WIP Wednesday

The other day, while my mother-in-law was in town, we decided to explore more of the country, so we headed over to Fort Laramie for a day of history. Ft. Laramie is only about an hour from here and is located on the beautiful Laramie River. It was used as both a fort & a stopping place along the Oregon trail in the mid-1800s. Many of the building are in ruins, but there are several that have been restored over the years.

On our drive out there I decided to start working on my Misfit DQS. This is my first time doing hexies and can I just say I LOVE them. So relaxing & mindless, and in no time you've got a nice little stack going. :)

This was the hospital. The cemetery is a ways off to my right, but there were a couple graves around the back of the hospital. (See the crosses in the foreground?)

Inside the barracks everything was set up as if the men were still living there.

The married officers quarters were set up beautifully.

Beautiful dresses & hand sewn quilts.

The Old Bedlam. The oldest standing building in Wyoming, was built in 1849.

The last stop on our way back to the truck was the old bar. The fun thing about it is that they serve Sioux City sarsaparilla & other "Old West" pops. They had one called Birch Beer. Well, I had to try it. Like root beer, that was once made from roots, birch beer was once made from the bark of birch trees. It had an anise (black licorice)-type flavor & was stronger than the sarsaparilla. It was delicious!

The wallpaper behind the bar was beautiful. The "barkeep" told us that the original barkeep's wife was from New York & although she loved the prairie she wanted the men to have a little "culture." So she ordered some William Morris wallpaper from New York, she put it behind the bar because she figured that was one of the walls that the men probably stared at the most.

Well, I just adored the wallpaper so when I came home I looked up this English textile designer. Immediately I recognized some of his work & realized where I had heard his name before!

On Monday, Sally & I went to my LQS to look around and she was nice enough to buy me a charm pack of my new favorite collection, A Morris Tapestry. :)

I wanted to keep the charms whole to show off the tapestry & yesterday I spent some time arranging them into 4 9-patch blocks. I'm still not happy with the arrangement, but hopefully I'll get it so I can start sewing it together today.

If you have any suggestions on which charms to move for better distribution of color & pattern I'd love to hear them.

Today WIP is over at Don't Call Me Betsy. If you haven't already been there, head on over and say hi.

Yeah, that says "6 sore heads." I love Wyoming! :)

Sunday Brunch

Sunday's in the Tuckey home are set aside for Sunday Brunch. Sundays are usually the only day that Jake has off. We either end up staying home, watching movies, & working on projects or we'll go out for a drive and explore the area.

Since today is a cold, windy, rainy day we decided to stay home, have a delicious breakfast, & watch Firefly.

Here's what we made:

Fried eggs. I don't like runny yolks so I break my yolk, but I do have the skill (usually) to not break the yolk for Jake's over-medium eggs. :)

Last night we had BBQ. We had so many fabulous appetizers that by the time we got to the steaks I was too full. Jake cut up the steak into bite sizes pieces for a delicious hash.

Next he got the potatoes ready. Peel the potatoes and "pre-bake" them in the microwave for a few minutes. (If you've never cooked potatoes in the microwave before be sure to stab the potatoes a few times with a fork before heating them, otherwise they'll explode.)

Throw the potatoes on the skillet, which has been preheated with plenty of olive oil. Brown the potatoes for several minutes.

Add the steak & continue to brown. We like our hash on the crispy side. Don't forget to add your favorite seasoning. I think he added garlic powder & pepper, and most likely some Lawry's season salt too.

While we were making the hash & eggs we also had some bacon baking in the oven. Serve up, drizzle with some Tapatio for a little kick, add some fruit, & enjoy!

Isn't teamwork great? :)

Jake's mom is visiting from California right now and yesterday we took her to Ft. Laramie, which was a military post and also a stopping point along the Oregon/Mormon/California Trail in the mid-1800s. It's a pretty amazing & historic national park that most don't know about. If you're ever in Eastern Wyoming it's definitely worth the $3 entrance fee!

I'll share more pictures later this week, but I thought you might like to see a picture of the decor of the bar. It has been restored, but this is an exact replica of how the bar looked in its day.

Isn't the wallpaper beautiful? The wife of the barkeep wanted the men to have a little culture.