Back to Work

I spent the weekend in Iowa for my Grandmother's funeral. It was bittersweet. The funeral was sad, but it was wonderful to spend time with my aunts, cousins, and cousin's children.

My cousin Joanna lives in Iowa, and on Sunday afternoon we went out to her farm. They have a four-wheeler. I used to have one too, when I lived out on the vineyard, so I'm pretty familiar with driving one. 

I will say that it is one thing to drive around with your friends, and another thing entirely to drive around with nine of your various cousin's children who are screaming for you to floor it. The oldest kid in the picture spent most of the afternoon driving all the other kids around, with some of the grown-ups rotating through to drive or ride.

In this photo, I am calculating how quickly I can leave the country if something goes wrong.

We didn't last as long as the kids, I think mainly because we were much more intensely aware that with one wrong turn we could wipe out half of the future generation of our family.

Joanna also got a pony called Tina off of craigslist for $100 dollars, and she was a popular attraction for most people. My brother Andrew wasn't super impressed.

Joanna says having a pony is sort of like having a really big rabbit.

Andrew and I both stayed at my cousin Jenny's house. In Andrew's room there was this old quilt on the bed, and I forgot to ask Jenny who made it. It has beautifully hand quilted baptist fans, but the layout is very curious to me. The placement of the color blocks makes no sense to me, with the way the blues are all sort of jammed together in a few spaces, and everything seems both placed deliberately, but seemingly without any sort of overall plan.

I've been toying with the idea of quilting in columns, and noticed the other bedspread in Andrew's room was embroidered with the same idea. It's something I definitely would like to try.

All in all, it was a good trip, but I'm glad to be home.