Glanalaw - delighting in pure song

A modified log cabin block table runner. Constructed from the fabric of various thrifted clothing -- either things which I bought specifically for the fabric, or which no longer fit me properly.  All the materials are wool or linen, and it's filled with part of a thrifted cotton blanket. I made the top in a single evening, hand stitched the binding, and then machine quilted it in two sessions. It's now on sale in the shop!   (And I've decided I need a walking foot for my machine.)

I love a tall glass of iced coffee on warm mornings. It's best if sweetened with a large dollop of sweetened condensed milk.  But that is a luxury I can't always afford, so for every day, I use powdered sugar. It dissolves in the cold liquid so much better and faster than granulated sugar.  I use cold-brew coffee, which has a lovely flavour and won't melt your ice right away!.  Top it up with milk (and a splash of cream if you're feeling decadent).  Delicious!

Eventually, I will have that post about the player piano for you.  I'm having issues with the video.  For now, though, spring flowers! They are so delicate to look at, but so sturdy. And I'm finally getting the hang of making my camera focus sharply on a single object while blurring out the background.

I avoided reading The Hunger Games  for quite a while.  It seemed like just another one of those fad series; I pictured it as another Twilight , and decided to skip it.  But I finally heard enough good things about the books from people I respect. I read the first one in 4 hours -- picked it up to read a few pages before bed, and finished at 3 in the morning.  Definitely a page-turner!  So I was excited to see the film when it came out, although I wasn't sure I would actually like it.  I'm so picky about movie adaptations of book.  But I thought this was excellent.  It was extremely unusual in that large sections of the film actually looked almost exactly like my mental picture.  So cool!  I'll probably be blogging about the series again once I've read the second and third books.  Not only are they impossible to put down but the first one really made me think. At the top - the Reaping hairstyle. Below, right before the Aren...

It's pouring rain and I'm sitting at one of the coffee shops downtown, wishing I had an umbrella and possibly sensible shoes.  I had to be out of the house at 7 AM (to attend traffic school... sigh...) and I didn't take time to check the weather.  It was clear when I left but now it's chilly and so wet.  And my umbrella is in the car on the other side of town.  It'll be a damp walk up to school for my afternoon class! But Blondie's is a charming shop and I don't mind spending an hour here!  Their food and drinks are excellent and I like the atmosphere.  They play music from the '50s and '60s, the staff is friendly, and the big windows balance out the dark, exposed brick of the walls and the black beams in the ceiling.  I keep glancing out the windows and seeing people I know - it's nice to be at the point where I'm beginning to be familiar with this town. I wish I had more time to just hang out at coffee shops.  Or in fact to just sit...

Yesterday I had a migraine.  It's maybe the second time in my life this has happened and I hope it's the last (but it probably won't be.)  I woke up with a splitting headache and that weird haze - almost a mirage? - floating in the corner of my eyesight and making it difficult to see out of my left eye.  I almost stayed home from school but decided against it -- I hate skipping class.  The haze went away, mostly, before I left, so I thought I was doing better. Not so much.  By halfway through my 9 o'clock class my teacher said I looked like I'd just died, and after class he told me to go home and forget about the rest of the day.  I considered it, and decided I didn't feel well enough to drive anywhere, so I curled up on a bench in the lobby -- where apparently I terrified another teacher, as I was so white in the face she thought I'd passed out. So I spent two hours lying on a couch in yet another teacher's office.  I have to say I was so touch...

Today has been a lot busier than I usually like my Sundays.  We've got the children's musical coming up this week at church, so we held a two-hour rehearsal directly after morning service.  How is it that children always have several times the energy of the adults in charge? This afternoon there was an orchestra concert at school -- the two winners of the Concerto and Aria competition, plus they played Brahms' 2nd Symphony, which was excellent.  (Well, it all was!)  I had about an hour and a half between the end of my rehearsal and the beginning of the concert, so I wandered around campus in leisurely fashion and took pictures of flowering trees.  Also of myself, because I could. For a change, no part of this outfit was made by me!  I do occasionally wear ready-made clothes ;-)  The dress and the shirt are both from Old Navy.  I bought this dress back freshman year of college, but I almost never wore it -- it's a halter dress with a very ...

Hooray, another recipe!  Or really not a recipe, it's too basic for that... You know those breakfast sandwiches a lot of fast food restaurants sell?  An English muffin or a bagel, egg, meat, cheese, all grilled up together?  I love these, but I don't like McDonalds and I can't afford Panera on a daily basis.  But I figured, how hard can they be, really? Basically, you take your bread - shown here as an English muffin, but bagels are really good too - and butter the outsides.  Fry an egg.  I recommend you break the yolk towards the end and let it squish out and then firm up a bit - otherwise it'll break when you grill the sandwich and make a mess.  Layer cheese, meat of your choice (bacon, breakfast sausage, sandwich meat -- bacon is my favourite but I used deli turkey here), and the egg on top.  You can use any kind of cheese - or several - and whatever meat strikes your fancy.  If you want a little more kick to your sandwich add some mu...

So, I was going to call this something descriptive like "Red Pepper Pasta" or the like, but I referred to it on Facebook as "a pasta thing" and my cousin requested that I name it that officially.  So I did.  Just for you, Lauren! I made this on Saturday.  I really wanted pasta but I didn't want a heavy tomato sauce or anything.  So I experimented a little and came up with this!  It probably owes something to someone else (maybe the Pioneer Woman?) as I know I've made a somewhat similar sauce from a recipe before.  But this one's my own twist on it.  It ends up being light but flavourful.  I think it would be perfect served with crusty French bread and a salad!  (Neither of which I had on hand.  But theoretically...) The recipe looks a little complicated, as you end up having several things going at once, but if you read through it before you start I think you'll find it's not too bad.  Mainly you end up doing chopping or blendi...

I might get fired if Dr. Foster ever sees this ;-P Choir tour this year was interesting.  For one thing, we went to  Jackson and Memphis... whereas the last few years I've been leaving from  Jackson.  But going to Jackson meant I could walk up to Union (we stopped for lunch half a mile from the school) and visit old friends!  I saw my old voice teacher, a whole assortment of random friends, and most of the music faculty, and I got the great joy of singing with the Union Singers again for a rehearsal.  I miss them so much! St Peter's Catholic in Memphis Then we went on to Memphis.  We had three full evening concerts over the course of the week, but mainly we visited high schools.  We did this with Union, too -- we go to a school, sing for them, hear them sing, and then the director works with their choir and there's usually some Q&A time at the end.  Most of the schools are fun, but kind of mediocre (and then there are the groups t...

My goodness, it's been a while since I posted!  I've been quite busy and also out of town, first for a vocal competition and then for choir tour.  I'll post more about both of them in the coming days but I thought I'd pop by and mention that I'm still alive!  Briefly, though: Orpheus Vocal Competition at MTSU.  Didn't place, did have fun. Stopped by my alma mater on choir tour.  Saw old friends and teachers, sang with my old choir, was for three hours perfectly content. Met a cat named Cat. Lunch on Beale Street, got soaked going back to the bus in the rain.  Wrung water out of clothing.  Amazed no one got sick. Home-stay last night with a wonderful lady who had (among other things) a lovely cat an a 1921 player piano.  Also five antique music boxes, the kind you can put discs into to play different songs. Came home and immediately made a pot of good tea.  It's been a whole week. Also made a microwave mug cake to celebrate being...