Well-fed wildlife!

There is no shortage of wildlife here in the suburbs!

Rich is a bird-lover (and so am I), and he just got new feeders over the weekend for the squirrels and the birds both.

The backyard is always full of cheerful chatter even on horribly windy days like today. We get so many varieties of birds it's hard to believe. The birds and squirrels are downright FAT! lol

Saturday while Chloe was at riding, Rich and I walked the trail along the South Platte river and got some great photos of pairs of ducks. I wanted to get some photos of the Canada Geese that seem to be EVERYWHERE... everywhere except there, apparently! lol

Sunday morning as I got out of bed, a bit of movement caught my eye in the east window. It was a coyote. There is a pretty good-sized pack of them just back of here- we have green space behind our back yard- and we have all been warned to keep a track of our pets, especially at night. Many neighbors have had their cats disappear. Such is life when you live side by side with wild animals, I guess.

Anyway, I decided I wanted to see if I could get a picture, and ran out back with the camera. Good thing I have a decent zoom lens, he was a good piece away and looked right at me. There were three of them, and Rich said they were the healthiest looking coyotes he has ever seen. Up in the hills he saw them a lot, but they were much skinnier.

I think it is very cool living so near to so much life outside!

Quilters ATCs!

The latest rage in my sewing room is Quilters Artist Trading Cards (ATCs for short). What a blast I have had taking a foray into this particular arena!

I have experimented with a few techniques that I have hesitated to try on my quilting, like thread painting and embellishing with a variety of fun things.

I have made a new friend right in town here and she was the one who invited me to go along with her to a quilt shop she likes to trade these cool little treasures with a group of ladies she has taken some classes with. I can't wait!

I will put the entire collection of cards on my Webshots page (link at right) if you are interested. Here is a little something to pique your interest...

Fabric Adventure!

I had a GREAT day! I met up with my friend Joan who lives in Denver, and we went to the Rocky Mountain Sew Expo in Denver.
What a show- so much to see and touch and drool over. So many choices about what to buy and what not to buy.

I hadn't met Joan in person before today; she and I belong to the same online fabric postcard trading group and she nicely offered to go with me to the show, knowing I don't know a lot of people around here yet. We started out by having a leisurely breakfast first and then spent the next three hours wandering from booth to booth. Joan brought me a gorgeous moose pincushion as a "welcome to Denver" gift. Isn't it cute? Joan is a sweetheart.

I really didn't intend on buying any fabric, but the prices were so good and I saw some stuff I knew my girls would LOVE. They are bag-a-holics just like I am and any time I get cool fabric, they want a bag of some sort out of it. I have lots of bag patterns and I love making bags... so it's all good!

Next week my adventure continues when I will go to an artsy quilt shop with a friend I have made here in the neighborhood. We will be trading quilter's ATCs, and I have been working feverishly on them for the past couple of weeks. I will post later today or tomorrow and show you a little sample of my "art".

In the meantime, check out the cool fabric I got today. I am so excited!

Another hike

Well, we have been out hiking again, and this time we saw lots of footprints in the wet clay.

I am including a photo of what I believe (after looking it up) to be mountain lion tracks- they were ALL over the trail we were on. We saw deer and bunny tracks too, but my camera battery was pretty low and I couldn't take as many photos as I usually do.

It is so cool to be able to hike in light clothes in January! But the ground is a weird texture this time of year. As our soil is clay, the water/snow doesn't get absorbed too far down, and so even the grassy areas are slippery to walk on. You definitely have to watch your step. It would be so easy to slip and fall or twist your ankle.

We didn't go out much last weekend, Colorado actually had a cold snap and it was a bit too chilly to be out long.

Chloe started riding lessons at Coventry and loved it. Learning English will be a bit of a challenge, but she is up to it!

Other than that, I have been keeping busy with housework, quilt classes, and volunteer stuff- I have to do something to stay out of trouble! lol

Cooking Gourmet...

Anyone who knows me, knows how much I love to cook and bake. And boy howdy! Am I ever having a blast doing that here!

I was concerned about cooking on a gas stove- but I love it. I was concerned about cooking at high altitudes- but I really haven't found much difference to tell the truth.

Rich bought me subscriptions to Gourmet and Bon Appetit magazines and I go through them cover to cover. I cook things out of them regularly. Rich will often choose something he wants to try and then together we make it on the weekend.

The thing about the recipes in those magazines is that they usually feed a small army! However, though it increases the prep time and ingredients to have, the cooking time is the same, and then I have an extra meal or two for the freezer for those days that I am at a quilt class or otherwise occupied. So I love that they make a lot!

Today, I am making a dish called Sunday Ragu, with Polpette as an appetizer- though I have no idea why you would need an appetizer before this dish. Polpette are torpedo-shaped meatballs- and they are made from the same meat mixture as the big meatballs. I guess it is to tease you a little before the main event. The ragu is basically a bunch of different meats prepared, browned, and then cooked in the tomato sauce, then you take the meats out onto a platter and serve them with a side of pasta and the sauce.

I am including a bunch of photos because I don't believe I have ever cooked- or eaten- a dish with so many meats in it! There is a total of NINE pounds of meat! This will be at least three meals for the four of us, and a couple of lunches for Rich too. The frying pan holding this meat is a 5.2L pan...

The list of meats is: beef braciole (bra-chee-oh-lee), which is top round cut thin, pounded thinner, filled with a mixture of garlic, parsley, romano, and pancetta then rolled into little parcels; sweet Italian sausage; hot Italian sausage; pork shoulder; country-style pork ribs, and huge meatballs made from veal, beef, and pork.

This house smells SOOOO good right now! So, the sauce is simmering and now it is time to make cookie dough for lunches this week- chocolate chip cookies and also some almond biscotti. Later I will bake enough just for tomorrow. After a 3+ mile hike this morning and cooking so much of today, I am getting a bit tired.

Then I will sit.