SAQA Conference - Denver 05-20-11

Lovely sunshine today, lots of puffy, fast-moving white clouds against a very blue sky.  Temp about 60F.

This view of an old stone church was taken from the pedestrian overpass from the Comfort Inn to the Brown Palace Hotel.  The trees, as you can see, are just getting fully leafed out - it is still Spring here and the lilacs are in bloom.  Crews of men with towering trays of flowers in small pots were replanting the large flower bowls along the sidewalks. 

This old stone and brick building is to the left of the office building that is just barely visible in the top image.  I don't know what it is, but I think that Navaree carved below the eaves is a word associated with Mormons.

This picture is to the east as the sun was setting.  We had driven out to Golden to see two fiber art shows, one at the Quilter's Newsletter Magazine offices and the other at the Rocky Mountain Quilt Museum, both were excellent.  Then back to Denver to see an exhibit of three artists in a large gallery associated with an entire building of artists studios - the building is an old ice house.  Some amazing work by Carol Ann Waugh using both hand stitching and the fancy stitches on her sewing machine.  She took our group of five back to see her studio and her newest work.  I am impressed.  

 
We had all ordered ahead of time for a fancy lunch today.  Luana (pronounced to rhyme with Iguana) Rubin of eQuilter gave the Keynote Address: "Finding and Creating Your Vision".  I think she is an amazing person with the talent and charisma of Oprah!  She talked about her life and growth and how she got to where she is today - very inspirational and sometimes quite funny.  I greatly enjoyed her presentation.  The lunch was good (Turkey Wrap for me) and the dessert was fabulous.  As you can see above, it was also nicely presented.  There was a box with three donated pieces of SkyDyes on each table and one lucky person at each table took it home with them.  Not me!  Not Ruth!

It is very late and I am exhausted.  Don't worry if I don't Blog tomorrow after the banquet.   

SAQA Conference - Denver 05-19-11

This is the view out our seventh floor window at the Comfort Inn in downtown Denver. Fortunately there is the width of about a three story building between here and there.  

 

We can look out and see the street below.  In the rain, of course.  Fortunately there is a pedestrian walkway on the second floor that gives us access to the Brown Palace Hotel where the meetings will take place tomorrow.  We don't have to go out in the rain. 

Looking out to the other side of the window we see this ancient building all hidden behind the skyscrapers.  I asked the parking valet where they parked our cars in the bowels of the motel and he told me that they are all in this building which was once a bus station.  Doesn't quite make sense - it looks more like an place where there once were ladies making clothing on high speed machines, back in the day.

Here is Ruth Powers' bed stacked with all the pillows in the room!  I always carry my own special pillow, so I just let her have all of them!  My bed is identical except for the pillows.  I drove out to the Denver Airport, about 20 -24 miles to pick Ruth up this morning and she came in right on time. It wasn't even raining, but it has been pretty much all afternoon and evening.

Here is Ruth at the Meet & Greet (or whatever name they use) this evening.   She just happened to be standing in front of her little quilt "Border Terrier" which is part of the traveling SAQA exhibit "What is a Quilt?"  You will notice that there are no names on the quilts, which I find very irritating.  I just think that if someone does all the work to make one of these little gems it should have a label acknowledging their effort.   I continue my campaign for the 21st Century to stamp out Anonymous was a Woman.

Groups of three or four would form and then be joined by a few others and then divide and go off to another area and reform.  It was fascinating watching this process of pooling and un-pooling.  Here are Jill Rumoshosky Werner, Judith Trager and Diane Munoz visiting.

 

Here is that dear lady Linda Colsh giving me a wave.  She lives in Belgium and comes home to the USA for SAQA (she is a board member), to see her family and to shop for things she can't find in Belgium.   There are several Linda Colsh quilts in the Thomas Contemporary Quilt Collection and, I'm sure, there will be more in the future.  She does wonderful work.  http://www.lindacolsh.com/

 

These conferences are so exciting, meeting people from the past and making new acquaintances, seeing interesting clothes and jewelry, hearing what new directions the artists are exploring.  But I get exhausted very easily any more.  There are NO chairs unless one goes to sit around vacant tables in the meeting room, so everyone is static.  There are these stairs, but only half the width can be occupied, while the other half is for people who want to go up and down.  So, I finally just gave up and came up to our room.  After a bit of a rest I started with my computer 'duties' and now it is late and I need to get into bed.  Soooo tired!

On the Road - Grand Junction to Denver, CO 05-18-11

A lot of pictures tonight - 13 to be exact - and an adventurous day for me.  At the advanced age of 72 I finally drove in a snowstorm.  Not a terrible one, but bad enough, and the snow did not stick to the ground.  Maybe it did behind me, but not right where I was.  I was amazed that drivers kept to the speed limit, only a few of those 90mph fools who think they own the road.  I wasn't afraid, just cautious and careful at 60-65.  As for the pictures.  I hardly ever look toward the picture, I just point the camera in the right direction with one hand and click the shutter, all the while keeping my other hand on the wheel and my eyes on the road.  When I can't do that I don't take pictures.  And sometimes, as you will see, picture taking becomes impossible.

I put captions below the pictures - you can click each picture to enlarge.

In Grand Junction the sky was low and very dark and the Colorado River more than filled the space from river bank to river bank.  Here it looks almost placid, though it was running fast.

Just a short distance later I followed the sign that said I-70 and ran into construction (a forewarning for the rest of the day) and a STOP sign to get on the highway.  I thought it was odd, but with construction one just takes one's chances.  It turned out I was on I-70 BL - BL standing for Business Loop.  With all the construction I decided it would be easier to keep on the BL rather than try to figure out how to get back to my starting point and on the Interstate.  About 12 miles later I was back in business and sailing along on the REAL I-70.

Quite a few miles later I pulled off at one of the "Parking Area" signs which are generally intended for trucks, but there wasn't anyone there and I wanted to try to adjust my camera - which required reading the manual!  Here is the Colorado rushing to the west (left of picture) right after making an almost horseshoe bend, guided by this massive abutment.  Most of today the river was on my right, but this little loop road went over the river and back again about a mile further east.  

There is a nice rest stop and tourist info center in Rifle, CO., where I stopped to use the facilities and found myself taking the binoculars out for a walk.  Red-winged Blackbirds, scores of swallows, some grackles, and one little yellow warbler, but they are so quick and so secretive I couldn't see it well - might have been a Prothonatory Warbler.  This picture is a different kind of wild mustard called Rocket. 

The flowers are smaller and the foliage (below) is different. I should look it up, but I am too tired tonight.

There were several plants I am not familiar with - I'll look them up later also.

Yes, more construction.  This time I-70 became a two lane road - one lane in each direction.  Fortunately, there wasn't much traffic and almost no trucks.  The speed limit was forty and the construction zone went on for miles and miles.  

As I drove along at 40mph I could get a good look at the Colorado, now a raging torrent.  Notice the train cars higher up on the right - they look like ore cars, but I don't know what was in them.

Up and up and up, until I was spacing my breathing due to the altitude.  11,156 feet is enough to press in on my chest so I know that I need to regulate my intake and outgo!  I do love driving through these particular tunnels - right through the mountain that rises up pure white above the entrance. It was spitting snow and the pavement was very wet.  Since I started driving vehicles with cruise control I am in the habit of letting the cruise control take over, but one cannot do that when the pavement is wet.  So, it takes more attention and more control and more adjustment of the right foot and is, therefore, more tiring then using cruise control.  Of course, you all know that, but just in case someone has forgotten...!

When I came out the other side it was still cloudy, but not raining.  However, the distant trees were dusted with snow.  Maybe the shadow of the mountain protects this area somewhat.

Not for long!  Within a few miles it really started coming down.  It wasn't cold enough for the snow to stick to the pavement which was very wet.

I put down the window on the passenger side to take this picture of the snow rushing past.

 
Finally, I took this shot with the snowflakes splatting on the windshield and put the camera away.  The storm just got so bad I could only concentrate on driving.  There was even lightning (and, presumably, thunder) with the snow! 
I managed to get into Denver just as everyone was leaving work and drove around for almost an hour trying to find the hotel which has minimal signage.  All the one-way streets amidst the towering buildings were so confusing I couldn't ever turn the way I wanted when I wanted.  My GPS is not working right - I never think to update it and it can't even find a Starbuck's.  I have postponed my attempt to cut down on my Starbuck's habit until I get back home. 
When I stood at the counter at the Comfort Inn the first person I saw that I knew was Linda Colsh, here from Belgium for the conference and a visit with her family on the east coast.  I knew that she would be here, since she is on the SAQA Board, but to see her first thing after such a stressful day, was just like receiving a prize!  I joined her and a couple other Board members for dinner at the Brown Palace Hotel, connected to the Comfort Inn by a second floor pedestrian bridge.  We can go back and forth to our meetings without going outside in the rain, wind, snow, whatever Nature throws our way. 

On the Road - St. George to Grand Junction, CO 05-17-11

Oh, my goodness!  What a lot of wide open country - glorious views and open road - I'm in my element.  How I have missed Road Trips over the past four years - I know I have already said that, but I am having such a wonderful trip I have to say it again.  Not much traffic, especially not many trucks, only a few showers and a little wind. As you can see it was mostly cloudy, but the sun peeked through enough to set off the red rocks and those glowering dark mesas.

Then, all of a sudden, around a curve up pops a little settlement - way out in the middle of nowhere.  I wonder what these people do out here, although there is some agriculture and occasional herds of horses or cows.  This little village is well established, but I didn't catch a name.  Beyond the next curve, more of the vastness of the western high desert plains.

At 6000+ feet the fresh snow was visible all around on the even higher mountains.  Temperature was about 40F here.

It was clear if one looked straight up when I turned east on I-70 - this is where it begins off of I-15 and it goes all the way to Baltimore, MD.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interstate_70  It was the first Interstate project started in the US. 

I actually continued north on I-15 about two miles beyond the I-70 turnoff so I could get gas at Cave Fort, UT.  Some years ago I was driving west on I-70, just tooling along admiring the scenery, and turned south on I-15.   As soon as I did my fuel light came on - with nary a sign of any civilization.  I didn't know what to do, so I started looking for a turn off that showed some sign of human beings and not far along I saw a water tanker truck refilling at a construction site.  I found my way in and asked the driver where the closest gas could be found.  He directed me north again to Cave Fort.  Fortunately, once I got to the turn off,  the highway off ramp and along the short distance to the Chevron station is all downhill, so I sort of coasted into the pump.  I'm sure I was running on fumes (in the Dodge Caravan).  In the Lexus when the electronic trip page says one has ZERO miles to go I have always been able to make it to a station.  This time I still had about a hundred miles left, but stopped and filled up at $4.09 for old times sake.  I don't know where the next closest station might be, but it was probably further than I could have gone on that previous trip.   I've decided I am not ready for the funny farm - I remembered this adventure from 2007 and also where to find an Arco station in north Las Vegas and I think it was about six years ago when I stopped there last.  But there is the question of what I had for breakfast.  Dunno!  

About seventy miles into Colorado there were several heavy showers.  You can see them ahead in the center of the picture - long streaks from the clouds to the ground.  There are just a few early raindrops on my windshield.  It was very dark and 41F. 

 
But before too many miles went by the clouds were higher and thinner and some sunshine came through.  There are lots of "View Areas" along the way - no facilities - so motorists can stop to see the rock formations and the wide vistas in every direction.  I didn't stop at any this trip, but I have many times before and they are worth the time.  Frequently there are signs and images explaining the topography and history.

 
This is that fabulous pass that goes down, down, down (when heading east) at a rate of about 6% grade.  Narrow and twisting, it lets out into the folds of a massive escarpment and the highway shoots straight across to another distant range of hills.  The rocks are much redder, but, as in all these pictures, it was gloomy enough to mute the values. 
Grand Junction tonight and on to Denver tomorrow.  It is only about 250 miles, but most of that is through the Rocky Mountains, going to a high altitude and with much winding roadway.  However, it is all at least two lanes in each direction, divided, so, barring snow, it should be an easy drive. 

On the Road - Placentia to St. George, Utah

Of course I got away "late"!  What's late?  As long as I arrive in Denver by Wednesday night I won't be late! It was rather an easy drive on I-15, not many trucks and only an occasional clog where the perennial speeders catch up and try to get around the law abiding drivers. I gassed up in Las Vegas - WOW has it every grown in four years.  I think that was the last time I drove through there. All those tacky little two story houses squeeze tightly together - it made me sad.  Definitely the land of the haves and the have nots.   

I love to drive through the desert at night - especially when there is a spectacular sunset that lingers and lingers and lingers!.  This is was just about the peak of the glory - I had to pull off on a ramp to get a good shot as it was mostly setting behind me. 

 
This was my view directly ahead to the NE - a reflection of the blazing sky behind me.
It has been cloudy the entire way and there were a few raindrops.  My vehicle has automatic windshield wipers (which startled me the first time they came on suddenly) and they sense just a few drops and start wiping.  It was a great drive and I am so happy to be on a Road Trip after so long. 
And I am feeling good.  I did my exercises last night before I fell into bed.  I could not figure out how to get on line, every motel is different and I haven't needed to figure it out lately.  So, I am all packed and in the lobby using my laptop after Marco the manager helped me get on the Internet.    And now I am headed north again on I-15.  It is cloudy and very stormy looking, but the temperatures are not low enough for snow - at least not here. 

On the Road Again! 05-16-11

Corky was at Camp Del for the weekend and is now home with his parents.  I am going to blame him for my not being ready to leave yet this morning.  Of course, I have had the "not ready" gene since my birth, but it is nice to have someone to blame now and then.  He isn't over his "no pictures, PLEASE" snit yet.  He just refuses to look at me when I point the camera.

I'm going to the SAQA conference in Denver this coming weekend, so I need to get on the road.   Don't worry if I miss a day on this Blog.  I expect I will be so whipped when I arrive at a motel for the night that I will just fall on the bed in a stupor.  This is my first Road Trip in four years - I don't count the 5 - 6 hour drives to SJBautista or Lake Havasu as Road Trips.   Keep your fingers crossed for the weather to not be too terrible.