Archive for the ‘Vermont’ Category

The last art-related thing I did before hubby’s surgery on November 13 was do the yearly ArtFest at the Milton Artists’ Guild and Gallery. I could only do Saturday, and a friend helped me out, but we had a great time – and we sold both fabric and framed art – two pieces, including the large one I was working on on Instagram in October…and I learned how to use Square – which has come a long way since I first saw it used in 2012 at the StashFest in La Conner, Washington – new technology then, real easy now.

We did do some simple day trips this summer, and did take 3 days on the Cape before surgery. Vermont is gorgeous in the summer, and the Cape was beautiful off season, especially since we were right on the beach. Now it’s time to be thinking about all the shows coming up this year, and all the logistics involved in organizing which pieces go where….

Schenectady, NY on the Mohawk River at sunset

East side of Lake Champlain, North Hero

Overlook Park in South Burlington, looking west

Queechee, Vermont

SOLD! “A River Runs Through It” – hand-marbled, machine stitched

Sacandaga Lake, visiting my cousin whom I hadn’t seen in 45 years

Saranac Lake on a summer’s eve

Waitsfield, and the Mad River

Burlington lake front, from the Champlain ferry

The town of Vergennes was settled around the French and Indian War, very big up here in the Vermont/New York area. The downtown has begun to revitalize, although some of the outer businesses haven’t been able to make a go of it. We hadn’t done much exploring within Vergennes, as it was always on the way to somewhere else. This time we took the turn for Vergennes Falls and were delightfully surprised at what we found – gorgeous falls, running wildly from the rain, and some great picnicking to return to next summer. Lots of photo ops, and a chance for me to experiment yet again. The sun wasn’t perfect,m so you can see how I played around with that. Definitely a place to come when the sun is exactly right – start keeping that in mind when we set out to explore.

Definitely benefits from cropping  and sharpening – this is the middle of the three falls:

Much better with the light – Close-up, just some cropping –

Almost impossible to get all three falls in, given my little phone camera –

The original – you know I love bark –

With cropping – light issues –

Black and white, as part of an online challenge – I will continue to work with some black and white – really love the effect.

Not really able to take much of a long vacation this year – getting ready for surgery, finances, hurricanes cancelling Delaware – lots happening, so we did manage to get a few wonderful short rides around Vermont, exploring a lot of new off-the-main-road places. I am using my camera phone and hubby uses his little point-and-shoot. A new DSLR is on the agenda for next year, but in the meantime I am understanding the difference between digital zoom and optical zoom – explains why my “close-ups” hardly ever are in focus. I also am concentrating on more interesting framing of my pictures. I find I take more pictures, and usually have one or two good ones out of each batch.

This trip was a Sunday drive down around the the town of Georgia, perched right on the eastern shore of Lake Champlain. Normally we take the road from north to south, but this time we went south to east – like it was a completely different area! Sometimes it pays to look backwards at where you’ve been Discovered this beautiful boat access that we wouldn’t have seen otherwise. Plus, we’d had so much warm weather for October that autumn was pretty sketchy for New England – then suddenly the leaves turned – almost over night. We hit a couple of good spots for leaf-peeping.

This top one benefited from cropping. I was moderately successful at removing electrical wires.

This next series was looking north on St. Alban’s Bay – you can see how the cropping helped with more interest.

I fell in love with turning to the left to see what was there – light wasn’t perfect, but I think there’s a lot of interest in the photo.

Better with the cropping.

Some lighting contrast.

I love it in black and white!

Facing the bay, northwest. Light was not great, but I was playing.

A gorgeous Vermont autumn day!

Marilyn Young, Barton, VT

I It only took me 21 years to get to the Vermont Quilt Show. When I was set to go before leaving Vermont in 1994, it was way over the 90s, and the person who was going to drive couldn’t handle the humidity. So I had to pass, but I finally went in June….to find out me camera took virtually no decent – in focus – pictures. Time for a new one, this time two or three steps up from my point and shoot – which has gotten me great pictures over the eight years I’ve used it. So here’s a few good ones:

Marilyn Young

Marilyn Young

A number of zentangles made their appearance at the show:

Dresden Plate Zentangles – and reversible!

Other side

Sorry – did not get the maker….

Loved the colors in this next one:

Sea Glass – Lynn Whitton

And finally…..I am back to my own work!

In May, as spring was in full bloom, we headed south to visit Crown Point and its new bridge. We had watched the video a bunch of years ago about the destruction of the old bridge, and now we had a brand new one. Most of Crown Point hubby hadn’t seen for years, and I hadn’t been to the fort and the lighthouse. The colonies had both British and French forts at this location, active during the French and Indian War – nicely done job on a small museum.

Light house at Crown Point, NY

Samuel Champlain

New York side, looking toward Adirondacks

Shoreline on NY side

The new bridge – you can walk across

Baking bread

The Browns River in Underhill, VT

Yes, rivers in Vermont have WATER in them! This is the Browns River, names for my husband’s family who settled this area in the late 1600’s, Indian raid and all to Montreal. Lots of history here, as well as all of New England.  In all of our travels this summer we passed this sign:

…which as I looked for other pictures realized we have crossed it many times in our 40-plus years of travel and never realized. More here.

So after 6 months some observations about our new home on the other coast…..

Local news – we arrived right at the end of the legislative session….for a week we had complete coverage of the major bills, pros and cons, what all the provisions were, and when they would take effect. Very different from Tucvson/Arizona. reminds me of living in Maryland where bhe national news WAS the local news.

GREEN……watched a full-blown spring develop, which was so incredibly gorgeous and reminded me of how much I have missed the seasons. Had to wear my heavy raincoat once, otherwise my jacket was fine. Weather was wonderful, and on days when the humidity is down, it is glorious. So far we are handling the humidity!

Over heard a discussion of several adults at a show we had gone to, lamenting the fact that a “big box” store was coming to the area – small town idea of a big box store coming in to town – Dollar General. But hey, Big Lots is huge!

No Target store anywhere in the state, and only two Walmarts in the state. I do miss Target, but if I have severe withdrawals, I can go across the lake to Plattsburgh,

Very few chain stores/fast food places – CVS for pharmacy, 1 Walgreens in the county, mostly mom-and-pop stores – bookstores, restaurants, really nice for a change to support locally.

Yellow traffic lights mean to “speed up,” and since there are not a lot of center turn lanes, you wait for your chance and GO.

Everyone loves Bernie – Feel the Bern! – including a barn painted to support our senator and presidential candidate.

Candidate Bernie Sanders

There is water all around. WE’VE HAD A WET SUMMER SO FAR, so the corn crop has suffered, as well as early fruits. Very interesting to be back in solid rural farm country, with farmers’ markets all over.

What was once solid rural now still looks rural, but as you go off the main streets, you can see the new development. The commercial development has roads leading off the main drag, and then everything for parking lots and inner roads are well-developed. Easy to get around.

It is so easy to get somewhere else – trip to the Hudson River Valley was only about 200 miles away –  easy to see a lot of things.

Really friendly people, even at DMV! In order for hubby to qualify for his handicap sticker, by state law he had to do a driver’s test to prove with a disability he could still be a safe driver.

Because of humidity, odors tend to hang in the air more….like skunk and manure……

Lots of mom-and-pop motels – very few of the motel/hotel chains until you hit the bigger cities. Tree bark is completely different, and nearly every gas station has a full-service deli….

Dress Barn – fantastic colors, very bright, as opposed to many of the softer southwest colors. Road grades are interesting – we thought out west 7% was steep – highest we’ve come to here has been 15%.

I’ve got to get to all of my pictures……November is turning out to be pretty warm (high low 502 today), so I’m sure soon we’ll be staying in a lot! A couple of quick shots of autumn, looking west over Lake Champlain to the Adirondacks.

Autumn from Overlook Park, Spear Street, looking southwest

Lake Champlain, looking northwest, from Overlook Park, Spear Street, Burlington

We are here, finally, after two years in the planning. We are finally at home in hubby’s native state of Vermont, as well as the area his ancestors settled: Jericho, Vermont. Yup, he’s a Brown. And the operative word is GREEN!!! Once we got into Arkansas, the greens of spring were really soothing, and as we headed further north, greens were sprouting, until finally in Vermont there were just a few sprinklings of beautiful spring. But two days of rain changed all that to glorious colors spreading very rapidly. We literally watched the lilacs sneak into bloom. It was a hard trip across country, and not the first time we’ve done this trek. I counted up and this is our fourth time back and forth across the interstates.

But we are older, and the amount of sitting really took a toll. First night from Tucson to Santa Rosa, NM east of Albuquerque. These first two days were long ones because we wanted to make it before more storms hit tornado alley. Second day to Ft. Smith, AR, and third to Nashville, TN. Then to Roanoke, VA and the fifth day to my niece in northern Virginia. That was an easier day – a wonderful glass workshop in Staunton, VA that we had been to five years ago, and then a tour of Manassas Battlefield. My great nieces and nephews are adorable, and my oldest – Gracie – is a firecracker.

No mater how many times we stopped to stretch and do some simple yoga moves, my legs still cramped badly. A week after arriving they are finally back where they were and the aches have started to subside. But oh my, the traffic!! This country definitely runs on trucks. Arkansas infrastructure really needs work on the interstates, so I can only imagine what the state roads are like. Tennessee was better, but Pennsylvania was exactly like we remembered – cold patching flopping in the breeze.

The amazing thing about all this move is that everything has been falling so easily into place.The last two months before the move I had a lot of anxiety about whether or not we were doing the right thing…but NOTHING was a problem. Everything happened as it should, from the delivery of the truck to the packing to the unloading and storage here in Burlington. Everything was so smooth – and if you’ve moved any time at all, you know how stressful it can get if something goes wrong. Our only problem was a night in southern New York with the Sheraton saying it wasn’t a CHOICE hotel, and the Choice saying it wasn’t a Sheraton. How did they solve the really lousy night and service? By offering us a voucher for a free stay at that hotel when they were done with construction…..like we’re headed back to Newburgh, NY just to stay there……..Not thinking highly of Sheraton at all.

So last Wednesday we crossed into Vermont and headed up Route 7 (after missing the turn, which we have used for some 39 years). Green Mountain state, how gorgeous. The photo at the top is by the small park in Underhill on the Browns River, and it looks like spring is in full swing, but not so – it’s just started up here. There is still forsythia in bloom – which I remember from springs in Maryland was the first color to pop. There are so many blooming trees – I had forgotten just how many trees come out in color this time of year. I love birch trees, so I had to snap that. I have other pics but they’re on the main camera.

The only wrinkle is our actual new home. We had been on the waiting list for some senior housing for the last nine months, but when we checked in with them, we were not at all happy at attitude – not willing to show us floor plans, talk about costs, nothing until we were at the top of the list. Well, that doesn’t help us much at all. So our first day out and about was discouraging. Couldn’t get a new bank account because we had nothing to show with a new address – thank you, Patriot Act. Well, Friday I left for the day with no expectations at all for what we would find. The best thing about Friday morning was the fog – we have fog in Tucson maybe twice a year. It was gorgeous.

We had an appointment to look at a senior complex Friday at noon (this after I spent about 3 hours on Craigslist the night before trying to see what was available). We had talked about what we wanted in a place so we wouldn’t have to move again, and we finally settled on the most important criteria – second bedroom studio space, decent light, covered parking, no stairs. This complex we looked at had all that and more: still being built, third floor, good light, spacious, new appliances, emergency pull that hooks into the local rescue, good community, and everything nearby – pharmacy next door, great bagel shop across the street, credit union within walking distance – and……UTILITIES INCLUDED! Absolutely perfect, so we signed on the dotted line. The wrinkle is we can’t move in until September, so we will be doing some traveling in the meantime. No pics yet, as everything is under construction.

So – the adventure continues!