snow pact

not snowpack...

nope ... snow pact:

snow

snō

noun

1. 1.

   atmospheric water vapor frozen into ice crystals and falling in light white flakes or lying on the ground as a white layer.

   "we were trudging through deep snow"
2. 2.

   something that resembles snow in color or texture, in particular.
3. 
   
4. combined with:
5. 
   

pact

pakt

noun

1. a formal agreement between individuals or parties.

a couple of years ago, Auntia and i made a pact to work on Snow Days (a Crabapple Hill pattern for an embroidered quilt of a small, rural community that is celebrating a snow day) together ... we collected fat quarters and embroidery floss and sparkly thread and more fat quarters and yardage and more embroidery floss and more sparkly thread and more fat quarters and more yardage till we decided that we really oughta start the actual doing ... we agreed to embroider one block each month till we were finished ... neither of us had done much embroidery with sparkly thread and had no idea what we were getting ourselves into...

i got this far:

my house and barn - the same one that is in Awesome, but from the back

the covered bridge to Auntia's house

before i put it down and started working on anything else because i hated working with the sparkly thread - it shredded and knotted and tangled and shredded some more every time i tried to use it ... after two or three months, i decided to give it another go... 

Auntia's house
and got that far - right before i was gonna need to start in on that sparkly thread again - and realized that i was never never ever gonna work on it with any joy if i kept using that stupid sparkly thread ... so i ordered more fabric waaay too much, as it turned out, which led to yet another embroidered quilt project that is still hanging out in the to do's cuz paper-pieced snowflakes are not all that fun and started over ... i caught back up with Auntia who is STILL using sparkly thread in a different color scheme and embroidered my little heart out for the past year ... and then it was time to trim the stitcheries and add some piecing to the sides...

 trimming embroidered blocks to size is not for the faint of heart, lemmetellya
and piece the center blocks...

is this all gonna come together?!?

yes ... yes, it is!!!

then trace and stitch more embroidery ... and then put it all together...

don't you love it when a plan comes together?!?

pretty doggone cool, innit?!?

here are some closeups of the embroidered blocks...

 little bunny and little birdie

my house and barn ... it's a very, very, very fine house 

 mmhmmm ... the dragon lady DOES live here

 the covered bridge ... which leads to Auntia's house

 Auntia's house

and her barn ... which shelters Tug

Tug ... a true ranger's horse

 yes ... Auntia DOES run with wolves

 snowmen under construction ... look out for snowballs

 LuLu's house and barn
 
 she and Auntia are my sunshine ... and i am their moon

 the general store ... it has EVERYTHING you could possibly need on a snowy day

including Moon Pies

God's house

with free wireless access

school?!? nope - no time for learning the three R's today

land of the free

  run little doggie!!!

 sledding down the hillside...

 ...is worth hauling the sled back up to do it again

 and another house and barn for family and friends

Superman AND Wonder Woman ... with room for Willy the Whale

the creek bed

whew!!!
i bordered it all with lilac hydrangea petals from LakeHouse Dry Goods and it is ready to send off for quilting ... and now i get to watch Auntia keep on keepin' on with that nasty sparkly thread cuz she is Not A Quitter like me, lemmetellya...

If we did all the things we are capable of, we would astound ourselves.
Thomas Edison