Snow Before Halloween

A few photos of what we woke up to this morning. It's a good thing that we got some of the leaves raked on Monday! We don't often have snow before Halloween. I don't know if this means we are going to have a hard winter, or not.

The patio.

Beyond the fence you can see the play yard. It has a tarp on the top level and two more tarps on the sides, one on the north and one on the west. It is doing a great job of keeping the wood that is stacked underneath dry.

The maple tree in the back yard still hasn't lost it's leaves, poor thing! I'm glad it is a sturdy tree and we don't have to worry about the weight of the snow on the branches.

We have already had the wood stove going a few times this winter. Our daughter who lives in New England said they run their pellet stove all day and night now because it is so cold there already!

One more thing I wanted to write down so I don't forget... Sparky's tail FINALLY fell off yesterday! We've been checking it every day for a few weeks wondering when it was going to come off. Here is the link to the original post. It took a month for it to fall off. I don't remember the smaller lambs taking this long, but maybe they did. We'll be sure to do it when they are younger next spring.

Time to milk!

Oregon Trail Quilt: Log Cabin

At the end of the journey, it would be time to build a log cabin, so that's the last block the quilt store gave us to do. I like paper piecing, and I like the center square of the log cabin to be the same size as the other strips, so I drafted a paper piecing pattern instead of using their directions.

Photo of finished blocks. This is the way I will put it into the final quilt. Since this is a directional block, it will look differently depending on how it is placed.

You should be able to click on the image above and then right-click and save as to your computer.

You should be able to click on the image above and then right-click and save as to your computer.

I rough cut the pieces for my log cabin and then paper pieced them. I don't cut as I go, I cut all the pieces at once, just like I do for a regular pieced block. It saves me time and frustration cutting them to a little larger than the piece in the block. Paper piecing gives very accurate blocks! I love it!

Oregon Trail Quilt: Prairie Queen

Prairie Queen took some time to stitch together. I strip pieced the small 4-patches used on the center sides of the block. That made it go faster than stitching together so many 1 1/2" squares! I also used a special ruler called a Triangle Square Up Ruler by Quilt in a Day. It made the corner half-square triangles very quick to piece.

This is a fairly old block. A Prairie Queen is a woman who lived, worked, and raised a family on the prairie.

Photo of finished Prairie Queen block.

You should be able to click on the image above and then right-click and save as to your computer.

You can find directions for Prairie Queen at Patterns From History.

Here is some fun information on Prairie Queens found at Prairie Queens.com.

You, or your female ancestor, might be a Prairie Queen if:

• You had any of your children at home, alone, with no doctor or midwife, no medicine and no family member present.
• You learned how to knit, sew, crochet, embroider, quilt, tat AND needlepoint all before the age of 12.
• You have cooked beaver, raccoon, possum, ground hog, squirrels or whatever else was brought home.
• You made mincemeat for pie by starting with a whole hogs head
• You have recipes for souse, hogshead cheese, egg butter and green tomato pie.
• You make your own sauerkraut from scratch.
• You make a poultice to put on your child's snakebite.
• You have six or more children.
• Your cellar is filled with canned vegetables from your garden.

Oregon Trail Quilt: Broken Wheel

Another block that I enjoyed making and I really like the way it looks, too! The ladies at the store who chose the colors did a fantastic job!

Of course you would find a Broken Wheel block in a quilt titled "Oregon Trail!"

Photo of the finished blocks.

You should be able to click on the image above and then right-click and save as to your computer.

If you want to try a 12" block, you can find it here at Quilter's Cache.

Oregon Trail Quilt: Rocky Mountain Puzzle

I loved this block! I don't know if it is the colors or the pattern, but I like it either way!

The directions for the block are for two fabrics, I really wanted a third color since most of my blocks have three fabrics in them, so I used a different color for the center block and for the corner blocks. The half square triangles are made out of the two fabrics that the store provided.

Photo of the finished 6" blocks.

You should be able to click on the image above and then right-click and save as to your computer.

The directions at Quilter's Cache are for an 8" block.

Oregon Trail Quilt: Indian Mats

Not my favorite block, but the name works in with Oregon Trail, that's why they chose it. It looks quite a bit like Bear Paw, but the coloring is different and the 'paw' is solid on a Bear Paw. Here's the link to my Bear Paw blog entry.

Photo of the finished blocks.

You should be able to click on the image above and then right-click and save as to your computer.

If it had been me picking the patterns for the quilt instead of the quilt store, I would have chosen this version of Indian Mats found at Quilter's Cache. The rules of the "Free Block of the Month Class" are that you have to complete the quilt squares from the last month in order to get the kit for the next month for free.

I almost always get my blocks done, I think there has only been one time in 5 years that I haven't. If I don't particularly like the block pattern, then I don't add it to the quilt. But I always do the block because I almost always learn something while I am working on it.

Tomatoes and More Tomatoes

Sheepy's Dad has lots and lots of tomatoes. The agreement is that I will dry as many as humanly possible and she gets half. What a great deal for me!!

Here are the 4 boxes that got it started.

I found out that if I spray the trays with non-stick cooking spray the tomatoes release easily and I don't have to wash the trays as often between batches.

The first 9 trays. Hubby had another 20 trays at work, which he brought home a few days later when another 4 bushels of tomatoes were dropped off. It takes me about 40 minutes to wash, slice, and fill 15 trays!

I love this dehydrator! It will handle up to 30 trays, although I don't put more than 15 on at a time. Hubby has two bases at work, so I have two dehydrators going almost all the time. It takes between 18-24 hours to dry one batch of tomatoes. 

Dehydrating tomatoes is so much easier on me than bottling them. I get to work for a few hours and then the dehydrator does the rest. I don't have to babysit the canner or worry about jars breaking. All I do is slice and stack!

So, what am I planning on doing with all these tomatoes? I made my first batch of lasagna last week. I blended the tomatoes in my blender until they were a powder, added water, garlic, onion powder, and salt to make the sauce. I was very tomato-y flavored. If I had let the sauce simmer on the stove, I'm sure it would have mellowed the flavor a bit.

Here's a link to Diane Hopkins blog post about V8 Powder: although I have only dried tomatoes, the idea is the same. At the end of her post are two great tables that show how much tomato powder to mix with water to make tomato paste, tomato sauce, tomato juice, or stewed tomatoes.

I've lost count of how many bags of tomatoes I've sealed. These are the two that are ready to head to the storage room.

I am sealing my tomatoes as they come out of the dehydrator, not powdering them first. That way if I want stewed tomatoes I can crumble the tomatoes a little and just add hot water.