Spring Plants

Every year when I see little green shoots poking out of the ground I become hopeful for a healthy, green summer vegetable garden in spite of past experience.

I know that in less than two months the blistering-hot sun will scorch leaves, daytime temperatures will cause chronic wilting, and all the stress will make the plants susceptible to pests and diseases.

But this is such a cheerful sight!

This year I decided to just empty all my old tomato seed packets (some of them 7 years old!) into one of the planters and wait and see.

Obviously they are thriving in our lovely warm Spring. If the mild weather would last through May, we might just get a real tomato.

Katrina

Is It May Already?

Looks like two whole weeks flew by while I snoozed (actually sneezed, mostly).

There are a few things going on, but my daily activities don’t lend themselves to photography or blog updates. Examples:

I sat in a spot of shade on the patio, while a hummingbird visited the flowers on my bright red shorts.

Of course I did not have my camera at the time.

 

After two weeks of daily workouts and no pie (okay, minimal pie), this number refuses to get any smaller.

 The scale must be broken.
 

I pulled this dress out of a pile of UFOs from last year, made some progress on it, then ground to a halt again.

It should be cute though, if it ever gets finished.

We have hit our first 100-degree day already, so I’ll just use the summer sun as my excuse ... for everything.

 

Katrina

Mix-N-Match McCall's

This colorful patchwork print ITY

from Fabric Mart, sometime last year

was originally intended for this pattern

 

as part of the all-70’s slate-blue collection that I planned way back when.  

Since it is now April, which in Phoenix is the thermal equivalent of August in the rest of the Northern Hemisphere (we’ve hit 90 F/ 32 C already), the allure of a long-sleeved, maxi-length polyester dress has pretty much evaporated.

However, I do have a couple of short sleeved tops made of poly-ITY that are inexplicably comfortable even in the summer heat. So went to the pattern stash to search for a compromise between 70s groovitude and polyester discomfort.

I found these two dress patterns from McCalls. They look similar in the photos, but the line drawings have a number of key differences.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I like the gathered shoulders on M6073 but I’d prefer a bit of a sleeve as on M5662 in view F. In fact I would have used M5662 if only the skirt were gathered in the back, which it is not. M6073 has skirt gathers in front and back, which I prefer.

M5662

M6073

So I hodged bits of both patterns together into a podge of a dress.

front: the pattern is simple,
the fabric is wild

The shoulder gathers from 6073 went onto the sleeves from 5662. The midriff band from 5662 is with the gathered skirt from 6073. Somehow it all worked out, and I like the look of it.

 

I'm not too sure about the wearability yet, as I still ended up with a maxi dress in polyester.

back

Yes, I could have made it shorter, but I just hate having 1/2 yard of fabric left! Too little of it to make a top, but too much to throw out. My scrap bin is already overflowing!

I’m giving it a test run on a dinner date next week, after which I’ll know for sure whether it’s going to be a summer dress or be relegated to the closet until next fall.

 

 

What’s on your sewing/crafting table?

 

Katrina

More Citrus Recipes

Our little orange/tangerine/mandarin tree took this year off from making fruit.

It's trying to have some flowers, in spite of wind, rain, and snow.

But I still have needs! And one of those needs is for a Tangerine Chess Pie, so the Piemaker bought a whole big bag of clementines for $2.99. (We know there’s a difference between tangerines and mandarins, but we don’t care. We use them interchangeably.)

 

He made the pie, and we ate the pie, but we were still left with most of the bag of fruit. I snack on them everyday, but I can’t resist baking with them, too. So I started going through my recipe books for interesting recipes to adapt.

 

Here’s one I came up with the assistance of Grandmother’s Pies and Cakes, by Jane Fallon. 

 

Usually you find this type of bread with walnuts and cranberries, but I happened to have raisins and almonds on hand, so I used those instead.

 

Mandarin Orange Bread

Makes one 9-inch loaf

Ingredients ½ cup butter 1 cup sugar 4 tsp grated rind (this is 1 - 2 oranges or 4 clementines) ½ cup orange/tangerine juice 2 large eggs 1 ¾ cups flour 2 tsp baking powder ¼ tsp salt Options: ½ cup dried fruit ½ cup chopped nuts

Directions ·       Preheat oven to 350 . ·       Grease and flour a 9-inch loaf pan. ·       Beat butter, sugar, rind, juice, and eggs on medium speed for 4 minutes. ·       Sift dry ingredients together. ·       Add dry mixture to orange mixture and mix with spoon. ·       Mix in fruit and nuts ·       Spoon into loaf pan (batter will be very thick) and bake for 60-70 minutes.

 

And I found another inspiration in Better Homes and Gardens’ Cookies and Candies, copyright 1969.

 This was my very first cookbook!

The original recipe was called “Apple-Orange Brownies”, but in addition to taking liberties with the recipe, I’ve also renamed it. The word “brownie” connotes chocolate to me.

 

Mandarin Bars

Makes 24 squares (approx. 2 ½ x 2 ½ inch)

Ingredients 6 Tbsp butter 1 cup brown sugar ½ cup applesauce 4 tsp grated rind (this is 1 - 2 oranges or 4 clementines) 1 large egg 1 tsp vanilla 1 ¼ cups flour 1 tsp baking powder ½ tsp salt ¼ tsp baking soda ¾ cup chopped walnuts

Directions ·       Preheat oven to 350 . ·       Grease 15 x 11 x 1 inch pan. ·       Mix first six ingredients together. ·       Sift dry ingredients together. ·       Add dry mixture to orange mixture, stir. ·       Mix in nuts. ·       Spread evenly in pan. There will only be a thin layer of batter over the bottom of the pan. Bake for 15 minutes.   Make an icing with: 1 ½ cups confectioner’s sugar and 2 tablespoons orange juice. Drizzle over the bars while still warm.   Or sprinkle with “orange sugar”: 1 part coarse-grained sugar (like Demerera or turbinado) mixed with 2 parts finely grated orange zest.

 

 

And we still have a lot of fruit left!

Katrina

What a Week

The week passed in a blur of busyness. I don’t have much to show for it, except this:

icy snow in the lettuce

Cold, crunchy, white stuff fell from the sky (so they say) to the earth on Wednesday. This was the same week during which we saw 70+ degree temperatures with bright sunshine, wild winds, a 2-day downpour, and an overnight freeze.

snow in the cauliflower

What could be next?

Katrina

Something New in the Garden

It’s so exciting when I’m able to grow something completely new and different in the garden!

hint: it's not a cabbage

This year I planted a package of cauliflower seeds with no real expectations. I’ve had good years and bad years with broccoli, so I didn’t know what was going to happen with this close relative.

Cauliflower is a real cold-weather crop. It won't tolerate dry soil, and if the temperature goes over 80, the flower heads will bolt. So our unusually cold winter has been good news for cauliflower.

First I got big plants. The plants grew huge leaves. The leaves drew lots of caterpillars, and soon had lots of holes.

plants in November, 2 months after planting

Finally last week (4 months after seeding!) I got my first peek at some little cauli-flowers. So far there are two white ones, two purple ones, and a yellow-green one!

Now I have to be patient and let them get a little bigger.

Katrina

Blue and Gray Like the Weather

I cannot believe the East Coast folks are getting hit with another storm of the century! They just can’t get a break. I hope everyone gets their power back on very soon.

Here in the desert, we had a week of springtime sunshine, and then the temperatures dropped again. We’re looking at cloudy gray skies and hoping for rain again this week.

So my first couple of pieces in the new dusky blue wardrobe fit right in with our weather.

I made the jacket first, so I could get a feel for this stretch denim-like fabric before I embarked on the pants. It’s quite nice: heavy but not stiff, and fairly easy to sew, although the thicker twill stripes tend to send pins and needles off course occasionally.


"Marc Jacobs Cotton Double Stripe Suiting"
according to Fabric Mart.
It looks and behaves like stretch denim.

The 1975 pattern was a lot of fun. I like almost everything about it, including the oversized collar.

 

The yoke and pocket flaps were perfect for playing with the stripe, and I really like the way that part looks.

click to enlarge

The one part of the pattern I wasn’t thrilled with was the attachment of the “belt” tabs to the front.

I think it looks sloppy, and although part of that is my poor topstitching, I think there must be a better way of applying these. On the other hand, I do like the look of the rest of the waist, with the wide elastic casing.

It was all easy sewing, but it did take a lot of time, due to my interior finishing. The fabric was unraveling throughout the construction process, so I thought a complete binding would be best. Also, it looks so nice inside an unlined jacket!

 

I used the same pattern to make the bias skirt, because, hey, the pattern envelope shows that you can use a plaid.

mystery fabric, probably a rayon blend?

Ha! I immediately regretted it when I spent hours trying to match up the side seams and insert the zipper. Why are plaids so difficult to match on the bias? This is not rocket science!

In the end it all worked out, of course. In the photos, the skirt is unhemmed, still doing its bias hang to make sure it does all the stretching before I hem it.

Next I’ll work on an “easy” blouse while I mentally prepare for the jeans!

What’s on your creative agenda this week?

Katrina

Fresh From The Garden

Week in and week out, I’ve tormented regaled you with tales of my struggles to grow a vegetable garden in the desert. It’s so nice that you’ve refrained from asking me why I bother with gardening at all.

In return for your patience, today I offer good news: proof that occasionally I DO successfully grow food!

In the past week, I’ve harvested:

 A pound of snow peas.

SO delicious, raw or cooked

A small bunch of carrots.

Cosmic Purple, Scarlet Nantes

A sample of the different colors of beets.

Detroit (green leaf, red root) Bull's Blood (read leaf, red root),
Chiogga (White stalk, pink root), Golden (yellow stalk, yellow root)

And some broccoli florets.

Removing the center flower is supposed to encourage the side flowers to grow larger.

If you click to enlarge this photo, you can see the tiny florets
along the sides of the main stalk.

We still have a lot more vegetables coming, as long as we don’t have a flood, a drought, a freeze, or a heat wave in the next two months.

That’s not too much to ask, is it?

Katrina

Turning Disaster into Dinner

Although most of my vegetable plants made it through the hard freeze last week, the tomato plant decidedly did not.

 Yuck!

I should have harvested all of the green tomatoes before the freeze, but I left them on the plant. The freeze did not visibly damage the fruit, but since ice formed inside the tomatoes each night, causing cellular damage, the decomposition process will soon begin.

I needed to harvest and use them ASAP!

I found a recipe for chili verde that called for green tomatoes rather than tomatillos. The Piemaker dumped the whole batch in - enough for a triple recipe! - and cooked it for an entire day.

 Yum!

Katrina

Chilly Dogs

We’ve had below-freezing temperatures five nights in a row, and it has not been nice. Maybe the heating and plumbing contractors are pleased, but the rest of us are just trying to thaw out as we view the gruesome carnage that used to be our gardens. When I’ve had a chance to uncover everything and fully survey it, I’ll post a picture of my plants so we can all remember the Great Freeze of 2013.

In the meantime, let’s look at what the dogs got to keep them warm during those freezing nights.

My sewing mojo went missing somewhere around the time of my hand injury, but now that my hand is fine, I still don’t feel like sewing! But my poor pups were really cold! So I got over my inertia, grabbed some small pieces of fleece I’d picked up at Joann’s for this very purpose, and made two little coats.

At first I thought I could design one, but the muslin fitting process was not popular with the dogs.

So the coats are loosely based on B5126, View B.

It’s lucky that the pattern was multi-sized, because I used size Extra-small at the neck, Small in the torso, and Medium in the length.

As usual, I followed exactly none of the instructions.

Instead of a separate belt, I simply cut the waistband as part of the single coat piece. I made a hem all around the edge to limit the stretching.

The neck is held together with a 2” length of sewn-on Velcro, and the belly band with a 3” length.

I originally thought they should have hoods, but after making Dolly’s coat, I realized the hood didn’t make much sense.

The coat fit perfectly, but the hood was flopping all over the place.

I’d started out with a small, square hood, gathering the base to fit the neck. It looked like this.

 

I cut it down, and it fits better, but still slips off pretty easily.

I could make it much smaller, but that would squash her gigantic ears!

Manny’s coat is the same pattern, but with no hood.

I gave Manny a fancy belt, just because.

They LOVE these coats. They wore them all day, inside and outside. It's nice to make something that fits perfectly, is useful, and it was finished in the right season!

Katrina