(Inside A Black Apple)

Icing Cupcakes By Candlelight (Or, My July Fourth)

My ears are still buzzing from the barrage of firework-sounds they were just exposed to at our friend's fourth of July shindig. At half-past-midnight on the 5th, it's now officially not Independence Day for the US, but I thought I'd share what I made in honor of the day.

I made a batch of vegan brownies with peanut-butter frosting for the vegan-ese that would be in attendance, and vanilla cupcakes with cream-cheese/orange frosting for everyone else. I had done my baking last night, and just needed frost them today...and wouldn't you know it? We had a really bad afternoon thunderstorm which left me frosting my cupcakes by the light of candles.

Eventually, though our power was still out, the natural light returned and helped me with my decorating. The Fourth is always a hard holiday for me to get into aesthetically...I'm not really a huge fan of the red/white/blue, stars & stripes motif decorations, so I schemed up another way to celebrate my country.  I printed out little flags from the nation's inception (the only US flag that I love) and made some little cupcake-toppers out of those as well as some notable presidents and/or founding fathers: 

I topped the cupcakes with people that I'm really happy + proud are/were American:

Tom Waits, William Faulkner, John Coltrane, Joey Ramone, Johnny Cash, Dorothy Parker, Ronnie Spector, Amelia Earhart, Edgar Allan Poe, David Lynch, etc.

They were such a hit! Lots of people kept theirs, which I think is really sweet and made me happy that I  figured out a personal way to celebrate the country I'm from.

Sublime Stitching + The Black Apple!

Well, since there were quite a few (happy!) beans spilled about this in the comments of the last post when the kits went live on the Sublime Stitching site, I thought I should make an official post about it sooner rather than later....

So, huzzah!

The new collaboration kit created by myself and those embroidery wizards is indeed now up for purchase right here. I'm really proud to be part of their artist's series!

Here is a pretty photo of Jenny's embroidery hoop at work:

I'm was feeling very squeal-y when I saw the finished embroideries...I so hoped that my drawings would make for cute stitchy things, and I'm so, so happy they do!

Happy Thursday & Happy Long-weekend!

Yesterday Day

I did quite a few small tasks yesterday, one of the least-small being washing and ironing the heap of custom fat-quarters of fabric that came over the weekend. There are, um, a lot of designs to show. Remember this?

I think today I'll just show you the ones I'm maybe most excited about...these harlequin-vintage-y diamond patterns:

These is my little "Night Magic" pattern in two colorways.

aaaand the real-life realizations of the one I blogged about last time when I was nerding out:

These really take the cake for me.
The Spoonflower folks are really doing a cool thing, and I'm grateful they dreamed up their service.  My only real frustration as a user is that, like with the last prints, there were some major color-shifts. As a former photo-person who color balanced many a color print herself, I notice that stuff (and I totally understand that there are always color shifts when printing). Luckily, it seems with my images to mostly be isolated to the reds, which are the biggest chameleons. They keep wanting to go orange! Bright orange. I think with a bit of trial and error and swatching  on the user's end it can be sorted out just fine, though.

Another small task from yesterday? Designing new Black Apple shipping labels with our future address on them:

My other project for the day (this was actually late in the evening) was sewing up a Tom-Waits-night (this Saturday!) capelet, which I'll hopefully get to photograph soon. So many little projects here and there...and the big project of MOVING looming!

I hope your week is going nicely, and I'll be back soon with more fabric designs and more to share!

Portland Weekend

We got back in town in the wee hours today, and so I'm just now getting to hop over and see you guys!
The trip was whirl-wind, but fun and useful...

Let's bullet point this, shall we? There was:

• The first-time-ever real life uniting of myself and one of my very best long-distance pals and her most excellent Mr. Drew & kitten Isadora. We made for a cute crew all weekend, If I do say so.

• Good food...of the trashy, fancy, and in-between variety (I even had a two-gelato-day on Sunday).

Ahem.

 

• A great hang-out with all of the Chicken fam.
  
• Aaaannd, the "real" reason for the visit...we met our cute new house! Hooray!

• We also met the flippin' rad Berkleys (who set us up with their former abode!), charming Matte + Vivienne, and sweet-pea applets Dave + Trina. It was cool creative-couple overload.

Happy (barely) Monday, lovely ones!

Glazed Orange Scones For Your Weekend Breakfasts

I kept getting these very tasty orange scones at one of our usual lunch spots, and I frequently said to myself: "You must try to make something similar at home". I'm on a huge citrus kick right now, which began with the last of the season's tangelos and is still going strong.

For these, I adapted a simple scone recipe from my beloved AllRecipes.com , and the results were tender and crumb-y and delicious.

(Makes about 8 medium sized scones)

Ingredients:
1 3/4 C flour
4 teaspoons baking powder
1/3 C white sugar
pinch salt
5 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut into 1/2" chunks
1/2 C orange juice
1/4 c sour cream
1 egg
1 teaspoon milk
Zest of 1 orange

   1.   Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F/200 degrees C    

2. Sift the flour, baking powder, sugar and salt into a large bowl. Add the butter using a pastry tool or your hands, until the mixture is crumbly and there are still pea-sized lumps of butter visible. Stir in the orange zest. Mix together 1/2 cup orange juice and sour cream in a measuring cup. Pour all at once into the dry ingredients, and stir gently just until blended. Do not over-do the blending.

3. With floured hands, pat scone dough into balls 2 to 3 inches across, depending on what size you want. Place onto a greased baking sheet, and flatten lightly.  Whisk together the egg and 1 tablespoon of milk. Brush the tops of the scones with the egg wash. Let them rest for about 10 minutes.    

4. Bake for around 12 minutes in the preheated oven, until the tops are just golden brown. Transfer to rack to cool.

5. Once cool, you can leave them be or glaze them as I did. To make the glaze, I combined about 1/2 orange juice, the zest of 1 orange, and about 1/2 an orange cut into small chunks. I simmered the mixture lightly for about 10 minutes, and then took it off the heat and allowed to cool. Once cool, add confectioner's sugar until it reaches a good glazing consistency, and stir til' smooth.

6. Squirrel away any that remain in a tightly sealed container at room temperature.

We're heading to Portland today for a short trip, house business, and not least of all: this lady's birthday. See you soon & have a lovely weekend.

Hippocampus

I finished my other painting for the Suite 100 show, and had it framed up today. We're going to Portland on Thursday for the weekend, so I've got a bunch of loose ends I'm tying up today and tomorrow.

Like lots of people, I'm really interested in and love old carousels and the animals that were carved to inhabit them. In one of my big carousel books, there is a photo of a "hippocampus" carousel figure, which is a mer-horse of sorts (it's also a part of the forebrain, Wikipedia tells me).

I thought it would be just the creature to star in another aquatic-themed piece...

Hippocampus    11"x14"x1 (Framed size approx. 16"x20"x3")  Acrylic on canvas

Here is a (crummy) shot of the painting with its frame:

Have a lovely Tuesday!

The Last of the Comic Books

(EDIT: THE LAST BOOKS HAVE SOLD...THANK YOU SO MUCH!)

My boss:

...finally gave me permission to release the rest of the Scuppernong & Muscadine books for sale in the shop. What a taskmaster...I'm really just the lovely Miette's whipping girl.

Okay, really I just wanted to be sure of how many I actually had on hand before posting the last batch for sale. This is the end of the print run of 250, and they won't be reprinted (at least, not by me!)

I hope your week is off to a nice start! I'll be back soon with a new painting and a new recipe.
xo

Robin Red-Breast

Curious that as I (temporarily, I hope) close the Fashion-y blog, I have a clothes post for you!

I dreamed up this dress idea a year or more ago, and I swear there's a sketch for it somewhere in my library of embarrassing sketchbooks. I didn't go rummaging for it, but I think it's in there. Anyway, I dreamt of a grey dress with a red bib and fluttery bits, like a pretty little robin. The idea came back to me last week, and as I was looking through the closet for something to transform, I realized I had this pretty, but basic-ish grey jersey dress that hadn't been worn for quite a while. Perfect for my purposes!

So, I made my Robin Red-breast dress real:

I altered the over-skirt, added the little flutter-sleeves with the extra silk, and added the silk-velvet bib part (leftover red from my mushroom-sewing!). Oh, and I stitched on the little cream mesh ruffle a the neckline. It's a little Renn-faire, but then again, I think I'm a little that way.

You Are As Sweet As Banana Muffins

Seriously, though. You are some sweet peas.
I just wanted to make a little "thank you" post. I made a batch of Nigella Express banana-butterscotch muffins last night, and I though I'd offer a, um, digital one to you.

Thanks for reading this blog, and for your silent or chatty presence on it.
Thanks for taking a look at what I'm making, what I'm thinking, what I'm cooking.
Thanks for being excited with me about such things as sofas.

What the blog means to me has changed subtly over the few years of its existence, but one thing has remained a constant: that nowhere else will people get excited/"nerd-out" with me about all of this stuff. Stuff like dolls, fabric, paintings, pies, BBC shows, and sofas.

So, thank you, lovely Applets. Have a muffin.
(and happy Friday!)
xoxo

The Couch of Dreams

I think lots of people have a perfect couch in mind.

I know the sweet Amanda does, and you probably do, too. In fact, I think there is a This American Life segment about a man who has been searching for the perfect couch for something like 10 or 20 years, and until he finds "the one", he's got some terrible futon. Many people know I've had a longstanding (okay, 3 years or so) love-affair with the Amelie sofa in light blue velvet from Anthro. The thing is, in real-life that sofa is actually pretty small and spindly and also seems very un-kid-friendly (you know, for the future). Sharp points and all that. And it's not even available in the blue right now, anyway. SO. I moved on.

My new love is still French-y, vintage, and dusty blue velvet, but it's larger and (seems) sturdier. Lo & behold, when I went to "visit" it today, the couch I've been saving my pennies for from Neiman Marcus online was on sale...

Friends, I totally went for it. And it was substantially less pricey than the Anthro sofa, to boot!

If your tastes run a little more vintage/traditional/romantic in the realm of furniture, I really recommend checking out what the Neiman's website has to offer. Some of it is surprisingly affordable, and most of it is really beautiful.

Happy Thursday & xoxo