Kirsten's Adventure, Part 3: New Mexico!

Our New Mexico adventure!

On March 3rd, we made it to New Mexico!  We drove north on Highway 285.  We spent a relaxing evening in Carlsbad, NM, at a hotel called "Mainstay".  It was very nice.

We headed west toward the Carlsbad Caverns park.  It was a beautiful morning in NM.

New Mexico is a really big place, with lots of desert.  We spent a few hours in the caverns, which went on and on and on.  I was amazed at the shapes and sizes that had all grown in the darkness under the desert.

After the cave(s) we stopped in a tiny place called White's City, where C bought some fudge.  We had lunch at the only restaurant, at that wide spot in the road.  It was amazing!  The waitress was awesome and there were several gluten free options on the menu, which made it difficult for C to choose. Smile.

Our next destination was Deming, NM.  We had to go back into TX and to El Paso, then back into NM; up to Las Crusius, then west on to Deming.

We spent two nights in Deming, as M's pick-up was having a noise.  

We dropped the pick-up at the tire and automotive place.  Then we found the quilt shop!  On-line says it opens at 9:30, but it was closed.  Sad panda!  The lady in the floral shop said the owner would be in around 11ish.  

We went out for coffee or Chai tea and wonderful oatmeal in the historic downtown part of Demming.  Of course, it is now afternoon.

The repair folks thought they knew what the trouble was, but they could not fix it.  They sent us to another automotive shop, who said, "Bring it back in the morning and we can have a look."  So, we parked the pick-up at the hotel and got the room for another night.

We went back to the quilt shop, and it was open!  A very nice retired lady owns it, and she was so much fun to talk with.  C bought one yard of yellow grunge dots fabric, and I bought one-half yards of black and white checked fabric.  She had stretchy fabric, too, and buttons, ric-rac, colorful elastic and interfacing.  Now that Joann's no longer exists, this is a place that can make up the difference.

The lady at the visitor center told us a good Mexican restaurant to have dinner at.  We needed a reference, since there were so many Mexican restaurants to choose from.  It was a great restaurant, and we noted they also served breakfast.  We planned on having breakfast there in the morning.

That evening, at the Holiday Inn Express, M and C helped me wash my hair, and M fixed it all up for me.  Don't I look divine in my pajamas and new hair-do?

Next morning, we arrived at the automotive shop at 8 am.  We dropped off the pick-up and went to breakfast. We came back and found out that the guy who works on those issues does not come in until 11ish.  Elevenish seems to be theme in Deming.  We went back downtown and took some photos, then we went to the historical museum, which was in a huge old schoolhouse or courthouse.  It was really big.  The folks there were very nice and we had some great conversations.  We found out there is a quilt show going on in Deming right now.  Meanwhile, we saw the exhibits in the museum an one room was completely dolls!!! What!?   They had art.  They had musical instruments, including square pianos.  They had two iron lungs, a nice cowboy hat display, an entire wall of geodes, a decent barbed wired collection, old cars, photos, cameras, telephones, televisions, native American artifacts, and date-nails from abandoned railroad ties. Most impressive was the button hook collection of Pearl Sanders.  There were three large wall-mounted cases of her button hooks.

Our visit to the museum took us a bit.  M was in communication with the auto shop.  We still had time to go to the Deming Arts Council and see the quilt show.

I know this is feeling a little long winded, but there is just so much to tell!  Since C posted about the quilt show, I will make my post briefer. It was a wonderful show!

This is a close-up of one of my favorites at the exhibit.

We went back to the automotive place and the guy told M he could find nothing amiss.  She asked him if her truck would make it to Kingman, Arizona.  He told her it would make it clear to New York.  She did not seem pleased, but we had a wonderful time in Deming . . . at least C and I did.  So, we gassed up and headed toward Arizona around 2:30 in the afternoon.

Quilt Collaboration Complete

Astrid and Jane got their scrappy liberated medallion quilt completed.  They both did the piecing of the quilt top.  Jane did the quilting and Astrid did the binding. 

It is in a very scrappy style using leftover bits and orphan blocks from several previously constructed quilts.  They are trying to not waste fabric.  I think it will fit into our Gwen and Freddie style for our next quilt show!

Kirsten's Adventure, Part 2

We stopped in Vicksburg, MS, to stretch our legs and get some fresh air.  C knows a lot about the Civil War, because she has read a lot of books about it.  She told me about the siege at Vicksburg.  

What I found amazing, is the size of the Mississippi River.  There are two bridges going across here.  One is old and is used for foot traffic only.  The weather was divine.

We drove through Louisiana.  We stopped in Shreveport and got a milkshake and visited Walmart.  M had a little problem with the GPS and rather more traffic than she ever remembered Shreveport having.

After having driven through Texas, we all three think that Texans have forgotten the Texas way of driving friendly.  Maybe that is just on the highways and interstates.  They seemed friendly enough in downtown Waco, where we visited the Dr. Pepper Museum.

It was very informative.  Did you know the Dr. Pepper factory was hit by a tornado once?  It was!

C and M found a nice Hawaiian restaurant, where we had gluten free lunch!  Yum!

We drove on to the house of S, who lives in Shertz, TX, just northeast of San Antonio.  Another of M's friends flew in that Saturday, so we had a wonderful time.  S has a nice big house, with room for all of us to stay a couple days.

We headed out toward El Paso, but took the highway north from Ft. Stockton, and headed to Carlsbad, New Mexico.  We stopped in Ft. Stockton to have lunch.  C found an amazing cafe that was veteran owned.  They had amazing fries, cheeseburgers, and sodas.  They had gluten free options!!

Marsha Made a Kawandi Style Quilt!

Marsha here.  I was reviewing our quilt blog a couple weeks ago, and was reading Jane's January Tutorial from January 15, 2024.  I decided to give it a try.  C's friend, D-F, gave her a piece of fabric that she found at the ReUse Market in Garden City.  C gave it to me, so I decided to use it in a Kawandi style quilt.  

It is not humongous, however, I learned a lot from making it.  It is nicely bright and will look amazing on the wall in my room.  The oversized plaid sort of fabric, in all four corners, and here and there throughout, is the fabric from D-F.  It and the grunge yellow polka dot really make it Springy!

Kirsten's Adventure, Part 1

I went with C to Fort Walton Beach, Florida, to visit M.  She was retiring from the Air Force.  We helped M get some of her household stuff boxed up and helped clean the house after the movers came and took all her stuff away.  She kept back a few things that she packed in the back of her pick-up and in the trunk of her car.  On February 26 we left FWB and drove to Mobile, Alabama, where we stopped to see the USS United States of America.  

They are getting her ready to be sunk in the Gulf of Mexico to make a coral reef.  You can see her smokestacks have been removed. She is a sad sight, yet magnificent still.  

We headed from Mobile, C and I in the car, and M in her pick-up, up the highway to Laurel, Mississippi.  

There was a SAQA art exhibit on display at the Lauren Rogers Museum of Art.  The museum was really big.  You would not know it by looking at the front of it.  It has many large rooms with all kinds of art, including baskets and quilts.  The quilt exhibit was part of an exhibit called Art Evolved: Intertwined.

This photo is of my favorite art quilt in the exhibit.  It is by Valerie Maser-Flanagan, of Massachusetts, USA.  We lost track of time, and the museum people lost track of us!!  We had come back upstairs from the quilt exhibit and were heading down the main hall to the front of the museum, when we surprised the security man.  He was starting to lock up, and did not know we were still in the building.  I call that a close escape!

The weather was beautiful and so was the small town of Laurel.  

This house is my favorite.  It is located directly across the street from the Grandiflora Bed and Breakfast, where we stayed.  We had the most relaxing time, for our very first day on the road.

This is the staircase that leads down from our room (or up to our room!)  The people were so friendly.  It felt like you were staying with friends!  Amazing!

Here I am, relaxing at the end of the day, on an antique bed.  Smile.  This adventure is going to take several posts, I believe.

Collaborative Quilt Top

In January we posted about the mess on the design wall.  Astrid and Jane have collaborated to make a quilt top out of all those scraps.  Some were orphan blocks, such as square-in-a-square, nine-patch, and pin wheel.  We even have some left over.

This is Astrid and Jane's quilt top.  They are now working on cutting out the backing piece and then Jane will quilt it.  It will take a little while to get those tasks done.

Meanwhile, we have big news.  Kirsten went on a trip with C, to Fort Walton Beach, Florida.  Kirsten's very good friend, M, retired from the Air Force in February.  Kirsten and C drove M's car from FWB to Glendale, Arizona.  M drove her pick-up.  They had great adventures and now Kirsten is moving in with M, in Arizona.  She promised to tell us all about their road trip adventures, soon.

More About "Road"

 

We met a lot of people, including Ann, at Kismet.  This is me in front of Ann's beautiful Kantha quilts.  She has the same taste in fabrics that I do!

I ran out of space on my previous post, because there was just so much excitement and so many photos and so much to talk about!

The lighting on C's entry was way too bright, and it washed out the colors, so this photo is not doing it justice.  To see all the little details, click on the photo below.

Wouldn't it be fun if we could all come next year?