Busy Day

So much happened today, and it will be another busy day tomorrow.  First, I embroidered the butterfly for the Gardener's Journal quilt.  These are tiny little motifs...just 2 ½ inches by 2 ½ inches.

After that, I chased down Little Chief Muddy Foot of the Never Wash Tribe.  

He wasn't very happy about getting his feet cleaned, but then, I wasn't happy about his muddy footprints all over my floors.

Then I started in on the week's laundry.  Smitty made sure I got every last piece out of the hamper. 

Once we had that going, I decided to try out a coffee cake recipe I found this week.  It turned out really good, and it was easy to make.  Without going into great detail, here's what you do.

First you mince up some fresh cranberries along with some granulated sugar.  Set that aside.

Then you make a streusel topping from brown sugar, flour, butter, cinnamon, and finely chopped walnuts.  Set that aside.

 Then you mix up the cake batter and spread it into a well-greased 9 x 13 pan.

Then you smooth  the cranberries over the top of the batter.

Then you sprinkle the streusel over the top of that.

Then you bake it.

Then you eat it.  Yum.  The topping gives the cake top a nice little crunch.

If that looks good to you, you can thank Isabelle Boucher over at Recipe by Crumb:  A Food Blog.  The recipe is right here.  Is it time for breakfast yet?

After that, we went out and bagged the wild Christmas tree, if by "wild" you mean, "grown on a tree farm". 

The tree farm is all of one mile or less away, and so this was a quick process.  They sell Noble Firs for $10. What a steal!  Then we came home and put it up.  We haven't decorated it yet.  We're waiting until tomorrow so that Smitty can get used to the idea of having a tree in the house.  Baby's First Christmas, you know.

Then I finished up the doll quilt I've been working on for the past few days.  This is for the December doll quilt swap.  My partner doesn't read my blog (at least, I don't think she does), and so I can show it to you here.  This quilt is from Janet Kime's book Christmas Cats and Dogs.

 The theme for the December swap is "Signs of the Season" and this is the quilt I made.  This quilt is called Catty Canes.  It is 22 inches wide and 20 inches long.

The faces are machine stitched with silver metallic thread and the eyes are from silver hot fix nailheads.  I had to redo one of the tails because her method of paper-piecing them was a little different from the way I learned.  I ended up with a reversed tail, and it wouldn't work when I tried to stitch it to the quilt.  Once I figured out her method, I was up and running again.

The quilting is all stitch in the ditch around the cats and the stripes of their tails.  Then I did a little stylized Christmas tree motif of my own design in the border.

I still need to sew the binding on, but then this one will be in next week's mail.

And now...I'm just waiting on one more load of clothes to come out of the dryer, and then it's time for my jammies.

Tomorrow, we're meeting Erik and Mae to look at a house they're thinking of buying, then we'll have lunch with them afterward.  Then...Matthew will be coming in by train tomorrow afternoon and staying with us until he finds a place to live when he moves back to Portland.  A place to live is the only thing standing between him and his move at this point.

How about you?  Is your weekend as busy as mine is?