Whole-Hearted

Good morning, my friends. There was another pretty sunrise this morning. 

And it was a good day for sewing yesterday. The weather is a smidge cooler, and Mike went out for a couple of bike rides. I spread out on every available surface with the hope I could finish the Vintage Valentine quilt top. So, let's just see how that went.

You might remember I was planning to redo the top row of the heart. I wasn't happy with the background fabrics at the edge of the heart. It messed up the shape of the heart.

So I took out the two pieced blocks and set them aside. My plan was to use them elsewhere. So, I first needed to make another pinwheel and a broken dishes block.

When I had them sewn into the top row, they looked like this. I like that better.

Okay, continuing on, I needed blocks for the second row. As I made the blocks, I counted up how many I would need in other rows, and made them all at once. That was the plan, at least. I miscounted in a couple of places. The second row had a rail fence block. I needed two for the quilt. All of these blocks finish up at 2-3/4 inches.

Also I made two 4-patches. Only one was needed for the second row. I switched to my wool pressing mat for this, but I’m still having trouble getting them to lie flat. Next trip, I’m bringing my clapper. 

Also...a bow tie block.

This one is called a Yule Log.

And this one is called Homeward Bound.

When I had all the blocks I needed for the second row, I sewed them together,

And then sewed them to the top portion of the heart.

For the third row, I needed an hour glass block. (I didn't get my points matched up very well, but I left it as it was.)

And then, I needed two 9-patches.

Also, I needed one of these...this is called a Lincoln Log. (Sorry for the blur.)

This one also used one of the rail fence blocks I made earlier. When it was sewn to the top of the heart, it looked like this.

Next, I needed a friendship star. (The friendship star is one of my favorite quilt blocks.)

Here I used the pinwheel and the broken dishes blocks I'd made earlier. When they were all sewn together, it looked like this:

Next, I needed another Yule Log...

And another 9-patch.

By then, I was on the home stretch.

I just needed to sew the final blocks to the bottom of the heart, and it was finished.

It still needed borders. The pattern claims this will finish at 13-1/2 x 16 inches. Mine ends up at 16-1/2 x 18-1/2 inches. I'm not sure what accounts for such a large discrepancy, and I suspect that’s a typo. 

I could not have completed this quilt top without the assistance of my excellent sewing cat.

So that was a good day of sewing. I'm always happy when I can finish a top. The weather has turned a little bit cloudy. We've intentionally put off our indoor to-do items for the cooling weather. Today, we're going to head to the Bellagio Hotel & Casino. They have a Bellagio Conservatory & Botanical Garden that is free and open to the public 24 hours per day, 7 days per week. Seems like a good way to spend the day.

We have just three more days here in Boulder City (including today), and so we'll be winding things up here. Our next stop will be just a couple of hours north of where we are now, in Pahrump, Nevada. There's nothing special about Pahrump, except that we like the RV park there. We'll be there for another two weeks.

Okay, and that's all the news I have for you today. I'm hoping I'll have some pretty botanical images for you tomorrow. 

Keyhole Canyon

Good morning, my friends. We had a good day yesterday...a short, but breathtaking hike, and then plenty of rest and relaxation later in the day. Before we left the RV, I noticed Smitty has a red scratch on his nose. He likes to bully Sadie sometimes, and sometimes she has to put him in his place.

Try that again, Big Boy.

Okay, so with peace established, we headed south from Boulder City. Looking at the image below, you might notice a bright white line running horizontally near the middle of the image.

Several large-scale solar arrays are located here in the Eldorado Valley, forming one of the largest solar hubs in the United States. Key projects include the 802 MW Copper Mountain Solar Facility, the 300 MW+ Techren Solar Project, and the 150 MW Boulder Solar project. It appears there will be more added too. In the image below, you can see more solar panels in the distance. The large dirt area in the foreground appears to be in preparation for more. For now, we saw some motorcyclists out there enjoying the wide open spaces.

We turned off the main highway at Route "S". We had four miles of dirt road to travel before reaching the canyon. (Sorry for the reflections in some of these images…bright sunshine.)

It was a rough road, except for this one mile or so traveling between two rows of power lines. With so much solar power and hydroelectric power, we have a feeling electricity is relatively inexpensive in this area.

We could see the mouth of the canyon as we approached.

This is such a remote hike that not many people travel out here to see it. The rules were simple...mainly, pack it in, pack it out.

Passing through the opening and looking left, we were agape with wonder at these rocky walls. These were probably about 100 feet high.

Looking a little to the right, Mike is there for scale.

Here, two big rocks fell together to form this tunnel. It went all the way through to the rocks on the other side.

And, yikes! I wouldn't have wanted to be standing there when this big rockfall came down.

Here's another big rock wall. The fractures in the rocks were fascinating.

This was a sort of cave. It looks like someone has been camping here, but it would have made a good shelter for indigenous peoples.

Turning around from there, this is a 30 foot dry waterfall. If we'd had our climbing equipment (as if), we could have climbed up here to get to an upper trail. 

As I mentioned in yesterday's post, this was a little confusing when I compared online information with the information in our hiking book. It seems you can reach the upper part of the trail one canyon south of where we were. We turned off on Route "S." If we'd gone a little farther to Route "T," we would have found the upper part of the trail. It would have required rappelling in spots, and, um, I'm not really up for that. 

Here's another look at these amazing rock walls.

I've seen better petroglyphs than these, but I'll give them credit for being some of the oldest I've seen. It's estimated some of these are as much as 1,000 years old. Imagine that.

The desert gold poppies were blooming in abundance.

Here's a close-up.

This next one is Desert Chicory.

It's distinctive for the pink stripes on the undersides of its petals.

My phone tells me this is Chlyismia, a kind of evening primrose.

Heading back had me thinking about the mountains. These are old mountains, taken down by erosion from what might have been loftier heights at one time. The youngest mountains are red in color, indicating the presence of iron and manganese.

These darkest black mountains were formed from ancient volcanic activity, and they are among the oldest mountains in this area.

I was contrasting them with the peaky peaks we saw in Alaska (the image below was taken near Palmer, Alaska), where the mountains are still being pushed up. The sharp peaks indicate younger mountains. And so in less than a year, we've seen extremes in mountain building and decay.

Okay, so that was our day. There was a pretty sunrise this morning. It’s a good way to start any day.

Today we'll have another chill day. I'm fully intending to get out my sewing machine today, and I've encouraged Mike to go ride his bike. I want to make some progress on my Vintage Valentine quilt. If I'm to have it finished by Valentine's Day (not really a goal), then I need to get going. Time's a-wasting.