Autumn on Lake Superior

Last week my husband and I packed our R.V. and went camping in the Upper Peninsula. You know your almost there when you see the Mackinaw Bridge.

Our first campsite was on the Straits of Mackinaw. The coast is so rocky compared to ours back home.

When we arrived a storm was coming in over the tree tops. Nothing better than sleeping in a camper while it's raining.

The rose hips were beautiful.

Our next campsite was on the Tahquamenon River (it runs into Lake Superior). We love to camp off season, you get the best campsites and hardly any other campers.

The leaves were in full color, perfect for hiking.

On one of our long hikes, tucked in the woods was this large moss patch. I climbed in through the branches to take some pictures. The moss was so thick and squishy, I don't think another human had ever walked on it.

There were wintergreen plants,

and tiny spruce trees,

and wonderful mushrooms. It was so magical looking, I expected to see faries or elves living there.

Early morning looking out of our camper at the fog on the river.

We hiked part of "The North Trail" along Lake Superior. This trail goes from New York to North Dakota.

The leaves were drifting along the shoreline.

What a picture they made.

As we hiked I collected leaves to play with printing them on wool, oak.

And white birch. I bundled and steamed them, now there waiting to be unwrapped. I'll show you how they turned out next week.

For my "family tree" quilt the lattice strips between the house blocks will have on them the hobbies and favorite past times of the family members. While on our vacation I cut and appliqued the first strip. This is my families hobbies, my mom was always a "sun worshiper" and loves to read. My dad loved to fish and hunt for mushrooms. And he always took us all camping. I still have to embroidery in the names and details.

This is how it will look with my childhood home. The blue lattice strip will be embroidered with my dads Navel history. The "yard" of the house which I already embroidered with the family births, deaths etc. I covered with chunks of fabric for some privacy on this big world wide theater!

Girls quilting retreat

Last Wednesday my girlfriends and I took off for 5 days of quilting up at my girlfriends cottage "up north". The leaves were almost at peak color, it was sunny and warm, we packed lots of good food and wine, who could ask for more.

Our view of the lake from the cottage.

The first thing we did was to return each others "row by row" quilt. We began the exchange last September with everyone making their own first row and sending some fabric along if you wanted to for the rest of the rows. It was so exciting to get your quilt back. This was Laura's snowman quilt.

Cathy's black and white with a little spark of color in some of the blocks. (I'm holding them over the living room balcony).

Jody's more subdued quilt to go in her living room.

Joni's quilt for her living room.

Jamie's Christmas quilt. I love the black lattice strips, it makes it very elegant.

And my "Ultimate" Halloween quilt. I took the picture outside on the deck.

The project I worked on I began 15 years ago. I bought some pretreated fabric squares (they were a dirty white color, I can't remember the name of the technique), picked wild flowers from our river property, laid them on the fabric, placed it in the sun for around 10 minutes, then brought them in and rinsed the fabric out in cool water. The fabric turned indigo blue leaving the flower print. I printed 12 of them.
The lattice fabric I ordered years ago, it's cotton from South Africa. I prewashed it quite a few times, the blue keep running.

This is the back of the fabric with their trademark.

This is the beginning of the quilt, the next set of boarders will have the same white stars pieced in them.

Laura pieced and quilted two Halloween quilts for her twin grand kids.

Laura also took her sons favorite Hawaiian shirts from high school, unsewed them and pieced them into a surprise birthday quilt. He was a football player and every Friday the team wore their Hawaiian shirts to school, lots of fun memories. Some of the blocks still have the pockets and the button flaps on them.

Cathy's daughter in law is a music teacher at our local school. This is for her for Christmas. The outer boarder is choir singers.
This is just a few of the tops that were pieced during our stay.

We also took walks collecting leaves.

I brought premordanted silk scarves for everyone. We laid the leaves on them, rolled them up tight, and simmered them awhile. They took them home to unwrap after a few days.

Jamie and I played around pounding leaves on muslim.

Our group photo, what a wonderful time. Thank you Laura!

Home from Florida

I arrived in Florida and off we went to the ocean. The water was warm and the waves were high due to all the hurricans out in the ocean. The boys loved jumping and playing in the water.

OK, they really loved it, we spent two days playing in the waves.

We also took a few hikes. I love the hanging moss.

My favorite purple berries were out in all their splender.

While I sewed on my wool house quilt block the little one sewed little pouches for their "silly bands". I cut them out of red polar fleese, they sewed up the sides and a button on top.
The necklas around my neck I made in the early 1970's. My daughter had it in her sewing box after finding it in mine.

Everyone sewing with their glow-in-the-dark skeleton shirts on. I bought them and also Halloween pj bottoms. We decorated the house and celebrated Halloween the whole time I was there.

My daughter's friend brought this throw home for her from Saudi Arabia.

I don't believe it was made there, it has some beautiful hand work.

Back home looking out my dye studio window with the last flowers of summer.

Magical streams

Over the holiday weekend I packed a picnic lunch and my husband and I went "two-tracking"
up north through the woods. We had our lunch at this magical little spot along a creek. The moss and ferns were beautiful.

A perfect spot for elves and fairies!

And look at this fallen log filled with different lichens

So much inspiration, I collected a few old lichen fill sticks to dye fabric with at home.

A few more miles along we found this large stream, these are the tree roots growing over the water. and the tree perfectly healthy. My husband watching the flying geese.

A beautiful woodland plant called cardinal flower.

I don't know the name of this woodland plant, I've really never seen it before. If anyone has any idea please let me know.

Back home in the dye studio, I wrapped silk around the lichen stick and some silk with red maple leaves around a birch stick. Steamed them awhile, now setting in plastic bags processing. we'll see what kind of prints I get in a week.

This is the beginning of the next "family tree" house block. This was my husbands mothers child home. I love they had a outhouse, but that was quite a long walk in the night. None of it is sewed on yet, when it's finished there will be a lot more detail, the yard will have lilacs on the left side of the house and a big tree on the right.

My friend Deb brought me this wonderful warty pumpkin, it fits right in with my sweet potato vine.
And speaking of pumpkins this will be my last blog until the beginning of October, I'm leaving for Florida to spend some time with family. I'll be back in time to enjoy all Michigan has to offer in the fall. I'll see you then.

End of Summer

I've been having fun playing with eucalyptus, this picture shows 3 scarves I printed/dyed with the leaves. The first to the left is wool, then silk/wool and the right one is silk. With my eucalyptus dyed yarn laying on top.

This is how the wool yarn looked coming off the stick. What a wonderful variegated yarn. I can't wait to use it.

We had a beautiful rainy morning and I was lucky enough to have nothing to do. Looking at how my flowers were nearing the end and looking at my wool I was inspired to start a piece to go into my Earth quilt, "end of summer".

This eucalyptus dyed wool piece reminds me of my flowers, a few still blooming but most browning and fading away. I started by outlining the still blooming flowers using my eucalyptus yarn with a simple running stitch and a french knot in the middle.
When finished it will be layered with batting and rain drops sewn on.




I found this pumpkin growing on the other side of my garden fence, I was just able to see him now that the leaves are starting to die back. It's sort of watermelon shaped, may not be able to stand on his own but will be nice tucked in one of my big flower pots.

I wanted to share with you a few pictures I had taken at Fredrick Meijer gardens. These were in the glass house and are the carnivorous plants that live on bugs. They have a beautiful collection.

From those in the wet lands,

to varieties that hang from trees.

And look at these beautiful pitcher looking plants.

And here's another variety that hangs from the trees.