Blueberry Bars, Booties, and a Baby Shower

This weekend was a flurry of activity - and we had more than a few flurries of snow! We started the weekend with a fundraiser on Friday for Big Brothers Big Sisters in our community, and then on Saturday we hung out with our "little." He and I made baby booties for his soon-to-arrive new baby sister. He's 12 and had never used a sewing machine before and just loved it. Later on Saturday I made an additional pair of pink booties, and a batch of blueberry bars for my niece's baby shower that was on Sunday.

Blueberry Bars & Booties

aren't these the cutest booties you've ever seen?!

Lacy and a Pittsburgh Steelers onesie she got from a friend.

Blueberry Oat Bars
adapted from allrecipes.com

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour (I used white whole wheat)
1 1/2 cups quick-cooking oats
1 1/2 cups sugar, divided
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 cup cold butter
pinch of salt
3 cups fresh or frozen blueberries
2 tablespoons cornstarch
2 tablespoons lemon juice

In a bowl, combine flour, oats, 1 cup sugar and baking soda. Cut in butter until mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Reserve 2 cups for topping. Press remaining crumb mixture into a greased 13-in. x 9-in. x 2-in. baking pan; set aside.
In a saucepan, combine blueberries, cornstarch, lemon juice and remaining sugar. Bring to a boil; boil for 2 minutes, stirring constantly. Spread evenly over the crust. Sprinkle with the reserved crumb mixture. Bake at 375 degrees F for 25 minutes or until lightly browned. Cool before cutting.

My notes: These bars are awesome! Every time I make them someone requests the recipe. They come together quickly too. I've upped the blueberries to 3 cups. You just can't have too many blueberries! I've made them with butter and sugar, and also made them with butter sub & Splenda and both ways are okay. Although they are a little more crumbly on top when you use Splenda.

Happy 4th of July!

Red, white, and blueberries!

Mystery Quilts on a Line

Each winter our local quilt shop, Sylvia's Quilt Depot, provides a shop mystery. This is a mystery quilt where for each of 6 months we stop in and pick up a free step to a mystery quilt, and then the seventh month (or so) we all get together for an outdoor quilt show and see how everyone's quilt turned out. Keep in mind they are all made from the same pattern, the only thing that differs is each quilters's choice of fabric. Each month you are given cutting instructions as well as piecing instructions, so it really goes a little at a time until the sixth month when the layout is finally revealed. A lot of the quilts are tops only at this point, meaning they don't have batting, backing, or quilting yet. Adding the batting, backing, & quilting will change the look a little. With the light behind them I think they look a little like stained glass.

This is me with my quilt top. I have another border to add, and then will probably add a couple more but haven't decided what kind yet.

This is my mom's quilt. The people hanging the quilts hung it upside down - the part without the outside pink border is going to be the top of the quilt.

I love to see them all lined up blowing in the breeze. They are all so different!

There were about 20 quilts this year.

Playing Catch Up

Where has the time gone? It's already mid-June. Warmer weather, trees, and flowers are in full swing in Alaska - FINALLY! It's been so nice out the last couple of weeks.

It seems that things are settling down a bit. The last several weeks I've had 2 weeks of being sick :( and then a week and a half of busy-ness with business, errands, and trying to get a quilt top finished in time for an outdoor quilt show. I did get the quilt top done at 11:30 the night before the show, which was followed by a short night of sleep and an early morning working, racing back to see part of a parade, and then getting to the quilt show. I hope to get the quilt show photos up very soon.

My goal for this week is a couple of bentos (they really help cut down on the lunches out), some catch-up blogging (I've got a backlog of photos and things to share), and a generally less busy week. Hope it is fantastic for all!

Spicy Spring Spiral

This week I completed another of the Spicy Spiral table runners. This one is for an "Ugly Duckling Challenge" that I'm participating in with the Country Roads Quilt Guild in West Virginia. (the guild there voted last summer at their annual picnic and chose "the ugliest fabric" for this challenge. It's the lime green with orange dots fabric in my project - and I love it!) Nope, I'm not in WV, but my gracious mother-in-law has offered to submit it for me at the May meeting. This one is different from the blue & green table runner I made because I used only 4 fabrics and repeated them, rather than using 8 different fabrics.

Down the center I've placed dimensional appliquéd flowers that I made using the flowers from the outer fabric print and stuck them together with double-sided iron-on adhesive (the ladies here in AK affectionately call it "lick & stick" although there isn't any licking involved). After the flowers are stuck together you simply cut around whatever shape you have (for me it was flowers) and then tack them down somehow. You want the edges to curl up on their own a bit.

This is also the first project that I have done any free motion quilting. Luckily I'm not including an up-close photo so you can't see the variations in the stitch lengths. I will definitely need to practice with a steady foot and steady hands on the free motion quilting.

Harmony Handbag

My mom and I took another quilting class, but this time it was for a bag called the Harmony Handbag by StudioKat Designs. They have a bunch of cool bags, this is the first of theirs that we have made. I'm also taking a class to make the insert and am almost finished with that. I love that the insert is a separate pouch that can be transferred from bag to bag. The bags themselves are kinda giant as far as purses go (I'm a tiny purse kinda gal now), so my entire purse fits inside my bag with room to spare. I should have taken a pic of the inside of the bag, but haven't yet (maybe will update the post later w/an additional picture). The bag itself has a place for 1 or 2 drink holders (I made 2), plus I put an additional sectioned pocket of my own design inside. My bag is the first one I'll show you. My mom's is the cow bag and the other one is the sample the teacher made for class. She's giving it to her daughter or daughter-in-law as a diaper bag. (sorry the photos are taking up so much of the page, I've been fighting w/blogger and can't get them just right - at least not right for my liking)

Photo Friday, nope it's Tuesday 2.9.2010

So I didn't get around to posting a photo on Friday. I really wanted to but last week was a little crazy. So here are some photos today.

Saturday I took a spiral table runner class at the local quilt shop. Mine isn't all the way done, but the top is so I'm sharing that and some of the runners the other ladies made.  Mine is the one with the lime green and blues.