What a difference a week makes… Beach Cities Quilters Guild, Orange County CA

It took me most of Tuesday to track down my bottle of hand sanitizer…I had missed buying the big bottles and wipes 🙁 . I looked some more and found five individual Wet Wipes in my crate of travel things and added them to my hand luggage.

Off I went last Wednesday, bound for Southern California. We were being advised to wash our hands and sneeze into a tissue but only the very cautious were staying home…

My flight was changed just before I was due to leave home. SouthWest Airlines were as efficient as ever and had me booked on a new flight before I had chance to work something out for myself. The sun was shining in Oakland where I waited for my connecting flight down to Orange County.

Wendy was waiting for me at the airport but where were my bags? Oops! They had stayed in Oakland. They didn’t make the next flight either. I negotiated with the baggage office to get a few essentials and await my bags the next day…

I was too tired not to sleep well. I had a really cute new outfit for Thursday in my checked luggage but the t-shirt from Target was OK? My standard travel breakfast of two poached eggs (medium), one slice of dry whole wheat toast and fruit was excellent.Sheila arrived to join the fun and Wendy took us off to see the ocean…

It never rains in California, but when it does… yes it pours.

Off to Corona Del Mar,

The promise of tidal pools was not going to entice me across that water…There was a sliver of blue sky to tease us.The flowers enjoyed the rain?Such vivid colors.It was still raining in Crystal Cove.There were no lines for lunch at the ocean front restaurant and we picked a table that wasn’t in the direct line of the leaky roof!

When you travel you get what you get… Childhood vacations in England taught me that…

Yes! The delivery driver had just pulled up in front of the hotel when when we drove up after our adventures. I had couple of hours for a hot shower and change of clothes and to sort my stuff out for the evening meeting of the Beach Cities Quilters Guild.

The meeting started with some business. Here’s the mini quilt that was being raffled. The lucky winner was announced at the end of the meeting.There were lots of quilts ready to be given to various local organizations.And then it was my turn. The news was getting worse… there were rather a lot of empty seats when I looked out from the podium…I knew it wasn’t anything personal.We enjoyed our Trip Around the World in Folk Art Stitches and Sheila and I were kept busy in my little pop up shop once my talk was over. This is my view of Show and Tell!My Walking Foot Quilting class had been sold out in advance and we only lost two people… Sanitizing wipes were available…I was warned that the students probably wouldn’t want to stay until four o’clock… Really? I took it as a compliment when that was found to be untrue…

Organic curves were a hit!Lots of new ideas to get those quilt tops finished into quilts.

It was still raining when Johannes took me to dinner at Dana Point. These poinsettias were enjoying the showers.
Patricia picked me up for an early flight on Saturday morning. I had my favorite row all to myself… there were just fifty passengers for our quick hop to Las Vegas.I made sure to record the sunshine as we took off past the Strip…
Another row to myself… Steve was waiting for me at Midway, my bags came through and now I’m home.

I wasn’t planning on spending much time In Naperville this spring…

My first cancellation came through when I was on that outward flight and since then three more events have been removed from my schedule. One has already rebooked for next year. My thinking is to keep my options open for the next few months. Travel funds are accumulating in my Southwest account. I hope I will be able to use them before they reach their expiration date. We were going to go and visit the family in England the first two weeks of April. That’s not going to happen 🙁

Time to hunker down and make something? There might be some new embroidery designs on the horizon. I quilted a small piece yesterday. How are you spending your enforced hours at home? I’m trying really hard to not waste the unexpected extra “leisure time”.

I will be writing again soon, with pictures!