What my backyard looks like. Only there's more snow now! And the sun is definitely NOT out today.

Well, we didn’t have much snow for a while, but it looks like the Upper Peninsula is going to live up to it’s wintry reputation this week.  It’s been snowing since Sunday.  I went out and cleared the driveway yesterday, but it’s pretty much filled back in already.  Plus the city plow left a BIG pile at the end of the drive.  Oh well.  Nobody here has to go anywhere today, which is probably a good thing.

Poor Andrew had oral surgery yesterday.  He wasn’t a very happy camper last night, but he’s feeling somewhat better today.  Having had oral surgery myself some years back,  I’d rather shovel the driveway with a teaspoon than to go through that!  But at least it’s over now, and he can focus on recovering.  I’m taking good care of him, and feeding him lots of soft food.

Enough with the non-quilting stuff.  Finally finished the diagonal strip quilt yesterday.  All I had to do was to bind it, but one corner just wouldn’t cooperate, so it took a bit longer than I thought it would.  But the quilt and I finally came to an agreement, and it’s now sporting a cheerful yellow binding.  A picture will follow after it’s washed.  Then I WILL mail those three quilts off to the ALS Quilt Challenge this week!

Today I want to make another block for the BASICS Home Gather that V is doing right now.  Plus I started a small free-pieced quilt the other day.  Just sat down and playing around with sewing scraps and strips together.  I want to finish that today, and get it quilted and add it to the pile for the AAQI.  Once I get three done, I’ll register them and send them off.

Plus I’m thinking about my next donation quilt.  I’ve joined the Heartstrings Yahoo Group, which is a group that makes string quilts to donate.  You can send them completed blocks, tops, quilts, or fabric, or you can make quilts and donate them locally.  I’m going to take the second route, since I obviously have a problem with mailing things off.  (Actually it’s hard to get to the post office.  Parking is impossible.  It’s easier to walk than to drive, but it’s too cold to walk down there right now, especially with a large box.)

My plans include making crib and child-sized quilts for the local women’s center, and maybe some 60″ by 80″ quilts for the Salvation Army, too.  So I’m thinking about doing the 20″ wide strips mentioned in Mile-A-Minute-Quilts by Sharon Hultgren.  Or I may just do individual strip blocks and quilt-as-you-go.

Why you don't go out on the breakwater during a storm...

This is a picture from last fall.  There’s a sign warning people to stay off the breakwater during storms because people have been swept away in the past.  Andrew was standing right at the beginning of it, but I was so nervous about him being there that he didn’t stay there very long, thank goodness.

Enough of this.  I’m off to sew!

Strip quilt ready for quilting!

Here’s the stashbusting strip quilt I’ve been working on this week. I meant it to be a crib-sized quilt, but it came out about 46″ by 48″, so I think I’ll donate it to the Hopes and Dreams Quilt Challenge for ALS.  I STILL haven’t mailed off the two quilts I’ve completed, so I guess I may as well wait another day or two to finish this one before I mail them all off.

I meant to practice quilt-as-you-go with this quilt, but it didn’t happen, mostly because of the bias edges on the outside of the quilt.  I was afraid they would stretch, and they did.  I hurried up and sewed borders on to contain the ever-growing edges, and they seem to have done the trick.

Tomorrow I’ll get the backing done, and get it basted.  If I’m feeling really ambitious, I may even start quilting it.  It should go pretty fast, as I’m not going to mess around and do anything fancy.  Straight-line quilting is the only way to go!

House block with kitty

V over at Bumble Beans is collecting house blocks to make quilts for BASICS, a group that helps homeless people in NYC.  She’s asking for 10.5″ house blocks; click on the link for the pattern and directions if you’re interested in making a block or two for her!

I decided to take a break from the string quilt and make a house block this morning.  V said you could applique a heart on the house, but what’s a home without a cat?

I cut the kitty out of some fabric I had on hand, and fused it down.  Then I went around it with an outline stitch just to be sure he doesn’t go anywhere!  I love that grin.  Wonder what he’s thinking about getting into?

This block really is square.  My photography skills aren’t the greatest, I’m afraid!

Ice mountains along the Lake Superior shore

Went for a walk yesterday.  It was COLD out there!  The north wind definitely had teeth in it.

The constant wind has been blowing the ice up against the shoreline.  This area is usually open water, but you can see how the ice has built up.  The waves are breaking against the ice, which is way out from shore.

Snow drifts across the bike path

I couldn’t resist taking a picture of the snowdrifts on the bike path!  The wind comes in off the lake and dumps the snow right on the pathway.  There’s always an adventure around here.

Don’t forget to vote for Marquette in the Dozen Distinctive Destinations at the National Trust for Historic Preservation!  Right now Marquette is in first place!  Woo hoo!  But that could change, so we need to keep voting.

This has been an insanely busy week.  I don’t really like it when I don’t get to sew for two days running!

On Tuesday, Andrew had two appointments at the VA in Iron Mountain, which is 80 miles from here.  A long trip in the snow, and we had to be there at 7 AM!  The only upside is that they’re on central time, and we’re on eastern, so at least we didn’t have to leave until 6 AM.

We didn’t get back home til about 3:30 in the afternoon, which makes for a long day.

Our camper. We sure did have a lot of fun traveling around with it. But once we moved to Marquette, our traveling days were over!

Yesterday we hauled our camper down to Escanaba to the RV dealer, who was going to buy it.  We had a 30-foot long fifth wheel that had been sitting in our driveway for over a year.  We’d been trying to sell it all of last year, but with the economy so bad, there were no takers.

Of course, the camper was snowed in.  I mean SNOWED IN.  Andrew had backed it in from the street when we moved into this house back in October of 2008.  But there was no getting it out the way it came in, until spring!

Since waiting wasn’t an option, we wondered if we could get it out the driveway.  We hired the merry crew of snow shovelers who happened to show up on Monday to clear a path for Andrew to back the truck up to the camper.

Bright and early yesterday morning, we were out there, making our preparations.  I had to move a little more snow, but Andrew got the truck backed up, and we managed to get hitched up.  He was at a pretty sharp angle to the camper, so we weren’t sure this was going to work.

But it did!  We had to trim a few low-hanging branches off the big oak tree at the end of the driveway, and Andrew had to drive through a rather large snowbank, but he got the camper out of the driveway.  Somebody came walking down the street just in time to make sure the camper would fit under the overhead electrical wire that goes to the house, while I watched the back end, to make sure we wouldn’t hit anything with it.

Of course, that was only half the battle.  We still had to drive the thing 60 miles down to Escanaba.  The roads were snow-covered and slick, and poor Andrew was pretty stressed.  We found out later that two vehicles had slid off the road earlier in the morning.  One had flipped over, and the other went over a steep embankment, rolling at least once on the way down.  I’m glad we didn’t know that at the time!

We left just before 11AM and got to Escanaba around 12:30.  We left the camper at the RV place for them to inspect it, and went to have lunch.  After lunch, we picked up our check and headed home.  Of course, it was pushing 4 before we made it back home.  And we were both wiped out!

My intrepid fisherman and his little red boat

We didn’t get as much for the camper as we had hoped to, but at least it’s sold, and now Andrew can recycle that money into a bigger boat. He’s been going out fishing on Lake Superior in his little 12-foot boat for months. Now he can get a 20- or 22-footer, which will make me feel a little better about him being out there!

Today Andrew had another doctor’s appointment, but at least it was here in town.  I even managed to get some sewing in this morning!  I’ll get some quilt pix up tomorrow.

Barn Dance, finished!

Finally got around to taking some pictures yesterday.  Here’s my “Barn Dance” quilt hanging on the clothesline.  It was a bear to quilt, but it’s finished!  I have to say that I’m quite pleased with how it came out.

The next picture is of my “Rail Fence” quilt.  I like how the lights and darks zig across the surface.  It’s quite a lively quilt, with a lot of movement.  Not bad for just sitting down and sewing a pile of strips together!

I’ll get them packed up this weekend, and in the mail to the Hopes and Dreams Quilt Challenge for ALS on Monday.

Rail Fence Scrap Quilt

I went up to Alley Kat’s Quilt Shop yesterday.  All the fabrics were 30% off, including white PFD (prepared for dyeing) mercerized cotton.  Such a deal!  I got five yards for less than $18, including sales tax.   Ben Franklin is having a sale this weekend, too.  I have a 40% off coupon, so I think I’ll run over there this morning, and get another quilt batting.  With all the quilting I’m doing right now, it’s nice to be able to save a few bucks on batting.

Now that I have some white fabric to play with, I may do some dyeing today.  Fabric Dyeing 101 has lots of great tips for dyeing fabric.  I especially like her directions for making batik-like fabrics with gel glue.  I’ve dyed a lot of yarn, and even tried my hand at some socks last fall, but haven’t done any fabric yet.  Since I already have the pro mx dyes, soda ash, and everything else I need, I’m ready to go!

I also took a look at Fusing Fun!  Fast Fearless Art Quilts by Laura Wasilowski yesterday afternoon.  I am hooked!  What a fun book.  I even have an idea for my first fused quilt, once I get a few fabrics dyed.  I need to pick up some fusible web while I’m out today, too.  I have some Wonder Under around here someplace, but since I don’t want to tear into my closet, I’ll just buy some more and wait for it to surface, which it will, eventually.

Haven’t done any sewing the past couple of days, and don’t know if I’ll get any done today, but hopefully I’ll get back to it tomorrow for a bit.  Right now my brain is so full of stuff that I feel like I may explode.

Thill's Fish House, at the Lower Harbor in Marquette, MI

One last thing:  Marquette, MI,  my hometown, is one of the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s Dozen Distinctive Destinations for 2010.  Here’s what it’s all about:  “Since 2000, the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s Dozen Distinctive Destination program has recognized cities and towns that offer an authentic visitor experience by combining dynamic downtowns, cultural diversity, attractive architecture, cultural landscapes and a strong commitment to historic preservation, sustainability and revitalization. In each community, residents have joined together and taken action to protect their town’s character.”

Between now and February 28,  anyone over 18 can vote for their favorite, as often as they want.  Marquette is trailing behind Rockland, Maine, and we can’t let that happen!  So please click the link, register (they just want your name and email) and vote for Marquette, MI!  Vote early and vote often!

Yay, Andrew made it home safely last night, around 12:30.  He was tired, but wound up, so it took a little while for both of us to calm down enough to go to sleep!

So of course nobody was up early this morning.  I slept til eight, which is late for me.  I let Andrew sleep til 9:30 before I woke him up.  I hated to do it, but I know he would have trouble sleeping tonight if I let him go too much longer.

I did manage to get some laundry done, but other than that, the day was a wash.  And there’s nothing wrong with that, either.  It was nice to sit on the couch with my honey and look at the pictures he took in TN and just talk.

Mary from Making Scrap Quilts From Stash was nice enough to send me a link for Mile-A-Minute Quilts.  This sounds exactly like what I’m looking for.  The idea is that you piece a long strip about 20″ wide, and then machine quilt the strip.  Then you join the strips. The strips are much smaller and easier to handle than a full-size quilt.  Love it!

I was tempted to order it, since I can get it for less than $5, but shipping always adds up.  So I ordered it inter-library loan!

Speaking of which, the first three books I ordered last week came in yesterday.  Of course, I had to walk right down to the library to pick them up.  Liberated Quiltmaking, Liberated String Quilts, and Fusing Fun! Fast Fearless Art Quilts are MINE for the next three weeks!  And I also have Thinking Outside The Block by Sandi Cummings and Karen Flamme on order, along with Mile-A-Minute Quilts.

Liberated String Quilts is great!  I’ve already gleaned lots of ideas from this book.  I need to make a few notes so I can remember them later on. I can’t wait to get started on my next project now!

Just started looking at Liberated Quiltmaking this afternoon, but didn’t get too far before I  nodded off.  I’ll look at it some more tomorrow, but it looks it’s full of great ideas, too.

I was going to take some quilt pictures today, but just didn’t do it.  Oh well, tomorrow is another day, as Scarlett O’Hara says.  I need to walk up to the little quilt store in the Village tomorrow since they’re having a sale, so while I’m outside, I’ll pin the quilts to the line and snap away. I know, going into a fabric store when they’re having a sale is dangerous, but I’ve already decided the only thing I will buy is some Wonder Under and maybe a couple of yards of white material to dye.

Molly perched on the arm of the couch

I’ll close with this picture of Molly.  She was so funny last night.  While Andrew was gone,  I usually went to bed around 11:20, after watching the local news and weather.  Last night, of course, I was going to wait up for Andrew, so I didn’t go to bed like I usually do.  Poor Molly was just having a fit!  She started jumping up on the back of my recliner around 11:25 pm, and was obviously agitated over something.

I got up to see what her problem was, and she led me straight to the bedroom!  I told her we were going to stay up and wait for Daddy, but she wasn’t convinced.  She finally did settle into my lap for a bit before Andrew got home.  Poor kitty.

Looks like our January thaw might be over for a bit.  But I sure enjoyed it  while it lasted!  Here are a few pictures from my walks along the Lake Superior beach last weekend.

Woo hoo, look at our thermometer! Been a while since it's been this warm!

Ice balls along the beach on Saturday. They were nearly melted the next day, so I'm glad I got this shot! They look like something from outer space, don't they?

Look at the neat designs in this chunk of ice. Be sure to click on it to enlarge it. This could be a quilting design!

Somebody built snowmen in these planters in Mattson Park at the Lower Harbor. They have petunias in them in the summer. Sitting on those benches right now would be a challenge, wouldn't it?

It was cloudy and overcast today, so I stayed in and sewed all day!

The big news is that I finished “Winter Journey,” my first Liberated Challenge Quilt!  By the time I finished the binding this afternoon, I didn’t feel like messing around with the camera.  Besides, I want to get out my light box and get some good photos, so I’ll do that in the morning.  I will tell you it came out really cool.  There will be pix tomorrow!

Strings! These are an inch and a half wide. Guess what I was doing today?

Leaders and enders. I wound up with over 100 little four-patches from this pile! Almost enough for another quilt top already. You can see that I'm getting liberated and using up all my old thread, too! Who says you have to piece with white thread?

Besides sewing loads of four-patches, I also finished piecing the borders for my barn-raising quilt, which I’m going to call Barn Dance.  I’ll get the borders sewed on tomorrow, and then that top will be ready for quilting.  Pix will follow!

So you can see I’ve been a busy little girl!  I’ve been sewing my heart out, and having a blast!

Woo hoo!  Got a new Knit Picks catalog in the mail yesterday.  I have a LIFETIME supply of yarn, especially sock yarn, but, oh, it’s so much fun to look!  And this is the perfect catalog for a gray and white winter season, just full of lively colors and patterns and gorgeous yarn…no, will NOT buy more yarn…

I sewed my barn-raising quilt together yesterday, too.  It’s about 37″ by 42″, which I think is a bit skimpy for a lap quilt, so I will be adding a border.  I want to use up the last four blocks in the corners, which means the borders will be about five inches wide.  That should make a nice size small quilt.

I’m considering how to do the borders.  I have LOTS of 1-1/2 inch strips, so I was going to seam a bunch together, and just do strips.  But now I’m wondering about doing it in little squares, to match the blocks.  I would use the Scrappy Trips Around The World directions from Bonnie Hunter’s Quiltville.  This is how I made the blocks to start with, but my scrap quilt sure didn’t look as good as the ones on her site!

It would take longer to do that, but the idea of slow cloth is calling me.  Why am I always in such a rush to finish stuff?  I’m learning to slow down and let the quilt lead me where it wants to go, instead of trying to force it to conform to an idea in my head.

I stopped quilting for a long time because it was such a struggle.  I couldn’t get my seams to line up nicely, projects came out awful, sewing just wasn’t fun any more.  I realize now it’s because I was trying to control the process too much.  I had the idea that the more I controlled things, the better my quilts would be.  But the paradox is that the more I let go, the more I find enjoyment in the process, and the better my work is.

On a different topic, we’re in the midst of the fabled January thaw.  It was actually above freezing yesterday, and the sun was out.  In the afternoon, I finished scooping mushy snow out of the end of the driveway and took off for a walk!  I love to walk, and I walk up the beach near my house nearly every day when the weather is nice.  It’s hard to motivate myself when an arctic gale is blowing, though, so my walking tapers off during the winter months.  It’s nice to get out when the opportunity presents itself!

Here are a few pictures from my walk.  Click on the image to make it bigger, and click on the magnifying glass icon when it appears to make it bigger yet!  Enjoy!

Ice build-up on rocks by Picnic Rocks. You can see the ore dock at the Upper Harbor in the background.

Icy build-up on tree at Picnic Rocks. You can see the Presque Isle lighthouse and the Upper Harbor breakwater in the background, along with the ore dock.

The beach I love to walk on when it's warmer. Too cold today, with an icy wind coming off Lake Superior!

I snapped this picture while walking along the bike path. The white birch against the blue sky and blue water caught my eye, but the giant multi-trunked tree is really the star here.

I love how the bike path meanders through the trees here...just inviting you to go further and see what's around the corner!

Snow bridge at McCarthy Cove. This is open water in the summer. It's shallow enough to wade out to the rocks, but because of the ever-present strong cross-currents, most people don't venture out there.

Coyote tracks through a winter landscape.

When you live in the Upper Peninsula, you’d better enjoy winter, or you’re in for a long, hard slog.  As the saying goes, we have ten months of winter, and two months of rough sledding!  Actually that’s not quite true.  Winter is about six months long here, usually starting in November, and extending into early April.  But the summers, short and fleeting though they are, make getting through the long winters well worth it.

Andrew wanted to go fishing Saturday afternoon, and he invited me to go along to go snowshoeing.  We finally had some sun, the first sunny day in well over a week.

Fishing in the winter, you say?  Oh yeah.  Like I say, you gotta make the most of winter around here!  Apparently the Chocolay River, south of Marquette, is a hotspot for steelhead (rainbow trout that live in the Great Lakes and come back to their native rivers to spawn)  and even salmon.

Andrew, hoping to hook into a steelhead

Here’s Andrew, making a cast.  He did get a nibble from a big steelhead, but wasn’t able to land it.  Apparently they’re hard to catch.  Of course, the fishermen use little tiny hooks, which I don’t understand.  Seem like you could catch a big fish easier with a bigger hook, but then I’m not a fisherman!

While Andrew was fishing, I strapped on my snowshoes and wandered around in the woods.  It was cold, but I was bundled up, and I stayed warm as long as I kept moving.

I took several pictures of coyote tracks weaving through the woods.  I want to figure out how to use the tracks in a quilt design.

Sunlight slanting through the trees

I liked the way the sun was shining through the trees, backlighting them.  The sun is so low in the sky this time of year that it looks like it’s much later in the day than it really is.

Ice frozen on a branch in the Chocolay River

I’ve had to take a break from working on my AAQI Challenge Quilt. I enjoyed the handquilting so much the other day that I definitely overdid it! I have carpel tunnel syndrome, and it usually doesn’t bother me if I’m careful.

But I cheerfully threw caution to the winds last week, and I’ve been paying for it with numb hands at night, and achiness in my wrists and hands. It’s getting better now, though, so maybe I can work on it a bit tonight. There’s not much to do to finish it, but I do need to pace myself.

Blocks cut in half

I had cut the blocks from the Quilt from Hell in half last week. Yesterday I cut my brown squares. Using the technique you use when sewing lots of half-square triangles,  I sewed two triangles to each square, so I could avoid stretching the bias. Then I cut the squares in half and pressed them open.

Today I’ll trim the blocks so they’re all the same size, and square them up. Then the fun starts as I try out different arrangements for sewing them together. The blocks will end up being about six inches, which means they’ll finish at about five-and-a-half. Small blocks, but I have sixty of them. It will be interesting to see what I wind up with!

Gotta love the Upper Peninsula!  100% chance of snow tonight, tomorrow, tomorrow night, and Saturday, with 12 to 20 inches expected, all told.  Oof-da!  (And I’m not even Norwegian!)  We managed to miss the last big storm the Weather Service forecast, but I don’t think we’ll miss this one.  Just looked at the radar, and the tell-tale bands of lake-effect snow are already showing up.  Oooh, it just started to snow!  And it’s really coming down…

I know what I’ll be doing tomorrow! 

But between the shoveling and snow blowing, I’ll be finishing up Sarah’s quilt.  I only have one border left to quilt, and then I can square it up and bind it.  Yay!  I’ve enjoyed working on it, but I’m ready for my next project.

Why do they always get an itch whenever I want to take a picture?

When I stuck my head out the door to get the mail a few minutes ago, I saw one of our many squirrels in the big oak tree by our driveway.  That’s the neighbor’s house in the background.  Mr. (or is it Ms?) Squirrel was sitting in the tree eating an acorn and looking cute, but by the time I managed to snap his picture, he’d put his head down to scratch his ear or something.  Drat!

The cat does it to me all the time, too.  Animals must see me coming when I have a camera!

It was cold on the porch, but I tried again.  This time he’s sitting on the ground,  having his snack.  Better shot!  I do like the telephoto button on my camera.  Otherwise, all you’d see would be a little gray dot against a big tree!

Well, I woke up this morning expecting to have to clear at least six inches of snow from the driveway.  Surprise!  The expected snow didn’t materialize, so that was a nice Christmas present.

We got about five inches yesterday, so I shoveled the end of the driveway where the plow always dumps a load of snow, and then got out the snow blower.  I have a little electric one, which is really somewhat underpowered, but it does do the job, as long as you don’t let the snow get too deep.  I zipped through it pretty quickly, as the snow was light and fluffy.  I figured I would have to do it again today, but got a reprieve!

Andrew and I enjoyed a pretty low-key holiday.  Andrew could hear the waves from Lake Superior when he went out to the garage, and he wanted to go see the waves.  So after lunch we went out for a ride and took some pictures.

Big waves coming in at Picnic Rocks, which is only a couple of block from our house. No wonder we could hear the waves!

Waves crashing into the rocks along Lakeshore Drive. The road was closed just past here. We had to take a detour to get to Presque Isle.

Two ships at the ore dock. I don't know if they were unloading coal or being loaded with taconite (a form of iron ore). It's been pretty busy at the ore dock lately after a slow summer. The locks at Sault Ste. Marie will be closing in January for maintenance, so the mining companies need to get as much ore out as possible before then.

The waves hitting the breakwater at Presque Isle

Andrew in front of the breakwater at Presque Isle, with a wave crashing into it in the background.

I’ve been working on a baby quilt for my daughter, Sarah.  She and her husband Jared are looking forward to a new baby boy in April.  This little guy will be joining his three older brothers, Tal, Shaddy, and Kieran.

Baby quilt layered with batting and backing. Ready to put the safety pins in for machine quilting!

I layered the quilt this morning, and put the safety pins in this afternoon when we got back from our ride.  Now I have to decide how to quilt it.   Free motion or use a walking foot, and a machine embroidery stitch?  Or both?  Guess I’ll decide in the morning!