"What's Country Now..."

...is a feature in the Country Living magazine. I've taken the magazine for years, and have seen the trends sway to and fro.

I chuckled when I saw this month's feature - also under the title of "Bargain of the Month".

Well, they really didn't ask me - but I've been "country" all my life - and I made one of these about 12 years ago - it just wasn't because I was trying to make a "country" statement. In fact I Country When Country Wasn't Cool.

There's a really sweet story that goes along with it! Mike's mother's family holds a reunion every year, and they always have an auction to raise money for the following year. Well, money was really tight for us at the time (we had just moved our family of 6 into a 16' x 40" cabin the year before. We were caring for Mike's aging parents), but I wanted to do something for the auction. I scrounged through my scraps and made the checker board and even hand quilted it (Back then I didn't even know that you could machine quilt!).

I cut the checkers from scrap lumber with a hole saw, and painted them, and Mike built some really neat clips for storage.

Our cost was $0, as even the paint was left over from another project that the girls had done.

I was excited to take it to the reunion. Lots of older folks attend that I thought would appreciate my work and I thought it would bring a nice price. But...only one bidder, and for $7. I didn't know who had bought it, but was a little disappointed. Well, here's the best part of the story - my sweet husband saw that no one was bidding on it, so he started the bidding! He said he would have gone higher, because he knew how much work I had done and he didn't want it to just go to someone else and just be thrown aside. I've treasured it since! So now I ask you...is it "country" enough and which is the better bargain?!!!!

That's my father's day tribute to my dear husband who is also a fabulous father to our wonderful children and an awesome Gramps to the grands - of which we now have two, with the third due in August.

Our second was born May 25 - a sweet baby boy named Asa Barret. I got to spend five days with them, and it was such a blessing.

I also was only two weeks late with his quilt!

 Not sure if you can see in the photo, but I had quilted arrows around the animal blocks and deer tracks in the cornerstones/4P. Mandie decorated the nursery in a woodland theme - which you can see here.

Hope this finds each and every one of you richly blessed and remember...