Weekly update: hiking, feasting, quilting, reading

 Thursday evening:   the first Christmas Eve service I've attended with my sewing machine.  That was so we could watch the Lessons and Carols on our church's YouTube channel.   We fervently hope that this was a one-and-only and that next year we can worship in person.  We dimmed the lights and lit candles for  Silent Night.  

Christmas dinner: roast beef, acorn squash, braised parsnips. Pear/spinach salad.  Cranberry-pumpkin upside down cake.  The vintage tablecloth just covered the table. (The table is mid-19th century and not a standard size.)   And when was the last time you used a pickle fork?  LOL. 

We went to Lyons Woods Saturday afternoon.  Ornaments were hung -- randomly -- on trees along the trail.  Once I caught on I kept walking to see if I could find more.  Two women I passed said they'd counted more than 40.  

Though we are in a "snow drought" it's still gotten cold.  There was ice in the tree roots at Illinois Beach on Sunday.   Shoreline erosion toppled these trees within the past two years.  

Lower center:  There is a bike trail (finely-packed gravel) under about a foot of sand.

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In the studio:   Nine-Patch Churn Dash is a flimsy.   I used "All in a Row" by Kim Diehl as the starting point.  

The next CWRSRP (Civil War Repro Stash Reduction Project) is nearly a flimsy.  

The design idea is from a quilt called Blue and Gray by Etherington/Tesene.  

Here are the 9-patches, flying geese, and red units for Clue 5 of Grassy Creek.  

When I began the mystery the fabrics were neatly arranges in the box.  Five weeks in, not so much. 

It's time to post December OMG finishes.   I said I would piece the quilt code-named Welcome Home.  (This is all I will show because it's a surprise.)  It is on the long-armer's schedule for the end of January.  

The photo shows the flimsy and the backing (a black/white thrift-shop sheet).  

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Kerri Arsenault's memoir Mill Town: Reckoning With What Remains has been named to several "best of 2020" lists.  The accolades are well-deserved.  

Arsenault lovingly, critically, fearlessly, and lyrically describes the past and present of Rumford and Mexico, Maine, the community where she grew up. Her father, grandfather, and great-grandfather all worked at the paper mill that for 150 years has produced cardboard and coated stock. The bleaching process uses chlorine; its byproduct is cancer-causing dioxin -- and cancer is the primary cause of death many, many millworkers and members of their families. Arsenault probes to find documentation and to tries to get corporate admission of malfeasance. She describes growing up in the town where the smell of the mill meant the smell of money. She explores her family's journey from 17th century France to P.E.I. to early 20th century Maine. She acknowledges the challenge to Rumford/Mexico: how do company towns endure in an era of leveraged buyouts, takeovers, and offshore production? (She details how Rumford -- desperate to diversify revenue -- sold significant access to its water supply to Nestle/Poland Spring.)
An important book, all the better for Arsenault's extraordinarily fine writing.

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