Barn Quilts

Apparently the hottest trend in the rural mid-west is to decorate a barn with a quilt.  Here are some barn quilts at http://www.barnquilts.com/ that have been put up across the US.  The quilts are actually plywood that are painted in quilt patterns.  This past winter my mom and dad worked many hours on three separate blocks.  So after all the their work making the plywood blocks, we spent yesterday actually hanging the two that were finished.  The barn quilts were made for my dad's tractor shed and my Grandpa's tin shed in Waseca.

My dad I started putting up the barn quilt on the tin shed.  It was a 4'x4' piece with a pattern that is on point.  This one was definately the more difficult one to put up.  It took us about 3 hours total time to hang.  We did have to install some backing material for mount, which took more time.

The second one we put on the tractor shed.  It was a 4'x4' piece as well called "Farmer's Daughter".  This one was put up square and we didn't have to put up any additional backing material.  Both ended up looking really good and just may be the talk of the town.

Here is the slide show of the whole process for both quilts.

Antique tractors

This past Sunday I went with my dad to the Scott Carver Thresher's Association tractor show. My dad brought two of his tractors (Farmal Cub and his W-6) and my Simplicity garden tractor to be displayed at the show. I had been to this show one time before, but I never had my own tractor on display. We arrived on Sunday in time to have a quick lunch and then drive the tractors in the parade. I drove the Cub while he drove the W-6. His tractors were near the front of the parade and my Simplicity was near the back, so it gave me time to drive mine in the parade as well.

We spent sometime after the parade walking around looking at all of the different tractors and steam engines. We watched threshing machine thresh rye for a little bit and talked about the fire that started on a hay wagon the day before. I missed this, but apparently it added for some excitement on Saturday. While we were loading up the tractors with it being so dry a log started to smolder near the sawmill, probably starting from a steam engine that was runnning the sawmill. It was put out right away and didn't cause any damage.

It was a fun day. After the show we loaded the tractors up and brought them down to the shed in Waseca where they will sit until the next show.