Get Away From It All... Lancaster County, PA

Today, guest blogger Samantha takes us on a tour of one of my very favorite places, Lancaster County, Pennsylvania (aka Amish Country):

Earlier this week, my husband and I went to a conference at Willow Valley Resort in Lancaster.  While we were there, we had some down time and decided to visit some of my favorite places in the area.

We visited some shops, saw some of the lovely farmhouse architecture, and of course, went to Kitchen Kettle Village, which is a tourist village that has some of the most delicious food and drinks.  We stopped at The Roasted Rooster for some cider and pumpkin spice lattes...

And oh myyyyyy, was it good.  We also visited my very favorite place in Lacaster, The Jam and Relish Kitchen, where jams, jellies, relishes, and salsas of all varieties are jarred and sold.  You can actually peek into the small kitchen in the back to see the Amish girls working on the batch of the day! It is really fascinating.  The best part though, is that there are samples of EVERYTHING sold in the shop!  It could quite easily be a full meal...

Visiting Lancaster really is a special treat for me.  I love getting to be out in the country with all of Pennsylvania's rolling hills.  It is truly inspiring to see the simplicity of the Amish way of life, and it reminds me to slow down sometimes and enjoy all things beautiful.

By the way, if you are not familiar with the Amish- they are a religious sect which eschew modern ways of life- they dress "plain" (women in dresses, men in black), they drive horse drawn buggies instead of cars, and don't use electricity. If you are interested in learning a little more about them, you can read an article here and here.

Last, on our way home, we stopped at Terrain, which was a very special treat, since there are only 2 locations in the country! (Terrain is a garden/home goods shop that is owned by the Anthropologie folks).

They are getting ready for Christmas! I can't believe the holidays are here this soon, but I am delighted that they are.  I am hosting Thanksgiving this year, and then comes Christmas shopping and Christmas baking and Christmas music!  I am a junkie for it all!

Are you ready for the holidays? Extremely excited, or totally terrified? How are you finding ways to rest before this hectic season begins?

Happy Weekend!

Samantha

A note from Jacquelynne: Congratulations to Christine in Australia and Karrie in Michigan who won the giveaway last week!! Your prizes are on the way! And thanks to everyone for their very nice comments about my block tutorial. I was not able to respond to everyone, but I did read each and every comment (with a big smile on my face.)

Also, I have had to turn on the captcha again for comments. I really hate to do it, but spammers somehow found their way past the filter, and in a 48 hour period, I had no less than 70 spam comments posted to my blog- all for prescription drugs. (If anyone out there needs Tramadol or Ativan, let me know- I have a long list of sources for you now....) Sorry for the inconvenience- I hope you will still leave comments!!  :)  Maybe I will try turning it off in a week or so and see what happens......

Sweet Potato Casserole

I like cooking. But sometimes I don't. Sometimes I am really in the mood to spend a whole day in the kitchen. And other times, I can go an entire week without a bit of culinary gumption. This week happens to be a week when I am in the mood to cook. (Of course, next week I will have to cook for Thanksgiving- maybe I should pace myself this week??)

The other night I was really in the mood for sweet potatoes, so I made a sweet potato casserole. It was really good! A delicious prelude to next week's Thanksgiving feast.... Creamy sweet potato base (not too sweet) topped with a generous crunchy, nutty topping (I am intolerant of skimpy toppings, aren't you?)

The sweet potato casserole was a bit time consuming (peeling the potatoes, chopping and toasting nuts for the topping, etc.), but really well worth it. Since I spent a lot of time on my side dish, I made the rest of the meal ridiculously simple- baked chicken breast and spinach sauteed with a bit of chopped onion and olive oil. I do this a lot with my cooking- I choose one or maybe 2 dishes that I will spend a fair amount of time on, and then go super simple on the rest. It makes the meal special, without having to spend a whole day in the kitchen.

Also, this casserole can be done a day ahead, so you could make it on a Sunday for Monday night dinner (just pop it in the oven when you get home from work), or it would be a tasty addition to your Thanksgiving or Christmas dinner (for those big dinners, I do almost everything a day or 2 ahead so I can actually enjoy the holiday, and hopefully not have a melt down in the kitchen on the big day itself!)

 Click here for a FULL SIZE PRINTABLE version of this recipe for your collection.

This recipe calls for sweet potatoes OR Southern yams.... the difference between sweet potatoes and yams seems to cause a lot of confusion... so I did a little research. Apparently, true yams are difficult to find in the United States. Most "yams" sold in the U.S. are what are considered to be "Southern yams"- very similar to, and almost interchangeable with, a sweet potato. A true yam is native to Africa and is much larger and starchier (not as sweet) as Southern yams. So if you are shopping at a typical supermarket in the U.S., be assured that sweet potatoes and yams are almost the same and can be substituted for each other in most recipes. OK, botany lesson over :).

I am going to try (really, really try! I think I can, I think I can.....) to do a December newsletter (if you're not already a subscriber, you can sign up in upper right side bar of this blog.) There will be lots more messes in the kitchen this week as I work on a new recipe or 2 for that. You can click here to go to the Newsletter Archives. Each issue has free recipes, patterns and projects. Oh, and did I mention that it's free?

Hurricanes and Hope

(Click here for printable PDF version of this wall print.)

First, let me say thank you so much for all of your prayers for those of us here on the East Coast of the United States a couple of weeks ago. Our family and home here in New Jersey weathered the storm without injury or property loss. This is quite amazing, and I would say miraculous, given that the eye of Hurricane Sandy passed directly over us.We are only about 80 miles from the shore, which has been the victim of unimaginable devastation, as you know.

We were well prepared for the storm. Our power tends to go out fairly often, even when other neighboring homes do not, so we assumed that we'd be without electricity for a week or more. On Saturday, my daughter's school made the call to cancel school for Monday and Tuesday, and my husband was also told not to come into work. We had the generator hooked up, moved everything we possibly could off of the basement floors, had plenty of bottled water and canned food and batteries for the flashlights. We kept our crucial devices plugged in all day so that we would have them fully charged when the power inevitably went out (who could live without their cell phones, lap tops, and iPads in this day and age?!?)  And then on Monday, the day of the storm, we waited. The rain picked up, the winds howled. All local programming on the television was pre-empted by news coverage. We settled in with books and magazines, waiting for the power to cut out. By dinner time, we were sure the electric would go out at any moment, as the winds whipped fiercely and the rain poured down relentlessly. We ate dinner early, thinking that surely this was our last chance for a hot meal for the next several days! And we waited, and waited..... and went to bed with power still intact. Actually by bedtime, the winds died down to almost nothing- the eye of the storm passing over. Early in the morning, around 2 a.m. the winds picked up again. And then we awoke the next morning- to power in our home, and gray drizzly skies.

As I said, this was truly miraculous. My husband and I are no strangers to the devastation that a hurricane can cause. In 1989, when we were first married, we were living on the island of St. Croix in the U.S. Virgin Islands where my husband worked for an oil company. The forecast for Hurricane Hugo was dire, and we were evacuated to a large metal warehouse on the company property, since getting off the island at that point would have been difficult or impossible. The hurricane made landfall on St. Croix on September 17 through the night till the 18th. That night was the most terrifying of my life.

We sat in the warehouse, as the storm raged outside. Sleep was impossible! The roof began to pull away from the building, but managed to stay in place. We had to move to different areas of the warehouse, as we would settle into one place and then it would start flooding. At one point, some men knocked out the wall between our warehouse and the adjoining fire station so we could get in there. More than once, we thought that the building might blow away, taking us with it. The storm had stalled over St. Croix, with winds reaching 140 miles per hour, pounding and beating away at the island for hours upon hours.

The next morning, after the hurricane had passed, the warehouse doors were opened, and the sky was a weird, eerie green color. We saw palm trees, sheared in half. We saw rows and rows of concrete foundations, where houses had used to stand- there was literally nothing left of the homes but the poured concrete foundations. Somehow, somehow, our house was spared. It sat snug against a little hill, which we believe protected it from the fierce winds. However, the back wall was caved in and roof separated from the house- and a washing machine (not ours), sat in the back yard. Apparently, the winds had hurled someone's washing machine into the back of our house. Our car, however, was totaled-  all of the windows crushed in and it was full of debris from the storm.

Power was out on the island for over a month. There were riots at the gas stations. Store owners sat on their roof tops with machine guns, trying to keep looters away from their shops. After about 4 days the National Guard was sent in to get looting under control. When they were able to, about a week later, my husband's company sent in a plane with food for their employees and families.

So, yes- I know what hurricanes can do. To this day, I hate the wind. If there are strong winds outside, I put earplugs in my ears because I cannot shake the fear that something bad will happen, something will get destroyed. I have seen people lose everything.

And yet, going into this event, I was peaceful and calm. I actually surprised myself.  It wasn't that I was ignorant or oblivious to the possible imminent destruction- on the contrary, I was quite aware of how deadly these storms can be. But we prepared, we prayed, and then we waited. In the past I would have made myself physically ill with worry. But I felt at peace that we would be cared for.

Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own. Matthew 6:34

Perhaps this is something that comes with age and wisdom- faith that somehow, everything will be OK. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but eventually. And worrying does not lessen the chances of bad things happening. The best you can do is prepare and hope for the best.

I painted the little poster at the top of this post with a quote that I like by Corrie Ten Boom, a holocaust prison survivor. I have created a PDF version to share with you- you can print it out and hang it up if you would like. It is a good reminder, not just on difficult days, but every day.

Please continue to pray for the people of this area- so many have lost so much. My husband was able to go on Friday with a group of men from our church to help with the clean up.

If you would like to make a donation, you may do so at Samaritan's Purse (the organization which is doing a lot of relief work in the area and organized my husband's trip there). If you would like to make a donation directly to a local organization, you can click here.

Thank you again for your continued prayers- they are much needed and appreciated.

Apple Cider Doughnut Muffins

Guest blogger Samantha is making my mouth water today! You might need to hit the gym after just reading this post!

Fall has been so very good to me! Apple picking, long walks, and play time with my kitten, along with a visit from my mother-in-law and some much-needed time off from my full time job.  And in that time, I got to putting together some yummy recipes to pass off to my coworkers when I returned.  This is one of those recipes, however, I didn't really want to give up.  I was inspired when we went apple picking and was totally tempted by the apple cider doughnuts. I love how dense they are with the cinnamon-sugar topping all around.  That's the kind of feeling I tried to get in these muffins and, not to brag, I think I succeeded.

Here's what you'll need:
1/4 cup butter, softened
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/3 cup brown sugar
2 tbsp apple cider sauce or regular applesauce
2 eggs
2 tsp baking soda
pinch of nutmeg
1 tsp cinnamon
3/4 tsp salt
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup milk

Topping –
3 tbsp butter
6 tbsp cinnamon-sugar mixture

1.  Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Place baking cups in a 12-cup muffin tin and lightly grease the insides. Set aside.
2.  In a large bowl, thoroughly mix together butter, oil, sugars and apple cider sauce. Add eggs, beating to combine, until mixture is smooth. Stir in baking powder, baking soda, nutmeg, cinnamon and salt.
Add the flour to the butter mixture alternately with the milk, starting and ending with the flour. Stir to combine well. The batter should be light and fluffy.
3.  Fill muffin cups 3/4 of the way full. Bake until a toothpick inserted into one of the center muffins comes out clean, about 15 minutes. Remove from oven and allow to cool 10 minutes.
4.  Melt butter for topping. Dip the tops of each muffin into the butter, then roll in the cinnamon-sugar mixture. Place on a cooling rack to cool completely.

And there you are! Delicious muffins that are good for breakfast, brunch, or dessert.  I used the apple cider sauce that I got at a local farm stand, but regular unsweetened applesauce can be used as well.

What have you been up to this fall? Any wonderful farm stand finds?  Tell me all about it!

Happy Weekend!

Samantha

Glorious Autumn Quilter's Block Party

Welcome! Today it is my turn for the Glorious Autumn Quilter's Block Party, sponsored by Quilting Gallery! In case you are new, here is what's going on: Michele at Quilter's Gallery is sponsoring a block party for 15 weeks. Every week there are 3 FREE block patterns/tutorials by 3 different designers.
That's 45 FREE BLOCK PATTERNS!!! Yippeeee!!!!!!  There are also many manufacturers providing "Super Deals for Quilters," i.e., special offers and sales.

I have answered some fun questions as part of my designer profile:  How many UFO's do I currently have? What was my first quilt? How did I transition from quilter to designer? You will have to go to the Quilting Gallery page to find out!

There's a Flickr page, too, so you can see what other folks have been up to with these free block patterns.

And there's a giveaway.... 2 prizes, folks!

My block is called Autumn Jewel Box, and it features my Fruitful Hands Fabric line:

With this block, you can make quilts like these:

You can click here for a PDF of this tutorial.

Here is how to make this block:

White- cut 4 squares each 3 7/8"
Red Floral- cut 4 squares each 3 7/8"

Cut these squares in half diagonally to create 8 triangles each:

Cut a strip, 2" x about 15", from each of the following fabrics: Orange Dot, Green Floral, Red Texture, Green Texture:

(Don't worry about trimming the selvedges off now.)

Sew the strips together along long edges:

 (Why is it that the cat is most interested in me when I am trying to get something done??)

Trim off the selvedges and cut this unit into 4 units, each 3 1/2" wide:

Sew the red and white triangles together into 8 squares (sorry I forgot to photo this step!!)

Sew 4 of the squares into pairs like this, and then sew the pairs into a square:

Sew the remaining 4 squares to the ends of 2 of the strip units (note that the red triangle is adjacent to the green rectangle, and the white triangle is adjacent to the orange rectangle):

Sew the remaining 2 strip units to the large square:

Sew the block together as shown above. This yields a 12 1/2" (12" finished) block.

That's it! Hope you enjoy making this block!

As mentioned, there's a giveaway- with 2 prizes. Each prize will contain fabric from the Fruitful Hands fabric line, plus a pattern assortment OR an autographed copy of my book, Fruitful Hands. The retail value for each of these prizes is $40-$50.

For the giveaway, you can get up to 3 chances to win:

• Comment here on this post and tell me your favorite thing about the Autumn season. 
• Like my Facebook page, and then comment here that you have done so.
• Subscribe to my newsletter (see the box in the upper right bar of this blog). Comment here to let me know you have done so.

I must be able to contact you if you win! If your email doesn't show up automatically through your Google or Blogger account, please include it in your comment. If you don't want to leave your email address in your comment, you can email me to give me your address and let me know that you have commented. You must comment by midnight EST on Monday November 12, 2012. Two winners will be chosen at random. Good Luck!

Don't forget to also visit the other two featured designers this week and get the directions for their blocks:

Jo's Country Junction and The Caffeinated Quilter (love that name!)

In The Studio Today: Painting & Playing

I have been taking Brenda Pinnick's Color and Mixed Media class. One of the things I have most enjoyed is experimenting with products which I have not tried before. One of these products is called Yupo Paper. It is a synthetic material, and unlike regular paper, it does not absorb the paint or water- the paint sits on top of the surface of the paper. You get a really different look than you do when painting on typical paper- more streaky and "loose," less blended colors. Here is a  quick little painting that I did while I was "playing" in the studio:

Doesn't it look cool? Because Yupo doesn't absorb the paint, it does make layering colors much more difficult. I don't think I will be moving to Yupo for all of my future projects- I like a lot more details and layering in my paintings than I am able to do this way- but it's fun for a change of pace.

The other thing that is cool about Yupo is that there is a version which is translucent, like tracing paper. You can place a drawing under the Yupo paper, and do a quick painting that way, without having to sketch it out on your painting surface first.

I love venturing into nature for inspiration for my artwork. After 3 1/2 days of cold, raw rain (thanks to Hurricane Sandy), it is finally dry and seasonable again- good weather for walking and hiking. Although much of the brilliant foliage is gone, but there is still plenty of nature's handiwork to admire....

My husband and I went on a "date" on Saturday, and went for a long hike through a nearby state park. The beauty and stillness refreshed my soul....

Being outside always calms me down and relaxes me. What recharges your batteries and refreshes your soul? Is it a favorite place? Music or books? Prayer or meditation? A special person or people who make you feel warm and loved??

I thank you God for this most amazing day, for the leaping greenly spirits of trees, and for the blue dream of sky and for everything which is natural, which is infinite, which is yes.  ~e.e. cummings

NYC Is Good To Me: Part 2

Guest blogger Samantha shares more from her recent trip to New York City:

Warning! This post is very photo-heavy, because I'm about to show you my favorite part of our trip to New York a few weeks ago.  You remember first we visited the Hell's Kitchen Flea market, but then after that we made our way further downtown to take a walk down The High Line park.  The High Line is a park that has been built on an abandoned elevated rail line above the city, running from W. 30th Street to W. 14th Street.  What a beautiful way to "upcycle" an unused space.  It was so peaceful being above the city streets, strolling alongside some really cool murals...

City murals are one of my favorite things to see on a trip, along with architecture, which was also really fun in the area surrounding the High Line.  It was such an interesting mix of old and new, traditional and modern, and, of course, man-made and natural.

(Isn't this car park so cool? I didn't even know they existed on this scale!)

I hope to go back to the High Line soon; it was such a wonderful place to visit, that I'm sure changes in every season!
After walking the gardens, we moseyed back to Times Square where we saw the stage production of Mary Poppins!  It was a great show and I'm so glad we saw it.  What can I say, my husband spoils me rotten!

And now to settle back into real life; my least favorite part of travel! Oh well, here's to long work days followed by sweatpants and tea!

Happy Weekend!
Samantha

A note from Jacquelynne:
In regards to yesterday's newsletter- I mentioned how much I enjoyed the Hunger Games trilogy by Suzanne Collins. In hindsight, I should have mentioned that this series is not for young teens or children. At times, I myself found the book difficult to read. However, I felt in the end, that the character development and the issues raised were worth exploring, and insightful in view of some of the things going on in our society today. They are definitely mature themes. If you haven't read the books or seen the movie yet, before you do so, you may want to check out some reviews and see if this story is for you.