More Ricky Tims. . . and more

Woo hoo! I think maybe I'm finally going to manage this. Hilda walked me through it by phone yesterday morning, but then I got cocky and deleted the first picture I downloaded so I could practice and could never get the button to work again. Now if I can only get it to work again when I try to download the second picture. If you click on the little photo icon in the tool bar when you're creating a new message for your blog, you can supposedly add more than one photo per message - I've seen some of you do this, but have never done it personally mayself. Anyway, this is Ricky Tims' first quilt - he started about the same place many of us did - sampler quilt, said his blocks ranged anywhere from 11 to 13" when he was finished piecing them. No indication of the directions quilting was eventually going to take him.


This quilt is called The Way Home. The entire quilt was pieced from a bolt of damaged fabric that he bought at Hancock's when he was a "poor" quilter. I loved the way it turned out and how innovative his layout is. He said that he really likes this one too, but rarely shows it anymore because the fabric quality is so poor that the dyes are beginning to break down in it. I count myself lucky to have been able to see this one.












This wall hanging is called Ritual Fire Dance - his machine applique is really nice - the flames in the background remind me of a class I took with Carol Bryer Fallert - I get the same feeling of movement from his flames that I do from much of her work.













I don't have the names on these next two quilts -- this
Trip Around the World quilt in the soft hand-dyed shades is really beautiful -- traditional pattern in more contemporary fabrics. I love the look of it.
















This quilt was made by Ricky and his dad - his dad pieced the star in the center, and Ricky did all the applique elements surrounding it. He and his dad started quilting at almost exactly the same time - and his dad started with one of these stars - although the first one was in poly cotton blends, etc.

My second artist date on Sunday to the Pueblo Grande Museum was also fun, although I have no pictures to show of it. My first love in this venue is the Navajo rugs, and I got to see several of them on Sunday, although they weren't in my budget this particular trip. There were a couple of beautiful, more contemporary rugs with assymmetrical designs that I particularly liked, but the traditional ones are lovely too. I got to watch a young Navajo woman weave for awhile, and watched a Hopi woman making piki bread as well -- how they spread that cornmeal mixture onto the hot stone with their bare hands is a mystery to me! Otherwise, it was an abundance of Native American art -- jewelry, pottery, paintings, sculpture, leatherwork, etc. I had a very pleasant couple of hours wandering around and absorbing things.

Yesterday I took a walk in North Mountain Park and picked up my 5 stones for the Week 6 task -- well, it started out to be 5 stones, but I think it was more like 7 or 8 by the time I made it back to my car - my pocket was getting pretty heavy. I'm grateful that I can still get out and about in the wintertime without fighting extremely cold weather and snow and ice -- but Sophie's pictures of the icicles and snow-laden pines sure are pretty. It was overcast yesterday and pretty cool and windy - by the time I got back to the car I was having a full-blown allergy attack. The pollution has been pretty bad lately, and perhaps I should have opted for Curves for my exercise instead of the walk, but it was nice to get outside and move around. The rest of my day was pretty low key, trying to get a grip on the allergy thing, but I'm doing better this morning. At least my nose isn't continually dripping anymore. Want to go out on the porch and arrange my stones somewhere now.