THE DAY AFTER THE FEAST!

 When we have Thanksgiving dinner at my friend Mary's house, the table is always set beautifully.  The lovely napkin set up was so nice that grandson Jeremy just didn't want to spoil the look by taking it apart.  The black ribbons on the napkins was perfect!

My sweetie carved the turkey while I supervised of course, and twenty pounds
of carved meat went quite quickly along
with all the fixins' as they say.

Pumpkin pie ala mode or whipped cream with apple crisp topped off the dinner.

We were all moaning about how full we were of course which says that the food was great!


 Our rocker has been completed and looks amazing.  I took a photo of the lake view from
the work shop deck which just shows what a great spot we have.

I think the dog figured out that he could
see squirrels better from the chair.  He didn't
mind the chair rocking at all.

I posted my "man bags" last time  and they were a huge hit.  Grandson is going to Halifax training camp for sprint canoe for a week, so he is so happy to have a bag to put all his stuff in.

Grandfather noted that now he can loose his stuff all at once now that he has a man bag.....snort...

Also gave granddaughter pot holders.
"What are they for Nana?"
Me...for taking pans out of the oven!
Granddaughter...well you better send me a pan and recipes for the oven then!:

I didn't laugh in her face!  But her mother told me that she hasn't used pot holders in years so how would her daughter know what they were!  They now have pot  holders.

And....she loved the spaghetti scarf, wore
it as she left the house to go back to
University with the instructions to make
black ones too. 

We are returning from the city to the cottage on Thursday following dental surgery.  If you think I MOANED about my foot, wait till you hear of my dental work!  I'm having nightmares!

MAN BAGS! AND OTHER SUNDAY MORNING MUSINGS!

 First, here is my "man bags".  I don't have many manly colours.  Even my black fabrics aren't manly.  But the men in my life need their own little bags for their personal |"stuff". 


Yesterday, being one of those perfect perfect days on the lake, quiet waves, sunshine, temperatures being about 28/82
degrees.  Hot enough for a summer day!

I decided to keep being the bag lady of the family with these two bags.  I had to move the sewing table out of the sunshine which was coming into the sunroom so that I could see what I was doing, it was that bright of a day.

Also, I wanted to show you the spaghetti scarf on the right which Helen made.  As my private teacher, she likes some of my way out there ideas.  She also took her daughter's tee shirt to give to her as a gift!  How good is that idea eh?

Her daughter loves tea, so the little tea cozy is just a perfect thing to keep on your desk while you work and need your tea fix.  It is cute beyone belief.  Quilted of course.

 Also, needless to say Helen made some awesome pot
holders. Quilted scraps and designed so that the back is not quilted.  Since I broke my little Canon sureshot, I didn't carry the big camera over to her place.

The mornings on the lake are usually hazy in the autumn days as the lake is warm, the morning cool hence the foggy looks of the lake in the early morning.

We count all these days as blessings, because usually on Thanksgiving, we've had rain, blowing winds and it is cold enough to send us running to the city for the turkey feasts.   This year, we wish we could stay here and that the family was here as the weather is like summer.

But, it is not to be and we are off to Whitby for my friend Mary's feast.  I am making my famous (family only) pumpkin pie and the apple crisp that is easy to carry on our travel.

We seem to be rid of the bear (fingers crossed) as no one has had a sighting for ages, and the neighbours who offered restaurant fare at their fridge also haven't seen hide nor hair of the creature.   Because it is bear shooting season we suspect that it may have been too close to a gun and therefore we no longer are living in the nightly fear that any little noise is the bear ripping into what ever was available.

I'm aware that we live in this animal's habitat, but he was certainly making us afraid to venture too far from safety for a while now.  I may have spoken too soon though as it may have found a better food source, a place to settle for the winter to have decided to book his spring vacation on our island in 2012.  I hope not, but we are ever vigilant.

On finishing this blog, I've got the radio on listening once again to the stories on Steve Jobs of Apple Inc.  I am not a techie type.  I have a phone to call people, I don't play games on a little thing no bigger than my playing cards.  I don't spend my day texting as I prefer to talk to people.  Oh, I'm getting older by the minute.  But honestly other than a date calender if one is in business, to what has the world descended?

That we cannot move without these bloody devices in our hands?  Have you ever been having a conversation with a person and their phone indicates a text coming in and the world stops while they read that instead of realizing that a real person is next to them.

I have a rule in my car for my grand kids.   Do not, and I mean NOT, use your phone in my car.  Enough said.  Am I wrong?  Does everyone need this 24/7 in their lives?  I'm at the cottage and a land line is my source of talk.  Other than my trusty computer to rant and rave of course.

FAVOURITE THINGS FRIDAY...THANKSGIVING...

This is Thanksgiving weekend in Canada.  We all get together for a turkey feast, and do actually give thanks for the simple things in life that make us who we are.

Good health is my big thanks this year.  My foot is good, no more moans from me regarding that!

The fall colours are in full bloom here in our little island paradise.  The tree photo
comes from the Weather network of a
person who really caught the works of
nature around our area.

Our lake is calm after the winds of  last weekend, the weather is warm, 20 Celcius, or about 70 F.  Who could ask for better weather in October?

I am always thankful for sunshine as our sunroom warms up and I am able to keep at the sewing machine.

Yesterday, I made pot holders.  Yeah, yeah, simple mind stuff, but you know what?

My pot holders which I've had for years actually almost disintegrated in my hands in the morning when I made a rhubarb coffee cake.

So, this fabric of tea cups and saucers was perfect because for the life of me, I don't know why I bought it.  I couldn't possibly put it into a quilt as it's just not me, except that I loved the colours.

So, I have 16 of these babies made, lined with the proper linings too.  I made a couple of large ones, whoa!  Too big!  More like hot plates than pot holders!  Next, downsized, and just about got it right, In the end 8" was the perfect square to cut with a teeny tiny bit cut off the lining to make it fit in the envelope of the tea cups fabric.

Helen, dropped by to see what I was doing and also brought a spaghetti scarf she made, using her daughter's tee shirt....oh well it's going to her anyway.  Very cute and so finely done too.  I loved the look, but she thought that the fatter one inch cuts were better.

So, dear friends in blog land, finally I thank everyone who pops in, looks, and leaves a comment.  It's the making of  little loves in my daily life here at the cottage.

PHOTOS PLUS. THE WONDERS OF THE WEB!

Isn't this just the best idea for a crib?  The blog..The Art of Others had this and many more ideas on it.

It's an old blog, but some really coll photos are on it!



I cleaned the cottage yesterday, floors, windows and even washed a slip cover for the Ikea sectional.

Bad idea washing the cover.  It shrank...It's on but my sweetie will need to really give it a stretch on the one side to make it fit properly.

So not having energy to do much more than eat,
I surfed the net.

You know how much of a bag lady I am, and I suppose a suitcase classifies as some sort of bag.
I love this use of a suitcase.  My westie would need shorter legs for this bed, but isn't this clever?


On the same thoughts, there was a chair made out of beer cans.  Oh, the beauty and practicallity of this in the living room.

I can see it now.  A total College Dorm
makeover!  And so cheap too!

Of course it's a guy thing as I am not a beer drinker, however I did find a Christmas tree made out of wine bottles.

Now that I could identify with.  Wine doesn't make me burp!

And this photo caught my eye.  This is from Philly.  It just is so beautiful that I had to post it even though the others are
just fun things.

And finally, cottage stuff.  My sweetie made a cedar rocker that has sat in the trees for the past 11 years.  We would wander over to that spot a couple of times
a year, but really it looked very sad for
the last few years.

We put it on the lift, but Bob ended up underneath as it was put on it to bring it up to the workshop to be finished.

Bob, our resident painter, sander, finisher of jobs, looked at this earlier this year and said that he was going to finish it.  It took him three days to sand it.  It now sits in the workshop all stained for next season.  I will take a photo when it is out in the open once again.

My camera went for a swim in my boat bag.  I have a bag that carries so much stuff when we go shopping or anywhere.  I put water bottles in it, my purse, any of my sweetie's stuff, keys, dog leash, and of course my beloved little Canon.  Well the water bottle somehow spilt and the Canon I think is toast.  So must go to the big camera which is always kept in a big.  I have an old Canon SLR which is a great camera, but not one that I can put in my pocket and go.

Shopping is definitely going to happen when we next get to the city.

Thanks to the blog world for all the information out there.  All the quilting blogs, the information blogs and even the blogs in foreign language are so informative.

I didn't realize till I started looking at blogs on photography that there is so much out there.

SPEGHETTI SCARFE ON SUNDAY

 It's a rainy windy day at the lake.  This is day four of rains, winds, huge gusts on the lake, so much so that we are still stoking fires and keeping warm and dry as much as possible.

So, this morning as I was on the web, I found this so cute and easy scarfe called "speghetti scarfe".  I found an old tee shirt that I didn't realize wasn't old but belonged to Michelle, the daughter of Mary.  Oh well, I was going to give it to
her anyway as she loves this stuff.

Here is my first attempt at making the scarfe and a sort of tutorial.

I cut the shirt at the arm pit.

Then, cut from one side to ALMOST the other side, measuring sort of about an inch or two as I went along. (NOTE...the skinnier cuts are better)

Then after cutting, I stretched the cuts,
being careful to hold the ends and not to
tear as I was stretching.

All of this took about 7 minutes to do.  I also cut the bottoms of the tee shirt as you can see.

Here is the sample of the cut tee shirt.

Note the cutting just goes about an inch from the top.


I used a rotary cutter because I have one of course, but scissors would suffice.



As you can see, it's a very simple thing to do, even for me.

Here you can see the stretched speghetti
just before I gathered all the ends and then
put them over my head twice to make the scarfe.

This is the original photo that I found from a retro sight which I forgot the name so cannot give the proper claim to fame of the creator.

I think her scarfe is made from a very large and I mean very large and very stretchy tee.

So, is this not so cute?  Wouldn't it just make someone happy?  Search the web and find many many variations of this so very cool little easy peasy craft.

Not bad for a rainy day activity don't you think?

FAVOURITE THINGS FRIDAY....BAGS!

I love making bags!  I'm the bag lady of the family.  I used to make jean bags with jeans about a size 6 for kids.  I'd put fabric pens in the pockets, and put a strap on the jeans so that the kids would have little overnight bags to bring to Nana's house.

Then, I started making these jean bags as birthday gifts for granddaughters' friends which were always a huge hit.

Tory, granddaughter of mine went to a girl's house recently, and saw a jean bag.
She knew it was made by her Nana, so she
asked the girl where she got it.   From her
babysitter when she was 5 she said.

Yep, my other  granddaughter Courtney  had given it to her as a birthday gift that many years ago.

So, I still make bags.  The recycling experience has been awesome for me.
One year, a friend and I made the jean bags in larger sizes for groceries as
Christmas presents.  A big success.

I'm still stopped and asked where I got
the jean bag I use weekly.

The bags above were given as gifts of course
and are used all the time.

The little travel bag is a cake.  Not made by me, but I loved it of course and if I was to get one of these, I'd definitely eat the kangaroo on my way to Australia.

These bags you see were made this week.
Today, the two with the red straps are copies of my mother's 50 year old bag with me making the larger one as I up the anty on my bag lady experiences.

On rainy days here at the cottage, I can
be found at the machine making bags.  This little one I made last year to try and please my mother, but it wasn't heavy enough for her.  Not substantial she said..get canvas.

That is canvas, but light, so now these are all doubled and are used by my mother and the cast offs of her displeasure are used by the grandchildren and their friends.

I used to have cards made up called "Baggie Jeans"  just so that I'd have a different card with which to identify my bag lady status.

So the tradition continues.

AUTUMN DAY ON THE LAKE!

I've said that our friends Mary and Bob are here for the week.  Well the weather isn't the greatest at times, so Mary decided to knit.  These fingerless gloves are a huge hit with young and old.  So very cute and so simple to make.

I make them for charities at the hospitals and also am now making them for shelters so that people can feel good at times of need.

We have had rain on and off, but when the sun came out yesterday, we packed up goodies and took an afternoon boat ride on the lake.

We came upon this sweet cottage all locked up, sitting forelorn on a point of the lake.  I hadn't been to this end of the lake for a few years and didn't remember this little beauty.

This is happy me with Wilson the Wonder dog on the lake.  He loves putting on his very cute red boat coat.  It was such a great day that after this photo was taken I removed the jacket as it was just too warm.  Imagine, September 28th...

As we cruised the lake, we saw a little waterfall that was trickling down and we all commented that next year we would be back in the spring to see the gushers!


I have been quilting a bit.  I had this fabric which was my mother's material from the Virgin Islands.  Well her little pouch that has been her favourite for 50 years, finally bit the dust, so I took the bag apart, copied the bag, quilted this little bag for her.  The ends are recycled from her canvas bag and she will just love it.  On the right top is Tortola BVI...Bliss for my mom who is 92 yrs old.

 Oh, and the bear has visited our neighbours again.   We are told that it will probably be back and back for the next couple or years.  OMG!

MONDAY'S CHILD...THAT WAS ME YESTERDAY...

 Yesterday was my birthday.  Oh I don't dwell on it because I've had more birthdays behind me than I do coming to me.   My friend Mary arrived with a blueberry pie (which is my fav) and it was the most delicious ever.  She used 5 cups of blueberries so you know she didn't skimp!

It's been fabulous fall weather and of course lots of people get married in the fall.  The door was at a country wedding that my daughter and her kids attended over the weekend.

Isn't that just the most clever way of using an old door?  The bride's family live on the farm where the wedding was held.  I am definitely going to look for
an old door like this!

 I wish I could say I took this photo of the sunrise last weekend, but alas, it was taken by someone else.  The person didn't leave their name, just the photo on a weather site.

Isn't it just perfect?  It looks so eirie.

We have many strange mornings at the lake in the fall.  We are now being inundated with falling acorns.  They are
everywhere!  It's taking one's life in peril
to walk near them.  Or worse to step on
them on the ground.  They are like ball
bearings.

Fall days at the cottage also bring a calm to the waters that sometimes the reflections are such that it is hard to tell up or down in the photos of scenery.

The pines are blowing their needles this year also and when there is a breeze, it's
raining pine needles. 

Here is a photo of the wedding people all dressed up.  Our boy loves dressing up.  The life of everyone is so busy these days that to get together to have a photo op is special.

The days are getting shorter for sure.  We are now quite dark by 8 pm.  But that means we get to see the beautiful stars at night here since there is so few people on the lake it is very dark indeed.

THIS IS SO CUTE!

Roz sent me this from California.  It took forever to arrive at our little post office.

Roz said she sent one to Israel and Italy too and they had received theirs a while ago.  Snail mail for sure.

Anyway this is so cute.  I expect that when I travel to Florida this fall that this will carry my needles.

I love this.. it's like a little purse and
it is so delicate to see. Thank you Roz

I noted on her blog that she had a cook book in print too, so have a boo there.

It is an absolutely beautiful fall day here at the cottage. So much so that we took our last cup of coffee to have on the dock.  Those days will come to an end soon enough so we take each as it comes.

While I came up from Whitby on Friday,
it was raining for most of the way, but still
the colours of autumn are breathtaking.

I took this photo while driving up highway 35 to Dorset.  It doesn't do the colours justice, but still the trees are in full autumn bloom.

The loons are busy here too when the lake is calm out our way.  There is lots of little bass at the end of our dock so the loons get a full feed.

Yesterday a humming bird was at our flowers who are looking pretty sick these days, but Helen, who is only a few cottages away saw a fat hummer getting his last feed from her feeder before heading to warmer climates.

All around us there are closers.  The lake is beginning to have fewer and fewer of us hardy folks around.  Next week there will only be a couple of us here, but for the Thanksgiving weekend, many return to close for the season. 

Just an update on the bear issue....the bear is gone...hopefully for good, but we are ever vigilant at night.  Just so that he doesn't tear the door off the garbage bin we have left it open....no garbage in it, but he doesn't know that. 

FIRST QUILTS...

This is Helen's first quilt.  She says that
she did all the wrong things one does when quilting.

She began by seeing that there was a course in "english piecing" I think she said.  She had the pink print which was all cotton to make a dress for one of her girls.

The light blue and dark  were  given to her by a friend and Helen says that they both had poly in them.  The white was cotton.

This quilt is hand cut, hand pieced, hand quilted.  Now the fact that this took her about ten years to make is remarkable to me....I just don't have the attention span to take on a quilt of this size.

  However, her Grandmother's Garden quilt is soft from use by Andrea and is much loved.  It's beautiful in its composition, with knowing the details that Helen put into the project makes it all the more loving.  There is also a label which Helen just wrote and then cross-stitched the date etc.

That in itself was so fine that the camera didn't capture the work.  I might try with another camera one of these days.

After this class she was hooked on quilting
and continued to take classes in the many
aspects of hand quilting and design.

This, is my first quilt...no lessons here folks.  cut with a rotary on a 12" matt and a 12" ruler.

I still have some of the 280 squares left in a little stash somewhere.  I cut so many of the orange and white that finally my sweetie asked how many did I really need.

Only about 120 to make it work so you can understand so many extra orange squares.

The fabrics were sheets, $4.00 for the orange, $2.00 for the white and the back print which was fish or some such.  I have redone the binding on this because the first attempt was looking like I had rolled a cigar in the fabric.  The other part was that I had to add some width to the quilt because I didn't realize that the quilt would "shrink" somewhat when putting it together.

I bought polyester batting...boy was that hard to put the basting through.  I almost quit right there and then.

Trust me, this didn't happen on Helen's quilt. 

Undaunted, as we all are when we love this craft, I made another and another with the same 12" tools.  Then I saw the large matt on sale....wahoo!  Life became so easy!

What was your first quilt....did you take lessons?   I've only learned from the lessons Helen gives me when I hit a wall of what to do.  Patience is not in my dna.

We are battened down today as the lake is roaring, the wind is howling all around us.  Only the brave will be out on the lake today.  There is only one other person down the way on our little island.

We are 11 days without our bear visits.  We are all hoping that we have seen the last of the pesky guy. 



FAVOURITE FRIDAY...."F"

 Friday...the end of the week, welcoming the weekend with Friends.  I love the letter "F"  it stands for so much.

Finished...yep, that's a beauty word!  Finis was what I thought when I finished this quilt.  It's scrappy with totally left over fabrics, but wow does it ever look fantastic.

For sure, quilts just don't look finished
till the quilting is done.

The next quilt was from Walmart Jelly that I bought for $12.00.  A great find and totally awesome, and fabulous.

Finishing the backs of quilts is always a dilemna for me.  What to pick, and how will it look makes me frazelled at time.  Not for this baby.

The back is almost as good as the front.  I also did a bias binding to really pop the quilt.

Finding the right back was a bit of a challenge to find the right fabric to compliment the front.

By putting a black sashing on the back, the same colours, practically are on the back.  The effect is quite flashy.

Finally, thank you to Barb of Bejeweled Quilts, who sent me the jelly fabrics from Samoa last autumn when I was laid up with my hip surgery.

I actually had pieced all these tops last winter while recouping, but just couldn't do the finishing of the quilts.

The back of the quilt which is not shown is the blue of the front.

This quilt is cute beyond belief.  My sweetie who knows I don't do blue well, just loves this.  I do too so it will be a keeper for me to remember the generosity of Barb.   Thank you again.

Finally, F is for fire...we are burning wood to warm our little cottage this morning.  The coolness of the mornings is quite shocking after a warm night under the duvet....The outside temp was just above freezing this morning and the inside a few degrees warmer.  Brrrr...or Frrrr. 

Finished projects make us all happy.  So for now, Friday fun at the cottage begins with 'F"

1. 

DINNER WITH OLD QUILTS

 Wherever I go around the lake, I take my camera as I never know what I shall find.

We went to our neighbours to the east of us, which we must access by boat as there is a small body of water seperating us.  We just putted over there which was about a two minute ride.

Their cottage is over a 100 yrs old, is very ecclectic in that there were additions, renovations over the years, so all cottages require personal touches to make it one's own.

But here is the quilt I saw upon entering their sunroom.  This quilt is soft from loving use, hand quilted by a Christian group that does quilting.

I photographed the labels to show the care given to the quilt.  I don't do that often.  I write the date somewhere on the quilt....if I remember.  This old quilt reminded me that I should label quilts...at least the ones that are given away.


The backing was flannel which certainly seems to have withheld the hands of time as the print is still lovely and soft after many washes.

The other quilt is an old hexigon that she didn't remember where it came from and of course there
wasn't a label on it.


 Also much love given to this soft and cosy quilt.  The backing was cotton and so soft.


We had appetizers on their veranda which was so inviting with all the charm of an old cottage.

The cottage has many antiques from years
of travelling around the country.  The cottage is also their prime residence.  They
have lived at the cottage for about 5 yrs now
but, leave the island around the end of October. Oh, that will be us too this year!

The winds do begin to howl, with dropping temperatures, uninsullated buildings we will leave around the same time as they do.

The cottage has much wood in the rooms, this dining table has seen many happy occasions for family and friends. 

Directly opposite this area is the area where life goes on in the evenings when it
cools at the lake.  That wood burning stove has probably had cords of wood put into its belly over the years.  I love this room.  It is so inviting.

The neighbours also had a visit from our friend the bear.  It raided an outside storage area  while they were away for the night.   Not a pretty picture I can tell you.

Funny though, the bear didn't eat any of the delicious veggies growing around the area.  Well we all know he is a pest, although no one has reported a sighting since last Thursday.  You think he's gone?  We don't. 

We've been sharing ideas about the great memories of bears.  They keep coming and coming....apparently like the Everready rabbit.  So, we are diligent.

I have twenty four Ohio Star blocks done.  My best work to date.  I don't know what it is about my fingers and measuring that makes my quilts always look a bit wonky to me although Helen (private teacher here) says they look amazing. 

I found a couple of tops that are going to charity donation so, till I go to Fabricland which has a sale on, I'm going to practice my "in the ditch" so the Ohio will be awesome.

We are going to get some rain.  The sun came into the bedroom window this morning with so much promise.  An hour later, we are awaiting rain, so I'm not heading to the big city of Huntsville to pick up fabric.   Oh well, I do have lots to do.

|We had the most awesome appetizer at our neighbour's the other night, so I must call her for the recipe that I can post.  She said it was super easy...my kind of recipe.