Is There No End To This?

Well, life was moving along pretty well for a change. A whole month had passed since Tornado Time, and we still had huge tree logs piled up all around the yard. Like an idiot, I had begun to complain that the trees hadn't been picked up. I'll never learn.

The tree-picker-upper-guy came by with his huge jaws truck and began merrily loading up the tree debris. And I was happy. For ten minutes, I was happy. I'm upstairs sewing away, enjoying my happy little life, watching Tree Dude do his thing through the window, when I hear sirens. Loud sirens. Very close by. Like in front of my house close by.

I go to the window and what do I see? A great big fire caused by a tree. See?




Yes, dear, that is a fireman trying to put out the fire. Somehow, all the trees in the back of the truck caught on fire. Me? I think Tree Dude threw a cigarette in there. There were lots and firemen, and a shiny red truck, too:



Although we will never know what actually did happen here, what we do know is this: Tree man realized his great big truck was on fire (dry oak makes an excellent fire, by the way) and proceeded to try to DRIVE IT AWAY while it was afire, and with the steel support rods down. In the picture you can see that this procedure ate up the road.

If you study the next photo carefully, you might be able to figure out where I've been the past week:




Yall are so smart! When the Tree Dude moved his truck, he parked it RIGHT UNDER our cable and telephone lines. And we had only had our cable back on for four days.

You can see how hot this fire was. It actually melted the black paint off the side of the truck. The paint was dripping onto the road. Weird. And the fire department couldn't put the fire out. After hosing it down for thirty minutes, Tree Dude was directed to drive to an empty lot nearby (with the thing still on fire!). The fire guys followed him in the big red truck, they dumped all the logs, and they finally put it out.

So now, a week later, I finally have cable and phone service again.

I'm not complaining about anything else. I used to complain that I couldn't grow flowers in the front yard because there were so many trees. Now I can grow all the flowers I want to. And I'm not about to complain that I don't have a front porch anymore.

So what have I been doing? Why, sewing of course. Here's Little Miss Sunshine, all finished:




And the back:

A close up of the back bodice. See all the cute piping?

A close up of the sleeve:

And a close up of the front bodice. Although it's a little hard to tell in this photo, the light blue smocking thread matches the blue of the piping wonderfully:

What else have I been doing? Shopping for fabric and patterns, of course. I have four pieces of fabric ready to cut out. Decisions, decisions.

I'll be back later. Right now I'm going to go cut up!