Just returned from a trip to California and I picked up these two books from a shop in Solvang called Village Spinning and Weaving. They have a couple of displays of the dyestuffs that are shown on the cover of Navajo and Hopi Dyes. They are quite well done. Each display has as its centerpiece a miniature backstrap loop with a small weaving showing off the various dyes. They are really beautiful. The other book, Dyes from American Native Plants is a work that is gleaned from information gathered by the Works Project Administration during the Great Depression here in the US. The researchers/authors, Lynne Richards and Ronald J Tyrl painstakingly went through tens of thousands of documents that recorded people that lived in the Oklahoma Territories and their recipes and impressions of dying materials. There are great color plates of the plants, color chips that use the Munsell Color system. I think this will be an incredible resource to me in future.
Our trip to California started with a beautiful drive down Interstate 84 through the Columbia River Gorge. We boarded our plane to San Jose without delay and got the rental car and drove to Fremont. We spent a couple of days with my mother and the girls arrived the day before my m-i-l memorial. Thanks to Anne Halligan and the many neighbors who made this possible. Many old friends were able to attend and share stories of Vi. The girls, Amy and Matt, Tom and I took my mom to our favorite chinese restaurant in town and had our favorite dish. Mashed garlic pork. Lovely, however I don't think my mother thought that the conversation was always entirely appropriate. Oh well, when the girls and I get together we have the most interesting and funny conversations. This one dealt with black holes, the end of time, something about a greek phalanx that I can't repeat here and all kinds of other wonderful things. I got to see a picture of the youngest's new beau. OMG!!!!! Let that suffice for now. Don't want to scare the poor guy off. He is very good looking.
Next was the train ride to Santa Barbara from San Jose. Couldn't have had a nicer day and can you believe that the train was 45 minutes early??? A good time in SB. Rebecca and Dave were able to be there with G squared, the kids, and Amy joined us at the last minute. Thanks to Ruth and Lee for the incredible hospitality as always. Lovely weather. We took the train back to Portland a few days later. The Coast Starlight line now has an old Parlor Car. It is a refurbished 1955 car with wood paneling, club chairs, a bar, and real cloth tablecloths and napkins. It was exquisite to be treated so well. The food was great, the views were great and even though we arrived in Portland a bit behind schedule (4 hours) it was worth it. We decided to stay the night in Portland because we were too tired. It was easy to walk the half mile to the Tri Met station and take the train to the Airport to retrieve our car. Pretty nice time.
Home again and all seems well. It is taking me a while to get back into some kind of routine. After being pampered on the train and in Santa Barbara, one doesn't quite want to do for ones self!!
We did go see the latest "INDY" flick this am and it was good. Much better than #2 (what wouldn't be) and I think it wrapped things up pretty well. Not sure I believe Shia LaBeouf as an offspring of Karen Allen and Harrison Ford, but hey.
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Our trip to California started with a beautiful drive down Interstate 84 through the Columbia River Gorge. We boarded our plane to San Jose without delay and got the rental car and drove to Fremont. We spent a couple of days with my mother and the girls arrived the day before my m-i-l memorial. Thanks to Anne Halligan and the many neighbors who made this possible. Many old friends were able to attend and share stories of Vi. The girls, Amy and Matt, Tom and I took my mom to our favorite chinese restaurant in town and had our favorite dish. Mashed garlic pork. Lovely, however I don't think my mother thought that the conversation was always entirely appropriate. Oh well, when the girls and I get together we have the most interesting and funny conversations. This one dealt with black holes, the end of time, something about a greek phalanx that I can't repeat here and all kinds of other wonderful things. I got to see a picture of the youngest's new beau. OMG!!!!! Let that suffice for now. Don't want to scare the poor guy off. He is very good looking.
Next was the train ride to Santa Barbara from San Jose. Couldn't have had a nicer day and can you believe that the train was 45 minutes early??? A good time in SB. Rebecca and Dave were able to be there with G squared, the kids, and Amy joined us at the last minute. Thanks to Ruth and Lee for the incredible hospitality as always. Lovely weather. We took the train back to Portland a few days later. The Coast Starlight line now has an old Parlor Car. It is a refurbished 1955 car with wood paneling, club chairs, a bar, and real cloth tablecloths and napkins. It was exquisite to be treated so well. The food was great, the views were great and even though we arrived in Portland a bit behind schedule (4 hours) it was worth it. We decided to stay the night in Portland because we were too tired. It was easy to walk the half mile to the Tri Met station and take the train to the Airport to retrieve our car. Pretty nice time.
Home again and all seems well. It is taking me a while to get back into some kind of routine. After being pampered on the train and in Santa Barbara, one doesn't quite want to do for ones self!!
We did go see the latest "INDY" flick this am and it was good. Much better than #2 (what wouldn't be) and I think it wrapped things up pretty well. Not sure I believe Shia LaBeouf as an offspring of Karen Allen and Harrison Ford, but hey.