O Happy Day!

I won! I won! I won! I really so rarely every win anything, and can't tell you just how happy I am to win this particular giveaway on Paulette's blog... a $60 gift certificate to csnstores.com. I had never heard of CSN before, so was curious, and spent some time looking around. I would compare them with a company like amazon.com for their variety (although they don't seem to have as much to offer), and the prices seemed to be very competitive. Want to know what I bought?

2 cast iron bread pans, which I can hardly wait to use... a coffee grinder, which has earned top ratings as a spice grinder (which is exactly what I will be using it for- I am so happy to not have to keep scrubbing my coffee grinder out when I need to grind spices, then drinking contaminated coffee the next time, because no matter how hard I scrub it, the spices never seem to wash out well)... and a little saucier that goes with the pot set that I already have, perfect for small batches of sauces, syrups, and glazes. I'll make sure that my three new toys are featured in future blog post recipes!

In other news, I'm really happy with how my new dryer balls are working. I still have static cling issues when drying anything with polyester in it, but I can't say that I'm surprised. Overall, the dry time seems to be slightly shortened, and they have held up well through several dry cycles, including a couple of batches of denim. My favorite part... the low, quiet, steady thump, thump, thump as they go round... I find the sound soothing... is that strange?

And probably your most favorite news of all... I have finished framing the final two samplers in my Birth Sampler series. Here are all four of them propped up together on my mantle.

TA DAAA!
(cue choir music)...