Its so hard for me to quilt in the summer!

It is so hard for me to get much quilting done in the summer. 

I suppose since Kenna sleeps in my sewing room, that doesn't help.

But I did get this sweet thing back from the machine quilter a few days ago.

This is a Friendship Quilt Block quilt from a few years ago. 

Meaning that some of the Dutchmans Puzzle blocks were made by some friends from my local quilt guild.

I think it turned out great. Now my most dreaded part - the binding.

This is a simple quilt I made for one of my civil war reenacting friends. 

He usually portrays a Confederate Infantry soldier, so I made this quilt to look like one of the quilts a family member or a ladies aid society would have made and sent to the soldiers in the field.

I used all civil war reproduction fabrics and attached this label.

It says " Made for J.P. Merton.

I pray you will return to us safely.

R. Crane"

I get to deliver this quilt to its new owner next week. I hope he likes it!

13 of my family members have been involved in a really fun friendship block exchange over the past year. We have a reunion coming up next month where we raffle off items to raise money for the reunion the following year. My aunt had a fun idea to have us each make a block and put together a quilt for the reunion. There is always a gorgeous quilt made every year, so this is just an additional quilt.

I put the quilt top together yesterday, since we all decided on a patriotic theme for our blocks. I need to add one more border of blue, maybe two, and then get this baby completed by Labor Day.

It has been such a fun project with blocks made by family members from age 11 to 72ish. 

Then that brings me to this sweetheart. I have blogged about it before, but I FINALLY got it bound last week and entered it into our county fair. 

I made it in 2011 as a block of the month for our local quilt guild. 

It is called Time Marches On, and each block represents a time period or war the United States has been involved in.  Of course I used civil war reproduction fabrics, and traditional block patterns so it could be used at my civil war events.

I love combining quilting and civil war whenever possible.

So, that is some of the sewing I have been able to get finished recently. It is too nice outside to be sewing. And too many weeds to pull as well.

My grandpa was a logger.

Torrey Apple Days is always held on the weekend following the 4th of July.

It has been a tradition for many years for our family.

This year just the kids and I went down with my parents because Matt had to work.

We went to the parade and then we headed to my grandma's house which is just a block away from main street.  That is always my favorite part of the weekend - just going to my grandma's house.

On the short walk there, I saw some of my grandpa's old equipment and took a few pictures for fun.  

There are some old pictures of my grandpa sitting in the front of this truck that are so sweet.  

He was a logger.  He knew Boulder Mountain better than anyone in the county.  

He loved being out in the trees with his sons and their chainsaws.

This little dozer is my uncle Tuv's.  It was used to drag the trees they cut down to the piles.  Then all the trees were hauled off the mountain to the sawmill.  My uncle Tuv died on the mountain when I was 7, doing what they all loved to do.

 This is my uncle Mack, myself, my Grandma Elaine, and my cousin Weston's baby, Bryndl, on my grandma's front porch.  It was a great visit.  My cousin Marcy and all of her grown up kids were there and I haven't seen them in years and years and years.  Marcy was the super cool and beautiful older cousin that took me to get my ears pierced when I was 8.  So many fun memories of her when I was little.  I also got to visit with my fun and crazy male cousins.  They make me laugh.

I had a great weekend and I am so glad I got to spend a little time in Torrey.

  I

Just Fishing

Wasatch Mountain State Park in Midway has a super fun pond that we have visited to feed the ducks a few times.  We always see other people fishing there.  Well, it was our turn so we all went over on a beautiful evening last week and went fishing. 

Matt spent the entire time fixing poles and hooks, and the kids spent the entire time casting and reeling.  They loved it.

Love this picture I captured of Kelsey.  It was a truly gorgeous evening.

I grew up fishing with my family often.  It seems like many Sunday or Saturday afternoons were spent near a lake on Boulder Mountain or Thousand Lake Mountain, or a creek near Fishlake.  I have such good memories of those times with my parents, my brother, my sister, and sometimes neighbors and cousins.

Kenna and I just roamed around.  She loved watching the ducks and it sort of makes me sad that she says "duck" better than she says "mom," but oh well.

I am not sure what the family outing memories my kids will have of their childhood, but hopefully they are good ones, and there are plenty of them.

I wish every evening could be spent fishing, feeding the ducks, and being together.

Kenna turned one year old!

Kenna turned one year old a few weeks ago.  Boy how the time flies!  She seemed to just grow up all of a sudden a few weeks before her birthday.  She interacted with everyone more, started chattering like crazy, sort of listened to things I would tell her to do, played with different toys more, just an overall grow up spurt.

We went out to eat at Luke's in Midway that evening.  Her brother and sister enjoyed it more than she actually did, but it was a nice family outing to celebrate her one year mark.

I know, I know, but I just love this picture!  

All day, I kept thinking thoughts like, "Okay, about now one year ago I was in labor and was sitting by the air conditioner because I thought I might actually perish"  and "Okay, about now is when I told the kids their baby sister would be born this day" and "We went to the hospital about now exactly one year ago today."  Funny how a mother's brain works.

We did the traditional MAKE A MESS cake attack.  We have done this with all our kids on their first birthday.  Kenna wasn't shy about it, but she wasn't a pig either.  The kids loved watching her and cheering her on.  They kept sneaking tastes as well!

I sure love this little girl that was added to our family.  She makes me happy and keeps me busy.  She is a true joy and now that she has the stairs mastered in our house, LIFE IS GOOD!

Happy Birthday Sweet Kenna Holland Crane

Camp Floyd 2013

Memorial Day Weekend means a few things to me.  One of them is the Civil War encampment at Camp Floyd.

We could only attend on Saturday this year.  I loved it in past years when we camped and spent the entire weekend, but one day is all I could make work this year.

It was a pleasant day, weather and all.  The girls were well behaved and had an enjoyable time.

It was wonderful to chat with some of my reenacting friends that I only get to see a few times a year.

I took the girls through the Stagecoach Inn Museum.  They had not been in there before.  They loved it and of course we talked about how pampered we live now.

The girls and I had a marvelous day together.  I love that we can share good times together doing a unique hobby we all enjoy.

Baptism day

I made Kendal's baptism dress from a bolt of nice pima cotton that once belonged to Matt's grandmother.  The same bolt I used for Kelsey's baptism dress as well.  I decided to go through my grandmother Lela's button jar and found 4 matching white buttons, with the thread from the last project still attached.  I cut the thread off, and sewed them onto the back of Kendal's dress.

I am the sentimental one, so I thought it was sweet that Kendal had a piece of two of her great grandmothers with her when she was baptized.

The service was fantastic and Kendal loved having her special day.  Kelsey played the violin while Kendal and the other two children who got baptized that day sang a song for everyone.  That was my favorite part of the program.  After the service, we had a little lunch BBQ at our house for friends and family that had traveled to attend Kendal's special day.

We had a great afternoon eating together, chatting together, laughing together, and playing together.  I appreciate all the good friends and family we have around us.

 

  

 Happy baptism day Kendal!  We love you!

Harriet Ann Jacobs is on my mind

I purchased a bunch of books for Kelsey's Kindle the other day for my sweet voracious reader.  When I do this, I always put some of the free classics on there as well, for me to read.  I downloaded a book called Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl Written by Herself the other day and I have been reading it when I feed Kenna.

It was written by Harriet Ann Jacobs (February 11, 1813 – March 7, 1897) and was published in 1861under the pseudonym Linda Brent.  She escaped from slavery and became an abolitionist speaker and reformer. The book was one of the first autobiographical narratives about the struggle for freedom by female slaves and an account of the sexual harassment and abuse they endured.

There is one portion of the book I read today that made me think about my sweet children.  The background to this quote is that her 5 year old son, 1 year old daughter, and teenage brother are in jail because she ran away and hid in order for her master to sell her kids to a slavetrader she had previously set up to buy them.  Her master had a definate obsession with her, and she felt the only way to get her children out of slavery was for her to run away, therefore infuriating her master into selling her children.  The father to the children was a free man, and the slavetrader had arrangements to buy their two children and then sell them to the free father.

The 19 year old slave woman is hiding in a kind white woman's attic and gets reports from the cook every day.  When she learns her master has put both her children in jail in order to bait her to come back, she struggles with the cook to go to the jail and save her babies.  Betty the cook, who never had children, tells her to stay put and it will all work out.  These are the author's thoughts from page 156:

"Good old soul! She had gone through the world childless. She had never had little ones to clasp their arms round her neck; she had never seen their soft eyes looking into hers; no sweet little voices had called her mother; she had never pressed her own infants to her heart, with the feeling that even in fetters there was something to live for. How could she realize my feelings?"

Kenna has the sweetest habit of putting her arms tight around my neck whenever I hold her in front of a mirror.  Its as if she likes to see the two of us so tightly together.  It makes her smile, me smile, and it makes my heart melt.
I love looking into Kelsey's deep brown eyes and see so much love and compassion and goodness.
I love looking into Kendal's beautiful blue eyes and seeing the mischief and fun that fills her eyes and the love she has for life.
Even though Emmitt is 4 years old, he still loves to be held like a little tiny boy, tight to my chest, and snuggle without trying to get away. 

They are all precious to me, and I can not imagine life without one of them.  There are all kinds of love, but the love of a mother goes so deep.  It is not easy for me to express, but I feel it most ardently and deeply.  I wish I could put my feelings into words, but I am not capable.

So, I just hold them a little closer and a little longer, and thank Heaven they are mine.  I am grateful they are mine, and will not be taken away from me like the children of so many mothers in the ugly past of slavery.