Bread, Lovely, Fantastical Bread

Homemade German Bread Recipes

I follow the blog: Mum's Cookbook of Authentic German Recipes. I'm trying to get in touch with my "German side." (such a hackneyed phrase!) A recipe for Kartoffelbrott German Potato Bread showed up, along with this commentary:

Source: German Recipe Blog

There are many delicious German bread recipes. Walk into any baker in Germany and you are spoilt for choice. Germans are the biggest consumers of bread worldwide and pride themselves on having the largest variety available. It is not surprising as the Germans eat bread for breakfast, lunch and for their Brotzeit in the evening. Not forgetting the children taking it in their lunchbox for their mid morning snack.


I'm German!
I love bread!
I love lots of bread!
I could live on bread!
Hail to my German ancestors!
Hail to the Boshs!
Hail to the Becksteads!
I love thee my fore-bearers, for bread, bread, lovely bread!
Joining with others celebrating: Really Random Thursday (click on badge on right)

Quilts from My Sewing Machine #4, Chris the Fireman

Okay, so it's a day before Really Random Thursday, but here's a post to add to the few I've written about quilts I have made. Today on the docket is the first "quilt" I made! As I remarked in a earlier post, I had made quilts before this, but all were the basic one piece of fabric sandwiched with another and tied.

And without further ado....My First Quilt!

Me, a sophomore in college, in a dress I made!

I had sewn clothes from my first 4-H class through to when I was 30. I never really enjoyed it, but I was competent enough to make clothing. It was cheaper than buying clothes back then. Also, my mom said, you could have just the right fit, right color and the lines would match along the seams! I gave it up finally because it got more expensive, but really because I didn't enjoy it.

Noel Heart asked me to make a quilt for Firstest’s second Christmas. I had already decided to make a baby quilt; the type I'd done before with two pieces of fabric. But Noel Heart had different ideas.

We found a book with the cutest quilt made of panels of fire trucks and Dalmatians. It didn’t look too bad, so I decided I could make it.

It is named Chris the Fireman, after my dad who was a fireman. I made it into a double bed size, starting in 2002 and finished in 2005. I found the pattern in 10 * 20 * 30 Minute Quilts, by Nancy Zieman.

Here is what the quilt looked like in the book:

I had to add some rows to make it a double size, so I decided on square-in-a-square, some checkerboard rows and use the smaller dog pictures.

To get started, I went and visited my DMIL. She is a wonderful quilter and I needed lessons. When I showed her the pattern, she looked worried. "Are you sure you want to make this quilt? It's kind of difficult?" I was fearless! Of course I wanted to make it! This was for my first grandchild!

It was my first experience with rotary cutters and real quilting. I actually cut my first piece with scissors, which my DMIL found hilarious. The first step she taught me was to cut strips and sew them together to make a checkerboard. When I sewed that first strip then cut it, I was hooked! I thought this was the most fun I’d had in a long time and a much better use of a sewing machine than for making clothing. 

It took me a long two years, but it did get done. I tied the quilt with red crochet thread and Firstest had it on his bed for years. When he was twelve, Noel Heart told me she had never washed it! Needless to say, I took it home with me to mend some seams and wash it!

Chris the Fireman, finished!

Chris the Fireman Statistics

Life Quilt #1
Started: Winter 2002
Finished: April 2005
Size: Double
Designed, pieced and tied by myself

And It's Design Wall Monday Again! Quilts from My Sewing Machine peek #1

Beware Bloggers! The Learning Curve is Steep!

Before I even begin, I want to issue an apology to all those who viewed Saturday's post and found there were no pictures. Instead of pictures there were grey ovals with a white rectangle in the middle. Shut the door! you thought, what are those gray things? Luckily one of my followers, Susan, from The Bored Zombie, let me know of this travesty!


I had been looking at Google+ (which I am a part of) and found a tab named photos. I checked it out. Omigosh and golly! there were all these pictures in there. I hadn't put any in there either. And there were duplicates. So I deleted duplicates and took out a few I didn't want Google+ friends seeing.

After hours of searching Google, I finally figured out the answer. I had to wade through a gigantic list of back-and-forths in a forum. I deserve a medal for that! You think it would be easy to find the answer to the problem, since Blogger is run by Google!

And that, my gentle listeners, is the mistake I made. Interestingly enough, Blogger (Google) stores the pictures from your Blogger with Picasa. These pictures are displayed in the picture section of Google+. When I deleted pictures, they disappeared from my blog...I didn't know where to blow my stack or to beat my head against the wall.

Soooo, my apologies! I wish Google could issue an apology to y'all, but hey I have better things to do than wait for eternity for that to happen!

I have put back the pictures for that post and for what appears on the sidebars. I'll work on restoring the remainder a bit at a time. Luckily there are still a few there, since I didn't delete those.

Back to business...my design wall. I reported my progress on the Log Cabin and Spool quilts on aforementioned blog post. It's worth reading. (Shameless self-promotion) with lots of pictures and happenings in my life while not posting. Eagerly you can click here to see that high caliber entry.

Meanwhile, here's other projects that are in the crock pot of progress.

I am making an Advent Calendar for Christmas for Curly. I've made each of my grandkids an Advent Calendar. All of them were felt and sequin types and, surprisingly, were fun to make. Until Now.

The previous calendars have been so much fun...I don't know what Bucilla has done. I think the intelligent drones who write the instruction for the calendars in the past have been replaced by evil drones from a wicked planet. The directions are obtuse. As if that's not enough, they skip steps, they don't tell you what embroidery stitch or color to use. I am very sick of looking at directions, consulting diagram, reviewing the key to diagram, and looking at the photo. I would just think I was just dense, but I've done these before.

All this has caused me to avoid the calendar. The progress is not much and the deadline is Thanksgiving. Thank goodness that provides motivation. Up till now that hasn't been much motivation, but I'm sure as the weeks pass by the motivation will increase exponentially!

How It Will Look When Finished

My Progress

Here's a look at quilts that I'm working on block-by-block. I have no deadline. Of course that means they are always pushed aside.

The blocks on the left are for a Blue-and-White Quilt, a sampler type quilt.



Second from the left are blocks for my redwork quilt, Innocence Lost.

Third from left is a BOM from Keepsake Quilting. I got it as a beginner's quilt when I first started quilting. It was way beyond my expertise. I have been able to do all the techniques for years now, but it really is low priority.

The blocks on the right are for a churn dash quilt. Each block will be made out of fabric used on each quilt I make. I got the idea when I was hand quilting a quilt top my Aunt Marie that had made of
six-pointed stars. I realized as I quilted that it was a charm quilt. Thus my idea for the churn dash quilt was born. I'll just make the blocks until I have enough for a quilt. When that one is done, I'll choose another block pattern and continue. I have to catch up on recent quilts, but I don't turn out many quilts a year, so it's not many.

I'm hooking up with other quilters. Wander by and visit their creations! The links are on the right side bar.

Patchwork Times
Show and Tell Tuesday
Fabric Story
WIP Wednesday
It's A Party
We Did It Wednesday

Enjoy the day     AND    Happy Quilting!