Hi, Little Friend

Look who came to visit us this week!  It's a Sand Hill crane, one of a group of five (5!)  that dropped into the park behind our house.  I used the zoom on my camera to take this photo from my porch.  The sounds they make are so strange, almost mechanical.

There are wetlands in the area, and we have seen nesting pairs with chicks in past years.

 The sun is shining on the porch this morning.  It's hard to believe it was snowing here yesterday.  Wisconsin weather.  What can you do.

In other news, I finished this little quilt.  Jo Kramer of Jo's Country Junction calls it "Brick House".  She featured it on her blog, and I couldn't wait to try it out.

My favorite block is the one with the zebra.

Here's the back.  Isn't this dog fabric a hoot?

A weird thing happened.  I made a scrappy binding, and included some light blue fabric left over from other baby quilts.  Pictured on it was Winnie the Pooh, writing.  Without any effort on my part, the words from the fabric ended up visible on the edge of the quilt.  Above, it says, "hi little friend".

The next part says "you're a real friend".

And lastly, "some friends are smaller than others".  On the fabric, he was writing to Piglet.
I think this qualifies as a very special quilt, so instead of donating it as I had planned, I will save it for my baby grandson.  Sure, I already made him a quilt, but you can never have too many, can you.  I can't wait to hold him again, and say, "Hi, little friend."

Wanna see my Rainbow Scrap Challenge shoofly blocks for this month?  Okay!

These are so simple and fun.  The best part is dragging out all the different scraps to choose from.  (The worst part is putting it all away after the blocks are done.)

We're living through a really strange time.  I find myself doing weird things to cheer myself up, like opening cupboards just to admire how organized they now are.  I've never been what my sisters and I called "Susie Homemaker".  The house has been reasonably clean, and the meals have been reasonably good, and that was fine.  I don't think there's any danger of me becoming a perfectionist, but I may be raising my standards a bit.
Yesterday, my husband (finally!) put up new blinds in the sewing room.  (We bought them months ago.)  Naturally, I washed the windows first, and even vacuumed the carpet when he was done.  So what should I do today?  Sew like crazy, that's what!  I am going to make a giant mess, and I can hardly wait.
Are you going to make something today too?  I hope you have as much fun as I will!
Cheers for reading,
Sylvia@Treadlestitches

Linking up with:
Sarah at Can I Get A Whoop Whoop
Angela at So Scrappy
Alycia at Finished or Not Finished Friday