November.....

I have to admit it is hard how quick the months slip by, it is almost Thanksgiving....which I love but at the same time I am not ready for Christmas! SO many things to make....who is with me on that? I love the idea of doing a handmade holiday but how do you fit it all in when you work and have family????

There hasn't been a cloud posting in awhile so I thought that I would share some new clouds....I think all of these were taken on my iphone. Amazing how much I use that camera, probably because it is always with me.

When was the last time you looked up at the sky? What do you see? When was the last time you looked at the stars?

This is a spot that we drive by when we go into town from the house. I am always stopping and taking photos of the clouds....or sunsets...or the mountains....

This was even more amazing in person. I really need to carry my good camera with me.

A contribution from my brother, Jason, when he was out fishing. Love that he takes photos of clouds and sends them to me....kinda cute!

I have to get to work...it is never ending. I wanted to end this with some cute kids......

And our most recent family photo.....

Have a great Thanksgiving!!! Enjoy your family and friends and be thankful...I know I am!

XOXOX

Valori

Jenaveve photo shot day 1...

I'm sitting in Salt Lake City airport waiting to go home from market and I thought I would share our photo shot we did last week with Jenaveve. As you might remember I received the fabric on Monday.

The lovely, colorful box from Korea....it is so fun to open up the sample yardage boxes and see your hard work come to life in fabric.

Tuesday morning.....

Three Creeks lake the location for Jenaveve photo shot. It is so beautiful at the lake that day. Knowing that we only had a couple of days before the weather turned.....No one was at the lake and the water was perfectly still, clear, and cold.

Mom, Carolyn and I started scouting out the beach area for photo opportunities....

Mom decided since she had her camera that she would take "behind the scenes" photos....kinda fun, huh?

We laid out all 15 pieces of lovely cotton linen....oh so soft and yummy! I envisioned (with some help of Carolyn's brilliant mind) a clothes line of the fabric blowing in the wind.....now to find the trees to tie the rope onto.

It took some time to get all of the fabric on the rope....I didn't realize how heavy the fabric would be it really weighted down the line. But we did conquer it!

This was the final outcome...there were tons of photos taken but this is my favorite. As we were scouting out the area we noticed so many great possibilities for photos with the fabric.....the colors of the area were perfectly neutral. Does that make sense?

 

I love using my LenseBaby....it creates the soft affect on the edges. You can move and tilt the lense to pick your sweet spot. Too much fun!

The greens.....

Teal and grey.....

This print is the Tribal Floral...I just love it. I'm thinking that some pillows need to happen or maybe a chair...just have to find a chair to cover. Not like we have a lot of room for another chair....maybe something small. Anyway, I digress...

The reds......isn't it just perfect with the red of the stump?

There are a lot of rock "studies" going on up at the lake....I love taking photos of what others have left.

Around 2 p.m. we decided that to sew up as much of the projects on the list as we could knowing that Wednesday was going to be beautiful. Carolyn and I heading to my studio to make a skirt, quilt, bag and some pillows. Mom would come by later and pick up some of what we couldn't get done.....it was going to be fast and furious.

Carolyn and I had so much fun sewing and getting time to just be together. We hadn't spent time like this in ages....did I mention that we recently adopted two kittens and a puppy. Yep, chaos in the Kennedy house. But fun all the same....Carolyn had a heck of a time getting the skirt cut out with Lilly attacking the tissue.....

The final result for the postcard for Market ended like this.....

The back had swatches of all the designs and then we stapled a swatch of the fabric to the card. I thought that it would be good to have the fabric on the card. We are such a tactile group of people once you feel the fabric you will want it!

Tomorrow I will share the photos we shot with all of the projects...yep we even got them all done! Giving ourselves a big pat on the back......

Now I must catch a plane home. I can't wait to see the family!! YEAH!
XOXO

Valori

The little man's one....

How has the time flown…I swear I just posted but no it has been weeks. Part of me can’t remember where it all went then I cough and the memories of being sick for 10 days hits me. I was taken down by this cold knocked me on my butt….it hit everyone in the family except Ross. There has to be one man or woman standing to take care of everyone. Mother natures way of keeping us a little sane…..

 Yesterday was Teague's first birthday....I got to spend the whole day just playing with him. It was wonderful just to play and do what he wanted.

  Sweet little baby.....

 
Getting to be such a big boy....

Oh, the clouds in Central Oregon are just breathtaking….I must share the newest clouds and a few rainbows.

Now I am off to photograph some covers for new patterns....

Have  a great day!

XO

Valori

Top 17 photos of summer.....

I was trying to come up with just 10 top photos of the summer but I just couldn't narrow it down...

With the hundreds of photos to go through I think that 17 is pretty good. Besides 10 is hard for me because I really like odd numbers and find myself working with them as much as possible.

I couldn't resit a cloud photo...our trip to the beach with family in June.

My favorite Quilt Show photos are the kids and mom and....

the girls and I drawing quilt block with chalk in the parking lot.

The teachers at daycare took this of Teague during Vi's birthday party.....we all "heart" Violette.

My garden.....

Quilter's Hall of Fame....go mom!

Birthday girls...more than anything we just had an excellent summer party....don't you just love summer parties?

 
At the cabin in August.

Even in summer we get the rain and the beautiful rainbows over the canyon.

Papa and the kids...

Two of my favortie photos this one of Miss Vi.....

And Miss Liv.....

My summer in 17 photos....I have to say I think there needs to be more to express the whole summer but it was fun and challenging to be able to pick those faves out.

XOXO

Val

Clouds.....

What do you think about clouds? Recently I have been fascinated with them. Of course the only camera I seem to have when I see something amazing is my phone. The images that I have right now are from my phone but beautiful all the same..... What do you think?????
XOXO
Valori
The first photo is from Cleveland near our hotel the other one is from our flight to Cleveland.

35th Anniversary......

As promised some new projects that are in the works for the 35th Anniversary of the Sisters Outdoor Quilt Show and the Stitchin' Post......

This week I finished up the photos and we went to print on a calendar for the shop...here are a couple of shots.....

It has been fun but a lot of work, quickly.....sometimes we have so many ideas and way too much to do that projects get put on the back burner until it is time to turn it in. AHA such is life!

On Tuesday July 7 we are having a Birthday Gala for the Quilt Show......there will be an art auction - among other things - this is the painting I did for the auction...

 

There is the unveiling of the DVD.....

 

Oh, this is going to be so cool! Can't wait to see all the footage put together.....Kara Jensen is the videographer....I think that is the proper term....anyway, she is awesome and I am totally excited to have the opportunity to work with her.

The last fun project.......BEER!!! (ok, fun to me and fun that I got to design the label)

 

Three Creeks Brewing is our own local brewing company and they were totally up for the idea of making a special summer brew for our show!!! Just have to get the quilters to drink more beer and less wine....At least I know we will have some in our fridge!

For now those are the projects that I have been intimately involved in....not that there are not other great events occurring during our week of festivities. But for me I can't seem to get my finger into everything....there would have to be 3 or 4 of me to do that. Should be a great year.....

XOXO
Valori

Winter at the Oregon Coast......

Ross, Teague and I just returned from a 3 night stay in Manzanita, our favorite beach town on the Oregon Coast.  Mom and John watched the girls while we had a little break.....wow, amazing only having one child. Ross slept in one morning and I got really nice, quite, one on one time with Teague. It was different from time at home where there is so much going on that I don't just sit and play with him. He was smiling and cooing, it was awesome.......we had nice walks on the beach - hit the weather just right - it was raining the day we got there and raining the day we left but nice while we were there. I recently got a new lens for my camera - LenseBaby - Composer. It is a different lens that is predominately out of focus but for a small sweet spot that once you focus in on then you can tilt the lens to be able to move the focus spot.....it is going to take some practice to get used to it but I did get some fun photos.

The little man......

the beach......

 

 

 

 

My cute husband!

 

 

I had time to paint.....these are the two paintings that I finished....little 6"x6" paintings - love little paintings right now........

 

Hope you had  a great week!!!

XOXOX

Valori

Happy Christmas!

Christmas Day - our Family.....we had a wonderful day! So fun to watch the girls open gifts and to spend time with the family. We had 9 (plus Teague) for dinner at our house. Love, Love, Love having people over for dinner. There is something about cooking and being with people with good food, wine, and laughter that makes my day. Must be why I got two cookbooks for Christmas and a pasta maker attachment for my Kitchen-aid. Ross wasn't too sure if that was a good gift or not. I had just made a comment how much I love cooking then opened the gift from him......think it was a good gift honey!

We are in a temperature inversion so there is a frost on everything, the light is very even and soft and it is VERY cold. I spent some time out shooting in our garden yesterday....sounds odd but here is some of the photos......I hope you had an awesome holiday!!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Good thing that I didn't have time to cut all of the dried flowers out of the garden........I wanted the sunflowers to drop their seeds but the rest just didn't get done. Happy about that now for the great photos!!!!

 

My beautiful Babes.....the photo from our Christmas card. 

One more thing.......I am totally embarrassed to admit that with all of the hub bub of the holidays and the travel and the sickness - yep Liv got pink eye before we went to Portland for a long weekend and Vi had a cold. Thank goodness none of us got any of the icky germs! Back to why I am embarrassed....I have not sent out the fabric from the give away at Thanksgiving!!! Now the girls have picked the numbers but I have not sent out the 16 winners!!! So....this week while we are all home - no daycare - I will email the winners and send out the packages. I am so sorry and again totally embarrassed!!!

Happy New Year!!!! Wishing you the best for the new year.......

XOXOX

Valori

Lazy Sunday....

Just finished cleaning the house - I am not sure why Sunday just seems like a day to clean. We finally have some nice weather and I think we will get to the park today.....the girls will be SO excited.
We woke up on Friday morning to the electricity being out! As much as we rely on power it was a wonderful day - with a fire burning and the house quiet except for the kids playing. Kinda nice - well maybe not the part where we couldn't flush the toilet. I ended up spending part of the day finishing a painting. It was very meditative to just paint in quiet. I normally have music on but I think I might try this quiet painting again. That night I had a showing of my work in Bend for the First Friday Art Walk in Downtown.  My work is hanging in my favorite shoe store, North Soles....It looks great!!! I can't believe that I forgot to take my camera and take photos. I am going to take my mom in to see it and take some photos then.....it was a busy night will all the "art strollers"  out and about. It was great to get to see my work in another venue.....thanks to Margaux!
Well, the laundry is calling so I will leave you with a few photos......

These were shot off the canyon at our house.....love how they look on the rocks.
Have a great day!!
Valori

So many photos so little time....

Getting ready for market is always a busy time for me. I have been working on quilts and projects for months. Now, patterns are being written and everything is getting ready to print. Last week Carolyn and I took a drive over the pass for a photo shot. I really try to take as many photos locally as possible but I needed a little green as our winter is still lingering here in Central Oregon. We went into the lush green valley near the MacKenzie River......where a family friend has a lavender farm, Blackberry Hill Nursery - Carol was so gracious to let us come invade her property to take photos. We loaded up the car early and set forth with coffee and yummy treats that mom picked up for us.

The night before our we left I was laying in bed thinking of how I wanted to shoot the Del Hi Street quilts - I wanted to have a road with a fence that one of the quilts could hang on and have Carolyn run with the other quilt floating behind her down the road. I had painted a sign with "Del Hi Street", that would be nailed to a post. That was the "vision" I had....I get those a lot for photos but can't always make them happen. WELL......there was a road next to the canal by the nursery.....with a fence....perfect! Here is what we got.....

Very exciting to find something so similar to what I saw in my head and then to have to have it actually work.....
I will have more photos to share later.......
Have a great day.....
Valori