Home Tour 2013

Several years ago we agreed to be on the Home Tour for the Town of Buchanan.  This is a fund raiser for the Community House and we were glad to participate.

We were approached to do it again this year.  The house is the same, but we now have a fledgling B&B and Harry Gleason (Town Revitalization manager) thought local people might be interested in seeing it.

We are happy to help, but it does mean we have to get out all the decorations that generally spend Christmas in boxes.  All our kids are coming for Christmas this year for the first time in quite a few years, so we probably would have gone all out anyway.

 

So now we have two trees.  One upstairs and one downstairs

 

This is my favorite spot in the B&B.  A cozy corner to curl up and read.

 

The bedroom is finished and we even put some decorations there, although we won't do that when we have guests.  You have to have places to put the junk we all travel with.

 

In addition to the Santa themed Christmas tree, we have a corner with a large Nativity scene.

 

I took the advice from others and changed the wheelchair vignette.  After Christmas I can remove the Santa hat and the bear can occupy the chair until I get some antique dolls.

 

We put out more decorations scattered throughout the rooms.  I hope the visitors will feel they got their money's worth.  It IS for a good cause!

Lee is even showcasing his truck.  His truck hauling Santa.  The reindeer must be on strike or something!

The Finished Wheelchair

I started on the wheelchair repair project in October.
http://shenandoahgatewayfarm.blogspot.com/2013/10/great-grandmothers-wheelchair.html

I didn't want to start on it earlier, because there was no point in getting it ready to be re-caned and not have some one to do the work.  We found Alice Higgins in Verona and she agreed to do the work.  Being cheap Not wanting to overwhelm her, I did the wood restoration myself.

 

We drove up and got it yesterday.  The new cane is obvious, but I was convinced to let it age naturally rather than staining it.  The colors will be close in about three years.  It is harder to see the repairs on the caning in the arms (the left arm).

 

It will hold people, but I hope no one sits in it.  If they do, I hope they don't press down on the cane arms to get up.  It needs to last the rest of my lifetime.  I doubt I will be willing to pay more to repair it than it is worth a second time!

We have placed it in the B&B rooms.  I chose to cover the new wicker with an "artfully" (my word) draped family quilt.  And I fully admit, my artful needs some help.  My Aunt Suzy is bringing me some of my mother's old dolls to place in it.  Naturally, after I find a doll hospital to repair them.....(Is that another project?)

 

Lee said, "Why pay to get it fixed if you are just going to cover it up."  I hate logical, engineering thinking.

"I want to keep people from sitting in it."

 

Will it?  Quilt or no quilt?  You tell me.

T-Shirt Quilt

When I said I was only going to do one more project this year, I lied.  Well, I misspoke.  I meant it at the time, but facts have proven me wrong.

 

I cleaned up my closet and discovered a bunch of old Federal Express T-shirts that I had saved.  Some were from when we lived in Hawaii and the rest were from when we were in California.  Rather than tossing them, I thought I might try my hand at a T-shirt quilt.  This is when you cut out the printed part of a T-shirt and use it to make squares for a quilt.

 

I would never start a project without my able, slothful, assistant.  And who would want to work with fabric that wasn't covered in cat hair?  Well, I would, but I don't always have that option.  And Lee would never help me, so he is company, of a sort.

I even have one from when I worked in Burbank, before I met Lee.  I may leave that one out.  It was in the early days of Federal Express and the guys all got together and had some shirts made.  The planes flew in to the Memphis hub and then the packages were sorted and flown to their destination overnight.  Back then the service commitment was that the packages would be delivered by noon the next day and Federal Express was the only company that could  consistently do that.  We were proud of that and so the T-shirts were born and they said:  Federal Express - keeps it up all night and gets if off by noon.

Ah, youth.  They all thought it was funny.  Ok, I admit it, I thought it was funny, too.  I still have the shirt.  I probably won't put it in the quilt.  Most likely.

Most of the quilts have been worn and have various stains. I didn't have enough to discard those and I just decided that that will be part of the charm of this quilt.  Or I may applique something over he worst of the stains.  I'll decide that later.

 

I haven't made a quilt on my own, without a class to tell me what to do.  I went to the Fincastle library to find a book on T-shirt quilts.  They have an extensive collection of quilting books and I found one. 

 

Then I hit the Old Trinity Schoolhouse Quilt shop for advice and some supplies.  I bought some fusible interfacing to iron to the back of the T-shirt material to stabilize it.  Federal Express had Purple and Orange as their colors, so I got some of that.  Now that they are FedEx, there are variations on purple and orange for the different services.  The T-shirts I have are from the olden days, though.  Antique.  Last century.  Gosh, I'm old.

 

I cut out the fronts and ironed them to the stabilizer.  This took forever.  I had to force myself to make the first cut and after I was successful with a few of them, it became easier.  Then I cut them to sizes that will work in rows.  Some will be larger than others because I didn't want vast area of white T-shirts on my quilt. 



 

I don't  have an even number, so I think I will fill in with pictures I will attempt to download onto fabric I can run through the printer.  Also purchased at the quilt shop.

 

I am not going to stress about this project, because there is no deadline, so I will work on it when I feel like it.  And when I can decide what goes where.  I need a class!

 

Icy

 

It is pretty icy out there this morning. 

 

School are closed, or have delayed opening. 

 

But it sure makes for a pretty picture. 

 

I don't know if trees hate being encased in ice.  I know cats hate ice.  This is as far out the door as our cat went this morning.  Then he turned around and came in.

 

Cold

I rarely used to listen to the weather report when we lived in Southern California or Hawaii.  You could pretty much count on nicer than average weather.  Now it matters.  They were predicting snow and ice.

And they were right, even down to the amounts.  How is that possible?  Here is what I have to say about that.

 

A little snow,  a little ice
But in the house it's toasty nice

 

assuming you think 65 is toasty
I don't and neither does the cat..ty
 

One More Project

Every year we ask our grown children for a list of things they want for Christmas.  We don't want to buy them a book they already have or get them clothes that don't fit or they don't like.  We buy a few things off the list and a few other things and a great time is had by all.

Getting lists from is sometimes a problem.  I DO NOT participate in any mall shopping the weekend after Thanksgiving.  I don't need anything badly enough to suffer through that type of madness.  By the time I got the lists, it was well into December.

I have gotten a good start, but one thing caught my eye.  It seems my favorite (and only, at this time) son-in-law has lost a hand made scarf given to him by a friend and he may want another one.  I didn't know if I had time to finish one before Christmas, so the plan was to buy a scarf.  But I really wanted to make him one.

I don't make hand made things from yarn at discount stores.  If I make something and put all those hours in, I want some great yarn.  That means I have to plan  trip into Roanoke, to the closest yarn shop I know, Yarn Explosion.  It is an old house converted to rooms full of amazing yarns. 

 

It also means I need to get a simple pattern that will work up quickly.  Who wants a foot long scarf? I found one with just knit and pearl, so that I really don't need the pattern  But I may want to make the hat and the salesperson was so nice and helpful.  I bought the pattern.

 

One thing that worries me is it calls for blocking wires to press the scarf.  I have never pressed anything I have knit or crocheted.  I'm hoping I can get away without doing that.  Does any knitter out there have any suggestions?

 

I picked out a yarn I liked, but they didn't have enough for the scarf and it was too close to Christmas to get more.  Then I found some llama indigo yarn mixed with linen and silk.  It is soft and has interesting nubs and bits of other color from a natural cream to black.

 

The nice thing is it has wisps of fibers mixed in with the yarn, so you can't tell if I knit in some cat hair by mistake.  And I will.  You know I will, right?

I started when we got home and I spent a couple of hours getting a decent length to see if I was going to like it as a scarf.  Then I rubbed it on my bare arms to make sure it was soft and not itchy.  No point in making up the whole thing and end up with something too scratchy.

 

After two evenings of work, I think I can finish before Christmas.  At least I can put the unfinished piece in a bag and finish it before they go back to England.  Where you really need a scarf in winter.  And spring.  And fall.  Hardly ever in summer.

Sweet and Sour Meatballs

I promised myself that I would diet between Thanksgiving and Christmas.  Then I would splurge at Christmas and get back on track after New Year's. And then one of the food/cooking channels started showing restaurants that only served meatballs in various forms.  (sigh)

And it got cold and cold weather is comfort food weather.  Right?  And if I serve the meatballs with pineapple, that's healthy.  And serve them over brown rice?  Man, I should eat this way EVERY day.  I would be so freakin' healthy!



Sweet and Sour Meatballs

Meatballs

1 pound hamburger Yes, that's a lot for two people, but try and find smaller amounts...leftovers!
1/2 cup bread crumbs
1/4 cup milk
2 Tablespoons minced onions
1 teaspoons salt
1/2 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
1 egg

Preheat oven to 400°.

 

Place all the ingredients in a large bowl and mix with a fork until well blended.  I like to use a medium cookie scoop and over fill it.

 

 I do a bit of shaping by hand and then place them in a 13X9 pan that I sprayed with Pam.  It took two pans.

 

If you are just making meatballs, then you are done and can bake them for 20 to 25 minutes.

I wanted to make sweet and sour meatballs and for that you need some onions.  I wanted to cook the onions for a bit, so I cut up the rest of the onion I used for the minced onions and chopped them into medium chunks.  I placed the onion chunks into the pan with the meatballs and cooked them for 15 minutes. Then I took the pans out and rolled the meatballs over to avoid over browning the bottoms. Cook for the additional 10 minutes and remove.

Sweet and Sour Meatballs

1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1 Tablespoon cornstarch
1 can pineapple chunks  I used the kind in its own juice.
1/3 cup vinegar  I used apple cider vinegar
1 Tablespoon soy sauce

 

The rest of the onion, if you like
1 small green pepper, optional...I opted to avoid the pepper

 

Start the sweet and sour sauce about when you turn the meatballs.  Place the brown sugar and the cornstarch in a large sauce pan. 

 

Mix them together and then add the pineapple chunks with the juice.  Add the vinegar and the soy sauce.  Heat to boiling, stirring constantly.

 

Reduce the heat and then add the meatballs and onions.  If you like green peppers, add them here.  Cover and simmer for about 10 minutes.

Serve over brown rice.