I am loving looking at more of my quilt pictures today, that I took yesterday at the quilt class with Barbara Cline.  You can also see some of her quilts and more info here.

Here is a picture of the Chinese Checkers quilt that she made and that our class was on -

There were so many being made in such interesting other colors!

Here are some other quilts she brought to show us - this one is called Bursting Forth and is in her book, Simply Triangles.  In the close up picture, she was showing us how she used netting over some areas of the quilt to make changes in shades of colors.

This one is called Blazing Star -

This one, I think, is called Dazzling Daisies -

And some smaller table runners she made -

I wish I had gotten a closer picture of the intricate and creative quilting she did!

It was a wonderful day!  And I am so thankful that about 6 years ago, I met Barbara's sister Polly right here on xanga!  We became blog friends, and then friends in real life, as I had the pleasure of meeting Polly and lots of her family, including Barbara.  One thing led to another, and Barbara came to Salem to teach a class, and then another class, and now, we are friends!  And I am friends with several of her sisters.  And friendship with this family has been one of the greatest joys of my life!

I took a quilt class today at the Salem Museum here in Salem, VA.  The teacher was Barbara Cline, an inspiring quilter, as well as a quilt designer, teacher, and who has several books published.  She has also been a friend for several years!  

It was a wonderful class.  We were working on a pattern of hers called Chinese Checkers - I'll have to put in a picture of her Chinese Checkers quilt on my next post.  I can only post 8 pictures at one time these days, on xanga, on my Mac, so the next post will be some of Barbara's quilts.  

Here, she is demonstrating one of the steps we had to do - lots of cutting, piecing, making triangles and diamonds and matching everything the correct way!   

Some views of the gals around the room at our sewing machines -

One gal had this cute Singer Featherweight - made in England, she said.  The white ones were made in England!

We had a nice lunch outside on the porch -

It was such a good class!  Barbara made what looked like a very difficult and confusing quilt, very clear and fun!  

I was noticing footprints on my blog, and even a friend request, from several people I didn't know or who hadn't come to my site from someone's site who I do know.  Then I could see that I made it onto Xanga's top blogs.  This has happened before.  I don't want to be one of Xanga's top blogs!  Anyone know how to stop that?

I drove for 10 hours this past Wednesday to get to Indianapolis for the True Woman '12 conference!  I had planned this months ago, to meet my friend, Julie, who has been involved in the True Woman movement for a number of years and has gone to the conference before.  She invited me to go.  It was wonderful!

Thousands of women had an opportunity to see some wonderful speakers - Nancy Leigh DeMoss, Elyse Fitzpatrick, Janet Parshall, Mary Kassian, Priscilla Shirer, Susan Hunt, Joni Eareckson Tada, and others.  The topic for the weekend was Revival!  The music all weekend was done by Keith and Kristyn Getty.  WOW!!

The first event was a Leadership pre-conference luncheon.  Here are some pictures of the ladies at our table, most of whom were gals who had come down from Illinois with Julie.  Her daughter was at our table too but she was busy with many responsibilities, so I didn't get a picture of her.  The bags in the center of the table were gift to everyone - filled with books!!  

I tried to get pictures of the speakers, but they didn't turn out well.  Too dark for you to see.

Before we went into the luncheon, Julie and I were waiting in the lobby when these ladies from the Dominican Republic came and sat where we were and we had a nice chance to chat with them.  3 generations - grandmother, mother, daughter, and friend - all women who love the Lord, and we really enjoyed our short opportunity to get to know them.

Here is a picture of the main conference hall - it was soon packed with almost 9000 women!

So much rich and godly teaching!  Lots of prayer and fellowship!  Scripturally sound and motivating music!  Inspiring stories!  A weekend of reminders of the gospel, how it is all that we need in all of life, how we need revival in our hearts and lives, God's Word to be central in our hearts.  WOW!

I really enjoyed the opportunity I had to meet several women that I had already gotten to know a little from facebook, as we prepared as a group to go to the conference - prepared spiritually, through working on a Bible Study together and sharing with each other.  They were all a group of ladies that Julie knew, and now I consider them my friends as well!  Here we are at dinner one evening - 

Sorry that I couldn't get pictures with any better lighting for most of the weekend!

I left early - Saturday morning - although the conference didn't wrap up until noon.  But I really wanted to get home, and it was a 10 hour drive home.  And look what was waiting for me from my wonderful husband when I arrived home!

I had to admit defeat tonight. . . sigh. . . the Swallowtail Shawl is no more.  I started the shawl at the beginning of August, took a class to learn the difficult lace pattern and how to make nupps.  Nupps are when you knit 5 stitches into one stitch, sort of, to make a little bauble and add some depth to the pattern.  You have to pick up the 5 stitches by purling them together on the next row.  On a shawl where every row you knit is adding more stitches, you have lots of stitches on your needles as the shawl keeps getting bigger.  In the pattern I was doing, the nupps started towards the outside of the shawl, making them every 10 stitches for about 300 or so.  I was getting it, but for some reason, even though I counted and counted, throughout the rows, and at the end of every row, and by the time I got that far,  even putting in a lifeline every other row, I was making a mistake somewhere on a nupp and the whole pattern was off.  But the yarn I was using, while beautiful, caught on itself and stuck to itself, making quite a bit of pulling apart when taking it out.  I was spending more time taking it out down to the same lifeline.  Finally, tonight, the yarn started shredding and breaking at that row.  And I gave serious thought to whether I wanted to take it out several lifelines down, cut the yarn and attach a new piece.  I was not enjoying this project.  Once I got down to a lifeline, this yarn was very difficult to pick up by threading the needles back through the stitches, and I was feeling like the hours I spent working on it and taking it out and re-doing it were keeping me from working on projects that I love.

I thought about just stopping in the middle of pulling it out this last time, putting it away, thinking about getting back to it again in the future.  But don't we all have unfinished projects hanging out in our sewing rooms that we started and never finished for some reason, tugging at the back of our minds, giving us no peace until we tried again?  And I didn't really want to try again on this one.  I didn't like it.  I am not even sure I would enjoy wearing something that I really didn't like making.

So, I ditched it.  Gone.  And it is ok!  Because I don't think that we always have to finish every single thing we try.  Some projects are learning experiences where we have to see the benefit we got from the process.  What benefits did I get from the process of knitting this shawl?  I learned some new stitches and patterns in knitting.  I learned that I love to knit lace but if I see nupps in a pattern, I will most likely not attempt it.  Or, if I do ever want to attempt them again, I learned that I need to pick my yarn more carefully.  I chose this yarn for its color mostly.  I didn't look closely enough to see that it was delicate and would shred when stressed.  I learned that I need to look up my yarn and projects on Ravelry to see if others had bad experiences with it.  And in the process of taking the class and working on the project, I got to spend time with a dear friend and get to know some others better.

So, there won't be any pictures of my Swallowtail Shawl!  I don't miss it at all!  In fact, I feel quite relieved and am looking forward to having time for another project.  And the next knitting project is one I have done before and love, and is very worthwhile - I am going to knit a prayer shawl for another dear friend who has just been diagnosed with breast cancer and will be having surgery very soon.

Jim had a course that he was taking in Washington DC last weekend, so I went with him.  We stayed at a great location, a nice hotel . . .  I am trying to remember the name of it. . . the Washington Plaza Hotel (I had to look up the bill), where the course was being held.  Close to the metro and convenient to walk to things.  I was able to see Suzanne a lot!  On Friday night, we drove out near where she lives and went out to dinner.  Then, on Saturday, she took the metro in, and she and I spent the day together.

We went to one museum that we had been to before - something about portraits.  But we really didn't want to see the museum, we wanted to get lunch in their cafe and eat it in their beautiful courtyard!  Only there was some video program going on in the courtyard, so it wasn't as quiet and pretty as it was the last time we were there.  But we enjoyed our lunch and continued on our walk.  

Next stop was to find a yarn shop we had found online.  It required taking the metro to Dupont Circle.  No problem, Suz is metro- savvy.  BUT the portion of the red line we wanted was under construction that weekend, so instead, they were offering free shuttle service.  So, we took that.  It was nice that it was free, and it did take us right to Dupont Circle, but the buses had to drive through DC traffic, so it took awhile.  We got there, found our cute little yarn shop on the 2nd floor of a row of other shops and restaurants, didn't buy anything, and continued on our walk, with a refreshing stop for a Starbucks coffee drink.

We were walking along a very pretty route with lots of homes, lots of well-kept front flower beds, and lots of the embassies.

The Australian embassy -

And it had this sort of statue with kangaroos on it!

That road down beyond this statue of Daniel Webster had lots of embassies, we were told, but there were black clouds and a storm coming, so we decided to move along and walk back to our hotel.

I just had to stop and take this picture.  My father was a Jewish war veteran, and I might have stopped in to see what sort of things were in this museum, but it was closed.  

The storm was getting closer, with warnings coming to our phones about thunderstorms and possible tornados, so we walked a little faster and made it back to the hotel just as the rain was starting!  We sat in the lobby and watched the wind outside blowing the pool furniture and umbrellas around, but the storm passed quickly.  

That was about it!  Dinner at the hotel, then Suzanne headed back home and Jim and I came home the next day.

All this traveling!  Everyone teases me because I say I don't like to travel and I haven't been home more than 2 weeks at one time lately!  I like being at the places I am going, but I feel like I just about get home from one trip and unpack and catch up when it is time to pack up again.  Housework doesn't get done well, my piles of papers to go through and deal with only get higher, laundry tends to look like a mountain, and the ironing. . . well, you know what I mean.  And so, guess what?  I am home this weekend, but going away again next weekend.  I am so excited - I am going to the True Woman conference in Indianapolis, and meeting my friend Julie there!  And I am ready to hear some wonderful speakers and be challenged by God and His Word in my life!  But there is that 10 hour drive out and back. . . more packing, more hotels, more catching up when I get back.

Meanwhile, I am knitting my Swallowtail shawl and working on nupps!  Don't know what nupps are?  I didn't either until I took this class and started this pattern!  Pictures of that next time!

I haven't blogged since I arrived home from Colorado, which was a couple of weeks ago now, because there hasn't been very much news.  I missed my grandchildren very much, and I have spent as much time as possible with them since getting home.  I miss Betsy terribly, but I text with her almost every day, and am so happy that she has been feeling a lot better and recovering well from surgery.  Here is her latest blog: ConcettoSpazialeAttesa.   I am feeling my age for sure these days as it took me a good week to get over the exhaustion of a long trip and changing of time zones so much.  It has been good to be home with Jim again!  He had the house clean, all the laundry done, and it was a pleasure to not have to feel like I was behind in everything.  And we celebrated 35 years of marriage the day I arrived home!  I have been happy to get back to church and all of those activities, seeing my friends, exercising regularly, working on my projects.  

Here are some projects I have been working on:  

These ruffly scarves are so much fun to make!  I am selling some this year, so if anyone local wants to buy one, I have some available and can order other yarn colors if need be.  Just message me on here or on facebook for details.

This one is going to Betsy, and unfortunately, I haven't been able to find this particular one anywhere, so I can't make another one of these:

Here are a couple of others I have recently made -

And I am still working on my swallowtail shawl - it is a difficult pattern, requires a lot of attention, so isn't good to take to a sit and stitch, but is slowly looking pretty good!

I am determined to also work on my Grandmother's Flower Garden quilt.  sigh.  I need more hours in my day.  Don't we all?  A quilt blog that I read had a challenge to stitch with needle and thread for at least an hour a day.  I'm going to try that!  I'll post progress on my next flower next time!