Operation Migration and Whooping Cranes

Well Mary, I have so much to post and the computer has been good for a whole day now that I believe I better post quick before it starts to misbehave. As you know I was at Necedah Wisconsin for CraneFest 2008 last weekend. We got to see the cranes fly behind the ultra light three times. Here are two video's I took the first day. No editing, I have no idea how to do that. Maybe someday I will have you show me it. Or maybe not. I am a lazy bum.

The second one started over to the east of the tower and moves across to the west where a single ultralight had landed to give 811 some exercise. They go down the 'runway' for some ground effect flight and then another crane comes in to visit.

I love having these memories of the time at Necedah. I also love the early morning mist. It is so beautiful when the sun is just barely up. These are new from this year.

This is the crane sculpture at the Necedah Refuge office. And this Great Blue was so nice looking under the fall leaves I took many pictures of him. This is my favorite.

Love,

Nancy

TOGA madness

Well Mary I finally got my computer working! So I can put up the videos I took at the River Rat TOGA in Lake City MN a couple of weeks ago. 

I hope, hope, hope this is the video of Annie doing free hand feathers on a treadle machine. Wow is she good at it.
This is the third time I tried to get the 3 minute video up. I think I finally made it. I would watch these with the sound off. There is a lot of gossip going on in the background and it is distracting from the work. Although not for Annie! She just keeps on treadling.

YES!!
Love,
Nancy

Knitting in Wisconsin

Oh my Mary,

I have been to Meg Swanson's Schoolhouse Press. It does not have a retail outlet, just a storeroom like area with an office in front. When I called they were at first going to turn me down but I explained that I was visiting from North Dakota and they told me I could come between 10 and noon on Friday and they gave me good instructions. It was only 30 miles from Necedah!

When I drove up it was a very plain house like place. No sign on the building, and you had to be told what door to enter (none of the ones showing). Once in, you were in the office area with the little rug and desk. Tammy was at the desk and Eleanor was in the book/yarn area beyond it. They are hiding from the camera.

I figured I would buy books as they are so expensive to ship, unlike yarn. Eleanor showed me where the lace books were and I had an enjoyable time there. I got the book on Shadow knitting and several wonderful leaflets on lace knitting. I should have a list for you but they are in the car.

Then I looked at yarn.

And looked at the yarn.

And looked at the yarn.

And I succumbed. You knew I would. I bought a Meg Swanson DVD about lace knitting a Marianne Kinsel pattern called Primula. I believe it is in the Second Lace Knitting book which I already have. You need 4 skeins of laceweight wool for it. I found a wonderful dark blue. Very rich looking. I bought 5 skeins, just in case.

After I paid I looked around. They were so nice! They let me take all these photos. Here is some art work they have around the office. I don't know who did these paper items, but the painting is by Meg's late husband, Chris.

I had a wonderful time!

Love, Nancy

A Pink Cast

(This post is about a week old.  It took me awhile to get around to finishing it. mdp)

Hi Nancy,

  Well, what's been up with Mom and Dad?  More of the same.  Thursday we went in for Mom to have her old orange cast taken off, her wrist re-xrayed, and a new cast put on.  Mom chose pink this time.

 

I told her I could dye her hair to match, but she merely looks amused and doesn't deign to reply.  She must be taking lessons from Fatty Kitty, although he never looks so amused.

    Dad continues to gather information on the presidential candidates.  It's been very interesting.  I suppose you already saw THIS; I keep trying to embed it but it won't work, so please follow the link.  I never laughed so hard.  Now that we can keep track in so many ways every word these people say, it's amazing that they still get away with it.  I suppose not enough people are listening.

There is also this site that I discovered as a result of visiting an exhibit at the Weisman Art Museum.  It has so much information about written and spoken material by the presidents, including pages for each of the 2008 Presidential candidates, so you can compare what they said last month to what they say today.

But enough of that.  Another of Dad's tasks is to go out and grab the tomatoes before they get eaten.  We're not sure what's eating them - some of the higher tomatoes are getting chewed on as well as lower ones.

Soon we'll have to start covering the tomatoes, and I'm about ready to pull up the basil and dry it, except for a couple of plants that I'm letting go to seed so I can save them and use them next year.  I have the same plans for some garlic chives, and the oregano that Dad has going in the garden.  I hope to have a big herb garden next summer.  Love, Mary

TOGA TOGA TOGA

Hi there Mary,

That is the way you start your message calling all Treadle 'onions' from the land of Treadle On to a gathering.

TreadleOnGAthering is how I assume the name TOGA got started, but like many things in Treadleonia it is a mystery to me.

One thing that often happens, according to Cindy Peters of Lake City, MN is a TOGA entertainment which involves ambulances or some sort of official intervention. This time is was a car starting on fire right in front of Cindy's storefront and then (thank goodness) it continued through the intersection until a valiant citizen of Lake City ran into the street and, waving her arms, stopped the car and dragged the confused and protesting driver to safety. Cindy is going to find out who our heroine was. She claims everyone in Lake City will know by tomorrow morning.At that point cars continued to drive around the stopped car so several of us (yes, me too, you know how bossy I am) went out into the street to stop traffic. Several people were quite indignant that they couldn't drive past the burning car and had to go AROUND THE BLOCK!

Once the 2 police cars, and then the fire department got there they effectively blocked the street and we could go back to gawking. I got a few photo's and thought you would all like to see the fire department in action. They had a little trouble getting the hood off and when they finally did we all cheered.

This happened on Sunday morning so after this excitement we went up to the church and watched Damascus Annie (Annie Kusilek) do some free motion quilting on her Singer Treadle. I think it is a 15/90 Singer but I am not sure. Hopefully someone will confirm or correct me.

I was fascinated by her 'feathers'. All I can say is WOW WOW WOW.

After that I got out my new Singer 99 to check it over and do a little practice sewing on it. It was pulling the fabric a little and I was wondering about the pressure on the presser foot, so I called Bill Holman over and he looked at the machine. He noticed the tension knob was incorrectly assembled so he took it off and fixed it and put it back. What a guy. He is what a Treadlonian calls a OSMG (Old Sewing Machine Guy) They are national treasures in the sewing machine world and I can certainly agree about Bill. I am sure he had forgotten more stuff about sewing machines than all the rest of us put together knew.

I tried to post a video of Annie treadling the feather quilting but the download died. I will show you when I get home on Monday.

Love,

Nancy

Visiting with Mary

Hi there everyone,
Jim and I went down to the cities on our way to Necedah with a short stop in Lake City for a TOGA. Before and after we will go to the Twins games to give Jim a little something to do before I make him do all the stuff I like to do.

First I gave Mary the apron I made for her since she is not a purse person. She really likes it. Here she is wearing it to keep clean while computing.

Then the next day we went downtown to see the Twinkies at the dome. Outside the dome and inside the dome a little later. Hmmm we had dome dogs and soda's and one of us had a philly steak. We came away with several keepsake cups too. (I couldn't spell suevineer)Mary and Jim used their new scorebooks although Mary got a little testy when the Royals kept changing all the pitchers near the end of the game. It worked though, they won in 10 innings.

We had a good time anyway.

Love,

Nancy

Quilts and more quilts

Hi Mary,

OK already, I think you found Christy's quilt on my webshots page, but here is one you haven't seen yet. I finished it about a week ago. I have been working on it, off and on, for more than two years. It is a pattern I found at the quilt market in Kansas City one spring. Bee Creative Studios is the name of the designer. Hollyhocks and Hummers is the name of the pattern. I call it Paula's Hollyhocks because I went to Paula's Restaurant in Mayville, North Dakota to get some better details of buds and seed pods for the quilt. Paula's has had Hollyhocks growing at the back of the restaurant for years.

My niece Joanna helped me draw the buds and just opening flowers. Then I put it away for a few months. The next spring I got it out and chose fabrics and got it marked but not cut. Then I finally cut and appliqued the leaves last year. This year I finished the flowers and the buds and got it quilted. One word of advice to anyone else doing this. Use batting that won't pull through the fabric or use black batting. The white batting I used somehow came through the batik background fabric and it looked like a cat had been laying on it for years. What a pain.

If you ask I will tell you how I 'fixed' it but only if you ask. Otherwise it is a secret. HA!

Love,

Nancy

Missing quilts

Hi Nancy,

I was just looking at the quilt pictures on your webshots site, and there are two missing.  One is the quilt you made for Christy, and one is the quilt you are holding up in one of your profile pictures.  Rats, I can't find a picture of the quilt you made for Christy.  But here's the Fern Fusing Frenzy quilt:

And then there's the quilt that's behind Christy in the picture in this post.  The reason I got on this subject is an email from one of my friends which said: "Here's something you already know, but it still has to be said:  Your sister is an AMAZINGLY gifted quilter- actually, she's magician with fabric.  I'm still shaking my head with wonder over what she can do." 

And I don't think she had even looked at your webshots site.  Yes, you are an amazingly gifted quilter.  I'm proud of you.  Bang.