Summer's Bounty

Teresa has been posting pictures of her Bountiful Baskets stash each week, so I finally broke down and got one this week, instead of going to the Farmer's Market.  It hasn't been the fear of the unknown that's kept me from doing this, but the god-awful pick-up times on a Saturday morning.  This week it was 6:45 am.  No joke.  I decided to suck it up this week and I wasn't disappointed.  I totally forgot to take a picture, since I was half asleep and put it all away when I got home, but it really was bountiful.

• 5 black plums
• 7 white peaches
• container of strawberries
• large bunch of seedless black grapes
• 1 cantaloupe
• 6 bananas
• 4 roma tomatoes
• 2 heads of romaine
• 1 bunch of broccoli
• 4 ears of corn
• 1 bag of carrots

The black grapes are awesome.  I've never seen seedless black grapes before, and I hate grapes with seeds in them.  These are super sweet, and have some great flavor, and yes, they're almost gone.  I'll be eating a lot of salads this week, since I already had a huge bag of romaine hearts from Costco.

I also have tons of corn, since I had bought corn at last week's farmers market.  What do you do when you have more corn than you know what to do with?  I made Southwestern Corn Chowder, happily everything was from my pantry or fridge.  Super simple, just some sauteed sweet red onions, cubed potatoes, chopped fire roasted chilis (I used jalapenos and anaheims), fresh corn, chicken stock, milk, and a splash of cream at the end.  Oh, and seasoning, can't forget the seasoning.

As for stitching, not much to show this week.  I battled my sewing machine and got a few smalls finished, so I'm happy about that.  I hate sewing, so those type of finishes tend to pile up until I feel guilty and finally work on them.  I had 5 that needed worked on, and got 3 done.  Both of these were part of the Autumn Challenge in the Samplermakers group.  This was one of the main motifs supplied by Jennie Lynn.  I just added a touch of whimsy with the felted wool circles and mother of pearl buttons.  Super simple hanger of some black hemp twine knotted in the corners.

This was my own little composition, using the moon, cat and cauldron provided.  Its just finished into a simple little decorative pillow, and backed with felted wool.  You can see my Russian matryoshka dolls behind.  Yes, that is a Gorbachev doll, and the ones inside are other Soviet leaders.  That, and the really big doll, were purchased on a trip to Moscow in 1984.  The doll on the left is from a trip to Votkinsk a few years ago.

Hopefully next week I'll have some more stitching pictures to post.  I actually did get a lot done this week, just it was spread across so many things, it wouldn't look like much.