Sewing Projects

OK, so it's been almost as year since I wrote a blog.  About a year ago I purchased my embroidery machine and have been cooped up in my sewing room ever since.  I have made a lot of fun things while exploring and learning this fabulous macine.  I have many items on Etsy for sale but I'll write about them another day (promise!).  Today I will share some of my personal projects.

A new friend from my church was looking for someone to trade craft supplies for some ribbon samples she got from market.  Of course I was game for that!  She came loaded with shopping bags and large bins full of samples.  We sorted through some and I came out with a pile of samples.

They were about 6 inches long and glued and stapled to cardboard headers.  There some beautiful satin wired pieces.  It took an afternoon to remove them from the headers and remove all the wire from the edges.  I have been looking into crazy quilting and had great plans!  I bought some fake suede fabric at Hobby Lobby.  Using some of my embroidery software I embroidered 8 blocks and made a shoulder bag.  I created the flap and pocket using some of my new treasures.  I sewed them on using clear thread and a zig zag stitch.  The ribbon was already embellished so I didn't have to get fancy,  I added an adjustable strap and a metal "frog" latch.  Here is the finished bag.  And  I still have hundreds of samples!

Most fabric and quilt shops in the nation have a yearly contest called Row by Row.  This year's theme was Water.  Each shop designs their own row and gives out the pattern or sells a kit to complete their row.  The contest requires you use 8 different patterns and you must visit the store in person to get the patterns or kits (no mail order)).  They give you about 2 months to complete the quilt and the first person who returns it to their store wins a prize.  I had great plans to do this and collected one pattern and one kit to start with.  I was a little intimated by the kit since I had to hand cut and stitch all the pieces so it took a month to get the nerve to try it.  By then people were already turning in their completed quilts.  Oh well.  It will make a nice table runner or maybe I'll decide to sell it on Etsy.  But it was fun since I did the driving on this one.

I love Fall especially after a long hot Texas Summer.  Here are two project I can't wait to use.  One is a banner that I again had to hand cut the pieces and machine applique them.  The quilting was done in the hoop on my fancy machine using a leaf outline pattern.  The towel was done in the hoop and all I had to do was place and trim the orange fabric and change thread color when the machine told me to.

I also love Christmas and decided to make this banner.  Again the pieces were hand cut and machine appliqued manually.

There are so many unwritten blogs running through my head.  I promise I will write more than once a year.  If you enjoy reading my blogs please follow me on here to get automatic emails when I do write again.

Finally Cooler Weather

I was shocked to see that it has been a year since I wrote a blog.  Guess I've been busy!  After a long hot Texas summer it has finally cooled off.  One of my favorite things to do in the fall is make a giant pot of beef stew.  Today is the day!  I have made this recipe for as long as I can remember.  When we were first married (42 years ago!) we did a lot of tent camping with friends every fall.  We lived in New Jersey at the time so we were used to much cooler weather.  I would always make a big pot of stew to take.  Once the tent was set up we would heat up the stew over a fire.  Every time I make stew these memories come back to me.

Beef Stew

2 lbs stew meat
2 bags frozen stew vegetables
Minced garlic
2 pkgs mushroom gravy mix
Red wine
1 cup beef broth
2 cups water
Worcestershire Sauce
Oil
Salt
Pepper
Paprika

Brown beef cubes in oil.  Add about 2 tbs red wine to deglaze the pan.  Add salt, pepper and paprika to taste.  Add about 1 tsp of minced refrigerated garlic and a splash of Worcestershire sauce.  Add 1 cup of beef broth, 2 cups of water.  Sprinkle 1 package of mushroom gravy mix over the top and stir to blend.  Add two bags of frozen vegetables.  Bring to boil, reduce heat to simmer and cover. Cook for about 2-3 hours.   About a half hour before serving add and strir in the second package of mushroom gravy mix.  Simmer uncovered until thickened.

Note:  I am making this in my dutch oven but before I had one I mixed everything in a crock pot and cooked all day.

We will be enjoying this tonight with heated dinner rolls and for many other nights since I will have enough to freeze for additional meals.

Camping trips in the 1970's

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Pinterest Recipes - Yummy and Crummy Reviews

Last year I wrote a blog about how much I like Pinterest.  A year later nothing has changed.  I am still quite addicted to it and have thousands of pins.  I am very blessed to be retired and have lots of play time.  A lot of that time is spent trying different recipes from Pinterest.  Some have turned out better than others.  Here are reviews of my latest experiments.

YUMMY - Broccoli Cheese Rice Cups

For some reason we seem to eat a lot of rice, especially since I bought my rice cooker at Walgreens.  We like Basmati rice the best.  This recipe is wonderful for leftover rice.  They freeze and reheat well too.

YUMMY - Cilantro Lime Chicken Bake

More rice!  A quote from Guy Fieri - "winner winner chicken dinner".    I think it used every bowl and electric kitchen appliance I own but it was well worth it.  We only ate half - the other half is in the freezer.

I have never used fresh tomatillo's before but they are my new favorite food.  That step required a food processor.  The rice was cooked in my rice cooker and the chicken was grilled on my George Foreman grill.  The best part was the tomatillo dressing you pour over the top when serving. 

CRUMMY - Bacon Cooked in Water

This sounded so stupid it how could I not try it?  I followed the directions and ended up with the chewiest almost inedible bacon I have ever had. 
Don't bother pinning this one!

YUMMY - Cool Whip Cookies

Once again this sounded so wheels off that I just had to try it.  I used chocolate cake mix.  The batter was very strange and stiff.  But the cookies were actually very good - a cross between a cookie and a brownie.  I will have to try other flavors some day.

YUMMY - Baked Cream Cheese Spaghetti

Ooh this one is REALLY good.  I know it sounds a little strange (have you guessed I like to try weird recipes?) but the cream cheese melts and blends with the spaghetti sauce and is quite tasty.  And as the original pinner said, don't for get the onion rings on the top.  They makes the whole dish!

YUMMY - Hash browns and baked eggs

I tried these this week and loved them.  I followed the directions but I don't think I cooked the hash browns long enough since they weren't crispy.  Instead of bacon I put a sausage round on top of the hash browns.  And I over cooked the eggs but these were still really good.  I had one left over and it reheated very well.  Definately a repeat.

YUMMY - Broccoli Cheese Soup

I made this two days ago and am still craving more!  It is fabulous!  I did everything the instructions said except for the crock pot.  Some days I want instant gratification and used my dutch oven instead.  Next time I will be doubling the recipe. 

KINDA CRUMMY - Garlic Brown Sugar Chicken

Don't get me wrong, this wasn't really bad but it didn't live up to to all the hype on Pinterest.  People called it the best chicken recipe ever.  It was just OK and nothing to brag about.  Will not be making it again.

YUMMY - Garlic Cheddar Bisquits

Who doesn't like Red Lobster bisquits?  I have tried copy cat recipes before but this one is the closest I have come to the real thing. 

YUMMY - Cucumber Tomato Avacado Salad

This was really good.  I had seen similar recipes using corn so I added corn to this and loved it.  We grill our corn and I used leftovers.  It had a great smokey flavor.  Unfortunately it doesn't keep very long because of the avacado.

YUMMY - Baked Garlic Cilantro Fries

Baked french fries are a new addiction.  I have used this recipe and have also made them without the garlic and cilantro.  Either way if cooked long enough to get cripsy they are even better then fried.  And certaninly better for you.

CRUMMY - Lasagne Cups

Sometimes things sound good but don't turn out very well.  This recipe was one of them.  The recipe used wonton skins and instructions said you didn't have to trim the excess.  Well they were so hard and crunchy we couldn't eat them.  The rest wasn't too bad but I wouldn't bother making this recipe again.

YUMMY -Scallops!

The website where this came from is userealbutter.com.  Yes, you must use real butter for this.  Wouldn't be the same without it.  I also add freshly ground garlic and cook it until it is crunchy.  Yum!

CRUMMY -Crustless Quiche

This was pretty good the night I made it.  But I really wanted to freeze individual pieces to eat for breakfast.  I tried that but there was just too much spinich in it for breakfast and it didn't really reheat well.  I ended up throwing it away.  Fail!

YUMMY -Baked Tomatoes

These are really good if you have tomatoes that are a little over ripe and you want to use them up.  I've made them a number of times.











I think that is all I have tried lately.  I have over 400 recipes pinned so it it is hard to remember everything.  Might help if I blogged more often!  Obviously I love to try new recipes.  Which if you know me well is quite funny since I have a lapband and eat very little.  But I still love good food.  Thankfully I have that lapband which allowsme to try things without over indulging or else I would be as big as a house thanks to Pinterest!  I am also blessed to have a husband who will try anything and likes most things I make. 

I have a lot of new recipes I am looking forward to trying and will review them at a later date. I also try a lot of the craft ideas I find but that will be fodder for another blog. 

Happy pinning and eating!

Newport Beach California

Last week we took a 5 day trip to Newport Beach, California.  We flew into Orange County Airport then drove about 10 miles to the Marriott Newport Coast Villas.  It is a sprawling resort set on the side of a cliff overlooking the Pacific Ocean. 







  

Photo taken from Marriott Website

Our 2 bedroom 2 bath villa overlooked the golf course and the ocean.  We had a fully equipped kitchen and lovely balcony.  There were 3 pools on the property.  All the comforts of home but a much better view.  The weather was warm for them - in the eighties during the day and 70's at night.  Perfect for us to get away from the Texas heat.



We ate well at a variety of restaurants.  Two of our favorites were The Chart House and The Rusty Pelican - next to each other on the inland waterway.  We had some fabulous fish and seafood.  There were beautiful yachts to drool over while eating on the patios.  But the best were the "wedding cruises".  We saw a number of them - on very large 3 and 4 level boats.  All parties seemed to be having a great time. 

Another favorite was an old English pub and restaurant in town.  We ate in the smaller part which reminded us of our trip to England in 1991. 

Our last night we found a restaurant called Gulfstream.  That was our best fish and seafood meal of the week.

The highlight of our trip was the day we took a whale watching cruise in Dana Point.  The whole area was beautiful and one of my favorites of the trip.  But the whale watching cruise was the icing on the cake.  We saw close to a dozen blue whales, which are the biggest.  They came as close as 50 feet from our catamaran which was a little intimidating because of their size.  And countless dolphin putting on a show right next to the boat.  The one thing I really wanted to see was a sea lion and I wasn't disappointed.

Just a few miles from the resort we stumbled upon Balboa Island - full of little streets, a few shops and lots of tiny (but million dollar) bungalows. 

Of course no trip with Rich is complete without finding old cars and this one was no exception!

 Real estate in California is quite pricey.  One day we sat at one of the pools looking across at huge houses on top of a cliff.  Technology nerd that I am I broke out Zillow on my iPhone and looked up the prices of the houses we were looking at.  The one below is on the market for $18 million but there was one for $35 million that we couldn't see.

We had a great 5 days.  Below are some random shots.  We now look forward to our next adventure in Oahu next year.  Love the retired life!





Dana Point



This boat was in the Pirate of the Carribbean movies





Laguna Beach