Weekly update: blossoms, books, bunco, blocks, and WIP

 The week flew by as quickly as cumulus clouds on a bright autumn day. 

Fringed gentian is in bloom at Illinois Beach State Park. Isn't that a beautiful shade of blue?   Along the same trail:  flame-red sumac.







 Natalie Rompella was the speaker at Tuesday's AAUW meeting. I didn't get a picture of her but I did snap a photo of two of her children's books. She's a former teacher turned nonfiction writer (with one upper-grade novel to her credit). As a librarian I've been the penultimate consumer of children's books. Natalie provided insights into the creative and business parts of the continuum.  (BTW, Famous Firsts is really interesting. I hadn't ever thought about who invented the trampoline, or cheerleading, or in-line skates.)

A good time was had by all Friday night at the Zion Woman's Club annual bunco fundraiser.  It included dinner, a silent auction, a bucket raffle, and a 50/50 drawing.  I contributed a quilt, a table runner, and a tote bag to the silent auction.  They did respectably (and the purchasers got good deals).   The treasurer's preliminary report is $1900 profit for the charities the club supports. 

I made three Halloween blocks for the October Block Lotto.  I had to search through the stash to find frightful seasonal prints for the centers.




These California Poppy blocks are some of the  winnings from the August Block Lotto. The final batch arrived from Australia this week.  A side-by-side setting did not thrill me.  Hmmm. What about alternate blocks? 

Here is the result!  It's 60 x 72. 


I used Deb Tucker's Wing Clipper ruler for the sawtooth stars.

It's under the needle now.  I'll post a photo of the pieced back in a day or two.

Here is the Monday link lineup:
Design Wall Monday
Monday Making
Oh Scrap!
Moving It Forward