still snowing....................

It's snowing, what a surprise. While we stayed inside snug as bugs it was a blizzard like we have not seen in a very long time. Power out in the county and goodness the roads. Car pile ups all over the place. Hwy 2 in the UP was closed down and it took forever and lots of ploughs to clear it. That's the stretch that goes along the sand dunes on Lake Michigan.
Meanwhile we got about another foot. Lucky for us we had a couple of days of rain that washed it away, except that the snow froze under the rain. Staying inside was the best deal. I sewed. I am making some progress and enjoying it at last
Today though I will show some bird pictures.
Today there were 15 Blue Jays hanging out in the trees. I have never seen so many together.

This guy looks like he is saying come on down.............

There guys were discussing the quality of the food.

This one is saying "I got mine"

Not so many Starlings today and so the Cardinal family showed up together.

Mrs was hungry and stuck around more than he did.


She had a twinkle in her eye, does that mean spring is coming?

A lone Junco came.


I have been getting through a lot of bird food. There is so much snow I feel so bad for them. I saw rabbit tracks on the front porch and deck so will throw out some bread for later. I hope the Possum comes back. I think the snow has stopped for now. I am not sure what tomorrow will bring.

The snow is just so pretty, the back yard is pretty full right now. The fence is buried.

The trees look lovely. I would like to get out for a drive but not sure what the roads are like, they keep them pretty clear but when there's ice under or worse black ice, well I just don't like to be on them.

Well I sure hope there is something better than the weather to talk about next time.

Dawn Chorus........................

This morning I was awoken by a Cardinal singing his heart out near my bedroom window. I will hear him every morning now. It is a sign that Spring will not be too long. It reminded me that here in Michigan it's nothing like what it's like in England. The Dawn Chorus is a real thing there.

I think as a young person I didn't hear it too often. One time though, we were there to hear the very first bird sing to awake all the others. I thought it was a Blackbird but could be wrong, it was a very long time ago.

When we were young, ah, that's the thing. I worked at A.C Delco at the time. There was a charity event where people sponsored people at so much a mile. It was a 50 mile hike and I think I may have written about that before. What fun we had. If my memory serves me well, and these days it doesn't, I think Liz Seabrook, Sheila Wilson and Margaret Dryden were the ones who made up our little group. We wore bicycle lamps on our backs so that when we got out into the dark countryside we could be seen by traffic. That was a wonderful idea until we had to go pee. Ducking behind bushes sort of lost a bit of it's privacy when you forget to turn your lamps off. Anyway, we made it 25 miles on that particular hike.

The Cardinal does not have such a pretty song as the Blackbird, in fact I was ready to throw a shoe at it this morning. Its NOT Spring yet darn it.

It gets rather annoying I can tell you.
Anyway, the charity walk was a lot of fun. There were cars with people picking up those who wanted to quit. About midnight someone stopped to ask if we were OK and did we want a ride home yet otherwise we were on our own till morning. We voted to continue, and so we did until we could not put one foot in front of the other again. I remember sitting on a farm gate waiting for someone to come and rescue us. That was when we heard that Blackbird sing. Then there was an answer from another, and then another and off they went full throttle into the Dawn Chorus. What a wonderful thing it was. A night we will never forget. We made it 25 miles and got certificates to prove it. Somewhere I still have mine but I don't know where right now. It's probably with my family research papers.
Oh to be young again haha. We sure felt it the next day. I remember having to sit and slide down the stairs after falling out of bed. My legs just were not working for me. Blisters, we had a few but the worse for me was the muscle aches. Had to go to work next day.............boy there were some surprised people having to cough up the money but we earned it.

Sewing Woes and Wonders.........................

I am not a good sewer. I am too impatient. I love the end results but wish they were perfect. I really do not have patience with much of anything really. I like to do things quick and hope they turn out well. I dislike fiddling with things and so I often do not get things just right. I envy people who do. They can measure and double measure and I tend to just slap things together and hope for the best. I know this about myself so why do I bother you may think. Well I just love making things. That simple.
So today's project should be easy but. Sigh......had a few rip outs an do overs because I was not paying attention.
I am trying to use up fabric. Think I said that somewhere before. So I am making Haley a quilt and I had found fabric to go with what I already had. This is the combination.

So I thought the pink and white fabrics would make good bowl holders and pot holders to go with that when I am done.

What can be easier than a simple potholder you may ask. Well if you don't get it square it wont come out right. So had to do some trimming up after the fact. Ended a tad smaller than intended. It was not a good day to sew but I am determined to get going on this stuff.

Edna whacks out a whole bunch of these things and I know hers will be perfect. Maybe if I use one layer of batting it won't be so hard to wrangle.? Would it do the trick though? Probably. Maybe I will make me a couple of single layer ones and test them.



I think I am going to have to get some backing fabric for the quilt and some batting oops. Another trip to the quilt store?
I must have something around but I don't think I do. I think I want black for the backing but I could use pink, neither of which I have.
So tomorrow I will start on the front of the quilt top and make sure I cut it out right.
Today I will throw some more fabrics together to make more bowl holders and hot pads. Tomorrow may go better.

Isadore.............

Today was supposed to be a better day, it was supposed to be sunny. Well it wasn't. We decided to go out as planned but Gerry needed to get gas and instead of heading out M72 as I had expected we went via Sutton's Bay. That was fine by me, I wanted to get pictures of the Bay as it has frozen over. It is officially frozen when it freezes as far as Power Island.

I hadn't thought of it until we got to Suttons Bay but there's a quilt shop there. Woo Hoo I thought of it just in time. I needed some 100% cotton batting. Yeah.....so I went in and got some. I also found some fabric that I like better than I got the other day for the Green/yellow/blue quilt. Bonus. I came out very happy.
So, onwards to Lake Leelanau, Gerry has formed a fondness for the White chocolate Mocha coffee and me for their Peanut butter cookies. I found out they make them themselves. They are soooo good.


Having set out in that direction we continued on that way until we reached Bohemian Rd and took a right down to the beach. I just wanted to check out the water, it was moving and frothy with mushy ice. It was cold but in the 20s. So I didn't need my coat as I had a heavy sweater on, but alas no boots. It was really gloomy. Not really a good atmosphere for pictures but I got a couple anyway.

The stream that crosses the road down to the beach, so pretty in snow.(above and below)





So then we headed back towards Cedar rather than going on our usual route. I really wanted to get to Isadore.



The view going into Cedar, you can see Lake Leelanau in the distance, on a clear day its a pretty view.

I wanted a picture of the river in Cedar.



The church in Isadore has a history.


Isadore was a small community that faded away. We discovered it years ago, the buildings from the former village were still there and not inhabited. I am glad we saw them back years ago when all were still intact because some burned down. Anyway I got some pictures today of what is left.

Look at the old truck (above), not that it has anything to do with this but I thought it looked cool next to the old buildings.



Now the church is relatively new. The one that was once there is long gone. I will put some links here rather than write out the whole story. Basically one of the Nuns there disappeared. It took awhile to find her.

There was a trial and it was quite the sensation at the time and apparently they did a stage show of the story.

The other reason I wanted to go out there was to get some pictures of the stained glass windows.(On December 12, 1923 Bishop Kelly blessed the new Holy Rosary Church. The Roman-style edifice was beautified with 13 stained glass windows fired in Munich, Germany that still awe visitors and parishioners today.)
I could not see them though, I would need to be inside the church in order to do that. I had read that when the priest decided to build a new church he ordered the windows from I believe it was Germany. Anyway the windows got made but then war broke out and so it wasn't possible to ship them, and so to avoid them getting found, confiscated or destroyed they were buried. When the war ended they were recovered and shipped and installed in the church. I thought that was interesting in itself. Funny how such a tiny little place like Isadore has such a fascinating story.
Anyway, we got out there even though it was gloomy. I didn't get the pictures of the windows but will have another go.

Possum's and Potholders...........

Last night we got a visitor.

I noticed the outside light was on, it has a motion detector on it, so lights up if anyone or anything moves on the deck. It's really for the poodles but can also let us know to look to see who is visiting before we let them out. It could be a skunk. Brea has only just got her own smell back after the last visit to the groomers. she had to have chased the skunk in the garden one evening (morning, can't remember). All creatures are welcome here but some do not appreciate us as much as we appreciate them.


Anyway, I love Possums and haven't seen them for awhile.
Naturally they are nocturnal so we wouldn't see them during the day. The outside light doesn't bother them though. They stay very still when they see movement rather than run away. If they begin to feel uncomfortable then they sneak off slowly.



I stood and watched this guy for quite some time, he knew I was at the window. He was really enjoying the new fat ball I made with coconut flakes, peanut butter, rice crispies and fat. The birds like it too and it's already about gone. I don't have much fat left, maybe one more batch that I can make. Got to get me some more supplies. I generally use up stale stuff. Funny thing is everyone loves the bread more than anything except peanuts in the shells.

Possums are good to have around. They eat a lot of stuff that's bad for the garden, do not carry Rabies or disease and are generally good guys. Very cute too although they would look prettier with a fluffy tail, but as they hang by their tails (must be strong to carry that weight) they couldn't have hair, ouch........
So, again today the snow was coming down. I had wanted to get out today and take a trip to Isadore. I want to write about the church there and want pictures. I thought the Cedar River would also be pretty. Well it's supposed to be nice tomorrow and I think Gerry got the end of the drive chipped out.
Instead I decided to do some sewing.

I want to make some small things, way ahead of time for Christmas gifts and to use up fabric. So one thing I wanted to do was pot holders. I need some myself. I found a pattern but it had no instructions. I found the fabric I wanted and cut it out. So far so good. It was obvious how to put it together until it was time to put the ends on. It's one of those two handed jobs that fits on the hands and is long to hold on to both sides of the dish...........well the dang thing is so thick my machine will not sew through all layers, so that tells me there must be an easier way.

Now to think. I must find a real pattern instead of thinking I know what I am doing. Duh!!!! it seemed so obvious, except now I have to hand sew the dang thing. Not at all what I wanted to do. I guess before I start my next project, the little micro wave bowl holders I have to go and get some "cotton" batting. I have so much scraps of batting that I had thought I would not need any, but I have no way of knowing if its 100% cotton and I do not want to give them away only to be responsible for burning down someone's house.

Who knew thing's could get so complicated. Seemed easy enough to me. 10" squares with a tuck to make it curl around a bowl or mug and voila a nice handy gift. Gift? I want some myself, you know what it's like taking a hot bowl of soup out of the microwave. So these nice easy projects are on hold. Meanwhile I could start on cutting the borders for my 3 quilts I have ready to go but now I am frustrated and got backache so for the rest of the day I will gain some inspiration from some patterns and books and find a decent pot holder pattern, and while I am at it without rounded ends. Pffft. that was a pain and a half. Gonna use up a whole bunch of fat quarters though. I am on a roll.
You won't see a picture of the final product tonight(potholder) I need daylight to sew by hand. (that's my excuse) and I need to find some embroidery thread. Sigh!!!!