ASILOMAR-MARCH 1-6. 2013

My Friend and I-Our Great Adventure

Vicki Jones and I, friends for almost 50 years attended the Empty Spools Quilt Seminar-2013 at Asilomar in Pacific Grove, California.

We were high school friends, buddies at girl's camp, roommates in college and she was a bridesmaid at my wedding. Remarkably we are still great friends and we had so much fun together! Can't wait to do it again!

Here we are in the Spring of 1971 standing in front of  what we dubbed "The Sunshine House" when we were college roommates.

Here we are at Asilomar in 2013.

Starting our walk on the beach. We walked almost everyday.

Here's Vicki kissing a piece of kelp. I saved my kisses for "Nessie."

Vicki playing with a family's dogs.

A beautiful California beach sunset. I miss the beach!

We took Mary Lou Weidman's class-Legacy Quilt's-Story Telling in Quilts.

Saturday we went on a field trip to the Back Porch Quilt Shop. Mary Lou showed us good fabrics to pick for our quilts and why and gave us hints on picking out quality fabric. It was a great shop and there were long lines at the cutting table and cash register.

Our classroom was in Scripps Hall, one of the original buildings at Asilomar. Asilomar was originally built as a YWMCA camp over a hundred years ago. It is beautiful! 

We had a great set-up--four folding tables set in a group. We had a whole table to ourselves. There were 22 in our class. We worked hard!

Here's Vicki at her work station. This was at the beginning of the week. My work station got messier and messier as the week went on! Below is a picture of Mary Lou and us. Don't you love our tiara's!

Vicki wore this great skirt to church on Sunday. She's so good, she wore it all day. I changed to jeans. If I had a skirt like hers I probably would have worn it too. It was a vintage skirt. You can't see it but the village was covered in sequins and beads.

One exercise Mary Lou had us do was cut out a face from a drawing she had made. We couldn't draw it-we just cut it out. Everyone's turned out great. Mine is the tine beige one.

Here's my work station across from Vicki's. I could not keep it clean! I tried. But I make a mess when I work then clean it up at 
the end of the day.

Here I am with some of my completed blocks.

Here's a picture of our entire class. Mary Lou is in the front with her hand over her eyes.

I had to include a picture of one of the buildings in Pacific Grove. I wish I had had more time to explore!

Here's Vicki with the hat she bought at Tasuti Zoo's. She looks so cute. I tried one on and looked like an idiot.

Here are some of Vicki's completed blocks and her design for her quilt.

Here are some of my completed blocks and my design for my quilt. It's a memory quilt of my dad and me. He passed away on September 5 of 2012. Somewhere I'm going to add the words: My Dad, My Hero, My Protector, My Star

Here I am with Vicki and Elly Sienkiewicz. I have admired her since my early days of quilting. She is an expert on Baltimore Album quilts and has had several books and patterns published. I have several of her books. She taught a class. Three ladies in her class bought some of my dolls.

This is Diana McClun who started the Empty Spools quilt Seminars years ago. She has also published lots of books. I have Quilts, Quilts, Quilts and More Quilts. She gave me Q is for Quilts. Here she is looking at my dolls. I gave her the one she is holding and she was so gracious and thrilled to have it. She's great. Vicki was her driver on the way home and when we dropped her off in Walnut Creek I was lucky enough to get to see her studio. 

Here's Vicki on the last night of our retreat. We both sewed like crazy to get as much done as we could before we left. We were getting a bit goofy since it was so late at night!

I drew this the first day while taking notes from Mary Lou's class. She wanted to take a picture of it so here I am the night before we left trying hard to finish painting it.

My good friend Vicki getting ready for the day. Below are some pictures of her trying on Mary Lou's glasses. Mary Lou collected frames for her glasses all over the world in places she taught classes. I loved them I just got new Plain Jane glasses and after seeing her's I wished I'd picked out some wild ones. But I can't afford to have a pair of glasses to match every outfit!

This pair is my favorite. They would go with everything. I should put them on my wish list! They look great on Vicki.

Mary Lou-we will miss you. You changed my life. My quilt color palette has totally changed, I'm not afraid to use purple for hair, I learned that memory quilts can span many years of memories in one quilt, I learned to not be afraid to be myself and I learned that scarves are great accessories (I learned that from Vicki too). Vicki also taught me that it is easy to start a conversation with anyone and by doing so you can make new friends. Vicki and Mary Lou also taught me that it is not scary to be happy and show it. I love you guys!