Yesterday I met with some gals from our class of '59 for a luncheon.  Out of a class of 27, 10 were girls.  We try to get together a couple of times a year. Two gals live in Arizona and one up west of the twin cities, so this is our usual group.  We talk about our kids, grandkids, even great-grandkids, health, and memories.  You know--"remember when".  None of our classmates have passed away.  Must have been hardy stock! Where we ate is one of my favorite eating places and one of my favorite foods there is their pie!  Banana cream pie!!  Look at the height of that meringue!  I'm pretty sure there weren't any calories in it!  I really do like to eat my dessert first.  Want to make sure I have
room for it. I'd rather leave some of the main course
than to be too full to eat my pie!! 

 Jolyn

Christmas Pickle

 Last fall Tracy and I went down to the AQS show in Des Moines.  Fell in love with a lot of quilts, but this one, "Christmas Pickle" by Dreamspinners caught my eye.  I bought the pattern thinking I had enough greens in my stash to make it.  When I started pulling out fabrics, my greens were blue greens and seemed to all be the same value.  So I ended up ordering a kit.  All of January 2010 was spent piecing this.  To make the pinwheel blocks, I overcut the triangles and then trimmed the squares to size.  Tracy quilted it for me and made it come to life.  I guess some others liked it too as it got Grand Champion at our county fair.  That's a first for me.  If I remember right,Tracy got a Grand Champion on her Island Sunrise wall hanging that I pieced and she quilted.  I think we're a team!  There were enough leftover pieces to make four more blocks, so I used purples instead of the reds and hung it in our bathroom as it matches the colors in there.  There is still a box of green fabric leftovers.  This one will hang in our living room during the Christmas season.  Always fun to have something new to hang up.

Buggy Rides

 When the grandkids come to the farm, one of the things they enjoy doing is going for a buggy ride with Grandpa Wayne. It's a quiet, peaceful retreat from our hectic world.  Our dog, Trooper always gets so excited when Wayne hitches up Sammy.  If he doesn't get to tag along, he lays and crys and crys. It's pretty pathetic!  When they're on the road, he's learned that when Wayne tells him to "Lay down" - he minds as cars are coming.  He hasn't learned how much easier it is to ride in the buggy than to lope alongside of Sammy for miles.  Trooper runs through the puddles of water in the ditches to cool down.  Will have to get a picture of him on here.  
 He loves people!      Just a warning.     Jolyn

Graduation Quilt

I'm practicing while our granddaughter is here so I can holler for help.  This is a picture of our latest grandson to graduate from high school.  Right now we have four grandsons in college.  This quilt is "Fire Escape" by Atkinson Designs.  Fun quilt to make (and no borders!)  
The sun is shining and we're waiting for the fields to dry out so the combines can roll.  One of my favorite times of the year!  We've had a hot and muggy summer, but the crops look good - just need to get them out of the field!  
Jolyn

Barn Quilt and Horses

I'm still learning how to do this!  It's so easy with our granddaughter here to help me.  Tomorrow will be the test! 


  I like to decorate with quilts - even outside.  My friend, Tracy made this barn quilt and it sits where everyone can see it driving up our driveway.  You might notice the "doctor's buggy".  We have a horse - Sammy.  Guess we've always had horses.  The last two winters we lost our two older horses - Jimmy who was almost 40 years old.  Last winter we lost Jake who was in his 20's.  That was unexpected.  This spring Wayne was reading Craig's list and found us a new one, Sammy.  I always thought Jimmy and Jake were the best horses you could get, but Sammy is really a good one too.  Jimmy was the type of horse that we could put any grandchild, any age on him and he would be gentle.  Still remember the time one of the grandsons wanted to be a cowboy and ride Jimmy alone.  So he grabbed his grandma-made vest, cowboy hat and we sat him on Jimmy in the middle of the pasture all alone.  He sat like a cowboy, singing away and Jimmy never took a step.  Memories!!

New to the blog world!!

Hi- After thinking about blogging for quite sometime, this is it!!  Helps to have a granddaughter help set it up!  It's a beautiful sunny day in southern Minnesota after last week's torrential rains.  We got over 7" to make our month's total so far 14",  The soybeans are ready to harvest so this was not good timing!  But we are very thankful to not have inches or feet of water in our basement.  

  Our granddaughter came Saturday night and will stay until Tuesday or Wednesday.  This morning we each made a batch of rye bread (5 loaves apiece) and canned 17 pints of beautiful applesauce.  Much more fun with someone to help.  Wayne and I had gone to an apple orchard Saturday and bought a half bushel of Haraldson's.

They were huge, making the peeling go so much faster.  Will have another 8 pints to do tomorrow.