Blogger's Quilt Festival - Shiplapped

I worked on this all weekend to squeeze it into the Blogger's Quilt Festival before the deadline.  Whew! I made it!

A few years ago I bought a kite ruler that could be used to create equilateral triangles.  At that time I had also collected a bunch of scrap strings.  I decided I wanted to make a quilt with triangle string blocks.  Soon after I started making my 6" string blocks I discovered selvedge quilts, and the remaining blocks primarily consisted of selvedge strings.  Every time I finished a quilting project, I'd make several more triangles (and some crumb hexies that were also inspired from the same ruler).

Blueberry Cake

Newbury blueberries are little and flavorful.  They're perfect for baking and I recently received a four pound bucket of them.  Enough to make lots of blueberry cake.

I had to chuckle when I pulled out my recipe.  I copied this decades ago from my mother's recipes.  This must have been a recipe she wrote down and not out of a book, because the method was exceedingly terse.  "Fold whites" of course means you've beaten them first.  It never even mentions separating the eggs, it simply says to add yolks to the butter and sugar.  My recipe writing style is much the same - so I've tried to be more verbose here than usual. 

I Like Thursday: Leftovers, Odds and Ends

I like walking the beach on the off season.  Lots of sand and water, not many people.  I was amused by this sign I had not noticed before - it claims to be Pervert's Perch.  I'm sure it has a great view of the beach below.

I met a goofy golden lab on my walk, too.  He looked like he was digging to China at the waterline.  He was putting a ball in the hole, then digging deeper.  I stopped to talk to his caretaker - said the dog just liked to do that.  At this point, the dog took notice of me, ran over and dropped the ball near my feet.  The guys were impressed - evidently he doesn't share his ball with just anyone.  I threw it into the water - further than any of us thought I could.  The lab was thrilled and went swimming after it.

I also enjoyed meeting a pair of treasure hunters that day, with their metal detectors.  All they had found were nails, no doubt flung from the construction site at the top of the bluff.

Blogger's Quilt Festival - Sunshine

Yay!  It's time for the Blogger's Quilt Festival!  I'm not sure where I'll find the time to browse through the hundreds of entries.  I always add more from each festival of things I need to try and I'm already working on a backlog of patterns.  This isn't helping.  Nonetheless, I'm thrilled to participate.  (I just need to finish my second entry by Monday.  Eek!)

My first entry was completed in January (thus the snowy photo).  My mother requested a twin-sized quilt with rounded corners and picked Bonnie Hunter's Celtic Solstice as a pattern.  Once I calculated the yardage, we met at a fabric store and she picked the colors she wanted.

Fall Boston Pignic 2018

We always fret about the weather for a pignic.  Too hot?  Too cold?  Too wet?  We decided to hold it on a possibly too-warm day instead of wait for the rain date, which currently looks too cold and rainy!  We did the right thing.  Under the trees at the Wellesley Bowl, it turned out to be a terrific day for a pignic.

Wedgwood's Fifth Birthday

Wedgwood is officially five years old.  I still suspect she's a little younger than that, but we'll roll with this.

And what a year for rolling with stuff.  Since her last birthday Wedg has lost Boadicea, then lost weight, then eventually gained Mabel, and lost some more weight.  Through it all she's kept her attitude, her pointed nose, and her fan club down at the vet's office.  I suspect she's kept all her badness, too, but she's less inclined to dish it out with Mabel.  That tells you how well they're getting along together.  They're a great pair.

Nauset Light to Campground

One last leftover from Chick Weekend - then I swear I'm done.  Well, maybe a couple of more photos in the next I Like Thursday post.

We stay in Eastham, a short walk from Campground Beach.  Nauset Light (from yesterday's post) is on the ocean side of Eastham, three miles straight east from Campground.  When we got back from Nauset Light I recorded what high tide looks like at Campground for comparison.  These two clips were taken only an hour apart. 

Ocean Fun

On the last day of Chick Weekend we headed to Nauset Light in Eastham, MA.  It was windy, cloudy and cool.  We decided to see what the water was like and check out the seal/shark activity.  Turned out to be an exciting way to spend the morning.

Shark warnings, kite surfer, lots of sea foam, and a much shorter sand dune with a missing staircase

The wind was whipping and the waves were impressive as high tide rolled in.  We were immediately sandblasted as we got out of the car.  The stairs and the bathhouse were gone from last year.  They've given up on building stairs (which have been rebuilt year after year) and have opted for a sloped path through the dunes to get to the shoreline.  I know there were plans to rebuild the bathhouse; currently there's a sad little trailer at the other end of the parking lot.  I'm amazed how much has eroded in my lifetime.