Abbie's 1st haircut

A few weeks ago Alex was on a boys only trip with his dad so I felt it was the perfect time for mom/daughter haircuts. Abbie just got a little trim and then Laurie was nice enough to style her hair too. I on the other hand got my hair chopped off and left a big pile on the floor.

I've been knitting

I have recently been knitting dishcloths as an easy take along handwork project. Most of them are pretty simple but I decided to make a transformers washcloth for Alex. While this washcloth was not technically difficult to make it was hard to keep track of the stitch count and I don't know if I will be willing to make another one of these.

Pattern here

Line 25 is incorrect in the original pattern. Here is the correction.

I was on tv!

A local news station came to the hospital where I work to do a story on our teen mom program. I happened to be doing my new mom group at the same time so they came and videotaped that. I am the one in the blue scrubs.

Aunt Martha's Banana bread

Here is my favorite Banana Bread recipe:

2 1/2 C flour
1 2/3 C sugar
1 1/4 tsp baking powder
1 1/4 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
2/3 C soft shortening (I use butter or margarine)
2/3 C buttermilk (or just add 1 tsp vinegar to the milk)
1 1/4 C mashed bananas (approx 3)
3 eggs
2/3 C nuts (optional)

Grease and flour the pan. Mix together 1st 5 ingredients add shortening buttermilk and mashed bananas beat 2 min. Add eggs then fold in nuts Bake 350 degrees for 35 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean.

*My notes: I always have lots of overripe bananas for making bread because when a banana goes bad before it gets eaten I just throw the whole thing in the freezer for when I want to make bread. This bread always takes more than 35 minutes in my pans, up to an hour sometimes, just keep checking it. I like to sprinkle the top with a little sugar before baking to give it a nice crust when baked.*

Connected

Since I moved into this house last January I have been getting by without an internet connection. The only problem with this is that it makes it difficult to make posts to my blog. Last Tuesday I started graduate school which is a hybrid online/in class program. This means that I need reliable internet at home. Today the internet man came and set up my internet and this evening I got my wireless router working. I am now happily sitting on my couch connected to the internet getting my new office software setup. I hope to be able to post more reliably in the future.

What I've been up to

I've been building Lego Storm Trooper transport ships for Alex who is currently obsessed with Legos and Star Wars

I've been knitting dishcloths. They are a great quick project to have on hand when you are watching TV or stuck sitting in a waiting room.

I've been making lots and lots of double pinwheel 1/4 blocks. I have had the Eleanor Burns Double Pinwheel Quilt book for quite a while and have never made one. Since getting back from Quilt Camp I have been quilting a lot more and after I finished Abbie's quilt I decided to finally make a double pinwheel quilt. I raided my bin of scraps and my precut 2 1/2" strips and 2 1/2'x4 1/2" bricks and my stash for all red, blue and tan fabrics. I am going to make 1/4 blocks until I either run out of fabric or get sick of making them and that is how big the quilt is going to be.

Quilt done

I got Abbie's quilt done this afternoon despite Abbie's "help" and telling me that it was done because she wanted to play with the quilt. As soon as I actually got it done and was taking a picture Abbie had to bring her pillow out and do a test drive.

I just stuck the quilt into the wash while Abbie was not looking hope she doesn't notice :)

Of the original pile of fabrics I have just a small amount left. I really had to get creative in order to make this quilt completely from stash. When I ran out of the solid cream background fabric I switched to the second choice fabric. When I didn't have enough of the multi colored polka dot fabric to make another row I made the piano key border with the leftovers. When I realized that I had cut a zillion 4" squares and had no yardage of background fabric left I pieced the inner borders. Lastly when I used the red fabric for the binding rather than the blue I would have preferred. I am very pleased with how this quilt turned out and hope that it gets much use over the next several years.