PAQA-South Retreat

I feel like I've been in a whirlwind! This past weekend was the PAQA-South retreat at Mary Beth Bellah's house in Charlottesville, VA. What a gorgeous place she has there. Huge amount of acreage, beautiful 3-story house, and a mammoth stash of fabric! I'm not showing her wall because I didn't ask permission, but believe me, she could open a quilt shop tomorrow. 9 books cases - each about 3 feet wide - and 5 shelves high. Her fabric is color coded, folded neatly and stacked and organized. Incredible.

Mary Beth also has some pretty cool pets. She has two goats - well, one had twins last week and one had twins the day we left (after we were gone). This is the lovely Oreo smiling for the camera. Isn't she the cutest? Mary Beth has chickens and geese, too. Evidently, the geese greeted and menaced a few people when they arrived, but I never did get to see them.

Lyric Kinard gave us some exercises to do from a book she is writing (Winter printing, maybe?). We had a lot of fun doing that and learned a lot, too. Here are some photos of our little group. I have stitched down my piece and hope to get it mounted shortly. I will post a photo of it when I have it finished.

(Top): This would be Christine Hager-Braun (President) in the far left corner, Judith Glover (V.P.) in the shorts, Lynne Harrill (treasurer) sitting in the blue chair, Lyric Kinard in the way back on the sofa, Mary Corcoran (Secretary) in the tie-dyed shirt, Ann Flaherty (Spring exhibit committee) in the far right corner, and Cynthia Harrison, a guest and hopefully new recruit. Mary Beth wasn't in the room. I believe Mary is searching for a lost child in that gigantic bag she brought...

Same room with a photo of Karen Lee Carter on the left. What a lovely person and a real treat to get to know.

Here is Lyric preparing to give us our lesson, with Karen searching for something behind her.

I also learned a much faster way to and from Charlottesville! It took me 4 1/2 hours to drive 284 miles up I-81, then over to Charlottesville. It only took 3 1/4 hours to come home down 29S - and 211 miles. We will definitely be going a faster way to NY in June than all the way over to Wytheville!

So - it was so gorgeous outside on Sunday afternoon that I got my camera out. A lot of new flowers had bloomed and I wanted to try the hood I found for the lens. I've had a lot of trouble keeping the glare off the flowers in the photos when in bright sun. I put the hood on it and Holy Cow! What a difference a hood makes! Steve also gave me a polarizing filter that goes to his Nikon, but it fits my lens. These make such a huge difference. Check out these photos - I'm pretty darn proud of them!

Here is my orchid - I have no idea what it's real name is. I bought it several years ago at a small nursery that was going out of business.


Here is one of the iris growing on the far side of the house. I never go over there and had completely forgotten that we even had any flowers there. Steve showed them to me. The photos of these iris would never had come out without huge glares without the hood, I'm convinced of it.

This is one of my favorite photographs taken last Sunday. It is the Jasmine blooming on the trellis against the fence in the backyard. I put it on my computer desktop. (I guess I haven't mentioned this because so many people are familiar with blogs, but you do know to click on the photos to see a larger version, right?)


This is my other favorite. I just love this picture! I want to have it printed out really large. So - that's it for now.

This weekend is Mother's Day. We are celebrating on Saturday, as Steve's sister is on call and can't leave Sunday. Peter and Jill and Keri and Sarah will be with us, but Ian has to work so he and Laurie can't make it. It's supposed to be a pretty weekend, so I hope we can eat outside under the dogwood tree. I'm sure I'll have more photos by Sunday. I bought some Setacolor paints to play with and make sun prints with Keri & Sarah. Can't wait!