A Cookbook, a Bag, and a few new Dice…

Summertime is winding down, work is looming on the horizon, and the heat is beginning to take its toll, but the crafting, cooking, planning, and booking is still going strong! Lots to still do today, so lets make this a quick post and do a list, shall we?

A new Cookbook Project is in the works this year. I’m still not sure if it’s an every-single-recipe-in-my-repertoire, or a current-favorites kind of collection, but it’s been such a fun thing to pull out to work on throughout the spring and summer! (and the Faeries are just fascinated by the smaller size binder- they think I’m making it for them.)

Oh what a hideous picture, right? Ah, the travesties of phone cameras! This is a messenger bag I made for myself to lugg all my Gaming Gear around with me to conventions and Game Days. It’s the Snooty Girls Bag, and the design still needs some work (gotta work a handle into the flap next time), but I love it and have been dragging it around with me everywhere this summer!

And this happened this year- I finally sorted all my minis (figurines) and dice into a two-sided organizer and discovered that I have a pretty decent collection of both! I also discovered I’m an official Gamer this summer- I bought Dice instead of Jewelry at ComicCon this year! They are the watery blue ones up there, along with the black with gold numbering ones, and the purple ones. (Also, you are an official Gamer when you buy dice so your characters can all have their own colour coded favorites. ahem.)

So it’s off to the kitchen to make up some goodies for the week- meatloaves, oatmeal, spaghetti sauce and a pot of brown rice for quick veggie stir fry lunches. Toodles!

 

Crafting- A Valentines Quilt Block Potholder

This week I really felt like sprucing up the whole house, but couldn’t find anything in the shops I liked for the kitchen. I’ve had these charm packs of red fabric that haven’t wanted to be made into anything for a few years now- but today they marched themselves straight up to the sewing table for some piecing and quilting and voila! Valentine Hearts Potholders!

They are easy to make- just a bit fiddly and time consuming to do. Start with one and a quarter inch strips:

Piece together one pattern and one solid- red and white are classic, but you could do red and light blue, or pink and red, too. (The dimensions can also be changed to make a larger block. Each block is made up of square units, so if you increase your strip size, just cut your units as wide as your individual strips. See the picture above to illustrate. ). Cut a one inch unit off the patterned and solid strip and join to a 2 inch patterned strip- you’ll end up with a four-quare unit. Tilt it on it’s side and voila! A red and white heart!

Now, make four more- you ‘ll need five for every block you want.

I chain pieced this, so I cut a strip of white two and a quarter inches wide and sewed all the heart units on at the same time, then cut them apart. 

Make sure all the hearts are facing the same direction, then sew all three strips together.

Add some borders- I just used white again so the hearts would really pop!

Backing the quilt with a sold layer allows you to quilt it without the hassle of fitting bulky layers through your sewing machine- woohoo, a sewing win! Just leave an opening to turn it right-side-to…ahem. (voice of experience- picking stitches kind of ruins the “look what I made!” experience, doesn’t it?) I just stitched-in-the-ditch around the outside of the block- it’s sturdy enough if you be sure to iron every seam while sewing the individual blocks together, and I don’t intend to send this through the washer very often (it’s more of a decoration than utility piece). You could certainly quilt every seam, or do little X’s through each square, or squiggly free-hand, or- heavens, the options are quite limitless with such a small project as this!

Here are the components of your quilt “sandwich”: two layers of batting; the quilt block; the handle; and the backing. This is also the order of layering to use: batting, then the quilt block face up with the handle on top with the loop facing inside, and finally the backing on top of the sandwich, facing down.

Pin it all together and mark your seamlines. I couldn’t see the quilt block seamline where I tacked the pre-backing on for the quilting step, so I just marked a line with a dry erase pen lightly- it worked like a charm, and made this final sewing step really easy! Grade your seams, turn right side to, slip stitch the opening closed and press. I didn’t edge seam this piece as again I don’t see it getting heavy use, but I would if it’s for a utility piece, so I can throw it into the washer and dryer without having to iron it out if I don’t want to.

Voila! Happy Valentine’s Day, Kitchen!

(The Kitchen Faeries are convinced it’s a quilt, and are competing with the Bedroom Faeries  over whom has the best one- the Bedroom Faeries appear to be winning, as theirs is about ten times larger…)

A Strange Change in the Wind…

Well- hopefully not that strange! I thought we could all use a bit of a change of pace around here, and updated the old blog a bit. Shined her up, tossed some things out, rearranged what was left, and voila! I quite like it, and hope that you all will too!

I’ve also decided to change the content as well- it’s been so long since we’ve had any sort of structure in this space, I thought it was high time for a bit of a change, don’t you think? We’ll set up a kind of an on-line Journal, perhaps even the feel of an old fashioned Magazine, shall we? How does that sound? And to break it down for you, I’ve created a new List!

Our new categories are:

Letter from the Editor (perhaps I’ll change that title, but the intent shall remain the same; once a month, a few words to set the tone, hmm?)

Cleaning (Recipes for cleaning supplies, tips, hints, admonitions, bewailments, you know-the vagaries of life in a dirty house!)

Cooking (ooo- this one will be scrumptious! Recipes, receipts, formulas, techniques, etc.)

Crafting (How about an easy-to-do project, for everyone to join in on once a month? With Instructions and step-by-step pictures to boot!)

Gardening (Well, it wouldn’t be a Magickwyrds production without pictures of the lovely Hedge out the Backdoor, now would it?)

Myth & Lore (Faeries, Trolls, Mice and Men- basically anything that catches my fancy we’ll use as a monthly theme- sort of a backdrop for the whole issue? That ought to keep everything in line…)

Seasonal (We could throw a Party for Mother Nature, with the theme inspired by the current Season!)

Sightseeing (A place to put all those lovely pictures of our Outings.)

Writing (I’ve had ever-so-many-ideas popping into my head for more chapters in the Market Faire book- stay tuned for Plot, Conflicts and maybe even some Themes in the coming months.)

Well, that sounds just marvelous, doesn’t it? I love a good Spring  Cleaning, and this dusty shelf certainly could benefit from it I dare say! I look forward to seeing how this “new” space progresses this year, and all your thoughts on our New Look as well!