It's Duck Race Time In Estes Park

Our mascot waves hello to Estes Park Duck Race participants.

The 25th annual Estes Park Duck Race will be on May 4, 2013. The committee has been working hard for months and has added several special elements to make this Silver Anniversary a huge success. The participating organizations collected their duck adoption forms at the meeting earlier this week. Below is the handsome 25th anniversary logo designed by Gary Hazelton.

Beautiful Sunrise

I woke up early enough to see this gorgeous sunrise - what a lovely way to start the day. Barely two minutes after snapping this picture, the sky had faded to pale colors.

This afternoon I attended part two of my sewing machine lessons in Fort Collins. Once again the two hours were packed full of useful information and tips ... buttonholes, pintucks, heirloom stitching, programming. I'm eager to try everything.

We had early morning visitors munching their way across the yard.

Friday Afternoon Quilters

Fruit Pizza - Beautiful & Delicious

My Friday Afternoon Quilters met here this afternoon - a small group, just six of us. We spent most of our time together going through boxes of quilt books and magazines that belonged to Elaine, a beloved member who died last summer. Her husband, also a good friend, asked me to distribute a large quantity of Elaine's books, patterns, fabrics, quilt tools, etc. to her friends and quilt groups. It's a big job but one I'm happy to do. Elaine and I belonged to the same three quilt groups. We sorted, talked, laughed, and ended with this dessert. It was a lovely afternoon.

New Mexico Twin Quilts

The New Mexico twin quilts are on their way to Linda in San Diego and will arrive today or tomorrow. I'm eager to know how she likes the border I've added. Linda began the project by making two identical centers. She sent them to me and I added the first border. She'll add the next border and send them back to me for the final addition. Each of us will quilt and bind her own identical version.

The photo above shows one of the "twins" on my design wall. You can see a bit of fabric to the right that I may use in the quilts when they come back to me. I'll have to see what Linda does. Her center is a beautiful collage of mountains, river, landscapes, and photos (printed on fabric) of our trip to New Mexico. It took me a long time (months) to decide what I wanted to add. I felt that the center was so busy that it needed a relatively plain border to calm it down a bit. This turquoise ombre (shaded) fabric was a serendipitous find and makes the center "pop" while providing a complimentary frame. The corner stones are iconic New Mexico images printed on fabric: map of New Mexico, flag, chili peppers, turquoise rocks.

Snow is falling so heavily I can see only the barest outline of the mountains through my loft windows. We have several inches and are grateful for every flake! I'll spend most of the day up here working on projects and getting ready to host my Friday Afternoon Quilters tomorrow. Time to make some tea!

Happy Valentine's Day

My sweet husband gave me these Valentine flowers, a romantic card, and a small bag of my favorite sweet treat, chocolate almond toffee. He has his usual Rotary meeting during the lunch hour so I'm taking my mother out for lunch. Actually, it will be a 10:30 brunch at one of our favorite local restaurants.

My 91 year old mother was my guest at Quilt Guild last night where the program included members showing quilts and telling the stories of those quilts. I showed Mom's "sunbonnet baby" quilt made for her by her grandmother when she was a little girl using fabric from Mom's little dresses. It was loved and used well and had suffered the kind of damage such a quilt suffers over the years. I repaired the worst of the damage several years ago and it remains a cherished treasure.

Tonight, Wayne and I will have a quiet little dinner here at home.

Library Lovers'Month

Libraries are some of my favorite places to visit. I LOVE my local library. Here is a link to a web site with information on how one can celebrate libraries.

http://www.librarysupport.net/librarylovers/index.html

My Sweet New Sewing Machine

My friend, Gray, and I shopped for new sewing machines last week after lots of research and testing of various brands and models. We both bought Viking Sapphire 875 Quilt machines at The Sewing Circle in Fort Collins. I'm impressed with the shop and its staff who spent hours with us and offer excellent support. I've signed up for a new machine owner's class later this month but in the meantime, I'm working my way through the manual learning and practicing what my new gem can do. I've gotten the basics down and have made a pillow case and sewed borders on my Cobblestone quilt. I've had the most fun trying out the decorative stitches - I plan to make a sampler of all the stitches for a reference tool.

My last new machine, a Brother purchased in the late 1960's, still works but after more than forty years, I wanted a machine that will do things my Brother never dreamed of. I have a hard time staying out of the sewing loft even when I have other things to do. It's like a magnet!

I have three "priority projects" of the quilting variety that I'm working on now.

• The first is my contribution to the New Mexico Twin Quilts that my friend, Linda, and I are co-making. She did the centers and I'm about to put the first border on each one and send them back to her so she can add something. The twins (as we call them) are to commemorate our trip to New Mexico last year. The borders will include cornerstones of New Mexico icons that I've printed on fabric.
• The second project is putting together my contribution to our February Quilt Guild program. I'll be showing two antique/vintage quilts and I'm doing some research for the presentation. The Sunbonnet Babies quilt belongs to my 91 year old mother. Her grandmother made it for her when she was a child. The second quilt belonged to my mother-in-law, then my husband when he was a child. It has fifteen blocks embroidered from early 1900's patterns by Ruby Short McKim. Both quilts are charming.
• The third project is the Cobblestone quilt. The borders are on and I'm ready to start hand quilting.

Those should keep me busy for awhile.