The Perfect Day

It's amazing to see how blogging seems to be connecting women from all over.  Crystal, a friend who lives in California, sent me this link and wrote something like, "You should check out this blog.  This woman, Anna Maria, is a fabric designer and she lives in Nashville.  I love her fabrics."  

It turns out that Anna Maria lives in the next town over.  AND, via her blog I discovered that she was heading up a community project to make quilts for the middle Tennessee flood victims.  AND, they were going to get together on Wednesday, October 20th, for their next sewing session.  I emailed Anna Maria and told her that I wanted to help out.

When Wednesday morning rolled around, I started having thoughts like, "What if I'm walking into a group of women who've known each other for 20 years?  That's awkward!"  (My middle school students used to say everything was awkward.)  I almost talked myself out of going, but I'm so glad that I didn't.  It turned out to be the perfect day.  Here's what I loved about it:

• I met lots of interesting ladies, some who had come alone just like me - one woman had moved from Sunnyvale, California three years ago and her husband had worked at Yahoo!  Btw, it turns out that Anna Maria's husband works at Vandy in a department that occasionally works on projects with Howard's department.
• I received training on Tennessean pronunciation and vocabulary.  If you hear the word flares, they might be talking about flowers.  Some people say hit instead of it.  (The woman who told me about that had been skeptical the first time she had heard about it until when one day when she heard a woman commenting on her new baby, "Isn't hit beautiful?") 
• I got to be a small part of the work of dozens of women working together for a good cause.
• I got to hang out all day in a stunningly unique, but simply restored farm home, in a picturesque Fall country setting. 
• It was 72 degrees with cool breezes and blue skies - I worked on the porch for awhile trimming blocks and listening to country western music.

I regret that I didn't take any pictures, but it turns out that Channel 5 was there covering the story.  Even though I'm not in the footage, I promise you I was there!  It was the perfect day.

It's 10:10 AM on 10/10/10

I'm sitting here waiting for the computer clock to change before I hit publish.  Maybe I'm a little OCD - just a little.

Weather Report

Check out this week's weather forecast for Nashville.  If I didn't know any better, I would say this was a forecast from the Bay Area in California.  So far, October is my favorite weather month here.  I hope I didn't just jinx it!

Cheekwood + Chihuly = Surreal

My sister came to visit for ten days.  She left on Saturday so now I have time to write about our adventures.  It's always good to have visitors because 1) it's fun, 2) the house (usually) gets clean, and 3) it motivates Howard and me to do some sightseeing.  Two Saturdays ago (9/18) the three of us discovered Cheekwood together.  

In 1896, Leslie Cheek married Mabel Wood.  Around the same time, Joel Cheek, Leslie's uncle, developed a new blend of coffee that was sold at the best hotel in Nashville, the Maxwell House.  Ring a bell?  Joel's extended family, including Leslie and Mabel, were investors. In 1928, Postum (now General Foods) purchased Maxwell House's parent company, Cheek-Neal Coffee, for more than $40 million.  Can you imagine what $40 million in 1928 would equal today!?!  It's inconceivable.

Leslie and Mabel later built a mansion on 100 wooded acres in West Nashville and named it Cheekwood - a combination of their last names.  Since 1960 Cheekwood has been open to the public and often hosts art exhibits.  When we visited, we were very lucky to stumble upon a Chihuly exhibit.  You're thinking - what in the heck is a Chihuly?

Dale Chihuly is an extremely creative glass artist with a unique and grandiose vision on how to display his stunning work.  If a Chihuly exhibit ever comes to your area, make sure you see it!  I think he had an exhibit in San Francisco not too long ago and we completely missed it!

The foundation for "Saffron Tower" cost 

$1 million to build - there's usually a guard nearby.

Hundreds of pieces had to be assembled.  If you look 

closely, you can see each tube is tied into a support.

Howard's eye for framing photos has really improved.  

I love how he 'captured' the Sphynx woman admiring 

Chihuly's work over her shoulder.

 

This piece is called "Sun", but I think it should be called

"Medusa".

Purple Herons

 

Look at how Howard caught the reflections of "Mille Fiori".

 

Blue Herons

 

Sisters

The only other stat that I can remember from the tour was that the Chihuly exhibit arrived in FIVE semi trucks, each piece individually wrapped.  Howard and I will have to go back to hear all that info again.  We bought annual passes so we're good to go.  We can take three visitors for free each time we go.  If you come to visit us before October 31st, you can experience Chihuly at Cheekwood too.  Book your flight now!  The guest room is ready, mostly.  My sister helped paint and furnish it while she was here.  We only make family work when they visit ;o) 

Thoughts on annual passes:  In each place we live Howard and I always seem to end up with an annual pass to somewhere.  In San Diego it was the San Diego Zoo.  It's no fun paying $30 (now a whopping $37!) for a one-time zoo visit and forcing yourself to stay there all day (until you're exhausted and can't walk another step) just to get your money's worth.  With the annual zoo pass we could go for only a couple hours (guilt free) to make funny faces at the monkeys, admire the hippos, and get a little exercise.  In Massachusetts, we had passes to Old Sturbridge Village.  We loved this place.  It's a living museum with characters dressed in period costumes who demo daily New England life in the early 1800s.  In the Bay Area in California it was Filoli.  Howard frequented this place and took lots of inspiring photos of the gardens there.