- Try ... try again and again: Needlework lettering (updated 2/8/2015)

Note: To see all posts with letters of some kind, use the new Index term: Lettering.

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In getting ready to start the next linen towel, I wanted to see whether I could make use of some rubber stamps for lettering.

I tried the black fabric ink pad on "Blue Stem" and the brown fabric marker on "Grass" ... then using a single strand of DMC black floss, I backstitched "Blue" and "Gras," leaving "Stem" and the last "s" in "Grass" unstitched.

Note how the ink pad left shadows around the letters in "Blue Stem" ... and how the letters in all the words are far from level. Still, the whole point of the exercise was to see what did and did not work. So the final step was to wash and press the piece to see which inking method worked best.

And it's pretty much a tie. I was pleased that the ink washed out on both (although they're not supposed to wash out, I was hoping they would). However, it was much easier to see my stitching in progress doing black on brown, so that's what I'll be using.

Onward.

Addendum: I have since found that using a water-erasable fabric marking pen on the rubber stamps is an even better strategy. Live and learn.

Addendum 2: Best yet ... writing in my own hand using water erasable marking pen

Addendum 3: And even better ... writing in my own hand using a Pitt pen.

- Have you seen the white whale? Folk art assemblage in progress

Me: "Wait, wait ... slow down! I want to take pictures."

Don: "I can put it back together."

Of course, I ended up taking the pictures in terrible light with the iPhone (never mind that there's a perfectly good dslr in the house). But when Don starts doing a fish (or in this case, a whale), things happen fast.

Carpe diem (aka seize the sperm whale).

Be watching for the big reveal on the breezeway wall in a hopefully-not-too-distant-future post.

- Kitchen Towel planning: The Homestead

Do you remember having to show your work in school? And how frustrating it could be to show each and every step when the answer was abundantly clear? Besides, how do you show a mental leap on paper? Or, in the case of a blog, how do you know when to take a picture?

Still, Austin Kleon has a point: sometimes it can be a good thing to show the process by which you arrived at a final product or conclusion. It's especially interesting when the dead-end ideas are thrown aside ... who knows what fertile ground they may land on and what may spring from them in the future?

As I finished hemstitching a new kitchen towel, I started thinking out loud, wondering what to stitch. The lines of running stitch on the napkin and kitchen towel in the previous post had reminded me of the lines of latitude and longitude on topographic maps. Pulling out a map of the USGS Wimberley Quadrangle from my Texas State University days, I discovered that the towel was almost, not quite as large. Certainly do-able.

At which point Don said, "Didn't you say something once about doing a map of the property?"

"I dunno," I mused, "the proportions aren't right. Our lot is 200' by 800' and the towel is about one-and-a-half by two feet. Of course, I could cut off the flood plain at the back ... just stop at the fire pit."

Then I went down the rabbit hole.

Three hours, several maps from Google and a plat from our house closing folder later, I had sketched in a towel-sized version of the front two-thirds of the property on a piece of baking parchment paper. After coming up for air, I spent the rest of the afternoon working in the yard, and with only a glance or two at the sketch over the course of the evening, went to bed and slept on it (figuratively speaking).

[Note: this would be a really great place for a picture, wouldn't it?]

The next morning I dug out some watercolor pencils purchased several years ago. They were a fanciful indulgence considering I discovered many, many years ago (when I mistakenly talked my way into a third-year art major's drawing class) that I don't draw very well. But rough sketching is something I can do and hey, you just never know when you might need some watercolor pencils, right? The time had arrived and as I've been wont to say, it's all about the pantry: whether you are cooking or creating, you just have to have the right ingredients on hand when you need them.

So I started coloring in my sketch, finessing some of the lines from the previous day, peering out the windows every so often to get a reality check on where the little blue stem grasses had taken hold, stepping back to take in the bigger picture, imagining what stitches would work best for roof lines and paths, trees and grasses. I vaguely recall Don saying he was going to the store, and at one point I thought it might be past the normal time to brush my teeth, although upon so doing I managed to deposit a fair bit of pencil dust from my hands to the towel in the bathroom.

Finally, I realized the sketch was good enough for its intended purpose and I stopped, took a quick picture, then cleared the counter so Don could unload the groceries.

The morning gone, it was time for lunch: an Asian-inspired salad of greens, red pepper, red cabbage, scallions, mint, Thai basil, cilantro, grilled pork, and wontons dressed with pickled ginger juice, lime juice, rice wine vinegar, peanut oil, sesame oil, and white soy sauce.

Yep, it's all about the pantry.
Now if I can just figure out where
that fabric marking pencil got to ...

- Kitchen Towel photography: Trying to capture subtle stitches (updated 2/8/2015)

Note: Click here for all of the Kitchen Towel index links.

I've been watching the sun climb into the sky all morning ... every half hour going out and taking yet another round of pictures, trying to capture the subtlety of the stitches on my kitchen towel as well as a napkin. It's time to stop trying and go with the best I've got for now.

What I didn't mention in yesterday's post was that before there was a towel, there was a napkin ...

Running stitch on cotton/linen napkin detail. Note how the lower horizontal line of stitching is "off track"

It was a test piece, worked on a West Elm cotton/linen blend napkin with DMC cotton floss. As each DMC strand ran out I began a new color, all in soft earth tones of course (and therefore equally difficult to photograph). The problems I encountered were two-fold: the machine-made hemstitching on the napkin did not parallel the warp and woof of the fabric (see the right side of the napkin) and the warp and woof were not evenly sized, making it harder to "follow the line," particularly when stitching at night.

Still, I learned a lot from practicing on this piece. Mostly that it was fun to do plain old running stitch, particularly with no real plan, end product, or deadline. I had nothing to lose except for a few hours of my time ... and since much of that time was spent sitting in the sun, that in itself was sufficient. But I also found a stitch size and rhythm that suited me, I tried out some different knots for starting and ending, and I realized that doing my own hemstitching on an evenly woven linen would be a good idea the next time around.

Upon completing the napkin (which has since become a kitchen towel), I set my sights on a pale green linen tablecloth that had been cut into before. The quality of the linen was middling, the tablecloth having been purchased for about $30 at Target many years ago (when it was used for a smaller dining table than we have now). However, it seemed to have a good hand  (what Merriam Webster defines as the "the feel of or tactile reaction to something") for its intended purpose, so I cut a piece about one inch larger all around than my favorite kitchen towel, following the weave of the linen by eye. I turned under a 3/8" hem (which is what "felt right" for the weight of the linen) and hemstitched it at about four threads per stitch (note to those who have hemstitched: I did not pull a thread because the linen quality was too poor, so I took the lazy way out and just followed the weave of the linen).

After hemming the towel, I chose eight DMC cotton flosses in colors that reminded me of the ocean, all with very soft, gray tones: light green, medium green, light blue, light blue-green, medium blue, cream, taupe, and charcoal gray. I made lines of running stitch following the weave of the fabric from the bottom to the top of the towel, choosing a new starting point and a new color for each row. Knowing the towel would get much more handling and laundering than most needlework, I chose to do a double running stitch when beginning or ending a thread.

Sadly, the pale green floss looks more like amber
and the pale green linen ground looks more gray than green.

I also drew some random circles on the linen using a compass and pencil, having seen something similar on Pinterest that appealed to me. The pencil faded away after a couple of washes ... one unanticipated advantage of making a quotidian piece that will get a lot of laundering. As with the beginning and end of each row, I used a double running stitch at the beginning and end of each encounter with the circle, which also made it more visible.

Note the bits of floss furling out at the top of the circle ...
a failed attempt at a different knotting technique.

As I worked, I decided I didn't really want to do the whole towel one way, so I free-styled. In the end, one half of the towel was dominated by closely worked vertical rows with small stitches and blank circles (which have inspired me to do a phases of the moon piece in the future), while the other half focused more on the intersections created by working horizontally in varying widths.

The happy result was not only did I get to try out different techniques, I now have a different "look" depending on how the towel is folded and hung over my oven door handle.

 

Someday soon I'll go to the camera store in Austin to get the camera checked out and then ask them how best to capture the details of color and stitching with my DSLR. But for now it's enough to show my work in progress (both the needlework and the photographic work) and move on.

- Quotidian cloth: Kitchen Towel mending and making

My frustration level is rising as I try repeatedly to get decent photography of my running stitch kitchen towel. The main problem seems to be that the colors of the needlework and ground linen are too subtle by half to be captured by the camera (which is why I like them, of course). Less subtle colors photographs just fine, as this patched repair on a worn towel shows. The patch is 1 1/8" high by 7/8" wide, indigo dyed cotton on a linen-cotton ground photographed in indirect sunlight, and the colors are true.

By way of contrast, here is one of the "better" shots of the cotton on linen towel details which almost gets the color right, but still leaves much to be desired. There are dozens more shots taken over the past few days that aren't even close to usable and the photo editing programs just make a bad situation worse.

I suppose there could be some sort of contemplative lesson to be learned from the photographic challenge, but it escapes me at the moment. In any case, also to be answered is the question Don asked when I first began the project:

"Why a kitchen towel?"

After all, what gets less respect, more abuse? Why spend the time and effort to hemstitch a towel, then add to it the creative energy of choosing stitch patterns and colors, deciding on stitch length and the width between rows of running stitch? Why bother with something that will ultimately disintegrate? Indeed, once the towel was finished, I had to keep reassuring Don that it was okay to use it. But from the start, the answer was obvious to me:

"Because of all the things I could make, this will be a a day-to-day presence during the meals that are such an important part of our lives. We will be able to touch it and enjoy it up close, not just peer at it imprisoned behind glass on a wall." 

In other words, because it is quotidian.

Now if I could just take the pictures to make that manifest ...

- J and G at the beach (2013)

For whatever we lost (a you or a me)

It's always ourselves we find in the sea

                                                        e e cummings

 (From The Random House Book of Poetry for Children, p.112)

- Carolina Dreaming: Flannel photo album

When we got back from the Outer Banks last June, I was already dreaming about returning 51 weeks later. But since our little ones would hardly remember the beach, let alone who was there, I decided to give them a tangible way to look forward to seeing each other again.

The text was created on Word ...

and printed along with the pictures on a commercial color photocopier.

All the photocopies were coated front and back with Mod Podge to make them reasonably water-resistant (but certainly not water-proof).

The pictures and text were cut out and arranged on flannel pieces cut approximately 5.5" x 11" for the interior pages and 6" x 12" for the covers.

The carefully collated pictures and text were attached using the zig-zag stitch on the sewing machine (after some testing to determine the best stitch length and width).

Then the individual interior and cover pages were stitched together with two runs of zig-zag stitch. Cover stock was slipped into the gap between the pages to give them some body, after which they were trimmed to size with pinking shears.

The last step was sewing the interior pages onto the cover pages.

The books were completed in September and have held up to the tender mercies of the toddlers depicted therein. 

Now all we have to do is count the days until we get back together in June. I can't wait!

- Newfangled Birthday Bites: Almond cake balls go decadent

It's really, really hard to bake for someone like Paul, who slam-dunks incredible meals on a regular basis ... but I tried. My idea was to create cake balls, but made from scratch rather than using cake mix and prefab frosting. And not too sweet. With a few different varieties. Of course I decided to do all this the day before needing them, leaving no time for experimentation. In fact, as I'm writing this, the cake balls newfangled birthday bites are in the chill chest and I'm hoping they'll be ready to transport by 6:00 tonight (in 4 hours).

But I'm getting a little ahead of myself. This all began with yet another adaptation of the Smitten Kitchen Petit Four Cake (which is itself an adaptation ... stealing like an artist to make Austin Kleon proud).

Almond Cake

6 ounces butter (1 1/2 sticks)

1 cup sugar

1 tsp. vanilla

3 eggs

1 cup all purpose flour

1/3 cup almond flour

2/3 Tbs. baking powder

1/3 cup whole milk

Cream butter and sugar. Beat in eggs and vanilla. Alternate flours and milk (2 rounds of each), but don't overmix.Spray two 6"x2" round pans (Wilton makes them and they are fantabulous), divide batter between the two. Bake at 350 for 25 minutes. Put on wire racks to cool.

While the cakes were cooling, I assembled my additions for six different flavor combos: 

 

 The ingredients on the left were destined to be paired with a chocolate ganache coating. From the lower left:

• Drambuie, espresso powder, and chopped hazelnuts for "After Dinner Bites"
• Seedless raspberry jam, almond extract, and almond meal for "Petit Four Bites"
• Cocoa and chipotle powders for "Hot Chocolate Bites"

The ingredients on the right were to be enrobed in sweetened Mascarpone cream. From lower right:

• Cinnamon, vanilla, and colored sugar crytals for "Mardi Gras Bites"
• Tequila, Cointreau, lime (zest and juice), and Outer Banks Sea Salt for "Margarita Bites"
• Barbancourt (Haitian rum), nutmeg, and toasted coconut for "Island Bites"

I whipped 16 ounces of Mascarpone with 8 ounces of heavy cream and divided it into six small bowls, reserving a small portion for the Mardi Gras Bites (to be explained later). The cake was likewise divided into six equal portions. From there is was a sequential operation of crumbling cake, mixing additions into the mascarpone, and gently combining the two, while holding back about 1/3 cup each of the flavored Mascarpone to coat the Margarita and Island Bites.

It was especially enjoyable working out how much of what to add to each batch, as I sampled my way through the process using most of the teaspoons in the flatware drawer (over a dozen). The resulting cake combos were shaped into five walnut-size balls per flavor and packed off to the freezer in a parchment-lined Pyrex dish.

While the the naked birthday bites chilled out, I tested out my first cream coating with some plain mascarpone and cream, half and half, confectioners sugar, and vanilla for the Mardi Gras Bites (I didn't want to use the cinnamon filling in this case because I wanted the sugar crystals to show up on the cream). Dipping the chilled bites in the vanilla Mascarpone cream was a little dicey and I didn't make quite enough so the coating was a bit thin. But I soldiered on, placing each bite on a metal cooling rack and then sprinkled them all with King Cake green, purple, and gold sugar crystals.

The Margarita Bites went better, with a larger batch of lime/tequila/Cointreau/confectioners sugar/Mascarpone cream topped with a pinch of salt. The similarly upsized batch of nutmeg/Barbancourt/confectioners sugar/Mascarpone cream on the Island Bites was dusted with toasted coconut. At which point everything went back in the freezer again.

Since the remaining three batches were all to be topped with chocolate ganache, I glugged about 1/3 cup of heavy cream into a medium-sized mixing bowl, then thought the better of it and doubled the amount. One minute in the microwave on high and 8 ounces of Ghirardelli 60% cacao bittersweet chocolate chips later, I was whisking my way to a glossy ganache.

The remaining bites were quickly swirled through the ganache using some old fondue forks and given different toppings to make them identifiable: coarsely chopped hazelnuts on the After Dinner Bites, finely ground almonds on the Petit Four Bites, and a sprinkling of chipotle and cocoa powders on the Hot Chocolate Bites.

Then back in the freezer yet again whilst I tackled this blog post to keep me from peeking too often ... which worked, up until now. So I just checked and the ganache-coated bites have firmed up nicely ... the mascarpone bites not so much. Uh oh ...

What's worse, the ganache-coated bites are more than a bit too big to fit in the nifty little cupcake liners that I got to put in the egg cartons that I'm using (they're brand new, unused egg cartons, btw). So much for my attempt at upping my presentation skills.

Fortunately, the Mascarpone cream bites are a little smaller, so I get to use the liners after all ... which is a good thing because the cream coating is a bit soft. By George, I think I'm going to pull this thing off!

Note to my future self:  If I'm going to use the cute egg cartons again  I'll definitely have to down-size the bite-size. As for the flavor profiles, the jury is still out. News at 11 (well 10 actually ... we're on Central Time). 

Update: the consensus winner was the Drambuie/Espresso/Chocolate/Hazelnut combo

- Quotidian Cloth: Patching jeans boro-style

My first attempt at sashiko stitch,
a Japanese mending technique also known as boro

I've always been fascinated with words ... from the eclectic to the esoteric. Consequently, curiosity led me to Google "a lover of words, " where I found myself to be a logophile.

So when I was thinking how best to present my exploration of slow cloth, I recalled the little-known word "quotidian" from the gentle, quiet time I spent attending a Quaker meeting in Williamsburg. One of the books in their library was a book by Kathleen Norris entitled The Quotidian Mysteries: Laundry, Liturgy and "Women's Work."  I've just ordered a new copy to refresh my memory on all she had to say, but this quote from the back cover of the book is telling:

"Our daily tasks, whether we perceive them as drudgery or essential, life-sustaining work, do not define who we are as women or as human beings. But they have a considerable spiritual import ..."

My trusty Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, Tenth Edition (a high school graduation gift that has survived six moves in 40 years) defines quotidian as:

"occurring every day ...belonging to each day ... commonplace, ordinary"

Which has everything to do with the slow-cloth-style of needlework that has occupied my attention of late. Not wanting to make yet another picture for the wall, I wanted to explore running stitch, sashiko, boro, and darning by making and repairing things that would be used every day: kitchen towels, cloth napkins, patched jeans, darned socks. And in so doing, I re-discovered a contemplative practice that had long eluded me.

To be continued ...

- Granola redux: Coconut oil vs. olive oil (revised 8/27/2015)

 

One of the first posts on this blog included a recipe for Garrison Trail Granola. Since 2009, it has had a place at our breakfast table on an almost-daily basis. Its unique blend of oats, olive oil, maple syrup, and an every-changing combo of raw nuts and seeds made a perfect accompaniment to Greek yogurt. Until ...

Don had a pain in the gut that he self-diagnosed as an overdose of nuts and seeds. So those got tossed out of the recipe. But oats alone proved to be a bit bland, so we added Sunridge Farms Organic Five Grain Cereal Flakes from the Central Market bulk bins to the mix. Better.

Somewhere along the way, I spotted a granola recipe that touted brown sugar so I tried adding a quarter cup to spark up the flavor. Nice.

Then our Unio olive oil ran out ... and we couldn't get anymore ... anywhere. This was a major turning point, as the other olive oils we tried just didn't cut it. So I went out on a limb and tried coconut oil. Oh my my ... yes!

However, the addition of coconut oil was not a one-and-done ... I found out the hard way that there is coconut oil refined to the point of tastelessness (to be avoided at all costs) and then there is coconut oil that is "unrefined, expeller pressed" (much, much better). Kinda like olive oil, actually. 

If I had any doubts about the wisdom of using a saturated oil (even though in relatively small quantities), they were dispelled by recent news reports of a medical journal article debunking the "sat fat is bad for you" myth.

Bottom line: the recipe has now morphed to the point of unrecognizable. So without further ado, here is the new and improved version:

Cascade Trail Granola

1 lb. five-grain rolled cereal (uncooked)

9 oz. (1/2 container) old fashioned oats (not quick oats!)

1 cup raw coconut flakes (the bigger the better)

1/2 cup unrefined coconut oil

1 cup maple syrup (Grade B if you can find it)

1 1/2 tsp. Kosher salt

2 tsp. vanilla extract

1/3 cup light brown sugar
Optional: 1/2 cup pasteurized egg whites for added protein

Combine cereal, oats, and coconut flakes in a large mixing bowl. 

In a small, microwave-proof bowl combine coconut oil and maple syrup. Microwave for 1 minute on high. Whisk in salt, vanilla, and light brown sugar (and optional egg whites).

Pour oil/syrup mixture over cereal/coconut mixture and stir until evenly coated. 

Divide mixture between two cookie sheets and place in a 225 degree oven for 2 hours.  Every 30 minutes, remove the pans from the oven, turn the granola with a metal spatula, then return the pans to the oven on opposite shelves to ensure even browning. Cool completely after baking before storing in a sealed container.

Note: I've recently discovered Coombs Family Grade B Maple Syrup and their website has a "Where to Buy" link.

A Note on Nuts and/or Seeds

If you miss having nuts and/or seeds in your granola, by all means add them in. However, since Don is avoiding them these days, I make a separate batch of nuts for myself. 

Nana's Nuts (revised 8/27/2015)

1 lb. raw cashews 
1 lb. raw almonds
1/2 lb. raw pistachios

Rough chop the almonds and cashews, then combine with pistachios in a large bowl.

1/2 cup grade b maple syrup
1/4 cup unrefined coconut oil 
1/3 cup brown sugar
1 tsp kosher salt
1 tsp vanilla extract

Nuke the maple syrup and coconut oil for one minute on high. Whisk in brown sugar, salt, and vanilla. Pour over nuts and stir until coated.

Prep two cookies sheets with parchment paper. Spread nuts evenly.

Bake at 225 for 2 1/2 hours, being sure to turn the nuts every 30 minutes so they cook evenly. 

BTW, aside from being a great addition to granola, a small handful of nuts makes a great snack.