Patriots and Broncos...

Yes , we are not in the world series this year. I enjoy making these and wearing them all day Sunday. It was a great game and enjoy every bit of it!

Little Nicolette loves her Patriot fleece neck warmer!

Kitchen towels, you cannot have enough of these no matter what you do. I love to make kitchen towel and give them as gifts to friends.

I was in a mood to make few towels for us. When I saw this print, I knew I had to get it, because it was so cute! 

I have not finish the task of actually making them yet! I will soon post the finish project. 

Kale salad, Tuna wrap, and Chips

Kale salad has been one of the main salads that I enjoy these days. 

I add few slices of canned cooked beets, black olives, onions, lime juice, salt and black pepper. It is a refreshing salad with alot of vitamins. 

I top it off with a tuna wrap, few chips, and few sweet pickles. 

Week night dinner...

Back to school means more time at work and at school. In other words less time prepping food more time with family as much as possible. How do you keep it together, answer is more planning less shopping. More meals to make at home, this works great because there is always leftover. 

Getting protein for a family of three and one vegetarian could be a challenge, because you do have to make sure the vegetarian get some form of protein as well. I am still working on my self getting protein. 

Past weekend I was able to gather four bags of meat with marinade for week nights, and hopefully we might consider something light in between these nights, that would accommodate the vegetarian with a healthy protein the entire family can enjoy more to come on this. 

This was a fairly simple project, which my teenager was able to help me to assemble it. Meat could be enjoy with bean rice and a salad. 

As we ran out of store bought marinate for a one batch of meat. We decided to come up with our own. We will let you know if it is family approved on a later post. 


It is a big relief to know dinner is all set for five nights!

Experimenting with remnants…

 

My love to the remnant rack at the fabric store never cease to surprise me. I made this scarf out of anti-phil fleece and cost me .75 cents. It keeps my neck warm on a very cold day. Not only that it adds that punch of color. 

I have made many neck warmers with remnants. This was unique because it was a very skinny strip of fleece and worked very well with my project. Getting use to my sewing machine with different fabrics could be so much fun! I love this project and might make few more as gifts! 

Tail end of the winter track...

 

Getting use to my camera and catching Nigel's performances at meets have been my newest discovery. Soon he will be off to start his college life, and I am making sure that I am able to catch all his work. 

I know for sure he enjoy his time at meets. Watching his non stop talking, laughs, tension, but still been able to run that all off, is amazing. His resilience towards running, taking part in these meets and keeping it all together is neat. 

Least, I could do with all my work is to show up, and look in his eye and say that he can totally do it, and it means a lot to him I know. 

More Projects for winter

Cold months offer enough opportunities to catch up, un-finish projects, read under cozy blankets, read to kids, play, learn, bake and many more. 

Few things that I wanted to accomplish during holidays and before school starts were to watch a CD about on language. More about improving myself towards teaching, in other words professional development on a budget this year! I have done a great job, by noticing some windows to join in for free classes. This CD has been sitting on my table from last summer so it is time to get this out of the way.

Knitting, has been a challenge to me recently, simply due to timing. I love to knit during winter months, because it keeps my hands warm. I received this wonderful cowl pattern from a friend and cannot wait to work on it!

I might consider using two yarns together as oppose to one. Knitting could be very therapeutical depending on the project. I cannot wait to begin this project more to come!

Nicolette been a bit older, I like to plan and play activities with her more now. This takes away chunk of my time but I enjoy every bit of it!

Stocking

 

I have been busy stocking my shop most of the time during this year; however, I manage to carve out some time to quilt too. I know some of you might think I am very industrious but I always enjoy keeping my hand busy. If I do not have anything do I will at least read. 

This is a fairly easy quilt with really cute calico floral prints. I guess this is going to go to Nicolette’s quilt collection and only difference will be, it is a bit larger quilt. I hope I get to finish it soon with busy schedule I have. The prints are very subtle reminds me of my grandma’s collection of calico prints she use to wear. I love them very much. 

I know for sure, if I travel this summer I will be collecting fabric from fabric stores because you cannot have enough fabric. Isn’t it bad, I know but we quilters are crazy!

Decorating with cards

 

This year I decided to add some picture frames to our creative room. I received many cards during this holiday and some were really neat. I wanted to do more with them with these cute holiday cards. 

I bought few frames form IKEA and the rest was fun. I needed to get them on the wall soon! It adds a bit of whimsy to the room!

Keeping up with track...

I know summer is a long ways, the busy winter schedules keep us up in our toes. I enjoy going to see Niegel run with our crazy schedules. Past week was pack with activities, from school and work. It was great to watch Nigel working hard towards his goals. I know he was happy to see us at the meet as well! 

This was not a serious meet according to Niegel, but he did great by running bit faster than earlier meets. I am still working on taking pictures at his meets. 

Completed Projects 2014

Few projects have been pushed around due to work from last year. I finally was able to get them done this year and that made me so happy. I started this tiny scarf almost an year ago but I could not get to finish it. I was happy to weave in the ends and finish it off. 

Cowl was something I did this year it is entirely my pattern. I wanted to make one and I manage to come up with this pattern. Nicolette loves it and I did add a small button to make it unique for her. 

Nicolette was happy to model with these wonderful two scarves. She loves both and wear them to school. 

Through the Winter Storm

Angles are bit off, but this is my creating space. It has been a busy few weeks for me. I was motivated to clean my space during this month. I will get to it. I want to say this is a lovely space that I created to work with my kids.


I think if you were to create a space for your creativity it is vital to have a window and let the natural light come into your working space.

 I love taking a break and sip my tea while checking the yard, in this case it is the snow. If I look very carefully, I can see the squirrels, birds, and at times bunnies roaming in our yard. It really adds a sense of wonder to your creativity depending if you are an outdoor person. 

I have few more things to straighten in this space during this year and few are bit like projects. I want to cave a little space for my love of scrapbooking.  

I am considering an area rug and a live plant if I can find the space!

Cooking Turkey a Quicker way...

I enjoy baking a stuff turkey during Thanksgiving but that’s about it. I am not a turkey person; however, this year during November holiday, I told Panduka, We could cut the cooking time almost in half if we cut the turkey before cooking. Of course their would be no carving at the table. 

Well, there was a bit of carving involved, when you bake a cut up turkey.

I love this recipe which uses onions, apples, and maple syrup. You cannot go wrong with that combination. It did smell great while baking. I used same recipe that I would use for stuff turkey but I did cut the turkey into pieces. We cooked it in less time and according to kids it tasted great! There is no change in taste, but I did brine the turkey and that goes a long way. 

I used few sprigs of sage, and thyme. It looks so yummy. I simply served it with mashed potatoes.  

Happy B'Day

Our Nicolette celebrated her fifth B’day and was very low key this year. I did not bake for her B’day for the very fist time due to the huge holiday baking we had at our place. 

We went to movies and saw “ Frozen” which was neat according to Nicolette. We are planning a big bash next year and more planning needs to be addressed. 

One of her gifts was a jump rope! She is getting the hang of it and I can’t wait till summer.

We read many books, but she enjoyed ice cream with chocolate cake. 

Sleding for Donuts

Knowing that I did not have to go to work made me take a long good night sleep. I meant to say till like ten in the morning. I did not feel like doing anything to catch up the lost time.

I love winter but my heart goes out to people who are fighting the storm. I help my son to shovel snow. Nicolette took a ride on the sled to near by Dunkin Donut to enjoy some donuts.

I manage to take few pictures of our town which was almost buried in snow. I find beauty in this stillness. 

As we walked towards home we notice an older person doing just what we were doing she is enjoying the snow with two walking sticks to walk in the snow like a skier. 

Winter Storm

Happy New Year to All, The snow, storm, school cancelation, time in hand made me to work on the projects that I could not get into year 2013. This has been lovely and I am enjoying my time with my lovely family. Nicolette get to practice her Rainbows to her B’day chart while I get to sew and stock my little shop. 

This year begins with the winter storm giving us the most wanted things like the cozy blankets and comfort food.