Happy Thanksgiving!

The measurements and mini tutorial for the base pillow will be coming soon!  

2011 Autumn Open House

We sure enjoyed our time with everyone at the Autumn Open House. It was so much fun to have our studio up and going! I was so busy that I forgot to pick up my camera and take photos! The scrap bins were a huge hit and so was the little make and take project, an adorable little needle felted snowman!

I want to share the Zucchini Lemon Cookie recipe with you. They were really yummy! (As were the the other varieties, but it's so fun to have a new cookie flavor!)

My heartfelt thanks to Ronda and her loving hours of service. She also shared some of her latest creations and we all enjoyed her beautiful hand work!

My daughter had jaw surgery in the middle of all this ~ life happens. But things really went well, all things considered. I enjoyed getting feedback from people as to what they would like to see happen in the studio. It's nice to be finding a rhythm and getting a feel for how we can be a good resource to all those creative folks in our lovely valley.

Thank you for your support and encouragement!

Zucchini Cookies

Ingredients 1/2 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
1 cup sugar
1 egg
1 cup finely shredded zucchini
1 teaspoon finely grated lemon zest
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 cup raisins
Lemon Glaze:
1 cup confectioners’ sugar, sifted
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1/4 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Spray a whoopie pie pan with nonstick cooking spray or line a regular baking sheet with parchment paper.
2. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment or with a hand mixer, beat the butter and sugar until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Beat in egg, zucchini and lemon zest and vanilla.
3. In a medium bowl mix together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon and salt. Stir flour mixture into wet ingredients until just combined. Fold in raisins.
4. Use a medium cookie scoop (1 ½ tablespoons) to drop dough into the center of each whoopee pie well or simply drop them directly onto the prepared cookie sheet. If you are using a cookie sheet, be sure to leave a few inches between each cookie.
5. Bake in preheated oven for 8-10 minutes or until lightly browned. Remove to wire racks to cool.
6. Make the glaze by mixing together the confectioners’ sugar, lemon juice and vanilla extract. Drizzle the glaze over cooled cookies.

Notes:

-If you are using a regular sheet, your cookies will be a bit thinner than the ones pictured above.
-Store cookies at room temperature in an airtight container for up to 3 days.
-Recipe adapted from allrecipes.com.

I found this recipe here.  It is a wonderful blog for all things tasty :)  I did use the whoopie pie pan and it yielded about 23 perfectly round cookies!

Open House Next Week!

2011 Autumn Open House at the

Black Sheep Woolens Studio!

Tues. Sept 20th

4:00 pm - 8:00 pm

Wed. Sept 21st

10:00 am - 2:00 pm

We have been busy like a little bees...cutting, sorting and folding wool! Hope you can stop by and see our new room and stock up on wool for some fall and winter projects. 

• If you have a pattern you need a kit for, bring it over and we'll help you get just what you need for it.
• Try your hand at needle felting or hooking a rug!
• As always...we will have treats!

Parking is a little limited but you can park on the road and walk up the hill if the driveway is full. 

Call for directions or send me an email. (Address on Sidebar)

435.755.5906

Attention Chicks from Needles & Friends:

If you signed up and paid for a Button Jack kit at Needles and Friends this past week, we will have those available for you.  *I  also have better reference drawing for the Button Jack that you can pick up.  I forgot to sketch in the vines.  And...I forgot little brown strip for the vine the bird stands on.  Sheesh!  I had too much on my mind and struggling with some jet lag when I put that kit together...so sorry!

Jack Button Pillow Slip

Where Did Summer Go?

A new venture...an account with Moda.  We have two more shipments coming our way in this fall.  We are excited to start creating some new projects that will mix wool with cotton!

***

I was able to make two quilts for a sweet friend's two daughters this past month.  I loved creating them!  They are full of color, life and energy just like the cute couples they went to.  Sue Badley did a wonderful job quilting them...in record time, I might add.  I was under the gun to get these finished.  They were both pieced in about 4 or 5 days.

For Carlos & Kasey:

"Facet"  from one of Kaffe Fassett's books.

Kasey loves the colors of a peacock and especially purple.

 I started with a jelly roll of batiks and then went form there. Really fun to work with all of the fabrics that worked their way into this quilt.

 Below is the back.  I offset the strip of birds down the length of the quilt.

Samantha had given me this picture from an Anthropolgie Catalog:

Her color requests were green with a little rust and a modern feel.

For Samantha & Brandon:

I used this pretty tree motif for the backing and gave it a border all the way around so it can be reversed for a more quiet look.

Here is a photo of the quilts at their twin open house last week.  Congrats to both couples!!

The summer has been full of busy weeks and travel and family. Fall is in the air at night now.  I am looking forward to some new projects I have underway.  I am so happy to be settling into my new studio.  It's a great space!

International Quilt Market 2011, Salt Lake City

Lindsey and I enjoyed a day of classes and getting to know some of the designers better.

So much creativity and inspiration everywhere we went.  Anna Maria Horner gave everyone in class a cupcake. 

Lindsey was smitten with this pillow and everwhere you looked there was handwork and embroidery embellishing quilts and pillows and home dec. items.

We met Sarah Jane, a local designer who is a children's book illustrator and young mom.  How do they do it all? Her work was wonderful!

Paula Prass is a favorite of mine.  She talked to us about the process of designing a line of fabric.  It was very interesting to hear about.  She handpainted a lot of her art work. It was gorgeous.  AND...see that little piece of fabric in the bottom right hand corner of the photo?  I won it! I am in love with this piece called Wing Study from her newest line. Paula is a darling lady.

This is right after sample spree Thursday night. My daughters and I had a blast shopping and looking at all the goods. Emily found an adorable bracelet and cute purse and Lindsey and I stocked up on jelly rolls and fat quarter bundles. We are really happy about some of the new patterns we found.

Friday we spent the morning taking in as many booths as we could.  

Here is Paula's booth. She used my favorite piece of fabric to cover this chair seat. 

We were so very impressed with Edyta Sitar. She is a very warm and genuine person as well as a very talented designer and teacher.  She has a passion for her work and it shows.  She is eager to share everything she has learned with you. She has designed some gorgeous batiks and the way she mixes them with other cotton fabrics is magical.

 Edyta's Booth ~ Laundry Basket Quilts.

 Sandi Henderson

 So many quilts to enjoy and be inspired by.

 This booth was serving sorbet ;)

Looking down into the vendor area...sooo much to see.  It is overwhelming.

One last designer I wanted to touch on is the very talented designer of  Don't Look Now.  I think her name was Kellie and she is from the land down under.  Her booth was incredible to see and I didn't have my camera when I went back to get some of her patterns.  You can visit her blog here and I would highly suggest you take a peek.  One of my favorite pieces was a framed family tree. The background she used was copies of her daughters favorite story book pages as a child.  It is the sweetest idea ever!  Her work is executed meticulously and is so colorful and vibrant! 

The little pocket project is called "25 More Sleeps" and is the cutest little advent calender.

The exciting thing for us was chatting with the Moda reps and deciding to look into getting an account with them so we can order fabric to use in kits with our wool.  Lindsey and I are looking forward to designing some new projects.  Since market I was able to meet with the reps in my home and I have placed my first order.  We are also ordering some silk fabric to try some overdying on that.  Exciting things in the works!

2011 Color of the Year

I never realized that there was an actual color of the year.  I just thought that with each new season there were new trendy colors.  I am liking this color of the year.  It will be fun to incorporate it into my business. Last year the color of the year was Turquoise.  It was a hot color in the fabric industry and I certainly dyed my fair share of it.  This year we have....

I love this!  I will be working on some yummy formulas that I can dip my wool into.  I can hardly wait to get started!  I wonder who gets to pick the color of the year and what the runners up were?  I tell you... you learn something new every day.  Too bad I'm so slow with the cutting edge most of the time! Hope you find a fun little shade of honeysuckle in an item for yourself or your home that you adore!  Happy hunting! Aren't those pink boots the cutest things EVER?

Miss Rosie

The last post seemed kinda crazy to me, so I thought I would save the post about Miss Rosie for a post all it's own.  It's always fun to meet someone "famous". Carrie was at Winterfest as the visiting national teacher.  You can visit her web site here. I really enjoyed her trunk show and chatting with her on the last day.  Happy for me, some of my wool went home with her in her suitcase.  I wish her success and also some quiet time amidst her crazy busy schedule. She is a lovely person.

Miss Rosie from the famed Schnibbles patterns shared some pretty sweet quilts with us and and great stories, too! I was most impressed with her generosity after the show.  She told everyone they could come and examine the quilts on the table and ooh and awe over the beautiful machine quilting her quilters had done on the quilts.  She adds some great little thoughts as labels on the back of some of her quilts. Loved that! Loved being inspired.

Carrie is in the black vest - I thought this candid shot was perfect!  She loves to chat with the girls.

What A Week! Winterfest 2011

Last Tuesday I got to tote some of my wool scraps to our Needles & Friends guild class.  My cute friend Kris (center photo) was teaching.  She found the most beautiful pillow at Anthropologie and worked with the most talented Jessica (bottom left) who drew up the design for her! It was a great class. The pillows everyone was creating will be stunning.  They will be using little scraps of wool as well as scraps of upholstery fabrics.  I am the very happy owner of the cream one Kris is showing in the photo.  It was the best Christmas gift ever!

Winterfest 2011

We enjoyed our time at Winterfest, a quitling retreat attended by over 100 wonderful, happy, and creative ladies.  It was great to observe and  meet some very sweet people.  We learned a lot about the crazy fun industry of quilting.  I loved those girls at the Corn Wagon who were wonderful "neighbors" and my granddaughter Molly's BFFs. Daniels Summit was a beautiful place. 

We were able to work on some projects during our down time.

It's never too early to start working on something for Christmas!

Thursday morning was one of the most beautiful mornings I ever saw!

We left Midway just after 7:00am and the entire valley looked like this. Absolutely spectacular.

 

The girls from Pine Needles

Little Miss Molly, just happy to be with all the ladies toting around her mommy's purse. 

The Lazy Daisy Cottage, all the way from St. George.

 

 I didn't really get any great photos - my camera's battery died

shortly after we arrived and I didn't bring the charger.  Yay for 

the cell phone camera.  This was our corner of the room.

The insides of one of my kits :)

Lesson learned: The ladies to love to buy a kit!