I seem to be having difficulties in actually sitting and posting. LOL.

I guess you could probably tell by my several years off?

Anyhow. 

I thought I would show how I have been making my binding.

Step 1 - I measure the quilt to see how much I need and then I cut strips the width of the fabric, at 2 1/2" wide. I trim off the selvages and then seam them together into 1 long piece. Then I go to the ironing board and press the seams open and then press the long strip in half. It is now ready to put on the quilt. (This is the method I use for most of my quilts - especially if I give them away to kids)

Step 2 - I sew it to the edge of the top side of the quilted quilt using my walking foot. I use a 1/4" seam allowance. Leave a piece at the beginning about 6" in length. I don't measure it. 

Step 3 - coming into the corner, I stop 1/4" from the edge of the quilt. You an mark it with a pin, or just eyeball it. I have occasionally over run the 1/4", and then I have to remove a stitch or two to make it work right. YIKES. But it works. 

step 4 - fold the binding back making a triangular looking edge, and then making it even with the edge of the side - fold it down even with the edge of the next side to be sewn. You do this a few times and it gets easier and soon you'll be a pro at it. 

step 4 - Now here's your preference. I have heard it both ways. I start at the edge of the new side and sew right on down the new side. Others will tell you to start a 1/4" down. I don't think it matters which method you prefer. They both work. Your corner will be beautiful. Repeat this on all the other corners until you get back to the start of the binding. Stop sewing about 5-6" from where you started. 

step 5 - trim off excess binding leaving lent of overlap. I think I have about 4" to 5" extra here. It doesn't have to be measured. Just be sure there's plenty for seaming this. 

step 6 - here I fold the binding back on itself and finger press. I don't overlap, and I don't try to make it match perfectly. I prefer a tiny bit of background showing. I think this is about a 1/16". It's very small. Pin it and stitch it on the machine. You can open the fabric and stitch it and press it and fold it back if you want, but you'll probably need to leave more room between the start and stop. I just stitch it while it's folded. This is a very quick method here. 

step 7 - this is something I do, I press the seam open and stitch it down along the opening, so the binding is now fully attached. Then I fold the corners down and tack it together. This will keep the corners down and enclosed in the binding and not let them poke out accidentally. Then you can fold the binding around to the back and stitch it down. I forgot to take a photo of this. WHOOPS! The binding is big enough that you can use the machine to sew in the ditch on the front side and catch the back side of the binding. I do this on most of the kids quilts I do. I will hand sew it down at other times. 

cooking and quilting

 More cooking fun here... 

Tried another new recipe-

It was super easy, open things and dump them in the crock pot... leave it alone for several hours, then eat it. 

It was so yummy, that I forgot to take a photo of how I served it up. I dished it into bowls and served it with some buttermilk biscuits. This was a big hit here, and this one I will definitely make again. My husband has requested that i pick up some tortilla chips for use with the left overs. (It made a big pot, and there's just two of us here at this time.) 

I have also been busy busy busy with quilting. I set myself a goal to get 7 done for Christmas for my son and his new wife's blended family. I have all the tops put together, and have 3 completely quilted and bound. So I thought I would show how I have been doing the quilting here at home on my domestic machine. 

step one - I spread the backing out face down on my dining room table using clamps to keep it stretched out flat and secure- 

step two - I smoothed out the batting over the backing, smoothing it out as flat as possible. both were cut a few inches larger than the top. the back being two pieces seamed across the middle. The batting somewhat sticks to the backing as it is soothed out, so the clamps are not needed to hold it down.

step three - is to lay the top on face up, and smooth it out. I have my tools ready to start pinning it. Notice that I included the tv remotes with my tools. I put a movie on and give myself the length of the movie to get the pinning done, and I usually do get it done, if I don't get too caught up in what's going on on the television. 

Step four - I know that there's a fancy tool you can buy to help you pin baste the quilt, but I found this small screw driver also works just fine. I swiped this one out of my junk drawer in the kitchen. I don't think my husbands getting this back. It really worked well. 

step five - when I got the first half all pinned I removed the clamps, and slid the quilt over to the bottom half, and re-clamped the backing to the table, then smoothed down the batting, and then the top. Very much like steps 1, 2 and 3... then I continued pinning until the top was completely pin basted. At this point I also cut some of the excess batting and backing away. It is pin basted very well and there shouldn't be too much movement in the quilt. I find the extra backing and batting get in the way on the domestic sewing machine. So I leave only about an inch and a half around the top. 

step six - this particular quilt had a pretty good grid in it already, so I chose to us it to do the quilting. I didn't mark it at all but aimed from corner to corner and went at it. It is not perfect by any means. But it's not terrible, It's a quilt for a kid, and I expect it to be used and loved, so I didn't care if the lines were perfectly straight or not. It is mostly straight. The boys will love them. At least I hope they will.

step seven - I used my ruler and rotary cutter to square up and cut the edges preparing the quilt for the binding. Again, it's for a kid. It's not getting entered in any competition, so I didn't stress too much.

and here we are, a quilted top, waiting for binding. I think I will do a step by step on that for the next one I do. But this one is done and labeled, and waiting to be gifted for Christmas. I think my grandson will love it as much as I did making it for him. 

adventures in cooking - Amish Bar-be-cue Pork Chops

 Sooooo, 

I have actually been working on quite a few things. 

Including several scrap quilts that will be gifted at Christmas.

But, today I wanted to talk about cooking.

I am not a great cook, but I collect cookbooks and recipes.

I decided I needed to start using them.

I plan to try a new recipe or two - every week from the collection. 

This came about because I bought a box full of old cookbooks and recipes and notes...

at a yard sale way out in the country side. 

The collection had come from a 90 year old neighbor of the person I bought it from.

Lot's of hand written recipes and notes in the books and magazines.

So I selected the following recipe to try out... 

It looked rather simple, and she said it came from a country magazine and is an Amish recipe.

Bar-be-cue pork chops-

mix;

1 can cream of mushroom soup

1 cup of catsup

1 TBLSP Worchershire 

1/2 cup chopped onions. 

pour over pork chops and bake 2 hours 375

Well, like I said I' not the best cook, I didn't buy any Cream of Mushroom soup 

because I thought I had some in my pantry. Turns out I didn't. whoops...

So I substituted cream of chicken soup because I did have that.

I decided to throw it in the crock pot instead of the oven, for convenience.

this is what it looked like all in-

I let it cook all afternoon, while I worked on other things...

And then it was dinner time.

Turned out pretty good. 

They were small thin pork chops, I served them with a salad and potatoes. The salad came from a bag at the grocer, you mix and serve. Easy and about 3.50$. The potatoes, are ones I do in the microwave quite often and are favorites of ours - with out a recipe for the most part.

My son did recently ask me how to make them- so here goes.

using the smaller red skinned potatoes, 

cut them into bite sized pieces.

put in microwave safe bowl with 1 - 2 TBLSP butter (depends on how many potatoes in the bowl)

add some seasoning, this time I use Mrs. Dash garlic herb blend. other times it's paprika or other blends.

microwave 3-5 minutes stir and repeat until potatoes are soft.

makes a great easy side dish.

So what did we think of the Bar-be-cue pork chops? They were alright. My husband said they were really good. But they had more of a sweet taste than a Bar-be-cue flavor. I may make them again some time. It was rather easy. But quite frankly, if I want bar-be-cue flavored pork chops, I'd probably just smother them with a purchased bar-be-que sauce. It would cost less than this sauce did. But I am thinking it may have a smokier taste if I use the actual cream of mushroom instead of the cream of chicken. So don't base how this recipe went by my doing here. LOL, like I said - I am not the best cook, but I am trying. I like eating, so I figure this is a fun way to try new things.