Linda (and Paul) were here for several days and we worked hard, designing her next two quilts. And then, yesterday, we got to play! We went to the Dallas Arboretum to see the Dale Chihuly exhibit. We didn't exactly know what to expect but it was a beautiful day and we figured at the very least the fresh air would be great. We were both blown away – it was so lovely! I took lots of photos and you will want to see a lot of them so I'm going to spread them out over several posts.

This is not something you'll see elsewhere. It is site-specific and so amazing. The plantings were designed to work with the glass sculptures. Some of the pieces were small and intimate like these orange 'sprouts' and some where just huge and stunning – like that 30' spire in the distance.

One of my favorite photos is this one, with those yellow spikes against a clear blue sky… FYI – click on these photos to see them bigger.

Linda and I both loved the way the colors in the plants worked with the colors in the glass…

I want these in my front yard! I cannot afford them and I don't think they could handle a Texas hail storm but still, I want some. I'll share more tomorrow because in 12 minutes we have 12 folks joining us for dinner. Thank goodness Steve is the one of us in charge of the kitchen. I just made the house pretty.

Continuing from yesterday…

I didn't show you the stack of rainbow solids that I intended to use for the flowers! Here they are. Pretty!

I decided against drawing a pattern for the flowers. While they will be similar in shape and size, I like that the fact that each one will be different.

The black and white hex flowers are going to function as flower centers. I placed a hex flower on top of the flower fabric (on top of my sandboard) and I drew a flower around the hex flower.

Each of these flower shapes has 6 lobes, just as a hex flower has six hexes around a center hexagon. It's a nice fit.

I cut 36 flowers from my stack of rainbow solids. Orange and red and pink and purple and blue flowers… You know what? Too many colors. It was hard to look at which is never a good sign.

The blues and purples worked the best so I cut more flowers from those colors. I put them on the wall and the quilt was nice, but missing something. It needed warm colors!

And leaves and stems…

I really wish I could show you all nine blocks on the wall. They are looking happy! But I can't because 1) this quilt will probably be in a book and 2) if you see it now, you won't be excited later when you see it finished. It will be old news and old news is not exciting.

I have more fabric to cut tonight and then I should be able to start appliqueing. Hoorah! Just in time because Linda is coming to Texas and we're going to be busy during the day and stitching at night.

Linda and I are working on what comes next, after the next book that is already in the editing phase. I do the drawing in Illustrator, on my computer, so I am very grateful that my computer is happy. 🙂

My computer appears to be fixed! Hooray! I've upgraded my primary computer to mountain lion and all is well. Can you hear me knocking wood? The office computer is now being upgraded and then the laptop. I find it amazing that I actually need 3 computers, but I do. 

With the computer humming along, I turned my attention to the quilt on the wall. Remember Tick Tock? I con't show the full quilt, but I can show some interesting parts. I got the backgrounds finished and had to decide what sort of applique was called for. 

You wouldn't know this, but I don't often work this way. I usually start with the whole quilt drawn, then I color it with fabric. Designing on the fly is harder for me — both challenging and exciting. I put some vinyl over a block and doodled…

Nice, but I've done more than one block like this before. There's nothing wrong with that, but I'm in the mood to change it up a bit.

I sketched and came to no comclusions. It did become obvious to me that this quilt was going to have flowers on it. I like flowers. They are colorful, pretty, and I enjoy the circular patterns that are almost always present.

I pulled out a stack of solids, arranged like a rainbow and combined them with the little black and white hex flowers that I've been making. I chose a color from the stack that made me happy and pinned it and a hex flower to a block:

Now what? I'll tell you more tomorrow.

Friday I took the kids to the fair with their other grandmother, Judy. We had a great time and I was oh-so-glad Judy was with us. She is the non-judgemental grandmother and I am the grandmother with a few more rules… we're a good pair. Every kid should have one of each don't you think? (That said, I did buy nutella and let the kids eat it at practically every meal. How can they call what is really chocolate frosting a hazelnut spread? I did my best not to think about it as a I spread it on gluten free bread.)

We sampled snacks in one exhibition building. We visited animals in another building:

Honestly, the kids were not excited about any building that did not have food or animals. So we didn't visit many exhibits.

Rides were ridden, but not many. I should have been mentally prepared but going to the fair is EXPENSIVE! It doesn't pay to think about how much each of those tickets that you buy is worth. It would cost hundreds of dollars to ride all the rides. We were selective.

We rode the huge Ferris Wheel that lives at the fairgrounds year round. We only got to go around twice but we all enjoyed it. Even Elanor who almost didn't get on. Here's one view from on high:

You know, the best part of the day was not what we did, but that we did it with the grandkids. A good day! We came home happy and tired and the kids slept soundly. Yay!

Saturday and Sunday with the grandkids are sort of a blur. When you aren't used to living with little kids, time flies. Today I'm back to sorting out my computer – there is hope! I have another Ryan at tech support and it may be that we are on the way to really fixing my computer.

And I went to my doctor today for my annual visit and was told that I should consider a different, bioidentical hormone replacement therapy and a chiropractor for my neck. Neither are things I am prone to love but tomorrow I'm visiting the chiropractor that sees my doctor. And I have my science guys (Steve and Jeff) scoping out the HRT. Life is so full of important details and all I want to do is work on the quilt on my design wall!!!

In other news, Chris, my oldest turned 31 today. Steve and I sang a painful rendition of Happy Birthday. Are we even more officially old now that we have a child who is 31? I hope not :-).

A couple of weeks ago this young parrot landed in our backyard long enough for me to photograph him. And then he was gone. I think about him a bit and hope he found a home.

My kids fly in and out. Jeff is in the air a lot, going to conferences. Chris and Lorna are flying out later this week. Steve and I both fly off pretty often…

May all those flying, every day, all the time, get to and from home, safely.

I love Star Wars, but there are apparently hundreds of thousands of people who are way more into Star Wars than I am. That's good because a lot of them are collaborating on an uncut version of A New Hope. The movie's trailer, "The Escape", is below. I laughed, a lot.

Hundreds of 15 second scenes, filmed by all sorts of people, were put back together in a finished film. These fine folks are credited on the Vimeo site:

Bryan Pugh, sound mixing/editing master, Aaron Valdez, video editor and general creative boon for the Uncut Team, and Jamie Wilkinson. AND – you can go to the Stars Wars Uncut site to sign up to film your very own 15 second segment! This so sounds like something my son, Chris, and his kids should do. (Can I join you?)

Star Wars Uncut "The Escape" from Casey Pugh on Vimeo.