A Great Start to December

Just when I thought I would never see my fabric order (placed in October) with my potential backing for Nantucket, it arrived as the calendar turned to December. And none too soon, as Roberta is now ready to quilt it. It's a great red and coffee toile from the Bon Voyage line by French General that seems to be a commentary on early hot air balloon rides.

Toiles can be an acquired taste but I really like this particular print, which is a relief because when you order online you can't always tell. And the fabric itself is beautiful.

I wasn't sure if it was going to work with the quilt top but a quick trip to Roberta's confirmed that it was ideal so I brought it home, washed it and put the backing together. It's now safely back in Roberta's hands and she will likely quilt it within the week.

Efforts to try and match the pattern were stopped in fairly short order. It was easy enough to match the pattern horizontally but in order to completely match the pattern I would have had to lose about 12" of width. Whaaaaat??? Not sure what the designers were thinking. Anyway, I still love it and am prepared to live with the half match that I've been able to achieve.

Since I had most of my cookie baking supplies still to unpack from our Bakeoff on Saturday I decided it was a good time to start the baking for our gift tins. These Raspberry Ribbons were a new recipe that we tried this year, and, in addition to working up quickly, I think they will look great on a cookie plate so I made a batch of these. The Official Cookie Tester was very happy with the results and didn't need to be convinced to finish up the trimmings from the ends....M