sewtakeahike

weekend in photos

 

 

 

 

xo,

Penny

fires, evacuations, and hummingbirds

 

A lot of you may have already heard about the High Park fire and if not, you can click on the link to read a bit about it if you wish.

We had some tremendous lightening storms here last week and one of the strikes started the High Park fire that has grown like mad over the last week.  For the first day and a half after it started I thought we were sitting fine.  The fire was 7ish miles north of us and our home is on a large lake and we live on a sort of penninsula, so yeah, I thought we were good.  But then last Sunday afternoon the smoke plume kept getting closer and closer and then the call came to evacuate. 

I froze. 

I'm not proud of this next part, especially since so many people have lost so much, but then I had a sort of mental temper tantrum, thinking that if I couldn't take all my fabric, then I didn't want to take any of it. 

 

L-man promptly brought me back to my senses by telling me he needed me to get it together quickly and pile together the things we had decided we would take in case something like this ever happened.

Our evacuation ended up being like a mini vacation (still going to work, but being blessed by a friend by being able to stay in super nice accomodations with our Foz-man) for a few days until we were allowed to come back home.   

 

The firefighters were able to get part of the fire contained 3 or so miles north of us, but it continues to grow on the north and west. 

So please pray.  Pray for safety, pray for peace, pray for rain, pray for uplifted hearts, pray for generosity, pray for sympathy, pray that friends reach out to help others, and pray the fire is contained. 

The phrase "there's no place like home" had never hit me so hard as when we were allowed to come home on Wednesday evening.

 

Walking into the house I could hear the hummingbirds whizzing around looking and sounding like the jetsons and I promptly opened all the windows and put a pot of hummingbird food on the stove. 

And although I woke up very early in the darkness on Thursday morning, having a hard time breathing because the smoke was so heavy in our house, I couldn't help but think, there really is no place like home.

 

you're invited!

 

Happy Friday morning to you! 

It's a gorgeous day, the birds are singing their heads off (I really love this about mornings.  It makes my heart sing when I hear the birds starting at about 4:30. Usually the robins get going and then everyone else chimes in after.  Ahhhh!  And then, the other day I had the priveledge of seeing one of these guys!  My local bird expert says they are rare to see around here, so I feel very lucky!  It all started with me hearing him sing and since I had never heard his song before, I went searching and found him atop one of our cottonwoods.  And have you ever heard a meadowlark?  Well they sing my all time fav song (this link also has a creepy man breathing sound as well, sorry!  It was the best song link that included a great shot of the bird!).  I've even heard a couple of them lately here in the foothills.  It makes my heart melt everytime I hear one!!  How was that for a post interlude?)  and the sky is clear.

I wanted to invite you all to two things, so other than that long winded bird interruption, this should be a pretty quick post.

 

1.  I will be doing a wrap it up bag class at Mama Said Sew on June 22, so any of you who are in the area or plan on being here, please do sign up! 

 

2.  Today is the kickoff for Jacquie and Katie's Quilting Modern blog book tour and I'll be back tomorrow with a review and a few shots of a project I've been working on out of the book.  So please do come back tomorrow!

See you soon!

~Penny

Trip report and a GO! baby giveaway!

 

It was a remarkable weekend for L-man and I here in Colorado. 

We packed up our tent and gear into a friends truck and headed down near Gunnison for the weekend.  We camped out and on Saturday morning, shuttled our gear to the Gunny Gorge trailhead and hiked it all a little over a mile, down to the river.

 

Here is the raft roll, which L-Man, Curt, Matt, and I carried.

 

Down at the river, it was a sight to behold:

 

This trip is definitely my favorite one we took this summer!

The canyon was amazing (although I wasn't able to get any pics until the rapids were done),

 

 

and spending time with friends was priceless.  I'm so regretful that I didn't get a group shot of all 12 of us together though.....  I AM however, so very thankful that L-man took the time to put the trip together, that Curt allowed us to carpool with him and his daughter Arwen, that Lance and Heather graced us with their presence and allowed us to use their raft, that I finally got to meet John and Alex (two of L-man's kayaking friends) and for the donuts that Lance and Heather brought (boy did they taste good after a long day on the river!)  And last but not least, I'm thankful that Arwen took an interest in sewing and sewed several yoyo's for me while we were in the car (the drive was about 6-7 hours one way!!).

So enough about my weekend, lets get on with the giveaway!

 

As you have probably guessed, the fine people at Accuquilt are offering up a go! Baby and your choice of 3 dies to one sewtakeahike reader!

All you have to do to enter is leave one comment on this post telling me what your favorite thing was that you did this summer.  And if you didn't have a chance to do much this summer, tell me what your dream summer trip would be.

I'll leave the comments open until the afternoon of this Thursday, Sept. 15.

Good luck to you!

~Penny

 

 The giveaway is now closed!!

fun, fun and lucky ducky

 

First of all, thank-you, thank-you everyone for playing along with my silly "down the road a'piece" game for the giveaway.  I giggled over and over again, and had such a good time reading all your comments.  So fun!  Thank-you for the smiles!!

 

Wendy in "Don't mess with mama"

And just to share a little bit about our weekend, we had an absolute blast camping and kayaking with some friends!  At one point, we were all making dinner and I turned around to find Wendy standing by the dinner area holding a spatula and a pistol.  I grabbed my vintage apron that Tara gave me and took the opportunity for a photo-shoot (pun intended).   She totally rocks this look, wouldn't you say?

Next, I must apologize!  I made a mistake on what Amy is giving away today.  I posted that she is giving a tea towel, but she is actually giving away a piece of her screenprinted fabric,  not a towel, so you can make whatever you like with it (I bought a piece of this from her and it's the exact image that's on the towel, but without the fabric border like the tea towel has and can hardly wait to use it.  It'll take a special project though!) 

So without any further delay, the lucky ducky winner of the screenprinted fabric and teapot paper piecing pattern from Amy is #27, Debra, who said, "When I lived in Georgia that was standard directions. Go over yonder and down the road a'piece. I bought a map!" 

Go ahead and get your info down the road a'piece to me, Debra!  Your color preference for the fabric and your address, and I'll send it over to Amy!

Happy Monday everyone!!

~Penny