The Travels of a Quilter

Monday, March 23, 2015

Snow Dyeing

Last month I did some snow dyeing with my Text'art group and thought I'd better show the results while it is still winter.

This is what the container looked like after I sprinkled the dye on to it. The turtleneck is under the snow and on top of a rack in a kitty litter container.

And now a rather old, tatty turtleneck has a new lease on life!

This is the blue fabric produced from the blues below. The dye had been sitting around the house for a while and I think had lost it's oomph. But this will be useful for something one of these days - or it will get overdyed!

Tuesday, January 20, 2015

London break

Partly as a birthday celebration and partly to get away from the cold (-24C) and ice we took a quick trip to London. We managed to fit in 4 museums and 2 musicals ( the Grand Tour and Commitments) in 3 days! And had a visit with our daughter who is currently living near Southampton.

the view from our room - classic row housing near Paddington

There is always something in bloom year round. Including decorative planters.

We spent the good part of a day in the Tate and saw an exhibit of sculptures by Henry Moore.

The main reason we went to the Tate was to see the Late Turner - Paintings set Free. Unfortunately photos weren't allowed. I enjoyed seeing many of his works- especially the ones of Venice. I had no idea before that he did so many allegorical scenes though.

These colour circles are by Olafur Eliasson and are colour experiments based on Turner's paintings.

These two pictures are of a stairwell in the Tate.

And this exhibit is by Philip King to celebrate his 80th birthday. He felt that his sculptures should be on the floor with the viewer, not on a plinth.

The dress above had a wonderful quilted look, although it was a woven fabric.

On the right, a shot of the decorations on Oxford St

This was a parrot that we saw in Hyde Park. Please leave a comment if you know it's name.

The Royal Park Hotel - great service!

Tuesday, January 13, 2015

McGill College Ave

These are a few photos I took while walking up McGill College Ave in downtown Montreal. I didn't linger - it was -22ºC. Which is why the sky is so clear and blue!

Place Ville Marie in the background.

A new condo! One of many new ones downtown.

The Illuminated Crowd.

I zoomed in on the building behind the crowd and these are the reflections!

Saturday, December 13, 2014

Winter is here!

We had about a foot of wet snow fall the other day. Very heavy! Below is my husband shaking the snow off some of the branches of our fir tree- those branches on his right should be sitting horizontally about 10' up in the air.

A couple of shots of the water at the park next door. It's starting to freeze over, but not quite yet!

The snow was so wet, and blowing so hard that it stuck like spray foam to one side of the trees.

And my first day out on x-skis. It was perfect, and a real winter wonderland.

Thursday, November 13, 2014

Urbanité x 2

This is an exhibit by two artists, Heather Dubreuil and John Vasilinskas who have combined their talents to show architecture from Montreal and overseas in their art. It's a lovely gallery with lots of light and the details of the show are at the end of the pictures.

A great place for a light and delicious lunch is just down the road at Café Prague.

Thursday, November 6, 2014

Quilting Retreat 2014 with Stitch 'n Bitch

This was our 10th retreat at the hotel on Lac Brome. This year it has new owners and has been renamed the Auberge Lac Brome (formerly the Quilliams Inn). Not too much has changed so far, and the food is still delicious with duck confit, my favourite, featured on the menu a few evenings. The workroom is lovely in the day time with all the windows overlooking the lake, and the lighting was vastly improved for working in the evening.

Three of us managed dawn walks on the golf course. Dawn, of course, is at 6:45 these days!

And we did a little shopping in Knowlton, and stocked up at the Brome Lake Duck store.

And a lot of quilting was done.