Chillin' Out

Like many other places in Canada and the US we have been experiencing extremely cold weather and plenty of snow this past week. Living on the Canadian prairie, winter snowstorms are to be expected and, for the most part, we are generally prepared (e.g., warm clothes, snow shovels, etc.) for times like this. Having said that, how does anyone prepare for this?

Last Monday, it started to cool off and the snow began to fly later in the afternoon. So much so that by Tuesday, we ended up having a snow day as a result of the 30 cm (12 inches!) of snow that came down. Many businesses and services remained open, but I work at a college and our classrooms were really, really empty on Tuesday morning. Public transit wasn't running and it wasn't very nice for those who would normally walk to campus. I'm grateful to work somewhere where they care about our safety enough to know when to call it a day.

As much as I like my job, there is just something so decadent and exciting about a snow day! Imagine, staying home from work on a Tuesday afternoon - what joy! It was a perfect time to finish working on a little project I had started on the weekend.

A couple years ago, I picked up a fun holiday print in an after-Christmas sale at Fat Quarter Shop and all along, I knew I wanted to use it to make pillowcases for my bed. It only took me three years, but I got them made last weekend. After that, I thought it would be fun to make a pillow to go with them. I foraged around in my scrap bins until I had a bunch of neutrals and some colourful scraps to go nicely with my pillowcase focus print. I followed Toni's directions to make Skinny Churn Dash blocks and they turned out so cute! I did some straight line quilting across the top, added a quilted envelope closure for the back and in short order, my new pillow was done. Here it is, nestled against the pillowcases I took my inspiration from.

What a fun snow day! I hope I get to do it again sometime.

e.