Colors of Port Gamble

Not only did I get to enjoy Paula's garden last weekend (see previous post), but the next day I went to Port Gamble and saw its gorgeous dahlia garden. The closeups show the incredible designs of these flowers, and the rain drops were an added bonus.

The garden is maintained by the Kitsap County Dahlia Society. Here are just a few more flowers.

There were also some cheerful yellow flowers outside of the quilt shop, The Quilted Strait. The shop is in an old stable building.

I'm working on this starry winter night quilt right now, but I might leave out all but one house and put in more trees.

I bought a little pile of splashy floral prints plus some text fabric. The black and white print on the bottom will be the sky in the winter quilt.

And I finally found Kathy Doughty's latest book, "Organic Applique." When I saw her in person at the Gossypium quilt shop last year (field-trip-gossypium-kathy-doughty-and.html) I asked about her applique process and she said it would all be explained in her new book, so I'm excited to have it.

And you know me, there has to be some food involved. So after we hit the quilt shop and dahlia garden, my friend Sherry and I headed over to have lunch at the Butcher and Baker. The baked goods are incredible! I got a large piece of apple slab pie to take home, and Sherry got a chocolate mint brownie.

For lunch, I had a grilled veggie sandwich and potato salad that was enough for two full meals. Sherry had a big salad.

Have a colorful day

"Fall"-ing Into Paula's Garden

I love this lady in Paula's yard.

Happy Fall!

I got in a visit to Paula's garden over the weekend and thought it would be the perfect blog post for this first day of fall. She is a superb gardener. She paints her world with beautiful flowers and textures for every season. Here's a glimpse:

She also grows mountains of vegetables, including these funny looking Mad Hatter peppers and a rainbow of tomatoes (shown here with curry powder).

She roasted the tomatoes and turned them into a tasty galette. Here she is in action, shaping a golden turmeric crust. She's also a fabulous cook.

It came out of the oven bursting with tomatoes, carmelized onions and cheese. Yum!

After lunch, we went for a lazy turn around the lake in their boat with hubby Duane at the helm. Paula's son, Nathan, kicked back while his son, Teddy, sprang into action.

I'm always relaxed and happy on their boat, except for once when the wind whipped off my brand new orange prescription sunglasses and they disappeared forever into the depths of the lake.

Back home, my fall decor

focuses on the bunnies.

Have a colorful day

A little humor, a little coziness

Facebook had some good spousal humor today. I'm celebrating not having to deal with this stuff anymore, especially the one about being constantly interrupted when trying to read.

And earlier this week, there were pictures of both of my kids on Facebook snuggling with their furry children. Keith's wife posted the picture of him with the dog, and I'm sure he would be embarrassed if he saw it -- but he's one of those rare Millennials who's not on Facebook so he won't know.

And here is Julia with two of her super snuggly bunny babies. I miss them. I'm planning a road trip next month to see them all.

I'l end with a quote that I pulled from Instagram this morning. It's been my goal this year. Sometimes I slip up and cry, but I'm getting way better overall.

 Have a colorful day

A relaxing Sew Day at Linda's

An old friend greeted me at Linda's house during Sew Day this weekend -- the Fall 2005 issue of Quilting Arts Magazine. Linda had picked it up at a sale for 25 cents and didn't realize until she read it that I have an article in it! The quilted women's faces on the cover were done by my friend Bonnie Saxby, and inside is an article by me on non-traditional bindings and an article on the art quilt group that Bonnie, Julaine and I had formed when I lived in Illinois. A real blast from the past!

I tried a little hand stitching on my wool appliqué, being careful not to overwork my thumb. The brace I bought got ditched after about half an hour because it cut off my circulation and made my arm numb. Instead, I worked very, very slowly and took a lot of breaks.

Linda P. also worked on wool appliqué, stitching some Christmas blocks that she downloaded from a Facebook group.

Carolynn worked on this swashbuckling coat in burgundy wool for her son. At 6'3", he'll be a head turner when he wears it! She went to the Pendleton store in Oregon, a few hours from here, for the fabric.

Linda J. was trying to put a dent in her stash by sewing 2-inch squares into 16-patch blocks that she'll set off with pinwheels like in this pattern.

She also had some fall show and tells:

Lunch was a delicious taco salad with colorful toppings in a pottery server from Mexico.

But what really caught my eye was the swirling colors in the water glasses!

  Have a colorful day

Madison quilts and critters

The white glove at Wisconsin Quilt Expo.

The reason I picked last weekend to visit Keith and Rachel is because it was the weekend of the  Wisconsin Quilt Expo in Madison! I had never been to that one and was excited to find some inspiration.

I took photos of my faves but decided I probably shouldn't put them on the blog without getting permission from the makers. 

But I did get a picture of Heather Givens, the designer of a pattern I'm excited to make. I'm a big fan of snail mail and pretty notecards with matching envelopes, so this quilt really caught my eye. In fact, out of the entire show it's the one thing that got my blood pumping!

The pattern is "Letters From Home" by Crimson Tate. It comes with a square template to use with your rotary cutter if you want to fussy cut prints for the envelope. It also comes with directions for making an optional open envelope that you can slip notes or goodies into.

I'd love to visit the Crimson Tate shop sometime in Indianapolis.

Then I found Blue Bar Quilts on the last day of my trip and was in heaven. It's a modern quilt shop with wonderful graphic fabric, a large gallery featuring a different quilt artist each month, and a makers gallery with items for sale. I bought this selection of fabric:

Moving on to wildlife, here are some Sandhill Cranes we saw while hiking in the Pheasant Branch Conservancy. These beautiful  birds can be up to five feet tall!

We also saw plenty of wild turkeys. These ones were sauntering through Keith's neighborhood.

 At Olbrich Botanical Gardens we saw ducks eating duckweed.

And squirrels were everywhere, squirreling away nuts for the winter.

Which leads nicely into this quote:

 Have a colorful day