Big Snow, Birthdays, and Christmas Tree Skirt Blocks

Remember the man who came to look at the six-wheeler one snowy day when Larry was working at the school, and his cell phone had gone dead, and he was late meeting the man here?  Well, the man did buy it – or rather, he traded for it.  He traded a very nice motorcycle, and some money besides.

Tuesday, the blizzard descended on us as promised.  Late that morning, I went out to make sure the bird feeder was full.  It was only half empty, but I didn’t want the birds to run out of food in the middle of the blizzard.  The snow was already over my boot tops, more than ten inches deep.  It was windy, too.

Animals and birds can fend for themselves, I realize.  Until they begin depending on humans, that is.  Then, if there is bad weather combined with loss of food supply, they might go hungry.  They can usually survive, though.  Usually.

A few years back when we had a really bad blizzard in the spring, thousands and thousands of geese that had been migrating north died out on Lakes North and Babcock, just north of town.  Most of them were killed because 55 mph winds blew them into things they couldn’t see.  With the snow coming down hard, and with night approaching, the visibility was near zero.  Numerous songbirds died, too, because they couldn’t find food on account of everything getting thoroughly iced over when the blizzard hit, and staying iced over for days.

I spent most of the afternoon and evening working on taxes.  Fun, fun, fun!  I seemed to be missing a bunch of receipts from the Goodwill.  I itemize, and because we tithe at church and because I clear out stuff and haul it to the Goodwill periodically, I have a pretty good list of deductions.

School was canceled for the day.  I wrote to Amy, “Wheeeeee!!!  Wanna have a snowball fight?”

She wrote to tell me that their driveway had a tall drift over it, in some places three feet deep, and in some places five feet deep.  Teddy had managed to get out early that morning.

Larry got out, too.  They were working together on Teddy’s van.

On Christmas Day 2009 we were snowed in.  Larry went out and scooped and scooped and scooped.  You’d think he was frantic to get away from me!  heh  Meanwhile, I made the yummiest chili ever made in the history of the world.  It was simmering fragrantly on the stove when Larry finally got out of the drive in late afternoon and drove to town.

Bobby and Hannah had saved food from the church Christmas dinner for us.  Larry decided he might as well eat his share while he was there, visiting with them. 

He came home completely full right up to the gills just about the time the chili was done.  I wanted to put the pot upside down over his head.  (I would’ve had to empty it out first, though; it was much too good to waste.)

Amy got a new embroidery machine on Craigslist last Monday.  The lady from whom she purchased it had lost the original box, but everything is brand new, and the plastic covering most of it had never been opened.  The lady gave Amy a machine for Emma, too.  It’s nearly new, still in the box.  She also gave Amy a lot of fabric, and told her, “If you are in town again, bring something you are making to show me, I’ll give you more fabric.”

Her basement and garage are full of fabric.

I tried paying some bills online and discovered that the deposit Larry had made was not showing up—and learned that the banks were all shut down on account of the blizzard.

Sooo... I wrote to Hester, who works at First National Bank, “Did you get to stay home and play today?  Wanna snowball fight?”  (since Amy hadn’t taken me up on the offer)

She wrote back with the expected, “Lololol!!!  The bank and Andrew’s office closed today.  J  I haven’t left the house...  it’s been great!!!  Lolol”

But you will note, neither did she take me up on my offer of a snowball fight.

By the middle of the afternoon, the wind was howling at a steady 27 mph, with gusts up to 45 mph.  It was 29° with a wind chill of 15°, and still snowing.  The bird feeders were full of birds.  I saw a goldfinch struggling to keep his perch on the railing.  A junco did his characteristic leap forward, then scraping backwards with both feet to uncover some seeds – but the wind blew him clear off course, and he stared down at the unruffled snow in front of him after landing, tilting his head and looking quite surprised, as if thinking, Well, mah woid.  I was shore I scraped a layer of snow off’n ze heap.  

When I called Loren, he didn’t answer his home phone... and when he answered his cell, I could tell he was right out in the blizzard!  He’d gone to Janice’s sister and brother-in-law’s house to rewash his clothes, because something went wrong with his washing machine, and the door wouldn’t come unlocked until he’d tried numerous variations of the buttons, and it hadn’t drained or rinsed.  He talked to me as he drove home, saying that he could only see a few yards in front of his vehicle.  We need to put him in a cage when the weather is bad!

I might’ve gotten those taxes done a little sooner, if Victoria hadn’t felt like chatting.  But I’m not about to discourage chatting, when the time is winding down with one of the offspring, and I can clearly see that one of these days she will be in a home of her own.

The online quilting groups, too, were chatting away that day.  I belong to a couple where chatting is fine and dandy, and to one where moderators are prone to rapping knuckles with rulers if anyone chats too much about anything other than quilting, and even certain aspects of that can get one into trouble.  Certain moderators are liable to get bent all out of shape like pretzels and funnel cakes if we mention the fact that we filled the bird feeder on our way to the quilt studio.  There is at least one moderator who, once given an inch, became a ruler.    Some love to moderate overmuch, sort of like our sixth-grade librarian, who will doubtless be reincarnated as a drill sergeant in the German army. 

Not that I have anything against drill sergeants.  And not that I believe in reincarnation.

I once got reprimanded for mentioning prayer – but then ladies came out of the woodwork both to offer and to request prayer, and the moderator hushed up, evidently feeling outnumbered.  It’s a fine day, when we have to tolerate blatant sins of all sorts, but it’s open season on those who really love the Lord!  One of my favorite verses is, “For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it the power of God unto salvation...” 

Another moderator on another group once had a snippy fit because I made a joke about bedbugs.  Good grief.  She acted like I was a heathen of the worst degree because I bought pillows to cover from the Goodwill.  (rolling eyes)

Some think it’s a world-class crime to not trim your messages (that is, remove all or most of the message to which one is replying).  When I first joined that group, I trimmed my messages down to one small sentence of the original email (I don’t like it when there is nothing of the original email, and the replier doesn’t say enough to let you know what on earth she is going on about) – and I still got a message from a moderator up at the top of the emails, “Please trim your messages.  Our little brains will go up in smoke if you don’t!” (or something like that)  I finally wrote and asked, “What more do you want me to trim?  My bangs?” – and she stopped doing that.  heh

I think an untrimmed message is less obnoxious than a bossy moderator.  So there.

I like people.  I just wish they’d all act like me!

No, strike that.  I do like people, all sorts of people, in all their various characters and characteristics. 

Yep, I have a dogmatic opinion about, oh, just everything.

I belong to one little quilting list that seems to be nearly extinct.  Rarely does anyone write anymore.  I really liked some of the ladies on that list, but I never hear from them anymore.  Probably, for a lot of them, life’s demands and traumas just got in the way.  I know several had more than they could very well cope with.

Finally I got to feeling like a braggart for posting:  “Hey, look at my Christmas tree skirt!”  “Hey, everybody, look at my Amazing Grace quilt!”  “Hey, lookie here what I made my brother!”  “Look at me!  Look at me!” – and I just stopped, other than to answer the rare email from any other lady that might come through.  Thus, there have been less than half a dozen emails since the New Year.  Too bad, really.

I very much enjoy seeing the things others make.  Other people’s talented and inspired craftwork gives me many of my own ideas, and, as I’ve said before, I’m a fairly good copycat, but sometimes not so great at coming up with an invention on my own.  I am constantly amazed at some of the beautiful things others make.

When I was a wee little girl, four years old and on my way to the children’s Sunday School for the very first time, I recall what my mother admonished me:  “Whatever you do, don’t ever act like you can color better than any of the other children; you’ll make somebody feel bad!”  I remember feeling quite indignant.  I, after all, was a great big four-year-old who knew better than to act like that, and hurt someone’s feelings! 

Or maybe not.  My mother knew me well; and I reckon we all – especially at age four – have a pretty good opinion of ourselves.  And as you see, I never forgot what she said.  My mother really did make a difference in how I treated others, in how I felt compassion and sympathy for not only people, but also animals.  My father was a more dominate influence, partly because he had such a boisterous personality.  So I didn’t appreciate the quiet influence of my mother until I was quite a lot older, maybe because I’m more like my father in many ways.  But I’ve tried hard to instill the same values from both my parents into my children.

Now, if I could just be the lady my mother was, cheerful in the face of any obstacle, quiet and humble, always thinking of someone else’s welfare more than my own, I will indeed have “works to prove my faith”, as the apostle James wrote.  I’m not quite like her.  I don’t suffer in silence very well at all.  On the contrary, I suffer loudly!!! if I suffer at all.

Shortly after midnight, I finished the taxes and e-filed them.  I don’t like the job, but at least we’re getting a refund instead of the other way around.

By then, the snow had stopped.  We’d gotten a total of about 15” of snow. 

Kurt worked with his grandfather’s company, Koch Excavating, through a good part of the night moving snow, driving one of their dump trucks.  The city owns humongous snow blowers that go along picking up snow and blowing enormous quantities into big dump trucks.  It takes an amazingly short time for it to fill those boxes heaping full.

I headed out to fill the bird feeders Wednesday morning – and discovered Larry had shoveled a path for me, all the way across the large deck to the feeders!  The snow would have been tumbling into my boots, had he not done that.

I filled up my coffee mug with some steaming Hazelnut Cream coffee, and headed downstairs to make a nightgown for Emma’s dolly.  Those fuzzy little bunny slippers I got for it just had to go to her now, rather than waiting for Christmas next year – and slippers need a nightgown to go with them, don’t they? 

Larry came home in the early afternoon hours and used the snow blower on the front walk and driveway.  The snowblower kept bogging down, trying to make it through a three-foot drift.  More pictures of the snow:  15” of Snow

After we came home from church that evening, I went back to work on the little nightgown.  I don’t suppose Industrial-Strength, 2”-wide Velcro would look good on the back?  That was the only Velcro I seemed to have.  I decided to use it.  First, I cut the Velcro into a skinny strip, a little less than ¼” wide, since it was Industrial Strength.  Didn’t want a sleeve or something to come right off in the child’s hand when she was tugging and pulling, trying to get that tough Velcro loose!  It’s the steam-on kind – and it did indeed steam right on, with a very tight bond.  Why have I never used this wonderful stuff before, on all those multitudes of doll clothes I’ve made??!

{Answer:  because I really am quite fond of tiny buttons and buttonholes, though they do take more work.}

It can get cold down there in the basement.  But I had on moccasins that kept my feet all toasty and warm.  Suede, with soft furry stuff inside them.  Sooo warm and soft.  Victoria gave them to me for Christmas a couple of years ago.

At 3:00 a.m., the dolly nightgown was done.

A little after 4:00 p.m. Thursday afternoon, Hannah called to tell me that the doctor had released Joanna from the hospital, and they were on their way home.  Surgery (removing tonsils and adenoids) took twice as long as predicted (an hour, all told), because there was more bleeding than expected.

I made the next block for my Christmas tree skirt that day – a 3D poinsettia with beads here and there on it.  That was the 6th block for the Christmas tree skirt.

I took pictures and posted them on my blog.  But... the more I looked at the pictures, the more dissatisfied I became with that block.  So I got back out of my comfy recliner with the lovely heating pad behind my back, and trotted me back down to the sewing room, where I added a little bit of ruching and a few more beads. 

For the next block, I thought I’d try making Baby Jesus in the manger.  “I’m not making any promises, though,” I told Victoria; “I’m notoriously bad at faces.” 

Victoria suggested, “Well, you could make it an Amish doll; then you wouldn’t have to put on a face.” 

I’m pretty sure that was sacrilegious, but I still laughed.

That evening, Victoria put together the ingredients for a crockpot supper that she planned to start in the morning.  She put everything but the meat into the stoneware pot.  She marinated the meat overnight in a separate dish.  Everything then went into the refrigerator.  It smelled so good when she was putting it together, it gave me a case of lockjaw. 

By now, the Mosaic Lighthouse quilt might very well be on its way from Paducah to Daytona Beach.  I sure hope I fixed the slight lumpiness of that quilt before I shipped it.  I blocked it the best I could, laying it on my marble table and steaming the living daylights out of it, then letting it lie there until it cooled before moving it and steaming another section.

’Course, then I folded it all up and put it in a box; so who knows if all that effort did any good at all.  I had once considered putting little silk ribbon roses on all those areas where there are flowers in the ‘picture’.  Maybe I should do that, before I enter it in our county and state fairs.  I mentioned that to someone on another quilting group, and she wrote back, “Well, you know, you do have to stop and move on to other things some time!!!”

I thought, Well, you know, I don’t either, any such thing.  I can fiddle around with this one as long as I jolly well please, so there. 

I hope to enter this Christmas tree skirt in the fair, too... and I have a table topper I made a couple of years ago that I’ll enter.  I was really proud of that thing when I completed it; but now I look at it and think, I could do better, nowadays! 

“Well, shouldn’t we look back and see how far we have come instead of getting worse at what we love?” wrote a friend, when I mentioned this.

Yep, guess so.  Though I do sometimes get worse, it seems.  I try to replicate what I once did successfully – and make a colossal catastrophe of it. 

Have you ever started on a large embroidery project, worked your way around it, and by the time you got back to where you started, you discovered you’d improved enough to make the first stitches look inferior by comparison?  You could take out the first few stitches and redo them... but that might be a never-ending process.

Larry finally got home, some time after midnight.  He’d gotten one side of the van totally done and ready to be painted.  He smelt of welding smoke.  Poor husband, he walks in the door, bone tired, cold, and hungry, and his wife greets him with, “PPppppeeeeeeeeeeeeeeewwww!!!”

The van has been more work than it should have been:  when Teddy ordered the section he needed to replace the damaged part of the vehicle, the people at the salvage yard, after selling a certain portion, proceeded to cut it smaller than they should have – in order to send it in a smaller crate and pay less shipping, evidently.  So he had to get a few more parts, and Larry has worked long and hard to splice it all together.  Finding parts for this fairly nearly new vehicle is somewhat difficult.  This world would be easier to live in, if people were just honest!

Furthermore, the people with the least to lose often have the hardest time hanging onto it.  When you’re carefully going along only just barely making ends meet, all that has to happen is for one of those ends to fray a bit, and you’ll be in a heap o’ trouble! 

It makes me want to box people’s ears when they say carelessly (and probably a bit disdainfully), “Well, why don’t you just hire it done?”, referring to car repair, house finishing, or anything else that might come up.  I wonder if they’d take offense if I replied, “Don’t be stupid on purpose! – you’re dumb enough, by accident.”

Oh, well.  People who work hard are almost always happier, that’s the truth of the matter. 

Friday morning, it snowed again.  The mail lady came shuffling to my door with a box, grumbling and griping, “I hate snow!”

Why on earth would anyone take on a job as a mail-delivery person, if they hate the weather?!  She acts grumpy and snarly when it’s raining, too. 

Come to think of it, she’s not much more pleasant when it’s sunny. 

In the box were two kinds of Cameron’s coffee, Fancy Feast cat food, and Tide laundry detergent.  The Fancy Feast looks particularly delectable.  Would you prefer Chicken with Ham Bits, or Salmon with Greens?

I did a bit of cleaning, and then headed downstairs to the sewing room to work on the next block for the Christmas tree skirt.

I called Loren at 2:00 p.m. as usual; no answer.  Then Lura Kay called me at 10 after 3 after trying to get him; she was making a turkey dinner, and had enough for him, too.  So I wrote to Larry:  “Have you heard from Loren?”

He hadn’t, and he was working on the school, so he went out to check on him. 

I wasn’t particularly worried, since Loren is sometimes doing something noisy and doesn’t hear the phone, or has left his cell phone in the house when he goes outside.  Sure enough, Larry found him outside splitting wood.  Earlier, he’d been vacuuming, and then had been in his garage cleaning his pickup.  He hasn’t been able to get his fireplace going in the last few days.  He thought the problem was green wood... or maybe the cap on the chimney.  So Larry climbed up a ladder to the roof and took the cap off.

It didn’t help; Loren still can’t get a fire started yet today.  Last night he talked with one of the Tucker boys who works with his father for Tucker Masonry; one of them will be able to help him and find out what’s wrong.  They know chimneys inside and out.

Victoria drove the Jeep a couple of days last week.  She loves her car, but driving it after a big blizzard, she says, is a little like walking across a snowy, icy street in high heels.  hee hee

By late afternoon, the beef and vegetables Victoria had put in the slow cooker that morning smelled scrumptious.  It had chunks of beef, potatoes, carrots, onions, and celery in it.  The beef was melt-in-your-mouth tender.  That evening, she and Kurt, along with Kurt’s brother Jared, took a big bowlful of it to Lawrence and Norma’s house, and then ate supper with them.  A friend had earlier taken them an apple pie, so that was dessert.

Victoria left more than enough stew in the crockpot for Larry and me.  It was scrumptious. 

That night, I finished the 7th block for the Christmas tree skirt – Baby Jesus in the manger.  Or at least I thought I finished it.  But, once again, the more I looked at the picture, the more I thought it wasn’t finished.  It need some ‘hay’ around the manger.  I found some sort of coarse light tan yarn amongst one of the boxes of Janice’s things that Loren had given me, so the next day I added tufts of hay. 

Ah, much better.

I have sometimes kept adding to something until I passed the point of ‘just right’ and arrived unexpectedly at ‘too much’...  This time, I managed to stop at ‘just right’.  I think.

Most of the blocks are satin and taffeta.  The background of all of them is satin.  On this block, the appliqué pieces are cotton.  The ‘swaddling clothes’ are made of muslin.  (A lady on a blog I read never fails to write ‘Muslim’.)  The ‘fluff’ on the lamb’s head is terrycloth.

I used to conduct a Jr. Choir, with children ages 7-12.  Once each year, the children would choose an elderly person to whom they would be a Secret Pal.  Each week for two or three months, we’d think up something new to do for them, and the child would write a little letter to the person.  I had to keep warning them, “Don’t give too many details, or they’ll guess who you are!”  Their final letter, at the end of the few months, would reveal their identity.

One week, I printed the Proverb “A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in pictures of silver” on parchment paper in an old-fashioned Calligraphy font.  Then I brought rolls of tin foil, 8x10 squares of posterboard, and various pieces of shiny gold paper to our meeting, and the children covered the posterboard with tin foil, then cut out apples and glued them to the foil.  I had colorful silk leaves... shiny white paper to make little rectangles to make the apples look shiny... little 3D bug stickers, and tufts of ‘grass’ for them to choose from, so each child could make his picture unique. 

Not long ago, I was visiting one of our elderly friends – and there was that foil picture, framed and hanging on her wall!  Her Secret Pal from years before had given it to her, and she had saved it.

Another time, having come upon a long ditch full of lilies far out in the country, I cut a couple for each child to give his or her pal.  I cut the stems short, and we put them in baby food jars that the children decorated with ribbons, and then we attached the verses, “Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin:  And yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.”

The children could also do things on their own, if they wished.  I recall that during the winter months, a few of the older children sneaked over to their pals’ homes and scooped the walks.  Whole families sometimes got in on the fun, with mothers baking bread or rolls... fathers ferrying their children to their pals’ homes after dark, in order to hang a surprise on a door handle or set a little potted plant on a porch. 

In late October one year, we put a small pumpkin, a couple of ears of Indian corn, and a few colorful gourds on people’s porches, and tucked an envelope under them with the verse, “The harvest truly is plenteous, but the labourers are few; Pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he will send forth labourers into his harvest.”

What made this especially enjoyable for the children is that their pals began doing things for them in return.  Many of the Secret Pals remained extra-special friends with their elderly ‘pals’, years afterward. 

Saturday, I made the last block for the Christmas tree skirt – a silhouette of the Wise Men on their camels.  I used the fusible appliqué method.  Since I had no sheets of Heat and Bond and had no desire to go to town that afternoon, I dug out an old roll of Stitch Witchery – more of Janice’s things – and laid strips on the fabric I needed to cut until it was totally covered.  I ironed muslin to it to give it more body, ironed freezer paper, on which I’d traced the scene, onto the fabric, cut it out and glued it to the background, and then used a satin stitch to finish the edges.

Now to put the blocks together and finish the skirt. 

We had high winds again the last two days.  Sunday, there was a steady 20 mph wind with gusts up to 40.  It was really whistling up a gale, around the eaves.  Why does it seem to alway happen on church days?  I don’t exactly like walking into church with hair that looks like a turkey roosted in it!

By the time we got out of the evening service, it was windier than ever, blowing steadily at 25 mph, with gusts at 45 mph.  Larry and I went to Wal-Mart to get gifts for Grant, who turns 3 today, and to get a clear, lidded tote for Emma to carry her doll clothes in – she’s 10 today.  Grant was born on his sister’s 7th birthday. 

When I tried to get out of the Jeep in the parking lot, I couldn’t push the door open against the wind.  I tried a couple of times, and then it banged shut again – and Larry had to come around and open it for me so I could get out.  When we started walking across the lot, I was nearly blown off my feet, so I grabbed Larry’s arm and hung on for dear life, all the way to the door.

The nice lady who greets us at the door was laughing when we walked in; we must’ve looked pretty funny. 

This afternoon, it was even windier than yesterday.  The wind was gusting at close to 50 mph.  “If it gets much stronger,” I remarked to a friend, “I’ll have to carry a cast iron skillet with me if I step outside!”

It died down slightly as the afternoon wore on, so I took Emma and Grant their birthday gifts.  We gave Grant a big, soft, stuffed gray schnauzer with fluffy white whiskers and paws, along with a set of miniature Thomas the Tank train cars.  For Emma, the ‘My Life’ doll, along with the fancy dress and accessories I made, the nightgown with fuzzy bunny slippers, and a couple pairs of shoes (saddle oxfords, and the silver glittery flats) and a pair of boots—and the bin to keep everything  in.

Baby Warren waved at me and said “Bye-bye” when I left.  He’s adorable.  I’m not prejudiced; just factual.  “The facts, ma’am; nothing but the facts.”

When I was little, I wanted saddle oxfords soooo badly... didn’t get any, for a while.  My first oxfords were actually all black, with the middle sections black velvet.  There were little heart-shaped red leather inserts in the velvet.  They were cute, and I’m sure my mother thought they would fulfill my ‘oxford desire’, but... I wanted black and WHITE!

One day when I was wearing those black oxfords, not too long after I got them, I came dashing around the back of the church, which was right next to our house – and wound up stepping smack-dab into a newly-poured slab of concrete that they were preparing to put new air conditioner condensers on.  Ankle deep.  Why did they need eight inches of concrete, just to rest a condenser on??! 

My mother washed my shoes as best she could, but they were never quite the same.

Some of the ladies on a quilting group have been discussing how best to rip out stitches done on a longarm quilting machine.  There are some youtube videos showing different ways to do it.

I like how cheery those youtube ladies tell you how to do it, regardless of the particular method.  They chirp, “This is so quick and easy! “  (with big happy grins)

Just think how many more views they’d get if every now and then they’d throw themselves on the floor, alternately screaming or holding their breath, pounding their fists on the floor, tugging at their hair, and what-not.  <giggle>

Siggggghhhhhh...  Seam rippers!  May you all use them seldom!

,,,>^..^<,,,     Sarah Lynn     ,,,>^..^<,,,