Quilting in the Desert

I've been traveling since last week, which explains why I haven't posted in awhile.  I am in Phoenix at a quilting retreat called Quilting in the Desert.  The original plan was that one friend and I would leave home on Thursday and drive to Santa Fe, shop at Santa Fe Quilting Friday morning and a couple of Albuquerque shops Friday afternoon, then drive to Phoenix on Saturday.  That changed when an ice storm was predicted for Wednesday night/Thursday morning.  We left home after my physical therapy appointment (for my ankle) on Wednesday afternoon and drove as far as Amarillo.  We shopped Santa Fe Quilting Thursday afternoon and spent the night in Santa Fe.  We shopped Quilts Ole and Southwest Decoratives (in Albuquerque) on Friday and spent the night in Gallup.  Then we drove to Phoenix on Saturday, going through Sedona on the way (what a beautiful drive that was!).  We picked up another friend at the airport on Sunday morning.  They treated me to a (late) birthday lunch Sunday at a very nice restaurant called Lon's at Hermosa Inn.

My workshops started on Monday.  I've been taking Abstracting from Nature from Jane Sassaman for the past 3 days.  It's been a wonderful class!  She has very patiently guided us through the process of designing our own quilts.  This is what I've been working on:

Abstracting From Nature - Coneflowers

It isn't anywhere near finished in this picture.  In fact, nothing is stitched.  And the white "stems" are just paper place holders.  But I did manange to get a little tiny bit of stitching done after taking this photo, and I'm very happy with how it's going.

Tomorrow I will take Altered Photo Artistry from Beth Wheeler (who has written 2 books on the subject).  We were to email her a photo of a flower before the class, and then she will have altered it and printed it on fabric for us.  We'll use thread painting and free motion quilting techniques on it.  I had chosen a coneflower photo to work on, which is one reason I've been doing coneflowers in Jane Sassaman's class too - I thought it would be really interesting to do 2 quilts on the same subject matter in very different styles. 

Then on Friday I will take Out on a Limb from Wendy Butler Berns, where we'll be doing a little tree quilt and learning several texturing techniques.    I'll try to post more pictures in the next couple of days.  We're leaving on Saturday and will be home on Sunday.  It's been a fun time so far.