Scrap Happy

'Member back here when I said I had some scraps to use up?  Well, in fits and starts I've begun to diminish the gargantuan scrap bin.  I can't seem to toss any scrap out.  I was even keeping selvages for awhile until I thought that my hoarding may be becoming a problem.  Now lookie what I could have done with them.  Alas, I threw them away before I saw any of this brilliant-ness.  Now I'm keeping everything.
I started with a mini version of a rug I have in the Manor loo.  We'll call this a hot pot rug....

I started with this:

I tore 2 inch wide strips from large scraps of leftover fabrics.  I wanted the edges to be funky and shabby and thought that after it was all crocheted most of the edges would be tucked pretty tightly anyway.  I don't know the size of that crochet hook, I just got the biggest one I had.  It probably could have been even a little bigger, but it worked fine, really.  Next I tied a slip knot in the end of a strip, chained 4, 2 SC in the 3rd chain from the hook and proceeded that way (2 SC in each chain) until I came to the end of that first row.  It was then 2 SC in each stitch from the previous row, making rounds until I used up all of my strips.  When I came to the end of a strip I simply either tied a new strip on or looped the new strip over my hook and continued crocheting.  I'm going to make more, and might even make one big enough to have a replacement for the loo rug that was my inspiration.

This beauty was made by a 92 year old client of mine.  It's so adorable, and so was she.

While I was flopping around on the internet the other day I came across this.  A perfect idea to use more scraps.  My ladies' bible study group is beginning a study that requires lots of reading and flipping and flying around the bible and our workbooks.  It seemed to me that we could all use a cute bookmark.  So the toile and polka dot fabric that flirted with the idea of becoming a quilt for Princess Pooalot (she was over the toile by the time she arrived) became ruffled bookmarks for a lovely group of ladies.

Get the tut here.  Easy peasy.

Years ago I figured out how to cover hangers with crochet.  I thought there must be a cute way to do the same with fabric.  Crocheting with fabric strips around a plastic hanger just seemed more trouble that it was worth, plus I think I'd end up with a really fatty hanger.  So I wrapped hangers instead.  Again, I tore about 2 inch wide strips, folded the end of one strip over the end of the hanger, wrapping the remaining over that end to hide and secure it.  I continued wrapping until I came back to the place I started and slipped the tail into the final wrap, pulling the tail tight.  Cute and the shoulders of my shirts don't flop off.

Do you guys know about Pick Your Plum?  It's fantabulous!  Look what I got for almost no shillings:

Bunches of ribbons with it's own little distributor box.

Last week I got vinyl for my Cricut for .25 a sheet.  Every day or so they have a new bargain that's unbelievable, and they send you an email so you can get in on it before your neighbor does.  It's worth checking out, people.

Cheers to you!

DeeDee

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Jamie's Pesto...sort of

It's week 2 of getting naked with Jamie Oliver over at IHCC.  We're celebrating April showers, something we have no shortage of here at Fairfield Manor.  There was no shortage of March showers for that matter.  Ideally, April showers will bring May flowers and all that.  I have a feeling that the Manor gardens won't be lush with anything except slugs and mud in May, but we'll see.  Back to my story:  being naked with Jamie.  This week, the challenge is to prepare one of Jamie's recipes that focuses on fresh...as in veg (Jamiespeak) or fruit (I'm not aware that he calls fruit anything but fruit, but if you know differently, let me know?)
The other night the Earl and I joined friends for happy hour at a local Italian restaurant and for a mere 5 sheckels I had incredibly good pesto.  It was served over very nicely cooked pasta with a skewer of shrimp.  I've been thinking of it ever since.  I love that, when you have a dish at a restaurant that stays with you, you know, in a good way.  I've never made pesto at home.  I don't know why, except that I rarely have pine nuts around.  I decided to take this opportunity to leave my pesto virginity in the dust.
Jamie's recipe is fairly ambiguous, measurement-wise but it didn't seem to matter.  I still didn't have pine nuts in the Manor larder, but I did find some pecans in the freezer and thought "how bad can that be?"

First step:

Lightly toast the pecans (or pine nuts, or just about any nuts apparently).  When you just begin to detect their aroma, get them off the heat.  My measurement was one overflowing handful.

Next, rinse and pat dry 3 good handfuls of basil.  Seriously, these are Jamie's measuremental terms.

Measuremental isn't a word, by the way.  Take the leaves off the stems.

Toss the leaves in the food processor and give them a good whack (or pound, both Jamiespeak), along with a clove of garlic and a little sea salt.  Add the nuts of choice and whack again.

Transfer the mixture to a bowl and add a goodly handful of grated Parmasan and mix with olive oil.  I ended up using about 1 cup of olive oil....all that I had so the Earl is off to the Greek deli tomorrow for replenishments.  

This whole process took about 5 minutes.  Seriously.  Had I known that pesto was this easy, I surely wouldn't have let a small thing like the lack of pine nuts stop me.  You could even leave the nuts out entirely and it would still be smack.  (That should freak out the various Dukes and Countesses - smack.) heh heh.  Back to the finished product, which admittedly, isn't all that attractive.  There's something about vibrant green food that's slightly off putting, unless it's in it's natural state, like broccoli or something.  But this stuff is amazingly good.  I hope you try it.  I served it over mushroom ravioli, but it would be good over any pasta, I should think.

Pesto, serves 4

Jamie Oliver

1/2 clove garlic (I used a whole clove, in case of vampires you know)

sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

3 good handfuls of fresh basil, leaves picked

a handful of pine nuts, very lightly toasted (I've explained the nut situation here at the Manor, so go ahead and experiment)

a good handful of freshly grated Parmesan cheese

extra virgin olive oil

a small squeeze of lemon juice

Pound the garlic with a little pinch of sea salt and the basil leaves in a pestle and mortar, or pulse in a food processor.  Add a bit more garlic if you like, but I usually stick to 1/2 clove.  Add the pine nuts to the mixture and pound again.  Turnout into a bowl and add half the Parmesan.  Stir gently and add olive oil--you need just enough to bind the sauce and get it to an oozy consistency.

Season to taste, then add most of the remaining cheese.  Pour in some more oil and taste again.  You may like to add a squeeze of lemon juice at the end to give it a little twang, but it's not essential.

Completely unrelated news flash:  Remember when I said I had a Silhouette?  Well, it turns out I really don't.  I have a Cricut.  See how friendly we are?  I don't even know her name.  So, anyway, a while back I bought some vinyl because I like to do things like that, you know, buy stuff I might like to maybe give a try out someday and then put it somewhere where I'll never find it, thereby  necessitating another trip to the store for the same thing....and on and on it goes.   Aaand we're back.... so this morning was apparently the morning I was going to finally try to cut some vinyl.  I gingerly pulled Ms. Cricut out and pressed the open button (which is awesome in itself), spent 15 minutes rummaging around and found the vinyl (I was positive it was black, but turns out not, it's brown).  After reading the rule book one more time (it's hell getting old....mind turns into a sieve, and not in a good way), I pressed some buttons, slapped the vinyl on the cool sticky mat and voila, I have a big ol' F!  So easy.  Stay tuned...I'm pretty sure I'm about to go crazy with this stuff.  For now, I had to find a place for my F, so the only likely spot I could quickly find (because I have to get to work to pay for more vinyl) was the old door we have randomly leaning against a wall in the Manor living room....in the East Wing of the house.

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Tulle and Ribbon

Three years ago, when the young Duke and The Countess de Couv were planning their wedding my mind was on all things fancy and floofy.  Toile, pearls, ribbon, sparkle and of course, tulle occupied my mostly feeble mind.  Helping plan a wedding on a budget for nearly 400 of your nearest and dearest is taxing, people.  Fun, but taxing.  The liquor and chocolate requirements at the Manor were increased by several-fold (is that a term?  several fold?  You get the idea).  Eeeenyway, besides wine and chocolate by the truckload (in addition to not a small number of orders of McD's fries), I also bought 200 yards (or more) of tulle.  It's really super cheap for all the effect you get from it, but still.  More than 200 yards is a bit much.


Voyez...

We floofed the guest book table

We floofed the front of the church.  Notice any flowers?  We didn't even miss them.  The huge screen in back was the scene of hilarious snaps of the Duke and Countess growing up shown just before the ceremony began.

We floofed some little patootie Princesses....in all there were 5 petite Ladies-in-Waiting

We floofed the aisle for the wedding party bravely led by 2 handsome barefoot Knights

And we floofed nearly every corner and crevice of the reception.  See the guest book bouquet making its second appearance?  It's sitting on top of a milk crate I had on my deck, lit from underneath with Christmas lights and beautifully draped by the Countess' clever aunt.  Each table had a centerpiece of a cake pedestal (Craigslist) topped with 3 mis-matched glass candlesticks (Goodwill).  The plan was to have ivory tapers in each candlestick, but silly us, we didn't think of fire regulations.  It seems that nearly 100 lit and unprotected candles could be a problem.  Ahem.  Sooo, back to Goodwill, scouring the shelves for clear, glass votives - the kind from the 70's and 80's that have the little pokey thingie on the bottom that sits in a sconce or something. The votives sat atop the candlesticks, a friend of the Earl's made dyed to match tealights for them and it was beautiful!  Of course, there was tulle wrapped around each candle arrangement, and pearls.  So pretty.  I wish I had a picture of the groomsmen putting all of them together at the reception hall while us girls were primping and posturing back at the church.

Even with all of that, I still have nearly a full bolt of beautiful ivory tulle just waiting to floof up the Manor.
To that end, I've had a springtime wreath on my mind and the Countess du Greece, Princess Po
oalot and Duke Zeus and I made a trip to Michael's yesterday afternoon.  The Earl stayed home to guard the Manor in our absence.  He's not a fan of "standing in one place and looking at the same thing for an hour" style of shopping that I may or may not practice.  I picked up a simple styro wreath to be tulle-ized, along with some cute ribbon and ball fringe...

Look at that cute little ball fringe.  It makes me smile.

I wrapped the form in a long strip of tulle, pinning it in just two places in the back...

Next, I added ribbon and the cute little ball fringe, wrapping and twisting until I liked what I had done....you like?  I do....

Still, it needs something.... 

Sooo....not one to shy away from adding just a little somethin' somethin'....

My little flowers are simple layers of circles (I used the ribbon spool for a pattern) that I scrunched in the center, and because I'm lazy I didn't even hand sew the scrunchie part, I just pinned it to the wreath form.  I added a ball from the fringe that was laying on my worktable for a flower center, looped some ribbons and decided that I liked what I'd done....

My happy little wreath took its place in my Easter vignette, adding some spring cheerfulness to the Manor.  In spite of the dreary Northwest weather, it's spring at Fairfield Manor!

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Some Craft....

I did a teeny bit of crafting today. I've been inspired by all the spring stuff I've been seeing around the internets.  I'm all refreshed after a lovely weekend at the coast with some lovely women, so I put together some things that have been on my mind.  One of them SO didn't work out, and when I recover from the hilarious humiliation I may let you see it.
As I mentioned before, this is Princess Pooalot's first Easter and when I saw this and knew Princess P had to have something similar.  Char used her Silhouette.  I have one, but we're not that friendly yet.  Every time I use it, it's like it's the first time I've seen it and it takes me three times as long  to accomplish anything.  So I decided to try the more labor intensive and more familiar route.

I had a piece of this chenille-ish fabric and I thought it would make perfect chicks.  I free-handed a chick-like creature for a template/pattern (what's the difference?)  You can see that I was having second thoughts about the size of my chick as I cut it out.  I'm glad I did, it turned out to be a really nice size on the little onesie.  After cutting it out, I pinned the chenille chick to a freshly pressed onesie with about 75 pins (I thought I had some Wonder Under, but couldn't find it) and sewed a zigzag stitch around it, as to applique. Well, yeah it was actually an applique. Since I was attaching a woven to a knit, I used a fairly wide zigzag stitch, not wanting to add a bunch of thread to the onesie.

I decided to use a stencil and fabric paint for the letters.  I mentioned my fear of my Silhouette, right?  In the end, I think I should have gotten over myself and tried the Silhouette. Still, I'm pretty happy with the results...

I think Princess Pooalot will like it, too.  I love it when they're still so young that they have to wear the stuff I make them.

I also had the opportunity to put another idea together.  Whilst I was away this weekend, my dear Earl did the laundry.  ALL the laundry.  Even that which should have gone to the cleaners.

So, yeah.  Here's my sweater.  I shouldn't wear horizontal stripes anyway.  But Princess P can...

Baby legs!

Here's a peek at another project as it begins...

We'll see how this turns out.

All in all, a good day at the Manor, I must say.

Thank you for your kind comments!  It means so much to hear from you.

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