Designing Quilts

Last time, I showed some layout options for the Fourth Rail quilt.  Most of my readers and I liked the first option. That one required me to make additional blocks. So I played with the first option, turning all the blocks around so that what was out is in and what was in is out.

I had a hard time seeing it the whole pattern, even with a picture, and realize that I need to make sure there is lots of contrast in the blocks in the center and the corners so the design is easier to see. I might have placed some of the blocks incorrectly, I'm not sure. The center is supposed to be "light" with rings around it.

Then Tanya said something about a spiral, which sounded really interesting, so I laid out the blocks again, this time in a spiral pattern. It doesn't really look like a spiral (unless I make additional blocks which round out the corners).  I think this is the same layout as I showed before, except for the center, but I really like this better, and I will not have to make any more blocks. To me, it looks like a three rail fence with a dark sashing.  I was hoping to be able to join these blocks without a design wall, but I think I will need to plan it out more to make sure there is enough contrast and the colors are balanced.

What do you think? Are the corners okay as is, or do you think I should make "light" rails with dark corners so the turns show better? Then they would look like concentric circles.

I am going to try seeing what it looks like when the darks in the corners are oriented next to other darks. That will make the corners bolder, but may show the spiral. Stay tuned!

In other news, I sewed some ATC holder rows together, and I am so tickled at the secondary pattern that is created! I think this will make a striking quilt even without any ATCs in them. (The dark shadows make it look badly sewn, but I just haven't pressed it yet.)

Here it looks with some ATCs in them. Looks good to me! Most of these cards have a vertical layout, but I am planning horizontal for this quilt.

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Off the Wall Friday

Fourth Rail Kicked Back to Blockmaker

When last we talked, the Blockmaker had declared that she was finished making the blocks for Fourth Rail and had passed the finished blocks to the Block Put-together-er and checked off the completion of all the blocks.  The UFOs and the WIPs rejoiced and had a celebration.

The Block Put-Together was supposed to try out different layouts to find the best one for this set of blocks. She was supposed to try the traditional fence rail with the larger number of blocks, a courthouse square, multiple courthouse squares, copy the layout of the last fence rail, etc.  She even took a book with pictures of different layouts of fence rails so she could try them all.  Being the lazy sort, however, she tried one layout with a little less than half the blocks. She wasn't sure about the layout but when she took the picture, she declared that it was good. She also decided that these blocks did not make good turns and required a different block be made for the corners.  Probably HSTs.

Maybe if all the rails faced with the dark rail inward instead of outward, like the center, the additional blocks wouldn't be necessary.

When asked for more choices and more pictures, she simply referred to the blog.  The rest of the pictures are ones you have seen already, but are put here for your convenience. This picture shows the multiple courthouse square/oval idea. It would also need corner blocks. Maybe more fence rails with a dark corner triangle. Or maybe they would be okay as they are with a slight gap in the corners.

This one looks like multiple rows of fences and does not need additional blocks.

 Here's the traditional fence rail which also would not require additional blocks. I already have a rail fence quilt with this layout, although it does not have a specific dark rail, but this is more traditional than the others, and I like the others better.

15 Minutes to Stitch: Week 28

This week, I pieced the rail fence blocks and the ATC holder. I also cut more pieces for the ATC holder today.  I thought I had pressed all the corner triangles, but I didn't.  These little pieces were hard to press in December, and would be even harder in the heat of the summer.  I may cut all the rest of the pieces and save it for the fall or winter for making more corner triangles. I will try to make more progress on it before I move to the next quilt.

15 Minute sessions of stitching this month: 7 out of 7
15 Minute sessions of stitching this year: 151 out of 195 sessions

Success rate is still 77%.

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Oh Scrap !
Moving It Forward

Next!

You probably didn't hear the Blockmaker say "next" because she mumbled it under her breath, but all those quilts waiting in the disorderly line noticed a sudden shift in their position.  The blocks for Fourth Rail are finished, and you can see the bottom of the shoe box!  I would show you the empty box, but it is a visual that only the Blockmaker would love. Since "make blocks" is a column in the progress chart, and I am able to check it off, the progress rate has moved up. The Fourth Rail blocks now move to the next station, where the Block Put-together-er is going to arrange and rearrange them to decide on a layout.

In the meantime, the next quilt scurried up to the Blockmaker's counter before anyone else noticed. This quilt happened to be ATC Holder, which is a horrible name for the quilt, but it is its name, so what can we do?  There was a spool of whitish thread in the box, and more blocks are now being made. This is a very calm, sedate block compared to the wild and scrappy Fourth Rail. This one requires precise piecing (those black cornerstones finish at half an inch) and only use three fabrics. This is a scary prospect that requires the right amount of fabric to finish the whole quilt. It looks pretty boring, but I hope to make it up in volume!

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Put Your Foot Down

A Dozen Rails

I have finished the Love and Happiness quilt - quilting, binding, labeling, everything. I'll show it to you after it has been delivered.

This means the floodgates open and there are a million new quilts I want to start.  How about an alphabet quilt? Or a postage stamp quilt that Lynn and Wanda and a whole bunch of other people are making? Both of these use scraps which would be really helpful in reducing some of the scraps. And then there is the Seasons Crazy Mystery Quilt. That one can also use scraps, but would likely make a bigger mess. I have a couple of other quilts to finish before I can get to that one.

Yes, I do plan on starting all of those, but to keep the current quilts from grumbling too much, I thought I should work on them at least a little bit so they at least feel like the line is moving forwards instead of backwards for them.

Today, I sewed a dozen rail fence blocks. The stack has more than a dozen since I also pressed all the blocks that hadn't been pressed yet.

And since it has been two weeks since I posted a stitching update, here it is.

15 Minutes to Stitch: Week 27

I have been diligently working on the Love and Happiness quilt (formerly known as Purple Smiles). It took me much longer than anticipated, which I guess is normal. Since my last update, I put on the borders, I tried to keep the borders lightly quilted so that it would retain a soft hand, and then bound it by machine.

15 Minute sessions of stitching this month: 14 out of 14
15 Minute sessions of stitching this year: 144 out of 188 sessions

Success Rate: 77% Finally an upward trend!

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Friday Foto Fun I made more rail fence blocks, and the picture would look similar.
Off The Wall Friday

More Rails and 1CAD

I am late in posting my week's progress, but better late than never.

15 Minutes to Stitch

I am doing two ongoing projects. One is the 15 minutes to stitch whereby I try to stitch for 15 minutes a day.  Last week, I worked on three different projects. One was sewing more rail fence blocks. I also worked on my genealogy scrapbook, which is mostly paper but does involve sewing. I was showing a friend at work my book of quilts, and she asked me to make one for her, so I looked for fabric on sale. She designed the quilt and I spent some time figuring out the math to make it the size she wanted.



15 Minute sessions of stitching this week: 7 out of 7

In making this report, I see  have been negligent in reporting my progress.  I was looking at 111 total sessions, but it's been 125 days. I don't know how much sewing I have done in those missing 14 days. I know I have been trying to sew every day, but I also know I've missed days. To keep myself honest, I will take credit for half the time.

15 Minute sessions of stitching this year: 107 out of 125 sessions
Success Rate: 86%

 My 2018 end of the year average was 85% and I hope to beat that this year, so I am still on course for this year

One Card a Day

In my last post, I talked about the one card a day that starts in June. 

 

Being the rule follower that I am, I have already started these little cards.

Just having fun and being playful. I don't think of it as making art, but just having fun putting something on these small index cards.

Here are some cards, all together. The first one is watercolor only, the second one is watercolor and marker, and the third one was marker only.

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Off the Wall Friday

WIP Inventory

Having finished a couple of small quilts, I decided to take inventory of my current works in progress and their current status.  I am hoping that this will help me see that progress is being made during the spring and summer slowdown. These are just the quilts I have been working on in the last few months, and not the other unfinished projects that are stored away.

Some people might be overwhelmed by the number of projects listed here, but I really enjoy getting to choose which project I want to work on. Since they are not standing in a straight line, being worked on one at a time, in order, when progress is made on one quilt, the whole group is making progress.

Here they are in no particular order.

 

Drunkard's Path

Ethnic Drunkard's Path was started in August 2003 and it is the closest to completion. It is already basted and a lot of the dark purple and blue spaces have been quilted.  I need to finish quilting it and bind it.  It is a fairly big quilt -  a big lap quilt. 

 

Colonial Bricks

 

Colonial Bricks was started September 2018. It has been pieced and the backing and binding fabric has been chosen and cut. The backing needs to be wider, so I am piecing the leftovers to insert to make the backing wider.

 

Sunlight in Winter

 

Sunlight in Winter was started December 2018. I am making the blocks one half yard of yellow fabric at a time. I used up half a yard of the butterfly fabric, and half a yard of the grunge fabric. I had a whole yard of the grunge fabric and since it is the darkest yellow, I decided to use that half yard to make the squares because I think the squares will show the pattern and it is my darkest yellow.  All of the yellow fabrics are very similar. I like that look but will consider adding more patterned yellows when I am closer to completion. I will not make the whole blocks until all of these subblocks are done.

 

Uncommon and Unexpected

 

Uncommon and Unexpected was started February 2019 as a part of a quilt along.  One of the things I really liked about the original quilt is how the cornerstones made the sashing look like circle dancing around the squares, and my eye moved from one overlapping circle to another.  My quilt does that, but the diagonally placed squares, and the striped fabric, and the small number of blocks stop the eye from bouncing too easily at the circles.  I want to add more blocks to help show more of that movement. Some of the border has been pieced but I am still thinking about how I want to accomplish that.

 

ATC Holder

 

ATC Holder was started November 2018. It doesn't look like a lot of progress has been made on this, but there has been.  All of those photo corners have been cut and pressed. I think that was the hardest part.  I need to strip piece the cornerstones and once I do that, I think I will be able to piece this pretty quickly. There isn't any decision making left on this quilt until the center has been pieced. It is deliberately plain to let the ATCs stand out.

 

Circles 365

 

Circle 365 was started November 2015, and I have been sporadically working on this quilt since then. I am putting the circles together into the quilt top when I have enough, and it is 2/3rd done. The quilt is getting pretty big now so I have decided not to take it out since my blog readers have seen this quilt grow from time to time.

 

Fourth Rail

 

Fourth Rail was started January 2019 as a leader / ender to use up scraps.  The layout has not been decided but this one looks pretty interesting to me. I have a lot of pieces already cut so it is just a matter of sewing them together.

 

Stitchery 

You probably forgot about this stitchery, but it is pretty close to completion. It's been a while since I worked on it. The first time I mentioned it on my blog was August 2018, so it was started about then, but I  bought the kit from the thrift store a long time before that. It is made with yarn.

 

Seiring Genealogy Book

 

I don't think I have shown you this genealogy book, but I started it shortly after I finished the Priest Genealogy Book in December 2017. I have the pages all ready and all the genealogy information has been printed. I need to make the cover, add the genealogy printouts to the pages and embellish the pages a bit more. The cookie box is going to be used in the quilted cover to give it more stability.

 

Cultural Fusion Rail Fence

I showed the Cultural Fusion Rail Fence as part of the Dust Off a Quilt Book Blog Hop. It was started November 2015.  The quilt top is done and the backing and binding fabric has been chosen.

 

Be a Diamond

I will be taking a part of this blog hop. My day is April 25. I want to keep it simple so this will be my April mini of the month.

 Bunny Parade

I am giving you a sneak preview of this quilt which I finished yesterday. This is a free pattern from Moda Bakeshop called Bunny Quartet. The designer of the pattern also provided a tutorial for a carrot on her blog, which I used as you can tell from the photo.  So my bunnies are a trio and not a quartet. She changed the name to Easter Parade, but since I have Elephant Parade quilt in the works, I am going to call it Bunny Parade.

Since it is a bunny quilt, I will show the whole thing to you on Easter. Since the diamond quilt will be my April mini of the month, Bunny Parade is my May mini of the month, so I will also show it to you again in May as a reminder. I don't want you to get tired of it so I am only giving you a preview now.  I know from personal experience that if you buy a Christmas present in July, it still counts as a Christmas present, even if you can't wait and give it to the recipient in July.

 

Quilt Statistics

 Since I pulled up my spreadsheet to record the finish of the bunny quilt and give you the start date for all these quilts, let's talk about the stats, shall we?  I have started 127 quilts and have finished 99 quilts, which is a 78% completion rate.

It takes me an average of 242 days to complete a quilt. This number has gone down, mostly because of all the mini quilts I have been making lately.  A lot of my quilts get done much quicker than 242 days, but I also tend to pick up projects that needed an incubation period. When I get an old UFO completed, that average number of days to completion goes up, but that won't stop me from working on my UFOs. The stats are there to record my progress, not to tell me what to do.

 

15 Minutes to Stitch: Week 11

I spent this week making the Bunny Parade quilt. I also took inventory of all of my works in process.

15 Minute sessions of stitching this week: 7 out of 7
15 Minute sessions of stitching this year: 76 out of 76 sessions
Success Rate: 100%

I checked my results from last year, and I was at 100% on March 18th, so I am on track for this year.  The following week, the 25th, I sewed 2 out of 7 days. I'll see if I can beat that this year. It doesn't sound like a high bar to reach.

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What I Made on Monday Yes I did make all of these today, why do you ask?
Peacock Party

Fourth Rail Fence Progress

I have been working on a rail fence quilt as a leader / ender project, and yesterday, I pressed the blocks I had made so far. The Fourth Rail is a dark one, hence its name, and the rest are scrappy. I haven't decided on the layout for this quilt, but the dark rail will help show off the layout.

I am really happy with this is how this is turning out, and I really like being able to feed these blocks through while I am making something else. It somehow motivates me to keep quilting because I don't get to that "good stopping place" as often when I am working on these as well.

I Can Stop Anytime I Want

When I started making the butterfly wreath blocks, I decided to just make a few and when I get bored, put whatever I have together into a quilt and call it done. Each set of fabrics make 8 HSTs and there are two HSTs from each set in each block, so each set of three fabrics make four blocks. Some of the HSTs do have to get rejected for size, especially ones that use charm squares.  Charm squares are sometimes slightly bigger or smaller than 5 inches so they don't play well with the others.

I made a few, and a few more.  Yesterday, I laid them out to see how they would look in a quilt and get an estimate of the size.  [I even counted them and safety pinned them in sets of ten to be all organized, but had to take out the safety pins to recreate the picture for you.]

It is a good size and I could easily put them together and get a quilt about the size of a bread box. I would work great as my mini for the month of March. But I am having fun with making these blocks so I made a couple more sets. They are like potato chips. You gotta have more. I don't want to use bright blues for this quilt, so the blues from On Ringo Lake won't go in here.  Since I am having a hard time finding the right tone of blues in the scraps, these blues came from the stash.

The decision making for this quilt has been surprisingly easy.  It is strange when I am looking for blue and green fabrics and the Cave of Wonders delivers a red fabric. I think it is a mood and not a color it is delivering.

 

Week 7 of 15 Minutes to Stitch

There was no work this week, so I had plenty of unexpected time.  I spent it doing household chores and getting appointments in and otherwise generally whittling down the to-do list on my calendar. I got my blog  post ready for the Dust Off a Quilt Book Blog Hop and scheduled it to post on Tuesday morning.

I was able to sneak in a lot of quilting time, which I spent cutting up the shoe box of scraps. There weren't a lot of pieces big enough or the right color for Butterfly Wreath, but lots of one and a half inch strips for Four Rails.  I put together the pieces that weren't long enough for Four Rails and made a long chain. While it was tempting to make another Matchstick Mansion, I decided to go with my original plan and cut them into rails. I want Four Rails to be less boring than the traditional rail quilt and if I get lots of these sewed pieces, then it will look like a natural part of the quilt instead of a few making-do-when-I-ran-out-of-fabric pieces.

I read a comment on a blog that said that a shoe box full of scrap fabric makes a queen size quilt. I guess that explains why it took so long for me to get through my box! It was my latest scrap box, and it was full of scraps from On Ringo Lake and other projects I worked on last year.  Since I had made snippet quilts [I Llike you a Llot Llama and the elephant], it included everything, including dog ears, orphan blocks (bonus HSTs mostly), and scraps and bits of fabric. I put the orphan blocks in the orphan blocks box but everything else was cut up for the rails and trash. I didn't generally keep dog ears and selvages and fabric dust so hopefully going through the rest of the scrap boxes will be easier. I do have a huge tote of scraps in addition to little containers which is scary but I am sure I will be able to get them all a little at a time.


The fabric trash can is now full, and the shoe box is empty.  I want to make something out of those little pieces in the trash can before I move on to the next container of scraps.

15 Minute sessions of stitching this week:  7 out of 7
15 Minute sessions of stitching this year:  41 out of 41 sessions
Success Rate: 100%

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Lets Bee Social

Quilt Reveal: Mighty Matchstick Mansion

In order to use up my scraps, I decided to make a rail fence quilt.  This quilt is designed to use up the scraps that were too small to fit into the rail fence quilt. These are all one and a half inch strips that are too short for the rail fence quilt.  So they are more like matchsticks really.

It took a long time to cut up the scraps for this quilt, because it is supposed to use leftovers from the rail fence quilt, named Fourth Rail.  I had to cut the scraps for Fourth Rail, and then the leftovers were used for this quilt. Sometimes I cut up a scrap of fabric and Fourth Rail used them all and there wasn't anything left big enough for this quilt, so I had to move on to the next scrap.  Also since this quilt is one block, I sewed more of Fourth Rail as a leader/ender, which meant I was making two quilts at the same time.

Some of the more astute viewers may wonder whether it is a courthouse square or a log cabin because it has elements of both.  Well, it is both. No, I take that back. It is neither. It is a mansion.

And because little matchsticks are able to make something like a mansion, they are pretty mighty. So this is a Mighty Matchstick Mansion.

It finishes at 16" x 17 1/2" and since it is bigger than a breadbox and was made in the correct time frame, I am submitting it to the Bigger Than a Breadbox Project Quilting Challenge.

Once I figured out I was early for the challenge because the deadline is noon on Sunday, not Saturday, I quilted it some more and cleaned off some of the stray threads.

I really enjoyed making this quilt, and it is very tempting to change my original plan for Fourth Rail and make it improv rather than traditional, but I am going to keep going as I have been. That has always been my biggest issue with making a long term scrap project. There are so many great ideas, it is hard to stay committed to one until it is finished.

I've Been Working On the Railroad

All the livelong day!

Okay, maybe not railroad, as much as rail fence.  There are three rail fence projects currently in progress. Yes there were two the last time I talked to you, but numbers tend to be pretty flexible here on the High Road.
 

First up is the four rails quilt which is my current scrap quilt project that I started earlier this year. I think the official name for this quilt will be Fourth Rail, sort of a play on third rail.  For the rails I am cutting 4 1/2" rails.  If the fabric is too short to cut that long, I cut them however long I can, and sew them together. The plan is to piece the short rails until they are long enough to fit, and add them into the quilt.

Next is the rail fence border I am making for the improv rail fence quilt. Here I am trying to see whether I want the rail fence as the inner or the outer border. I've decided inner border and have already started sewing. This one is actually the first priority, but I didn't want the fuzzy picture to be first on the blog.

Then, since I finished up my small quilt of the month, I have been thinking about my next small quilt of the month.  I've been thinking about making all of the quilts in this quilt pattern. The one on the right reminded me of a quilt I've been wanting to make for a while. Instead of courthouse, the idea s to make it log cabin style, and to use pieced rails instead of whole ones like this pattern does.

Turns out I have a start to this quilt already in the Fourth Rail quilt box.  So I am re-purposing some of those short rails to become my small quilt of the month.  I'm sure I will still have plenty of short rails to add to the Fourth Rail quilt, but for this month, they are diverted to this quilt. So this is my third rail fence quilt, although technically it would be called a log cabin quilt.  Like the Fourth Rail quilt, I am using whatever scraps I pick up without discrimination and letting serendipity have its way. Hopefully it will turn up some nice delights in this small quilt. This one probably won't have the wow factor the other quilt had, but maybe if I am quick enough, I can think of and make another quilt to also make that does have a wow factor.

Lego Rails and Improv Rails

When I am cutting the scraps for the Four Rails quilt, sometimes the fabric is not long enough to cut into a 4 1/2" strip.  When that happens, I have been cutting it into whatever length rectangle I can get out of it. I sewed them together to each other so I wouldn't confuse these pieces with the rails that are just the right size. These will be subcut to 4 1/2" pieces and used as rails.

When I first started cutting these fabrics, I was disappointed with the lack of variety and pizazz in the scraps, but now that I have gotten farther into the scrap shoe box, I really like how this quilt is turning out. The scrap shoe box doesn't seem any emptier, but the scrap trash can is almost full.

Being rail happy, I am also making rails for the border of the improv rail fence quilt. I haven't decided which of rows (the rails or the triangles) should serve as the inner border and which of the rows should serve as the outer border. Today I spent time trying to figure out how to make the rails turn the corner, which is strange because I wasn't planning on doing anything special to make the triangles turn the corner.

It's been super cold here, below zero.  You can tell because Zeus, who is normally blond, turns into a redhead. It was a very short walk.  The street is really icy, and you have to go uphill to turn the corner. I'm so glad it was a holiday and I didn't have to drive in it. Zeus loves the snow though and wanted to keep going outside throughout the day.

This has been Yesterday's News, Today.

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15 Minutes to Stitch Weekly Recap

 

15 Minute to Stitch Challenge: 

Week Two

I missed posting last week, and since each week was different, I will post each week separately.  For the second week of the month, I worked on new projects. I needed to decide on my next scrap quilt so I could tame the scraps and my idea for the Butterfly Wreaths needed 5 inch squares, which is bigger than most of the scraps in the scrap box, so I also decided to work on a rail fence to use up the smaller scraps. This week was spent cutting and sewing a few pieces to make a few blocks to get started and to see if the plan seemed like it was worth pursuing.

15 Minute sessions of stitching this week:  7 out of 7
15 Minute sessions of stitching this year:  13 out of 13 sessions
Success Rate: 100%

Week 3

I didn't get much time to sew during the week, so I made it up on the weekend.  Yesterday, I got a scrap box and started cutting pieces for the scrap quilts. Just take the first fabric on top, and cut it to size for one of the scrap quilts. So far, I didn't get any 5 inch squares, so everything was cut for the rail fence, but maybe I'll find bigger scraps today.

I am going to use the same rule I used last year - that if I miss the 15 minutes of sewing one day, I can make it up during the week and still count it. It is snowing here, so I will be able to get even more sewing done today.

15 Minute sessions of stitching this week:  7 out of 7
15 Minute sessions of stitching this year:  20 out of 20 sessions
Success Rate: 100%

 

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Introducing Butterfly Wreaths and Four Rails

As you know, I have planned to work on a lot of new quilts this year - not just trying to finish WIPS and UFOs but to start as many quilts as I want.  I am not going to give myself any limits and see if I can manage to stay in control without limits. The plan is to start what I want, and when I am starting to get tired of it, turn it into a quilt and call it done, no matter how small it turns out to be. The process is more important than the product.

In order to make this new process work, though, I need to make sure I document and keep track of the quilts I have started. So here are the new quilts I have started this month.

Butterfly Wreaths is a quilt that Gayle, Cathy, and Julie are making.  They each have come up with their own name and I am hoping that the name and this picture will help me remember the layout I am choosing. It will be a scrap quilt.  I really want to use scraps and make the wreath rings really stand out, but I am really not sure how to make that work.

I enjoyed making eight HSTs at one time for Sunlight in Winter, and realized I could make these HSTs the same way. Sunlight in Winter is cut 1/8th less than a whole square, so there is no trimming needed to make it fit the squares that it goes with.  Butterfly Wreaths only uses triangles so I am cutting three 5 inch squares at a time - two of the main fabric, one light and one dark.  The main fabric is paired with each of the others (one main with the light and one main with the dark) to make 8 HSTS each and then they are put together to make the blocks. I need to remember to press to the main fabric to make the seams nest. I think those butterflies can be either dark or light, but for now, I think I am going to see how I like it with just dark butterflies.

Yes this means there will be repeat blocks, but hopefully this quilt will be big enough that it won't matter. Repeat blocks might be good to add some cohesion to the quilt. And if it gets on my nerves, I might try to combine the subunits in different combinations to have more variety.

Four Rails is a rail fence quilt designed to use up my scraps.  Like my other rail fence, it will include all fabrics with no discrimination.  I will just cut and sew when the whim strikes me to make these.  It will be a kind of leader/ender project. I am hoping it takes over like the other rail fence did. This quilt will use four rails instead of three rails like my other rail fence quilt, hence the name Four Rails.  The pieces are cut 1.5 x 4.5 so they will be squares.

My plan is to use all my fabric scraps without any regard to color.  I will take a scrap, and cut as many five inch squares out of it as I can. Once it gets too small, then I will cut as many one and a half inch strips out of it as I can, and subcut them into rail fences. Once that is done, they go into the trash.

For my trash and snippet quilts, silly. You didn't think I will actually throw them away, did you?

 Today, I appreciate snow that makes everything pretty but isn't slippery.