Mini Vacay, One Quilt

Husband and I went on a 4-day vacation to southern Wisconsin. We picked that area because my friend from Georgia would be there visiting her parents; it was a good time to see each other.

We stayed at a resort. These pictures show the area. It was quite pretty.

I enjoyed the quilt theme on some of the doors.

Weather was perfect! Sitting on the balcony was restful and pleasant. We read, napped, and also took walks along the lakeshore.

My friend from Georgia is on the left. The friend on the right lives nearby, so we got to increase the fun and see her, too.

We are back home now, so I was able to finish this quilt. Some of these string blocks are at least 15 years old! I made more last week to finish this and quilt it. Then after vacation, today, I finished it off. I will donate this quilt locally.

Surprise: Nebraska!

My friend graduated with a Master's Degree last Friday. My husband suggested that we go there (Nebraska). Funny I had not considered it myself. (We live in Minnesota.) We made some last-minute plans to go, and I communicated with Friend's husband so that I could surprise Friend with my presence. She was totally surprised!

After graduation we went with the family and friends to a local steakhouse and had a delicious meal and fun time. I am so glad we decided to go!

The next morning we popped in at my niece's house to visit her new baby: 11 days old and sweet as can be! One of her grandmas was visiting, also. I am the one in the two-color blue shirt.

Next we visited the state capitol building. I have been to Lincoln, Nebraska several times now, and have never thought about visiting the capitol. Why? They are usually very beautiful buildings. This one did not disappoint. Friend met us there and gave us a bit of insider information. It was a gorgeous day and fun to hang out with Friend.

The floor was beautiful, but I didn't get a great shot of it. This gives you an idea. There were many more spots of floor with a variety of art styles, and art on the walls and ceilings, too. My pictures were mediocre, unfortunately. We went up to the 14th floor to look at some cool views of the city of Lincoln. It was an open-air space with fence keeping us safe.

The day was gorgeous; we then took the long drive back home. But really, it didn't feel that long (7 hours). Road trips with a loved one are special times. I'm glad we surprised Nebraska and ourselves with a last-minute trip!

Quilt Show in Blue Earth!

Last Friday hubby offered to drive me down to Blue Earth, MN. It's a two-hour drive from here. Why go to Blue Earth out of the Blue? (haha) For a quilt show, of course!

The Blue Earth guild has an annual show in August, and I have been wanting to go. This was the year to go as my blogger/quilter idol, Julie P., was their featured quilter. Here is a link to Julie's blog, but she hasn't written much lately. Slow blogging is in the air, I guess. Hubby was nice enough to drive both directions, so it was a relaxing day for me. I really don't enjoy driving.

This is Julie P. and me standing in front of her Navajo Code Talker quilt. A small/medium group from the guild all made this pattern, with variations. It was fun to meet Julie in person; we both got kind of shy even though we had talked quite a bit via blogs and email. Life is funny!

Her quilts were among my faves at the show, and many of them I had seen on her blog, but they're even better IRL.

This is her weather quilt from 2016, recently finished, which is similar to mine which I also just recently finished except I still need to do the binding. Mine is on this blog a few posts back, at "Summer Sewing."

This one refers to her love of geo-caching.

Julie Sefton asked Julie P. to make a barn, to be included in Julie S's book, "Build a Barn."

This is Julie's Lego quilt, inspired by Tonya Ricucci. I have one, too, but Julie's inspired idea was the little flying geese units, which I love. Mine does not have those.

All the above quilts are Julie's. All the quilts pictured below are by other people in the guild:

They had free food at the quilt show on Friday night, so we nibbled on that instead of having dinner with our relatives who are a couple towns over from Blue Earth. We got home with still a decent amount of the night left for diddling around; our little road trip was quick and fun. I have not changed my mind about being a big fan of Julie and her quilts. I love her quirky and colorful style.

Tripping Down Memory Lane

The college where husband and I met and from which we graduated is celebrating its 50th year of existence. My future father-in-law was its first business manager. Its first class opened in the fall of 1967. My future mother-in-law was a member of that charter class.

Each year they added one more class. I arrived in the fall of 1970, the first year they had four classes of students on campus. And that spring, in 1971, my future mother-in-law graduated with the charter class. I didn't know her or my hubby at the time, but I played in the band at her graduation ceremony.

Hubby and I started dating in the Fall of 1971, graduated in 1974, married in 1975, and now, suddenly, it's a million years later. How did this happen? Time is a funny thing.

We decided to take a road trip down to our old college and see what it looks like these days, and to peek at an art exhibit which has a piece of mine hanging in it. This exhibit is part of the college's 50th anniversary celebration.. they asked for alumni art and then picked the pieces they wanted. The exhibit changes about every six weeks. (Note: there were no classes in session on the Friday that we visited, so campus was very quiet and very few people show up in these pictures.)

I'm in the car on the way there. The college was built on a flat prairie; you can see the flatness out the car window. We were happy to see that the baby trees, planted while we were there, have grown up and are large and good for shade.

First thing we did was drive around town to see what we remembered. A lot has changed! This is the house my hubby and his family lived in since he was about 12 and while I dated him. It has been remodeled and is much bigger now. (My in-laws moved away long ago.)

Here we are!

The first picture is of my missing dorm. During my first three years on campus I lived in a dorm that was on this spot of ground. It has since been torn down.

The fourth picture, the dark and fuzzy one, is of the dorm I lived in during my senior year. The other pictures are general campus pictures; some scenes are things we had never seen before.

The next day we went back in the daylight. These two campus scenes are what we remember. The school was so new, it had only three main buildings. This courtyard was in the middle, and what we see in the picture is what we mostly remember. The campus is now much bigger. It looks great!

This structure was in the new student center which was finished about a year before we graduated. It had a skylight-type of dome over this structure. You can see it depicted in the next picture. Later the dome was removed, and they built more around and on top of this structure.

Here's the art exhibit I was in. Can you see my name on this sign outside the Whipple Gallery? Prof. Whipple was the Dean of Humanities and Fine Arts while we were there.

Some of the other art work.. the one below is a print of 400 sketches of horses, some very rough, some completed. I took a shot to show a detailed look at the small parts. Hubby is examining the big piece.

Bill Holm and Philip Dacey were two of our professors in English and Literature back in our day. The 2nd shot shows some book covers of books written by Bill Holm.

This is the hallway where my now-husband surprised me and asked me out on a date. I wasn't even aware that he knew who I was at the time! I was on my way to history class and then sat starry-eyed in class the whole hour without hearing a word the professor said. The second picture is the spot where he invited me to our 2nd date. After that, I don't remember any particular spots of importance.

I end with two pictures of the New - a view from the new student center, looking out toward the campus that we remember. And a view from the administration building, with a view of the dorm I lived in during my last year there.

What a fun visit! Old memories flooded back, and we enjoyed seeing all the changes on campus. And I got a new sweatshirt.