Wandering Wednesday - Portland

Some actual wandering, I went to Portland to visit with friend Jaye who was already up there. On my first day there we went to Powell's City of Books. Imagine our surprise to see quilts on display up on the top floor! 

It was a really excellent Pride month display put on by the Portland Modern Quilt Guild.

It was really fun to sit on the benches to rest a bit and take in all that rainbow goodness, good vibes for sure. Here's a link to their instagram with some more closeups and info.

There were many many books that I sat and browsed through and considered buying like this one, Boro & Sashiko: Harmonious Imperfection by Shannon & Jason Mullett-Bowsby. I really want to make this reversible rectangle wrap vest that was one of the highlights of the book. They had so many used and by now vintage (from the 80's and 90's) quilt books that were fun to look through. 

Jaye had rented a small house in one of the many suburbs of Portland, we had a great time walking around checking out all the street vegetable boxes.

This cabbage reminded me of the monstrous plant, Audrey II, from Little Shop of Horrors.

I loved this old junior high building with this very excellent quote on top of the door way: "Knowledge, in truth, is the great sun in the firmament. Life and Power are scattered with all its beams" - Daniel Webster

The extended version of this quote is even better and quite timely I think.

I think this was likely a repainted Coca Cola advertisement, but I still liked the colors and fonts.

I liked the walkway near the house that we stayed in, it had a great ground cover combination with flat stone. No tripping, but still pretty.

We also went to a couple of Portland's many quilt shops (of course!). This one was Pioneer Quilts, in a really lovely historic home called the Broetje House. The two main buildings are connected by a glassed-in walkway. Which I would imagine would be really handy in rainy Portland. It made for a nice space to display quilts and bolts of fabrics.

Really enjoyed this shop, they had a wide variety of fabric on offer that was really well-displayed. It's one of those packed-full quilt shops that is still easily navigable and organized. I'll post more later about what I ended up buying there. I resisted buying a Kaffe Fassett glasses case or umbrella (just barely).

Seems Appropriate

"Who I am is certainly part of how I look and vice versa. I want to know where I begin and end, what size I am, and what suits me… I am not “in” this body, I am this body. Waist or no waist. 

But all the same, there’s something about me that doesn’t change, hasn’t changed, through all the remarkable, exciting, alarming, and disappointing transformations my body has gone through. There is a person there who isn’t only what she looks like, and to find her and know her I have to look through, look in, look deep. Not only in space, but in time." - Ursula K. LeGuin

Planning Ahead

I'm choosing this as my guiding quote for the coming year:

"So I vowed to keep myself alive, but only if I would never use me again for just me - each one of us is born of two, and we really belong to each other. I vowed to do my own thinking, instead of trying to accommodate everyone else' opinion, credo's and theories. I vowed to apply my inventory of experiences to the solving of problems that affect everyone aboard planet Earth." ~ Buckminster Fuller (American Engineer, Inventor, Designer, Architect "Geodesic Dome")

In case you haven't heard of Buckminster Fuller, try here at the Institute named for him, or of course there is always Wikipedia.

A song to illustrate the quote above by Ben Harper backed by Jack Johnson (in a video made by a Portuguese speaker).