Author Archives: Chelsea

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About Chelsea

I am a small town girl. I came to Austin to study at The University of Texas, and a very handsome boy sat behind me in class. I love baking, sewing, watching movies, laughing, and willing my plants to grow.

sourdough/ week twelve

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Halfway through the year, and we already baked up (at least) 12 loaves of sourdough! Sticking with this project feels like an accomplishment, since each loaf takes quite a bit of time and care, or at least the time to remember its there and to move on to the next step! Really makes you appreciate the work and love that goes into a good loaf of bread.

This week, we made a raisin rye sourdough bread, and tried out my new diy proofing box!

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Our new proofing box! Which is actually just a large tupperware container. After an hour proofing at room temperature, I boil some water in a little mason jar, then put the bread and the jar into the tupperware, and close the lid up. The water is supposed to make it a bit warmer and more moist, to help with flavor and rise. By no means a controlled environment, but we are working up to it!

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For a rye bread, I would say we got some pretty good lift out of it! I also think it is one of the prettiest loaves of bread we have made so far. We gave it away as a gift, but we received very good reviews! Excited to make a loaf to keep soon so we can try it for ourselves.

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striped top with tulip sleeves

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I am proud of this one because 1. Its a silky fabric I’m not used to sewing, and it didn’t bite me. and 2. I made the pattern for the tulip sleeves myself! I used this tutorial for some help, and used my street sewing smarts.

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I took a moment to add a hot pink button, because I could and I did.

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Fluttery tulip sleeves in action! I always text Jon a picture of what I’m sewing, because he always gets so excited. I didn’t quite match the stripes on the side, but I think they matched up pretty well from the back view.  Patting myself on the back for a job well done.

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the tomato cage conundrum

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These tomato plants. Who knew they would grow so much? Not us. The cherry tomatoes we got were labeled as “good for porch gardens”, so you would plant them in a pot, which made us believe they wouldn’t grow taller than a person. We thought to ourselves- the small tomato cages will probably be fine.

Maybe it was our fault for tenderly caring for them too much.

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They have consumed the small tomato cages and laughed in our faces. They have become this massive wall of tomato plant, daring to slap you in the face with a rouge branch as you walk by. We have used some stakes and string to try to hold them in, but they are just spilling out every which way. It has been kinda rainstormy lately (which is good because we need rain!), but it makes me worry about the gangly tomato plants.

So after much stress, I found these tomato cages. Thankfully, you can build the cage around the plant. I don’t want to jinx it, because nature continues to prove to me who is boss, but look how nice and organized they are now. They have a hard time just telling me what they want, but I feel like they feel like they are better supported. Still not sure what to do about the overachievers popping out the top, but fingers crossed we are paid back with a million tomatoes!

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things that caught my eye/ eighteen

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Some things I found this week:

This week was a pretty good one. We had a bread and cheese dinner, I gave my first sewing lesson, we tidied and refreshed the yard a little, and spent a lovely evening with some friends. Let’s continue this good trend into the weekend, shall we?

Here is a picture of the baby garden. This was little over a month ago, pre-growth spurt, back when the tomatoes still fit in their cages.

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rice krispie treats with tiny chocolate chips

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Speaking of rice krispie treats, look what I made. One of my besties came over for a sewing lesson last night, and I always like to have some kind of fresh treat available. We currently have these cookies (a couple days old), this cobbler (starting to get a little soggy sad face), so we needed a treat refresher. I made the rice krispie treats fancy by adding some tiny chocolate chips to the top. Almost like a s’more!

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On the subject of tiny things, we watched this documentary the other day, which is about the tiny house movement and living small. We noticed that they are called tiny houses, not small, not mini, but tiny. The tiny part is not interchangeable with another word for small. So we have been calling everything tiny lately, because its fun to say.