Back from Bishop

We just got back from 10 wonderful days in Bishop. For those of you unfamiliar with California, it's a town about 5 hours north of here at the edge of the Eastern Sierras, known for its big Mule Days celebration and rodeo every Memorial Day. It's also the home of Galen Rowell, who was a famous rock climber turned photographer. There's a wonderful museum of his photography that I make sure to visit every time we go to Bishop.

We spent the first three days west of town on the Owens River at Pleasant Valley Campground. It's an Inyo County campground, has no hookups, and costs only $10 a night.

We like to take a spot on the south side of the river under the Chalk Cliffs, and usually we have the place to ourselves. We had some neighbors about 100 yards away - never a peep. Don was able to go walk the river every day, and I read, did some hand-stitching,  and made a couple of trips into town.

After 3 days with no hookups, and with cool weather, we moved into town just in time for the temps to get warmer. We went to Highlands RV Park, where I was able to have electricity and pull out the sewing machine. It was also nice to watch TV - I'm addicted to the Jodi Arias trial.

There's a great quilt shop in Bishop - Sierra Cottons and Wools - and one of the co-owners is Barri Sue Gaudet, who has numerous wool designs out under the Bare Roots name.  The quilt shop is right next door to the RV park, so I was able to walk over there several times. 

These are the store samples of two wool projects I'm working on - the first is a pillow, and the second is a block of the month quilt.

After 3 days at Highlands, we were going to go to Lone Pine for 3 days so Don could fish Diaz Lake in his float tube.  But the fishing was so good on the river (it's a wild trout stream, catch-and-release fly fishing only), that he came back to the trailer and announced, "I can fish Diaz Lake when I'm old. I won't always be able to fish rivers like this. Can we stay?"  I was glad to stay in Bishop for 3 more days, where I continued to sew, read, watch TV, and relax.

I finished 3 tops - all from charm squares. The top one is turned sideways!  It'll be bound in a black that has little tiny colored hearts on it - the black I used for the cornerstones.

This next one needs a border or two - and I'll be picking out some orange and gray soon for it. 

This next one is called Kylee's Kite - a pattern by Eleanor Burns, using a special ruler. It'll make a great baby quilt, won't it?!

Now I'm home, sewing away as usual, and here's my next big project: 

It's called Up, Up, and Away, and it's from the book Sunday Morning Quilts. It'll have 589 squares in it, and each square has a triangle in one corner. Turn the squares on point, and it looks like the triangles are floating on the background of white/neutral. I started sewing the rows together today - a pretty simple but tedious process.  I should finish the top in the next 2-3 days.