Fall is coming to Kansas. 

The sunsets get more vivid as the shadows grow in length.  The birds are gathering up for their trek South.  And the nights are getting cooler finally.  A blessing for us since we don't have AC in our house. 

I put my fall wreath on the front of the house this evening.  Guess that makes it official!  

TRAIL BOUQUET

Fall wholesale market in Houston is quickly approaching. This is the first quilt that is at the printers to get ready.  I thought I would be far ahead in my readiness, but life happens.  There will be two more pieced patterns and hopefully the digitized barns will be ready too.

I designed this quilt to be used as a block of the month in the Kansas Country Register.  The flowers were found by the pioneers using the trails across our country,  For the retail pattern, I've added two more flowers that might work well on a lighter background.  On my quilt I used more intense colored flowers so they would show up on a dark background.

Researching various wildflowers for this quilt was fun!

So what's up with the pretty pink and white althea I planted last summer?   I think it forgot what color it was supposed to be.  Makes me wonder if the color changes with the soil condition like hydrangeas.



But good old Kansas sunflowers always know what color they are supposed to bloom.

Today a lot of ladies came together to help me test my machine embroidery for the barns quilt.  Jane has worked like a madman (woman) to try to get them correct.  But there are still some changes that need to be done.  I'm going to try to learn digitizing, but it's going to take me a lot of trial and error before I'll even begin to learn enough to make things work.

On a good/bad note, my quilting machine is dead in the water.  It needs a new encoding board which I've sent for.  But in the meantime, I will get to play with my new embroidery machine.  Baby steps with at least doing some embroidery before I know enough to start digitizing.

 Work, work, work.  Four of us "had" to go to Branson in order to get some sewing done. That's our excuse and we are sticking to it.   Then a friend from Springfield joined us to sew.   Norma worked on a quilt she had on a closet shelf for a FEW years.



 Roxane finished her purse and started a wallet. 





Joan finished several hot pads for friends and Shirley did some hand work and then worked on paper piecing blocks. 

Lots of fun, laughs and eating way too much!  

An image from our town in Osage County, Kansas.  Don't Overlook Overbrook.

A town of just near 1000 people.   A nice place to live.  But we don't live in town.  We have a farm south of town.  Big news in the community is that we now have a new Dollar General.  Saves a trip to Topeka or Lawrence (each about 35 miles away) for things like shoe laces, shower gifts, etc.  We have a great quilt shop... Overbrook Quilt Connection , a nice grocery store, a farmer co-op and lots of other businesses.

The Santa Fe Trail traveled on what is now 4th Street.    

Holiday weekend
It has been a nice holiday weekend. Pretty great weather for early September in Kansas.  

Yesterday we had dinner at a friend's house and grilled and ate well.  These people have been friends since school.  Of the six, five were schoolmates and of those three of us rode the same bus.  Now as we age, three of us have become quilting friends as well.  Unfortunately we were missing another couple who rode my bus and my husband's and also a quilting friend.  The Ozarks were calling to them.

It's great to have such long time friends as these.