Wow what a holiday

I remember being younger and playing all day on Christmas.

Now that my husband and I are the hosts...it's hardly a day of rest for us. The prime rib was excellent this year, so it was definitely worth the elbow grease.

What was your favorite gift this year?

Mine was this.

It actually was not for me, it was from me for my husband.

We discovered padron peppers in our CSA this past year, and we are hooked. You fry them up in a bit of oil, throw some salt on them, and eat them like potato chips. If you have not had these, maybe you'll want to start growing them in your garden next year too.

Hope your holiday was filled with family and joy, as mine was.

Sometimes you feel like a nut, SOMETIMES YOU DON'T

To shake things up this holiday, we discovered quite by accident that our little one is highly allergic to nuts.

You can imagine how much fun we had in the ER with him and what a huge scare that was.

Come to find out that nuts are pretty much everywhere. So now what? Learning about how to find food that doesn't contain nuts, nut products, or food produced on equipment also used to process nuts.

Good times. Never a dull moment.

Ah, but so much to be thankful for this holiday season.

Having some time off work with my family is my #1 thing to be thankful this year, but having the kind of friends that will meet you in the emergency room, rescue your 4 yr old from having to hang out with the crazy folks in there so both you and your husband can stay there with the sick baby, and having those same friends bring you dinner later makes me realize how good we have it.

In other news, my friend Sharon gave me this totally insane and beautiful yarn ball for Christmas. I'm feeling a scarf coming on in the new year.

Christmas: Are you feelin' it yet?

Looks like it's only 1 week until Christmas. Are your stockings hung? Anybody out there besides me got some last minute projects still to wrap up?

Raise your hand if you are still working on making Christmas gifts?

Ok, whew, glad I'm not alone here.

I love to make Christmas ornaments every year and this year they are still laying around in pieces. I think they are waiting for my vacation to start so I can give them the attention they deserve.

My sister's family (including the worlds cutest baby girl) visited earlier this week for an early Christmas, so that was one of the big highlights for me this year. I made my sis a funky knit beanie out of this AWESOME Japanese yarn by Make Make. It looks so cute on her.

And if you need some Christmas cheer yourself, I recommend you visit this Snow Carving sculpture post. Wow, these are serious snow artists.

Dear Yoko Saito

I made block "F6" from the Dear Hannah quilt pattern using Japanese taupe fabrics.

Maybe I should call this quilt Dear Yoko instead of Dear Hannah. Do you think that Ms. Saito would approve of my use of taupe colors? I sure do hope so. I'm in love with little taupe applique blocks.

I'll be making another similar block for my sister's wedding quilt (which she will be lucky to receive on her 10th wedding anniversary at this rate! sorry sis - eek!).

It's starting to look very Christmas-y around here, and the kids can smell the closeness of Santa's arrival. We are still counting days instead of hours which is perhaps the only blessing there.

Mona, a friend from Singapore, visited the Yokohama quilt show and mailed me the catalog. Thank you so much Mona. Those quilts just blew my socks off. I'll have to photograph my favorite page for you or something.

She sent me Yoko Saito's business card with her email address on there. I sent her some fan email, but she has yet to invite me to lunch with her. I'm sure that will happen eventually.

Amish Quilts and Amish Abstraction

Oh so busy busy, almost too busy to keep up the blog posts.

Trust me, I've been out there quilting, and running all over the bay area on behalf of quilts.

On Saturday I attended a symposium that included discussion of the Amish quilt exhibit (on display now) at the De Young Museum, Amish Abstractions.

During the symposium, we heard the point of view of Steven and Faith Brown (owners of the collection) who told us all about their love of the quilts and how they started collecting. They were so generous and amazing, if you can find your way to see this exhibit, you will be in for a rare treat.

Also included in the discussion were Jonathan Holstein, Robert Shaw, Joe Cunningham, and (I will confess the last one was my favorite) Janneken Smucker.

They all had lots to say about quilts, quilt making, and Amish culture. I'll try to share some of my notes with you as I work my way through them.

As I already mentioned, the quilts are DROP DEAD GORGEOUS, so run...don't walk...to see this exhibit.

No photography allowed in the exhibit itself, so visit them in person for perhaps the most stunning quilt experience of your life (I mean it, I really do) or pick up a copy of the book which is very nice but really doesn't compare to the real deal.