A day out with my sister

Over the weekend my sister Deb came to visit me from Maine for Thanksgiving. With finances being so tight we haven't seen each other in 2 years, but a month ago we were able to find a flight on JetBlue for $80 roundtrip from Boston to Chicago to split, so this holiday has even more to be thankful for.

On Sunday we headed over to my favorite local gallery Packer Schopf to see the closing of Brian Dettmers exhibit of incredible carved books. The bonus was getting to meet artist Kathy Halper who also has an exhibit in the gallery this month.

I love Kathy's work, she does stitched drawings that explore the lives of teens in social media. Her images come from sometimes disturbing and often very humorous posts on facebook dealing with sex, drugs and the loss of privacy and innocence. Her work is so timely and relevant and perfectly executed in neutral colored floss on linen.

After the gallery, we walked over to my favorite coffee shop La Colombe, but had to stop at this dumpster when we saw it's public service message

Mmmmm hot coffee on a cold afternoon!

Tweet

Northern California will always be home to me

I just got back to Chicago yesterday and am just getting to writing some blog posts, so please be patient for the Quilt Festival pics that will be coming in the next few days.

Last friday I flew up to Sacramento to spend the weekend with my folks in Davis.

Some of my favorite california plants

I love Matalija poppies!

More cool giant pinecones

Davis' awesome farmers market

I saw this modified bike in Davis,

it must belong to the person who owns this tandem one that I saw last year in Davis.

It's when I see grocery stores that look like this, that I really miss living in California

I loved seeing my friend Joanies chickens who now roam the back yard of her home in Sacramento.

It's hard to believe Joanie and I became friends almost 35 years ago, when we lived in Salmon Creek, California.

Tweet

Beautiful Idyllwild, CA

After my last day of teaching, we found out there was a free concert in the park in town, so after dinner MaryRose and I grabbed a bottle of wine and few few folding chairs from the garage of our cabin and headed to the park.

We ran into Laura from class and sat down with her and eventually got up and danced under the pines.

While driving into town we passed this construction project and had to stop to read the sign.

I love this!

Pine cones!

The pinecones were huge up here in the mountains.

So many choices!

The rock formations on the drive to and from Idyllwild were fascinating, sharp and angular rock next to soft and rounded forms. This looks like the Venus of Villendorf on the side of the hill. Which seems totally fitting for this place.

Tweet

What fun I've been having!

I arrived in LA friday afternoon, met a friend for a drink in Santa Monica by the beach, then headed to The Los Angeles County Museum of Art to meet up with my college roommate Amy, who I stayed with over the weekend. Lucky me! Amy is the head designer at the museum and she gave me VIP tickets to see the Tim Burton exhibit, I am a huge Tim Burton fan.

After seeing the amazingly inspirational exhibit, I met up with several architect friends I used to work with 20 years ago as a graphic designer. Now, these guys own a successful architectural firm in Hollywood. We went to dinner at a fantastic Mediterranean Tapas restaurant called Cleo on Hollywood and Vine. After dinner, we had a drink on the rooftop patio and stopped to take a silly photo in the lobby, too fun, I love these guys!

In the morning, I went to breakfast with Amy and several of her friends, who are museum textile curators and heard about their amazing project designing a textile museum for the Queen of Thailand. These are a couple of their recent books.

While in Silverlake, I took a lovely morning walk and came upon this fence embellished with tiny painted chairs,

beautifully aged by the elements.

I miss gardens filled with bougainvillea, cacti and succulents,

I love this prehistoric grass!

In the afternoon, we stopped by my favorite art supply store in Glendale, Swains, to pick up some matte medium for my class in Idyllwild and had to admire the life size stuffed dogs in the window.

This one reminds me of a friend's dogs in Chicago :-)

You know you are in California, when the corner store sells pot!

My last night in LA, we ate dinner on Amy's patio and were visited by two skunks several times, luckily they waddled away with some gentle shooshing. They were so pretty, but I was a little nervous about getting sprayed the day before leaving to teach, lol!

Obviously we were disturbing their dinner plans, as you can see by the big raccoon who came by to eat the cat food, after we went inside.

Today, I fly to Northern California for the weekend with my mom, I'll post pics of my fantastic time in Idyllwild tomorrow. 

Tweet

A Sunny Day at the Antique Market

After getting rained out last month, it was so nice to spend a sunny day walking around the antique market down the street. I love living in the city! This was the day for seeing lots of awesome type, this thrills the graphic designer in me to no end.

When I was 18 and a student at Santa Rosa Junior College in California, I was the campus poster person for the student activities office. I designed posters for campus activities on an old letterpress machine using type just like this. I wish I could go back and use that press now, what fun I would have.

This is the type I couldn't live without.

I think these one foot tall letters spelling CUTE should be mounted on the wall over the bathroom mirror, for those days when one needs a little reminder :-)

My dog, Abby, grazing with the elephants.

Put a bird on it!

Beautiful glass!

I love this vintage store sewing machine parts bin.

It even had some needles still in it.

Indigo (nina) and I had a great day!

Tweet