I gave a lecture and workshop for the Thimbleberries Quilt Guild Friday and Saturday. What a nice group of women – and men. Or man. Jerry was at the lecture and in my class which was fun! I wish more men were interested in hand sewing.

There was a potuck supper before the lecture. Betty brought a carrot souffle that was amazing. It is her signature dish. Sweet, light, orange and very tasty. She shared the recipe with me and said I could share it with you. I'll do that once I get it in the computer. Remind me if I forget.

Her daughter, Joey, brought a cake in this carrier:

Yes, everything is better with cake and frosting. I WANT one of these! Joey said is was made by Dept 56 in the 90s. Ebay here I come. It was not just cute but very functional. 

And then there were the ladies with these name tags:

I love wooden yardsticks and had not thought of cutting them up in quite this way. The maker hot-glued pins to the back and decorative stuff to the front. Surely there are lots of other things you could do with a chunk of yardstick.

And then there was this purse:

If I am remembering correctly one of the guild members has a pattern and taught a class for this bag. I learned two new things that you may already know. Imagine a tape measurer. The metal is flexible and curved. The closure for the bag was made of that sort of curved metal ruler. You cut a length for each side and insert it into the casing at the top of the bag. Turn the strip of metal ruler so the concave side faces out. When you pull the two sides apart to open the bag, it stays open. Push them closed and they snap flat, closing the bag. Cool.

The mesh for the outer pocket is the flexible screen you would use in a window screen.

I had not thought of including that in a sewing project. It's wonderful to learn new things!

I've been in Florida for days and had not yet been to the ocean. I took a few hours Friday afternoon to drive to Hutchinson Island. It's a barrier island and more built up than I imagined it would be. However, once you get to the beach it looks a lot like most of the beaches I've seen on the southeast coast of the US.

Once I got past the high sand dune with the grasses, the beach was long and full of people. I'm generalizing but it looked like the retirees were enjoying relaxing and those under the age of 25 were playing. This man was in no hurry to go anywhere. I wonder if I'm going to enjoy that feeling when I retire? I don't like sitting and relaxing for more than a few minutes at a time now. I think I'd need a personality transplant. But I'm not retired yet so maybe that feeling comes.

I, dressed in my clothes for the lecture tonight, was completely out of context.

But my feet were at home in the sand…

I know many of you are 'enjoying' storms and frozen weather. Here's hoping a bit of the beach will warm you up!

I spent Monday and Tuesday in Jacksonville, FL, with the All Stars Quilt Guild. One of the ladies in my class, Carol, took photos and blogged about the class. You can read her post here.

Carol asked me before class started if I minded if she took photos which was fine with me. She was really subtle, I never noticed her doing it. She ended up taking photos that I would love to take myself but am always too busy teaching to be able to do.

So I'm sending a thank you to Carol and all of the All Stars for making my visit to Jacksonville so nice!

I spent Wed and Thurs in Titusville which was also lovely. I had no idea that the Kennedy Space Center is there. I sort of saw it off in the distance. I am now in Port St Lucie where I have the afternoon off. I think I'm going to go look at the ocean.

One of my husband's colleagues and his wife have a new son – Theo. They sent this photo (and gave me permission to share it with you). As the proud parent of two sons and two grandchildren I've gotta say – this is may be the best newborn photo taken by a non-professional that I've seen. 

Theo is handsome but it's more than that. In this photo he's looking at you. He's not just looking. You can see that there is a brain working behind those eyes. It's lovely that this photo captures that.

I think that all babies are thinking about what they see, but it's not often that a photo captures it. I cannot go back and take this great a photo of my own children but if I could, I would try to capture the spirit of this photo.

As a quilter I also have to say that I want to feel the blanket Theo is wrapped in. The stars are printed on… what? It looks like a quilted gauze. If I'm lucky Theo's parents will at some point let me see this blanket. If they do I'll report back. That said – these are parents of an infant and I'll bet real money that they are going to be sleep deprived for kind of a long time. If they forget that I'd like to touch the blanket I will so understand.

I loved my boys. I love my grandchildren. I did not love sleep deprivation and I would not willingly ever go back to being the parent of a baby. I like my children older. Chris at 30 and Jeff at almost 27 seem to me to be the absolute perfect ages for children. Elanor at 9 is really good. Jack at 4 – I love him a lot – but really, he's going to get better with age.

UPDATE: I found out that this swaddling cloth came from Aden + Anais. There is a set of four with different colored stars. I think they might make nice, short curtains too.

I spent this weekend in Valdosta, GA, with the Withlacoochie Quilt Guild. Seriously – how could these ladies not be fun with a name like 'withlacoochie'? 

Yesterday we worked on coloring a block from My Whimsical Quilt Garden. Today we worked on applique techniques. I took a couple of photos this morning before we had to get to work. Here's Grace and her block:

And Barbara and her block:

There were 22 students in the class and I wish I had had time to photograph everyone with her block because each one was lovely – and differently colored. I love a 2-day class where there is time to play with color! I very much enjoyed the time I spent with these ladies.

I left class today and drove 2 hours to Jacksonville, FL, where I will be for the next 2 days. Then it's down the FL coast to Titusville for 2 days and then farther south for 2 days in Port St Lucie. I fly home next Sunday.

I'll do my best to post more this week from the Sunshine state. It is, in fact, sunny!

In my layman's understanding, the 2nd law of thermodynamics says that all things tend toward disorganization. Murphy's Law is all about entropy. I have spent the last week fighting entropy all over my house. I have much tidier drawers and closets and I feel good! The photos, however, are not thrilling.

This morning Steve and I spent several hours fighting weeds on the patch of ground next to the driveway.

Our driveway backs onto an alley. The spot below, next to the alley, is hard to keep tidy. There is this wiry, persistent, obnixious vine that grows here and elsewhere in our yard. You can't really see it here but it had grown all over that chain link gate, up the crepe myrtle, and into and through the rosemary. 

We raked out the leaves and then layed down 4 layers of newspaper. It was at this point that I realized I did not have anywhere near enough newspaper. So I went dumpster-diving down the alley and was stunned to see that almost none of my neighbors take the paper or, if they do, they are not recycling. I called friends and got some newspapers but this job is going to take more time as we have to collect newspapers.

The reason we put down newspaper was because of an article I read that said that 4 layers of newspaper would smother the plants/weeds underneath. I hope so. Steve went for mulch as I spread newspaper. Here's a tip: pick a day with no wind. Luckily we did not have wind today. If we had this would have been a lot harder. 

I weighted the paper with logs and 'tree cookies' that we had on hand. Steve spread mulch between them and over the paper.

I admit that our after photos may not look a lot different from the before photos, but they are. The vines are cut back to the ground and it is to be hoped that they don't grow up through the newspaper. The leaves are tidied up. I am amassing more newspaper so that we can cover the remaining ground. I feel like I've made progress.

Don't you love making progress? I've also been working on the website this weekend, on pages that are not exactly obvious. I updated the video 'Lessons' pages. You can click here and here and here to see them. I also updated my class page. That meant re-writing all my supply lists. I've spent hours standing at the computer and working. I stand because it supposed to be a lot better than sitting. I can tell the difference – it's harder but my bone density is better.

Speaking of bone density… I've been doing a little yoga in addition to pilates. I read an article in the NY Times today that confirms what I had already been told. Be careful of some of those yoga moves bacause they are not as benign as you may have been led to believe. I listened to a related story on The People's Pharmacy about yoga for osteoporosis. It pays to be careful.