Stitching Friends Forever

March week one

Grab Bag
Recipe
What's Stitching
Freebie

Stitching Friends invites you to a St. Patrick's Day Tea! 

We are serving homemade Irish Soda bread that we will teach you how to make!

Mary's Irish Soda Bread:

2 cups unbleached flour

1 tsp. baking soda

1 tsp. cream of tartar

1 tsp. baking powder

1/4 tsp. salt

2 Tablespoons sugar

1 heaping teaspoon caraway seeds

4 Tablespoons butter, worked into the flour mixture

1 cup raisins

1 cup buttermilk

Preheat oven to 325

Mix dry ingredients excluding caraway seeds.  With pastry blender cut butter into flour mixture till crumbly. 

Butter blended into flour

You will now add the caraway seeds and raisins. Then pour in buttermilk all at once and gently stir to blend.

Next is the fun step of kneading the dough.

Place dough on floured surface and generously sprinkle with flour. You will knead the dough with floured hands and add additional flour until the texture is smooth and elastic. Don't overdo this step!

This is a double batter- recipe is for ONE loaf

Form bread into round and form shape of cross on top of loaf. Bake in a greased and floured 8 inch cake pan at 325 for 45 minutes. Remove from oven and rub a small amount of butter on top of warm loaf.

Serve with butter or plain, delicious either way!

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Our Irish Ornament

A sweet bunny delivering shamrocks to my Irish friend Mary

RJ stitched this adorable ornament for me.  She added the words "luck to you" under the stitch. Love the buttons, shamrock charm, shamrock ribbon and large rick rack she added to the finish.  It makes the perfect accessory for my St. Patrick's Day décor.    We wish you all good luck too!

Delivering Shamrocks
By Homespun Elegance
32 ct. linen
overdyed threads from stash
rick rack and charm from Joann's

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What's Stitching

Please mark the date for our upcoming one year Birthday Party at the end of the month.  We would love it if you would send us a photo of one of  your favorite stitches either fully finished or just stitched.   If you have another craft you would like to display, we would love to see it too.  We look forward to whatever you choose to share with us. You can send your photos to rjgator96@earthlink.net by March 20th.  Surprises are being planned and we can't wait to celebrate with all of you.

Mary and I have been so lucky winning many give aways this year.   I'm so excited because I just won a wonderful bunny piece that our friend Jutta made.  There are also pretty fabrics in this give away which I will share with my blogging partner Mary.   You can find Jutta's blog at   http://stoffundnadel.blogspot.com/  Aren't they precious???   I'm totally in love with these bunnies and see an adorable pillow in the making.  Thank you so much sweet Jutta.   

Such sweet bunnies!

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Irish Freebie

We have a cute Irish freebie for you from Threadwork Primitives.  Both these stitches were found on Pinterest.  They are both cute finishes using different colors.   You will find the free chart here  It's very sweet and may bring you a little good luck.

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Hope you are getting in lots of stitching time.  We love to come to your blogs and see what you are up to.  Thank you once again for visiting us.  We truly appreciate the time it takes to leave a comment.  Next post we will be sharing our Styling with Stitches project and our New Ornaments.   Hope to see you then.   
                                                                     RJ and Mary  

                

☘ May good Luck be with you wherever you go, 

and your blessings outnumber the Shamrocks that grow☘