Well, I don’t know about for the state of Maine, but for us personally this is definitely the coldest weather we’ve ever been in!   Last night when I went to bed about 10, this is what the weather station showed!

At bedtime last night. Wind chill went down to -34, but thankfully not down to the -40 predicted! I can hardly believe I just typed that…this is Minnesota weather, not Maine!

It was a little less wind chill when I walked the dog at 9 pm, and I tell you it was seriously Nanook-ette of the North in terms of clothes.  Dog wanted to come back in ASAP, but once he got the idea that he was **not** going back in until he peed, he got to it right quick.   This morning, Paul decided he needed to shovel the walk before taking the dog out (I just waded out in top-of-knee-deep snow and the dog sorta swam out).  In half an hour the path will be blown full of snow again, but this will give you an idea of depth and drifts:

Why am I reminded of Sysiphus? All that snow hubby is shoveling will get blown uphill toward our neighbors, and more will fill in the trench!

So what do you do when snow, wrestling meets and what not are cancelled?  Why finish up on a much-delayed postcard swap:

My cropped version of Henri Matisse’s Purple Robe with Anemones

I’m on a small group called Postmark’d Art (site here), and every several months we swap and can pick our theme for the trade from several choices.  I immediately wanted to do Matisse and the cutouts, but I was slow and the other four did cutout type cards, so I opted to paint.  I learned that my fabric paintbrushes stink for details (sigh).  I also learned that the next time I decide to do a postcard swap and individually paint four cards someone needs to smack me upside the head.   Seriously…I spent three full days on these… nuts! Well, at least a large part of several days.   I’m just glad they are done, apologize for the bumbling faces, and hope some new brushes (THANK YOU Susan Brubaker Knapp!) will help when they arrive.

And if you ever want a laugh, watch a dog in winter booties.  Can you read the expression:

Seriously, Mom, you DID this to ME? Your beloved pug-love? ME? WHY? I am beyond humiliated…..I feel so betrayed……

And then: Ha HA! I’m not as much of a walnut-brain as you think I am, Mom! I can deal with Velcro. Well, at least until you come wrap it tighter and I can’t get the end seeing as I don’t have a snout!

With that, I’m going downstairs (hoping the power lasts…looking good so far) and working on the back of Joshua’s quilt and maybe even putting in some miles on the exercise bike!

The power is back on (though it went out every day since Monday!), the house is warm, Christmas was glorious, and Maine continues to be beautiful in even the most wicked weather.  MAJOR KUDOS to the electric crews, not just from CMP (Central Maine Power) but from neighboring states; they gave up their Christmases at home to restore our power!

The river birch is a goner. Sigh. When we cut it down in spring (well, when Max cuts it down) I’m going to see if I can harvest some of the bark to keep and use for mixed media. So beautiful…..

News stations are saying this is the worst ice storm to hit Maine since ’98.  Outages covered from the midcoast to central Maine, with 87,000 without power–that’s about 7 percent of the state population!  Our electricity went out Monday at about 2 pm and stayed out until about 6:30 pm Tuesday (Christmas eve).  It stayed on several hours during which we all quickly took showers, washed dishes etc. (need elec. to run the water pump).  As soon as we went to bed, though, it went out again.  At 9 a.m. Christmas morning, though, the power came back on a full day before they expected!

The lowest portion of our drive way this morning while on dog-walkies. Notice the trees bent into upside down “U” shapes on the left.  Those are not “weeping” trees; they are totally bent over trees.   Chances are good, though, that once the ice (under last night’s snow) comes off, they will straighten back up (more or less).

Additional freezing rain led to significantly more damage on our property.  The gloriously lacy and beautiful river birch (above) bit the dust, splitting completely down to about 6 feet.   The big, robust maple also had significant damage, and at least a dozen trees on the edges of the woods surrounding us have broken-off tops.

The maple at the top of the driveway took a bit hit, too. The leader (main trunk, at the top) broke off about 20 feet down and fell uphill. More branches are bent, and many broken.

Paul and Eli pulled downed branches and Eli even climbed up a little ways into the tree to saw down some small, easily-reached branches so they wouldn’t break more branches and also to get them out of the place where Alex needs to plow the snow-heap!

A day or two ago (they are running together already!) Paul and Eli (the latter in jammy pants, flannel shirt, new heavy boots and Elmer Fudd hat) moved broken branches so Alex’s plow won’t have trouble.  We’ll deal with cutting up and tossing the branches (kindling?) in spring!

Morning walkies, as usual, offered great photo ops:

Tree bent over! Temps are supposed to go above freezing (a little) this weekend, so maybe some of the ice will melt.

Looking towards Appleton Ridge over the neighbor’s house:

From the top of the drive. On the far left are two trees next to an arbor that allows passage from the downhill meadow to the large meadow. We think the top of the second (rear) tree broke off, but snow is too icy to try to get over there right now.

Remember those chopped off willows I shared a short while ago…another photo, thinking Thermofax screen!

Looking up the driveway. The maple is right at the top of the drive, the birch just to the right (between the drive and hour).  Good news:  house doesn’t need painting.  Bad news:  house is hulkering brown.  When it DOES need painting it will be gray with white trim like the garage!

And the river birch (SOB), looking uphill with the house behind it. Got a good close up photo of the tangled branches that may also become a thermofax screen.

After shoveling the walk and sweeping the deck, found Pigwidgeon footprints on the deck…love this!

And then the sun came out:  can you say GLORIOUS MAINE?

From the living room porch, with deck roof and icicles overhead, shadow of house in the foreground.

Next post:  Christmas!

Then

Yesterday on Facebook I posted a youtube link to a favorite carol.  Then I decided it might be fun to post here, as well, and every day for the coming week share one of my favorite carols from my Christmas Vocals playlist.  I have more pieces that are instrumentals, but I’ve decided that while the instrumentals are great in the background (like at Christmas dinner), I prefer SONGS–the kind with words where I can join along (at least when alone in the car so I don’t break someone’s ears!).   Today’s carol is a new one, by quilting’s own Ricky Tims.  I’ve lived in small towns since 1998, and I can’t imaging going back to living in a city (even a small one) or suburbs.   Love the scale of life, the pace of life, the unexpected joy of running in to someone I know.

And photos from yesterday and this morning.  We have a glorious lot of snow this year before Christmas, so yesterday I walked the dog down our driveway (which is long, 3/10 mile) to the mailbox so I could shovel out the plow heap and get mail.  This was the view along the way down:

Walking down the driveway. Our house is in the middle of a large rectangle. The other lots are on the outside, ours is in the middle, so we have a 3/10 mile driveway that is a narrow strip between the two neighbors, then it makes an “L” around the bottom of our lot up to the house. This is on the bottom of the L, looking to the straight part between the log house on the right and the other one (hidden) in the woods on the left.  The willows had grown from shrub to Godzilla (each one) and were threatening the swallow cars on the driveway, so they got a major buzz cut recently.  LOVE the look of the stubs (and fear not, they will recover and grow with wild abandon again).

After clearing the plow pile by the mailbox, on the way back up the sunlight streamed through the woods (now on the right as you walk back uphill) and lit the beech leaves. I LOVE how the leaves refuse to let go all winter, only dropping when new growth pushes them off.  There is a quilt in the tenacity of the beech tree.

My favorite tree, a very old, prolific apple. It is on the right as you walk uphill (left looking down, as here). This tree is SO going to be a quilt!  Maybe this winter if I don’t goof off!

And this row of evergreens (opposite my beloved apple tree) planted by the former owner on the property line. Usually we have wind with the snow, so don’t have the frosted look too often.

And taking a step or two beyond the apple tree and looking uphill, you see the big meadow, the hedgerow/stone wall in the middle left, there’s another meadow (i.e. not-mown place) and the house at the crest of the hill (just to the left of the sun). Midday in Maine as we approach the solstice.

And this morning from Route 131 in Appleton, looking southeast. Isn’t that sky and sun and rays glorious? When I was about 4, we returned to the US from Argentina and stayed with my gramma a while. I had to go to Sunday school and learned all about angels. I also saw escalators for the first time (early 60s) and was enchanted as they didn’t have those where I had lived in Argentina. I wondered how angels got from Heaven to Earth, then saw the sun rays and figured they must be escalators for the angels. So forever after, Angel Escalators–even my kids know that’s what they are.

Enjoy your holidays.  Don’t let the hustle and bustle of the season distract you from the beauty around you and the joy of being in a place and with the people who make life wonderful.

And for those of you not on FaceBook yesterday, here is yesterday’s, Emmanuel God With Us by Amy Grant, which my dear friend Deborah Boschert shared with me years ago and has become a favorite.

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If you have to run errands, take time to smell the roses on the way. This photo is for Jacquie, with a detail below:

At Portland Architectural Salvage I saw this fireplace piece with the owl andirons and had to take a picture for Jacquie, who loves owls! (Waving over to Vermont!)

OR, in the case of doctor’s appointments in far-away cities, do fun stuff!   Last Monday I had to drive to Brunswick (75 minutes) for a 20 minute appointment.  But it is right near Freeport, home to L.L. Bean.  So I did some Christmas shopping and thanks to MANY credit card points, got a couple great bargains.  The next day, I had another longer drive:  nearly 2 hours each way to Portland for a final check-up on my feet (a year ago I had arthritis in my big toe joints removed and can now bend my feet again!).   So I visited Portland Architectural Salvage, Micucci’s Grocery, the Old Port Specialty Tile store and the Portland Museum of Art, and finally Whole Foods (the Key Lime cheesecake is awesome).

Jacquie: isn’t this a fine owl! He looks a lot like my sketch that I posted a few days ago.

There weren’t any great deals at the Salvage shop; it has clearly been discovered by the young 20-somethings fixing up their cool downtown Portland apartments and condos!  But there was plenty of free inspiration.   I just LOVED looking at the lines of doors stacked up and the abstract strata design in this close up:

Love the patterning in the peeling paint on these doors.

There were several ogival panels, too, that I am guessing came from a church.  What awesome quilting or applique designs these would make:

There were several of these panels (which I think cost about $400 each!). This is a perfect example of my fill-the-space exercise in my quilting designs class!

And more inspiration in the form of old heat registers:  you know how we have ugly rectangles with straight lines through which dry air blows heat at us?  Well, a century ago those openings for the heat to reach you were much more interesting:

An old heat register. This would actually make a cool “window” in a garden gate, or in a custom door with an arched top, wouldn’t it?  All that rasty old paint would need to get stripped off, but what a beautiful design!

Next I went to find Micucci’s, an Italian grocery that also wholesales gourmet foods to various places around the state, including Megunticook Market in Camden where Joshua works in catering.  I found a jar of chestnuts, torrona, and other delectables, and I also discovered the tile store was two doors away.  I had seen ads for this place, and OH MY.  Now, to win that lottery so I can re-do the bathrooms….

At the Old Port Specialty Tile store, I saw this mosaic by New Ravenna Tiles. I WANT. I want Want WANT!

Then before I went to Whole Foods on the way home (I call that place the hundred-dollar-a-bag store, my foot doc says locally it is called Whole Paycheck, but my they have good food and stuff you can’t find unless you order on the internet), I treated myself to visiting the PieceWork exhibit at Portland Museum of Art. I joined the museum when I signed up to visit the Winslow Homer house at Prout’s Neck, and I promise I WILL share pics from that visit a while back.  I was beyond thrilled to see at least EIGHT textile works of art as well as several mixed media.

I first saw this installation piece—it is easily 9 feet tall and much wider–at a gallery in nearby Belfast, Maine.  I was thrilled it made the cut for the biennial exhibit, which is of works by people living in or with other significant ties to Maine.

Library by Abbie Read

The signage for the mixed media work above

You could spend an hour or more poring over the artworks within the artworks.  I kept taking pictures, fascinated by the materials and messages.  Here is just one of the detail photos:

Detail from Abbie Read’s Library.  I love the start chart with which she has lined the box, the carefully cut twig and the niche she has created within the box.

I left SO inspired…all I wanted to do was head to my studio!

And a slide from my Adult Ed class on the Native Peoples of Maine, the Wabanaki, looking at how they lived both before and after the arrival of Europeans in the early 1600s.

So you can see, I am VERY BUSY.  Can someone please find me another 27 hours a day so I can make some art??????

Guess what I did today? And yes, that is a 7 cubic yard cart behind the lawn tractor nearly full of apples. From just two trees. That still have more apples.

It’s all about apples.   The prep work for teaching in  Houston is nearly done, and the last of the apple trees are seriously laden.  They won’t last until AFTER going to International Quilt Festival in Houston, so I figured I’d best harvest today.

This tree is so old, and I love the architecture of the tree. In winter when it is bare, the branches are like sculpture. In spring the blossoms are a soft pink, and in summer and fall the apples grow and grow. This year we had these unbelievable clusters, and some of the apples are as large as grocery store apples, not the usual apricot size on most of the 20+ old trees on our property.

This all started in early 2011 when the owner of this property (which became ours in February 2011) told me the previous summer he had harvested 52 **bushels** of apples and had them made into cider.  Let’s be honest:  I have NO interest in being a farmer, harvesting 52 bushels of anything, let alone turning it all into cider.  But….How could I let all those good apples this year go to the critters and bugs?  I have to do something with them….

I filled this big bucket about halfway with the red apples and twice with the red-green ones. 

This year we had a bumper crop of apples and peaches.  We had maybe 30 peaches (the previous two summers our maximum was 3, yep, three) and a gazillion apples and even a tree-full of pears, tho the latter never got above 2 inches long (if that).

Back when rhubarb started growing, fellow Frayed Edges member Kate Cutko made us a rhubarb crumble that was delicious–and really easy:  Ch0p fruit.  Make a crumble topping.  Make a slurry of water, cornstarch and sugar.  Put half of crumble in bottom of baking dish, add fruit, top with remaining crumble, pour sweet slurry on top of everything, and bake.  Then EAT.

I figured I could try that recipe with apples instead, and it worked!   The only problem was that our apples are SMALL–some no larger than an apricot (and not the honking big ones they now grow, but regular apricots), which meant a lot of peeling.  So I boiled ’em a few minutes until it was easy to peel (turns out the peel is thick, these were clearly apples meant for animal feed a century-plus ago!).  Sliced up fruit, etc.  Both Kate’s and my recipes are at the end of this post.  ENJOY!

Here is what I learned today:

• You really can shake the apple tree.  Well, sort of.  Our trees are not on dwarf stock like you-pick orchards.  They are 20 or more feet tall, and I’m lucky if I can jump up and snag the lowest branch.  So I grabbed the rake and used it to “grab” a branch and shake as many apples loose as I could.  Then I switched to a different branch.

• It is possible to shake the old apple tree and not get pelted, for the most part.  However it is advisable to look down in case an apple hits you.  Eyeglasses are expensive.   Fortunately, I thought of this before getting whacked.

• If you shake an apple tree where it hangs over the crumbling old stone wall, any apples that land on it will split open.  BUMMERS.

• If you shake an apple tree over bare ground it is much easier to retrieve the apples than if they fall into the thicket under the trees.  Next year I will learn how to use the bushwhacker (a weed whacker on steroids) and will use it to clear under the trees FIRST.  Then I will shake.

If you are going to shake the apple tree, it is better when the apples land on dirt. Not so good when they land on the rocks.

• Our wild turkeys are  thorough, effective groundskeepers. If apples fall, and they can reach them (there were some old windfall apples in the crevices in the falling rock wall), they will eat them.  All of them.  Do not delay in picking up fallen apples.

We have two clans of wild turkeys this year. One is about nine, the other about 19. The babies are now nearly full-grown. That’s a lot of turkey! The bunch of them moving through the woods is surprisingly  noisy. And I know they like apples because they were rather startled from a tasty meal the other day as I walked pas with Pigwidgeon.

• From the deer scat, it appears our deer are also very effective groundskeepers.  We almost never see them other than hoofprints in the driveway (or snow), but they are clearly here.  Recently.  Pooping.  The apples will be VERY WELL WASHED.  Very well.

• If the turkeys and deer don’t eat the apples, the slugs and bugs will.

• It’s a good thing we have an old spare fridge in the basement.  And it works.  It’s the kind with the plastic freezer compartment inside.  It is now filled with apples.  The smallest ones are in the built-in egg spots.  Every available space if filled:  the door shelves, the whole thing.  Full.  I will be busy when I get back from Houston!

• Homemade apple crumble is really good.  Ice cream or just plain heavy cream poured on it is delectable.

After moving to Maine, I learned that a barn is just a two-horse (or even one-horse) garage of yesteryear.  And I learned that every farm had at least two apple trees.  We now live in Hope, one half mile from Appleton (as in AppleTown).  Everywhere in Maine you see in the re-grown forests apple trees, still living on for decades after those who planted them died and the farms disappeared.

And recently from Fedco Garden Supplies, I learned that most of those apples were used for animal feed and cider.  Guess there’s a reason why the previous owner had ’em made into cider!  Fedco has a totally cool page about old Maine apples here and more information on how to prune and revitalize old trees.   Wonder how much it would cost to have True (Bragg, Eli’s wrestling coach who has a tree business) come prune these two trees?  But only after I take more photos.  That tree needs to be a quilt!

I’m planning on turning some of the apples into applesauce.  The others will become fixin’s for crumble.  I think I’ll slice up and freeze the larger apples.  Then I’ll make a batch of crumble, and just bake up one portion at a time.  However, I can attest that if you make an entire crumble and no one else in the house will eat it (what is WRONG with them?), your crumble will keep up to a week and re-heat very nicely in an oven-proof bowl in the toaster oven.   Good with cream.  YUM! Next time I’ll take pictures before I eat it all.  Ahem. I have no one to blame for my tight pants but me, but at the moment I’d eat a bowl in a nano-second!

Here’s Kate’s recipe (which is Jane’s Recipe):

Janes rhubarb Crumble

1 c brown sugar
1 c oats
1 c flour
1 stick butter

Mix all together and spread half of the mixture in the bottom of a greased 9×11 pan.
Over that, spread 3-4 cups of chopped rhubarb.  Top with remaining crumble mix.

In a small saucepan, mix
1 c water
1 c sugar
1 heaping Tbl. Cornstarch.
Heat until thickened. Pour over rhubarb\crumble.
Bake at 350 for 30-40 minutes.
Best served with vanilla ice cream or yogurt.

And my variation:

Topping:

• 1 c brown sugar
• 1 c oats
• 1 c flour
• 1 stick butter
• Cinnamon, cardamom and any other spices you like…I think I used 1 tsp. (heaping?) cinnamon and 1/2 teaspoon ground cardamom and a pinch of ground cloves.  Next time I’ll add a bit of ginger and a bit more cardamom, cloves, and maybe some fresh-ground nutmeg.

Mix all topping ingredients together and spread half of the mixture in the bottom of a greased round casserole dish.

Liquids:

• In a small pyrex measuring cup, mix
• 1/2 c water
• 1/2 c sugar
• 1 heaping Tbl. Cornstarch.
• Heat in Microwave for 1-2 minutes until thick.
• I think I added a bit of cinnamon and cardamom here, too.

Peel, core and slice apples.  Toss with thickened liquid. Place in pan.  I used a round souffle / casserole dish–probably 3 inches deep, 9 across, and I filled it nearly to the top with apples.

Add remaining topping to (well duh!) the top.

Bake at 375 degrees (sorry, haven’t a clue what this would be in Europe…we bake cakes at 325 to 350 degrees, so just a bit warmer temp).

I forgot/misread Kate’s recipe, so I put the liquids on the apples instead of on the top (I thought the crumble would get soggy).  I think next time I will try it on top as the crumble was powdery from the flour.  Or I’ll pulse the crumble in the mini food processor to get the butter into much smaller pieces.