Working, working, working...

There's a new baby quilt in the works in my studio! This will be the first hand-pieced quilt I've completely finished. My other "first" quilt top, seen here, was supposed to be a twin-size throw with a double layer of batting and I'm not sure my machine is big enough to quilt it, so I'm doing this one first. The photo above is the back - a glorious vintage cotton print (which I also used to make some loop scarves from for my shop) with a little pieced row of scraps from the front.

I pieced it together ages ago in a bricklayer pattern and was afraid to start quilting it without a walking foot, but my new machine has one so I spent the day with a good friend teaching her to quilt and simultaneously working on it! The front fabrics are all shirting weight cotton voile, i.e. incredibly soft, and 100% recycled to boot! My dear friend Ivy, who I've mentioned before, is a fabric sales rep and gives me lots of old samples which I love using for quilts like this. I'm shadow-quilting inside each rectangle like I did on the grellow quilt. It's almost completely quilted, but now I need to choose a binding. Can't wait to show it off when it's done!

Also, in other news, I made this...

Granted, this was a little while ago, but look at it! Om nom nom. I use Martha Stewart's recipe with some edits: instead of thyme I use rosemary, and instead of putting the onions underneath I stuff the bird with one and chop the other to toss with my favorite edit... Potatoes! I cube red fingerlings, onion, summer squash, and carrots, add a huge handful of whole garlic cloves, a drizzle of olive oil, and a generous sprinkle of salt and pepper and toss it all together in the bottom of the pan before setting the chicken on top. If I was stuck on a desert island with only one kind of food this would be it!