Lace and rust and sap, Oh My!

Isn't this beautiful? My friend, Elke, from Germany sent this to me. We have a personal courier, how special is that? Elke is the friend of the parents of a friend of ours here. This lace is from the town of Plauen in Germany and is specific to that place.
This is gorgeous. It's for a table but I don't know...with the infrequency of my dusting, I should maybe find someplace safer for it! Elke included a quilt pin from the German Patchwork Guild. And that beautiful colorful piece underneath? It's a piece of wrapping paper that will never grace a package. It's so pretty I'll frame it.

Thank you Elke!!

Snappyfriends was asking for something in rust last week. Last week I was completely preoccupied with work and sleep deprivation. But on the way home Saturday I drove by the antique junkyard that's about a mile from the house and there, in full twisted regalia was this...thing. I don't know what it is or who made it but it IS rusty! What would a person do with something like this? Wire it and plop a lamp shade on top? Train a morning glory? Wrap twinkly lights on it?

It's maple syrup time. Warming days and cold nights get the sap moving. This tree is in my daughter's yard and I spent the night there Friday so I could see their operation first hand. That's a five gallon bucket hanging on the tree.....

You can almost just see the drop at the tip of the spigot - it was flowing quite steadily, like an annoying leaky faucet.

First thing in the morning they sloshed out to the soggy, wet, thawing yard to pour the sap (which is loose as water and tastes like it, too) into the cook pot. Notice Colin's bare feet. It was a cold, wet, sloshy ground he was standing on. The bucket was full and heavy so he helped pour because there's a cheese cloth over a strainer catching tree bits.

By the end of the day they had one pint of syrup from that bucket.