Compost Color

 

Colorful pumpkins, their autumn orange starting to go dull, ended up on the compost pile this week. Nights of deep freeze caused their flesh to wrinkle and their sidewalls to collapse. 

The compost pile tells the story of good eating. Wrinkled peppers from the garden, grapefruit skins, orange rinds, onion peels -- all join the discards where time and rot and degradation, energized by bacteria and moisture and heat, will create a rich new start for next year's garden. 

Some days, when I walk out to discard the peels and parings from a meal, I will find things scattered and I will know that another creature is benefiting from pile. A deer might sniff and nibble on an orange rind. A raccoon carries an eggshell onto the pathway. 

Most days though, what I see is the subtle change as the color and form of what once was food slowly becomes soil. 

It's quite the miracle, this progression of organisms and molecules and cellular structure into nutrients. From the orange of autumn to the green of spring, the compost pile does its biological job. 

Little Piggies

Ed took this photo of me with the bronze javelinas just outside the entrance to Arizona Sonora Desert Museum last Saturday night.

We enjoyed their Midnight Sky event which featured night time walks along the garden paths, artwork for kids, a chance to dine at the Ocotillo Cafe, and some beautiful views of the full moon from out in the Tucson Mountains.

The javelinas are often mistaken for little piggies, so that's what I'm calling this blog post. Actually, javelinas can get to be the size of a medium sheep, much bigger than these little bronze greeters at the museum gate.

Southern Arizona had high winds last week and those high winds followed us to Michigan on Sunday. Our Delta jet did some turbulent rocking and rolling as we headed over the storm into rain swept Detroit. Still, it feels so good to be home.

Thanksgiving Blessings

With less than two weeks until Thanksgiving, I'm thinking holidays already. I didn't take the time to straighten and perfect this artwork. Thanksgiving and holidays in general aren't ever perfect either.

That's okay. What counts are all the good things that come our way through life's ups and downs. So if these turkeys are a little tilted, so be it. That's life.

Off center, tilted, and full of blessings.

Birthday Batch

At Grandma Pauline's -- Christmas 2010

The fall birthday batch is in full swing. Clay's birthday is today, but he is in Taiwan, so his birthday was really yesterday. (If you can figure that statement out, you have traveled across the International Date Line at least once.)

Wendy (far left) and Pete (far right) are October babies; Hannah (the little one) joins Finn who is not in this photo as a September baby, and Will (second from left) joins Clay (second from right) as a November kid.

Whew! That's a whole big batch of birthdays, all in a row, and it doesn't even count the myriads of friend birthdays that pop up on the fall calendar, too.

Eat cake! Be happy!

Big 4-0

Hard to believe, isn't it, when one of your kids turns a certain age? Whether that milestone is 1, or 10, or like today's child, the big 4-0, your children always shine in your heart, no matter what.

Today's is Will's fortieth birthday and he is working with the crew of Chicago PD, the next Dick Wolf drama that NBC is premiering on January 8th. Will's job as a steadicam operator and photographer puts him plop in the middle of some fascinating situations.

The situation pictured above is of Will when he was almost two, plopped between his parents during the fall of 1975. I was expecting Liesl in February and Ed, like Will, was working away from Michigan in Tennessee that fall. So this photo was taken, we think, in Great Smoky Mountain National Park, or maybe somewhere along the Blue Ridge Parkway.

Happy birthday, Will!

Last year's birthday post

Fashion note: Yes, I did knit Will's pullover (knit out of Coats and Clark Clansman yarn) and my poncho. A poncho! Good Lord, remember those! And check out the deep hems on Will's homemade pants. I certainly expected that child to grow! And then those navy and tan saddle shoes on a two year old -- stylish!

Quilt Max

I should remember the name of this teddy bear quilt that I made for grandson Max, but I don't. I fell in love with the applique bears that look out windows that crisscross the quilt. Their little paws, simple oval shapes, take on a charming look, kind of a "I see you and I want to give you a big bear hug" kind of feeling.

I started this quilt for Max before he was born, before we knew that he would be kid who loves purple. If I were to make a quilt for him now, I would include purple since that has become an absolute, all time favorite color of his.

Anyway, the Max Bear Quilt is a favorite of mine. It is a good example of how a little bit of applique (the bears) combines with a little bit of piecing (the diagonal sashes) and a little bit of quilting (the seashell pattern on the cloud fabric) to produce an enchanting quilt for a kid.

Note to quiltmakers: The pattern for this quilt is from Quiltmaker magazine, probably an issue in the mid-1990's. And, yes, I did use Thangles to piece the sashing.

Quilts Blooming

A favorite design for many quilters is the Blooming Nine Patch quilt. Here's the one that I made for Will and Wendy's wedding quilt. It is all batiks and it won a prize at the Thumb Area Quilt Guild show in the summer of 2004 (or was it 2005?)

My mother-in-law, Pauline Geiger Eichler, made the same quilt using green and pink print fabrics. As you can see, it was a prize winner, too. Set on the diagonal, this design uses nine-patch blocks that blend from one fabric to the next.

I can honestly say that I have never seen a bad quilt made from this design!