Not a lot of sewing

In spite of the above, I've done very little sewing in the last few days, but it's been fun anyway.  Sunday, we picked up Paul's brother Jim at the airport, and we've been busy "entertaining."  Monday we drove to Windsor, VT, a little over an hour south, for lunch with their sister Carole and her husband John at the Harpoon Brewery.  The weather couldn't have been much better, and after lunch we sat outside to chat.

Yesterday, we visited the Vermont Granite Museum here in town.   Jim is a geologist and wore is "Easily distracted by rocks t-shirt.   The exhibits tell the story of Barre's granite industry, and there was a sculptor working on several impressive, large pieces.  Afterwards, we stopped at Studio Place Arts to look at the gallery's annual "stone" show.  It wasn't open on Tuesdays, but the director saw us peeking in the window and opened up anyway.  The many sculptures from a variety of stone were very interesting.  Outside the gallery, Jim was able to see "the world's largest zipper" made of granite by the same sculptor who was working at the museum.

Lunch was at a restaurant that goes overboard decorating for Halloween, and on the way home we stopped to buy Jim a bag of apples to take home.  He says they just don't taste as good in Alabama.  We'll take him back to the airport this morning and get ourselves back to "normal" later.  The one thing we didn't do was get a maple "creemee" (Vermont-ese for soft serve ice cream).  Next time.

Sunny fall days

A long time ago, a library customer moved to Arizona but returned after a year or so, telling me that "it was just too sunny there."  I wonder what he would think now that we've had at least a month of almost constant sunshine?  I like it.  The mornings are crisp at around 40, and the afternoons are warmish, around 70 degrees.  It's been nice for leaf peeping.  

Tomorrow Pat has an appointment in Morrisville, so we're looking forward to driving up that way, especially through Stowe and then by Lake Elmore where it's usually very pretty.  The foliage may have already gone by but it will still be nice.   

We took a walk around the neighborhood this morning and saw a lot of the leaves have already fallen.  But there's still plenty of color in this post-peak time.  After all these years in Vermont (almost 50), you'd think I wouldn't get excited about the fall colors.  But every fall is a little different, and I do love driving around our beautiful state.  (These photos came from the state's Lake Elmore State Park website)

Adding to my stash

 Even though I am still sewing in the basement, two floors from my stash, I can't seem to stop adding fabric to my "collection."  Guess I'm more of a fabric collector these days, but I do plan to spend a lot of time in my sewing room this winter, using some up.  I bought a bundle of nice Riley Blake half yards on sale recently, and the other day a friend, Robin, gave me two tubs of mostly cottons to take to the free table at guild after taking some myself.  There were some bigger pieces I can use for quilts for "Bags of Love" and some blues that would be good for a few projects I've been thinking of.

Saturday, I took an online class on curved piecing with Beth Ann Williams.  I have wanted to try working on a scrappy quilt with arcs as well as the Blue Onion pattern.  Beth Ann is a great teacher - this is the third class I've taken from her this year!  Everything is clear and concise, and I now feel very confident to tackle Blue Onion.  That's what all of Robin's blues will be used for.

Beth Ann showed how she cut her fabrics and sewed the blocks together.  There's a bit of flipping, shuffling and trimming involved that I didn't quite understand from reading the pattern.  It's somewhat improvisational which I was hoping for.  

I'll set that aside for now as I have two projects nearly to finished.  First, I'm about halfway through hand sewing the binding down on Double Date.  And I'm days away from finishing a blue Christmas tree skirt with "Snowflake" Bentley fabric for my friend Pauline.  I have four snowflake blocks to machine applique, and then it will be ready to bind as well.  I will sew that binding on completely by machine as there's always a lot of binding needed for tree skirts.   Not my favorite step in the process but definitely needed.   I chose this holiday project to finish before a few others so that I would know how much of that special panel I have left to use.  I now have enough for at least one table runner for the library's Light Up the Library raffle.

Why is it taking me so long to accomplish sewing projects lately?  I've gotten distracted reading a few good books (Britt-Marie was Here, Silent in the Sanctuary, and Dreaming Spies), but mostly we've been running around the countryside looking at fall foliage.  We take advantage of nice weather now before winter keeps us closer to home.  Tomorrow we're heading up through Stowe to Morrisville on an errand with a stop at Thompson's Flour Shop which makes great sandwiches and amazing take-and-bake pies.  Early next week, Paul's brother Jim is coming for a few days when we'll do a little more leaf peeping.  Busy days here!