Welcome

As you enter my home you are greeted with my message to you.  GIVE THANKS.

To all my friends – Happy Thanksgiving!

Housecleaning 101

I have discovered that the best way to get myself to sit down and write is to start some serious housecleaning.  Which is some serious un-fun stuff.  So when I work at it for a little while, then I’ve earned the right to work on a blog post.  Ta Dah – here I am.  Floors are vacuumed.  Good enuf for this minute. 

Mrs. Farmhouse told me that it’s easier to write if you don’t wait so long in-between because now I have so much to show/tell that I hardly know where to start.  Since I last wrote, I’ve gone to Loose Threads, then to Woolies and throw in a trip to Minneapolis besides. Lordy, girls, there’s some good stuff happening.

Firstly (is that a word?), just a quick farm report.  It’s been a horrible fall for farming.  The sugarbeet harvest that started Sept. 29th and should have taken about 10 days – is still going!  This is unheard of – it’s been over 7 weeks now and still counting.  Our own sugarbeets are mostly harvested but there are many acres still waiting in our area. The soybeans are still being worked on.  Enuf.  Enuf.  I’m so.o.o.o.o bored with farming, aren’t you?

When the Loose Threads met this month, we were working on continuing our project from last month.  We had each cut out fabric for 12 blocks, then sewed them as a group.  We’d all go home with different blocks than we started with, making for lots of variety.  The scrappy look is good, you know?  Did I mention that the blocks are 4 1/2”?  Just cuter than a bug’s ear.  Which, when I think about it: are bug’s ears cute?  Do bugs even have ears?  If you have the answer, I guess you can let me know.  But in the meantime, here’s what I’m saying about cute:

Carole showed us the baby quilt she’d made with an adorable fabric set in an attic window pattern.

Karen brought a couple things to show.  One, an old top that she & others hand-quilted and two, a quilt she started at our retreat last winter:

   In this group, we are very, very health conscious.  For instance, we arrived at 9:30.  At 10:00, we had coffee and shortbread.  At 12:00 Denise served us a delish chicken casserole a salad and some wonderful bread still warm from the oven. Then a tasty apple bar from Carole to top off our meal.  Denise also served us each a little fat 1/8th bundle as table favors. 

Back to our health – at about 3:00, we decided to stop for a coffee break – along with, yep, you guessed it – PIE!  Jean brought the pie which was a recipe that Ms. Penny served us last month at Woolies!!  (another health-conscious group)

I wish I had a picture, but really, it is so very delicious and actually it is about as low cal as a pie can get:

Miss Penny’s Turtle Pumpkin Pie

• 1/4 C plus 2 Tbsp. caramel ice cream topping, divided
• 1 graham cracker pie crust
• 1/2 C. plus 2 Tbsp. pecan pieces, divided
• 1 C. cold milk
• 2 pkg. (3/4 oz) vanilla instant pudding
• 1 C. canned pumpkin
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp nutmeg
• 1 tub (8 oz) Cool Whip

Pour 1/4 C. caramel topping into crust; sprinkle with 1/2 C. nuts.

Beat milk, pudding, pumpkin and spices with whisk 2 min.  Stir in 1 1/2 C. cool whip.  Pour into pan.

Refrigerate 1 hour.  Top with remaining wool whip, caramel & nuts just before serving.

 

As I said, we are a very health conscious group.  It’s all about the quilting – not about the food.  Ya, uh-huh.

I had a few days rest after the excitement of Threads before making a quick trip to Minneapolis with Karen, aka Mrs. Farmhouse, aka Farmhouse Woolens.  I know, this is confusing, but trust me, if you don’t know Karen, you want to. 

This is where we went first – our favorite woolen store filled with hand-dyed wools and hooked rugs:  L J Fibers at the Wooly Red Rug.

Yes, I know there’s a reflection of me in the window but I was in a hurry to get inside.  I mean, look who got to the door first…………..(Ms. Karen)

Well, not to worry, there’s wool a-plenty for all.  Well, maybe there’s enuf – Denise & Kari were also shopping with us.  Oh dear.  Oh, don’t worry about me – I did just fine.

Farmhouse Woolens was considering adding a “couple” greens to her inventory.  Yes, she made some excellent choices.  How could she not when she had such helpful and knowledgeable assistants?????

This is just one section of delicious things……

And this awesome hooked rug (hooked by LJ herself) is just one of many, many more.  Well, I’m telling you that rug hooking is calling my name.  Denise has already jumped in with both feet and I think she’ll have several more joining her real soon.

We headed over to gift market from there to “help” Karen buy some things for her store that will be opening in February.  Obviously, since we were such good help with the wool, she knew that we would continue to help her with “top notch” advice.  That is what you were thinking, isn’t it Karen?  Whatever.  She was stuck with us and she did very well in spite of it.

SO THEN, on Thursday, we had Woolies.  More good stuff.  Oh yeah, we ate well too.  Let’s see. Arrive at 11:00.  Eat appetizers and iced tea.  12:30, eat lunch of 2 different casseroles, to-die-for bread and other assorted good things.  Topping it off with 2 kinds of bars.  A really rich pecan bar and a pumpkin bar with cream cheese frosting.  Don’t worry tho – we had a little snackey-poo mid-afternoon.  Whew.  Anyway, it’s not about the food!!!!

The show ‘n tell will knock your socks off:

 A sample of a kit Karen will have in her store:

 a Ms. Jean stitchery:

Karen’s quilt:

2 punch needles from Penny’s hands:

A wool bouquet & quilt from Shod:

Wool pumpkin banner quilt– Joyce:

Denise gave us a great rug hooking demo but I must have lost my camera but we all learned a lot from this advanced beginner and we can’t wait to try it ourselves.

A couple things I just finished in my wood shop, a tray and a chalkboard:

 One more thing.  Our hostess, Ms. J, had the most awesome Christmas Cactus I have ever seen.  What do you think?

Holy Samoley, girls, do you think this got a little long?   If you’ve only got a minute, just look at the pictures.  They’re worth a thousand (of my) words!

To all the Americans, if I don’t get back to you before then, have a wonderful Thanksgiving Day on Thursday.  To all my other friends, I wish a great week and the time to reflect on everything in your life you are thankful for.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Faye’s Fables

It’s perfectly obvious to me that summer is over. Not that we ever really had summer this year. It seems as tho we struggled to get the old thermometer over 70 degrees. The lakes still had ice on them in July. Oh, I’m kidding. You can’t believe most of the stuff I write. Anyway, time to put away the shorts and sleeveless tops and the bikini. (ahem). See, now, that bikini is another of those items you might want to question the accuracy of.  I’m just sayin’.

A little side note here. A ½ hour ago I asked my hubs what he was making for supper (dinner to you people who think you’re so darn sophisticated) ‘cuz I was busy. He got a look on his face like he was actually thinking about it and said, do you want to go to town to eat? No, that’s all right I said. I’ll whip up a salad or something. So I headed back here to my best friend the computer and am typing away. The best thing about having a computer for a BFF is that you can ramble on forever with nary a complaint. (all my other BFF’s are depressed about the whole weather thing which I promised you I wouldn’t talk about anymore. So I’m looking for someone “normal” to talk to. Let me know if you think you fit in that category….) Well, after I said I’d make a salad, hubs came in the room and said “I thought you said you had work to do”!! Well, no, actually I said I was busy. Then the air turned blue and there was a whole bunch of stuff I couldn’t hear. OK, I’ll be back soon. How long can it take to whip up a salad? Never mind, I’m back. He’s washing lettuce! Who knew? God, this internet is great!

Now I can’t remember what I was talking about. Oh yeah, lack of summer and now it’s fall or maybe it’s even winter but I don’t know for sure.  Doesn’t matter. I don’t have any fall clothes. I’ll just pretend it’s winter, ok? With the change of seasons, it’s time to purge the old closet. There’s a key word in that sentence, but I’m getting there. As I’m pulling out clothes, I’m thinking vintage is good. Vintage sets a style. Vintage makes a statement. Sadly, vintage it’s not. This stuff is just plain OLD. Suppose I’d better check the shoes too. I’m busy rooting around on the floor and I feel a little nibble on my ankle – and no, my husband is making salad, remember? Sheesh. It’s little Baxter. “No, Baxter sweetie, mommy doesn’t want her little munchkin to chew on the shoes.” Wait. That’s the pair of hooker boots with the ghillie laces from --I was gonna say another century. Shoot, it WAS another century. Those boots haven’t fit me since I was sporting the Twiggy look. And if you don’t know who Twiggy was, you’re too young to be reading this. But, hey, that was another century too. OK, Baxter, have at ‘em. And BTW, speaking of shoes, have you looked at any lately? I wanted to buy some new shoes to fix the old “October Depression” which I’m sure is an actual disease written up by the USDA (United States Dept. of Agriculture. You didn’t know that?) In our nearby shopping Mecca, we do have a (as in ONE) shoe department. I searched high and low and I’ll be darned if I could come up with a cute pair. Is it just me or are they all ugly this year? A lot of them have the rounded toes and the strap across the instep. Seriously, those are vintage Mary Jane’s. I think they’re cute until I put them on and then I decide I liked them better on the display rack. And what does one wear for socks with those? I’m afraid I’d wear the wrong ones and make a fashion faux pas. (and I don’t want to hear any snide comments about farm women and fashion work boots. Don’t even go there.) And then there are the slutty shoes with 4” stiletto heels. If you wear shoes like that, I apologize for my remarks but if I wore them, I’d probably fall & break a hip! (some of you are laughing harder than others at that, but let’s just move along here. I don’t want to talk about it). And then there are all the athletic shoes and the earth shoe wannabees. But let me tell you girl, I saw the CUTEST pair of boots in a catalog the other day (which I’ve since misplaced. Or maybe the hubs had something to do with it’s disappearance?) How cute were they? $265.00 worth of cute!! Boy, I’d love to find those in my Christmas stocking. Or my stockings in those…..

Getting back to closet purging. I was really getting into it. Old, throw. Old, throw. Ugly, throw. Oops, too small, throw. You getting the picture? Stuff was flying and little Baxter was running around and jumping in the clothes pile like it was a pile of leaves. At this point, I know you can just feel where this story is going. And you’d be right. Just like good old Mother Hubbard, the cupboard/closet was bare. Nary a stitch of clothing left and on the floor it was only work boots and flip-flops. I thought cleaning would make me feel better. Sigh. You might remember me mentioning our 2^nd annual harvest from hell? Maybe I should watch the old budget and NOT buy a closet full of new clothes. Hubs might, maybe & accidentally  happen to notice that. What could I do? I had to start putting things back in. There, now my closet is full and when someone says to me (which they won’t) “you look so nice today”, I can honestly say, “what? This old thing?”

I made this dress back about 1966.  (Another century, right?)

I gotta get some new clothes!!

I’m just doing my happy dance here because I get to pass along information about a Quilt Designer Blog Hop called Cross Country Christmas This link will take you to the blog of my friend Kari at New Leaf Stitches and she will have the full scoop. 

The hop will run from Nov. 9th – 20th and you won’t want to miss a single day.  Seriously, this is one of my rare “truthful moments”…..

There will be a different designer featured each day with a free project or themed story or recipe from each.  Let me tease you with names:

1. GE Designs
2. Pieces from my Heart
3. Atkinson Designs
4. Pat Sloan & Co.
5. Anka’s Treasures
6. Pam Kitty Morning
7. New Leaf Stitches
8. Whimsicals
9. This ‘N’ That
10. Miss Rosie’s Quilt Co.
11. Rosebud’s Cottage
12. Linda Lum Debono

Even if you’re not a quilter, you just might want to tune into this awesome hop.  It’ll be a blast.