It is not news for those of you who live in the northern part of the country. It has been cold, snowy and in general a rough winter. And I live in an area that has missed some of the worse weather. We did get a surprise Sunday night Monday morning. The weather predictors were calling for a dusting of snow. We go this

About 4 inches of snow. At least the snow we'd gotten a few days before had melted some. So what do you do when you don't want to be out in the bitter cold just to go shopping or fighting the panicked crowds at the grocery store stocking up on bread and milk (cause you know that the day or maybe two you might not be able to get out you'll drink more milk and eat more bread than normal and run out of everything in the house) Well here's some of the things I did. First I made a large Mariner's compass

And some blocks to go with that large one. And then because I found a better way to make the compasses I made a 2nd large Mariner's compass block. Although I ran out of background fabric, tomorrow I go on a search for fabric. The local quilting group is doing what they call a Block of the Month where everyone participating makes one themed block a month, someone wins all the blocks from that month. Well January's block was suppose to be ready this past Monday the Feb. 3rd. That meeting was canceled, but my block was ready. Today I'm working on the block for February, it is due on the 17th. Hopefully we won't have to cancel that one. In between I've been in the kitchen. First I dug the turkey carcass from Thanksgiving out of the freezer and made turkey broth and canned it. Of course I baked cookies, chocolate chips for hubby and I and then because he complained so much I baked double choclate peanut butter blossoms for my son away at college.

There was also an apple pie. Krogers had pineapples on sale 10 for $10 so yesterday I canned pineapples and one jar of water. (I'll explain the water later.)

I'd done pineapples after Christmas and the jars we've opened since then have tasted so good I'd planned on doing more when pineapples were on sale again. I didn't think it would be so soon. For instructions on canning pineapples and a lot of information, tips and recipes related to canning and doing it safely go here That's where I got the idea about the water. We've all had to go with out running water at some point due to water line breaks, repairing old lines, or in the case of a lot of WV a few weeks ago contaminated water. So if you are canning and don't have enough of whatever for a full load of jars, ( in my case 7 quart jars make a full load.) put in a quart of water. Water bath 20 minutes and it will last for a long time. I'm going to start building up a supply because our town has very old water lines.