changing colours

I can't believe it was spring the last time we visited Stourhead; the fresh greens were just coming through then. 

Now the trees and shrubs are slowly taking on new shades; not fully blown autumn yet, but well on the way.

We took a longer walk than normally, through the woods surrounding the gardens.

Beautiful sunny day; we have been having some frost at night, 

but day temperatures have been pushing up to 19 - 20 C, and again very dry.

At home I have been having fun with butterflies,

and I nearly finished stitchery no 7 for Little Patchwork Village wall quilt, 

only 2 more to do.

And this is a start of my new crochet project, a shawl, which I have rather fallen in love with.

I hope you will have a good week, where ever you are! 

©pleasureinstitching.blogspot.co.uk 2010-2018

weekend in the kitchen and little sewing too

My regular followers already know how much I like making jams, small batches of various fruit combinations. What I call my "regular summer jam" is a mixture of any summer fruit around, but this year I am little late; early in the summer it was just too hot for making jams, and suddenly here we are, with autumn approaching.

Luckily local strawberries are still around and now we also have English plums in the shops.

So, this time my summer jam is a combination of plums, greengages, strawberries, raspberries, and apricots.

I use very simple method in my jam making - cut up the fruit, mix it with sugar (a half the weight of the fruit), cover and let it "rest" for 3- 4 hours (or even overnight). I don't add any liquid, because while resting, the fruit releases its own juices.

Then I slowly cook the fruit, followed by fast boil to get the setting point, 

and here we are - little bit more sunshine for the winter months.

This weekend I have tried a new recipe for a plum cake, Plum and Frangipane cake, using spelt flower. The combination of plums, almonds and cinnamon is usually a winner.

And this is the result - the taste is great, although it took nearly twice as long in the oven, than the recipe said, because I just could not get the middle to cook completely.  

It could be just my oven (somewhat unpredictable). 

I will make it again, but in the future I will use large tin, to make the cake lower, may be that will sort the problem.

It has been a rather slow sewing week and little short on inspiration, 

but I have made some progress on my hexies wall hanging, which is now becoming "The Butterfly" wall hanging.

©pleasureinstitching.blogspot.co.uk 2010-2018

new winter project?

You already know how much fun I had making Gardenhurst, one of Irene Blanck's designs.

When I finished it, I sent a picture of it to Irene, 

and she was very kind to include it in her post, which you can read here.

When I was making Gardenhurts from Irene's book "Focus on Applique", I kept seeing a picture of "Awakening" at the start of the book, which was one Irene's earlier quilts.

I love this design, and I knew it would be my next big project. But the pattern is not included in the book, and I it doesn't seem to be anywhere for sale. So I contacted  Irene directly, and she kindly made more copies and ......

it arrived in the post this week!

So, this will be my big project for this winter. 

I have no idea at this point about the colour scheme for it. I have been very good this year using fabrics from my stash as much as possible, but I will go shopping for this one! There are so many new fabrics around, something might inspire.

The colours are slowly changing in our garden.

Most of plants survived the hot summer and have recovered, 

and there still is lots of colour around.

Specially the dark leaf dahlias are doing very well right now; 

the bees are loving them.

A new clematis planted this week against the garage wall; 

it should look really nice next summer.

©pleasureinstitching.blogspot.co.uk 2010-2018

FNwF

How does the time fly! Here we are in September, with autumn creeping in.

We have had some cold nights, but most days are still nice and sunny, real "beer garden" weather, and even some little stitching in the garden is possible.

Last night we met up again at Cheryll's for FNwF; thanks Cheryll, for being such a great host!

What was I up to?

Last night I nearly finished stitchery no 5 (of 9) 

for Little Patchwork Village wall quilt by Rosalie Quinlan.

Earlier in the day I finished joining together all the 2 in hexies, removed the papers from the back and backed the whole piece with Vilene.

What to do with it now? 

You know how some fabrics just speak to you? 

This piece of batik just shouts "applique leaves", doesn't it?

So last night I started playing with some ideas. You can tell I miss doing applique.

An idea is slowly developing.....

Enjoy the rest of the weekend!

©pleasureinstitching.blogspot.co.uk 2010-2018