A visit from Barb

Our friend, Barb Seils, was here for a visit. She showed us the quilt she just finished for her church raffle, which she completed with stitch-in-the-ditch quilting.








Barb worked on the placement of the blocks for this quilt from one of our classes with Nancy Crow.











Barb had returned recently from a wonderful trip to Italy, so we got to see some beautiful pictures of the areas she visited.
We also signed up to listen in to a critique session of contemporary quilts, where the panel views the original quilt and then sees and discusses possible improvements. See http://www.quiltcritique.com/ for the next scheduled sessions.

Sewing Day

Beth is working on cutting and sewing pieces for her new creation -- a Bird of Paradise flower. She creates a pattern of shapes on tracing paper and selects appropriate fabric pieces to pin up on her composition. Her completed pelican, using the same construction technique, is displayed to the right. It will grace the walls of her new beach home in North Carolina!!



Priscilla ponders her next step as she continues to give life and color to her newest jacket. An experienced teacher and construction artist, she will be helping a group of jacket makers with this new pattern. It is always a pleasure to watch her wonderful color and pattern choices as the creation takes form!






Marcia is back working on her latest jacket. In addition to the mola for the back of the jacket, she's going to use 3 Hmong collars from Vietnam and a wonderful woven fabric from Thailand that we think has a dragon design.... or is it a snake? It's been very time consuming to de-construct (unsew) the Hmong embroidery from the collars and remove the seams from the woven fabric -- many, many small stitches had been put in place by the original seamstresses.


Inspector Suki enjoyed all the visitors and had more people to let her in and out the studio door. In the afternoon she settled down for a nap in a tent constructed in a stuffed chair amid the busy artists' effors.

Senior Citizens

Some of the "girls" from the Class of 63 gathered for lunch and a little reminiscing, and we decided we still looked to be in pretty good shape for having just passed our 45th class reunion!

Genesee Valley Quilt Club meeting

The winner of this lovely raffle quilt made by Club members was selected during the meeting. She is from Syracuse and bought her ticket at the NYS Quilters Consortium show in June -- lucky lady!










The guest speaker for the meeting was Judi Warren Blaydon, and she displayed two of her art quilts.















The meeting included lots of great quilts in the members' Show & Tell. This one was made by Toni Foster for her grandson's 6th birthday.

This is Pat Pauly's quilt, started in Cynthia Corbin's class.




















Pat Berardi's quilt from Cynthia Corbin's class.

Caris Burton's quilt from Cynthia Corbin's class.











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Margaret Fahey's quilt made for her grandaughter.

A Visit from Priscilla & Beth

Priscilla and Beth were at the studio today for a little sewing and a lot of "catch up" chatting.

Priscilla just returned from vending at a quilt show in New Hampshire, where she won this lovely quilt from the guild's Chinese auction. It's all hand pieced, embroidered and quilted.








Priscilla recently returned from her trip to Thailand, Laos, and Cambodia, and she brought this beautiful, very large hand-made quilt back with her.

















Each of the individual embroidered blocks has a different scene.













Beth expects to become a grandmother for the first time this March, and has started working on an "I Spy" baby quilt. She kept very busy all day cutting out 6-inch squares of novelty fabrics from which she'll fussy-cut all kinds of fish, birds, kitties, and other assorted animals and objects.

Exhibit News

Some pretty exciting news just came in the mail:
"Blocks #3 was selected by juror Bruce Hoffman of the prestigious Snyderman-Works Galleries for SAQA's 2009 exhibit, Points of View."

(SAQA is the Studio Art Quilt Associates organization.) The exhibit will debut at the Long Beach Quilt Festival 2009 and travel to other venues for up to two years.

This quilt is 49" x 42".




Blocks #5 is currently being shown at the Arts Center in Old Forge, NY, as part of an exhibition of work by RAFA (Rochester Area Fiber Artists) members.

This quilt is 28" x 62".

And Jet Trails #3 and #4 are also at the Old Forge Arts Center. They have been traveling with SAQA's 2008 Trunk Show, which is under the banner of Art Quilts Alliance of New York. Both pieces are 12 x 12".

The Mighty Hunter

Suki, The Inspector, closely examines all possible hiding places in her domain on a daily basis. Here she checks out a wastebasket in the studio. If she finds nothing of interest, sometimes she will chase her tail, sometimes curl up and rest.







Her very favorite activity is hunting and running around outdoors. Here she has chased a chipmunk up the fence in the horse pasture. Unnoticed by Suki, the prey has moved down the fence to the next post. Suki is standing up at the bottom of the post on the left, while the chipmunk is on the top of the post on the right.



Suki climbs the fence post and wonders, Where did that critter go? The critter waits patiently on the post at the right, confident that Suki will soon lose interest and move on.





The chipmunk came down from the post, eluded pursuit from Suki once more, and scampered off around the barn into a clump of trees. Inspector Suki chases bugs, butterflies, leaves, birds, and many types of small four-footed creatures. She delights in all this activity, and while we understand the dangers of dealing with a cat who has outside access, we would be loath to cage her inside at this stage of her life.

New Lawn - Part 2

As the new lawn area is installed, Marcia works on weeding our spring bulb raised beds. They are a wonderful collection of spring flowers and some summer and fall bulbs for color later in the season. By early fall the weeds are well established, but yielded their roots on this
beautiful fall day.






Stone dust is applied to the pasture entrance of the horse stalls and around the base of the hydrant that feeds the horses' water tub. Pat's crew rakes out any high spots as we improve the base for the horses' safety and comfort.









Every once in a while a machine is developed that is perfectly matched to the task at hand. The working end of the "rock hound" has two sets of rotating steel fingers that sweep stones back into the attached bucket. When full, a quick run to a dumping spot returns the tool to work. If you click on the picture, you can see the teeth at work!





The final step is the spread of a solution containing grass seed, water, and fertilizer. If we keep it damp with our own watering, we should have germination in 7 - 10 days. We'll see!!

New Lawn

We were not pleased with the gravel that surrounded our new water line -- too heavy and filled with big stones which are tough on the horses' feet. As part of the new lawn, we will dig up the top layer and replace it with stone dust.








Our landscaper called today and said he could fit us in this afternoon as bad weather had delayed one of his other jobs. We sprang into action, moved the horses to the front pasture, and hauled the stall refuse to the garden. The picture shows Pat and his crew with the aptly named "rock hound" beginning ground treatment prior to seeding.






Although safely removed from harm, Crystal does not like the noise or the strange machine -- might be a horse-eating monster, you know! Her older, more-experienced companion ignores the disturbance and concentrates on filling his food needs.











A heavy frost is predicted for tonight so we managed to find time for a final(?) harvest. We had wonderful crops of peppers, summer squash, and fall red raspberries. The first week in October is a slightly later-than-normal end to our growing season!

Closing Camp

The camp, from the lake view, is put to rest for the winter. We drove up today to pick up brother Ken's cars and to turn off electricity and make arrangements for the plumber to attend to the draining and winterizing pipes duties. Some repairs are scheduled by a local contractor before the snow flies!





There were no boats on the water, but the maple trees were sprouting full color. There are more year-around residents each year, but after Labor Day, silence and solitude prevail!









The island and the shoreline present a pretty reflection every day any time of the year. This is the view from the dock.








The modified Jeep Rubicon ( a wonderful off-road vehicle) is ready for a trip back to Palmyra for winter storage in one of our barns. Marcia is ready to climb aboard for the bouncy ride home. Too bad she can't come cross country all the way!!