New York City vacation part 2

We started out our second day in NYC heading down to Ground Zero and the 9-11 memorial. Very moving

Then we headed over to Statue of Liberty, not quite finished with its renovation and closed to the public, except the land around it and Ellis Island, which had a great museum of its time as an immigration center. Fraunces Tavern Museum is the oldest tavern in New York and has a museum upstairs dedicated to the Revolutionary War. George Washington bade farewell to his Continental Army there. That night we went to see “Grace”, a black comedy starring Paul Rudd, Michael Shannon, Kate Arrington and Ed Asner. A young couple moves to Florida to open a faith based hotel, but runs into problems. Very good. After the play we went to Joe Allen for dinner, fabulous!

New York City Vacation - Day 1

On my bucket list was a visit to New York City - checked off. We had quite a busy 6 days there! The first night we just checked into our small hotel/guest house in the West Village and then walked around the area. We also got our Metro Cards for 7 days of unlimited subway and bus use - and we certainly used them a lot! Our hotel was a few minutes’ walk from a subway station, one that had both North/South (Uptown/Downtown) lines and a cross-town line, very convenient. In between the subway and our hotel were several coffee places, we ended up patronizing Think coffee for our afternoon coffee rest. There was also a small convenience store where we got our morning bananas. First thing the next morning we headed over to pick up our New York Passes - which enabled us to get through the rest of our stay without constantly handing over cash - we did that before we left home. I think we saved money, and we definitely went to a lot of things we might have passed on without it. Museum of Modern Art – Spent a few hours here, and once I got to the fourth floor I was glad we had. I got to see one of my favorite pictures - "Starry Night" by Vincent VanGogh!

Then we walked around the area, arriving at Rockefeller Center, so went up to the Top of the Rock. There was a Jimmyjib on the top, waiting for a photo shoot for a promo spot later that day. It was a beautiful day, we could see a long way.

Across from rockefeller Center was Radio City Music Hall. Loved the building art on its side.

Then we walked over to St Patrick's Cathedral - surrounded by scaffolding (there was a lot of renovation work being done all over the city).

We walked up to a craft museum that was featuring tinsel art (think aluminum foil in various colors). I was hoping for quilts, but not to be. That night we went to see "Silence: the musical", a parody of Silence of the Lambs, very funny. And for dinner we went to Guy Fieri's American Kitchen and Bar.

Cornucopia of Thanks quilt progress

I have been steadily quilting away on the Cornucopia of Thanks quilt, and now am stitching on the binding. There is still a bit of quilting to do, the 2" border. Got thread today at PIQF to blend with the rusty red color, the peach and the green thread were just too much of a contrast for what I wanted to do. I was inspired by Leah Day's Lacy Lattice for the 2" fill, will make them 2" high and 1" wide.

Shown from the back side: Stylized "waves" in outer border (bottom & right), leaves (on peach border), empty 2" border, grid on sashing

Shown from back side: block quilting, grid in sashing, empty 2" border, leaves

Front of quilt showing quilting on two blocks, grid in sashing, small design in peach square in sashing.

Grandmother's Choice BOW 7

This month's block was Alice's Flag, symbolizing a star sewn onto a flag for each state that ratified the 19th amendment.

Grandmother's choice BOW 6

This week was Aunt Eliza's Star, made fairly easy in a 9" version. I used Marti Michell templates for this one, C15 for the center, A1 for the corner squares and A4 for the QST pieces.

With six of these done, it seemed an opportune time to take a picture of all of them together.

Album of Quilters a Top!

Got the signature and a strip of fabric from the last swapper, pieced the block and got the last bit assembled! It is now a top. I'm looking for something to quilt in the alternating plain squares, top of my list at PIQF this week.

This was started last year, one of the UFOs on the 2012 goals - getting there! Now to get busy on this weeks Grandmother's Choice block, a nice easy one, Aunt Eliza.

Album of Quilters progress

Got the blocks mostly assembled, waiting for one more signature (and then will make another block) to replace the duplicate block (I had a couple of extras from the swap) and then finish assembling the last few blocks. This was also a UFO started last year, making progress!