Havin' Waaaaaay Too Much Fun!

It's been play time with the batik scraps lately to make more journal covers for the Holly Bazaar and I am having tons of fun. The process is so free. I love watching how the addition of each strip changes the look and feel of the entire piece. It is so engrossing that I find myself lying in bed at night planning different designs/strip combinations. Maybe I should get a life.

It is amazing to me how each each one develops its own personality and I love how the pops of colour against the more muted backgrounds come into play.

No rules - anything goes - fun, fun, fun.

I've got two more covers ready to assemble and quilt...

...similar, but different (actually, this one is upside down). The colours still look a little muted, especially on this one, but they are nice and rich.

I made this little wonky Log Cabin block - it's about 3" x 4" and will incorporate it into the next one, but I'm also thinking that a predominantly red design needs to be tried.

And speaking of needing to be tried, I found this recipe for Upside Down Nectarine Chiffon Cake while browsing the other day and it just looked too good not to try - especially since the fruit is fresh and in season. This isn't the site that I found it on but the directions and photos are good and I couldn't find the page that I worked from originally, so here you go.





It's a recipe from Dorie Greenspan, the author of the book Baking With Julia, and it's delicious, but not the fastest cake to make - maybe the second time around you'd have a better sense of the process and it would go a little quicker. I baked mine for a full hour rather than the time it suggested and it could probably have used another 5 minutes. It is a light lemon chiffon cake with a toasted almond and oatmeal streusel filling, and carmelized nectarines and got rave reviews from the Official Cookie Tester, even without the suggested whipped cream or ice cream...M