The Little Red Hen

Giving Thanks

We have a lot to be thankful for this year. We are all healthy, have enough food to eat, have a warm home, and loving, and supportive friends and family. 

We are enjoying a wonderful family weekend without homework (M finished his homework Wednesday!) and the usual routine of lessons and activities.

 

Yesterday we had a lovely afternoon of food and games with friends. I contributed a couple of pies to the meal. The pumpkin pie was made with one of our pumpkins using the recipe found here. It was delicious!

We have been doing some crafty things too. I'll probably share some of that later.

Thanks to all of you who stop by and make this such a wonderful place for me. I hope you are also having a wonderful weekend of fun with your family and friends.

Six Thousand Days

Over the years we have tried to celebrate the 1000 day anniversaries in our family. It is sometimes hard to do as they are of course not annual events and always occur at different times of the year.  This also makes it fun.  Kids who have summer birthdays get to celebrate during the school year and vice versa.  Yesterday, M turned 6000 days old!

 

Also on the theme of celebrating at different times of year, we had our Thanksgiving dinner yesterday!  D will have his wisdom teeth out Wednesday so it was nice for all of us to enjoy the turkey with trimmings.

 

Really, can there be such a thing as celebrating too often, being too thankful or having too many wonderful meals together?

We also enjoyed a walk in the new county park near us where I took these photographs.

At Least Ten Quilts

You  may have noticed that I really like quilts. I like making them. I like looking at them. I like sleeping under them.

I really like quilts that have a LOT of quilting in them. After washing they get very crinkly and drapey.  They make me want to snuggle up under them.

 

This quilt has a lot of quilting in a mix of traditional and modern designs. I put traditional feathered wreaths in the yellow blocks and then quilted all of the background white with a more modern swirl design. The animal print blocks were left free of quilting as were the triangle star points. This makes those star points float a bit on the design.  I like how the combination looks here.

I finished and washed it just in time for a show tomorrow. I love how it looks and feels after the wash. I would tell you how big it is but I forgot to measure it before setting up my booth tonight. If I still have it when I come home tomorrow I'll let you know.

 

My grandmother always said that you should have at least ten quilts in your cedar chest when you get married.  She also said that when she was first married and had a house heated with a wood stove she slept with five quilts on their bed in the winter.  Later, when I was grown and used to visit her in the winter I would sleep in her guest bed under two or three quilts that she had made.  We sleep under two quilts during our Michigan winters. I still have a lot of quilts to make if the next generation of the family is going to have the proper number of quilts. 

I had better get busy!

Magic Science

When I was little I remember placing leaves between layers of waxed paper and pressing them with a warm iron to preserve the fall color a little longer. I tried this when my boys were smaller and learned that waxed paper contained far less wax than it used to. That little project did not work.

After posting many photos of fall leaves on flickr, Sarah pointed me to this website showing how to dip leaves in melted paraffin. Uh, why didn't I think of that? As soon as I clicked on the link P and I headed out for a walk to gather leaves.

We came in, dug some 30+ year old wax from the depths of the basement, and went right to work!

 

We had so much fun with these we had to go to town to gather different leaves!

 

One day later, here are two leaves gathered from the same tree at the same time. It's like MAGIC!

Thank you Sarah for giving me that link on the PERFECT day. We have since had a fierce wind and rain storm and all our fall leaves outside are gone.

Our next project is to figure out how to hang the dozens of preserved leaves in the window. 

A Visit to the Farm

P's preschool class visited the farm yesterday.  I did notice a few differences from our place.  Look at those apples!

 

The trees were loaded.

 

I could make a lot of sauce from all those blemish free apples.

 

The farmer helped each child pick a few apples.

After looking at the beehives, learning about bees, and having a hay ride we went to the pumpkin patch to choose pumpkins.

 

It didn't take miss P long to find the PERFECT pumpkin.

 

Enjoying Fall - or How I Spent My Time at the Cross Country Meet

Be warned that this post contains several thrills.

The weather on Saturday was predicted to be cold and cloudy. I was pleased to see the sun and clear skies on our way to the cross country meet. I dressed for the cold because it was in the 30s! I stopped in town to take a picture of this tree that catches my eye every time I drive by. 

 

There were lots of pretty trees and leaves at the park where the meet was held.

 

This yellow tree was right next to the finish line.

 

 

Even the ground was beautiful.

 

Oh, and did I mention I was there for a meet?

A Brighter Day

 

Today was a brighter day. The sun came out and P and I rushed out for a walk around the fields. That was just what we needed. We came in refreshed and started in on our projects.  She is still working on coloring and cut outs.

I, however, started something new.

I am using every last bit of that animal print, some scraps, and some non scrap (gasp) fabrics. It feels good to have the scrap bin under control so that I feel like I can use larger pieces of fabric. The whole little quilt is planned around the animal print. I  measured the fabric (1/2 yard) and then figured that I could cut 3 six inch strips. I cut the strips into squares getting 18 squares and three left over bits. I cut one of the left over bits in half and sewed the halves to the other two left over bits. Now I have 20 six inch squares and no leftover animal fabric. The quilt will now have twenty blocks with animal print centers.

I bet you are on the edge of your seat waiting to see how it will look! I know I am.

House Construction

Now that D has moved to the dorm and M is back in school it is just P an me at home much of the time again.  We had fun this week in our spruced up craft room. We moved her desk in and can now work together!

This week we spent a day constructing houses. I made I spy house blocks for LauraJ and P fashioned her own houses from paper.

 

These blocks are part of the 8two8 flickr quilt block swap.

   

Now we are off to some more crafty fun. I see that P already has her scissors warmed up.

Late Summer Prairie

Our late summer walks through the prairie are pretty these days.

 

I like the way there are different things blooming throughout the summer.

 

Some flowers make big patches of color while others, like this flax, are more subtle.

 

The big blue stem grows very tall. This grass is over eight feet.

 

We do feel the coming of fall in the air.

What end of summer things are you enjoying?

End of Summer Calm

We have settled into an end of summer calmness.  D is settled into his dorm. M is working on his summer homework. P and I are taking walks and enjoying the wonderful end of summer weather.

 

She loves to play in the sandy back road. I am enjoying that our afternoons can be relaxed. When school starts we will be more scheduled and running about to after school activities.

The umbrella is for "just in case."  It is good to be prepared.