girls weekend......

Last summer Jane (my sister) and Max (my cousin) thought it would be a really fun to go to Winterset, Iowa. So much to see there!

Karen and I said we would go too.

Last weekend we made the road trip.

Planners in the front seat, tag alongs in the back seat.

We saw all the bridges, John Waynes birthplace, Fon's & Porter quilt shop, a local winery, and ate at the Northside Cafe and other stuff!

Along the road to Roseman Bridge. Characters from the movie, 

The Bridges of Madison County.

The quilt shop. It is small, but we all found one thing to buy.

Window decor for a yarn shop. Maybe it should have been Robert still waiting for Fancesca to get herself out of her truck and join him as he headed out of town in the movie.

Every bridge had a geocache (or two) nearby. I did not always find it, but was sure to look.

This is my kind of cache. Nice and big.

 It is hidden at the History Museum in Adel, Iowa.

I love my geocaching app. When we stopped, 

I would open it and hit...

"find nearby caches"

Now, this weekend I will stay home and sew!

AQS des moines quilt show last week...

Last week at this time I was in the shower getting ready to head down to Des Moines for the quilt show with Karen. We were trying to figure out how many years we have been doing this.

We still don't know, but several for sure.

This year we were in search of two special quilts.

One made by Lynne http://patcherymenagerie.blogspot.com/

And this one by Julie http://quiltdivajulie.blogspot.com/

The chains keep you from getting too close, but that doesn't mean I didn't lean over a bit and take a closer look at things. It was really cool to see both of these in person.

You see them on their blogs and all, but it really is true...that pictures don't do a quilt justice.

In person is so much better!

I was so happy when I learned that both of these would be in Des Moines!

It was fun watching people stand there and stare

and smile

and put there heads together to talk

 and point out this or that on the quilt.

I used my tea towel challenge bag as planned. I decided to join the AQS this year.

So my bag was heavy right from the start. I got a free (out of print) book, one of last years magazines, a catalog and show book. My bag got heavy right at the door.

As I meandered through one of the booths and out of it I could 'feel' this body moving with me. If I turned, it turned. 

Who is following me? It turned out to be the shop owner. The bag caught her eye and she needed to get a closer look at it! So as best I could I filled her in on the why and how this bag came to be.

It was made during the tea towel challenge last winter.

Now today I am off to meet my cousin Max at The Quilted Forest in Forest City.

I will also stop and mail my block lotto blocks from September.

Three were worthy of entering, the first one ended up being a disaster.

Not sure what went wrong with that one! 

I have Octobers done, just not pressed or pictured yet.