Quilts, apples, and ribbon wands

I found a sweet little quilt in a box of stuff from my mom. She believes that it was my dad's quilt as a baby. It's in perfect condition and each square has a Mother Goose Character on it.
Here are Little Miss Muffet and Little Bo Peep (click on the picture to see more detail):

You know I LOVE fall. The crisp air has me hankering for warm foods and apples. I really wanted to go to a “pick your own” organic farm, but the closest one is almost an hour and a half away. That’s a long time for two tiny people in the car. There is an apple tree I have admired the last few years, it’s right on path to our park.

The house has a new owner and this year the apple tree in his yard is LOADED. A couple months ago we introduced ourselves as we have such a friendly neighborhood. So I saw “Fred” out working in his yard Thursday after preschool. We asked if we could pick up the "nicer" ones off the ground.

He was thrilled and insisted we pick from the tree as well.

So after naptime, the kids and I went picking!!! Now I have a heaping bag full of apples, organically grown, local, and built a little bit of community in the process.

Also, we decided to try some raw even though they are all green and some are a bit on the small side. They are fantastic.

I have no idea the variety, but I plan to save some seeds and see if we can get one growing in our yard. Hey, I know it produces well in this climate and it's totally on it's own rootstock. Can you tell how excited I am?

Once we get cracking on our applesauce, we plan to take a jar to "Mr. Fred".

Finally, I got the my next craft swap item done.

I made rainbow ribbon wands. Hand dying the wood with watercolors and then sealing with beeswax took up the majority of the time. They are mostly all natural, but I did have to use a bit of glue to keep the ribbons in place and on the decorative buttons. I’ve got a second “spot” in the rainbow craft and I’m making wall hangings for that… only about 1/7th of the way done.