Late Thursday I arrived back home from my trip to the Rocky Mountain Quilt Guild in Fort Collins, CO. They are a great group and I had a wonderful time there; they took great care of me! The two day “Coneflowers” workshop was a lot of fun for all of us, I think. Some beautiful work was started and I hope to get finished photos to share with you!

Yesterday I had another commitment so I don’t even have all of the quilts put away yet – that is on the agenda for today.

Bad news arrived while I was gone – “Longhorn Splashdown” was not accepted to go to Houston this fall. This will be the first time that my work has been rejected there, and since they send their cattle up here to get fat, it’s not very nice of them not to take one back!!! Oh well, it will go somewhere else, I hope.Click on Longhorn in the side bar to see a photo.

Over the weekend we went on the local Pond Tour and visited all ten of the water gardens on display. We started early and by the time we finished Saturday afternoon it was in the upper 90′s, the heat index was well over 100 with the humidity. Really, only one of the gardens offered much in the way of inspiration, but that one was worth the trip! The water garden/koi pond was well established and beautiful but the whole surrounding area was amazing with huge hostas and gorgeous flowers. There was a coneflower – Echinacea Hot Papaya that was “to die for”! I went to town on Monday and bought one for MY garden.

The one on the tour was huge, loaded with big pompom flowers with a depth of color that was actually quite red. I can only hope that this one will mature into something similar. I also got an Echinacea White Swan and a Butterfly Weed to add to my space.

Wow, it’s been a week since my last post – times flies!!

I was really working hard to finish the Longhorn before my trip to Lincoln, Nebraska, but that didn’t happen. I still have just the “splash” to finish. With Mother’s Day in there, I had to quit and get the quilts organized on Saturday to pack Sunday evening for an early start on Monday.

Monday turned out to be a stormy, rainy day so the drive was NOT fun. That kind of torrential downpour that makes you want to stop and have a gooey dessert and wait it out. But there was not time for that so I just pressed on. I had a lunch date and a personal tour of the International Quilt Study Center/Museum planned. Fortunately about an hour and a half into the trip the rain cleared and I was only a few minutes late.

I had a wonderful time in Lincoln. What an amazing resource they have there in the Quilt Museum! The guild was warm and friendly; an inspiration with all of the activities and public service projects they have planned. The Coneflowers workshop was full, with a waiting list and everyone seemed to be having a good time. Some really beautiful works were started.

Yesterday was spent putting quilts away and dealing with inventory and book keeping for the trip, shipping orders and generally wrapping up loose ends. Today I will get my suitcase unpacked and hopefully back to normal – whatever that is! Since we’ve had so much rain, I hope it can include some weed pulling!!

I’ve been quilting off and on all week and have the piece less than half finished. As usual I am putting an insane amount of quilting on it.

It is still in the machine so I had to get close to snap this photo which seemed a little washed out so I adjusted the intensity and don’t know how accurate it will look on other monitors.

The dishwasher decided to die and the repair man said it would be cheaper to buy a new one than to repair it so that entailed a couple of trips to town. My appliances are Bisque – decisions, decisions – upgrade to Stainless? Our kitchen is small and dark so we decided to stay with Bisque. The salesman said some companies are phasing out Bisque, so we decided to go ahead and get a new refrigerator too while we still could. Probably should replace the stove soon as well! Then we should be good to go for another 10 years which unfortunately seems to be the predicted life span of new appliances these days.

I’m running out of Coneflowers patterns, so had to take the time to update that and get it to the printer – that’s a couple of hours trip – and today we have to go and pick them up. So it’s been a crazy week and again today I will not get to quilt very much.

Mon Grand Pere is showing at Denver National and won second place in the wall hangings! The two quilts arrived home yesterday in good shape from AQS along with the ribbon from Lancaster. No judge’s comments, which may come separately.

This lovely quilt, “Do Wacka Daisy”, was made by Karen Kielmeyer, started in a “Coneflowers” workshop in NW Arkansas last summer. Karen was using her own hand dyes, strip pieced, for the background pieces. I think it’s wonderful and so did AQS! It will be at Paducah next month!!

Congratulations Karen, and good luck!  Thanks for sharing…….

Merrilee has finished her class project and sent a photo…..it’s even quilted and bound!  Way to go, Merrilee!

I flew home from Atlanta on Wednesday and it’s good to be home. Thursday was spent unpacking, putting away, doing paperwork and general catch up. Yesterday I had to get up early for my annual physical Dr.’s appointment, then to the bank, the library, etc. In the afternoon I got the outside house plants ready to come inside and the gladiola corms dug because we are in for some killing frosts. Busy, busy!

The GA trip was good. I experienced the best and the worst of weather there, as I was there during the horrible flooding. I saw the torrential rain but I personally did not see any flooding where I was. When the rain cleared it was just perfect! Beautiful fall weather with no humidity and comfortable temperatures.

I visited with four different quilt guilds in the area, doing “Easy Design Play” and “Coneflowers”workshops and presenting programs which were well attended and fun. Many new Coneflowers wall hangings were started and Show and Tell at the last meeting included four finished tops from the earlier workshops already finished!! Too many photos to show but if anyone sends me a finished jpg I’ll share!

In between working, I got to visit some quilt shops, tour points of interest including the gala re-opening of the Carter Center which coincided with the celebration of his 85th birthday, so Jimmy, his wife, extended family and dignitaries were there.

There was lots of security of course, including these guys, a bomb sniffing dog and men in dark suits and sunglasses scanning the crowd.

We got to tour the museum and have lunch there.

This is a view from the grounds from the hill where General Sherman watched the burning of Atlanta.

One day I met with a friend and we had lunch at her favorite Chinese restaurant and then spent some time in a large oriental grocery store. So many exotic choices- what fun!! Thanks, Robin!

Today is the first day of Quilt Market in Houston and for the first time in over ten years I am not there. It’s sad to miss it as Rose and I always have such a good time in Houston but this year it was not to be.  I do have works on display there though, and there is always next year!

Now that I am home I look forward to getting back to a routine and sewing again. It’s been a long time since I created anything new.

Today I move from Athens to Marietta. There has been devastating flooding around Atlanta but not here where I am, though it has rained buckets!

Yesterday we had the “Coneflowers” workshop which is always fun. Unfortunately I forgot the camera so there will be no photos this time unless someone sends me a jpg later. I think everyone did a great job and most importantly, had fun.

I don’t know if I will have access to a computer at the Marriott – the nicer hotels seem to think everyone brings their own computers – so if you don’t hear from me, that’s probably why!

Check out Del’s comment from yesterday for a link to photos from the Asheville show that were posted on Susan Brubaker Knapp’s Blue Moon River blog. Mine are there along with quite a few more. Thanks Del!

And Rose – you absolutely CAN make Coneflowers in commercial prints! Click on Coneflowers in the tags and it will show you all of the examples so far. My yellow one with the black and white background is commercial – and there is that recent one from a workshop that is all spots and dots and wonderful.

In yesterday’s mail I got a nice card from Janet Bates with a photo of her finished top from the Wichita workshop – looks GREAT!! Janet if you are reading this- send me a jpg and I’ll post it. Not only did she finish it, she finished it that very evening after the workshop! WOW! I am impressed.

Finally! Photos from Wichita. The focus could be better, sorry about that, but the work still shines! We had lots of fun and these ladies really produced!

Hard at work.

Beautiful rich color.

Too much fun!

It’s always fun to see the Coneflowers in other colors.

Yummy!

Bits of light in the background just sparkle!

I’ll try to get the rest up tomorrow.