Just a quiet week so far. The school year is quickly coming to an end. No school this Thursday and Friday so we are taking a train to southern Switzerland and then on to Verona, Italy. We’ll stay a couple nights and then watch the Giro d’Italia on Sunday. The Giro is like the Tour…

Well I’m back in my sewing room beginning a new quilt. I’m making the Flower Shop pattern from Modern Handcraft. Today I wanted to make a test block and learn how to sew curves. It all went together easily – especially with some videos tutorials from the Modern Handcraft web site. Now I just need…

When I was in school I remember going to the potato chip factory… That was cool, but my girls are so lucky, they get to go on overnight trips to the Swiss mountains and to Italy! I’ve interviewed them about their trips and there are some photos from Bea and from Claire’s teachers. BEA’S TRIP…

While everyone in my family is away (strange) I took a field trip of my own. I went to the Textile Museum of St. Gallen. Eastern Switzerland has an important history of lace making and embroidery. So I looked at a lot of really old beautiful lace – some of it amazingly made by hand.…

I’m alone for a few days. Brian is in Paris – that’s not unusual. Bea is in Italy for a school trip and Claire is off to the Swiss mountains for a school trip.  Bea left Monday – she’s going to Rome and near Naples. Their flight was delayed so they ended up missing some…

Here are (most of) the quilts I've made over the years.  What is this pile missing? Curves and giant flowers of course. I spotted a new quilt pattern and I'm a bit obsessed and it includes curves. So this might have to be my next project. The pattern is called Flower Shop and it's from…

We went for a hike not too far from home. We tried to go to the Sihlsprung – it’s a narrow gorge part of the Sihl River – but the path was closed due to water and storm damage. So we hiked near it and still enjoyed the beautiful scenery and a nice picnic. 

This weekend we had a friends party for Claire’s Birthday. She invited a bunch of girlfriends for cupcakes and then we went swimming. Then a few of the girls came to our house for a sleepover. That’s a lot of party time! Here’s Claire putting up decorations. I made vanilla cupcakes from the King Arthur…