Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow: .a hodge podge

Today I got an email from Vivien at Seven Pines asking me what had happened to me and saying she had missed reading my blog. What a sweet thing to do! And needed too, as right after Thanksgiving I read something on another blog I follow where someone had dropped her blog as she posted too frequently (once a day).

This gave me pause as perhaps my goal to do as much was perhaps overloading people. After all, do people really want to read my blatherings? Plus....coming back from Thanksgiving in Michigan meant that we were quickly trying to finish up winterizing outside and to put up Christmas decorations. Our street goes nuts and that will be fodder for another blog post, but not this one. Imagine the "Christmas with the Kranks" neighborhood and I think you'll get the idea.

My daughter and I started decorating the inside of the house last night....and it really looks like a bomb exploded in it. I'm also trying to thin some of the things out.

However, today she and I went to the mall to purchase my husband's Christmas present. While my intentions were to dive in and leave, my daughter had other ideas and she now has lots of new clothes, purchased on sale or on clearance. I snarled at her reminding her that Christmas was coming. Some of these things will be wrapped and put under the tree, but I keep on thinking about something that Ben Franklin once said (actually, I think it was BF as "Poor Richard"). Basically, it said that nothing was so costly as something which wasn't needed (a necessity). Trying to drive that concept into the head of a teenager who is in love with clothes is something I'm not able to accomplish.

So, I'm glad to report that all my Christmas presents are purchased. I still have to finish making a couple and I have two quick quilting projects to whip out.

After being "malled", we went to the opening of Fran LaSalle's quilt exhibit at Glen Helen Ecological Center in Yellow Springs, OH. I quilt with Fran and she is also a member of Miami Valley Art Quilt Network. She had a solo show there last year and was asked to show her pieces with a potter this year.

In all, Fran made 21 new pieces for the show and has 31 pieces on exhibition. One of her favorites is the first piece I showed you, a single leaf of a Virginia Creeper (Parthenocissus quinquefolia) which is also known as "five leaved ivy." This other one is a lovely little piece for the fall.


This last one is a sun print she did with Setacolor paints. All of the pieces are for sale, and even before the opening today, three of her pieces had sold.

Tomorrow, I am driving to Columbus to have the Great Blue Heron at Sunset appraised. The quilt was accepted into "Quilting Natural Florida II" and will be shipped down to Gainesville, Florida in mid-January for the Feb. 6 opening.

Since I had one quilt I had in a show go astray, I have decided that every quilt which is accepted into shows at a distance will be appraised. The cost of appraisal is $40 here for a certified appraiser. If had put in an insurance claim on a quilt which had not been appraised, I would only get the cost of materials. For a 25" x 36" quilt, this wouldn't even begin to touch the amount of work I had put into it. In addition, the more quilts I have in shows, the higher the value of my pieces...something which is not reflected in the "materials only" issue.

In 2005, my quilt "El Ritmo Flamenco" was supposed to come to me here in Ohio. When she was entered her into the Kaufman Quilt Quest contest, I had no idea I would be moving to Ohio. Of course as soon as I found I was moving and had an address and telephone number, I sent that information off. However, the Kaufman people had a computer failure and up-loaded from old information....and sent my quilt to my old address. Fortunately, I was on very good terms with the people who bought my house, but I did have to pay an additional $35 to have the quilt Fed-exed back to me. I have also heard of quilts stolen, lost in the mail, or the ill-fated quilt which got caught in a conveyor belt and was pretty heavily eaten.

Therefore, for the quilts which are special or are traveling quite some distance, I have them appraised. Because it makes a difference, I supply the appraiser with a resume of my work, and the dimensions, photographs and basics of the quilt prior to making the visit. While the appraiser will probably still re-measure and take his or her own photographs, it does make it go a bit more smoothly. So, off to bed before I won't hear the alarm to drive the 1 1/2 hours to Columbus tomorrow.