Redwork & cookies

I was bad this weekend. First, I didn't sew any binding down on any of the three quilts that are waiting on me for this final step. Instead, I started on my redwork project. I'm doing nine blocks that all have a mother goose, nursery rhyme theme. This first one is little Miss Muffet. I stitched her first because she looked like she was the least amount of work.

And this one is Old Mother Hubbard. Again, I'm stitching in order of difficulty, so she looked like the least amount of work after Miss Muffet.

I'm using three strands of red (DMC 321) embroidery thread on a bleached muslin background. The white background makes it very hard to get a good picture that isn't too shadowy, especially since today is another cloudy one.

On the bright side, this is the first embroidery I've ever done, and I really like it. On the weekends I like to have handwork (usually binding a quilt or crochet) to do while I sit on the couch and relax. Plus, I love the way redwork looks. My head is spinning now with ideas about how to update the redwork a little...turquoise thread on a brown background, white thread on black, pink or light blue on white for a baby quilt... I'm quickly thinking of more ideas for projects than I'll ever be able to complete.

Sunday I slept in and enjoyed every lazy minute of it. I even stayed in bed for 10 minutes or so after I woke up, just enjoying the feeling of slowly waking up instead of hopping out of bed and scurrying around to get ready for work. Grocery shopping couldn't be put off any longer, so I did that too. For supper, I made "To Die For Crockpot Roast" from the recipe on pg. 21 in the latest issue of the Country Register. Cindy tried it first and highly recommended it. And I second her recommendation. It meets the rule of 5's for recipes: no more than five ingredients or five steps.

And because I was already being bad by doing my redwork instead of quilt binding, I figured I might as well go ahead and crush any hopes of weight loss by making oatmeal cookies.

I love Paula Dean, but I tried her oatmeal cookie recipe a few months ago and just wasn't satisfied. I'm sure it was my failure and not hers. Afterwards, I was told by my mother and a co-worker that the recipe on the lid of the Quaker Oats is the best one, so I used that one this time. As you can see, I had much better results =)