A Day At The Fair

Beware the fury of a patient man.  

~John Dryden,Absolam and Achitophel, 1680

Yesterday morning I listened to the buzz of chain saws as a tree service created an ugly eyesore of our neighbors Mulberry tree.  It did need trimming but not the hatchet job they did.  The company did protect the windows and asked for permission to enter my side yard for any fallen branches.  Little did I know the destruction that would take place to the plants and bushes on my side yard.  All of my hydrangea bushes ended up with several broken branches.  My camellia looks like someone put its branches through a buzz saw.  For the first time in my life, I did not take this quietly or wait for DH to come home and have to listen to my rants.  I marched outside and told the owner of the tree service what a crappy (excuse my language) job he did of protecting my plants.  Did it make things better?  No.  But guess what - that's what complaint forms are for on the Better Business Bureau website.  Okay, I'm through with my rant.   What are your plans for the weekend?

==========================

LITTLE FACT OF THE DAY

Stars

Don't you just love seeing all those tiny little lights in the sky?  Living in the middle of town we only see s few stars in the night sky.  There's just too much artificial lighting to see them well.  However, when we visit our DD#1 in Albuquerque, the night sky is full of sparkly jewels.  What a sight to behold!  Here are a few facts on stars:

* There are more stars than all of the grains of sand on earth.

 *You can see stars from the bottom of a well even in day light.

*Stars with really strong gravity cause themselves to become smaller and smaller and eventually turn into black holes.

* Stars come in different colors; hot stars give off blue light, and the cooler stars give off red light.

* All of the stars comprising the Milky Way galaxy revolve around the center of the galaxy once every 200 million years or so.

* Our galaxy has approximately 250 billion stars and it is estimated by astronomers that there are 100 billion other galaxies in the universe 

* A Comet's tail always points away from the sun.

* The sun is the largest star

* It might look like all the stars are out there, all by themselves, but many come in pairs.

* The closest star to Earth is Proxima Centauri, located 4.2 light-years away. 

===========================

QUILTS AT THE FAIR

I decided to enter four quilts in the Kern County Fair this year.  Three of them earned ribbons!  While we were there last week, I took photos of some of the ones we liked the best.  Unfortunately, I didn't get the exhibitors names for all of them but some I remember.....

I just love this candy corn little quilt.  This won first place in the Holiday division and was created by Candace Meares.  Aren't the prairie points cute, too?

This cute quilt was created by my guild president Marilyn Smith and entered in the "Quilted Article - Wall Hanging".  She earned a 3rd place for her efforts.  The eyelashes and part of the hair are made with real hair from her nephew!

Isn't this little red and white quilt precious?  It was created by LaVerne Anderson and entered in the "Quilted Article - Miniature Quilt".  She called this "Seeing Red" and it earned a 2nd place.

This beauty was created by a yahoo.com group made up of five different ladies from around the country.  Marilyn Smith was one of the building creators and the quilter.  She said that this was the first show it was entered in.  It received 5 different awards including Best Of Show.  It will be leaving here and heading north to the Pacific International Quilt Festival in Santa Clara.  (Sorry it's a bit blurry)

And you probably recognize this one - lol!  Yep, it's my Gardener's Journal quilt.  This time it earned a 3rd place!  I entered it under "Quilted Article - Misc".

I love the scrappy houses on this quilt.  It was entered in the "Professional - Hand Applique" category by Corey Starkey.  Corey always wins several ribbons wherever she shows her quilts and this one won a 1st place.

I just loved this little quilt and don't understand why it didn't receive an award.  Can you see the tape measure that was added as an embellishment and hangs down below the quilt's edge?  Nancy Dubie entered this quilt in the "Quilted Article - Wall Hanging"  category.

And I bet you recognize this little quilt too.  I entered this little quilt at the last moment in the "Bird Sewing Theme Contest".  Do you see that 2nd place ribbon?  I was all smiles.  When I returned home from the fair, I looked in the fair catalog and discovered that I won $45.00 for this entry!  I didn't even realize it had a larger payout than the regular quilted entries.

This quilt says California to me since it depicts our state bird, the quail, and our state flower, the poppy.  Alice Chitwood entered this in the "Bird Sewing Theme Contest" and earned an honorable mention for her creation.

Please ignore my reflection in the photo.  They put this little quilt in a display case and I couldn't keep myself or the glare off of it.  This beauty was also created by Alice Chitwood and earned her another honorable mention, this time in the "Quilted Article - Wall Hanging" category.

Isn't this a terrible picture of my little quilt.  It, too, was hung behind glass in a dark hallway and picked up all sorts of reflections.  You can't really see it but this earned a 1st place in the "Quilted Article - Miniature Quilt".  I'm totally smiling now :)

This was my DH's favorite entry in the quilts this year.  His love of batiks is obvious and he was charmed by the color combination.  Heather Burt created this 1st place quilt entered in the "Quilted Article - Top By One, Machine Quilted By Another" category.

Well, that's a quick trip through the quilts.  There were lots more entered but we don't think as many as last year.  We also checked out the landscaping and weaving entries.  We stopped in to see the 4-H entries and were glad to see that those entries had increased by quite a bit.  Of course we had to come home with our five bags of caramel corn - yum!  It was a fun day and made even better with free entry and free parking for seniors .... yep, that's us!

===========================

FINAL THOUGHT