Happy T Day & a Catch Up Post

Good morning everyone,
    On Tuesdays I enjoy joining in with Elizabeth's T Party where we share our week and a beverage. Click on T for Tuesday's button in the right column to learn more and join in.  (I am posting early as I am enjoying free time this morning)

  Not allot happening here. It has been very very hot and humid so I am not outdoors much in this kind of weather. We have gotten some rain which the veggie plants needed. My tomato plants are doing pretty well especially the ones that got yanked out of their pots twice now. lol We believe it is the deer doing it and not the raccoons. and surprise the impatients they ate down to the roots are beginning to show some leaves again which made me smile.

  I have been tired and also have lack of energy lately. Blame it on getting older, the extreme heat indexes here and allergies-which have been difficult since last fall for me. So I have been doing more reading, hand spinning, and the other evening I picked up my basket of civil war hexagon pieces to work on too. I also am planning to start cutting and sewing my newest quilt project very soon-see last post, I just need to finish up some things in the bathroom and get started back on setting rocks as well-which is actually fun for me to do.

     I have been taking the Boswellia and Turmeric Curcumin for a couple months now and it really has made a huge difference with my left hand which I had injured in a fall a couple years ago. These herbs have really taken away the swelling allot and helped with the pain. 
    I wanted to see if these herbs improved my hand function enough to hold and hand stitch the hexies again. And it has made a huge difference. Just can't go overboard hand sewing for more than an hour at a time,  which I tend to do with my craft projects.
    I wish I would have started this quilt project before my hand injury. I love these civil war reproduction fabrics so much and also the pattern--- that I am just going to continue on and see what ends up-It may not be the queen size quilt but something else 

Those blocks with the turkey red centers will be the focal point of the quilt-placed in the middle of the quilt and then different color combinations of the civil war reproduction fabrics for the rest of them. I will be using a light beige around each block and then a chocolate brown for the rest of the "filler" hexies.

   As I had mentioned in a past post I was trying out a new method for gluten free bread-my first attempt was the best the rest of the breads in that batch were still just too gummy inside but the wildlife enjoyed all that bread-they ate it up right away-there were allot of whole grain flours in it  
    So to make me feel better about baking I made hubs a sourdough rye bread that he says was perfect. I had ordered in a more sour rye starter from Austria for these breads-so it reminded me I do know how to bake. Gluten free bread baking is just difficult-and pie crusts I still have not gotten that right yet for gluten free.

  We were invited yesterday to a grill party at a friend's house. His parties are always fun lots of food as everyone brings a dish and he knows so many people that we get to meet and visit more of his friends.
   I usually bring a pie as the other typical sides are covered. and I do love baking fruit pies learned from my Mom and Grandma so they are country style pies with loads of fruit and the men all love them. I decided to make cranberry-blueberry this time I also made a batch of gluten free brownies and baked them in some mini cupcake liners and served them on a plate with some of my handmade dark chocolate bark placed in those same liners- I had made a huge batch of the bark last winter and just keep it in the freezer for times like this.

For my drink to share this week-we had purchased a watermelon that was a bit over ripe last week-especially in the center. This makes into excellent watermelon margaritas though-so I made hubs and I a batch one evening. Delicious and refreshing!

Happy T day everyone!