Whole Lotta Shakin' Goin' On

I guess it's official. We are walnut farmers, and today began the harvest of our first crop. Our farmer called at 8:30, to tell me that the shaking would begin soon. I drove out to the property, and saw this equipment parked out front.

This long lean machine is the shaker. It starts the work. Do you see the brushes, in front of and behind each wheel? They brush the nuts out of the way as the machine zooms back and forth.

I think this is the blower, but now I'm not so sure. It looks more like the scraper, that pushes the nuts to the center of the check.

Maybe this is the blower. hmmm. I thought I had it straight this morning, but now it's hard to remember. I should have taken more than 80 pictures, as apparently I did not take enough.

The shakers began at the far side of the checks. We could hear them rumbling and roaring, and the house rattled constantly as they shook first one tree then another.

The noise grew as the machines moved closer. I could gradually make them out as they emerged from clouds of dust.

Here you can see the machine grabbing the tree. It then shakes it violently, for about 15 or 20 seconds. I was amazed by how quickly the shaker zipped back and forth across the check, shaking this tree then that tree then yet another. zig zag zig zag shake shake shake.

This is what it looks like, when it's raining walnuts.

At this point, the west trees have been shaken and the machines have moved on to the east trees. Look at all those nuts!

I left for a few hours. While I was gone, they blew the debris away from the nuts and scraped the nuts into long piles down the middle of the checks. Then a big blue rumbly machine barreled back and forth down the rows, scooping up the nuts. If you click on these pictures, you can see much more detail. The rumbly machine is crossing the far side of the dirt road, going from west to east.

Once it's rumbled by, the orchard is quiet, filled with rays of sunshine, like a magic fairyland. Only it's a filthy dirty magic fairyland, with the rays of sunshine captured and reflected by the airborne dirt.

Hard to believe that's dirt? Believe me, it's dirt. This is a green car that was not dirty over the weekend.

But it's all worth it, as you see this bin full of walnuts go barreling off to the dehydrator. wow. We really did grow some walnuts. This was the second load I saw leave the property. yay. I guess there were more nuts than I thought!

And finally, we've still got nuts. This tree was shaken at least 4 times, if not more, yet look at all those nuts still on the branches.

As soon as all of the machinery is out of the orchard (possibly this evening, possibly tomorrow morning), we're to do one more round of irrigation, then shake them once more.

I don't know about you, but I found all of this fascinating. Growing walnuts has been quite the education!!

Walnuts: They're good, and they're good for you! :) Buy some and make a farmer smile. :)

P.S. Diana & Heather. I've wanted to respond to your comments, but you don't have an email link on your blogger profiles...

For You Dog Lovers

For those of you who ask about Chupa, she's still hanging around. This is about as close as I get to her, for the most part. My presence continues to make her edgy and nervous.

I used the zoom to get this shot. See how she gives me that "I don't trust you, I'm leaving" look? I get it every time.

Here she's showing one of her skills. I didn't realize she was a pointer. ;)

When the guys are around, it's a whole different story. She'll often give me a lick too, just to make a liar out of me. ;)

And finally, here she is, laughing at me, as she pretends she's going to just keep on going and enter the house. Sorry dog, I'm here. It's not going to happen today...

And there you go. Chupacabra, in all her glory.

Tulare County Fair

Yes folks, once again it's time for the Tulare County Fair. I'm not sure how many years the Fair has been around, but this is my...26th. wow. Yep. We moved here in Sept, 1985, just before the Fair opened its doors that year.

I joined the Valley Oak Quilt Guild in 1987, and have been one of its quiltie lady demonstrators ever since. I don't think I've missed a year. I even quilted with them the year that I did not renew my membership.

This is the quilt that won Best of Show, Professional. It's a beautiful Dresden Plate, begun by Loretta White. Loretta passed away, and Ann (second from the left in the above picture) inherited the pieces. She finished the quilt, and it is a stunner. I am thrilled that it was singled out for the BOS recognition.

Other Best of Show quilts hang front and center. On the far left (you can only see half) is the BOS, machine quilted by self. Next to it is the BOS, hand quilted. The large blue star quilt on the right is BOS, overall, BOS, all cotton, and BOS, machine quilted by another. The quilts were made by Diane Mitchell, Kathy Wasnick, and Sharon Scholta.

I'm kind of embarrassed that my airplane quilt hangs above and in the middle of the BOS display. I guess it's there because it celebrates the theme of the fair, which is "Just Plane Fun." It's not because it's BOS anything.

"The Flower Fades" did well. In the professional category, quilts are judged on their own merit, not relative to other quilts in the class. I love the coxcomb quilt hanging next to it, I believe it won BOS, group quilt. It, too, was made by Kathy Wasnick.

"Glacier Ice" hung in the Christmas display. The wreath is NOT part of my quilt.

Finally, I had a hard time finding my penguin quilt. I have to say that I LOVE the long beach quilt hanging above it. It was made by Darlene Byars. Now I want to make one. :)

And there you go, that's my snapshot of the fair. There was much more to see, but I was only there long enough to do a bit of quilting and then do a quick walkabout of the exhibits.

'til next time...

Where Am I?

On Monday, I was in Santa Cruz.

On Tuesday, I was with Adam, at Westside Auto. Adam...
Westside Auto...

Me...oh wait, I need to smile...

Here I am again. I don't remember holding the camera upside down, but apparently I did. I could blame it on the sun, but on second thought, the photo looks better this way...more balanced. ;)

On Thursday, I finished up my BOTV website submissions, most of which have been posted. Our 2012 entry form is now online, along with pictures of the 2011 winners.

On Friday, I drove to San Carlos, to babysit. I thought Penny (or her mother) might like this quilt.

I was right, Penny did.

Penny also liked her rice cereal.

She's starting to take over the living room. (I couldn't resist the drool...)

On Saturday and Sunday, I finished embellishing this little piece. Blogger tipped it, I did NOT hold my camera wrong this time!

I added some beads and shells and silk ribbon embroidery.

And although I was disappointed in my failed attempts to make a shell fringe, I am quite pleased with the shell & bead border. I used light-weight fire line to hold them in place. The trick to sewing on shells is to use a needle to go through the fabric, and then remove it to string the shell, and then re-thread the needle and stitch through the fabric. It's a tedious process, but I really like the result. The beads came from a shell necklace that I purchased for a dollar at a secondhand store.

And that's my week in review. Hopefully I will have more to post about during this coming week. Stay tuned...

Getting Away From It All

For Labor Day, we tried something new. We rented a house near the coast, in Santa Cruz. It doesn't look like much from the outside, but inside, it was perfect.

We were this close to the water.

Penny was there.

And Penny and her mother were there.

And Penny and her uncle were there.

And Penny and her uncle were there.

And Penny and her uncle were there.

And Penny and her Grandpa were there.

There was game playing,

there were walks along the water,

and imaginary house shopping...

This one got the most votes.

There were seagull swarms,

and surfers,

sailboats,

bougainvillea,

a lovely view from the kitchen sink,

and plenty of Penny for everyone.

Every get-away should be this successful!!! The only thing missing was Penny's Papa. Maybe next time...

Cool Facing Idea

Yesterday I pulled a UFO "art" quilt out of the pile, thinking I was going to try a new-to-me facing idea. I'd once seen something similar, on a quilt by Franki Kohler, that I bought a few years ago during the SAQA online auction. (BTW, this year's auction commences this month, Sept 12, at 2pm Eastern.)

Anyway, using the inset circle technique from Jeannette's class at Asilomar, I ended up with this. Yes, folks, this is the BACK of the little quilt. The quilt is about 10" x 12", or maybe a little bigger.

This is the front of the quilt, all wonky, but endearing, in its amazing imperfection.

I've just begun the embellishment - yes, I do the embellishment last - so far I've added some sea foam. Blogger flipped my pic, but it's a combination of French knots and beads. I saw the combo at Long Beach and wondered if I could pull it off. (I included this picture, because that mouse is so doggone cute.)

And here's a close-up of my corner. wow. It doesn't matter that it's flipped, I think it looks pretty good, if I do say so myself.

And now it's off to meet the plumber. Yesterday I noticed a leak as I was out at the walnuts, and we need to get it taken care of, for sure.