all used.  While it cooks I'll be in the studio playing with my new fabric, YAH!