Okay... I'm in! Farmers Wife Quilt -Along

Attic Windows #1

Churn Dash #20

Big Dipper #6

I have owned this book for quite some time. Recently, with all the activity surrounding this quilt and the quilt-along group on Flickr... I had that little extra push that I needed to start this project. Granted, I am behind... like I have made three blocks and the goal is to make 2 a week and the group is on week 11. I think I can catch up to the group. The fabric I am using is all dots. I have been collecting them, thinking I was going to make an applique quilt with my little growing stash. But the Farmers Wife is calling me.

PS I broke my CD last summer. Another reason I didn't start sooner. I called the publisher a couple weeks ago and they sent me a new CD... for FREE!

Thank you!

Garden before and after plus a huge tomato

May 2011

today

today

I was out in my garden today and I thought I would update the progress of my little annual patch I planted. As you can see in the May photo, not much is there. The flowers were struggling to grow in our cold spring. But summer is here now and the flower bed is bursting with color.

1 1/2 pound tomato

Next up is my HUGE tomato. This one is going onto my plate tonight. I will share this with Mr. Farmer in a caprese salad. I love this time of year. Our meals are so local... lettuce, pea pods, beans, cukes, tomatoes, herbs, berries, cherries. Tomorrow I am going to Castle Rock to pick up the butchered hog Mr. Farmer bought at the 4H livestock auction. Yeah! He also purchased chickens and a turkey. Mr. Farmer wants me to fix the turkey for a meal during the wheat harvest. Yummy! Turkey and all the fixin's.

Life on a working farm...

The farming life has got the best of me. My days have run into one another... I just hope a can wash my hair on a regular basis.

 

First thing, Happy belated  Birthday to  my baby girl.

Not such a baby anymore. She claims she is in her mid-twenties. Whatever. 

And my other baby came home for five days. So nice to see her. That was the best $$$ I have spent recently... for her plane ticket. It is not cheap to fly at the last minute but it saved her from having to drive 10 hours one way, by her self.

And Mr. Farmer sold his car.

 

 He bought this back in the early '90's from an elderly neighbor. Her Dad bought this car new in 1954 and died shortly after. Her Mom continued to drive this car until her passing in 1977. Then Karen could not part with the car and the memories. It sat in her husband's shop until Mr. Farmer spotted it. Karen felt that she could part with the car. So... it came to live in our garage. Mr. Farmer worked on the wiring and had some body work completed. Mr. Farmer thought about selling it at different times... like to pay for the girl's braces. But he couldn't part with the car. And it moved with us and sat in our lean- to and barn for years. Another neighbor recently asked if Mr. Farmer would be willing to sell the car and he agreed. Now Ethel belongs to someone else. I will miss seeing her. I never rode in her. But I did get to pull her to compression start her engine. I feel so close to her.

Ethel's Stats

1954 Ford Customline

four door

15,884 original miles

Mr. Farmer will be looking for a new hobby at the end of harvest.