New Website!

So, after a long internal debate followed by much inaction, I've decided to move to a self-hosted website and blog. I hope that explains the silence here. Stay tuned for details!

2013 in Pictures

Snow buries us deeper and deeper here in Chicago today.  It's been a perfect day for stitching inside, reflecting on the gifts of 2013. I'll start the year here with some images that didn't make it to the blog last year.

Ellis started Kindergarten in his Thumb and Pinky finery.

I stitched some special orders.

I made a robot costume. And it rained. A lot.

Ellis learned to take a selfie.

We hosted Thanksgiving dinner for my parents and dear friends, and the food was awesome!

Christmas came and we enjoyed every second of it. (Well, not every second, but I didn't take any pictures of the lousy parts!)

And Illinois passed Marriage Equality and Sarah and I got engaged!

I also started using my crummy phone more often to take pictures, so I didn't have much to blog about. Luckily, Christmas brought me a new, sweet phone with a great camera. I have much hope for my photography future.

2014, we can't wait.

It's All Painty Up In Here

Ellis has been inspired. He saw a painting of a lightning bolt at the movie theater and loved it so much he came home and wanted to paint something like it himself. Obviously, I had a moment of total parenting awesomeness. It was amazing not just because my child had a moment of inspiration but because I had everything on hand to help him realize his vision. Hooray for art supply hoarding!

He loved it so much he wanted to do it again a few days later!

Canning Swap, and Canning Season Updates

I'm gearing up for the social event of the season tonight: Our Canning Swap. 9 of us are bringing our yummiest, most safely-canned jars over to my place and we'll trade and leave with all kinds of goodies.

I'm offering up Peach Bourbon BBQ Sauce, Caponata (featuring garden-grown eggplant), and Peach Salsa.

Here is the Caponata in progress.

It's been a busy canning season, with a focus on things we can in quantity, like tomatoes.

Last year we canned tomato sauce for the first time, but in a group of friends. This was my first solo effort for sauce in my own kitchen. Of course, the food mill is borrowed from my friend Karen.

After processing, it all went into the roaster, a thrifted Christmas gift from my friend Erin. Even when you work alone, it takes a village to can tomato sauce!

All told, we got 19 pints.

We used the Ball Seasoned Tomato Sauce here, which is my favorite for canning. I'm heading out the the farmers market now for more produce. It's a cold and rainy day, so I'm feeling like beets might be on the agenda!

Millions of Peaches

Not quite a million, but our fresh produce fairy Anika hooked us up with a bushel of freshly picked organic Michigan peaches. They were quite possibly the most beautiful peaches in all the land.

So, what's a girl to do with 50 lbs. of peaches? I freaked out and did nothing the first day. But I did make a plan for jam, salsa, barbecue sauce, peaches in syrup, and frozen peaches. And Ellis made a plan to eat as many peaches as possible before bedtime. We both triumphed.

The next day, things got real. I took Ellis and his cousin to one of those crazy trampoline places in the morning to wear them out and then I spent the afternoon and evening putting up as many peaches as I could.

The first step in any canning session is to take your kitchen to Beauty Base Zero. Your kitchen must be a pristine blank slate onto which you can project your particular brand of canning carnage, er, I mean canning glory.

Then I sorted my produce. (Cue the gratuitous peach beauty shots!)

And then, my friends, it's time to get to work.

First up was peach jam. We used the most-bruisey peaches for the jam (though even the bruisey ones were awesome). Peaches can be tedious to process because you do have to take the skins off. Once you get into a rhythm, things go quickly. We used the Pamona's Pectin low-sugar recipe, but I used the most recommended sugar. Last year, my peach jam didn't set well. It was fine and we used it mostly in smoothies and things like that. Still, I wanted it to set. I must confess, it took over a day of cooling, but the jam does seem to have set up nicely.

With 12 half-pints of peach jam put up, I turned to the most awesome but most labor-intensive recipe: Peach Salsa. I'd gotten the peppers and onions and all at the farmers market that morning. Peach Salsa is a wonderful confluence of ripe things here in the midwest. Every ingredient was freshly picked. Still, salsa-making is basically a chop-a-thon. The chopping and prepping can take hours.  And it did. But what a pay-off!

14 pints later, all was well. Oh, except that it was 3 in the morning, I'd gone to bed, and the lovely and sleep-deprived Sarah has to finish up. True love means finishing up your partner's overly-ambitious canning projects.

Stay tuned for Peaches in Syrup, Frozen Peaches, Peach Bourbon Barbecue Sauce, and whatever I end up doing with that last bowl of peaches eyeing me from the end of the table.