Weekend Sewing Retreat

Catching up again. A couple of weeks ago, a friend invited me and another buddy to her cabin in the Jemez mountains, about 1.5 hours NW of Albuquerque. We spent a long weekend there, working on our quilting projects, watching the hummingbirds on the porch, taking a small hike here and there, and all-in-all having a totally relaxing girls weekend.




Mind you, I have a 3 year old and a 6 year old, so they got to spend some quality time with Daddy, while I enjoyed some much needed peace and quiet.

I was also very productive. Got 3 full quilts assembled (I had all of the blocks done before I went up). Here are two of them:



Party's almost over. School starts for one kid on Thursday, so its early mornings and rushing around time again. I think that this is the first summer that I haven't been looking forward to back-to-school. I've been having too much fun dyeing fabric in the back yard while the kids make mud pies, and "chocolate milk", and lakes, and moats, and snail habitats. My longarm quilting work schedule kicks into high gear when the kids go back to school, so I guess I'm just not ready for that yet. Oh well, it is coming, ready or not!

Next Stop: Carlsbad Caverns, NM

Our second trip for the summer was to southern New Mexico visiting Carlsbad Caverns. My father in law, sister in law, and brother in law all came here to celebrate my FIL's 70th birthday. I had never been to the Caverns, and was a little bit apprehensive, as I am quite clausterphobic, but I am telling you, these Caverns were AMAZING!

We went on Friday night to the Bat Flight, where something like 20,000 bats fly out of the cavern in a spiral pattern to go out for their nightly hunt. No pictures allowed there, so you'll have to use your imagination.

The next morning, we went to their once annual Breakfast With the Bats--to see the bats fly back into the cave after their big night out--and as part of the first 100 people there, we were able to go on a lantern light tour of the caverns. These caverns are huge--we went 800 feet down, in sprialing switchbacks through different cave "rooms". During the lantern tour, things were VERY dark! Not fun to carry a terrified 3 year old through! But a very unique experience. So, afterwards, a couple of us went through again with the trail lit up this time.

I would definitely encourage all of you to go check them out one day--and as a bonus, you can stop in Roswell, NM which is about an hour away, and see the UFO capitol!

Summer Vacation

This summer is just flying by! Particularly last month. The kids are out of summer school, and we have been gone for 3 weekends in July, so I am recapping finally. The photos are in somewhat random order, because I don't feel like wrestling with Blogger to get them rearranged.






We spent the 4th of July weekend in Iowa for a family reunion. The weather was very atypical for July in Iowa, thank goodness, and we spent a lovely several days with overcast skys and light rains.

One of my favorite sites was seeing quilt blocks painted on several of the barns throughout the countryside.

My grandparents were farmers--this is a picture of their old barn. Its seen better days, but still has so much character. I remember going to that barn as a little girl to help Granddad feed the cows and the barn cats!

And who can resist a little bit of Nature's Color Palate?