Reality

You remember I said I don't take photos ( much) of buildings, but I couldn't resist this bookstore in Winchester.  

Amazingly, we didn't go inside.  For me, bookstores are worse than fabric stores are for you.  Definitely a rabbit hole.  

We should have gone in but we were with Brian and his daughter and SIL and truly, I would have held up the day. We didn't have much time and wanted to keep going. This was a hard pass.

Look at that little sign.  How true!  How needed! One of the things we discussed before this trip was whether or not we would admit to being Americans.  How's that for reality?  We know as soon as we open our mouth people will ask where we are from, it's obvious we aren't British.  We decided if anyone asked we would say we were Canadian. 

Well, first day someone asked if we were American.  I actually hesitated. A long hesitation. Stared at her. Sighed and said, "We aren't admitting to that (being American.)"  She smiled and said it was ok, they loved us.  I said, "uh...no you don't."  Then I assured her WE are NOT like THEM.  

Next day, another one.  By the third time I realized we were like Thomas, denying the third time.  

    As soon as people knew, though, it opened the door to them giving us their opinions and one actually, ACTUALLY asked if "he" was crazy.  "Yes," I said, "he is." 

This trip we didn't do the souvenir thing.  We are old.  We are purging what we have.  But I can't and don't resist books.  We stopped just a couple of times because I knew I'd buy and books are heavy to transport.  But these are the ones I did get.  The top two I brought from home to read on the trip.  If you haven't read Remarkably Bright Creatures, do. It took me a long time to decide to read it because I couldn't understand the premise of the octopus but the recommendation from Friend Laurie made me finally do it.  I read half on the way to London and finished it over Newfoundland on the way home.  There was NO time to read while we were there.  

Like I do when home, when I finish a book immediately after closing it I search out the next one. That was Tilt.  I'm not one for survival stories and this one is certainly How-Would-You-Survive-A-Disaster-Like-This and setting priorities and what IS a priority to you and how far could you extend yourself. We have certainly been racking up natural disasters lately so I thought this was worth the try.  We aren't inclined to earthquakes in Michigan.  This one was really, really good.  A lot of "oh,yeah, didn't think of that, I guess that would be a problem" moments because truly we just don't realize how good we have it when everything works.  And then it's gone.

 

Hampton Court

 When we travel I take photos of not normal things.  I take photos of things I want to remember but am not great on pictures of buildings.  I like the quirky things inside the buildings.  

On Wednesday of our trip we visited Hampton Court. Henry VIII's house. It's not a ruin, it's still a viable building used for events and films like Wolf Hall. As we walked we were well aware we were walking the same paths and on the same stones as Henry VIII and his retinue, beheaded wives, counselors, Elizabeth I.  This isn't the first castle we've ever visited but this one was daunting. 

Don't you sometimes wish you could give your guests a behavioral expectation when they walk in the door?  Especially those vagabonds, rascals or boys? Notice boys is in all capital letters.   It was interesting that there were a few signs of the times that specifically targeted boys. 

The Great Hall was organized for us to see that it was a place of meeting both for court but also feasts.

I thought this was a great idea for visitors.  Each place setting included an expectation of table manners of the time.  These are all true, documented expectations of guests.

Turns out things don't change much.  Must have been a boy.

This was the king's chocolate kitchen. Of course he had a chocolate kitchen.

Dare to Do

 Have you ever done something you swore you would never do?  Something you couldn't even imagine yourself doing?  No matter how hard you tried?  Ever?  I have.  And I'm putting more and more of those things on the list of dares accomplished.  

I now sit up when we drive across the Mackinac Bridge.

I went to the top of what was formerly called the Sears Building in Chicago...the one with the acrylic floor that extends out from the side of the building that you walk out onto and you are "floating" over the streets of Chicago and if you dare look down the people are the size of ants.  That one was hard.  PH wouldn't even go inside the building but waited for me on the sidewalk. That platform was so high up you couldn't see it from the street.  I told the worker in the gift shop that they should be selling clean under pants.

 I ate a roasted brussels sprout.

And in London last weekend on Robert Burns Night I ate haggis.  This one is almost on par with sitting up while driving over the Mackinac Bridge.  No, I think this is a category of its own.

All of it.  I ate all of it.  

If you know what's IN haggis you probably wouldn't eat it, either. Sometimes it's better not to read the ingredients label. But we had just arrived, were checking into the hotel and they were advertising their Burns Night dinner special.  And being in a sleep deprived travel weary jet lag fog I said, "I have to!"  So PH made reservations for that evening, Brian walked over (his building is across the street from the hotel) and we had dinner.  I ordered the four course Burns Night special and the second course was haggis. Each course had choices very Scottish but the second course was fixed. Haggis.  It tasted like the end piece of a meatloaf. It was quite good, actually. Brian and PH just kept drinking their wine and beer and shaking their heads and enjoying the fact they were NOT eating haggis. 

That list of Daring Things to Finally Do can now be wadded up and thrown away.  I've reached the top.

Liberty

Mecca.  That's what this is to a quilter.  This is the front door of Liberty of London. It was built in 1875 and that Tudor look is a standout in the neighborhood.  It's a huge place, walk down that street in front of you and it goes all the way to the next corner.  The store takes up a city block.  

This was the department I was interested in.  This is the fabric department, the fabric is iconic, the Tana Lawn feel is like running your hands through whipped cream.  They DO have 'quilting cotton' that has the more woven feel but this is beautiful.  And the prints are quite iconic.  There is variety but Liberty fabric has a 'look.'  

The floor above was featuring their Bridgerton line and to be honest I've never watched Bridgerton and wasn't interested in it so I stayed on this, their main floor for fabrics.

This isn't just for quilters, of course.  There are people out there who actually sew garments - who knew!  

I know I've been saying for months I'm done buying fabric unless it's a very special and specific project (like the kids' graduation quilts) but you don't go to London and not go to Liberty and you don't go to Liberty without buying fabric.  Not if you are a quilter, that is.  

This was my cutting table spot.  I know what I'm going to do with this and the Liberty I have at home, something very simple that lets the fabric be what it is.  And two pin cushions and a tote bag.  I'm a sucker for tote bags and this was one I wasn't going to leave behind.  Happy Birthday to me!!

No, the fabric is no less expensive there.  It's the same price as anywhere you might find it so I got some but not yardage. There might be enough here for two quilts.  We'll see!  

I can't tell you much about the rest of the store other than it is very expensive.  We walked in the door and there was a striking display of scarves that I went right to.  They were on sale for 50% off so hey, why not?  Well, at 50% off they were $225 pounds.  I ran my hand through them and took the elevator upstairs to the fabric.

Our Brian

 We just arrived home from a trip to London last night.  Over the next few days I'll elaborate a little on things but for now, the reason we went.  It's a long and special story.

In 1903 my grandpa was born here in Kalamazoo, Michigan.  When he was two years old his parents took his older brother with them when they returned to England, but left Grandpa here at a county poor farm.  They abandoned him, no sugar coating that. When he was 4 years old he was adopted and given a new name.  

When Grandpa was in his 30's he tried to find out what happened to his parents and find his brother.  He knew his birth name, his parents' names, his brother's name which is a lot of information especially before computers and the internet.

In the very early 1980's I tried to help him.  I wrote letters, made phone calls, asked any professional in the field: historians, judges, the British government, found people with his sir name who ripped pages from phone books in the London area with his sir name and mailed them to me.  When he came here for his yearly visit from California, I took him to county clerk offices, libraries near here.  We usually came up short but we did find out one thing.  I took each "no" answer as a backward "yes."  It told me, "don't look here, look somewhere else." And I'd ask more people more questions.  I even went to a psychic.

Eventually I found his brother's London birth certificate and obtained a copy.  I found his brother's school records from here in Michigan and obtained a copy.  Grandpa thought I'd found the Holy Grail.  But we couldn't find his family.

Many years later the internet had taken genealogy and simplified it.  And we who search must thank the Mormon church for sending their people out into the world to search for information and record it for the rest of us to use.   

One day maybe 15 years ago (give or take) I signed up for a two week trial of Ancestry.com. Grandpa's brother had a very distinctive middle name and if you found that, you found him.  And one day, I did.  I remember jumping up from the chair and my heart missing that beat.  There was someone out there searching, too, and our paths crossed. Finally.

That person was Brian.  

Brian's father was one of the brothers Grandpa didn't know about.  Grandpa thought he was looking for one brother.  Turned out, as time went on, there were more.  Brian is grandpa's nephew.  He figured out  we are half first cousins once removed.

Brian and I started sharing family information, sent pictures, I introduced him via email to Grandpa's son.  We shared the very extensive genealogy information he had uncovered. I found newspaper articles that confirmed family lore on his side.  He filled holes Grandpa only dreamed about.

Then one day, maybe about 8 years ago PH and I went to visit, to meet him. We immediately fell in love with Brian.  And like a bad penny we keep going back.  We immediately fell in love with him and simply want to spend time with him. 

I like to think Grandpa knows we found his family.  I'm sure of it.  We refer to him as "Our Brian" because, finally, he is.

Cold

 Really, I don't know what's worse, the heat you in Australia are dealing with or our temperatures and relentless snow.  This morning where I live the actual temperature is -18F.  That's 18 degrees BELOW zero. 

I leave you with this.  We will be busy the next several days so I won't be posting.  

We don't have penguins walking the street here but someone said it's colder here than the Antarctic so they would feel right at home.

Meijer is a grocery store.  This is just about right if we step out the door we better be ready for what's out there. 

PS, you know how I say I don't need any new hobbies?  I was sitting in the blue chair watching the birds jockey for position with the feed and I focused on the window screen and thought...."hmmm, a cross stitch grid! I could use the screen for cross stitch! "   Now, talk me out of it.

Monday

 You may have seen these photos.  If you live in the US, you have because they made national news, but if you don't live in the US, well, here's what our last few days have looked like. 

The COLD arctic air coming in from Canada over the not yet frozen Great Lakes produces this. This photo was from yesterday, Monday.  The air was arctic, the wind very strong, the snow light enough to blow around.

Even though the police, the snow plow drivers and tow truck drivers BEGGED people to either stay off the roads completely or just slow down, well, sometimes this happens.  

It took eight hours to clean this up.  The schools in the western half of Michigan were all closed so they bussed people from this mess to a nearby high school to get them out of their cars and warm, then tow truck drivers played a game of pick up sticks for eight hours untangling the mess.  In addition to the snow, it was/is brutally cold. Brutal. 

This isn't normal, this is not ABnormal. It happens more on roads in snow belts, areas where the snow just hits differently. It happens close to the lakeshore with high winds. It happens when you get high winds and snow so light it's like dust and causes white outs where you can't see past your windshield. And it happens when you insist on driving dry July road speeds.  People do. Luckily, in this, no one was killed.

We heeded the pleas and stayed home. No errand or even job is worth this. 

And More

 When we started acquiring our grands I was into making reading quilts for them.  I bought those cloth story book panels, cut them apart and put them back together sashed.  I made a lot of them when they were infants and toddlers.  

And of course, I bought some I didn't use because they outgrew the need. So here they sit. Another never. 

These WILL be donated but if any of you who live in the continental US or Canada want any of these for your grands, speak now and I will be very happy to mail them to you at my cost.  I'm sorry, Australia, but postage is nuts right now.  

These were a big hit with my grands starting when they were little and I made them as their baby/toddler quilts. I didn't do fussy because I wanted them to drag them around the house carrying their sippy cups with them.  I sashed them and quilted them.  

Now, I COULD make these into charity quilts with the fabric overload I've been whining about but I will NOT quilt them. My machine is not a fancy thing and I'd end up using the thing for dust rags if I tried.  So they would become yet another unfinished project.

I apologize for the color, really, white is white in real light.

I will wait until February 1 but after that they join the donated pile.

Just to Give You an Idea

 Just to give you an idea....

Last night at 11 p.m. I was sorting through two tubs of stuff. I made a donate pile that included those 9 patches I've been dealing with for months.  I'm tired of dealing with them and neglecting other possible projects.  I also put in things I saved because "I might use them someday" which is never.  A real conglomeration of unsentimental stuff.

Then I uncovered things like this:

Do you remember this? Probably not, you're too young. Those prairie point pieced into stars?  I distinctly remember my mom coming over to our house and I had some friends over so she could show us how to make these. This is an embedded memory.  Note the cardboard templates.  The dusty rose color is a dead giveaway to the 1970s. I hate dusty rose. There were two of these completed to this point but not completed as a finished anything in the tub. Now, 50 years later they might be back in style.

Two pieces of cross stitch.  I haven't done cross stitch since 1980.  This is finished, on very small linen stitched over two threads.  I looked at it closely and marveled at my eyesight back then.

And this, I believe this was Aida cloth?  Again, I was impressed with my careful working (that temperature tree project made me realize I lost my touch for cross stitch.) Unframed because back then I wanted my cross stitch projects framed but didn't have the money to buy a pack of paper plates much less take this to a framer.  So it sat.  For 40 years.

I moved on from cross stitch to needlepoint.  This was a little "L" that I intended to make into a seat cushion for our daughter's rocking chair she received for her first birthday.  Fifty years ago. 

I bought this shirt at a garage sale for 25cents when our son was maybe three?  Four?  I absolutely loved it and when he grew out of it I tucked it away.  It was my favorite favorite thing and he looked so darned cute in it.

That was 44 years ago.  I'm not giving up on this one.  I saved it because I want to use it "someday."  Now that it's unpacked from the tub I'm trying to think of how best to do that so am open to ideas from you.  Right now as I stare at it I'm thinking of NOT cutting it up and using pieces but leaving it whole, sewing it shut along the buttons and seams and using the whole shirt as a medallion like center. 

Is this the sign of a hoarder? Hoarders can't let things go.  I'm more sentimental than a hoarder but I do know it's time now for those 'maybes' that turned in to "nevers' to go.  These things?  They'll stay (see what I mean?) 

Fiddling

Still fiddling with scraps.  Still trying to clean up the bits and pieces.  Still trying to control the mess.  

Still using January to do it.

I spent a day sorting through Friend Sally's little 9 patches and my four patches and put them together for a small mat.  It's too big for a placemat and too small for a table topper so who knows where it will end up?  Looks a little Valentine-y to me.

Found some more four patches tucked away and put them together not knowing what to do with this long piece.  I put it on the windowsill for the photo and said, "oh! it fits perfectly!"  Why does this matter?  Well, this window is where we sit.  If I am on the phone I'm sitting in the blue chair (in photo above) by the window.  If PH is reading the newspaper or on the phone he is sitting in the blue chair.  Just enjoying the birds at the feeder?  Sitting in this chair.  But we both ALWAYS have a drink of some kind with us and PH is a fan of coasters. Voila!

More digging.  I decided this is finished.  Time for a border of some sort. These four patches are the same ones I used for the first map of Lowell I made a few years ago. This one represents the area just as the fur traders arrived so there were no buildings.  I worked with it till I decided I'm trying to put things that weren't there in there and called it finished.  As I walk past the Thinking Bed I decided to make the sky border uneven, sort of like it is now.  When you look at the horizon the sky is not a straight line, is it?  

That little building in the bottom right corner?  Many years ago a friend gave me a birthday card with this little house that she batiked herself on it. It's silk. I knew someday I'd use it in a quilt and tucked it away.  I decided it looked like the first fur trader's cabin enough to become the cabin for this.  I gently peeled it off the card and appliqued it to this and will quilt it down well.  

There are Native homes, corn and squash fields, animals.

I struggled with representing the animals that were prevalent and trapped for the Native's use and for trading.  Then I found this background and was thrilled. I believe Thimbleanna saved the day on this one. The animals are there but I didn't have to fussy cut and applique them all.  

For the Indian corn I used little beads and again, it's perfect.  This is a wall hanging so it won't be used like a quilt so I thought the beads will stand up to it.  There is, of course, a planting of pumpkins which were so important. 

The state tree for Michigan is the White Pine and I represented that with a fern print.  Again, the animals.  An owl, deer, badger.  All relied upon by the Natives.

This is why you keep scraps.  I found this birch bark looking scrap I used the original for at least 15 years ago.  Birch bark is what the Natives used to make their homes.  The apple tree represents the orchards that fed them.

So, yes, I decided it's done.  Could I busy it up with more bits and pieces of this and that?  Yes.  Will I? No.  That's not what this is supposed to represent.  So, time for the border.

This is the first map I made years ago.  The center portion is of a hand drawn map a woman here in town made in the 1950s. I traced her image of the streets. On the lower right is the river that meets the river that runs through town.  The Natives called this place "Where the Rivers Meet."  

The buildings represent the area, there's a barn on each of the four sides because this still is considered a rural community even though Lowell is growing. On the lower right corner is our daughter's house, built before the Civil War, on the left side is King Milling,  a couple of churches, a farm stand on the top row far left.  Each tree in the corner represents one of the four seasons.  

I don't deal in absolutes, this is a representation, like the one I'm working on now.

The dining room table is full of blue snowballs as I put them into rows, probably finishing that today. 

I am really tired of the mess, the scraps, the closet full of fabric and for a moment thought about quitting quilting.  No matter how many scraps I use I just make more.  They will never be gone.  There are also pieces I think I will donate and try to get a fix on things.  I know if I quit I will be sorry, so I guess I won't, but boy, am I tired of the mess.

January

 I do like the quiet of January.  Christmas starts in September, moves over a little bit for Halloween but then elbows right past Thanksgiving so by the time Christmas actually gets here I can be tired. Of it. January calms the noise.  

But therein lies the dilemma.  Do I use the quiet days to clean out the kitchen cupboards?  Do I use the quiet days to sew my little heart out?   Truly, I get better cleaning done when the sun is shining and that doesn't happen much in January, it's pretty gloomy. Lights on in the house gloomy. So use the gloomy days to get the sewing projects done enough to line up for actual quilting?  Prep some for retreat?  Such a dilemma.  

Right now the sewing mojo is working so I'm working with it.   Though I did read on a cooking page somewhere that every January this person cleans out the spices in the cupboard, doesn't toss them out but puts them all in one jar for a unique blend that she uses all the rest of the year on anything.  Sounds intriguing and I just might try it.  One jar as opposed to many that just feels like cleaning out the spices, doesn't it?  And if they were going to be tossed anyway, why not experiment a little? I know some people who think the word experiment is a four letter word, but I do it all the time.  The only problem with experimenting is when you do something and it turns out really good you can't duplicate it. 

    So, I've been putting together some blue snowballs.  All of the corners are a deep navy solid or blend. I don't have a design wall so laid them out on the Thinking Bed just to see if I really liked it or if it was an experiment that didn't work, you know, tossing all those different blues into one jar. I think the dark corners makes it work because the blues are certainly a conglomeration of everything in my stash that was small.  All those little jars!

     I also cut the templates for Adelaide's graduation quilt.  She picked a style off Pinterest, "I want this design, but these flowers and this background."  So I cropped and enlarged the flowers at the library and got her approval on size. Unlike Charlie and Elizabeth's quilts, for this quilt there will be no surprises, she will supervise each step. So yesterday I numbered each flower, numbered each petal and traced and cut them out, putting each flower in it's own zip bag.  

     I have been gathering sunflower golds/yellows/orange batiks and have a small stack but want a few more for variety, shading, etc.  I will also look for some greens.  It will be all batik flowers and leaves and stems on a regular quilt fabric background.  Appliqueing batik onto batik can be hard on the fingers and I mix fabrics ALL of the time.   

      She is only a junior and there is another whole year before she graduates but this gives me time to think and be able to do other things, like snowballs! 

     

New Year

 I do hope your year 2026 is a good one, a better one, a smart one.  Here in the U.S. 2026 can't possibly be worse than 2025....can it?  

Chooky organized two zooms, for her it was NYEve and NYDay, a real marathon.  I am happy I was able to be on for both of them for a few hours before my battery on the iPad died each day. It's so good to catch up with what I now consider my people.  On the first day there were quilters from Australia, New Zealand, England, Canada, the U.S., Germany, Norway and I'm sure I'm forgetting someone.   The next day was quieter with a couple of us from the U.S. and Australia.  It was so good to see everyone and I was disappointed to miss others as people came and went throughout the two days. 

We stitched and shared stories and weather, food, plans for this year.  I learned a few things, too.  I learned that when a chicken lays an egg she squawks or clucks or clears her throat or maybe is cheering herself?  I'm a city girl, I didn't know that.  And we in the U.S. are apparently the only ones who refrigerate their eggs.  Betty said the rule of law is to treat them at home the way you got them.  If they were refrigerated then keep them refrigerated.  If not then don't fret, they're ok for even a couple of weeks if the weather isn't too hot.  Here in the U.S. the stores refrigerate eggs so we keep them that way at home.  Who knew?

There were times we all just worked on our projects and no one was talking, we were just together.

This is what I worked on while zooming.

I used my hand crank machine and put the corners on the new set of snowballs.  All will be blue and the corners are all a deep navy so they'll work next to each other with no worry.  There are 56 here!  The pile still left is bigger than this and I'm taking a break from cutting more corner squares right now so this might morph into a bigger quilt than I intended. Or two.  These will measure five inches finished.
 

I also put the binding on this with the cranker machine.  I've never attempted that before and was glad to see it wasn't as hard as I anticipated.  This was a piece from Audrey over at Quilty Folk when she was 'helping' us do one of her fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants quilts. Her style is very unplanned and free cut and I love that but I lost enough track of time that it languished too long so I got it out of the basket, big stitch quilted it and layered it and called it finished after sewing down the binding last night.  She has stopped blogging and turned to IG so I don't catch up with her work as much as I used to.  But I like this, there's something to look at everywhere.

So, fingers crossed, here's hoping here's hoping here's hoping 2026 isn't grotesque. I have to dig deep.