Calgary, here I come

Tomorrow it will be blast-of time. First I will go to Shawn and Emily in Olds for a few days , then to my sister-in-law Anne in Calgary and she will drop me of at Quilt Canada on Tuesday morning. In the afternoon there will be the annual meeting and that evening the official opening of the show. Then I will be teaching from Wednesday till Saturday and on Sunday I come this way again. All my teaching things are packed , now it is a trip to town to make sure, that there is enough here at home for hubby to eat. His aim was to get all the corn planted before I had to leave and he will accomplish that today. Most years we would not have started even. But everything is growing, including these daffodils. This small wallhanging I made a few years ago, using some of my dyed fabrics. It is fused and machine quilted. The crazy patch block is finally finished. Once I decided it had to be done , it did not take that much work. This is number 3, the last one will have to wait till this fall. Then it will be on to the border. As soon as the block was done I cleaned up the room and now I can find most things again. It also means ,that there is nothing on my design wall to be done. I did find some small pieces of vintage Japanese fabric and decided to use them to make a few simple cards. I always seem to need more and even those small scraps are too precious to throw away. But not even one scrap is left over. Yesterday was a very busy day, first with farm stuff and then later a trip to Waterloo. It was our monthly guild meeting and as a guest we had Sylvia Naylor, a fibre artist from Cambridge (www.sylvianaylor.com) Her thread painting is fantastic. I have tried it on a small basis, so I know how much work it is, but to do it on a much larger scale, is incredible. Before I would give it a try, I would have to invest in threads and more threads in all kinds of colors and varieties. I did bring my sewing machine to the dealer to get serviced. I have done a lot, at least for me, of machine work lately and this way the machine will be all tuned up for my next project.

It is official...spring has started

For Laurence spring starts when the first corn goes in the ground. And this is the day. After lunch he started the first field, almost 2 weeks earlier than ever before. But the ground is ready. We have some rented fields, that have no tile drainage and they can be very hard to get planted, so whenever it is dry, you better be out there and get the job done. This also means that our busy time has started. Out in the flowerbed, the daffodils are blooming. What you cannot see is the lack of crocusses ( see a few weeks ago). Still makes me mad. I have not seen a squirel since. Last year I noticed these small violas. They had taken over the flowerbed and I had a heck of a job to pull most of them out. What I did not realize is, that they will bloom from early spring till the first frost. Now I will keep patches of these flowers around, since they brighten up the whole bed. I just have to make sure to pull the extra's. This last week-end Shawn and Emily came to Ontario. All kinds of activities were planned for the upcoming wedding of Emily's sister. They did come over here on Sunday afternoon and all of us went to see Jeanette and Tony. We had a good visit. I noticed her 2 orchids, a white and a yellow one, in full bloom. Now she barely waters them and forget about fertilizer, but still she is getting these beautiful sprays of flowers. It used to make me jealous.Finally I have one. This orchid was left on the farm when we moved 11/2 years ago. There is sat on the counter in the cold house with no water for over a month. When we had people move in, I took it along home, since it had been my first orchid. All this time it was in a back corner of the office and to my surprise it got a flower spike and look at it now!!! Shows you to never give up and maybe I should back of with the watering and fertilizer. Last Thursday evening I gave a trunk show for the London Friendship Quilters Guild. The next day I did a workshop. They took a lot of pictures and if you like to see me in action you can go to www.lfqg.blogspot.com Not much quilting has been going on. In just over 1 week I will be leaving for Calgary and my time was spend getting everything ready. As of now the kits are organized and the patterns done.I'm getting close with the crazy patch block, but no sigar yet. Only 3 more patches to embroider, but my mind is black right now, so I put it away for a few days. Wait for some new inspiration.

Busy,busy, busy

The next few weeks will be very busy. In 2 weeks I will be going to Calgary, first to visit Shawn and Emily and then it is on the Quilt Canada. The 2 entries in the NJS have been shipped, so that is one less worry. Now it is on to getting the kits and patterns ready. Yesterday I spend time in Elmira to make all my copies and the next step will be to put it all together. This morning I had to get ready for my trip to the London Friendship Quilters Guild, where I will be giving a trunk show tonight and a workshop, small landscapes, tomorrow. Laurence just took the big suitcase down and put it in the back of the car, so everything is in place. I have a list and as I put things in the car, I tick them of. By the time all the ticks are in place, everything should be in the car. Up to now it has worked. I am still working on my crazy patch. I am getting mighty tired of it, but the end is in sight. By this time the table is a big mess. I love to clean it all up, but just 3 more patches to go! Block number 4 will have to wait till the fall. We have had fantastic weather over Easter, warm enough to sit outside. Neighbour Harold, who is in his eighties, loves to tell you about the time ,he was able to seed grain in March. Laurence always thought it would be special to be able to do that. Well, this would have been the year. It was too bad, that the tractor was at the dealers and did not make it back till April. He did seed some spring wheat, but he was 2 days late. Now it is back to cooler and rainy weather. The daffodils are in full bloom and the pansies look great out in the flowerbed. I realize, that we might get some snow yet, but they can handle that. Below you can see my re-blooming Christmas cactus. I bougth it last fall as a very tiny plant. Right now it is in bloom and there are lots of buds. Now it is backto getting kits ready!