A Finish

Carol here ~

Ta-Da! I finished piecing my Dogwood Lane quilt. As I mentioned previously, this is a Michelle Hiatt, Sew On The Go pattern.

I made a couple of tweaks ~ as you can see in the pattern, the chain is suppose to be two colors, one color on one diagonal, the second color on the opposite diagonal.

Dan's Ramblings

Dan here ~

How do Wednesday, I know that because yesterday was Tuesday and all is well.

We had a 4-5 inch snow storm Monday during the day and into the evening. It had been plowed when I got out of bed yesterday morning. The people who plow the driveway often do so between 1:00 and 3:00 in the AM. That’s in the morning. I am not awake nor does them performing their duties wake me. I often have just gone to bed. I sew at night. I do not get up early.

Carol saw a beautiful sunrise on Tuesday morning. I do not see many sunrises, it looked real pretty in the pictures. Real life was probably much nicer but I will live with the pictures.

Oink Oink

Carol here ~

This pig cookie jar on top of my refrigerator belonged to my Mom.

It always sat on top of the refrigerator at our home in Auburn. It pretty much always had cookies in it ~ mostly homemade but when not, then filled with good old Oreo's. When my parents tore down the original camp and built their log cabin here at the pond it sat up on the top cupboards.

New Project

Dan here ~

Friday, the beginning of the weekend, I hope you all have a happy and safe one.

The wet winter storm the other day brought out several wet spots on the pond that looked like they were centered around the same type of holes that I talked about in an earlier post. 

Guess they must have froze up ok as there were two young men out there ice fishing. I actually watched as they walked up to where the holes were just days before and proceeded to jump up and down trying to break through. I don’t think I’m interested in attempting that, maybe when their age… I’ll never tell and there were no cell phones so there is no record of it.

Lena's Anniversary

Carol here ~

This popped up on my Facebook memories yesterday.

It’s been three years since I traded in my Gammill Longarm for my Innova, aka Lena. Wow, it seems way longer than three years ~ way longer! I guess we have had so much going on these last few years that it is kind of hard to judge time frames.

Dan's Ramblings

Dan here ~

Good morning, Today is Monday, a day that used to signal the beginning of the new work week. That ship has sailed, or as I would say, that toilet has flushed.

Now that I am retired everyday is Monday, or Thursday, or Sunday. They are all the same, except for Tuesday ~ that is the day that the backup generator runs for 15 minutes and does whatever magic it does while it runs. We have grown to center our lives around Tuesdays.

Last week was special. I was in the bathroom when generator start up was to occur. Now to be honest, I was not really aware that it was startup time. Until it didn’t. That’s right, I heard a split second sound of the generator firing up… then it stopped. A couple seconds later I heard it again try to start, almost no crank, just a brief try and quit. I called to Carol “that’s two” ~ I heard 4-5 total tries to start then nothing.

Out and About

Carol here ~

Yesterday morning I had an appointment in Falmouth. I left the house with plenty of time to spare so I could mosey my way there on the back roads instead of driving on the turnpike. I much prefer back road driving to turnpikes ~ so much more to look at, especially since I rarely leave the house!

After my appointment I gave my Optometry office a call as I was going to go right by it on the way home. My glasses have been cockeyed and driving me crazy ~ if I got them straight on my face then one of the ear pieces was digging into my ear and hurting my nose. I’m sure those of you that wear glasses can relate.

The Pond

Dan here ~

With this lovely clear albeit cold weather, I have wandered around on the pond on snowshoes the last couple of days. No, not all day just an hour or so both days. Made loops and circles and followed them around aimlessly lapping and overlapping as I went. Sounds dumber than it was, at least to me.

Yesterday I went with Carol, we walked about three quarters of the way up the pond. I was following Carol and noticed that a lot of her steps brought up the slush laying under the snow. This occurred in some places and not others.

Puttering

Carol here ~

When I opened the front shades yesterday morning I caught a glimpse of something moving on the banking below the ridge. Upon closer inspection I could see that it was a fox. 

It came down the banking and ran across our end of the pond and up the banking on the other side. It was beautiful and healthy looking running across the pond with it's bushy red tail straight out behind him. Wish I could of snapped a photo but by the time I could of found my phone it would have been long gone.

I was suppose to go to Falmouth for an appointment yesterday afternoon but it got rescheduled for tomorrow so I spent the time up in the quilting loft.

I am still puttering on my Dogwood Lane quilt. I don’t seem to get things done as fast as I used to ~ maybe because I’m easily distracted by something else.

Dan's Ramblings

Dan here ~

Still has been beautiful walking of late. Carol talked yesterday about our snowshoe walk on Saturday with our oldest daughter and the grands. On that walk, I noticed a ridge of snow where a mouse had been tunneling just under surface pushing the snow up to form the ridge.

Saw where it popped up out of the snow and then it’s footprints on the snow where it continued along, now on the surface. I looked around everywhere but I could see no mouse.

Saturday Snowshoeing

Carol here ~

We had planned to meet up with daughters Vanessa and Erin and grands Kailey and Jakob on Saturday for some snowshoeing. We were going to meet in Farmington ~ Erin would be coming down from Rangeley, Vanessa and kids from Readfield and us from Oxford ~ all about equal distance to Farmington.

Erin ended up not being able to participate because of a sinus infection so Plan B was implemented.

We met Vanessa and the kids in West Auburn at the Lake Auburn Community Center and snowshoed the Merrick Trail which goes down to Lake Auburn.

TBT ~ Log Cabin Leftovers

Dan here ~

Log Cabin Leftovers was designed in 2007 as a weekend quilt.

Log Cabin Leftovers ~ 2007

For years at Threads Galore Quilt shop we had what we called Fall Quilt Camps. These were weekend long quilt retreats. They grew longer than weekends, but that is another story.

Snow Day

 Carol here ~

Yesterday was definitely a snow day. We had snow and sleet most of the day. I saw Dick, our neighbor up the pond, out trying to keep his ice skating area clear of snow. He was out there a couple of times, will probably be back out this morning.

Our plow guy came first thing yesterday morning for his first pass through. Dan cleared snow off the porch roof then got the snow blower out to clean it up. 

The Water Pipe

Dan here ~

I’m sure some of you have seen pictures of the pipe going out into the pond and wonder what it’s for. 

No it is not our waste pipe dumping into the pond! We pull our water out of the pond year round and yes the pond is currently frozen.

Weekend Stitching

Carol here ~

I spent the weekend at a Virtual Stay-treat via Zoom hosted by Michelle Renee Hiatt and Lynn Wheatley. It was so much fun!

This is the second Stay-treat I have attended with Michelle and Lynn. I was able to stitch all weekend from my little corner up in the quilting loft with 17 other quilters from across the country on the computer screen.

We had quilters attending from ~

Nebraska
Minnesota
California
Vermont
Massachusetts
Connecticut
Texas
Tennessee
Illinois
Maine
New Hampshire
Maryland