Most Recent Sign that the Appocalypse Is upon Us

Ever heard of Friendship Bread? I hadn't. And was duped because of it. So consider this your fair warning. Some other poor soul gives you a cup of a yeast mixture as a "starter" and you make your bread. That part's great. But you also have yeast leftover that you're supposed to pass on to a number of friends. And they have to do the same and pass it on to their friends. And they to theirs. And it grows exponentially like a plague (or a yeast). I don't know that many people! Who bake. Who live near me. Maybe if I were Amish, I'd have more friends. Certainly more who bake regularly. But I can't keep making two loaves of cinnamon bread every ten days for the rest of my life! And giving away yet more of it. What few friends I have will be friends no longer. "Friendship bread" is a misnomer. This is an Amish pyramid scheme!
I accepted my own portion from my sister-in-law, not knowing what I was getting into. To her credit, I don't think she meant to trap me in this circle of hell. I'm pretty sure she knows lots of people who bake and so didn't anticipate the burden. Now I've made the stuff three times! But I finally escaped the perpetuity by giving all my portions away (this is actually the second time I gave them all away. After the first time, one came back to us. It's like the proverbial cat.). I must say, however insidious the system is, the bread is dang good. Sweet and cinnamoned and soft and not too cakey. But I have three loaves in the freezer, so I've had my fair share, tasty though it is.

Some projects that have been in progress:

Baby hats, modeled by Marvin the Monkey, whom I've had since I was a baby. The platypus was a gift from The Husband years ago. Let's hope the baby fits the hats better than these guys. I got this knit fabric on sale at Joann's. Did the baby need more hats? Absolutely not. Did I need practice sewing with knit fabrics? Well, need is debatable, but I wanted to learn to sew them without getting all that stretching and puckering and lettuce-leaf edging. A walking foot and a ball point needle seemed to do the trick. I can't seem to find where I got the pattern from now, but if anyone's interested, let me know and I'll track it down.

Lamp shade cover (McCall's 5346). Note the absence of lamp. It's one of a pair we've had for years that were super cheap and currently unused. I ruined one in my first attempt at taking the shade apart. This is the second. The base of the lamp is black. Certainly functional, but I'm hoping the husband will have time to give it a quick white spray paint job before Baby arrives. I made this with leftover quilt from a quilt I started for a friend's baby years ago and never finished. More on that in a future post...

Pillows, loosely followed from the Semi-Simple Pillows pattern in Amy Karol's Bend-the-Rules Sewing book, though you could find this pattern tons of places. It just has that overlap seamed back so you can remove the covers for washing. This fabric was used by Scarlet Lily as a table covering in the baby shower she threw me a couple months ago. It goes perfectly with the nursery! Once the room is in better shape, I'll start posting pics of the finished product. We're just not there yet.

By the way, all these sewing projects are ridiculously easy. So, if anyone is looking for more info on them, just let me know!