New reads

 Tuesday's reads this week.  

I chose two that are over 30 years old but endure.  I tell the kids if a book is really good people will keep buying it and if they keep buying it the people who make the books will keep making more of them.  Some things really do keep on keeping on.

These two deserve it.

David Small is almost a household name in Michigan if you are in the children's book world. His illustrations are classic.   Imogene wakes up one morning with a huge rack of antlers on her head.  This doesn't seem to bother her in the least but it sure sets her mother off!  I mean, really, what would YOU do if your child came down for breakfast sporting a rack like this?  

I love, love, love this one.  Brigid wants markers.  Mom says no because she has heard that markers only mean trouble.  Coloring on walls, floors, themselves, they are a mess so "NO!" Brigid makes some good arguments in favor, makes some promises and keeps them so she manages to convince mom to get more.  And more.  And then temptation sets in.  With the kids there is ALWAYS a laugh and an "oh no!" moment at the end.

I am coming along very quickly on the border design for the BA quilt.  I chose to do a swag. The two long sides are swagged, I'm putting a sort of flower at the ends, which I like a lot, and when those flowers are done tonight I'll attach the long sides, measure for the short sides and keep on keeping on. It's coming and I'm on target to get it finished and layered for quilting by Christmas. But December is becoming very busy so I have to keep plugging on.  This year with only 3 weeks from Thanksgiving to Christmas is very stressful. 

New stuff

 I know I said I haven't done anything other than the Baltimore Album for months but I did get some pillowcases done for the kids for St. Nick's Day.  I have made pillowcases for the kids for years and Mike asked for some new ones for Christmas.  I have some but not many Christmas fabrics in my stash and only had to shop for a few.  The two cookie baking are for Adelaide and Ceci, the bakers in the families.  The middle one is Elizabeth.  It has a carol in tiny print and she is in the choir and writes like a No-See-Um crawling on the page so this fits her.  Mike chose the red snowman and Charlie, now a college student gets the manly plaid.  I use the French seam method when I make these for the kids and they love getting new ones.  Our DIL said the kids always want "grandma's pillowcases" on bedding changing day and in their Halloween photo Mike was taking his Halloween case trick or treating to fill with candy.  

Last week I couldn't breathe much less speak and things are not going to be better anytime soon. But I have to keep putting one foot in front of the other.

These are the two books from last week

This one the teacher always appreciates me bringing in.  Playground behavior many times dictates apologizing and this one gives good insight in how to do that. Correctly so it means something. 

Now, don't get excited.  But I have to say this title is always a way to stop the fidgets.  This is the story of a dung beetle who is torn between wanting to be with the popular bugs and his love of his food.  No one wants to sit with him at lunch for good reason.  But when it's time to show what he's made of - so to speak - he comes through and with that the other bugs admit to THEIR idiosyncrasies which can be just as gross or weird, proving we are all a little weird in our own ways.  The teacher liked this one so much after I read it last year she bought a copy for her grandchildren.

And these are from today

As much as I hate to use our new political situation in comparison to a great storybook this one does ring a few bells.  The river was there but it didn't know it was a river UNTIL (- a refrain throughout the book so soon your audience will say it at every page - )  bear comes along.  It's a cumulative story and very good.

You must know by now how I feel about Ryan T. Higgins.  Wilfred is one of his earlier books but no less wonderful.  Wilfred is a very large hairy monster who finds himself near a village of very little people who are ALL bald, even the children.  Because he is very large and very hairy he has a hard time making friends until one bald little boy befriends him.  Big "Awww" factor here. 

Look quickly

 Look quickly because I think I have to hide this post just in case Elizabeth looks at my blog, which I'm 99.9% sure she doesn't but just in case.  New post on something else tomorrow so this goes down the que! 

Yesterday I finished the last square and then took the night off. 

Each square tell something about her life.  Still needs to be sashed and bordered.  I am forever grateful she didn't want a 'fussy' Baltimore Album and when I calmed down, made a targeted timeline I had a wonderful time researching what to do.  But holy cow, the mess on the thinking bed working out colors, making templates, cutting and organizing them.  Phew!

Quickly:  she wanted flowers, the colors red, yellow and green to predominate, and I took it from there.  Top row: flowers and the right corner is cherries, her favorite fruit.  Next row: her yellow cat, and on the end oak leaves and acorns for the oak tree outside her bedroom window that she is very allergic to BUT that tree has been dated to the Civil War (1860s) and so it stays.   Next row, red colonial pineapples, old pattern.  Laurel wreath for Ancient Rome, her initial on the fabric she brought home from Williamsburg, Hamilton.  Next row, small wreath with raspberries for the many, many trips to pick berries every summer, next a red rose because June's flower is the rose and she was born in June, next, their house, next Hobbit hole door with the first line of the book embroidered under it. Bottom row, books.  She is an avid reader, the clunky flowers she painted on the mural on their garage when she was just a tot. I always thought her leaves looked like popsicle sticks.  

When she was just an infant she had a sleeper she wouldn't give up when she grew out of it.  She called it her cuddle.  We called it Cuddy.  Cuddy still sleeps with her.  Well, it was a dusty pink with gray rabbits on it.  I interpreted that by nestling in a rabbit on some of her blocks.  There's one on her initial, one on the house block, one on the wreath of berries. and in the center of the oak leaves/acorns there is an owl that you can hardly see because it blends in so well....as owls do in trees.  She has always had a thing for owls, too.

Each square is cut to 10.5 inches, to finish at 10. I cut them to size yesterday. Today I put the sashing on then measure and cut for borders then cut the pieces for the VERY simple border. 

Phew! Nowhere near done but I am on target.  

"Pity the Nation"

 My state of disbelief is beyond words so I had to let someone else say them.  I don't even have the capacity to react.  Disgust? Shame? Fear? I'll think of a few more when my heartrate settles down and my stomach stops churling.

My disappointment is mammoth.  I never, ever dreamed that the entire U.S. was so overrun with people who are bigoted and intolerant, who believe white people are the only ones worthy of living life, who would actually allow old white men to tell them what to do, who believe it's so ok to hate, to disrespect the person sitting next to them.  Who want to turn our history back 400 years ago.  That's not you, you say? Really? 

NEVER EVER did I think this is what people believed, truly in their hearts.  How can you hug your children if you believe in this person?  How can you smile at your neighbor if you believe in this person?  How can you proclaim yourself if you believe in this person?  People would actually say they 'didn't like what he said but liked his policies" and I would laugh.  He has no policies.  He doesn't know what a policy is.  YOU weren't listening.

Now, I know those of you who voted for this poor excuse for a human being think I am the one who is all of these things.  That I am the one casting aspersions on you, if you voted for him.  That I am the one who needs tweaking.  That I am the one who is intolerant of you.  Maybe so, now.  But I don't think so.  If  YOU voted for him you did this. You think his hatred, his complete ignorance, his criminal behavior, his white supremacist beliefs, that putting him in front of a microphone and doing NOTHING but spewing hate and name calling, things we put our children in time-out corners for, things we don't allow on the playground with kindergarteners, you applauded it, and rewarded it with the highest honor a citizen of the U.S. could hope for.  You allowed someone into that chair who declared he WOULD be a dictator and punish women and surrounded himself with the scariest power hungry white men.  You did this. After what will be 14 years of his vile behavior I don't know if we will ever turn away from indecency.  I hope you know something that I don't because God help us all. 

Now, that's the last I'm going to say about this, even though my heart rate won't slow down and my stomach won't stop churling and I am trying to decide what to do about the people I personally know who voted for him.  My capacity for forgiveness, let bygones be bygones, doesn't stretch that far. 

Hate wins

 I'm sorry, but I can't talk right now.

Halloween

Did you think I forgot Tuesday's books?  I did.  I thought of this post this morning.  Oops. Both are very Halloweeny books so save them for next year.

 I already told you what I think of Ryan T. Higgins.  He started with a book called Mother Bruce (instead of Goose) and it was an instant hit, not only for the story but this guy is a master at illustrations and expressions and making adults laugh.  This is his Halloween book and probably, *cringe* the weakest ONLY because I think knowing what the Legend of Sleepy Hollow is about helps with the humor and kids don't know that story.  But if you own all of the Ryan T. Higgins books, like I do, this is in the collection.

This one, though, has been a Halloween favorite for many years.  I can't imagine not reading it just before the holiday.  Mr. Wilkerson is a very crabby, mean ol' guy who wants his pumpkin pie perfect.  Demands it.  Mrs. Wilkerson makes his pie and as he was taking the first bite he dies. She buries him in the pumpkin patch and moves away.  A grandma and her grandson move in and unwittingly put a fresh baked pie on the windowsill to cool. Yup, Mr. Wilkerson wants a pie so bad he will rise from his grave to get one. And holy cow, trying to please that old codger isn't easy.  But Grandma isn't afraid of an old puff of smoke grump.  Again, the illustrations are amazing.

I am within three squares of 20 for the BA quilt for Elizabeth. I debated stopping at 16 but couldn't get my mind around a square quilt for a tall girl and I also didn't want to make four more.  Adelaide stopped by Saturday, I showed her what I have, she said Elizabeth will love this quilt and we brainstormed a few more ideas so ok, I'm making four more for 20. I will determine if she looks at the blog before I post any pics because she said even though she gave me some thoughts, she wants it to be a surprise.  Since that is the ONLY stitching I am working on there isn't much else to show.   

For now, the weather is unusually warm but it's windy so the leaves are all off the trees and the forest has a new blanket of fresh yellow and it's beautiful.  Too beautiful to be sitting inside so I am taking my book and tea out to read.  

A Sky High Adventure

 Our weather has been spectacularly beautiful lately.  Very mild temperatures for October and the colors are peak right this minute.  I have been feeling very guilty about not being out there in it so yesterday PH and I drove three hours north to Boyne Mountain.  It's a ski resort, there's golf and there are trees. Between two of the highest hills/mountains they built this:

Can you see that bridge strung out there with people walking on it?  It's called the Skybridge and you don't get much closer to feeling like you are walking in the sky than this.  

I suggested it to PH for a day trip and thought he would say no because he is very uncomfortable of heights and being out there on something like this, well, it would take all the courage he could muster. BUT he doesn't tell me no.  So we went.

It was a Monday so we thought weekend crowds might be lessened.  Nope.

You go up one ski lift to the top, walk across - everyone going in the same direction, and at the end take another ski lift back down.  

The bridge wobbles a lot. You are walking down then it evens out they you go back up.  Not a lot, but when it evens out in the middle it's also a glass floor.  I kept telling PH, who was concentrating his mostest to get across at all, not to look down.    I thought this would never be something I'd do but lately I've been talking about a hot air balloon or sky diving and so in PH's thinking this was small potatoes. And for me, I was surprised at how easy it was, how short it felt and how quickly it was over!  The views? Spectacular.  Do it again? Absolutely.  

Our son, who grew up on the Indiana Jones movies and can recite every single word of the dialogue of all the movies and relates just about anything to a scene in the movies sent this to me after I told him what we did. He thought I would have the problem with the crossing, not PH.

I don't know why I felt the need to go somewhere else because this is the view outside the door right next to where I am sitting now.  Our forest goes on and on with hills and the trees so golden the glow changes the whole inside of the house to golden.  Sit out there and the leaves fall on you like feathers and you can hear them rustle against each other as they come down.  Everyone says they love fall but hate what's coming.  But you don't want to hurry this.

 

It's Tuesday and these were my reads for today.  I didn't bring absolute Halloween books with me this time but stuck with the night and with a bat.

Stellaluna has been a favorite for 25 years.  I remember when I worked in a bookstore and it first came in I was won over with the illustrations, they are gorgeous.  

Stellaluna is a fruit bat.  One night she is separated from her mother by a hungry owl but falls into a nest of birds. Well, talk about being confused!  Birds eat yucky bugs and don't hang by their toes and don't fly at night.  She adapts, though she will never like the bugs.  Eventually she finds her momma who promises she will never have to eat a bug again.

This one is silly.  The animals are afraid of some night noise and thus afraid of the night animals the perceive are making the noises.  This one needs close examination of the pictures because the expression on this opossum's face when skunk demonstrates his way of dealing with a threat is hilarious. Not a lot of words in this one, the pictures tell the story so a little one who is learning to read can pretty much handle this one.  I love this one!