Monday, April 25, 2011

Earth Day and Puffins

Happy Late Earth Day and Happy Early Spring!!!!

In celebration of Earth Day, I decided to wear one of the earth-inspired felt pins I made this winter.  They provided a great way to think of the coming spring in the middle of the cold snowy winter we had this year.


I had a hard decision to make...ultimately the tree won out because it celebrated Earth Day and Spring.

I hope everyone had a happy Easter, and is having a great start to Spring.  This is what Spring looks like around here...



These were taken across the way at the Harriet Beecher Stowe Center.  They have some beautiful grounds.

This morning, before continuing our early spring activities (taking walks and spring cleaning) we tried a new recipe....Puffins!  A puffin is a tiny pancake-muffin from Bakerella.  And they are delicious!!!


We had ourselves a little Puffin Picnic with real maple syrup, peanut butter, butter maple syrup, and blueberry syrup.  Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm :-)


I hope you all had a great weekend.


How do you celebrate Earth Day and Spring?

Monday, April 18, 2011

One of my Favorite Things



A few years ago, we got some homemade vanilla for a Christmas gift.  We realized this winter that with a few more batches of chocolate chip cookies and pancakes, we were about to use up the last of the delicious vanilla (which, by-the-way, not so delicious if you ever actually taste it straight up!).  So, we made our own. 

I love homemade food....my Mom always had homemade jelly in the cabinet (raspberry peach will forever be my favorite), and a homemade dinner on the table.  When faced with the eventual demise of our stock of homemade vanilla we looked up the recipe...super easy: vanilla beans + vodka = yummy homemade vanilla!  It takes a couple weeks to make as you shake it daily and just let the beans steep in the vodka, but you can make it stronger the longer you keep it going.  Ours ended up pretty dark, so now it is just a matter of remembering that it is strong and you need a little less than usual.

So...next time you find yourself about to run out of a cooking staple, look up a recipe....maybe it will not be too hard and it will turn out even better than you expected!!!!


What is your favorite homemade food? 

Tuesday, April 12, 2011

Lunch Sets for Friends

Today, first things first....I have to do a shout-out to my parents who are celebrating 31 fabulous years of marriage today!  YAY!  Thanks for the great example Mom and Dad!

All right, on to crafty goodness...


All that fabric I bought the other week, well, it finally turned itself into these adorable lunch sets.  The sets include a sandwich wrap, snack bag, and napkin.  I think they all turned out rather well...and I hope Kate and Julie were pleased!


I think the green fabric with the chairs is so adorable!


And the yellow is almost psychedelic!


Here's a look at all of them together...


And you can't forget the all important packaging...


It was so much fun to make something for friends and put in all the extra surprises (my favorite sandwich recipe tucked in each sandwich wrap, and a little care instructions card...always important).


What little extras do you like to include when making things for friends?



Wednesday, April 6, 2011

Busy, busy, busy!

Hello all!  Sorry for my recent lack of a post.  Things have been crazy busy in my world revolving around textiles.  The major textile exhibition at my museum came down last week and a small one on quilts just went up this week...which means I was working at the museum on Monday, rather than on my Midwest Nutmeg blog post...my appologies!! 

I've also been hard at work finishing up those sandwich bags I mentioned in the last post.  You will be seeing the results of those very, very soon!  In the mean time, here's a few quick links to some fun stuff while you wait:

Fellow blogger, Carole Ann over at Connect the Dots Crafts, did an entire month of blogging about quilting and quilt inspiration.  Check it out here!!!

Also, an article on historic quilts at the museum.  You can find that one over here, along with some other historic textile articles.

I hope you enjoy and I promise to be back with a great post and some great pictures as soon as I finish these sandwich bags, so check back later this week!!


Do you have a favorite site for sewing inspiration?