Fresh Cherry Salsa (and Our First Canning Experience!)

Can I just say for a moment how proud I am of myself? I....cooked. (Well, kind of...I made something, no actual cooking was involved.) In this apartment, I'm not the one who does the cooking. Mr. 246 does most of the cooking and he's wonderful at it. And he enjoys it. That's the part I usually lack when cooking: the enjoyment factor.

Anyways...so what's that picture of? Cherry Salsa. Let me tell you...it is delicious. It's the perfect blend of spicy and sweet and deliciousness. Cherry season is here in full force in California. There are cherries everywhere. Every fruit vendor on every corner has cherries right now. We picked some up from the Farmers' Market this past Tuesday just to snack on but then I wanted to make something out of them for a craftalong on Craftster (It's the Harry Potter Craftalong...the subject of the "Herbology" assignment was cherries. Hehe.)

A lot of the recipes I found online were for cherry filling type cherries, not fresh big cherries. There weren't nearly as many recipes for the kind of cherries we have.The cherries we have look like this:

Mr. 246 says red ones are "Bing Cherries" and the lighter colored ones are called "Rainier Cherries". I did come across a recipe here, however, that used the proper kind of cherries. The recipe called for 1/2 pound of dark sweet cherries, but we didn't have a complete 1/2 pound of the red ones so I added in some of the Rainiers. I like the color contrast it makes.

Here's a copy of the recipe I used:
(Recipe Credit: Here is the About.com page I found the recipe on.)

Delicious Fresh Cherry Salsa
Ingredients:

• 1/2 lb. dark sweet cherries, pitted and chopped
• 1 Tbsp. lime juice
• 1/4 cup cherry preserves
• 1 Tbsp. minced red onion
• 1 tsp. finely chopped jalapeno pepper *I added 1/2 Tbsp to mine for a tiny bit extra spice.*
• 1 Tbsp. finely chopped cilantro

Directions:
Combine all ingredients in medium bowl and stir to blend. Cover and chill 1-2 hours to blend flavors. Serve with grilled meat, or with chips as an appetizer

I made a jar for Mr. 246 for Father's Day and we grilled chicken with it last night and it was amazing. I even sent Mr. 246 and Lunabean out today to get more cherries so I could make some more.

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But that's not all folks! On a whim I decided I should learn canning so I made a quadruple batch of the salsa and bought some canning supplies (basically jars with the lids, jar tongs, and a huge pot) and we tried our luck at canning tonight.

IMPORTANT EDIT: Okay, thanks to a kind friend online, I have learned that I failed my first canning attempt. The lesson I learned: Only to use canning-approved recipes for canning otherwise there is a good chance you will end up sick. I had the cherry salsa recipe...it was good. I found directions for canning cherry salsa but I didn't use the recipe they had used in the directions. Mr. 246 said it should work just fine and that the recipes were similar enough. No...apparently it is very particular when you are canning due to acidity, ect. (Ahem...clearly I know nothing about canning...) Well, so I have my mission: Can something the proper way to redeem myself. I'll let you all know how it goes after I've done some better research. My disclaimer: DO NOT USE THIS RECIPE FOR CANNING. On another note...I think we did the actually canning part quite well, all of our jars sealed. :)

It was quite an adventure. I drank hard cider and paced around a good bit. I didn't know there would be so much timing and waiting and hurrying involved, but we accomplished it. I think it would really take me another time or two of doing the canning until I got the hang of it, but I'm really quite proud of us. Here's a couple pictures from the canning experience:

Part of the Setup:

Water heating up in the big shiny pot. Salsa made and ready to go!

Heating up the salsa and lids...

Bunch of behind-the-scenes magic and: Voila! Five delicious jars of cherry salsa!

If you try the recipe out, let me know what you think! Also, Happy Father's Day Weekend!
-Ms. 246

This Moment (#2)

A Friday ritual inspired by SouleMama. A single photo – no words – capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment to pause, savour and remember.

Happy Weekend!

Wedding Crafts (& The Dreaded Wedding Stress)

First full week of summer: complete! I absolutely love staying home with the Bean everyday. I feel so so so lucky that I get to stay home with her for these 2 months of summer break. If only I could afford to stay home all the time...

I have had a somewhat rough weekend, though, between PMS and wedding stress, but I'm better now. (I think?) Poor Mr. 246...I'm lucky he puts up with me. I've got exactly 46 days until the wedding and I still have a bajillion things to do. Important things...like receiving my dress. (That's a story for another day...let's just all cross our fingers that it will ship soon.) I'm really starting to feel the crunch.

I did get two small crafts done a day or two ago. First up: Cupcake To-Go Bags. Hand stamped 36 of them. (We're expecting around 25 guests, but are planning on ordering 2 cupcakes per person.) This was one of those projects where your go a little crazy toward the end due to the repetitiveness. (I'm not sure though...maybe I'm the only one who gets like that.) Each letter is stamped on individually since I have an alphabet set. I like how they turned out those. Just plain brown lunch sack bags. I think they're lovely.

Next up: "Reserved" Signs for our family members' chairs at the ceremony. We're having folding white chairs for the ceremony. (No church pews since we're not getting married in a church.) So I wanted to block off their seats somehow. Pretty easy peasy project. I did the stitching as an afterthought but I think it makes them look much more finished. They're about 3-ish x 4.5-ish inches and none of them are really exactly the same size. Fine with me...I would drive myself insane if I tried to make them that perfect.

 

Yesterday, after another wedding-stress attack I decided that I would do no more wedding stuff for the rest of the night.  I've started working on a crochet bowl and it's pretty neat so far. I can't wait to show it to you guys. As for wedding crafting...look forward to: chalkboard wedding signs, bunting signs, table runners, and cupcake decorations. :)

Thanks for stopping by! 

-Ms. 246

This Moment

A Friday ritual inspired by SouleMama. A single photo – no words – capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment to pause, savour and remember.

Happy Weekend!

Crocheted Rose Brooches!

Hey there! The past couple days I've been working on these lovely crocheted rose brooches...

I'm working on all the wedding stuff recently (since I'm off work for the summer!) and instead of ordering flowers for all the family members to wear, I crocheted them.

I gathered the most "citrus" like scraps I had and went at it. See how lovely they look in a little pile!

They're a couple inches in diameter. I kind of based the rose pattern I found here on Ravelry by Ravelry user Elizabeth Ham. (It's a video tutorial...I prefer written, but the video is good! Makes me feel like I have a friend and she's teaching me to crochet something.)

She does 12 "petals" in her pattern. Once I crocheted the first one up, however, I didn't think it looked quite right so I increased the chain from 50 to 55 and added another petal. I kind of just made up the leaf pattern. It's probably about the same as any other leaf pattern. See the end of the post and I'll write up a quick pattern for them.

On the back I used 1.5 inch pin back thingys. (Yea...so I don't remember the proper name for these.) I sewed the "thingy" onto a small piece of regular ole' craft felt then sewed the felt right onto the rose back with embroidery floss. The first couple of ones I did, I had the pin back centered in the back of the rose. Once I tried on the rose, however, it flopped down a tad. Simple remedy though: put the pin back up higher! Now they hang quite lovely!

Here's an action shot: (And yes, my head is cut off, I am no where near photo ready today. Haha.)

 

Be prepared for some more wedding crafts! I've got a couple things planned. The wedding is 07.26.2013 and I have a ton of stuff to do still. I put everything off until I had the summer off. It'll be small so I'm not too concerned. As long as we get married, right?

Thanks for looking!

-Ms. 246

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Crocheted Rose Leaf Pattern: (Any similarities between this and other patterns are coincidence. A lot of leaf patterns are very similar. I don't really claim any rights to this pattern.)

•  Chain 10.
• Work through top loops: slip stitch in first stitch from hook. 
• Then, working back along chain: sc in next stitch, hdc in next stitch, dc in next stitch, 2 treble crochet stitches in next stitch, dc in next stitch, hdc in next stitch, sc in next stitch, slip stitch in next stitch. This should be your last stitch.
• Ch 2, rotate work so you're on the other side of the "leaf" and repeat what you did on the first side. Through top loops only: slip stitch, sc, hdc, dc, 2 treble crochet, dc, hdc, sc, slip stitch. Tie the end off with a generous tail, about 15 inches or so. (You should be at the "point" of your leaf). 
• Use a tapestry needle, sew through the point of your leaf, then weave through the backside of the leaf.
• I then used the rest of the tail to sew the leaf onto the rose.

Hopefully that's not too confusing. I've never really written up anything for anyone else before. Let me know if you have any questions.

The Big Ta-Dah! (Summer Garden Throw)

For the past year or two I've been somewhat obsessed with the blog Attic24. It is owned by a lovely lady named Lucy and includes many beautiful pictures of her life and crafts (mostly crochet) in England. Sometimes I like to read old blog posts of hers and daydream of what it would be like to have her life and to visit the quaint little villages in her area and just be jealous in general.

I love all of her crochet and especially her use of color. Whenever she does a big project and it's finished she likes to have a "Ta-Dah" to show off so people can "Ooooo" and "Ahhhh." If you've never done a large crafting project you may not know the feeling of finally finishing it...part of your soul goes into it. And at least for me, when your project makes people smile and makes them happy and inspires them, your heart feels like it could burst.

I envied a certain project of hers and I just had to have my own: The Summer Garden Throw . If you click on the link you can see her "Ta-Dah" Moment and like a lot of her stuff, it has links to her very own tutorials which are just fabulous. (Can you tell she's my craft crush yet?)

Anyway, without further ado.....here is my version of the Summer Garden Throw:

Includes: 144 squares of pure awesomeness, 8 rows of granny stripe edging, 1 "of-my-own-creation" granny scalloping edging.
Measures: 108cm x 108cm 
Yarn: Caron Simply Soft (wish I would have chosen wiser and more high quality, but I was as informed about my yarn choices as I could have been at the time)

Oh, but that's not all folks! I kind of went through withdrawals as soon as I finished the blanket so the very next time I started on a matching throw pillow. Here you go:

See how pretty they look together!! Of course then I had to have a photoshoot. (Sorry about the picture quality. I never realized how hard it is to photograph a blanket, let alone in our super dark apartment. Maybe I'll take things outside next time. I'll get better, I promise!)

 Look how cute and quaint and colorful they are on the chair! I am in love. Oh, okay...let's see how the blanket looks all nice and folded up...

...exactly what I thought: gorgeous! And last but not least bonus Boo Radley shot:

I kept trying to get a cute picture of Luna with it, but I haven't been able too yet. Let me tell you, she is in love with this blanket. I've been keeping it up on a low shelf (so Boo doesn't decide to try to make one of his blanket nests out of it) and when Luna notices it she gets super excited, crawls over to the shelf, stands up, then pulls the blanket down. It then falls into a heap on the floor and she kind of dives into it, happy as can be. She loves all the colors and just looking at it and loving it.

Half way through the blanket I was thinking I'd give it to Luna for her birthday. Is it wrong that I don't know if I want to do that now? Haha. I most likely will (She turns one in less than a month! Can you believe it?!)

Anyway...I've got another project I'm working on right now for the wedding so expect another reveal in a day or two. Luna's with her friends at daycare today so I have some *gasp* alone time today so I should get a lot done.

Hope you enjoyed seeing my blanket extraordinaire! Hope you're all well. Thanks for reading!

-Ms. 246

Saturday Night!

Here's a sneak peek of one of the things I've been working on. Once the Bean goes to sleep there will be much crafting, moonshine, and barbequing.

I'm going to have a little photo shoot tomorrow of all the things I've been making recently so get excited. :)