The Month of June in Pictures

OK!!! Here it is July 2 and I am FINALLY posting pics of our trip!

Merav, my friend from Israel came to visit me in person after 1o years of being internet buddies. So of course I had to give her the life time experience on her first trip to USA.

my dear friend Lis, Me in the middle and Merav on the other side of me. We went for a little trip south of my house to visit my dear friend Lis, and also my very good friend Lynn but didnt get a pic of her with Merav. Not sure how we managed to forget that!

First on the list was to go to Leavenworth Washington for a Quilters retreat for four whole days!

Top of main street in Leavenworth

Look at the artwork, merav says its onestroke painting

CHEESEMONGERS!!!! My favoritest place besides the retreat! I come here and buy my Ekte Gjietost cheese which is only available in very few places and this is one! Its a norwegian imported goat cheese thats cooked down to a brown color and is wonderful on crackers!

really nice idea, ride a horse and carriage through town and get a tour guide! We didnt do this but it was neat to watch others do it.

Main street downtown Leavenworth

a collection of miniature cuckoo clocks (magnets I think?)

Below are some photographs that are hung inside the Retreat hallways , they are really neat to stop and read about the history of the town and the building we were staying at.
Some historical pics of the town 100 years ago
Digging out the train that came with supplies, that was a big snow storm!
Frame with several historical documentations and pics of that time

The shingle for our retreat and quilt shop all in one spot!
Next are some photos of the rooms inside this wonderful building. It is a combined Bed and Breakfast/Retreat as well as a quilt shop all in one building!

sitting corner in our bedroom , Everything is antique, the clothes on the walls, the quilts on the walls and beds and even the furniture pieces
the other corner with tv and my laptop
above the headboard, lovely antique quilts all over the place~!
miniature quilt framed
another antique miniature quilt framed

hand crafted bear and cute pillow next to it

the upstairs sitting room, look at all the antique clothes, and quilts!
sitting room downstairs just off the kitchen
my favorite quilts in the upstairs main room
one side of the kitchen with dishes for breakfast , cuckoo clocks and other antique ornamentals wonderful collection of antique tea cups and saucers
the other side of the kitchen with the tables for us to eat breakfast , above are kitchen items and aprons of the day long ago when women wore these things on a regular basis

antique crazy quilt hung in the sewing room

Merav standing in front of the wooden toystore.




AND NOW....The quilters retreat SHOW AND TELL section!
First off, here are several pictures of the library blocks we made for our hostess Joy. She coordinates the retreat every year at Leavenworth and she is a librarian with a passion for books and quilting and often combines the two in her projects. A block with names of booksthis is my contribution, its a silkie photo in a frame with crazy quilt stitchesseveral other blocks with books and other knick knacks you would find on a librarians bookshelfmore pictures. They are all so cute! Merav is cutting out her jacket pieces

Sewing the pieces to create a jacket.Merav's very first attempt to make a quilted jacket and it turned out very well!

The Jacket was made with several shades of blues, greens and purple batiks
Rhonda with her little applique blockSheila's starry quiltJoys Projects, She is a librarian so she does alot of quilting by hand that are book related

Joy also does alot of baltimore album type quilts in smaller sizesThese couple quilts belong to Jean, the first one is blocks swapped at WASIQ groupHungry Hungry Catapillar!Jeans Grandmothers Flower garden, all done by hand and took several years!Donna with her machine applique with batik Salmon wallhanging. She did several of these projects while at retreat but I think I only got one or two in the cameraHeres the orca one that I really wanted to show you, I found it after I was done postingDonna with her totem wallhangingI think this ones Donna Kays too
This one Must be Melody's or Cindys. They both Love purple and yellow combinations so it coulld be either one.
Sue did this cinderella quilt and then hand quilted, and put hot fix jewels around it to make it glittery.Heres another of Donna Kays fish applique!Melissas Dear jane project and shes very happy its almost finished. Yes she does plan to put the triangle border around itMelodys autumn sampler. Very pretty!Melody or Cindy made this little cutieAlso Melodies, the hand embroidery work she has worked on for several yearsA little project that Melody made for her fridgeratorJulies quilts got lots of reactions and you will see why!That looks like a Judy Neimeyer pattern! All done in batiks!Julie with another impressive paper pieced quilt

OK!!!!! Thats all for now folks. BUT be on the lookout in a couple days I will post pics of the 2008 WASHINGTON STATE SHOP HOP pics!

My latest doings, keeping busy for sure!

This is a picture of the Lewiston Orchards, which is the outside perimeters of the city of Lewiston Idaho. Higher elevation, its like the slopes coming out of the deep bowl of desert heat(YUCK) but it sure is pretty in the spring when the crops are all coming in at different times.
my friend Lorin holding his chihuahua and my chihuahua. they are brothers from the same litter but they sure dont look anything alike! Mine is the one with big stand up fluffy ears and he is about 4 pounds heavier than his tiny brother.
This is the most recent quilt Lynn made while I was there visiting. She is making it for her nephew who just graduated with honors from boot camp. This quilt for Nick is really a special project that lynn is doing. She bought some awesome fabric on ebay that is rolling prairies and farmlands in patriotic prints, with barns and tractors. VERY representative of North Idaho country where Nick was born and raised so this will be a comforting reminder of HOME when he is deployed to iraq next month. CLICK ON PICS TO SEE CLOSER DETAIL
Heres Lynn taking a short break from sewing, to cuddle Sparky, her puppy who was feeling neglected while we sewed.

The love quilt that I helped to put together and then machine quilted for a member of one of my yahoo groups.
close up of the quilting I did on this quilt.
Here I am starting to make some raised garden boxes. to plant tomatos into shortly
Nobody was helping me to do this, I just up and decided that I wanted this done NOW and i was tired of waiting for somebody to help. Well then the boys came out and dumped all the dirt into the boxes for me after I was done building.
Now its finished, and theres 16 tomato plants in there. I wanted a variety of tomatoes and at my sons annual greenhouse sale at school they plant in pods of 4 for I got 4 different pods of tomatoes and each variety had 4 plants! I will not run out of tomatos this year! By the way, I bought sweet 100's, romas, early girl and beefy boy. Gonna try my hand at sundried tomatoes too if the weather is hot long enough this fall