Lorraine in One Tree Hill, South Australia --- please contact me at Quiltville@gmail.com .
I can’t ship your order without more information, and emails to you have gone unanswered.
If anyone knows Lorraine please have her contact me!
Brigitte,
I have been trying to ship your order of String Fling since they first arrived!
Your information is incomplete, and I can’t ship it until I get this information from you!
Please contact me at Quiltville@gmail.com!!
***NOTE*** If anyone knows Brigitte Sieber from Switzerland, please let her know I need to talk to her. I have tried her email address, and it bounces back to me, so I am at a loss at what to do ----
Thanks!
In Saturday’s class, several of us were discussing alternate routes I could take home rather than the usual “trek back over to Richmond and fight your way back down I-95 with all the semi trucks and weekend traffic” madness.
When Randee suggested that I take the Jamestown-to-Surry Ferry, I knew that was exactly what I wanted to do!
Now, those of you who live near water and where ferrying yourself from one side to the other is a daily occurrence, this won’t seem like a big deal to you, but I have a confession to make:
In all my world travels, I had yet to drive my car up on to a ferry to ride across the water, and drive off on the other side. This was exciting for me!
And even more exciting that it was “free.”
I wasn’t sure just what to do, so when I got to the ferry bridge, I just waited in line behind a few other cars – I must have been there relatively early, the ferry runs every 30 minutes or some such thing and there were only a couple cars in line ahead of me.
But as we sat there, soon there were many more cars behind me!
Here I am in line as the ferry pulls up to the dock after bringing people over from the “Surry Side” of the James River. Yes, that s my Williamsburg Hospitality House parking garage pass still on my dashboard!
Somehow I ended up lucky enough to h have a front row “seat”!
Can you see my license place? QLTVLLE!
Or maybe it’s the birds that have the best vantage point – and a free ride too!
I went up to the top observation deck to enjoy the beautiful view, and to wave at another ferry passing ---they are headed to the dock that we just left!
**Side Note!** This is how you know who the tourists are:
They are the ones OUT OF THEIR CARS milling around and going up to the observation deck to take pictures.
Those who ride the ferry regularly are on their cell phones, or eating their drive through breakfast and reading the paper, or reading their kindles. They stay in their cars. It’s an every day occurrence for them – but for me…it was SO COOL!
It takes about 15 minutes to make our way to the Surry Side.
As our gate keeper made his way to start letting the chains down and opening the gates so we could drive off on our way, I slid back behind Shamu’s wheel and made myself ready to exit my first drive-on ferry ride ever.
I don’t quite remember how much time all this would have saved me mileage wise, but I know it is considerable. If you can’t cross on the ferry, the only alernative is to drive way out of your way to cross a bridge further down the river.
One more thing crossed off my bucket list --- what’s next?
And the long road home….I drove and drove, getting home about 3pm.
I unloaded the car….stuff is in piles everywhere and totes and luggage need to be unpacked and laundry attended to.
I left it all ---and took a nap in my own bed that beckoned --- the ceiling fan whirling silently on medium speed, creating just enough of a house-bound breeze to require sleeping with just the sheet in this summer heat.
I woke up about 5:30, finding my afternoon gone!
A simple supper of grilled cheese and tomato soup was decided upon, and here I sit – trying to make my way through snail mail that has piled up over the past 18 days I’ve been gone.
It’s going to take a lot of digging to get out from under!
I only made a couple of stops on my way home – could you guess that I was just wanting to GET HERE? Those photos will come tomorrow. Right now, my phone is dumping over 900 photos taken on this past 18 day jaunt onto my external harddrive so I can edit today’s pics down tomorrow.
Let’s face it. It’s been a LONG trip, even as great as it was – and I don’t feel like editing photos tonight. I want to park my butt on the couch and watch the olympics and do NOTHING ---all the busy stuff can happen TOMORROW!
But for those who would rather read than watch, I did find something to download that you might like:
Keeping the Peace by Hannah Hooton is free tonight in the Amazon Kindle Store.
Genre: Drama/Romance
Book Description:
London waitress, Pippa Taylor has no interest in horses or country-living. But when she inherits Peace Offering, a hopeless racehorse, she embarks on a career change in order to see her late uncle’s wish to run him in the Grand National come true.
But having talked her way into a job as racing secretary to champion National Hunt trainer, Jack Carmichael and moved to the West Country, Pippa finds herself faced with more daunting obstacles than even the Grand National can throw at her.
The most challenging of them all is her relationship with her new boss.
Jack, although easy on the eye, is moody and fiery-tempered and certainly not easy on the ear. After a Christmas they would both rather forget, danger and deception threaten Pippa’s life in the country and as her time at Aspen Valley Racing Stables draws to its conclusion she discovers Peace Offering is not the only thing she must fight to keep.
Check to be sure it’s still free before you download…..and have a great evening!
This picture comes with a special hello to our friend-in-common, Darlynn!
One of the marvelous things about being a quilter is that whole 6 degrees of separation thing. Have you heard of that?
Six degrees of separation refers to the idea that everyone is on average approximately six steps away, by way of introduction, from any other person on Earth, so that a chain of "a friend of a friend" statements can be made, on average, to connect any two people in six steps or fewer.
Or in other words, I know someone who knows someone else who knows another person, etc ---who knows you, and through them, we know each other!
I met Darlynn when I taught for their guild retreat up in Madison, Wisconsin a few years ago. But it turns out we’ve got other quilters in other places in common too – because Darlynn used to live in Georgia, and that is where I originally met this sweet lady, who also knows Darlynn!
You might remember me mentioning Darlynn because she joined us in Sun River Oregon for the Sisters Quilt Show a few weeks ago ((Has it only been that long? It feels longer!))
So from Wisconsin to Oregon to Georgia to Williamsburg --- there was a whole lot of connection going on!
This is another block that can boggle the mind, and it is so easy to turn triangles the wrong way!
Midnight Flight was found in Volume 5 of 100 blocks – copies are still available from the Quiltmaker.com website.
Spirits were high as we sewed our brains out ----and since it was our last day, we were treated to a cheesecake table at 2:30pm for treats – just what we need to keep our energy up---CHEESECAKE! LOL!
Lucky for us, the cheese cake table was right outside our classroom door! Really, the Hospitality House Hotel and Conference Center here in Williamsburg has done a fantabulous job behind the scenes for us. The staff is friendly and helpful, the rooms are spacious, the food was really good…..I’d come back here to stay in a heartbeat!
Here’s our photos from yesterday’s class:
So --- I did what I said I’d do. I slept with no alarm clock. I wanted to sleep a bit longer and wake up by myself and get this day going. Guess what? I slept in maybe only 15 minutes longer than if I had set my alarm? I guess you just can’t fool a body clock!
Several local ladies told me that I should go home via the Jamestown Ferry – that it is a cool thing to do, good photo op, so I may head out that way. It’s about a 6 hour drive home for me – who knows how long it will take! There are some neat historic areas to drive through, but many of the places I’d usually stop may be closed on Sunday.
Time to pack it all up, load it all into Shamu and point this girl homeward!
You know that kind of high you feel when you’ve completed something really big --- when it’s been pulled off without a noticeable hitch ---when new friendships have been formed and continuing friendships strengthened in every area?
This is how I feel tonight! We had such a great time, all of us as instructors ---from the Quiltmaker Magazine Staff, to those of us who have participated in the magazine and were asked to be instructors for this very first of what I hope is many Quiltmaker Block Party retreats!
There was talk and discussion of how we all felt it went ---where we would like to maybe see this take place in the future…what locations? What time of the year? How to fit it in with existing schedules? Will any of us have our paths cross in our teaching travels in the near future so we can get together? I hope so!
We all left the hotel about 5:45pm after class was over and various boxes and bags and quilts and cases were emptied out of classrooms, loaded into our cars or prospective hotel rooms.
Weary and exhilarated at the same time, we walked out of the covered entry way, and out into the balmy Williamsburg August evening air for a 15 minute walk to The Trellis where we enjoyed a YUMMY dinner and animated conversation.
We did it! This event has been hanging on the horizon for a long time ---and we did it!
I hope you can tell by the picture how happy we are ---the only one missing is me, I’m taking the picture.
Tomorrow morning I start my journey home….that is AFTER I sleep til I wake with no alarm to buzz me.
Thanks, Quiltmaker! It’s been wonderful and I can’t wait to do this again!
I also can’t wait to play with the set of rulers given to me personally by Monique Dillard of Open Gate. She is such a sweet lady, and I really enjoyed getting to know her!
Right side of the table: Carolyn McCormick, Debbie Caffrey, Nancy Mahoney, Linda Howell.
Left Side of the table: June Dudley, Monique Dillard, Diane Harris
Not pictured: Me, Jennifer Chiaverini who left eary to go home, and Carolyn Beam who’s hubby arrived in town this afternoon and they were off enjoying an evening alone together. ((How romantic!))
Travel home safe, girls – let’s do it again!
