Pink Day

     Today was a day full of many emotions.  Sadness at loss which I'll skip talking about today, stress from over 100 Seniors waiting until the last day to turn in their pictures for the Yearbook and parents turning in Tributes for their children, and finally the excitment of Pink Day at Palmer High.

     Of course October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month.  Last week several students wore pink for friends and family on their own.  This week there was more of a push for staff and students to wear pink, especially today.  Between 2nd and 3rd period an all-call went out for everyone wearing pink to gather in the upper commons for a picture so that I could take one for Yearbook and the slideshow on the schools home page.  I was worried that I was too excited about today and hoping that so many would show up that I would be disappointed by a low turnout.  Well, from nearly 900 people in the building this was the turnout for the picture.  I'm happy, especially with all the guys that participated as well.  I too wore pink, but I'm not in the picture.  I was taking it!

Sunday Drive

     Sunshine has been a rare commodity lately and since it was very bright today and the fall colors are in full swing, we decided to take a drive.  Yes, the last two weeks in September are fall way up here.  We enjoy it for about two weeks if we are lucky, then a strong wind seems to arrive and before you know it the trees are bare and we are simply waiting for the snow to arrive. 
     The nice thing about Alaska is that there are many glaciers that you can easily see from the road if not walk right up to.  Many are around the urban areas as well so an afternoon drive can quickly take you to the wilds with beautiful scenery and if you're lucky, much wildlife.      

     Off we went north of Palmer, through Sutton and Chickaloon, to around the Matanuska Glacier area. We drove about 160 miles today.  The sun lasted until the last few miles home when it rained a bit, and we pulled off at many scenic pullouts to take pictures and just enjoy the sights and the drive.  This picture is just before the Long Rifle Lodge where we had lunch, and where there is also a spot to park if you want to walk out to and on the glacier.  We didn't do that although Bert has in the past.  This glacier has a great deal of silt on it and it is very messy and dirty to walk around an on.

Hexagons

The "finish a quilt" crusade continues. These pictures are of the latest unfinished project that is now finished. I can't even remember how many years ago I started this one. Something like six or seven it seems like. All hexagons as you can see and I sewed them all together by hand. The purple flowers are sort of like fabric origami. There are some in the book that are way more complicated than these but at the moment I'm too afraid to try them. I was going to sew the buttons on by machine, but decided that if I'd pieced it by hand, quilted it by hand, hemed it by hand, sewed the flowers on by hand, that I might as well sew the buttons on by hand, so, it is all sewed by hand. I know, I'm crazy. And I really do love the contrast between the teal greens and the purples. In general I like green and purple so this was right up my alley. I've got plenty of other projects to finish, including a Hawaiian quilt about a yard square that I'd started quilting but haven't finished. I think, though, that I want something different to work on to finish before I finish that one. We'll see.

Great Summer Ending Getaway

     Way back in June I got an email from Groupon about a 50% deal on a one night stay at the Knik River Lodge in Palmer.  I decided to snap one up and we could figure out a date later.
     Well, I should say at the far end of Palmer at the very end of Knik River Road.  The road follows the river and at the very end of the road is the lodge.  Around the corner of the foothill of the mountain the river continues a ways until its start reaches the end of the Knik Glacier.
     The lodge is actually 15 small cabins, a very small double cabin for the owner and his wife and young son, another building not much bigger than the cabins that is the kitchen and the Yurt that is the dining hall. 
     After looking at the calendar and knowing when we would be gone outside for visits to family and a school meeting, we decided on a Sunday and Monday (I paid regular price for a second night) to avoid the weekend rush and so that I could have a last fling before school starts on Thursday. 

     Our hosts were Dutch emigrees and couldn't have been nicer people.  Most everyone else staying at the cabins while we were there were either from Germany, France or Poland.  We decided to have dinner the first night at the Yurt.  The food was very good, but a bit on the expensive side.  Probably since everything was at the end of a 12 mile partial dirt road and was definitely the only delivery for Sysco on that road. 
     Back at the cabin that evening we decided to take it easy.  Bert had been reading Two Years Before the Mast and had been asking me about various terms because of my maritime background.  I had some hand quilting that I wanted to do, so he read out loud to me and I sewed away.  About three hours later he was many pages further in his book and I had completed a great deal of quilting.

     The weather wasn't the greatest, it's been raining a lot the last few days, so we continued in the morning where we had left off the night before.  Bert reading and me sewing.  We did get out in the late morning and the afternoon for some hiking, but those pictures will have to wait for later.  Here is one view across the Knik River.  On the other side of the mountains in the distance is the Matanuska River which flows from the Matanuska Glacier.
  Anyways, we had a wonderful and relaxing couple of days just for the two of us.

Grandmas Quilt

Summer is for visits and travels and while back in my home state I stopped to see Grandma at the old folks home.  I'd seen her last summer just after she had moved in and decided that she needed some color in her room and that a quilt was just the thing.  So Merry Christmas and Happy Birthday.  I used the Yellow Brick Road pattern, which I know many people are very tired of or abhor greatly, but it is a simple pattern that looks complicated, uses twelve different fat quarters for a size between a lap and twin, and is fast and easy to put together.  She loves it and so does the staff.  I've made her other quilts in the past but when she moved here my Aunt gave those back to me.  Mom made a quilt too and Grandma has that on her chair so she can cover up when she's watching TV if she gets cold.  Unfortunately I didn't realize that until later and didn't get a picture.  Bert suggested that I make her another quilt so that when this one needs to be washed she has another one to use on the bed.  She wants her quilt.  Know I just have to find another pattern that is quick and easy and uses lots of colors.

Retirement Geese

Well, I waited a little too long to think of what I wanted to do for a small quilt for Doc Dent for her retirement from teaching.  I only had two weeks to completely finish something from start to finish.  I saw a picutre that was much like this.  I figured that I could use my speed-piece method for the flying geese as well as for the trees.  I ended up stippleing in the sky areas around the geese which lifted them up and out.  I forgot to measure, but it is about 2 feet by 3 feet.

Mountain Village

     People have often wondered what it looked like where I first lived when I go the teaching job in Alaska.  Mountain Village is a small Yupik Eskimo village of about 750 persons located about 450 miles west of Anchorage on the north bank of the Yukon river in the Yukon Delta.  Mountain houses the district office of the Lower Yukon School District, a school district of 11 villages covering an area roughly the half size of the state of Louisiana.
     Travel in the summer is either by boat or plane, and in the winter by snow machine and plane.  There is only one road in the entire district which links Mountain Village to St. Marys, 18 miles away.  Pitkas Point is also along this road.
     The school in Mountain, when I was teaching there, had a staff of around 20 to 25 including all teachers and support staff.  The school had an enrollment of about 250.  The high school had four to five teachers.  I taught Business and Social Studies, there were also a Shop/Science, Math/Home Ec, and English/PE teachers.  Total enrollment in the high school had a low of 37 and a high of 86 during my seven years there. 
     The picture on top is a view from a plane when I was off to another village as the chaperone for the basketball team.  For orientation, the view is to the north.  The original runway used to be just to the right out of the picture.  The frozen river is at the bottom.  The line of houses to the left/west, is along the side of the "mountain" which is the dominant feature of the local terrain and is the last significant earth feature before the seacoast.  The location of where I lived is at the lower left point of the red line.  To the northwest of that location you can somewhat make out the school with the clearing in front of it.
     The other picture is the housing unit, duplex, of which I lived, sometimes with another teacher, sometimes not, depending on the number of other teachers that were single or with families.  We sometimes had to double up.  In our contract, this particular housing unit was classified as "B" and had a base price of $480 a month plus 10% of our salary.  In effect, the school district charged us about $2,200 a month for rent.  And this was from 1989 to 1997.  This did include all heating fuel, electricity and water.  Which actually was a pretty good deal considering that at that time regular gas was $1.75 a gallon, milk was nearly $6 a gallon, potatoes were $10 a bag, etc. 
     I still can't believe that I had the nerve to accept the job and fly sight unseen from Michigan all the way out there, but it was one of the best experiences ever.  The memories are really quite something.  I could type away for pages.
     There are a couple of other pictures that Bert and I have so I will try to find them and give some brief descriptions.
     Happy spring.  We are up to almost 14 1/2 hours of daylight but still only about 50 degrees.

Three-Seam Pillowcases

     I've had fun making these.  I had bought all of this fabric on sale at Walmart several years ago.  I was planning on being earth-concious and making draw-string bags for Christmas Gifts instead of using wrapping paper.  Well, that time has come and went several times over.  Then I ran across a blog posting showing how to make three-seam pillowcases.  So cool, so easy, and it used up all of the fabric and now I have eight pillowcases to donate. 
     But, the possibilities are endless.  Instead of using a small border between the body and the edging, what about a piece of lace?  Or silk for the edging? Or . . .!?
     So, off I go to attack another pile of UFO's and make a dent.  I'm on a roll and having fun and getting lots of sewing done.
     Spring is trying to arrive here but it is having to claw it's way here.  We've been in the low 40's here and there by the afternoon, but yesterday we got a couple of inches of snow.  The highway was treacherous this morning and slow-going.  Still lots of snow in the yard so we are weeks away from outside spring cleaning.
     State conference is over for another year.  All of the students were so helpful and understanding again this year and the adivisor stepped up to the plate and the public served as judges.  Thanks to all.  Computers were my nemesis this time.  Sometimes I do with for the days of typewriters.  My students did really well and one will be traveling to D.C. with me next month.  It should be exciting, especially since our opening ceremonies will be on the Mall in front of the Washington Monument.  How lovely spring in D.C. should be.  I'm really looking forward to 60's and 70's. 
     Well, off I go.

Yellow Brick and Jelly Roll

     Finally I have finished this.  It is the gift that I made for Grandma for Christmas.  I actually did have it made back in October, but the initial lady that I found to quilt it could not fit it in until January.  Okay, so then I took a class at the local quilt shop on how to operate a long-arm machine and then we could rent her machine to do our own quilting.  That is what I did and quilted both quilts for less than I was going to pay to have this one quilted by someone else.  I scheduled a time at the end of February.

     This is the Yellow Brick Road pattern and is super simple to make.  This took 12 fat quarters to complete a quilt about a twin size.  The dimensions for all the pieces are very similar, all straight seams, mixing and matching the colors and widths until blocks are made which are then laid out by block pattern in the order of your choice.  I made this complete top in about 4 1/2 hours and I wasn't even rushing.   

     Here is the back of the quilt showing the quilting.  I used a pantograph to follow for my first time.  I also used a variagated thread of blue and yellow which and feel so-so about but over all I am pleased with

the results.  My loops are the smoothest, but for a first time I'm happy.

     The next quilt is one that I made from a Jelly Roll that Mom bought for my birthday several years back.  It had been sitting on a shelf waiting for me to decide on the pattern to use and since all the fabrics were a rainbow of Bali prints I chose this pattern since it would highlight all of the prints equally and be bright.  I chose a different pantograph for this one, and again used a variagated thread, this time heavy on the orange color.  I'm very happy with this one with the quilting and color and everything.  Again my loops need some work, but it was a real learning experience and I'll surely rent the long-arm again.

     I've been sewing like made this spring break and have finished two other tops and eight, three seam pillowcases.  Pictures of them in a later post.