This mornings view from the picture window! There is still some snow on the ground most of it in the yard is what remains from plowing…aka snow mountains. The grass is turning green and there is that slight tinge of green leaves on the poplars. Spring seems to finally be here.
Erik and I walked the back paths to our pond yesterday, it is huge! Between the heavy rains this week and the snow melting and the ground still being frozen….
Our sump pump has been on constant duty for the last couple of weeks.
The robins have been busy rebuilding their nest under our deck…it’s always so much fun watching their process and can usually see the babies from the pool…. Summer is coming! Erik has taken advantage of our well being too high and has the pool almost filled!
We were also able to dine on the deck this week and Liam was more than happy to join us!
This fun quilt was picked up yesterday, I really enjoyed working on it during some of our greyer days!
This quilt was the second in a series of quilts made for my customer Karen’s grandchildren. The first was the Minecraft quilt that I have blogged about previously, this one is also double sided with the child’s name pieced in, how fun is that!
Using a panel for colour inspiration is a great way to start off in choosing fabrics for a quilt and as you can see blocks were chosen to grow the quilt keeping the panel as a focus.
Piecing the backing can create a challenge for a Longarm quilter, it just takes a little more time and planning in loading the quilt in order to centre the backing to the quilt top.
The pantograph Bubbles was chosen by Sam’s Grandma Karen the maker of these super fun quilts.
My morning view from the picture window is looking more promising that spring is on its way!
This has been an extremely long winter, with more snow this spring than anyone can recall. We have had warmer weather which has meant full time work for the sump pump and careful monitoring of basements!
This weekend we took Liam to check out a close by river which is usually very low and easy to walk over as it leads to a swimming hole.
We had meant to get ice cream cones but we weren’t able to get what we wanted so Liam and Erik ended up with Shakes. These two guys share a true love of ice cream!
My Dad and Katie held a Mother’s Day brunch yesterday. Katie is not only creative with paint but also with food. Her crepes were such a treat mixing both sweet and savoury including one of my Dads specialties of smoked tenderloin!
Liam was so excited to have extra special gifts for his Mom.
We also had a good visit with Eriks Mom, she was thrilled that her gift from us was that Erik replaced her clothesline that had been struck down by a tree during one of our spring storms. Hanging laundry on the line is something she and I both love to do. She also had visits with all of her children.
Another Mother’s Day without my Mom. She really did love family and get togethers, her granddaughters and great grands were near and dear to her heart. Family is not always easy and as the years pass it teaches me as a Mother many things.
This was recently shared with me and in this season speaks loudly.
And a woman who held a babe against her bosom said, Speak to us of Children. And he said: Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself. They come through you but not from you, And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.
You may give them your love but not your thoughts, For they have their own thoughts. You may house their bodies but not their souls, For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams. You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you. For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday. You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth. The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite, and He bends you with His might that His arrows may go swift and far. Let your bending in the archer’s hand be for gladness; For even as He loves the arrow that flies, so He loves also the bow that is stable.
In previous posts I have shared some of the creativity in my family. Today I am sharing another family member who inspires me in so many ways!
My youngest daughter has always been creative as a child she would often ask for crafting supplies as treats and her bedroom at times reminded me of the book Jillian Jiggs and for the most part that was fine with me. I understood…I also didn’t ever want to diminish her joy of creativity!
Of course she has grown up and went to school and married and has a career that she really enjoys….still the art needs to be released from creative people!
She has sold many of her pieces and her art is displayed in local businesses.
Spring May finally be arriving! We still have a ways to go before the snow disappears, the ground is still covered the yard with more than a foot in unplowed areas and the bush is still heavy with the stuff.
The good news is the weather forecast is for sunshine and warmer temperatures and no overnight freezing temperatures.
Onto Quilting.
I have quilted many quilts for Cathy and always enjoy our visits. When I first met her she was still working as a community nurse and had been my Moms Nurse after she had cancer surgery. My Mom really liked her and it wasn’t long before they discovered their link of quilting. This led to Cathy meeting me.
Cathy’s latest quilt really helped to brighten some very grey days around here.
I have always loved scrap quilts, they are so much fun to make and to look at!
I chose the pantograph Helix which really adds motion to the kaleidoscope.
A little research about robins led to some understanding about the one that kept banging into our windows. Apparently the male arrives first and stakes out it’s turf and seeing his reflection and thinking it’s another male he needs to attack! I noticed a second robin yesterday and the two were flying around the yard. The female apparently arrives a week or two after the male.
Hopefully they will build a nest in their usual place again as we really do enjoy watching the process and it’s really fun for the grandchildren to witness.
The first half of Saturday was so nice and Liam and I enjoyed a 4 km walk, it was such a nice chatty visit. He is getting so big and is so smart. We had a good discussion about critical thinking and propaganda and how important doing your own research is…
We had a lot of rain over the weekend and milder temperatures so the snow is melting…as much as I want to see it go we really need a slow melt! Our sump pump is running non stop and there is still tons of snow in the yard. Crazy for the beginning of May!
I think everyone around here is holding their breath as we have had two days of sunshine and today it’s raining and so far no snow. The temperatures are still hovering around 0C
The snow is finally beginning to recede and we can now see the top of the well and a little more ground.
Every spring I look forward to the robins returning…so far there is one and early this morning he began banging on our windows!
I sure hope his friend arrives soon or is around already.
On the quilting front I have been busy and will soon have quilts to show…I like to wait for the maker to see them first. Here is a peek though…
Cathy’s kaleidoscope quilt. I always love her quilts and this scrappy one makes my heart sing!
Travel is looking much more possible in our near future and this week Liam was thrilled to find a Wisconsin Dells catalogue in our mailbox…that required some serious study!
We took Liam to the Dells in 2019 with a plan to return the next summer and the next which of course couldn’t happen. Hopefully this summer!
Well…yes it’s still snowing there is even more forecasted for Wednesday yet again! The trees are heavy with snow and an attempt to walk to the back of our property failed due to it being waist deep!
The good news is that it’s not too cold, the snow is wet and heavy to shovel but it did feel good to be outside this morning and the sun was trying hard to break through the clouds. hopefully the sun will shine tomorrow.
11:30 am April 18 2022
On Friday I spent some time pressing and started cutting the fabric for Stellar, the third quilt from Season 4 of the Color Collective. It is comprised of 2 paper pieced blocks that mirror each other.
Marilyn’s third half square triangle quilt left this morning. Theses quilts are full queen size and such fun to look at. Her stitching is so precise and her quilts are always square.
Folded in half
I am presently quilting a super fun 2 sided quilt that is nice and bright! I always press the tops and backs before loading, it’s worth the extra time in my opinion. This quilt like the Minecraft Quilt has a very pieced and fun backing.
Well another snowy day, we woke to another 5”s of very wet snow. While the trees did look pretty, we had a near miss of a snow laden tree leaning on our power line…thankfully with a little help from Erik with less snow it bounced up a bit.
And a little later in the morning…
I am normally a pretty patient person, but the snow is stretching me though there is not a thing I can do about it….we are also waiting for our newest grandchild to arrive any day…I am not feeling patient about that either.
There is also more snow predicted for next week!
I have finished quilting the half square triangle quilt I wrote about in my last blog and have the next ready to quilt. It always amazes me how even in 18 years of quilting for others there are rarely duplicates!
This quilt is spectacularly brilliant! Just what’s needed to work on a gray snowy day!
I am itching to start project three of the Color Collective! It’s called Stellar, designed by Tara Faughnan.
Do you ever find it hard to break up a bundle and start cutting it up, I do but I know that it will will be fun and once I start it will be hard to stop… that might be part of my hesitation.
These quilts have been so much fun to work on! Baby quilts are great projects, they aren’t so big that they take what sometimes feels like forever to make.
Wendy’s Quilting and Life 