Hello from Ireland

I have not forgotten my Blog readers! I am currently enjoying a wonderful holiday in Scotland and Ireland - learning lots of history and gathering up many photos that will be an inspiration for future designs. All the daily photos will be posted as soon as I return home next week.

Photo Collage

I saw this picture on the wall at the Ottawa Hospital. The buildings are the Ottawa General and the Ottawa Civic hospitals. It is about 36" x 24" and is made up entirely of photographs of the hospital workers. Each picture is less than 1/2" square. What an amazing piece of art!

Quilts by Patty Latourell

Yesterday I was having my newest quilt, Hip Hop Houses, photographed by Glyn Davies. My friend, Patty Latourell, was also at the studio so Glyn could photograph 3 of her quilts that she is going to enter in the Road to California Quilt Show which is held in Ontario, California in January.

This amazing quilt is based on a photograph and is made up entirely of 3/4" squares of fabric. See the close-up below.

Here is Glyn photographing Patty's flower quilt. This is fused applique with lots of thread work. Close-up below

Patty used a vintage linen tablecloth to create this piece. It is embellished with stitching and hand-beading.

Good luck, Patty! I am sure your quilts will do very well at the show.

Appliqued Quilt

Several members of my guild, The Thousand Islands Quilters' Guild, hand-appliqued all the blocks for this wonderful quilt. It will be hand-quilted and then given to a local non-profit organization. The chosen group will then be able to raffle the quilt as a fund raiser for their organization. I think I will be buying lots of tickets for this one!

The RCMP Musical Ride Comes to Brockville

Today, the famous Royal Canadian Mounted Police Musical Ride was performed in Brockville in honour of Douglas Scott, a 20 year old RCMP officer who was killed last November while on duty in Nunavut in northern Canada. Doug and his family lived in the Brockville area and he attended the police program here at St. Lawrence College. It was a fitting tribute that the Musical Ride was performed on the grounds of the College.

The 36 horses arrived here last night in 3 tractor trailers. Another tractor trailer brought all the equipment. The horses were housed at St. Alban's stable which is just a couple of blocks from my house. The barns were open all day and you could go to see the horses and talk to the officers on duty.

One of the 3 horse transport trucks

Visitors of all ages could be seen at the barn.

These majestic black horses were obviously used to having lots of visitors. They all were very calm and quiet.

One of the officers on duty who also rode in the Musical Ride at night

Menu of the day

Poop Patrol: All part of a day's work

Almost ready to leave the barn

On the way to the mounting area

The start of the 4 kilometre walk to the College

And here they are in all their glory. What a magnificent sight to see on the streets of Brockville!

You can read more about the Musical Ride by clicking here.

Great Canadian Shop Hop

Tricia Sherman, producer of the Great Canadian Shop Hop videos has just released her latest programme. This show was filmed at Lori's Country Cottage in Sherwood Park, Alberta. Tricia's special guest was Mark Lipinski, editor of Quilter's Home Magazine.

You can see the video on Tricia's web site http://www.greatcanadianshophop.com/. Click on Video Player, then scroll down to Show #8.

My friend, Janet Rice Bredin was featured on show #4 filmed at Country Concessions in Cookstown, ON and I was on show #7 from the Country Quilter in Richmond, ON.

Hope you enjoy these great videos!