Fiber and Pulp

Musings

I am still thinking about these blocks - my floral fantasy squares from the Sue Benner class last week. Sue had a piece of advice for students that I took to heart - she takes a digital photo of her basic block units, prints them out and plays with the printed photo to decide on a layout. 

So, I took a quick pic of my blocks and cut up the print out to play with ideas. I made two color prints which was a good thing because I thought of different ways to use the squares. :)

Here is one type of what I am thinking of as a floral-burst design, a la Sue:

Sue's pieces look really nice done this way ... but this is way, way too visually stimulating for my eyes! I played with any number of versions of this idea before I decided to reject it. (sigh)

I was really divided as to whether I should persevere and do what the teacher's sample looked like (mostly as a memory prompt for myself) ... or go my own way. In the _spirit_ of Sue's approach to quilt making (no patterns, no rules), I decided that I need to put my own 'stamp' on this project. :)

So, then I tried some diagonal division ideas. Here are half square triangles made of divided floral units:

Here is a quarter square triangle arrangement:

Again, these are both kinda busy for my eyes. ;) My friend Barbara B. told me I should do something 'linda' with my blocks. So....now I am thinking about making each 6" flower square a page in an artist's book of some kind. Maybe a concertina or a Dos-a-Dos structure. The former would lend itself to easy display in my shop or at home (unfolded like a screen, along a shelf). Also, making each into it's own quilted page would let me further embellish each square with beads, embroidery, quilting, etc.

I am pondering this project while I do other things. When I cannot decide on a finished design, letting things 'gestate' in my back brain helps me decide what will appeal.

 

:) Linda

Two Days in Eden

I've been in a two day workshop yesterday and today - and enjoying every. single. minute! :) Sue Benner was here in Columbia, teaching her class on Floral Fusions for Milltown and Faithful Circle quilters (a joint workshop).

The theme of this class had to do with creating fused flower designs. Sue has made a whole series of this type of quilt (you can view some of them on her website). There was an enormous number of ways to personalize the designs so it was really exciting to do this kind of work with a group of 20+ talented quilt makers! :)

The photo above shows the twelve blocks I managed to create during the two days. I still have to decide what kind of layout I want to use (whether to keep the blocks whole or to cut them up into parts to be recombined;). Here are a couple closer photos for some detail:

The fabrics I used for my blocks ranged from the usual 100% cotton to silks of three different kinds (some of them things I had hand painted), linen, lace (see the black openwork?) and the sleeve of an old kimono (probably silk, too). I took the color palette from the kimono sleeve, liberally interpreted. :)

Many students chose to use elaborately cut shapes for their flower circles ... or brilliantly varied batiks ... I used simple shapes (easy for my untalented fingers to draw:) and mostly concentrated on textural contrasts - matte vs. shiny, dense vs. transparent. It was incredibly wonderful to see everyone's work - I did not see a single block I did not LOVE. :) 

I look forward to settling on a layout for this and assembling the quilt top. Then I can dig into my beads and threads and paints and really embellish my flowers! :)

:) Linda

Mother's Day

Sunday was quite pleasant here. I slept in until about 10 a.m. My daughter called just after I woke up and we got to chat for a while (I miss her!:). She seems to be doing well, tho' I think her carpel tunnel problems with her hands are getting frustrating for her. She and her husband built raised beds for a vegetable garden and she was annoyed that the crows dug up all the pumpkin seeds while bypassing every cucumber seed. :)

My son slept in, too. I didn't see him until later in the afternoon. :) He had a scheduled event to run yesterday afternoon so he and I will go out together later this week. :)

I spent a fair time doing some embroidery in the early afternoon, working on my class sample from Paducah. The class was taught by Laurie Malm, a la Sue Spargo, with a Modern twist. :) The photo above shows the center I have devised - the double layered pink and white silk flower is something I added (the rest of the fabrics came in my kit), along with the dark green button center and the gold bugle and seed beads. The button sure looks black in this photo - you have to let light shine through it to see the rich green lights inside. :)

Here are some more parts of the flower:

This is one large petal with a smaller one on top ... and a wool spiral on top of _that_. Herringbone, whipped backstitch, lovely pink filled pear-shaped beads and green running stitch. I loved those beads (they were included in the kit) as the holes are offcenter so the beads stand up very nicely. :)

Here you can see a long spikey leaf between two petals. The edge has been embroidered with blanket stitch and backstitch with shiny thread outside of that ... and fishbone stitch inside.

This is an almost-entire pic - the flower has six petals, six leaves and a center. The background is a nice strong spring pea green. I am really enjoying working on this piece ... I've done lots of embroidery before, but using embroidery to finish off fused cotton fabric applique like this is new to me. I really like the way it looks! :)

When I get done with the embroidery, I'll have to decide on a border and make it into a small wall hanging. Originally I thought I might make a sofa pillow ... but I really don't want my cats pulling on all the pretty stitching and beads. :) I haven't decided whether to hand or machine stitch it, either. Big stitch with dark blue thread might be really cool. :)

I decided that I had a yen for shrimp so Skip took me dinner at Red Lobster around 5 p.m. Of course, it was so busy there that it was almost 6 by the time we sat down. Lots and lots of happy families, celebrating their mothers - very cheerful buzz in the place! :)

I ordered grilled Mahimahi and shrimp with pineapple salsa and green beans. Yummy! The seafood was excellent but the beans were severely over salted. :P I am not much of a salt lover so I expect the food preparing staff did not think it was too much salt. :) 

Skip needed to send in our bi-weekly payroll to the paycheck company that prepares the checks and pays the various taxes for us so we drove up to the store after dinner. The sun was shining and the early evening light was very warm and lovely. :)

I actually watched not one but _two_ movies in the evening once we got home (streaming, from Netflix). Captain America, which I had not seen in the theater, and enjoyed quite a bit (they chose a very pleasing actor to play the lead role - and I enjoyed watching 'Elrond' be the evil villain:) ... and Super 8 which I had never heard of but enjoyed enormously. It was directed by Steven Spielberg and was good, as I expected. Great story line!

Today was a 'doing chores' day at work. I put the two borders on my round robin piece so I could pass it on (to the very understanding and kind hearted Nancy B.:) ... and sorted through the usual email, snail mail, FB chores ... and chatted with staff. I should have gone to my guild meeting this evening to hear Sue Benner (visiting teacher) speak, but I got caught up with helping my two evening staff members with experiments and forgot until too late. (sigh)

I packed up an assortment of stuff for myself - tomorrow and Wednesday I am in a two day, all day, class with Sue Benner. Will be interesting to see what I make!

:) Linda

Error in Memory!

Yesterday evening, on my way home from the Expo, I made a strategic error of memory. (sigh) That pretty picture above is a representation of the molecular structure of CAFFEINE ... which I seem to be unable to metabolize correctly. (more sighes) If I drink any of the stuff, I cannot sleep - it takes hours and hours for caffeine to work its way out of my body. :P

When I bought a snack on my way home, I also bought a diet soda ... forgetting that the diet soda one gets from fast food places is NOT caffeine-free (I generally drink diet caffeine free Coke). I could not go to sleep last night (even though I was tired) ... the last time I looked at the clock, it was after 4 a.m. Needless to say, I did not wake up this morning until after 11. It is a very good thing that I was NOT scheduled to work on the sales floor!

 

I think it was about one p.m. or a little past by the time I got to work - the Saturday monthly session of the Baltimore Album Applique class was just getting out and that class runs from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Sure was nice to see lots of happy quilters in the shop as I walked in the door. :)

 

I did a variety of necessary chores today (email reading and writing, updating our website and FB page, returning phone calls, making new part numbers and entering the data for kits Daria and Alice made, etc.). By the time I finished and started to think about useful-but-not-urgent things that needed doing, I was blinking with sleepiness. :P I left early (around 3:30 p.m.) and treated myself to a good salad at Peace a Pizza for late lunch before I drove home.

 

The weather was pretty when I drove in - partly cloudy and low 70s - but had gotten a bit cooler and much darker by the time I started driving home. There was a really big black cloud overhead all the way from Catonsville to my house on the south side of Columbia. Maybe five minutes after I got indoors, rain came pelting down and kept up for a couple of hours. I sure hope all the trees and green growing things do well with all this rain! :)

 

I found some more goodies that I picked up at the Expo yesterday to share:

I bought this assortment of small button sets from Quilter's Fancy - I thought they'd be nice on crazy quilts, but then I found this:

I think I might make a series of small pins with embellishments - finding a way to show off the flip flops and sheep will be fun. :)

I also bought this from QF:

A kit for making silk ribbon pansy pins. I really love pansies, violas, violets - they are such sweet little flowers! :) Now if I could just get myself to finish some of these. :)

One last vendor at the Expo whose work I admired was an heirloom sewing booth. I've done a bit of hand sewing heirloom work over the years (had three or four classes in hand sewing insertion lace, tiny bullion roses, etc.) and I am picky about this particular type of work.

Until I visited this booth, I can honestly say that I never saw machine work that could hold a candle to the hand product. Custom Keepsakes is the first machine embroidery designer that even comes close to the quality of product that I would want if I were doing fine heirloom sewing. I quite admired their pretty baby dresses, ladies blouses, etc. I have no one to do that kind of fancy work for (no way would I, klutz that I am, wear such delicate stuffs:) - but I almost wish that I did, the temptation to invest was strong. :)

 

Don't know what we will do for Mother's Day tomorrow (besides call my Mom:) ... 

:) Linda

Adventures of the Sewing Variety

Today I took an expedition into the dark and wild interior of Baltimore city. :) I don't go downtown very often any more (when I had children at home, we went into town at least once a month to the Aquarium or MD Science Center or some other local educational-but-fun destination:) - so today was an adventure for me. I put on my 'hat' as a member of the Baltimore Modern Quilt Guild and volunteered to woman our booth at the Sewing & Quilting Expo from noon to 4 p.m. 

 

The Expo is being held at the Convention Center (Charles Street entrance), with vendor/exhibitor booths, assorted classes, Make&Takes, demos and talks, etc. They put this on every spring (I _think_) but this is the first one I have personally attended (that I can remember:). I always assumed (based on the published class lists and vendor lists) that the thrust of the Expo was mostly toward garment sewists (I guess the term sewer - sew-er - is out of fashion because of the obvious confusion with waste water:). I was startled to find that many of the vendors were selling quilting fabrics and goods.

 

Of course, I was _not_ surprised that there were a lot of vendors that I, personally, might buy from (since I love hand embroidery and such:). Debra Gabel had a very nice booth there and I got a chance to spend some time chatting and catching up with her (she is looking HOT as she, too, is dropping pounds:). Quilter's Fancy had a booth where I spent some time and just a little money. :) ... and I bought three pieces of fabric and one pattern from other vendors ... as well as a very cute-funny saying sign (suited my warped sense of humor anyway:). 

 

Here is some of my loot:

This is one panel of an eight image set from Red Rooster fabrics - very interesting collage work, I thought (and I have not seen our regional rep from RR in ages:).

The other two fabrics I bought are novelty prints for the I-Spy charm square swap I am in - decided not to show those 'cause the swapees might enjoy the surprise more (don't know that any of them read my ramblings, but I'd hate to let slip a spoiler:).

My Mom was a nurse for 45 years ... and there is a nurses group from Johns Hopkins NICU that meets at my shop once a month. Might give this to them as a 'make you laugh' for the station. :)

 

If you are of the fabric persuasion, I'd highly recommend the Expo - on Saturday (not Sunday? I'm not sure of the hours) - as an inspiring day out. :) The four hours of working at the guild table was fun - I _love_ to talk to quilters and about quilting, so I enjoyed it. :) Saw a lot of people I know, of course. Got to sit with Emily and then Amy from the BMQG and get to know each of them a bit better. People are sooo fascinating! :) I hope I didn't talk their ears off - I must have been in a good mood 'cause I was kinda chatty. (grin)

 

There were a couple of quilt shows hanging at the Expo (and probably at least one fashion show, though I did not pay much attention to the demo area). I took several photos of one small quilt display from the Chicago Modern Quilt Guild group:

I took photos of the 'about' signs with each quilt ... but they were barely readable in my pics later due to my hand tremors, so I will spare your eyes and translate as much of the text as I can for you. :) The challenge was to make a quilt based on the work of an artist (click the link to read the details). Here are several pieces I particularly liked:

'Sarah's Bouquet' by Mark ?

'Chicago's Theater' by ?

'Kaleidoscope'? by ?

'Asia a la VanGogh' by Eileen O'Reagon

 

'Serenity' by Marla Margalewski

'Quilted Horrido' by Melissa Bogusch

'Rebecca's Hot Rose' by Mark ?

'Modern Migration' by Sally Prokupec

I apologize to the artists whose names I lost - I really have to do something about the hand shake and photo problems I have (sigh). My doctor tells me that I have something called Intentional Tremors - which will only get worse. I had never heard of it before (and it isn't dangerous, just annoying) but I noticed that my Aunt Jean has it, too, when I saw her last week. (shrug) Genetics, I guess.

I must say that losing weight seems to be improving my mobility (well, one would _hope_ so, eh?:) - it was much less difficult for me to walk the maybe five city blocks to and from the parking ramp that I had to do today (if you drive, park at the Down Under garage on Lombard Street - is $14 for the day with the coupon from the Expo website, which is a _considerable_ discount ... or, if you can walk, take the Light Rail with free parking:). Thank you, God, the weather was warm today, though cloudy, and walking was pleasant.

As I type this, the rain is once again pounding down on our roof outside. Makes me feel grateful to be warm and cozy indoors! :)

I thought I'd share a brief set of photos of the wire knitting experiments I'm doing now. So far I am just messing about with different sizes of knitting needles and ways to finish off the ends for closures. :) Here are the two and a half things I've done (one is a WIP:).

As you can see, I put a few beads on this one - you have to pre-string the beads and I only had enough patience to put a few on. :) Truthfully, this piece looked _nothing_ like I expected - I don't think of the knit stitch as being square! This is just all knit - would be garter stitch in yarn. :)

This one is fewer stitches wide ... and on smaller needles ... and you can see one end of the closure I am planning. I think I will use large-ish beads to make a button-up kind of fastener.

This one is on the same size needles as the second one, above, and has no beads (yet!:) ... and I haven't decided how it will clasp. You can see the bamboo needle on the far right side of the photo - still not finished.

This wire I'm using is 26-gauge enameled copper .. and, once the feel of it got familiar to my hands, is fairly easy to knit with. No 'spring' or 'bounce' to it, of course, but not difficult. :) I'm thinking that I will do some embroidery or maybe crocheted thread edging on these after I finish the knitted strand... and then mix some buttons or other beads on top. We'll see. :) Cloth, Paper, Scissors magazine has a Jewelry Swap in the near future - maybe I'll get brave and send a piece off to see what other mixed media people make. 

:) Linda

PS Did you notice the pink letter 'L' in the lower left corner of my name tag (first photo at the top of this post)? One of the booths I stopped at featured the new Slice shape cutter - they cut a letter to show me how it works. I was sorely tempted - might have to invest in one of these. Is not big and fancy (cuts from 1/2" to 4" square area), but has lots of cool shape designs and is easy to use. :) Many of the shapes are things like leaves, letters, flowers - stuff I might actually use for applique. :)

Cute and Cuddly

Today I had to work on the sales floor, so I managed to get up, take a shower and get to work by 9 a.m.!! Major effort for me. :) One of our teachers, Rebecca Hilchie, came in just before 10 a.m. with her new friend, Josie.

Josie was the cutest, most cuddly little puppy I think I've ever met - she is a maltese-poodle mix and, at ten weeks of age, only weighs one pound. :) She had a small cat collar on and it was way too big - Rebecca was carrying Josie around in her sweater to cuddle. What a sweetie!

I was so busy petting Josie I did not even think about taking a photo - so I found the picture above online so you could see something like Josie. :) She was very pale in coloring (champagne?) with a short, very waggy tail tipped in white. Adorable! :)

What a nice start to the day! Besides helping customers, I managed to clean my desktop off of minor tasks, compose and mail out an email newsletter (about our Open House next weekend) and took several important phone calls. 

I had an appointment with my nutritionist for a weigh-in after my work slot (at 5 p.m.) - I don't usually drive during rush hours and I'm always shocked by how much more traffic there is. :P Happily, this week I managed to lose another 1.5 pounds ... better than gaining! :) I guess I have to go back to being very strict to lose more ... but that might take some of the small pleasure out of my daily life. (grin) As I was leaving the office, I took some photos of pretty flowers in the front beds - pansies:

As you can see, I'm not much better at focusing my pictures - clearly the screen on my iPhone is not big enough for my poor nearsighted eyes. :P Driving back into Catonsville, there was a house along the road that had lovely azaleas flowering, too:

The juxtaposition of the azaleas and the blood-leaf Japanese maple is quite nice - good landscaping. :) It's little things like this that I encounter in daily life that make me feel good. :)

This evening, after my friend Barbara came in for our once-a-week sew-in, I worked on my project from the embellishment class in Paducah. I am so enjoying what I am making - I'll try to take a photo next time I get it out to share. :)

Tomorrow I have to go into Baltimore city and volunteer at the table for Baltimore Modern Quilt Guild at the Sewing Expo. It's at the Convention Center and I have not been there in _years_ - never mind find parking. I am planning to go in early (well, I'm scheduled to work from noon to 4 p.m., so I'll leave home between 9 and 10 a.m.) to allow time for parking, hobbling to wherever from the ramp, etc. Maybe I'll even have a little time for looking around? :)

:) Linda

Rainy Days and Tuesdays

I went to sleep last night at about the same time I usually do (sometime between 11 and 12:30:) ... but I was clearly more tired than usual because I did not wake up until seven minutes before noon. :P Hmm, well, I did come to consciousness briefly around 6:30 a.m. for some reason, but that did not last long. :) After I got up and moved around for a few minutes, I realized that this morning was very, very gray - thick clouds had blown in last night and rain was pelting down (I could hear it hammering on the roof above my head).

Chilly, too. The bathroom attached to our (master) bedroom is situated on an outer corner of the second story - the shower stall tends to get kinda cool when it is cold outside! :P My shower this morning was a stark mixture of nice warm water and cold air. (brrr!) Maybe the gray sky contributed to my sleeping late? The real effect of it that was annoying to me was that I had scheduled an appointment with the nutritionist at 11 a.m. - and had slept through it. :( 

Once I _did_ wake up and get moving, I called and rescheduled my weigh-in for 6 p.m. I keep swearing I'm going to do some REAL housework on my days off (Tuesday and Wednesday), so I washed dishes and gathered up cans for recycling (Wednesday is the put-out time in our neighborhood) - mostly cat food cans. :) I also washed dishes - amazing how something so simple can improve the kitchen so much. :) Also make me feel like I have managed to accomplish _something_! 

Cold rain made me think about doing something indoors - and then I decided that I should go to the cinema (it being a weekday and not so crowded:) to see the new Iron Man movie. Remember, I am not your usual 'chic flick' watcher. :) The show was scheduled for 3:10 p.m - so, a little more sweeping and tidying time went by and I went searching for my umbrella. 

Of course, it was in my car ... in the car port ... beyond the pelting down cold rain. :P I could try to own more than one umbrella, I guess, so I could keep one in the house, too. I have a hard enough time keeping track of ONE umbrella in my life, don't think I have enough attention for TWO. (big grin) The trees and flowers looked really happy to have the rain falling on them - but my toes sure got cold finding their way from the front step to the car! :)

I must say, I've seen the teasers and trailers for IM3 - and the movie was at least ten times better than I expected! If you like Robert Downey Jr ... and action ... it's a sure bet! :) I think there were maybe five people, including me, in the theater. My kind of fun. :) 

Luckily, by the time the movie was over, a few minutes after 5 p.m., the rain had stopped (of course, my umbrella had dried out by then, too). Still heavy gray skies (and it started raining again later - I can hear it now, as I type, hammering on the ridge vent of our roof), though. Took me a few more minutes than usual, sitting in my car, to bring my brain back to the ordinary daily world and drive away from the theater. :)

I got to the office building in downtown Columbia, near the lakefront, where the nutritionists work just before 6 ... as I was walking from my parking spot to the front door, the fire alarm went off inside. Sure was blaring loud (I could hear it screaming all the way through the glass doors and windows, outside) and flashing strobe lights, too. Everyone came pouring outside, looking bewildered and anxious. Not a drill, I guess. After a few minutes, my nutritionist, Jen, suggested that I come back on Thursday afternoon (unfortunately, they are not open on Wednesday) rather than wait around (alarms still blaring). Two fire trucks drove up as I was leaving the lot, so I expect it took a while to get things settled. I don't _think_ there was actually a fire, but I could not really tell. Hope they were all ok!

Tonight I've been watching more of the Sarah Feilke class on Craftsty - the lessons I saw were about using a 60 degree triangle ruler to cut interesting patchwork shapes and borders.

Other than that, quiet evening - and now I'm off to bed. Hopefully I will NOT sleep so late tomorrow. I really should do some more housework and I'd _like_ to do some work on my class project from Paducah. 

:) Linda

PS The photo at the top of this post is a concrete abutment with a scar (from the pouring? a crack?). I think it looks like a river from an aerial view ... or maybe roots ... or? Good inspiration for something stitched or pieced, maybe. :)

Perfection Today

Skip and I went to the Sheep and Wool Festival today ... this is the 40th year it has been held and the weather is incredibly PERFECT! High 60's, sunny, soft breeze, bluer than blue skies - glorious! :) Skip let me sleep in this morning (despite that I told him last night that he could wake me up:) so it was noon or so when we got there.

Parking is always a very big deal at the fair, so many hundreds of people attend. This year the police were parking cars across the road from the fair gates in addition to the fields they always use - there was a sign in front of the new parking field saying ".....Howard County Living Farm Heritage Museum" which is NEWS to me. :) I will have to explore this - I really _have_ been living in a cave if there is a farm museum in my county that I don't even know about! (sigh:)

Skip dropped me at the entrance gate and found a space pretty close by - people were leaving who had arrived early in the morning (the cop who was directing us said 'it's Mall Parking now, just look around'). The woman/volunteer who asked me if I'd like a copy of the program and to donate to the festival committee (there is no admission fee to attend) sounded familiar - when I turned me head to look at her I immediately recognized one of my customers. :) I was glad to see that many of the folks entering were indeed putting folding money into the donation hoppers (we contributed on the way out since I had nothing other than big green bills in my pocket going in:).

I took one photo across the main walk down the center road to show you the crowds (pretty much body-to-body):

I would have gotten the same people-filled perspective if I turned in any direction. :)

We strolled down to the building beside the 4H exhibit hall and had lunch - lamburgers and lamb sausage. Special treat. :) There was a cooking demo going on in the back of the hall (how to cook with lamb) so the chairs for sitting to eat were at a premium. I was surprised that several different people stood and offered me a chair (me and my cane, I guess I look as disabled as I feel:). All of the offering folks were my age or older ... still, it's good to know that common kindness and courtesy are not totally gone!

We took our time and strolled through the main vendor pavilion - Jolene's booth from Cloverhill Yarn Shop was BUSY (go, go, knitters!:). If I had not just been on a lengthy (spending) trip, I'd have actually shopped ... but I enjoyed looking. Many high quality woven fabrics, baskets, leather and wood worked objects, of course spinning wheels and looms, books enough to fill a fiber library. Such bliss! :) I did not take photos inside the pavilion - besides being way too crowded, it really isn't polite to the vendors. :)

The only other thing I wanted to do was wander through the exhibit barns to see the sheep. While I did that, and took photos, Skip went back to have another lamb sausage sandwich. :) Here are some of the photos I took in the barns (I tried to take the farm's name photo before the animals they brought so I could remember what _kind_ of sheep they were:):

These sheep had been groomed and covered with coats to keep their fleeces clean.

These ladies were prepping their lambs to show in a little while.

This little Jacob ram was small and seemed quite sweet (very soft voiced:).

One of these ewes had gotten first place as 'best ewe'.

This small sheep was being cleaned and groomed by his mistress.

Jacob rams often grow multiple horns - quite surprising and very obvious.

I have never heard of Clun Forest sheep before today - this ewe with her two lambs had just been sheared.

As you might expect for an animal that has been so long in domestication, there is quite a bit of variation between breeds of sheep - in color, size, purpose (some are primarily for meat production, some for wool, some for both), temprament, length and nature of wool, etc. There were sheep that came up to my earlobes in height and sheep that were barely up to my knee ... some that were very forward in their pens, interacting with people and others that stayed in the back, far as they could get away from the crowds. 

I, myself, am a bit partial to the Jacobs (the ones with multiple horns:) - especially the varicolored/spotted ones. :) Having grown up a farm girl, I know firsthand what the raising of animals entails and how much responsibility and work it is to keep your stock prosperous. Nothing I'd want to do, even to have pets! :) Still, I love visiting them and I deeply appreciate the opportunity to see and smell them in the show barns. :)

I think I'm off to rest, now. My knee is being quite grumpy with me - don't think it has quite recovered (if it is even going to) from all the walking I did in Paducah at the quilt show.

:) Linda

A WEEK???

 

It has been five days since I came home from my trek, as surprised as that realization makes me. :) What a crazy week this has been!

 

Do you know what this pretty flowering bush IS? I took this photo of an ornamental hedge flowering in front of a very nice townhouse in a new-to-me section of Howard County called Maple Lawn (near the APL Campus - a suburb? of Fulton, MD). I was there to visit a new-to-me doctor (a urologist). This bush is quite pretty but I do not recognize it - unusual for me as I generally recognize most of the common ornamentals. I love knowing the names of growing things. :) Names are stories all by themselves. :)

One of the things I did while in Paducah that I forgot to mention is to visit the Yeiser Art Center to see their fiberart show. I quite enjoyed many of the works in the show - and some of them actually made me giddy with pleasure. :) If you click on the link, you can see photos of almost all of the pieces. :) I took a number of notes about things that attracted me (no photographs allowed) - sometime soon, when I have web surfing time, I intend to check some of the artists out. :)

Among other things I did this week, I got to drive down to La Plata, MD to attend a meeting of the shop owners committee for Quilter's Quest - at Material Girls quilt shop. I love this shop! The meeting went quite well ... and I treated myself to a 3 1/2 yard piece of laminated cotton in an orange/green floral design (Amy Butler, I think:) afterwards. Last summer when I was in Indianapolis, I visited Crimson Tate (the Modern quilt shop) and, along with some other goodies, bought a copy of a pattern to sew up a hooded rain jacket. Have been looking for a laminate I like ever since - maybe I'll get my new rain coat this year? :)

 

The weather has been truly unstable this week. Was nasty, cold (mid50's), rainy when I came home on Sunday eveing and stayed that way until Tuesday. Now it is sunny, clear and high-60's, low-70's. PERFECT! My niece in Kansas sent me a photo yesterday, though, to show the SNOW they got! Crazy, just wicked crazy weather. :P

 

Tomorrow my husband and I are going out on an all-too-rare date to the MD Sheep & Wool Festival. This is the 40th year this has been held, always the first weekend in May. When our kids were young, we took them every spring to pet sheep, goats, alpaca ... watch the sheepdog herding trials ... eat lamb burgers and carnival junk ... and listen to music by people like Maggie Sansone (hammer dulcimer). (happy sighes!:) More about our fun later, I promise. :)

:) Linda

 

PS Another thing I did this week was to go to my regularly scheduled weigh-in/nutritionist visit. Much to my shock and pleasure, I 'gained' 1/2 pound over the course of the three weeks I was away. I very much doubt that a half-pound is significant, statistically, when weighing humans, but I understand why they do it (helps to encourage the losers:). I am truly pleased that all the irregularity in place, daily activity and diet did not wreck my losses. :)

Wednesday Wandering

Wednesday and Thursday we spent wandering from place to place in Paducah ... Looking at quilts, quilts and more quilts!

Wednesday evening (from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m.) I took a class with Laurie Malm of Lollipop Designs on embroidery & embellishment. It was really intended for beginners but I enjoyed every second of it! Laurie made complete kits for the students which had a definite 'modern' flavor (see the photo of her class sample - Fantasy Flower). I like the design so much I am thinking that I would like to make a small quilt with several different colors of flowers. :)

One of the threads included in our kits was a skein of Cosmo embroidery floss. What a joy to work with! I liked it enough to buy a number of different colors from her booth later. I am eager to do more stitching with this thread!

I took more than 200 photos of quilts from the show but I won't share many of them here (copyrights, you know). There is a photo catalog of the show available from AQS. I will say that no photo is as powerful as seeing the real quilt!

The brick wall might seem an odd thing to photograph - it is one wall of the convention center itself. I quite like the impression of leaf prints on the brick faces. :)

Everywhere I have been on this extended trip has been faintly surreal to me. I feel as though I am surrounded by stories everywhere I go - every scene, river name and street sign feels like the beginning of a complex tale, likely to be full of history and folklore. (Sigh)

:) Linda