Sauce Tomatoes. 26 Aug 23.

 I'll try to catch up a few posts from last week or so, until current posts.

Here is the first batch of sauce tomatoes.  The modern hybrid, "Supremo", had larger, earlier, firmer, meatier tomatoes, compared to my own saved seed plants of Roma VF.

I cooked down about 40% of them, reducing volume by 50%.  Pureed the result in food processor, froze in 1-cup portions.

I made most of the rest into salsa, and canned it.  The salsa also contained home grown green peppers, Jalapeño peppers, garlic, and onions all from my garden,

I'm not sure, but I think I will have a second crop, just as large, from the sauce tomato raised bed.

Onion Harvest. 26 Aug 23

 I've been digging the onions.  Very happy with the crop.

The red ones are the heirloom variety "Red Wethersfield".  The yellow are a modern hybrid, I forget the name.  The harvest is more than 100 onions, a good crop that will keep until Spring 2024.

The image with Rufus was the first few rows, a few days ago.

I'm letting them dry and cure, out of the direct sun.

Last year, my onion crop was very disappointing.  I think the difference is, this year I had much better (nonclogging) drip irrigation.  I was also able to keep ahead of weeds this year.

Red Star Quilt, Completed. 26 Aug 23.

 Here is the red star quilt that I finished this summer.  This was made mostly from upcycled men's 1% cotton shirts.  The sides and corner blocks are mainly my own design, and the body of the quilt was based on a pattern from Today's Quilter by Lynne Goldsworthy.  

I'm happy with the result.  A couple of the shirt fabrics were a more delicate weave than I should have used, and not as durable than I wish it was.  Lesson learned.  I have started cutting multicolored batik fabrics for an entirely different take on this theme.  Something to work on next winter.

Resuming Posting. 26 Aug 23.

 I haven't been posting for a while.  It's been a challenging summer, and I can't do everything I once did.

I hope that continuing to post is a sign of resilience and hope for the future.

Gardening is as important as it ever was.  Good for health, mental health, emotional health, nutrition, outlook, community, and the environment.

Disappearing Hourglass Quilt Block in Batik. 5,6.23

I wanted to make a quilt for Ning's sister, that I could make faster than the usual  cotton men's shirt upcycle quilts.  There are various versions online of disappearing hourglass.  I decided to use batik as the deeply colored parts and off-white with grey markings for the background.  I ordered precut 10-inch sampler bundles, but will also add some other fabrics.

First sew together a light and a dark square, facing together.  Sew a 1/4 inch seam all around.

One thing I discovered, is the precuts are not all perfectly square.  So it takes some finagling.

Then, cut corner to corner, both ways.  (I didn't photograph the first one, so the color is different now.

Then open what are now half square triangles, press, rearrange to make hourglass blocks.

Sew together.  That's the hourglass block.

Then cut into perfect thirds, horizontal and vertical.  That disappears the hourglass.

Now it's a nine-patch.  Rearrange the sides, corners, and middle.

Sewn together like a nine-patch, the block at the top is the result.  There are some challenges.  All of the pieces are on the bias.  The corners didn't come out perfectly on the first two blocks.  I think it still be ok with practice.  Also, the white backgrounds in the sampler aren't all what I want, so I need to replace some.