Thanksgiving Catchup

These two had so much fun together. We love our little cousin! 

Aris stuck to the smaller kiddie rides but still had just as much fun. 

Zoe was so brave & rode several of the grownup roller coasters.

Grandma Cindy & Zoe after a ride. 

Erik & Cindy

Omri wasn't too sure about all the rides. He had this reaction on almost every one he went on. 

This was one of the only rides he really could handle, can you blame him? Who wouldn't want to ride on a big rig ;) 

The kids on a ride with Uncle Ben.

Zoe wasn't too sure at first...... 

Daddy talked to her & she felt so much better. 

 Last ride of the night!

We had so much fun on our trip to San Diego. The ride down & back was super hard on Omri. He just didn't understand why he had to sit for so long. 9+ hours is a hard drive even for me. Hopefully next year when we drive down there it won't be quite so hard on him. Thanksgiving dinner was super yummy. Everything tastes better when you are surrounded by the people you love! Cindy, Sloan & I went on a girls day out the day before Thanksgiving. We all got pedicures & ate lunch at Chick-fil-a. It may sound silly that I get so excited about eating there but we don't have one in Reno. I love their nuggets & fries! It's probably a good thing we don't have one here, I'd weigh 500 pounds! Haahaa! 

Dean & I got to go out one night with his brother Ben & his wife Kristin. We ate at a very tasty Mexican/seafood restaurant. We walked around the marina & then headed downtown to the yummiest dessert place called Extraordinary Desserts. We all ordered several things & shared. Each dish had edible flowers decorating the chocolate. They looked like works of art & tasted like Heaven! If you ever have a chance to visit downtown San Diego you have to trust me on this one......don't miss eating here! You will thank me for it later.

Knotts Berry Farm was a lot of fun. There is a pretty decent balance of kids/adult rides. We all split up at various times during the day so all the adults could ride "big kid" rides while each of us took turns taking the kids on smaller rides. Sloan & Zoe were so brave! Both of them rode several of the "big kid" rides. I think the scariest ride was the Supreme Scream. I have never been so scared in my life! I screamed a scream that I have never screamed before. I seriously thought I was going to die! Haahaa! My husband was cracking up. It scared me so much I had to ride it two more times  &then I was done. I thought it would get less scary but it didn't. I'm pretty sure I said a curse on the last two times down. 

I think next Thanksgiving we are going to shoot for Disneyland. The kids will be at the perfect age for enjoying all the rides & Omri will be even easier to handle out in public. Did I mention he has a habit of running off in public places? Yes I've lost him twice. Only kid I've ever had that problem with. I don't know if it's because he's a boy or he's my curious little buddy or maybe it's because he's my fourth. Nothing is scarier than loosing a child in a busy public place. Hopefully when we head for Disney he will have outgrown this phase.

I always look forward to our trips to San Diego. I miss our family down there so much. I look forward to visiting again hopefully sooner than later!

Art As Quilts

Above artwork chosen as inspiration

I remember back to when I worked for an interior designer up at Lake Tahoe. We'd have fabric reps from all the beautiful design houses come into our office & show us the latest releases. We'd get books & boxes full of swatches from the reps, in the hopes that we would use them on our custom projects. I loved looking at them & thinking how each could look beautiful when used in the proper space. My boss always laughed at me because I was constantly commenting on how I thought such & such a fabric would look beautiful as a dress, coat, shirt or blanket. Even though I no longer work in the design world I still feel that same way. I look at peeling paint on an old wall when I'm downtown & think....Wow! Wouldn't that make a beautiful painting? Since I started quilting last year I've often looked at art work & thought.....Wouldn't that make the most amazing quilt? This is the heart behind my latest art show Art As Quilts. I've started pinning all my favorite art onto my Art & Illustrations board on Pinterest. I went through my board & chose my 5 favorite works of art & went to town. It took me a little over a month to finish all 5 of them from start to finish. The funnest part was choosing all the fabric combinations. I wanted the fabrics to compliment each & every work of art without matching completely. Since I didn't work from patterns the piecing part was challenging but a lot of fun. I didn't measure anything & just went with the flow. None of them are perfect but did I mention I had soooo much fun making them? I was going to do a separate post on all five quilts but had a change of heart. It just made sense to put them all together.

Robert Ryman Quilt

Fox Quilt inspired by the art of Inalux

Joseph Albers Quilt

Trapeze Quilt inspired by the art of  Laverne Originals

Cecil Touchon Quilt

All fabrics used in the above quilts were purchased at Joanns Fabric, Hancock Fabric & Ben Franklin Craft.

This is the first set of quilts I plan on making that are inspired by art that I love. Look for more art inspired quilts in the upcoming year!

Gallery Pics

I worked so hard over the past month to get ready for my art show & then forgot to take photos until just today. Today I took my show down, lol, but made sure to document everything before I packed it up into my car. Sadly nothing sold so I will probably be giving these as Christmas gifts. 

I have a whole list of other illustrations I want to make into quilts & will start on them after the first of the year. I've been very blessed to get a ton of custom orders to last me through the end of February. All this hard work is paying off & my dream of staying home full time after all the kids go to school is starting to feel attainable. The goal is to have my studio built & ready to use in the next two years. I'm hoping to save for half of it this year & the other half next. 

I'm also putting together a portfolio to send off to some galleries so that I can possibly line up some shows over the next few years. Most times there is a waiting list & that is fine with me. It will give me a chance to get a better body of work together. I plan on posting pictures of the finished quilts over the next few days. In each post I'll share the art that inspired them. So excited to finally be able to post about this!