Purrfect Binding

Good morning, my friends. The clock is ticking down. Are you ready? Except for two days of cooking ahead of me, I'm ready. We learned we had an extra guest coming for dinner last night, and so Mike has volunteered to sacrifice himself to the gods of grocery today. We only need a couple of things to supplement what I already have, but geez. Better him than me. It's one of those times when we'll be grateful for self check-out.

My day was pretty low-key yesterday. I gave myself a day to rest up before the big meal preparation. The kitties spent some time outside, but it was a wet and dismal day. They only lasted a few minutes before coming in and demanding treats in exchange for their hard work.

So, I prepaid them for their efforts, and then we sat down to finish off the quilt binding. Smitty wanted to get a good look at the lay of the land before settling in.

And then we settled in. Sadie was the emergency back-up cat. She stood by waiting for her shift.

She cleaned her paws in preparation.

When it was her turn to take over, she was ready.

With their help, I spent the afternoon on this, turning all four corners.

I had a stew in the oven, and I'd set a timer to remind me when it was time for the next step. When the timer went off, I had just this much left to stitch.

So I took care of my stew, and then finished off the stitching. And that, my friends, is a big finished. I started this quilt on November 16, 2020. It feels good to be able to remove it from my list of WIPs.

Here's a peek at the back:

And it was just about dinner time by then. After taking pictures of the quilt, I put the finishing touches on dinner, and we sat down to enjoy it. This is the Chile-Braised Short Ribs dish that simmered away while I was stitching.

I've made this dish before, and it seems each time, I have to write notes to myself about it. It's very tasty, but the broth cooks down more than the recipe would suggest. The only liquid in the dish aside from the "marinade" is 4 cups of chicken broth. In the end, the recipe would have you strain out the solids and then "reduce" the liquid that remains to 4 cups. Well, I had 2 cups of liquid at most. I added some beef broth (since these are beef short ribs) and then simply heated it up. It ends up more broth-like than sauce-like, but it was tasty just the same. We have enough for another meal. Mike isn't generally a fan of olives, but he likes the pitted green olives in this dish. I like them for the color they add.

So today will be a kitchen day. I'm making a Cranberry Cheesecake. Already I've made the cranberry filling. It needs to cool completely before I can proceed. In the meantime, I'll make the crust. The crust is made from Vienna Fingers cookies. When the filling is cool enough, I'll make the cheesecake. When it's in the pan, I'll swirl some of the cranberry filling into it before baking it. Then, it'll get a sour cream topping before it's ready to eat. The remainder of the filling will be ladled over the individual pieces.

Also, I'm making Tart Green Beans with Bacon. They're often included for celebratory dinners, and I've been making them this way for more than 30 years. The original recipe came from a cookbook my brother gave me for Christmas many years ago. I can never make it without thinking of him.

So that will keep me busy for most of the day. If there's time for sewing today, I'll get back to working on the Seasons quilt top.