Red flowers today 04-23-19

I'm trying to get ready to go the Empty Spools for a class with Sue Benner, but I keep getting sidetracked.  There is always so much to do and I always leave too much to the last minute.  Today KoKo went to the groomer and looks so handsome.  He does hate going, but I think they treat him okay, he just wants to be at home.  He will be staying with Cherie who lives here in Placentia and has taken care of him previously.  

No matter what, we have to go for our walks.  And what we see is trees, poles, bushes, and flowers.  While he is paying attention to those other things, I take pictures of flowers. 

I love this single geranium and used to grow it in Fullerton.  Have never tried it here at this house, but maybe I will.  It is so SCARLET! 

I have always known this as firecracker bush, but it has many common names:

red firecracker fern, fountain bush, coral fountain plant, firecracker bush, hummingbird plant.  One of my neighbors has several in the front yard and they are solid with blooms. 

That is an agave in front. 

Hummingbirds are fond of these narrow tubular flowers. 

In this yard the mulch is black dyed bark which really sets off this plant. 

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Viewing the Thomas Contemporary Quilt Collection 09-30-18

I am frequently asked what I do with the quilts in the Collection.  Mostly they are rolled or stored flat, covered to keep out the dust, and labeled so I can find them - mostly with the help of my dear friend Liz Williams.  I couldn't do it without her!   But I do display the quilts in my house so that I can enjoy them.  There is always one at the end of the hall that I walk down dozens of times a day (and night) and usually that is where I hang the latest addition.  A few are always on display - like Terry Grant's "Yellow Bowl"  and "Blue Threads" by Elizabeth Busch.   Both of which are on stretcher bars, not something I usually buy, but sometimes cannot resist.  

I have a couple walls that are changing galleries, usually every three or four months.  With age I find it more difficult to hang the larger quilts by myself, so frequently hang groups of smaller quilts.  They might be grouped by subject, artist, color, design elements, whatever occurs to me at the time.   Tonight I am posting a "wall of red quilts", chosen just because I wanted to look at them for a while and they read RED.  Two are 80th birthday quilts from two friends, the others are rather recent additions to the Collection.    

  Petite Jungle - Jane Sassaman 2016, Round the Bend - Catherine Kleeman 2014, 
Pomegranates - Rosie Caudillo 2017, Hummingbird - Lenore Crawford 2016, 
Spring Chicken - Bonnie Damron 2018,  Birthday Bird - Patti Brooks  2018 

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A Rental Car 12-14-17

Several weeks ago when I was returning from San Diego in stop and go traffic, the lady behind me forgot to stop.  She didn't hit me very hard, but we did the right thing and moseyed over to the right and got off at the next exit.  It looked to me like just paint scrapes, but she had lost her front license plate and the screws were embedded in my bumper.  So, we exchanged info and she called her mother while we were doing that.  The mother wanted to talk to me and told me they would pay to repair the damage without going through the insurance company.  So, okay.  But it took me a few days to get estimates.  I called her and told her they would have to replace the bumper, so the cost would be $1,083.00!  Seems like a lot, but the estimates were all about the same and I wanted to take it to some place convenient for me.  I did that yesterday and called Enterprise Rentals because I am uncomfortable being without a car.  The body shop thinks it will be ready on Friday and I am really hoping that will happen. 

 

The rental is a Hyundai which I have thought are good looking cars, but I wouldn't want to own one.  And now I KNOW I don't want to own one.  First of all, I am used to tall car (my Lexus 330RX) and with my bad hips I have a hard time getting in and out of a low car.  Open the door, turn around and lower my butt to the seat, then struggle to lift both my legs over the door sill and swivel to face forward.  Same getting out.  It is a struggle.  Secondly, I am used to a tall car (Lexus, etc.) and in this Hyundai I am so low that the lights coming at me and those in my mirrors are right in my face so I felt like I was about half blind.  Guess I will be home before the sun goes down about 4:30pm tomorrow night!  Thirdly, it is soooo noisy, more road noise than I am used to and a sort of tinny feeling to go along with it.  I read a list of the cars with the most fatal accidents and this car was on the list.  Whoa!  

 

On the good side it is a festive Christmas red which matches my habit of wearing red during December.  It has a display panel that shows the time, date, day of the week - handy for a forgetful old broad like me.  My first car was red, the only red one I have owned.  It was a 1956 Mercury convertible which I drove everywhere with the top down.  That was before I wore a hat all the time and I had to stop at a convenience store to buy a straw hat when I went out in the desert.  I tied in down with a scarf - I wasn't lovely, but my brains didn't fry. 

 

One should have these adventures once in a while, just to find out how others live, I guess!

 

I went down to sit with Bette today and met her very nice doctor.  Bette is in hospice, but she still has a grip like a wrestler.  Ouch!  I'll try to go down tomorrow again.  She told me today that she is going to get better.  From her lips to God's ear! 

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Quilt Festival -Long Beach '12 07-29-12

It has been a hard 3 1/2 days at the QFestival, I am just getting too old and infirm to "work" that many days in a row!  But I had a GRAND time!  Although I had a little nap when I arrived home about 6:30, I am ready to go to bed again.   I did stop at Corky's house before I drove to mine because today was his 16th birthday and, besides, I needed a little doggy lovin'! 

Tonight I am so tired and aching that I am only posting one quilt from the show.  This one because it is so bright and original that I just need to share it.  I love it, but don't think I could live with it for very long.

 

 

Clever technique.

Red & White Quilts in New York 04-27-11

I don't know how many times I have looked at these images. There are so many quilts (651) that I have to spend a lot of time looking at each slide. There are "famous" quilts that we have seen in magazines and books, it is nice to know that they are cherished and cared for, but there are also quilts I imagine have rarely been displayed. Maybe because they are not spectacular, but more likely because there are limited venues for displaying quilts. I draw your attention to a few I think are special: the red and white "stripy" in slide #4; the airplane quilt on the upper left of slide #3; the interesting combination of stars, bars and hearts in the center of slide #2. I'd love to know more about the redwork embroidery quilt in slide #5 - labels from flour? chicken feed? derived from fruit packing boxes? - history in thread. I wonder about the anonymous (mostly) women who imagined these designs and wielded their needles and sewing machines to create such beauty; they worked with poor light and limited time and, sometimes, had hopes of recognition, probably at the county fair. It is particularly wonderful that the collector, Joanna Rose, had the desire, the eye and the money to assemble such a fabulous view of quilts in red and white. I wish I could have seen this exhibit - all those wonderful quilts "in-the-fabric", but I wonder if I might not just have swooned away at the sight.



http://www.dnainfo.com/20110324/upper-east-side/quilts-take-over-park-avenue-armory

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Red 02-21-11

Someone (June?) said something about the birds picking the holly berries which were very red.  Perhaps that is what set my eyes for red when Corky and I were walking in his neighborhood yesterday. 

 
This is Nandina or "Heavenly Bamboo" and the berries seem to be particularly abundant and very red this year.  Some years there are few berries.  The leaves are especially bright in the fall and winter if we have  frost at some point.

 
And I noticed how bright the twigs of the eucalyptus are right now.  This is a fallen branch from all the heavy winds we have had the last week or so.   Some varieties have very bright red twigs, but the trunks are grey and silver and white and yellow and....  almost any color.  A fascinating variety of shapes and colors.

I also took a picture of a pot of screaming red cyclamen on someone's patio, but it was too blurry to use.  I'll be there again tomorrow, so I'll try for a better shot. 

More Simply Red and Fall really arrives 10-15-10

A few more items for the Simply Red basket. I may have to buy a larger basket as I have more fabric and other items still to go in. Some great things. I may have to bid on this basket myself, I really covet the little red iron.

Look! Fall seems to have arrived. This is the mountain forecast - I couldn't get my camera out fast enough for the "city" and "valley" forecast, but both include rain. We had some early rain this past month but nothing to amount to anything. I hope it doesn't rain on Saturday and Sunday next week because the new Visions exhibit in Oceanside will have an opening plus some special events. I am so looking forward to the weekend, especially now that I missed PIQF.

The Simply Red Basket 10-14-10

"November Fest" will take the place of a regular Surfside Quilters Guild meeting on November 9th. Live auction, Opportunity Baskets, refreshments, live piano music and lots of friendship. One of my contributions to the Opportunity Baskets is to put together a "Simply Red" basket full of red things - including red fabrics - donated by a number of different people.. Some of the fabrics shown are one yard cuts and some are half yard cuts - the big oval dots on the right side is a Dr. Suess fabric from Robert Kaufman Fabrics - neat! Among the other donations are spools of thread, scissors, patterns, pins, even a small red iron! There are many quilts in the live auction and I have my eye on a couple of them. Last year we did "December Fest", but found it was too close to Christmas and that it put too much pressure on everyone involved in presenting the event. We have moved it to November this year - who knows about next year?

Today I took Corky home to his parents and had lunch with his mommy, it was cool in LBeach as the marine layer had not yet moved out to the ocean. But back in Placentia it was hot and a little humid. I dosed myself with Benadryl and cough syrup and crawled into bed for about a five hour nap! Now I am ready to do a repeat - I feel better already.

Red Flowers 05-20-10

I picked up Corky, the Poodle Prince, in LBeach this afternoon. I arrived there just in time to take him for his walk. The grounds in his neighborhood are lush and full of flowers.

This is a hedge type of Bougainvillea and it is very RED.

The tiny white flower is inconspicous in this sea of red bracts.

Petunias are very popular as summer annuals - these are growing around a small tree in the middle of a lawn.

They are planted with yellow 'globe' marigolds, which makes an eyecatching pile of color.