The Berry of the day

Today's berry is the highbush cranberry. I knew well the low bush cranberry. It took a trip to the Whistler library and getting a library card to find this berry out! The library is new and right outside my door. How handy is that! The highbush cranberry is also called squashberry and Mooseberry up here in BC. There are important ways to be sure you know what a berry plant is. One is the form of its leaves. The very best thing to add to the leave knowledge is the flower it bears. With the leaves and flowers I can tell quickly most berries. But this time there was only some green berries with a touch of red coming on. Once the berries are ripe they are juicy and sweet. If we had been around for flowering this plant would have had a close cluster of tiny white flowers. Your raspberries etc have med to large flowers.

I checked out a book on the local native tribes eating history in the pacific northwest. Rich with berry eating. When peoples have eaten something for long generations you learn wisdom in how to use the Berry's. The Highbush cranberry is getting hard to find. I was delighted that I had.

Most Berries are fine to eat on the trail. Go hiking with someone who knows what is there and learn one at a time. Berries like elderberries can be very bad for you unless you cook them. They are famous for wine and jam. The native peoples like to soak the highbush cranberries for long periods and then in winter eat them like pudding.

On the trail I eat raspberries, black berries, Salal, wintergreen, Oregon grape, some gooseberries, service berries, salmon berries, blue berries, currents, wild strawberries (tasty but a lot of seeds), and huckleberries and thimbleberries (not my favorite).

What you never want to eat is Devils club, twin berries, bitter cherry, all the lily's,and honey suckle. There is more but the berries on these plants look good and ARE NOT.

Do you have questions? Do ask. You can get Vitamin C and some other great Vitamins in wild berries. Now is the time of year to enjoy them.

varying from Berry-ing

Today was my daughter (child #4) last day here with us. Before she left I got a really yummy cake recipe from her. She made this up herself. Took a basic idea and did wonderful things with it. This cake is cool and refreshing. You must make this for summer eating. We have been really enjoying piece after piece of her cake this week. I took a photo of all that was left. It's a pretty cake but she told me you can do anything that you like. So thank you Cheryl for this yummy recipe!

Cheryl's Island Paradise Cake (so good it will feel like a trip to Hawaii)

You must make this a day ahead so it will soak in the coconut milk. It looks like tons of milk but it does all soak in!

1 box of Betty Crocker Cherry chip cake mix ( and what ever the box calls for also)

1 can Sweetened condensed milk like Eagle brand milk

1 can of coconut milk (not fat reduced please)

1 can of crushed pineapple

cool whip for frosting

coconut for toasting

Maraschino cherry's for cake top

Bake cake using directions and ingredients on box Bake in 9X13 glass pan (it only works in glass)

Mix Eagle Brand milk with coconut milk and 1/2 the juice from the crushed pineapple. It helps to put this in a measuring cup for easy pouring. If too thick to soak into cake add more pineapple juice but not too much.

Once the cake comes from the oven let it cool for about 10 minutes. Then poke holes in the cake. These need to be a good size or the stuff in that measuring cup won't soak into the cake. Cheryl used a chop stick with the thick end as the poker. When she made it here in Whistler she found a wooden spoon with the right size handle and poked holes with that.

Pour syrup of milks and juice over the cake. Move across slowly to let it seep into the cake. If you made your poke holes big enough and chill this over night it will soak in all most all the coconut milk mixture.

How the cake looks when the milk is first poured on.

Cool completely

stir crushed pineapple into the cool whip and frost the cake with it.

Top with the cherries

Toast coconut in your oven. Safest to do it with a hot 450 degree oven and stir and watch. But you can do it under the broiler is you watch it and never look away.

Put toasted coconut on the cake just as you serve each piece. The crunch is wonderful with the smooth frosting and the sweet cake.

Enjoy and adjust this cake to make it your own kind of Paradise.

Beautiful weather, lots of hiking and biking... nothing like a vacation

Here is today's berry. It was a great find! I had to hike back to get the photo as when we first passed it the sun was so bright you couldn't enjoy the rich colors of this bush.

No guessing this time, this is a gray blueberry. It tastes wonderful and is larger than most wild blueberries.

YUM YUM.

This is the lake I was hiking to when I found the blueberry bush. Lost lake a popular busy place but so beautiful and even peaceful in a big crowd.

When we vacation here in Whistler anyone can join us but the rules are meal cooking is shared and we each get to do what we want to do. I put a pad of sticky notes out and everyone leaves times and places they are off to if they know. Well bleach boy and I had no idea where we were off to and when Lilly and her parents found us at lost lake we were very surprised! With 5 lakes within walking distance to our condominium we could have been any where.

On Monday the crowds of the week-end go away and you have the kids working the summer here and the families that live here and the summer camps. It's a different group on Monday. I did a tiny bit of hiking over rocks on Sunday and it swelled my injured ankle too much to walk on Monday. We ended up riding our bikes to rainbow park. I drive bleach boy crazy I'm sure, as I kept stopping to take photos of berries! Seems the bears were liking these berries too. Found lots of bear skat on the trails.

We spent all day at Rainbow park and one point I thought bleach boy was going to have to take off his shoes and go into the lake after a girl who had gone too far trying to retrieve her inter- tube that had blown away. Finally when she was much too tired she turned back to land. Lucky for bleach boy. I've always hoped he would be around if I was drownging. He is such a really great strong swimmer!

We spent the day reading. I read aloud the good articles in this months Foreign Policy magazine and then went to work on reading Goose Girl. We were going to baby sit Lilly that evening so around 4:30 we rode back into town, stopping for Photos all long the trail.

This is a fitting end to the day. Took this out of our deck.

Berry Berry where are the Berries

This is today's berry can you tell me what it is?

It was hard finding berries to show you this year. Everything is just past the flower and not yet the berry. Late because of the long winter. If you want a hiking snack don't look in the deep forest. No berries here. This is a nature trail along the Blackcomb creek.

When hiking I look for berries by the forest fragrance's. NONE this year. Just the heady smell of clover. Awe here it is.

I'm not sure why this is called Skunk cabbage. My Girl Scout troop loved to make jokes about this plant when we camped. Every time I run into this massive plant on the trail I think I have stepped back into a Jurassic era. I love the giant leaves and the odd lily like bloom and the light looks so pretty coming through the leaves.

I hope these berry blogs will help those of you new to the northwest gain some confidence to pick and eat the safe berries of the forest. The native Americans of this region lived well on the berries and seafood here in the Northwest. It is one of the great things about living here.

Maybe this will help you figure out the above berry

www.wnps.org/landscaping/plantselect.html

http://www.turtlepuddle.org/alaskan/wild/berries.html

Happy Birthday Eden

Happy Birthday Eden

She is the last of the family born in 1978. It’s not polite to state a ladies age so you will have to figure out what birthday Eden is celebrating today.

She’s the only daughter-in-law in the family. When she married our son she had to meet not only me but the four daughters. Now that would un-nerve any young lady. How brave she was.

Eden fits in perfect; we love all she has brought to our family.

So there we have it the far away daughter, a son-in-law and a daughter-in-law all born In 1978. If you are wondering about that year see my blog for Jared’s birthday.

I loved my 30’s. So if you are reading this and are in your 20’s heading fast toward the 30’s don’t worry about it. It’s lovely. The 20’s are full of choices that stress you. Where to go to school, what to major in, what to do when you change your major, how to please your parents, who to marry, where to live, how to support yourself, when to start your family, etc.. But when you get to the 30’s so much of that is behind you. You have gained some skills for what you are now doing. And the best of all you can visit your home town and people treat you less like a kid!

So dear Eden, enjoy these years to come. You are very special and we love you!

Domestic red currents

Last daughter guessed this one correctly. The berries are domestic red currents and they grow on my Northern fences. We love these tiny juicy berries. Frozen they are wonderful. Many long years ago my love of wild life convinced me to make sure all I planted on my property would feed something. So the currents feed the children who pass by and the birds enjoy them and if Gracie, my Cashgora Goat had her way she would enjoy the whole bush, all the way to the ground!

I'm on the search for some berry's to take photos of. Today, first day of vacation was a day of rest. No matter how beautiful the weather I just couldn't get myself off and onto a trail! You can smell berries in the heat of the day so I look forward to this search. It's a sweet smell, I'm sure the bears find the berries this way. I've seen the bears go from bush to bush just gobbling up those sweet treats. The village is a buzz with plans for the 2010 winter Olympics. But talk this year is that the long winter made the crops very late and strawberries are just now on. So I cross my fingers that this July isn't too early for some wild berries to enjoy.

wish me luck.

Berry Berry quite contrary

So we can have you guess each day with answers the following day

What berry is this? Can you eat it? just give me a comment below.

I'm off for my week of hiking in Canada. I'm hoping for lots of cool perfect weather. Last year I was rained out, sad. I wait all year for this. I have my favorite hiking sandals, my camera, and my day pack. Because I hike home to a lovely condominium every night I hope to send you a daily berry report. Yes it is berry season and my camera and I will go in hunt of all those wild beauty's Watch for photos of my hunt for the Berry Berry quite contrary. And as it goes in the Canadian Alps we don't want to run into any bears while hunting berries! Smiles, grammie person

Twins in a blanket

Natalie Elise

A lot of the family got together this week-end. We blessed Natalie,who is no longer very tiny, in church Sunday. I had 9 of my 10 grandchildren all together and forgot to take a photo can you believe that? I eavesdropped on my daughters talking and heard them sharing rhyming games to play with baby. There was Natalie at 2 plus months and Logan at 2 years and max and Lilly at 1 year. All the other children at 4 and older were outside playing the kinds of things bigger, little kids do.

So this is for the babies who can still be bounced on your knee or are about to be big enough to be bounced on your knee.

Trot Trot to Boston

In a lively singsong, with child on your knee of leg as if to ride a horse. Hold onto their hands.

Trot, trot to Boston

Trot, trot to Lynn

Trot, trot home again

And don't fall in. (down goes the child into the Ditch (space between your knees) and gently onto the floor)

Rag Dolls

You can do all the floppy parts easily

Let's floppy our fingers

Let's floppy our hands

Let's floppy our arms like rubber bands

Now floppy our heads, floppy your legs too

Like floppy rag dolls

I'll flop down with you

And now at request of Natalie's mommy here are the handkerchief dolls I made for you in church. I memorized them from this old book. Practice and you can amaze your kiddos.

This came from The Everything Book, printed in 1974. I learned the twins in a blanket from my mother who did them for me as a child in the early 1950's.

A dragon that snaps

Mouth open

Mouth closed

Did your mom or a favorite aunt teach you how to make those pretty little snap dragon flowers talk? Well here is how to delight a child.

Snap dragon flowers grow easily and can be found many places. No one has ever complained that I stopped at their bush to show a child how they talk.

Just take your thumb and pointer finger and pinch gently at the back of the flower. That moves its mouth and all you have to do is say something clever for that dragon flower! My grand daughter Lilly just looked puzzled the first time, the 2nd time she laughed. Worth it!

Enjoy those talking Snap Dragons.

What a big accomplishment!

It has been so busy I can't but help plan and prepared one event and then think about the next. Ever been that busy? When you can only think about the moment you are in? So in this mess I missed congratulating far away daughter on her graduation. The fastest, hardest MBA program on the planet. She studied and presented and worked hard day and night, week-day and week-end and on Saturday she graduated from the University of Geneva in Switzerland with an IOMBA. We are so excited for her. She will travel now to a far away country to do three months of volunteer work for UNICEF. If any one wants to hire a really hard working, experienced third child of mine you'd get a great deal.

So congratulations middle child and good luck!

You did what you set out to do!

Chocolate scratch n' sniff

just scratch n' sniff like those old stickers the kids used to have in the 80's. I buy these to dip holiday centers in, but this year with bleach boy working in California, and being on crutches, I didn't do my normal baking. That's a quarter on it to show you how big this is.

Didn't the scratch n' sniff work? Guess you have to turn off your virus protection

he he he he he he he he he he he he I can smell it....awe......

A flag what's a county to do?

Celebrating July 4th our Independence day is filled with symbols of what this country means to us. The flag is one of my very favorite of symbols. My heart pounds and I feel gratitude when ever I see it. Did you know the flag as we know it, one flag for all events, didn't come into being until after WWII.

That's right, it was a flag free for all. Right from the first declaration in 1776 people have designed different flags hoping to make it a symbol of our county

The process of our countries flag was helped by only three Flag acts. Freedom in flag designs abounded.

FLAG ACT I "Resolved, That the flag of the United States be made of thirteen stripes, alternate red and white; that the union be thirteen stars, white in a blue field, representing a new Constellation." 1777

FLAG ACT II provided for 15 stripes and 15 stars after May 1795. 1794

FLAG ACT III provided for 13 stripes and one star for each state, to be added to the flag on the 4th of July following the admission of each new state, signed by President Monroe. 1818

So those are the rules go for it! And these new U.S citizens did. So many flags for so many reasons. We loved and honored each for their intended use. No county has had more flags under one government. We use our flag, it follows us into battle, hangs in our public places, honors our dead, and brings us pause.

In 1892 the first pledge to our flag was started. This has taken many forms and was taught in schools to a fledgling generation of children. The pledge as I learned it in school, standing and saying it daily, wasn't in use until 1954. Before that point a similar pledge was used but it didn't have 'One nation under God' in it and it wasn't recognized by the Congress until 1942

.

The Pledge of Allegiance I Pledge Allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands,one Nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

After the "One nation under God" was added

Then-President Dwight D. Eisenhower said "In this way we are reaffirming the transcendence of religious faith in America's heritage and future; in this way we shall constantly strengthen those spiritual weapons which forever will be our country's most powerful resource in peace and war."

As a great leader of WWII he clearly knew the reason we needed to add the phrase.

Bleach Boy proposed to me on flag day, June 14th, 1972. We love to remember this day and hang our flag to celebrate the two great reasons for the day. This day for the flag began in 1885. Flag Day - the anniversary of the Flag Resolution of 1777 - was officially established by the Proclamation of President Woodrow Wilson on May 30th, 1916.

August 3rd, 1949, President Truman signed an Act of Congress designating June 14th of each year as National Flag Day.

The flag which belongs to the people has progressed in interesting ways and I hope you will check this web site. http://www.usflag.org/index.html It is one of my favorites on the flag. PBS stations all over are also showing a history of the flag where I got most of this information for this blog. Watch it, it's very good.

Be sure and stand tall with respect when your Flag passes by today. It is a symbol of freedom,a symbol of E PLURIBUS UNUM, Out of many into one. One great nation from 13 colonies, one great nation out of many immigrants.

Happy 4th of July American's all over, from all over!

July 4th 1776

When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

My grandmothers family left Sweden in the 1800's because they were not allowed to change their place of worship. Every member of my family there left at that time.

My grandfathers family came from Germany during that same time

My mothers father came from England for religious freedom

My grandmothers family searched for freedom until they found it in the Great Salt Lake Valley

It is because of them I was born in a free place.

Why are you here? Some came of their own free will, some were here already, some were forced because of slavery. The real Gift, of the founding Fathers, is that they left us with documents that allow us, all of us, to live together, to solve our problems, prefect our freedoms. It's not that The United States is a perfect package. No it's the right we have to make it better, to protect what makes us free.

As women we didn't have the right to vote until the Nineteenth amendment passed in 1920. Don't ever think that your one vote doesn't' have enough power! When you cast that vote you will do it freely and not under force. Start in the most important place, right in your city or county.

Today we will celebrate, we will join friends and family and have a good time. Put your flags out. Remember how fragile, how precious, how vital your freedom is. Remember to say a prayer of thanks. We have so much.

Happy Birthday to The United States Of American

Gardening Question

What do all those numbers mean in the gardening section?

I got a call from my gardening daughter. If she has fertilizer for Roddies, and one for flowers and one for grass which can she use on her veggie garden?

So here is the answer-fertilizers come with three numbers

1st number Nitrogen

2nd number Phosphate

3rd number Potash

When you look on a box, or bottle of food for your plants you will see three numbers sometimes they will be 0's. They go in the order you see above. The idea is to know what your plant needs and get the percent correct.

My violet food says 7-7-7 (7% of that bottle is Nitrogen, 7% is phosphate

etc)

Bloom boost says 10-50-10

Rose food says 18-24-16 (My rose food, which they love, is high in Nitrogen)

Cheryl’s Azalea, Roddie food 4-4-2

Cheryl’s Rose, flower bloom food 4-6-2

Are you beginning to see a pattern. Different combinations of the Nitrogen, Phosphate and Potash is different for each plant. BUT in reality plants need a variety of minerals and organic matter so the three numbers is only a beginning. Especially If you are going to be planning on doing sustainable gardening. You need to be able to start producing on your land what you will need to care for your plants. Before we go further I must say this is a simple view at a complex subject and I personally prefer using an organic approach which I can cover in a another blog. Right now we are seeing if my daughter can feed her veggies with the mixtures she has.

To begin with she is putting in her beans. They are well on their way now and need transplanting. Vegetables are heavy feeders. That means you will need to feed them more than once in this process. Cheryl will need to keep her veggie garden fed with an equal group Of N,P,K If the first number is larger than the rest I would avoid it for vegetable as it will cause overgrowth of the green and there will be little bloom.

So the Rose and Flower food looks ok

4- low on the N that’s not bad less is better for legumes

6-good

2-low on K would be better to be up at 6 also. We discounted the grass food as it had a weed killer we felt concern over.

One again this is a simple look. If we look at each plant Cheryl will plant they will have different requirements. Actually if I were gardening I’d say that Legume crop could be tilled in for a good burst of N. Guess she’d rather eat them!

Other factors are soil you start with, where you live, how you water, etc. Do you want to talk about gardening? It is my favorite subject!

A walk through my neighborhood

The weather has cooled back down and so we are walking again Lilly and I. My neighborhood is beautiful this time of year. Let me take you on a walk through my wonderland! Maybe you are one of my kids and you will be home sick looking up and down the road you once explored on. But if this is your first time on my street, listen for the chickadees, the sound of the horses, the smell of berries that are ripe, listen to the russle of the fir trees, and look up through the maple leaves as the sun glows through them. Now you know why I live here and NO where else.

Smiles

For full impact click on a photo to enlarge

This is just as you come off the main road onto my road, it was once just a dirt road

This is midas my cat following along

The 2 photos above are of a vine maple in my neighbors yard

My grand daughter Lilly was with me so we took photos of forest growing lillys

This is heading back the other way and yes they do trash pick-up on picture day!

Happy Anniversary Clint and Eden

July 1st 2000

Today is my oldest child, only son's anniversary. Seems like yesterday we gathered the family as it was, (one grandchild in the family) and got on a southwestern flight to Oakland. It was nice they got married in the place they both had loved as children. I remember when we took the 3 1/2 hour drive south, to the Oakland temple, with all the primary children. They never forgot the temple president telling them some day they would be back to the temple to be married for all eternity. How touching it was to have Clint take his love to the Oakland temple. (Her family was in Idaho, ours in the Northwest, Clint and Eden outside of L.A. so everyone had to travel)

I have some fun photos of the event it will be hard to choose which to use. We all felt so pretty in the blue Eden choose for the girls to wear and that California sun did it all justice. So Happy 8th Anniversary kids. Hope it has been the best 8 years of your lives. Hugs Grammie/mom

HOT HOT HOT

It is hot, and here in the Northwest we find 72 degrees F. just right and anything above that TOO HOT. We are on our 4th day of 90 plus degree weather and I think now is the time to write the Hot blog. I spent 13 years in California wine country and I learned all the issues with heat. It is from this I draw my helps for you.

#1 Today we took the neighbor girls to the movies. Car seats get wickedly hot. Baby seats left in the car likewise. Keep a towel by the door you go in and out of and carry a towel for each child to put on their seat. They will burn their bare legs so easily. Another help if you have over 100 degrees like we did in Ukiah. Keep a towel in the freezer, or fridge and lay it on the seat long enough to cool it off. My sister made little lemon water wipes she kept in Tupperware in the fridge. Made the car seats smell good and cooled them down too.

#2 Food. You can make everyone very sick with food that isn't treated correctly in the heat. Many people don't understand how this works. Simply bacteria loves starches and warmth. It can grow to a dangerous level very quickly.

So with this in mind foods that cause the biggest issues are: potatoes, rice, meat, fish, poultry, eggs and milk. Now this doesn't mean other things won't make you ill, these are just the fastest feeders for germs.

I know all this because I kept a food handlers license for 10 years, 5 of it cooking for the schools and the rest running a little catering business. From that experience I know that germs won't grow when the temperature of food is colder than 45 degrees F (7 C)

DANGER ZONE: 45 degrees F. to 140 degrees F. so this is how the danger zone works, outside of those temperatures things are safe, once you hit the above 45 all the way to the 140 degrees F. germs grow fast!

The food can smell OK, look OK but you eat it and YIKES.

How can you keep the food safe? Don't trust yourself to know how long it has been out at the picnic. keep food in the ice chest (full of ice) and let people serve themselves from there. You can put ice under the food of concern, a big bowl of ice with a smaller bowl sitting on top is great. I like to carry stacking containers to put ice under things then when the picnic is over I toss the ice and stack the pans.

If food has been hot and you are home, put it in a shallow container and cool it quickly. Ice underneath helps Put the food right into the fridge and keep it uncovered until completely cool. Many people are made ill by hot food stored incorrectly. Once it is cold you can put the food in what ever container you wish and cover it.

Your other choice when you are on a picnic is to keep the food hot. We have a traveling refrigerator that plugs into the car and can keep things hot or cold. It wasn't very expensive and we have used it tons! For the birthdays at the lake we took a travel battery and plugged the fridge into that. It lasted the whole party and food was kept cold.

One more point on the food for summer HEAT. If you are taking it home and plan to eat leftovers you must keep it on ice or you will have no idea how much germ growth there has been and if you put it in the fridge when you get home and eat it the next day it has had a lot of grow time.

There is so much to talk about on safe serving of food but this is just about those HOT days.

#3 Cooking at home in the heat. Here are two of my favorite griddle cookie recipes. DON'T TURN ON THAT OVEN. You will keep your home cooler if you cook in the microwave. But for cookies the grill is the best. (frying pan if you can keep an medium temperate consistent)

And keep your butter in the fridge in the heat it goes racid very fast.

Raisin griddle cookies (recipe from an old "county journal cookbook")

3 1/2 cups sifted flour 1 cup sugar 1 1/2 tsp. baking powder 1 tsp salt 1/2 tsp baking soda 1 tsp ground nutmeg 1 cup shortening (try butter or oil I haven't tested this but need to) 1 egg 1/2 cup milk 1 1/4 cups raisins

sift all dry ingredients together into a bowl. Cut in shortening until mixture is mealy Beat egg, add milk and blend together Add egg mixture and Raisin mixture to flour Stir lightly until just moistened and dough holds together. Roll on lightly floured board to 1/4"thick Cut with 2 inch round cutter Heat griddle until a few drops of water dance on it. (don't over heat) Oil griddle lightly and place cookies on it. As bottoms brown the tops become puffy. Turn and brown on the other side. Serve warm makes about 4 dozen cookies

If you want you can roll with a sprinkle of sugar in the flour and it makes a nice crust on the cookie These can be cut and frozen so you can take them out and cook what you need I like to add sunflower seeds

Lemon Griddle cookies

make as in Raisin griddle cookies but omit the raisins and add 1 tsp of grated lemon peel. This is very refreshing. I also add a bit of lemon flavoring to the milk before mixing it in.

More HOT Hints in future summer blogs

This is for you Wendy and anyone with scrap fabric

Snip in the center of the curve (see below)

See where my scissors are? That is the snip you take at the center

If you know a quilter or you are a quilter then you know where to get the scraps you need for this project!

Here is a wonderful fabric ball. It is very good for little kids who want to be able to hold on and drag those toys with them. I enjoyed making this for Max who turned one on Sat. I plan to make more. There is a bit of hand sewing which I don't mind. Be careful not to over stuff the pieces. You can see in the photo in my last blog that the fabric pulls a bit. I would firmly stuff the petal area and lighten up in the back so it is easier to sew together.

Here goes!

you need the pattern which you can make with the directions or see if printing them gets the correct size from my card board patterns. Be sure the patterns match the measurements on the diagram. If you want me to e-mail you just a PDF for printing I'm happy to do so, just send your e-mail address and I will keep it off the blog.

Cut 12 half circles from a solid color fabric or gingham. I'd keep them all on the same grain.

cut 12 petal pieces in bright prints, something with a smaller print looks better. I kept the long part of the petal at the grain. (lost about grain? do you need a blog on grain?) ( fabric weave direction not stuff you eat!)

Fold the half circles in half with edges matching and clip the curve on the fold 1/4" to mark the center. This is the turning point when sewing on the petal. (see my note by photo)

Pin a petal shaped piece to a half circle matching seam lines (broken lines) stitch together up to the center clip, stop the machine,make sure the needle is down, lift presser foot, swivel the fabric and pin the petal to the opposite side of the half circle. Sew, This will make a little pocket.

Clip curves (important) and turn right side out.

Press well and stuff.

To hem: Fold the two open edge into a hem, sew them closed by hand on the long side of the piece. See my photo of finished pieces before sewing cluster

Repeat for all twelve pieces.

Now for the fun.

Sew three units together. first sew #2 to #1 stitching all the way up the long edge you just sewed closed or opposite that. I held the two long edges together and whip stitched it.

Add #2 to #1 & #2 (see my photo of a finished cluster)

Do this with all 12 segments and you will have 4 clusters of 3.

Now finally match up two clusters and sew them together on the long edges. Do this until the final cluster and just sew it in by sewing the bottom with a good amount of tacking stitches and then tack stitch the top of the petals to the one next to it.

Because I over stuff I had to put my clusters together by tacking the top and bottoms together on all the clusters addition. I did 6 times with double thread and did a great knot and then pulled it deep inside and cut off the thread.

Have fun

Things to come.....HOT

This has been a busy week-end and to add to it I was suddenly asked to speak in church. For those of you with paid ministry you have no idea how it feels to speak in church! I have been assigned a topic and I will do my best to give a good message, but that will keep me from putting in my fun blog on HOT or heat and how to deal with it. I have some things to keep you safe and let you have fun and cook and do. I will type it out when the stressful talk is over. So check back on Monday, I hope our heat is gone by then but I'm sure some of you have heat all summer!

I will also put in the pattern for the little fabric ball I made for my grandson Max. His party was fun and the weather, in the shade, was lovely and I gave him a 12 segmented fabric ball. Wait for the blog on how to make this fun toy for babies.

I know, Promises promises!

Happy Birthday Max

Lilly and Max cousins

Max is the 6th child in his family, his mom is our 2nd child. He always seems so happy, and I am amazed at how early he began walking. Hates the new summer sandals however, keeps crying and pulling them off. Because his birthday is just a week after Lilly's birthday I have put a photo of the two of them that was taken at Lilly's party last week. You'll see he's not his usual happy self and it's all about those sandals!

Tomorrow is a party for Max's first birthday. At another lake this time. Itshould be in the 80's and everyone will be at the lakes this week-end. I've made him something perfect for a one year old but I don't want to spoil the surprise! Tell you about it later.

So HAPPY BIRTHDAY MAX.

Have a nice day