Tailor made...

Quilting, and getting started pruning the orchard (and rain and snow!), has kept me off the back roads lately. So I thought I'd dredge up some older photos of favorite barns to share for the next few weeks, until I can get back out there.

In the southeast corner of Washington is an amazing place called the Palouse. It's home to rolling hills and blue skies, wheat fields, old farms and homesteads. It's one of the most photogenic places I know. I love driving the winding back roads that snake between the hills and up the creek valleys, and I love the barns and farmhouses.

The Palouse is home to some of the most unique barns I've ever seen, like this one.



It's near the turn to Palouse Falls, a huge pair of barns built as mirror images of each other. As near as I can find out, these were built to house draft horses, back when horses pulled the farm equipment to harvest the wheat fields. They tower over the small original farmhouse (on the other side of the dirt farm road), and the much newer and larger house just behind it.

I would love to walk up the drive and knock on the door, and ask about the history of these barns. Maybe this spring, I will.

Linking up on Tom's Barn Collective this week.

Splendid Sampler...

Applique is my new favorite quilting skill, learned thanks to a fun sampler quilt book, The Splendid Sampler. I'm having so much fun making the applique blocks, I decided to make some of the pieced blocks, and will also make a few of the embroidered blocks. I don't plan to make all the 100+ blocks; no one has a bed that big! But I will make enough for a good-sized wall hanging. I love small quilts, which is a good thing because these 6.5-in. blocks have tiny pieces! I've made them all from the fabric in my scrap bins, and from a favorite charm pack. Sixteen done, twenty to go.

Above...

High in the hills above the Tri-Cities is a place so windy, it's best not to wear a hat there. And where you need to think about where you park, because if the wind comes from behind, it can rip the car door out of your hands. And if it comes at you from the side, you just might not get out of the car.

But making your way to the top is an easy drive up a wide gravel road, kept free of washboarding by road crews, for all the vehicles coming and going from the wind farm, and from the vast array of antennas that crown the hill. Radio stations, television stations, police and fire departments, and many more... they all have antennas atop 2200 ft. high Jump-Off Joe.

It's also the end of a geocaching power trail of 35 caches, and while we braved the wind and dust, we enjoyed the view. Since there are no trees or high peaks anywhere near, the view is outstanding. All over the Tri-Cities and west toward the Yakima Valley, north up the Columbia River and Hanford, east to Walla Walla and the snow-capped Blue Mountains, and south across the Columbia and into Oregon. It's an amazing view.

Eye of the storm...

My niece told me about the ship bearing four new container cranes, due to arrive at the Port of Tacoma. And when we headed for the Port today, to do our daily geocache, I was hoping we'd get to see them. We drove into a thunderstorm, with black clouds and rain, but to the west the sun was shining on the Olympics. The wind was ice cold, and I wished I had brought my Nikon so I could have zoomed in on the ship. I can't imagine how this cargo, towering high above the deck, traveled all the way across the Pacific from China. The cranes, once installed, will be the biggest container cranes on the west coast: 434 feet tall with the booms raised.

Patterns...

Broccoli, or cauliflower... this stuff is so cool!

Walkers welcome here...

King County could learn a few tricks from Pierce County. The county trails near me have ugly stenciled mileage markers painted on the pavement, most of them gone and never repainted. In contrast, the Sumner Link trail system has these cool rusty metal signs.

We've spent a bit of time on this trail lately, to find our daily geocache. No one else has done these caches for a couple of months, wonder why?

Barns and horses...

A break in the storm took us out on the trails today, and the rain held off until the last hundred feet before we reached the truck. And then it let loose. Still, I took a chance and got a little wet, to snap a few pictures of this beautiful Gothic barn, built of cinder blocks, with fresh paint and a metal roof.

And as we drove into town for breakfast at our favorite little diner, I thought about barns and rain, and being a horse owner. Some of my happiest times were spent in a barn, taking care of my Thoroughbred gelding, who would stand in the barn aisle and nod off to the sound of rain drumming on the roof.

A barn is a cozy place to be on a rainy day. I never minded cleaning stalls or moving bales of hay, sweeping the aisle or filling water buckets. On sunny days, I'd be itching to saddle up and go for a ride on the trails, or head up the road to the ring where I had my lessons.

But on rainy days, I'd linger. Read all the messages on the chalkboard, about who was going out of town, and which horses needed someone to exercise them. Straighten up the tack room. And on my week to feed, stuff hay into hay nets for each stall, and measure out grain and supplements for each horse. I'd check that the hanging blankets had dried overnight, and lay them out ready for the next day. Once the horses were in their stalls at the end of the day, I'd clean my stall, listening to the horses munch their hay, lick the last few grains of oats out of their feeders, and drink deeply from their water buckets.

I'd breathe deep, and inhale the wonderful, special aroma of horses.

Blooming in winter...

Two of my favorite flowers bloom in the Pacific Northwest winter :: Hellebores and primroses. Both seem to require that I lay down in the grass to get the best angle for a photograph. And on this cold and extremely wet day, that just wasn't happening. So I did the best I could. The flowers are happy with raindrops dripping off of them. I am not.

This primrose is already crowded by the perennials that are bursting out of the ground, now that we're heading toward the end of winter. It is my favorite color of primrose, and the only one that survives more than a couple of years. I buy other colors, and they seem to thrive at the farm. But they gradually die out, happily reseeding themselves into the native color of purple, with a yellow "eye." They've been blooming since Christmas, through snow and cold and wet.

In the valley...

Today we went exploring on some of our favorite back roads in the Snoqualmie Valley, reminiscing about cycling on the nearly deserted farm roads, and touring Carnation Farms as kids, when you got to watch them milk the cows, and the yummy ice cream bars we devoured at the end of the tour. We remembered the years when the Snoqualmie River flooded the valley, and when the only houses were the old farmhouses that were the heart of dairy farms and horse farms. When the valley wasn't threatened by the towns to the west, looking to expand. This valley is beautiful and serene, and it's one of my favorite places.

Carnation Farms still exists, but not as a dairy farm. After nearly 20 years in the hands of Nestle, the farm is once again owned by descendants of the original family. Today the 800+ acre property is a working farm and outdoor classroom, with summer camps and tours of their organic farm, and they host a farm-based education program for grades 5-12. The huge barns are still there on the side of the road, and they're still painted bright white, just like I remember from when I was a child.

New neighbors...

Each year in February, the herons return to the little heronry near my house. It's always a thrill to see them, and I love walking the nearby trail to watch them fly.

Soon the nests will be rebuilt and the eggs will be laid, and come spring, new herons will soar.

Buds...

With all the warm temperatures and rain, the orchard and perennial gardens are bursting into life. Winter isn't over... but nature is waking up anyway.

A line of trees...

The valley was heavy with mist, the grass green in anticipation of spring.  Ducks chatter on the ponds and river, and the sky is full of geese.

In the battle between winter and spring, spring appears to be winning. But I do not give up... I still hope for cold mornings and frost, and perhaps snow, before it's time to start gardening.

Resident eagle...

He stayed in the tree for the longest time, close enough to grab some photos as he surveyed the pasture beneath his feet. I don't often see eagles on my little farm, but this guy has been a fairly frequent visitor this year. He checked to the north, and to the south, back and forth for nearly a half hour.



Then something caught his attention, and just like that, he was gone.