A visit to La Conner, WA 06-02-18

Mabel and I visited the small water side town of La Conner, WA, on Thursday, May 24th.  It was a beautiful sunny day and there were quite a few tourists visiting this charming little town.  Our first stop was Seeds for a delicious lunch.  They had curried asparagus soup, very tasty and a first for me.  Then we checked in at the  Pacific Northwest Quilt & Fiber Arts Museum www.qfamuseum.org  which is located in an historic house with quilts in every room and lovely views from the top floor.  There is also a ground floor gift shop with many original items and packaged Japanese fabrics.  The current exhibits are man made quilts and I was honestly disappointed.  Too many negative themes for me.  But there were a few outstanding quilts that I took pictures of. 

 From there we visited Sylvia Pippen's shop "Indigo Stitch" down on the waterfront.  I wanted to just stay there - forever!  Such gorgeous work in sashiko and applique from the creative minds and talented hands of Sylvia and her mother Kitty.  But the samples are not for sale, just the patterns and the materials to create them.  I was reluctant to photograph inside the shop so you will have to visit yourself to enjoy the wonders.   Here are two websites that talk about Sylvia and the shop. 

https://okanarts.com/kitty-pippen/
https://okanarts.com/indigo-stitch/

We also spend some time browsing through the "Wood Shop" which has a wonderful display of everything it is possible to make with fine woods, or so it seemed.  I left some money to support the economy and to supply my Book Group with bookmarks made from wood. 

We drove back to Mt. Vernon for dinner and then off to a meeting of Mabel's book club to talk about Jodi Picoult's book "Small Great Things".  The book is a fiction about racism and the discussion among the dozen ladies was interesting.  It was a full day, but also a great day.  

A very nice quilt that my eyes kept going back to, I'm sure it deserved the prize. 

Outstanding workmanship and a really lovely quilt in the traditional manner. Amazing hand quilting, too.

Indigo Stitch, the shop.

Indigo Stitch, the shop, and Mabel Huseby. 

Finds from the Wood Shop - a toothpick holder, a sinuous pickle fork, and one of the bookmarks. 

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Revisiting a quilt by Karin Franzen 04-01-18

This quilt was part of an exhibit of Karin Franzen's work at the La Conner Quilt Museum in La Conner, Washington, in April 2013.  It was very difficult to choose a favorite quilt and I left Washington without one.  But once I was home again and looked at the pictures, this quilt stood out and I had to call the museum to give them my credit card number.  When the exhibit came down they sent the quilt to me and I was so glad I had made the decision to add it to the Collection.  It is so much more wonderful "in the fabric" than in the pictures. 

It is currently part of the "Birds from the Thomas Contemporary Quilt Collection" at Back Porch Fabric in Pacific Grove, CA., through April 30th.  

Karin generally bases her work on Alaskan birds and plants. There were about twenty quilts on the walls at La Conner, each was beautifully made using her unique techniques.

 This quilt has great balance and a lovely subtle color scheme.  The bird is a Northern shrike. 

"Flowers Come in Stony Places"  Karin Franzen - Alaska  2012 32"W x 46"L

Various fabrics (cotton, brocade, sheers, hand-dyes.  Piecing, fusing, applique, layering, printing, stamping, whatever is necessary!

Label at La Conner Quilt Museum in La Conner, WA.  2013

Karin beautifully blends color, value and texture using many different types of fabric.

Her quilting defines this fern frond.

An irregular piece of sheer fabric is laid over a brocade fabric and accented with machine quilting following the lines of the brocade. 

Pictures originally posted on this blog 05-09-13.

Check these sites for more info on Karin's work":

www.karinfranzen.com 

http://www.cfqgalaska.org/Karin_Franzin.pdf

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A lovely day in Washington State 05-07-15

We visited friends in Bellingham and waaaay outside Bellingham - muffins with lemon curd and crème fres for morning snack, followed by viewing of lovely quilts in progress.  Ending in a tour of the house and yard which Suzanne has transformed with a year of labor.  It is so beautiful; I particularly enjoyed the birds.  Goldfinch, swallows, towhees, house finches, robins, starlings, etc.  The hummers dive bombed us because we were too close to their nesting area. 

 

These goldfinch pictures were taken through the breakfast room window. 

He posed very nicely at first....

..but I guess he didn't like being photographed and turned his back.

On the grape arbor by the front door is a hummingbird feeder, but I couldn't get close enough to catch a hummer.  They were mostly rufous.

We drove to LaConner for a late lunch at "Seeds", definitely on my list of fabulous restaurants. It occupies a building that was once a seed store and has a lovely deck built around this ancient  beech tree.

They call it a European Beech, but I wonder if it is a "Copper Beech".

Lovely with the sun shining through the rust colored leaves.

 

Then we drove over to the La Conner Quilt & Textile Museum, just a few blocks away.

This amazing tulip was blooming in the flower bed along the house.  It was pretty droopy so Reynola held it up so I could take a picture.

We attended the reception for Kitty Pippin (on the left) whose quilts are hanging in an exhibit in the downstairs gallery.  We also visited upstairs where there are contemporary quilts by Denise Oyama Miller and Nancy Ryan.

 

Views from the cupola

Views from the cupola.

Views from the cupola - "Rainbow Bridge on left in background.

 

The Quilt Birds - Reynola Pakusich, Suzanne Lucy, Mabel Huseby, -  and Del Thomas.

 

 

And a sunset over Mt Vernon, WA.

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La Conner (WA) Quilt Museum Part 3 05-09-13

Karin beautifully blends color, value and texture using many different types of fabric.
 

Her quilting defines this fern frond.
 

An irregular piece of sheer fabric is laid over a brocade fabric and accented with machine quilting following the lines of the brocade.

The exhibits will continue until June 23, 2013. http://www.laconnerquilts.com/

La Conner (WA) Quilt Museum Part 2 05-09-13

Karin generally bases her work on Alaskan birds and plants. There were about twenty quilts on the walls at La Conner, each was beautifully made using her unique techniques.
www.karinfranzen.com
 

I didn't enquire about the price of this piece - I was afraid I could afford it!
 

Great balance and a lovely subtle color scheme. I believe this bird is a shrike.

La Conner (WA) Quilt Museum Part 1 05-09-13

I'll try this in "installments".  Let me know if the photos don't show.  Del
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I couldn't be so close and not visit La Conner (WA) Quilt Museum. It is less than an hour from Coupeville. They had many antique quilts on display on the first and second floors. And on the top floor was an exhibit of quilts by Karin Franzen whose quilts I have long admired.

 
This is a wonderful, happy 1930s quilt with very nice quilting.
 

The balloons are each about the size of a dime and the strings are embroidered with stem stitch.