Soup Monday ... and some frogging

Autumn is officially here, the Autumn Equinox was yesterday, and although we have had a sunny day today it's not very warm, so I decided it was time to make some soup for dinner to warm me up. As I like corn and knew that I have several cans in the pantry I went looking for a new recipe and found Chunky Corn Chowder on Allrecipes.com, with potatoes, carrots and corn. The recipe is vegan and made with soy milk, but I'm a vegetarian so I used ordinary milk instead. The soup was easy to make and didn't take that long to make and it tasted delicious, and I have saved the recipe and will make it again, perfect for chilly days.

I've been stitching on the muguet heart and have almost finished the right-hand part of the heart, and began stitching the bottom part that's on a separate page. There were markings for the centre on the pages and I assumed that the markings were correct, but when I had reached to the top of the bottom part I discovered that the markings had been out of sync by five or six stitches! I had to frog everything I had stitched when it came to the bottom part, maybe an hours worth of stitching :-( I'm just glad that it wasn't more.

Perfumes and more stitching stuff

I love perfumes (even if I'm not allowed to wear any at work), and I like to try on new ones. I'm a member of Fragrantica.com, and it's possible to make different searches there, for example for a specific note. I made a search for lavender and found several perfumes, but most of them not available here in Sweden. While looking I found some for me new fragrance companies, and ordered a few samples from Fragrances of Ireland and Molinard, and have received them now.

I haven't had time to try on all of the perfumes, but I love the Innisfree perfume from Fragrances of Ireland, there is lavender in it, and sandalwood and cedarwood in the base note, and I will buy it.

In the Molinard box there are five flower scents, lavender, rose, jasmine, violet and lily of the valley, and I also ordered an orange blossom soap.

As for stitching, I got more stash, this time from Sew and So in the U.K. I ordered a Vervaco kit, Majesty II, I've been wanting to stitch it for a long time and finally decided to buy it. I also bought a bookmark (with a cat of course), new scissors and a rotating Easy Clip frame (not in the photo).

I've continued to stitch on the Coeur de muguet, it's coming along fine, but I'm not sure I will have time to finish it before September 30, the day my mother was born. I have also found an old UFO, Who's watching whom? from Dimensions, and began stitching on it again. As you can see I have one of the models here at home ;-)

Sunny September days and some stitching

I'm on holidays now and I have to say that the weather have been exceptionally fine the last two weeks, it's been sunny and almost as warm as we usually have summertime during the days, people are still using their summer clothes and I'm still going bare-legged. Of course as soon as it gets dark in the evenings the temperature drops a bit and the mornings can be a bit chilly, but I do prefer the spring and autumn with the cooler weather to the heat of summer. The only drawback with having a late summer/early autumn holiday is that the evenings are not as light as they are in June and July, the sun sets already about 19,30 now instead of at 22,00 as it does around Midsummer.

I've been stitching on the Lily of the Valley heart the last week, I got the package from Madame La Fée, you can see the contents here (including my little helper):

And this is how much I've been able to stitch on it during this week:

I'm stitching the green part of the heart, it's five different shades of green and I find it quite easy and quick to stitch.

Stitching, shopping and a concert

On Monday last week I received two of the Seasonal cat samplers (Spring and Autumn) and on Tuesday I got the Coeur de muguet, and I began stitching on the Autumn sampler immediately, hopefully I will be able to finish it before the winter is here (winter solstice this year is on December 21). The fabric is aida, which is not my favourite, I prefer linen, although I have to admit it's a bit easier/quicker to sew on aida. I've also began with the first stitches on the heart pattern, which is on linen. There was a small gift in the package from Madame la Fée, a tiny angel charm, perfect to add to the heart when it's finished.

Yesterday I went shopping for new tea towels, or should I say old tea towels as I went to one of the charity shops looking for older tea towels made of linen as I like them much better than the new ones made of cotton. I have been using tea towels my mother had made when she got married, and they are/were more than 50 years old by now and have survived the everyday use and wear for that long, but now they are getting worn and I had to get new ones. I found half a dozen new/old linen towels that seems to be hardly used at all. I also bought a couple of lovely linen napkins, as well as a bowl and a jar in blue and white china.

In the evening I went to a concert, our county council celebrates its 150th year, and as a gift to all employees they arranged a concert (or rather six concerts as there are 12 000 employees) for free with Peter and Matilda, they are cousins and have both received the county's culture stipend. They are well-known in here in Östergötland and has also performed both in Sweden and abroad in musicals. The show was very good, they played covers, it was everything from Burt Bacharach, Dolly Parton, Simon & Garfunkel, The Eagles and Queen to Swedish artists as well as songs from musicals.

Sunday morning with cats and breakfast

The sun is shining again and it looks as if it's going to be a lovely late summer day today, after a misty and wet late night/early morning. The only reason why I know that it was very misty (my guess is that the visibility was about 50-75 meters about 5 a.m.) is that one of my cats decided it was time for his breakfast, and dry kibbles was not on his menu this morning. While feeding him I looked out and noticed that it wasn't possible to see very far, and the roof window in the kitchen was covered with moisture. I went back to bed (I don't do mornings ;) ) and slept for a few more hours, and all three cats came to snuggle in bed with me after their early breakfast.

I got up at 9 a.m. and made me a breakfast from yesterdays shopping. I chopped some olives, both green and black, a couple of marinated garlic cloves, a piri piri that was used as a filling in one of the olives, a finely chopped de-seeded tomato and some cheese cut into small cubes (as the cheeses were semi-soft and not suitable for grating). I fried the olives, garlic and tomato in a frying pan, stirred in two eggs and the cheeses, seasoned with black pepper, and made it into something resembling scrambled eggs. The taste was very good, but it didn't look too much. I will make it again, but I won't stir the eggs into the olive/tomato mix next time, I will instead make an omelet and add the olive/tomato mix and cheese on top of the omelette, or make the scrambled eggs with cheese and serve the olive/tomato mix on the side.

Now it's time to get up after my after-breakfast rest and start doing housework, I've been working all summer and the house cleaning have been neglected. As usually I have divided my summer vacation into two parts, I had two weeks off before Midsummer and three weeks now in late August/early September. I hope the weather will continue to be fine these weeks, and that there will be time for mushroom hunting and walks in the forest. If not, well, I have also lots of indoor activities to spend time on, especially when I get all those cross stitch kits I've bought.

Street Market and City Festival

Today the weather is sunny and quite warm to be in the end of August and it's perfect for this weekend's City Festival with outdoor concerts and lots of other events (many of them for kids and teens) going on downtown. I checked the program but there wasn't anything I felt that I absolutely *had* to go and see, so I decided to skip the festival activities.

The International Street Market is also visiting our city this week (Wednesday - Saturday), they are selling mostly different foods from different countries, although there are some other stuff too. I went to the market today and I have to say I bought a bit too much food: cheeses from France and England, chutney and lemon curd from England, pastries from France, Italy and Austria and olives from Italy and Greece. There were also different dishes to try, but as I'm a vegetarian there were not much for me, the only things I saw was a Thai noodle dish and a potato dish, and of course sweet things such as crêpes and waffles.

I also bought two cubes of Savon de Marseille (soap) and a small bottle of lavender oil. I love the olive oil soap, it's mild and doesn't dry the skin, and it can also be used for laundry and in home-made detergents, here are a few tips: http://www.savon-de-marseille.ca/tips.html Lavender is one of my favourites when it comes to essential oils, and I find it very versatile. I use it in a diffuser, add to detergents, a few drops on the vacuum filter, in the dryer and so on.

I passed the Farmer's Market on my way home, but didn't buy anything today, as I was already loaded with bags. The Farmer's Market is open every Saturday until October 5th on the outer courtyard beside the castle, so I have time to get there and shop locally produced foods and flowers.

August Full Blue Moon and new stitching stash

Today I worked "half-night", from 5 p.m. until 1.30 a.m., and on my way home in the middle of the night I noticed that it was a Full Moon, and this August Moon it's not only the Full Sturgeon Moon/the Full Red Moon/the Green Corn Moon/the Grain Moon, but it's also a Full Blue Moon, the third Full Moon in a season. The night sky was almost clear and the moon was up high and spread its light, a lovely sight to see. It was a little bit chilly to cycle home this late, even if it's still summer warm during the days, the nights are beginning to get chilly, and you can feel that autumn is on its way.

I wonder if it was the Full Moon's fault that I had a shopping spree yesterday and bought some new cross stitch stash, as I do have enough stash in the cupboard for a long time of stitching. I bought all four of Janlynn's Seasonal Cat Samplers, I've been planning to sew something seasonal for some time and when I found the cat samplers I knew that I wanted to do them. I haven't decided which one to start with, the Autumn or the Winter Cat Sampler, as I also bought Coeur de Muguet (Heart Lily of the Valley) by Madame La Fée, which is what I will begin stitching as soon as I get it. It's something I've been thinking of stitching since my mother passed away in May 2008. There was a vase with a bouquet of lilies-of-the-valley on a table in her flat when I arrived there while she was at the hospital. She died just a few past midnight on the Sunday that was Mother's Day in Sweden. I decided then and there that I would stitch something with lilies-of-the-valley as a memory of her, but it's first now I feel that I'm ready to do that. I found the heart pattern already shortly after my mother's death in a French cross stitch shop and I liked it, but I also searched for other motives with lilies-of-the-valley, there are a few patterns I also liked, but I've finally decided that the Coeur de Muguet is the one I want to stitch.