Archive for the ‘snow’ Category

I do miss snow. I’ve been a desert rat for 16 years now, and I miss the snowfalls, where you could just watch the silent snow falling to the ground, covering everything with such a pure white blanket. ‘Course, I like it even better when I don’t have to drive in it.

We  had our share of snow on the mountain this winter, even down to the 3000 foot level. We would wake up and look out at the mountain, to see a snow line across the face of the mountains, almost as though drawn by a ruler. Quite spectacular. But Sunday was up close and personal! I threw a few snowballs, laughed at the bikers in their shorts, sitting among the snow drifts, and ooh-ed at all the waterfalls created by the snow melt. Rocks glistened everywhere, and there were unexpected sounds of water running all over the mountain.

There are quite a ew spectacular views as you head from the valley floor up to the top of Mt. Lemon. At one point you can look back to Tucson in the distance, with Thimble Rock almost in front of you. This is the “back side” of Thimble Rock, and you can see the “front” side when you take the tram into Sabino Canyon, almost on the desert floor. Sabino Creek will have water running for the next few weeks, which will make for a wonderful spring.

The stone formations, while not as spectacular as Zion or Bryce, nevertheless are quite striking in their own right. You can see how the wind and water have etched wonderful monuments, that from some angles look as though they were going to topple at any moment. I love the hint of blue sky showing in the lower crevice.

Everywhere you look at amazing rocks, which is one reason why Mt. Lemon is a mecca for rock climbers.

And sometimes you just climb the mountain to be alone. If you enlarge this next photo, look for the man and his dog out all alone on the rocks.

And finally, the pure joy of snow! Somehow the t-shirt from the Festival of Books seems appropriate!

I have really been busy these last two days, made much better by the fact that I have no school work – no lesson plans and no papers this weekend, so that’s a real treat. Last night I stumbled upon the idea of taking a whole bunch of UFOs and getting them ready for the March show, since we will have a considerable amount of fiber in our booth. These are mostly pretty sad UFOs – been around a LOOOOONG time, way before skill sets improved considerably. The challenge now becomes how can I improve on them. Plus, if I work at bindings and things like that, I will have handwork to keep me busy at night in front of the television – anything to keep me from eating!

Before the reveal (too much HGTV…) a note about the Joggles button along the right side. Yes, I am an affiliate, but I gotta tell ya, I am really enjoying the landscape class I am taking right now, plus the store can make a real dent in your plastic – lots of ideas and lots of goodies to experiment with – so give them a peek.

Now, this first piece goes back to the very first Journal Quilt project, first announced on the QuiltArt list some many years ago. At the time I was running a nonprofit learning center, and one of our specialties was working with dyslexic students. I decided to do a series of journal quilts on the Orton-Gillingham method of learning to read, which starts with vowels, the key to decoding English. I managed to do three months, and then hit the wall with my execution of “silent e,” or “magic e.” Man, it looked like crap. So they didn’t go anywhere, but I still have them. The vowels are still around, and they seriously need a new binding. So here it is in all its unfortunate shape, with a new binding about to be attached. I do have a soft spot for this one.

Next is a landscape I started in a class with Jennie Rayment from England, about 10 years ago. She is a master of fabric manipulation. She had a fashion show for us of these amazing garments, all these nips and tucks…ALL made from muslin. The class was wonderful, and I own her books, but I haven’t really done anything with them. So this piece needs some more thread work and then a decent binding. Yes, I know there are composition problems, but I am hoping as I take my landscaping class, I will discover some ways of “fixing” them, like toning down the water.

Next is a mandala, in my series of mandalas. You can see two others here. This yellow one just radiates heat, and I want to do more with beading. The little pieces of masking tape are hubby’s attempt to spread out the beads, and mark where they will go. I tend to use some wild yarns braided for the edging. I do love doing free-motion quilting on marbled fabrics.

This last is unusual. This is my current table cloth, rescued from the art room a couple of years ago. This was the cloth the students would wipe their paint brushes on. I fell in love with it, as it reminds me of Provence, France – never been, have no idea what Provence actually looks like, but I can see it in this cloth. Some day I will quilt this.

I’ll leave you today with some pictures of our snowstorm – we don’t see much snow in the desert, and this week’s ending storm did a great job dumping feet on the mountains. As a New Englander, I do enjoy snow, but I would much rather just LOOK at it!