Los Alamos

When we went to New Mexico, we did not plan to visit Los Alamos but since it's there, why not.

As you know, Los Alamos is the site of the Manhattan Project and where thousands of scientists and others gathered in total secrecy during WWII to develop the world's first atomic bombs.

But, what you might not know is this is where the secret alloy called Nambe' was developed as well. I love Nambe' but really can't afford it. However, in Santa Fe, the Nambe' store was having some huge sale and I bought a piece of it for a steal. This is the second piece of Nambe' I own and am so happy with them.

So, the makers of these




created this




Pretty neat, huh? And you probably learned something to boot.

I don't mean to make light of the purpose these bombs were ultimately used for. I know the significance but just thought it was interesting.

A Big Little Life

This is a new book and true story by Dean Koontz, one of my favorite authors. My mom got the book from the library and has been gushing over how great it is. Mind you, this is a book about Dean Koontz's dog, Trixie, and my mom is not a dog lover. Well, let me amend that. She is a dog lover by osmosis through my dad and me but she is not over-the-top obnoxious like I am. So her recommending a dog book to me and saying it's one of the best she has ever read is saying something.

When she finished the book, she gave it to me and just reading the first few pages made me teary-eyed. Not sure how I'm going to get through the rest of the book. First, you know she is going to die but the way he writes about dogs and especially Trixie is so heartfelt and true. What he says is exactly how I feel but I don't have his writing talent to express that.

More finished projects

The name of this quilt is "I say Tomato". I have been working on it for a long time but couldn't get pictures of it without a dog taking a snooze on top of it.







This other little thing is a small (16" x 16") wall hanging for my friend Carol's birthday. She has a little wire haired terrier that looks just like the dog in the wallhanging. I'm very happy with the way this one turned out and especially like the stipple quilting which brings out the dog.

The BonTaj Roulet tour

A break from the vacation pics.



We went to see the Bontaj Roulet tour at the Dodge Theater Thursday night. I have seen Taj Mahal a few times before and really love him but I have never seen Bonnie Raitt and came to a new appreciation of her. She can really play the guitar and the two of them were just great. The concert lasted about 2.5-3 hours. First Taj and the Phantom Blues Band played, then Bonnie and her band, then both bands together, then Taj and Bonnie acoustically, then both bands again. I hate to use the over-used word "awesome" but they really, really were.





When searching for the video above, I found another video of Bonnie Raitt playing with another one of my favorites, John Lee Hooker. John Lee has now passed on but we saw him at the Celebrity Theater when he was about 84 years old.

A few more sites from around Santa Fe town

Just random photos. Click on each photo to enlarge for better viewing.

Billy the Kid was here.
The oh so narrow streets in town.

The front of the Georgia O'Keefe Museum.

An artistic sculpture in front of one of the many art galleries.

The Old Santa Fe Trail.

Santa Fe

I knew Santa Fe was an old town but did not realize it would be celebrating its 400th year in 2010 and also did not realize it had some of the oldest buildings in the U.S. until our visit last week, including the oldest public building, the oldest church and the oldest house.


The streets in SF are narrow and kind of helter skelter in their placement. Santa Fe also has a ton of churches and museums. We only visited the Georgia O'Keefe museum but did visit several churches with more about those in upcoming blogs.

The confessional in the oldest church

The oldest church built in 1610

Street view of palace of the governors with Native Americans selling their wares

Our hotel room in Santa Fe

We stayed two nights at the St. Francis in Santa Fe. It was a cool hotel but left a lot to be desired (like a full length mirror, iron/ironing board, two chairs, etc.) but it did have a very comfortable bed.

The stairway to our room. Very cool.

The room

The view from the room. Left a lot to be desired.

The front of the very old hotel.

on the road

We left Phoenix for Santa Fe and Taos on Sunday. The wireless has not been working 100% so this is my first post with one photo.

New projects

Here are some new projects I have made in the last few weeks. The towels, will be up for sale at the holiday boutique. The lace bowl I made as a housewarming gift.







The lace bowl is off a Zundt CD. Normally, it costs $99. Now I understand that Swiss lace is pretty nice stuff, but come on!!! $100 bucks??? However, 35th Ave Sew & Vac was having its Christmas in July sale and the disc was 75% off which was huge bargain. Anyway, the bowl is made of only thread. That's it. It was pretty nice.

New arrivals

I just couldn't resist the email from Connecting Threads re 1/2 off books plus free shipping. So look what I got. It's quite a haul for not too many $$. To make it even better, they were not much to begin with and have a lot of neat ideas that I never saw before. I also don't recall seeing these books at my local quilt stores.