Wouldn't it be wonderful to just be able to curl up in a ball anywhere and go to sleep...the bathroom sink was discovered by Bubbie yesterday. I started finding the stopper all over the house now. I suppose I will have to get a little chain to chain it in there.

Our weather is going through a drastic change tonight. Today was warm enough till a light jacket was the most needed to keep warm, and not even really necessary. Then tonight about 6:00 p.m. the wind started rolling through and has howled. I think the weatherman said there were gusts up to 50 or 60 miles an hour. There were tornado warnings in some areas, and severe storm watch the rest of the counties near here. It went from around 50 degrees at noon, to 10 degrees F. right now. The roads are icy and slick. Just a few flurries, but it rained before it turned so cold and that froze.

I have been fooling with this summer sausage my husband and his friends made from deer meat and pork roasts...I had to bake it for 4 hours on a low temp in the oven. Then it has to cool out completely at room temperature before we put it back in the fridge. He and two of his buddies and one of their sons worked about 6 hours Sunday making it. He brought home so much that we will be having to find people to give it to.

Last night I did go down and kind of get my sewing area cleaned up a little...I had planned to sew today but other things come up. Tomorrow is another day...but I done know two jobs I have to do. One is to got to the post office to mail in my husband's retirement papers...and I need to go buy some groceries.

Three views of the same barn....it is another barn that I really, really like. A few years ago, I was afraid it was starting to go downhill because part of the roofing was torn loose, then last year some doors were blown almost off and hanging by one hinge. I was surprised and very happy to see the roof repaired--can you imagine who had the nerve to climb up there. It was on the very top peak that the roofing was blown loose. And they took the doors down, so it is still a handsome barn.

I know this is not my usual type of picture. But it sort of pertains to today. I just found out that a family friend was found dead today in his home. I have three brothers that are older than me and he was their friend...and he was actually older than them. So he was at least 12 years older than me if not more. One of the first actual memories I have is of him coming to our house and I was trying to impress him--I was maybe 3 or 4 yrs old. Anyway, I thought I would impress him by jumping across this tiny stream but instead wound up falling in. He was so good to me when I was little--would sometimes bring me candy or other treats from the store. Sometimes just made me feel special by talking to me...all of us loved him almost as if he were our actual brother. He also gave me my very first kitten!

A wintry day

My daughter and I decided to go for a drive late this afternoon...though I have been wanting to head over into Illinois to try to capture some shots of the geese, the call of the Parke County Indiana lured me once again. To be more specific I want to go back to Bridgeton and get a new shot of the covered bridge there...this one is the new rebuilt bridge. Notice the ice in the picture at the left side, below below the dam....that gives you an idea of how cold it has been. The thought that crossed my mind when I first noticed the ice was tree mushrooms--called oyster mushrooms in the National Audubon's book of mushrooms.

From there we went to Mansfield and north from there. We saw wild turkeys, several hawks, blue herons, and this guy here....a young bald eagle. We saw him once right below the damn...I had seen him from a distance the other day and at first assumed he was a buzzard. This time he was right over us and we could see he was a bird of prey and not a hawk.

As we left the place and was starting to pull out on the main road, I saw an adult bald eagle taking flight across the way....so we proceeded back the way we had come to follow the creek and hopefully see the eagle. We had not gone very far when my daughter spotted this guy...these pictures are cropped and reduced in size...if not for that you would see how blurry they are. Still a very exciting evening for us.

One thing that totally surprised me, he was not as easily spooked at the blue herons...they take flight at nothing. Part of the time I can slow down, but soon as I start to roll my window down they take flight. This guy, he just sat. I got out of the car and walked a little bit nearer, and finally waved my arms to get him to fly. I wanted him to fly one way, but instead he flew the other.

When I was a kid, I would never in my life have dreamed I would get to see bald eagles in the wild. For that matter, didn't think I would see wild turkeys. Or coyotes. I see the turkeys on a regular basis, see coyotes fairly often, eagles not so often. But you can bet I will be heading back to this place every chance I get...I just wish I had a longer lens! And that I didn't get so excited...

Tennessee sunset

Sundown from my used to be Tennessee mountain home.

I am so ready for this time of year--I came across this in my files and thought I might as well post it, too. I can't wait till the time of year I can set outside and read, or talk on the phone. I think I miss sitting in my swing more than about anything during the winter months. It was all of 1 degree when I got up this morn and slowly...so very slowly climbed to all of 10 degrees now. And it is past 2:00 p.m. in the afternoon.

I made this several years ago and just now took probably my first picture of it...it is a small couch quilt. Not quite 5 ft. square. I wish I had used more colorful fabric now, but at least this looks cozy and warm.

This is our younger daughter when she was 12 years old, with a stray dog that just came here. We were just sure he belonged to someone--I posted pictures around town looking for the owner and no one ever called. He could always be found laying up against our front door every morning. About the time I became convinced no one was going to claim him, he disappeared. I drove every street in this town and alleys too, looking for him. We were ready to get him neutered and claim him as our own...as you can see by this picture he dearly loved our daughter. He liked everyone, but only had that look in his eyes when he was looking at her.

I found something you just have to check out--I got the sight from another blog but I forget who posted it...check THIS out...it is amazing what some people can do to a dusty windshield. It is pictures drawn on dusty windshields. I don't think anyone would regret looking. I wish I had an ounce of this guy's talent.
I took this picture last Friday--I removed the color and like it best this way. I have taken pictures of it before, but this is the first one I have truly liked. I prefer it in B & W, but the color wasn't bad either.

I just wondered, does anyone else besides me still patch jeans? My husband likes for me to patch his, and I patch mine when they need it. When I was a teen-ager I could not wait till I had to patch them....I had one pair that everyone envied. I wish I had kept them just to show my girls....oh, well. I have gotten till I sort of dread it when I have a pair to patch but it really isn't that bad of a job. It didn't take me too long to do the pair above.
I have all the strips cut for the baby quilts...I think I have enough for both quilts, but if not, it won't take too long to cut a couple more of each fabric. I finished the cutting Sunday I think...I would have finished a lot quicker if I had used common sense. I have no idea why I did this, but I cut all the reds and part of the greens, a single strip at a time! I have no idea what possessed me to cut that way. I cut the rest stacking my fabrics as usual--4-6 fabrics--then cutting the strips. I really prefer cutting about 4 strips at a time...but did do 6 a time or two. I am really happy with the varieties of fabric I have except for the reds...I sure could have used more variety in them--they all read about the exact same tone of color. And not much movement...but didn't want to use a couple fabrics I have and Joanns didn't have anything--or at least anything that wasn't see-thru thin almost.

It is another cold day here--down around 19 above. Not as bad as it could be, but colder than it was this morning. It was 32 when I got up and the temperatures have fell a little bit all day long. We got a new skim of snow on the ground, but not the 1-2 inches predicted. I don't know whether I am happy with that or not. I would have liked to had measurable snow to go take pictures of. I love it when the snow is heavy and weighs down the branches of pine trees....or it stacks up on top of everything.

Now, I need to clean up my kitchen, cut up chicken for stir fry and try to get a couple things done.

This is right below a dam--the water in the Raccoon Lake is not as cold as the surrounding temp so all this mist is rising when it hits our cold temperatures!

This was taken today--as you can see she still loves him dearly. They are 6 monthes old today! Still my pride and joy--get it "PRIDE"--and tomorrow I get to babysit my daughter dog again. Fun times ahead!

Something the farmer missed....

and I bet there will be some animal thankful for it. Probably a squirrel. It really is most amazing that one very seldom sees anything actually left standing in the fields like this, considering all the land that is farmed in this area. When the farmers get done, usually not a thing is left standing. I am sure that is some on the ground...but I don't there is much.

I did start cutting fabric the yesterday, officially day before yesterday since it is now 12:24 a.m. of Saturday morn,--didn't get too far till I had a kitty trying to help me. She is so inquisitive and wants to be right in the middle of everything. Today though, I went for a drive...I had wanted to go for a walk at the place pictured here but the wind must have been coming direct from the Arctic. It just cut right through everything I had on. And my fingers were cold in an instant.

To get to this pasture, I had to go through the covered bridges pictured below. Just in the drive I went on today, I physically drove through 3, could have drove through another, and two that are not open for driving. And that is not near all the bridges in the county.

I was so excited...I seen an eagle following the creek. I honestly thought he was going to land in a tree, but he didn't. It isn't the first eagle I have seen, but think I could count on my hands the number I have seen. At a power plant north of here that is on the Wabash river, every spring they have Eagle days, my husband went with a friend but so far I have never been. But in driving up there have seen eagles anyway.

Besides the eagles, I saw blue herons and hawks...but no furred critters! I was hoping to see something 4-legged but was really excited to see the others. I did not remember if it is normal for blue herons to stay here in the winter. I know that normally vultures don't but I keep seeing one or two of those here and there.

And tonight my husband and I went for pizza over in Illinois, and on the way home we seen lines and lines of geese heading north! It must be a major flyway over there, because we see them here, but never like over there.

We are getting skim of snow right now! i would hope for enough to take some good snow scenes but think it is just wishful thinking!

Sunset from Tennessee

Another from one of my scanned photos--this is a sunset from beautiful northeast Tennessee. Later than 1996 I think.

This is one of my favorite photos...I did have it as the header of my blog in the fall....it is a field about 5 minutes from my home. It was that perfect lighting. I used to never go any where without my camera, and wish I had never lost the habit.

I just thought I would take a totally different track for just a moment...I thought I would share one of my husband's hobbies: making knives. He has long wanted to make them, and the smaller one in the picture above, he made many, many moons ago. In 1978-79...while he was going to vocational school. But he had no way to put the shine on.

Last winter, he worked and built a small gas-powered forge, and got a couple more items for his shop and made 4 or 5 knives...the first one being the bigger knife in the picture. All the ones he made, he gave away to friends..and he finished his very first knife, which he did keep. He also handmade a sheath for each knife he made. You can see more photos of his work HERE.


As for me, I am trying to get back to quilting and creating...it has been slow coming. I went shopping today to pic up some extra fabrics for the baby quilts I want to make. The one is the one I got a couple weeks ago in Amish country, it will be the center square to built around, and the bottom pic shows some of the ones I picked up to add to the ones my daughter and I have already pulled from my stash....now I just need to start cutting.

Just a reminder of summer.....

Otto

Meet Otto, my youngest daughter's dog...or one of them. I will have to find an old one her other dog to scan in. This one came to their house about 2 months ago. He has since been neutered and been taken to obedience classes. He is all love...never meets a stranger. Loves kids. I babysat him the other day and had a blast doing it.

More from my film days--this is a robin the girls and I raised. We named it Cheep-Cheep cause every time it seen us it was hungry and started cheeping, telling us to hurry up. We do not know for sure what happened to it...we had it from much smaller than this, till not too long after this. We left for vacation and when the kid came to feed it, someone had let it out of it's cage. It may have survived on its own...just don't know for sure.

Skywatch....
This is a photo taken several years ago, July 1994 to be exact, so it is a scanned image. This used to be one of my favorite fishing ponds. It is huge and is the result of strip mining. The mining has been closed down for 5 or 6 years at least, the property leased to private owners, and everything is under lock and key. I cannot even get near this strip pit, and even if I could I would only cry because I absolutely loved that place. I spent a lot of happy hours there--sometimes with the family but also without. It was about 6 minutes from home, so if I had a couple hours through the day, I might go catch a mess of fish.

From the archives.....
I always want to know the stories these old places could tell. At one time they have made someone so happy....now they are falling down.

I don't have much to say, but thought I would post a couple more pictures from my files. Near the end of October....they were taken in nearby Parke County, Indiana. It is famous for its covered bridges, 31 of them the last I heard. Every October, starting the second Friday in October there is a Covered Bridge Festival. Crafters and vendors set up in every little town in the county....there is food galore. People come from miles and miles to visit. I think the estimate is in the millions. I know one couple that come up from Missouri every year to go...she buys a lot of her Christmas gifts then.

And all roads for miles around are lined with yard sales...if you had the time you could find almost anything you every wanted...the key word here being time. I think I like the yard sales as much as the crafter's and vendor's booths. And I for sure don't have much luck with the food, though there are a couple places I always have good luck with. It is just when I decide to try something new that I make my mistakes.

The bridge picture above is older--it is a photo scanned in. In 2005, an arsonist burned it down. The people decided to rebuilt it, and with lots of donations of time and supplies, that feat has since been accomplished.

It came today!!! That was fast!
And it has the KTCA seal....that is Kitty Tested, Cat Approved.


This is the small quilt I won for posting over on Jane's blog...thank you Jane for picking my name out of the hat!

I have had a totally frustrating day...looking for some papers. But in the process I came across this newspaper clipping that shows me picking apples. This was taken in the fall of 2004 or 2005...it seems like a lifetime ago. We did have a lot of fun...I miss the people I worked with and for. (Notice who took the picture....not me!)

I really do not know if it is my age or what, but every time I turn around I am having to hunt for something. I feel like I am slowly going insane....I was going to list some of the things I have had to hunt for recently but am too embarrassed.

And my body's thermostat is totally messed up....one hour I am freezing and the next my internal child is playing with matches. I will feel hot enough to heat up the whole outdoors. This is not fun.

I think I have decided how to do one of the baby quilts....it will be colorful I can almost promise you that. My younger daughter decided she wanted me to use the same fabric as my older daughter chose. So to get myself calmed down and farther design it in Quilt pro...it shouldn't be hard.

Not sure when I will get to it...I want to get up tomorrow and do something in this house. And I have got to start on the retirement papers for my husband. I cannot delay too long on that. So, guess I better hush here and think about settling myself down till I can sleep!

A little bit of fabric

Let the games begin....or should I say sewing?
These are the new fabrics I bought to work around for making baby quilts...click on pictures to enlarge them. Next, just to come to the decision how I want to use them...that is the hard part for me. The second one down is the one that my daughter wants me to use for her secretary. I got enough of it to do two baby quilts. I think the scenes on it are just about, but not quite 7 inches square.

The top one is going to be harder...I haven't measured them but they are big--about 9 1/2 inches by 12 inches...I wish I had had my camera to take a picture of the top the store had made from it. It was quite interesting...

Now the jungle animal one I thought to lay a ruler on it so you can kind of get an idea...and even two of the others have their own tape measure printed with them, just not sure if you can read it in the enlarged picture.




And this bottom one--these are small squares. I can use a 4 inch ruler and it will give seam allowance without cutting into the picture if I remember correctly. They are the perfect size to use as the center of a log cabin....or I can see using them in a 9-patch.

I know I only have two baby quilts I want to make, but I thought I better take advantage and buy more than I needed...good things like this don't come along every day. Each one had a good feel to the fabric and that made them even more hard to resist....

BTW, it is STILL raining...it has not totally stopped all day. Sometimes it rains harder than others but never actually stopped.

It is pouring the rain here in the midwest....the ground is so saturated that there are puddles everywhere. Come summer time, we will be wishing we had some of this. So I am trying not to complain....actually, it just makes me want to snuggle in a quilt and read a book.

I keep feeling like I am coming down with the sinus thing my husband just got over and my daughter now has. Part of the time I have to constantly have a kleenex with me, and my chest feels so tight. I just don't feel like doing much of anything.

I did make myself a new pair of pjs...I cut them out a few days ago. No big chore there--they consist of one pattern piece! So quick to make. I used slinky type of material....I didn't notice to see what it was actually called. It is not even 1% cotton...a big departure for me. And it would have been cheaper just to go buy a pair. However, I need the satisfaction of making something every now and then.

So, for seaming them together, I decided to drag out my serger. That was a first for a long, long time. So I took the old thread off--it had gathered too much dust. Though not too bad considering how long it has sat...it sets on a shelf in my sewing desk that can be pulled out. But it has set there with the door shut for a few years.

Anyway, I had to get the book out to re-thread it...and my boy came down. He tried his best to help but he is all paws and no thumbs! He was just into rubbing on everyhting and trying to look and see--reaching in with his paws. Finally, when I wouldn't let him do anything, he got bored and left the area. It took a couple tries for me to get it going. I sewed the crotch seams one night and did the edges of the top of them and the bottom of the legs till they wouldn't ravel. About that time daughter went to be so I stopped cause my sewing is directly beneath her bed...
I was down there for something yesterday and sewed the leg seams...then ran down last night and did the hemming and putting the elastic in the waist. It feels good to actually make and finish something.

Daughter and I did run over to Arthur, Illinois over the weekend. I found good stuff there...not Winnie the Pooh, but several different cheater squares to work with. I will try to think and take pictures after while. Not sure just how I am going to use them, but I sure like what I got...check back later to see if I have posted pictures.

Adventures with Bubbie

More Adventures with Bubbie...

He learned to do this today. he first jumps to the top of set of shelves that my husband built for me. They are approx. 4 feet high. Then if this door is open, he jumps to the top of it and walks back and forth...and he will walk on the door casing above the door, also. This is old, old woodwork...it is not just straight frames around the doors. There are all these little extras. Anyway, the top part of the door casing--it has the board that is directly around the door...that lays flat to the wall. Then on top of the piece across the top, there is an additional piece that is routered....not good at explaining this. Just trying to get to the point where you can understand when I say he has a two-inch width to walk on so it is possible. But he didn't do it when I was taking these pictures.

Bubbie has discovered that he CAN get on top of the fridge--and has been up there two or three times today. For what reason, I do not know. Unless it is just because he can. He is a very adventurous cat...and plays with my husband when he comes home from work. They chase each other through the house.

He and the Puss Puss still race Pops to the bedroom when he goes in there--any time he heads in there they think it is PLAYTIME--even if he is going to bed. They try to race through the door before he closes it.

Sewed a few lines on my scrap blocks, but they just do not capture my heart. And I still have come to no decisions about the baby quilts I want to make. I am trying to not dwell on it so much and hoping that it just comes to me. I really would like to mainly use fabric I have in my stash, but would not mind buying some. Something with characters I could fussy cut or else have little cheater blocks I could built around....we shall see.

I may head over to Arthur, IL to look at a couple fabric stores there in the next week or two. I love to go over there--it is Amish country.

Buttons

I must tell that this post is inspired by Barb --her picture and what she has to say both.
This shows my button box--or button tin as is the case. It contains buttons both from my mom and also Grammy...my husband's grandmother. This was Grammy's button box/tin. She wasn't much of a seamstress--didn't own a sewing machine. She could sew on a button or manage to hem a pair of pants, and that was about it for her.

The button box when I grew up was a tin box also but rectangle in shape...it was about 7 inches long, 4 inches wide, and probably 3 inches deep. As a child, sometimes my mom would have me dig through the buttons to try to find 4 or 5 that matched...she made almost everything I wore, except underwear and socks. Other times, I liked to just dig through the buttons and try to imagine what they had originally been on. (In fact, every now and then I still do this with this button box.)

Sometimes I would just go through seeing the biggest number of matches I could get. I wonder now where they all come from--I assumed as a kid that mom must have cut them off of things that wore out. And that is probably correct for the most part...but some of them were too fine to have come from anything in our life.

I guess we were really bored back then; I don't know what would ever have made me do this, cause my brother always ended up with it. I would get one of the bigger coat buttons--ones that were at least an inch wide. Then get a piece of string about 25-30 inches long--that is another little story in itself. Regular string is what is needed--similiar to crocheting thread. Put it through one hole in the button and back through another and tie the ends together....then pull the button till it is approximately in the middle. You grasp the ends of the the string and pull till the string becomes slightly tight--the button starts spinning. You just sort of let up and it will spin the other way....sort of like when you sit in a swing and twist yourself round and round and let your self go, you go back to the starting point and then twist on beyond it in the opposite way.

Now, don't that sound entertaining...NOT! But apparently it was for me. The bad thing was my brother would end up with it about half the time, and he would start the spinning and eventually hold it against my hair when he done it...causing one heck of a tangle! This is the same brother that would every now and then grab a handful of cockle burs and rub in my hair!

Another thing we would do with buttons sounds impossible...but I can guarantee you it is not. We would take a piece of cardboard or the back off a composition book. Use a nail to poke a hole in three places across one side. Use a lark's head knot to attach a string about 18 inches long to the middle hole. Then run each end through a button and tie that end to one of the side holes. Now try to get both buttons on one side...keep in mind that the holes the string runs through is much smaller than the button.

I have meant to mention string before, but don't think I have every actually gotten around to it. Due to our circumstances, my mom knew how to get full use of everything. And to this day any time I pull the string that opens a bag of dogfood--I think of my mom. Any time any bit of string came into the house like that--it was saved and wound on this ball of string. Then when my mom went to baste the backing to the quilt frame, she used this string. I don't save string--but I always feel this twinge of guilt because I don't.