We were so lucky with the weather on this vacation. It was fabulous and even on the last day (Thursday) I was able to get out to kayak for a couple of hours. This was on the way back looking toward the place where we stay. You can see that "our" house has a spectacular view.
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It's a 980 mile drive home so we always have a book to listen to and I have a crochet project. I started a shawl for this trip. We stated one book that was recommended to us and it was AWFUL. We switched to the newest installment of the Cork O'Connor series and it took us to within 15 minutes of home.

I only have a few rows left to do and this shawl will be done and ready for donation.
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I did do a little shopping on vacation. At our stop in Belfast, I picked up two new patterns. I've been looking at Lepidoptera for a long time. Katie made one a few of years ago that I loved. I thought Oak Moth was just cute.
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In Wilton I found these cute earrings.
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In Southwest Harbor these 3 fabrics asked to be taken home.
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Last week I talked about the rocks our friend, Bill, brought me. One person asked to see the rock collection so here goes.
Bill has a career in the US Navy and then a second career as a pilot for American Airlines. But his college major was geology. He loves rocks and collects them from places where he travels. These are rocks that he brought me from Ventana Canyon in Tucson, AZ. We visited them there last winter and hiked Ventana Canyon twice.
He always includes 1 untumbled rocks for comparison but he tells me that it takes weeks to polish rocks in a tumbler. The rocks are on the tea towel that his wife, Laurie, made for me. 

Here's the beautiful tea towel that I will really use. She wove it with a beautiful butterfly pattern. I have a scarf that I bought from her several years ago that I also love.

These are some of the rocks that he polished for me from Cadillac Mountain. I hiked Cadillac on my 60th birthday so he did these for me to commemorate that.

Last year (2023) was the first year that they stayed with us in Southwest Harbor so he got these rocks from the lake. I have a lot of little wood trees, some I've bought and some a gift from a friend, that I use with my rocks to decorate the mantle. It's a little unusual, but given that I also collect vulture art, it all seems to fit.

I haven't quite gotten myself totally organized for the week so I'm not sure what I'll be sewing but today I'll, at least, get the farm blocks out, press them and get them up on the design wall.

Our last visitor left Monday. We had a great visit with him and he even brought me these great fabrics that he picked out himself! he used to work on the high-end garment industry so he's an expert on fibers and colors. One of our earlier visitors is a weaver and, when I get home, I'll show you the beautiful tea towel that she wove for me. Her husband tumbled some rocks for me from Ventana Canyon in Tucson. They were the couple that we visited last winter. He's done sever rock collections for me and I love them.
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Since Dave left Monday we have had perfect weather. We hiked Bald and Parkman mountains Monday, kayaked a couple of hours Tuesday and today we hiked our favorite trail, Pemetic. It's not quite as high as Cadillac but a lot more interesting. It's a steep hike full of boler piles to scramble. I talked about it a bit in this post. This time we took the ravine path that required climbing down two ladders.  

The views from almost all of the hikes here are amazing. From the top of Pemetic we can see over Southwest and Bass Harbors and out to the ocean and islands beyond. 

In the afternoons we have been able to pull out the float chairs and relax in the lake for an hour or so.  It's all been lovely but it's time to head home on Friday. 

In the evenings we have been watching Season 1 of Joe Pickett. The house has Paramount+ so that's been a nice treat. I've gotten lots of crochet in and will have the baby blanket finally finished tomorrow. The big blue blanket is at a standstill because I need more navy Pound of Love yarn. I hope I can find some somewhere. It doesn't seem to be available online. I can get away with another yarn as long as I can find a pretty good color match. 

With the baby blanket almost done, I realized that I needed to start a new car project for the ride home. It's going to be a donation shawl. I got the first few rows done so now I know the pattern and have it ready to go for Friday morning.
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On the sewing front I did finish all of the blocks for Fab Farm! Everything is packed up now. I didn't want to try to cut sashing here so I'll finish this at home.
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The last blocks were the bees. So cute!
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Here's a look at one set of the blocks. I'm really excited to put this one together.

​I'll hopefully have the baby blanket ready to share Friday and then you won't hear from me again until Monday or Tuesday.

We started off early yesterday to get on the trails before the parking lot filled up. If you want to hike in the morning in Acadia you have to get to the parking areas before 9 to be sure of getting a space. We got to the trailhead about 8 and when we returned about 10:30 there were 5 cars waiting for a parking space. 
​We selected the Bubbles for our hike yesterday. This fun trail has two mountain tops in one trail. This is on top of South Bubble looking over Jordan Pond with the ocean beyond.
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On the North Bubble we were in view of Pemetic and Cadillac mountains. This weekend my goal is for us to hike one of these. Cadillac is the highest so that's a goal. But if we don't do Cadillac I hope we can do Pemetic, it's my favorite trail in the whole park. 
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We got back in time to relax in the sun for a while and then get in some sewing time. I'm now working on chickens! I started with the sections that are common to all 4 chickens. Getting these out of the way will speed up all of the other chickens.
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I got the first chicken made and I think it's so cute! We have another friend coming to visit today so I might not get the other chickens done before Monday.
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The crochet blanket is coming along great. I'm working on the border and only have about a round and half left to go.
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We left Wilton, ME Friday and made out way through Belfast and then on to Southwest Harbor on Mount Desert Island. We look forward to this view every year. We had some friends arrive and we were blessed with perfect weather for 4 days. Those guests left yesterday and we are on our own until Friday. Yesterday we woke to rain and it was mostly cloudy all day. But here's what's been going on so far.
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We have a tradition of doing our first hike on Beech Mountain. It's a nice length with great views and all different types of hiking surfaces. This view overlooks the pond that "our house" is on. Tuesday I kayaked the length of this pond out and back. It was about 2 hours and a lot of fun.
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Everyone except me hiked the Precipice Trail Sunday. Precipice has the right name, lots of ledges, rungs and ladders. Not for me at all! I kayaked the lake that day too. On Monday three of us hiked the Champlain North Ridge Trail. It's quite steep but had great views looking over Bar Harbor. Bar Harbor is the far point of the land mass with Bar Island right behind it. The town is named for the "bar" of land that is only visible during low tide. On the other side they have a sign with the nuber of a water taxi in case you get stranded.  Midway in the photo is a big complex that is the Jackson Laboratory, a large research complex that has 4 location just in Maine.

In this photo you can see that the fog was rolling in as we were hiking up.
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At the top it looked like we were above the clouds. 
So far the hiking and kayaking has been great but we took yesterday off.

I didn't do any sewing while we had guests here but I got my sewing corner set up yesterday and got back to the Fab Farm quilt.

I finished the tall sunflowers yesterday. Only chickens and bees left to do. 
​We have a couple of days until the next guest arrives so I'll make some chicken progress the next 2 days.

I did get some crochet done while our guests were here because we watched movies at night. The red marker is where I last left off and was ready to attach the next ball of yarn. I finished that whole ball and the blanket is basically square, as I wanted. Now I will start the border and get this one wrapped up soon.

Today we hope to go for a hike and then I'll be on chicken duty while Chris goes out fishing. We are gett the best weather this year! It's the best year yet for weather.

Today we leave Wilton and head to Southwest Harbor for the last 2 weeks of our vacation. We have enjoyed our last 2 days here. Yesterday Chris had a guided fishing trip so I headed out on the kayak for one last trip around Wilson Pond. It takes about 2 hours to paddle around the whole pond and I made it back just as some rain was coming in. Aside from Long Pond on Mount Desert Island, I think this is my favorite pond that we've stayed on in Maine. 
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On Wednesday we went toward Weld and hiked half of the Blueberry Mountain Trail. It's a very steep trail that gains over 1400 feet in 1.2 miles. I knew that I wouldn't make it all the way to the top but I needed to test out how well my foot is healing before we head to Acadia for a lot more hiking. It seems to be healed as long as I have it taped up with the KT tape. It's a cool trail and, if we come back this way next year, we will definitely hike it again. We saw some interesting flora along the way like these black trumpet mushrooms that are supposedly edible.....but I'm not trying them!
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This cool caterpillar is the spotted tussock moth caterpillar. I was thinking that it would make a cool fly lure to tie and actually found one but I can't seem to find it again. 

I've also been sewing and got 4 sunflower blocks done. I think these are the least fun to sew but they are really cute and will add some brightness to the quilt. These are the short sunflowers. There are 4 tall sunflowers too.

I got the flowers for the tall sunflowers done before I packed up my mini sewing room. All I have left to make are these remaining tall sunflowers, 4 chickens and 4 bees. I might have the whole top together by the time we head home in 2 weeks.

Today we will spend some of the day in Belfast on our way to Southwest Harbor. We have friends meeting is there to hike with us for a few days. The weather is expected to be spectacular for the next several days.

Like (almost) all vacations, things are going well here in Maine. Yesterday it turned a little rainy and it will be rainy today. But we have books and sewing so we're happy.
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On Saturday we got out to the Mount Pisgah Conservation Area and hiked the Tower and Blueberry trails. I taped up my ankle and I have absolutely no pain in my foot. That was a great success! Stepping in dog poo wasn't a great success but I got over it and my sneakers are really clean now.

I realized that the hike location was 10 miles from the Maine Cabin Masters store so we detoured there before heading home. It was fun to visit but it's just a tourist retail store with a lot of really expensive things.
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Chris is having fun fishing. It's always slow on maine lakes because there just aren't tons of fish here but he's having better luck on this lake than anywhere else we've been in Maine. If he had kept this one it might have been a citation. But he put it back from someone else.
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Sewing continues at pace and now the cows are all out to pasture.
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Next up are the horses. The horse blocks have strawberries as a component so I made these blocks first. They turned out to be harder than expected because I cut the green pieces and the large red pieces wrong! I didn't figure it out until I was sewing them together.
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My little workstation is quite dark so on a trip to WalMart yesterday, I picked up this work light in the hardware department. It was about $30.

I love it! It has 2 lights and the light arms are adjustable in height and angle. There are 3 light strength settings and a flashlight on the end.
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It's even magnetic on the base! This is going to be a great travel sewing light for me. It will be good for crochet too.

Today is another rain day. I hope to get enough of a break for a walk to town (1.2 miles) but mostly I will sew horses and we will read.

When we visited the New England Quilt Museum we went specifically to see the Paula Nadelstern exhibit. I was pleasantly surprised to see that they had an exhibit on the evolution of machine quilting! I didn't take as many photos in the exhibit because 1) I had seen many of the quilts in shows before and 2) there were a number of people looking at the quilts and it was taking too long to get in  a position to take photos. But I have a few to share.
​This first photo is a small section of a wholecloth quilt.
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I have seen this quilt in a magazine but it's so much more impressive in person. The center section is all machine created lace. You can see right through the quilt. She said she experimented with machine made lace as a connecting element, not decorative delicate element, in this quilt. 

As I'm posting these photos I realized that I didn't get any photos of some of the earlies machine quilted quilts. It's clear that as soon as sewing machines were invented that quilters were taking advantage of the timesaving tool for every step of the quilting process. There are some very early machine quilted quilts. They even have probably the earliest free motion quilted quilt.  

The photo can't possibly do this quilt justice. It's absolutely stunning. 

The quilt is made in intricately quited strips and pieced strips are appliqued over each panel join.
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I love Zentangling so I had to capture photos of these 3 Zentangled stitched quilts by Pat Ferguson.
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I think there were 3 quilts in the exhibit by Carson Converse and each one was very powerful and so precise! Her website is worth a visit! 

Here's a closeup of the absolutely perfect stitching on this quilt. There isn't a backstitch on it anywhere.
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When I started longarm quilting Karen McTavish was one of the first "famous" longarmers that I followed and I took a couple of classes with her at some quilt shows. She says that she made this quilt during the winter of 2023 when Minnesota had 138 inches of snow. I just love the grayscale transition from block to block.

Funny story on this one. I really wanted a photo and was waiting for another woman to finish taking photos so I could get in position. She was taking her time getting her shot lined up. What she didn't realize was that I could see that she wasn't taking a photo at all. She was holding her phone like she was taking a photo but she was actually reading something on social media. I know she was doing it on purpose as a little powerplay but I wasn't in a hurry and was just amused.

The detail quilting is beautiful!

There were also quilts by Margaret Soloman Gunn, Debra Wagner and others. You can see a few more quilts on the website.
Then we turned a corner and got this fun surprise...

You can read more about it here.

I took about 40 photos at the New England Quilt Museum and I'm going to have to split them into 3 posts over the next week or so. Today I'm going to share the photos from the Paula Nadelstern exhibit. It wasn't a huge room but it was filled with her quilts that spanned from her early years to recent work. I recognized many of them from previous exhibits and from her books but they all look different in real life.
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This is the first quilt you see coming into the exhibit room and it's one of her earliest quilts.
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The exhibit really shows the evolution of her style while still staying true to her symmetry roots.

This is a quilt I have loved in one of her books.

It was cool to be able to study it up close.
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I love everything about this quilt but I was really attracted to the background treatment.
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I remember talking with her while she was making the dinner plate quilt. The quilt on the right is fairly recent.
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Both of these are in books and I love both of them.
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This one is a favorite of mine from one of her books and I was surprised that it was bigger that I thought.
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In the end, I think this is my favorite. I've never seen it before/
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Look at the piecing detail! 

I'm so glad we took the detour to visit the museum. 
​More photos to come!

We arrived in Maine Friday evening and I thought I'd post Saturday but I was just too tired for some reason. But we're settled in the cutest small camp and have started exploring around the area. 

The trip up is a 2 day trip and we drove up along with the remnants of Debby. Chris was driving. I81 is always stressful with all the trucks and he had added tension with the bouts of rain and fog. I settled into the passenger seat and thought I might finish the center of this baby blanket. But somewhere outside Scranton I realized that the hook I was using didn't match the color of stitch marker that I use to remind myself the hook size. I use Clover Amour hooks with colored handles. The blue stitch marker I used indicated the H (blue) hook. I was using the I (green) hook! I stopped working on it until I could get to the hotel and lay it out to see if I really did make a mistake. 

Once I laid it out on the bed it was clear that I had used the wrong hook and had been using it for a while. That red circle shows where I was 2 weeks ago and the blue arrow shows how far back I needed to undo. So that's probably all the work I did over the past month. Darn.
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I unraveled one whole ball and part of another....almost half of it! But it had to be done and it's a charity blanket so there's no deadline. I'll get back on it with the blue hook this week.

The second day took us through Massachusetts and we took a detour to the New England Quilt Museum to see the Paula Nadelstern exhibit. I took a lot of photos and will do a post tomorrow on that visit. 
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When we arrived Friday it was still raining but this was our view Saturday morning. The camp is just a few steps away from the shore of Wilson Pond in Wilton, ME. This is our first year in this area and so far we are in love with this cute little town and tiny camp.
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Here's my sewing space. Fortunately we can eat on the screened porch.
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I was itching to get started sewing on the farm quilt and I've already finished 2 pigs. I love my little Janome Gem Gold that's at least 20 years old. It has a perfect 1/4" seam which is really important with these blocks. The eyes are only 1/2" finished so precision is important.
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Yesterday we went for our first hike I needed a fairly easy hike to test out my foot after all the pain I've been dealing with this summer. After x-rays, one MRI and 2 doctors it seems that I have 1 old injury that isn't bad enough to do anything about, a couple of "deformities" that aren't bad enough to do anything about and, most importantly, weak muscles in my right foot and ankle. I've been working on strengthening exercises so was happy to test it out on a 2.5 mile hike yesterday. It was a beautiful day and a lovely hike. Near the end we were greeted with this funny sign. The trail is at least 6 yards from the "cliff". If anyone gets that close to the edge I don't think this sign will help. But it was kind of funny.
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This is what the trail looked like beyond the sign. No cliff.

We came home and took the kayaks for a long ride and then had cocktails on floats in the lake. It was a perfect day. Chris is off fishing today so I plan on a long kayak on the lake and some more pig sewing this afternoon.
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We have friends who spend every winter in Tucson and they have been raving about the place for years. I'm not a huge desert landscape fan but this year we were ready to escape the Virginia winter and go anywhere warm. 
It was time to give Tucson a try and boy was it worth it! The Sonoran Desert is spectacular and it's particularly spectacular in this region where they actually get some regular rain. I am now totally fascinated by the saguaro cactus and I really love that we don't know a lot about them. Supposedly, if they have arms they are over 100 years old, but they don't know for sure. There are no tree rings to count.

Before I get into the vacation week I want to tell you about my two celebrity sightings! The first was when we left Richmond on a 6am flight. We were standing in the Delta check in line and we saw a man and woman get in the Sky Priority line. The man looked like an aging rapper and I didn't recognize him at first but as soon as I heard his voice I knew it was David Bromstad from HGTVs My Lottery Dream Home. No one bothered him and he seemed as nice as he is on TV. I assume he was in Richmond filming.

The next one was at Tanque Verde Ranch. We went horseback riding one evening and our friends were showing us around the ranch before our ride. I was surprised to see that there was some sort of quilting event going on there. As we walked through one area there were 2 men sitting at table talking with some of the quilters. It was Kaffe Fassett and Brandon Mably! I had not paid to be at the conference so I didn't feel it was appropriate to speak to them but I thought it was funny since I had just finished the blue quilt top that was from one of his books. In case you are interested, the retreat was sponsored my Madeline Island School or the Arts. They have retreats in Arizona, Minnesota and Maine.

Back to the trip. We had 4 absolutely fabulous sunny days with temperatures in the upper 70's and we took full advantage hiking every day. There are so many hiking opportunities in that area. We hiked in the Ventana Canyon, Sabino Canyon and East and West Saguaro National Park. This photo was in Ventana Canyon. That was out longest hike of about 6 miles, straight up and straight down. It was a great workout.
The last 2 days were cooler but still lovely and a nice break from gray Virginia. Today, though, Virginia is bright and sunny and almost 60.
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We went to the Arizona Sonora Desert Museum and got to see the raptor show. There's a hummingbird exhibit there too but we saw more hummingbirds at our friend's condo than we saw in the Museum enclosure. I expect that we were there at the wrong time of day. 
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At the Tanque Verde Ranch we went horseback riding. I haven't been on a horse since I was about 9 at 4H camp so I was a little unsure. I had a chat with Cimarron beforehand to explain that the ride was all on him and that I was just going to focus on not falling off. Laurie had Elvis and he was a little more of a handful so I was grateful for Cimarron. He's very comfortable leading ignormat riders around. It was a beautiful ride and I got over my apprehension very quickly. By the end I was hardly paying attention to the horse and just enjoying the great views. That was the day we saw Kaffe Fassett.
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During the down times we played a lot of tug with our new friend, Jammer. Jammer is an incredibly well-behaved dog. She doesn't beg or counter surf but we learned that she apparently has a jones for ear plugs. I sleep with earplugs and I put them on a little tray by the bed in the mornings. One night I noticed one missing but didn't think anything of it. I assumed it got accidentally thrown out, but just in case, I tried to keep the bedroom door closed. I opened a new pack and then I had 3 earplugs on the tray until the day we came home and all three were gone. I had accidentally left the door open. Then we were pretty sure that Jammer had developed an addiction. I was worried that it would cause her trouble. Bill and Laurie were not. Sure enough, over the next 2 days were were relieved by reports of fluorescent orange poo pellets. 

While we were there we also visited Biosphere 2. I didn't get any photos, the weather was awful and, frankly, I didn't think about it. The whole Biosphere 2 experiment fascinated me when it was going on and when it all collapsed so I was excited to actually see the place. If you are interested, the Wikipedia article on it is pretty darned entertaining. Today it's owned and managed by the University of Arizona and there's one significant experiment going on there, Landscape Evolution Observatory (LEO) where they are studying how volcanic rock evolves into fertile soil. All of other experiments referenced in the tour seemed to be halted. You can actually download the Biosphere app and take the tour virtually. What struck me the most about it was the size. It's not nearly as big as I expected and the idea of putting something like a dozen different plant and natural ecosystems inside, in essence, 3 buildings seems ill-advised in hindsight. Of course, we know it didn't really work but I'm sure there were good lessons learned for science anyway. The tour really glosses over the Biosphere experience for the residents and doesn't actually reference any real research that they were doing while living there. I think they were having enough trouble surviving and producing food.  It was worth the trip though. I've always wanted to see it. The drive around Oracle was beautiful and we stopped by Catalina State Park. We would like to hike that area someday too.
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I did get to visit a local quilt shop and a yarn shop. I bought some cactus-themed fabric to make some memento placemats. I forgot to photograph the fabric but I'll get it later this week. During the flights and little down time, I worked on chemo hats. Hats are the perfect travel project and I finished the 4 chemo hats on the front. The dark blue one is a hat I finished a couple of weeks ago when I was at a doctor visit with Mom. All of these are made with a really soft polyester yarn, Feels Like Butta by Lion Brand and whatever the Hobby Lobby equivalent is.

It's good to be back home and to have humidity again! I've never been so constantly thirsty and dry but we really enjoyed it and are looking forward to going back.
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