Weekly update: projects small and large + reading

 

Lake Michigan at Illinois Beach State Park this weekend:   if you look closely you can see a freighter on the horizon.  

The beach is back after strong autumn storms with over-wash -- the waves went over the low dunes along the shoreline.   

I paced the length of this trunk. It's nearly fifty feet.  A year and a half or two years ago it was growing some feet from the beach. The erosion is so severe that it undercut the dune and the tree toppled.

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In the studio:

Our guild has an ornament exchange at the holiday party. Ornaments don't have to hang on the tree! I made this mug rug as an ornament for someone's table.  (Pattern in the latest issue of Quilts & More.)  

After I finished quilting the CW Repro strippy (see last Wednesday's post) I leafed through the file of patterns-that-would-look-good-in-reproductions.  This was in Quiltmaker S/O 2001. I made a few 9-patches and decided I didn't want to fuss with the applique per the pattern.  I made more nine-patches.  Here's the work in progress.  

As patterned:  43 x 54.  My version will be 73 x 77.

Can you spot the mis-piecing? Fourth column. 

I had this much of the setting fabric left. 

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 Danny and Maeve Conroy, brother and sister, are seven years apart in age but bound tightly together by their childhood experiences. First, their mother Elna leaves them inexplicably to do charity work in India.  Then their father marries Andrea, an avaricious woman who personifies the wicked stepmother.   To cap that when their father dies (Danny is 15, Maeve 22)  they learn that Andrea has schemed to get all their father's assets with the exception of a trust fund set up for their education.  For the rest of their lives the Conroy siblings compensate, and compensate even more, for their losses.   The story is unsentimental and unpredictable -- and really, really good.

 Unfortunately the copy of The Dutch House that I read had lost its dust jacket -- the evocative portrait (shown here; it's Maeve) is a key element.

I have not followed the ups and downs of the Miss America Pageant. After reading Mifflin's history -- current as of 2020 -- I am better-informed, and I don't need to know any more.  (The book was well-written and well-researched. It's just not a topic that interests me.)

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Linking up with:  Oh Scrap!  Monday Making   Design Wall Monday

P.S.   Tree roots along the beach.