Sisters Outdoor Quilt Show 2023

 I am away from my home computer where I keep all my construction photos, so how about something different? I'm going to have to entertain you this week with some pics from this year's Sisters Outdoor Quilt Show (lucky you!).

This is the largest outdoor quilt show in the world, with over a thousand quilts scattered throughout the town. The quilts are a mix of traditional, modern, antique, "professional" and simple quilts.

 

 I was impressed with the choices that were made in grouping the quilts and how they coordinated in some way with the Western-themed buildings and surrounding landscaping.

I won't say that these photos are of all my favorites, because often I was just staring in awe and not taking pictures:)

 However, this one had to be a favorite! It was hanging from the porch of the Suttle Tea shop. (My companions and I had to swing back to this shop for some iced tea later, and oh was their Lavender Peach tea delicious!)

The quilting was exceptional on this one.

 

An interesting quilt...

 ...with and interesting back!

This isn't my style, but it is amazing work.

 

I liked this idea of a pastel background color.

A puzzle.

Just squares and rectangles!

Wildflowers in jars, just like in my kitchen windowsill at home!

 

Most quilting seems to be machine-done nowadays, and the quilting is just as amazing as the piecing. 

 

I had to stare at it a while to "find the block" on some. Is there a slight curve element to these blocks or is that just the quilting?

 

Which books would these be in your library?

 

The work on this was exceptional!

The quilts on this building seemed to be a color theme. Was it pinks?

Quilt-in-a-quilt

 

We saw many variations of log cabin quilts.

 

Several quilts were enlarged "blocks."

 

These two quilts are not "my style," but I was fascinated by them. So much to look at!

A "sampler" with teeny tiny pieces.

Blue and Yellow, a classic combination!

There was a row that was all "waterworks" themed wall-hangings. I should have taken more pictures of the quilts there-- it was really interesting to see all the interpretations of that theme!

 

A lovely garden arbor.  

 

This was a Christmas-themed quilt; I liked the combination of colors!

 

Bee-utiful!

Shoo-fly in small, medium and large

 

A gorgeous medallion!

 

This star themed quilt is quite striking in its eye-catching blue-and-white color scheme. 

 

We noticed plenty of teal-aqua quilts around, but somehow we missed the display that was "just teals!" 

And I forgot to take any photos of the tree-themed (in green and autumn colors) display, because I was having an interesting conversation with Nony from Netherlands. Nony, if you read this, it was fun to meet you!

This quilt was befitting of the area, which has the awesome Cascade mountain views.

I had to get in line to photograph this one!

 With thousands of people from all over coming to this quilt show, it was hard to avoid people in the quilt photos. 

But I did start to notice a theme with the people photos...

 

 These kind ladies apologized for being in the way, but they coordinated so well with the quilt!

 

I guess you are attracted to your favorite colors, and you tend to wear your favorite colors!

(this was on a row of black and white themed challenge quilts; the quilters were allowed one other color.)

I don't have any photos of what I wore, but I wonder if I was walking up to coordinating quilts myself?!

DIY countertops?

Do you think that picking out countertops would be the fun and easy part of this house build?

😆😆😆😆

Trust me, I did my research. I will spare you the details!

No, it wasn't going to be marble or soapstone or slate. Sigh. Yes, it was going to be a DIY project.  

One of my temporary kitchens

Our options left were wood, stainless steel and...tile. (Thankfully we closed the door on DIY epoxy countertops, because I can't imagine the mess that would have been!) Can you believe it become another tile decision? Probably influenced by my temporary kitchen tile "counter" (which was only for keeping the toaster oven from melting the plastic table underneath). 

The idea was tempting. We already had the tools for tiling work. I heard it was hard to clean tile countertops though.

Still, it was a tad cheaper than quartz countertops, and we could save the cost of labor by asking our in-house tile guy to do it.

One thing was for sure, no one wanted to figure out how to tile around the sink. It was finicky business. After a lot of discussion, we decided to do sink section that would be on its own and make it out of quartz. 

We found a "bargain" remnant in grey, that we thought would go with any material we chose for the counters.

There was some investment in tools to be able to cut quartz, of course, and some training to be found on YouTube.

The edge had to be shaped to match the sink bump-out. 

Of course it was not perfect on the first try. 

In the end, this piece sits up on the hill waiting to be useful with a shop sink someday. Thus ended phase one of "DIY countertops."

The Stove Saga

Do you have the idea firmly in your mind by now that we spent days, nay, weeks of our lives on research during this house build? 

Anyone else in the world would simply go and buy a stove at an appliance store. Well, I tried that too. 

The Stove Saga

Our "one chance" to have a brand new kitchen was our "one chance" to have NEW appliances. And of course, we wanted appliances that would not end up being hauled to the dump anytime soon. So we burned our eyes our researching stoves, reading reviews, and checking prices. 

We needed a particular stove, too (of course!). Our kitchen design needed a slide-in stove, not a free standing one. Electric, not gas. And I was too frustrated with glass-top stoves and wanted old-fashioned coils. By now loyal readers will guess that I also required manual dials and not flat-panel buttons.

We went to local appliance places to see what we could get that very day. Interestingly, there was not a lot of info about customer service and satisfaction in these places, no signs with such common phrases as "your satisfaction guaranteed or your money back!" You had to press the salesperson, and then it was revealed that they didn't really have many (or any) guarantees. 

So we went to Lowe's to see what we could get that very day. We kept running into a salesman who was talking us OUT of everything. "The problem with this one is, you can't get parts for it." "The problem with this one is, people keep frying the mother board. If you never use the self-cleaning function, you'll be fine." "I don't like that brand, but they make a great dishwasher." It was an odd shopping experience, but great to get an honest salesman! There was one thing the  salesman was finally trying to talk me into: glass top stoves. "As long as you don't scrape a pan across it, just lift it, you will be fine. Use this stove cleaner and don't rinse it off." Hmm. I wanted to plop down a  cast-iron skillet or use a giant canner on my stove, not something that can't handle real life. 

We went to a used appliance store to see what we could get that very day. It was a rather sad looking selection. 

We went to Craiglist frequently to see what might pop up. We gave Consumer Reports $10 to "unlock" their magical secret ratings. We upped our price range and looked at $1500 stoves. We got caught in the web of  online reviews.  I talked to friends: "My GE stove has been going for 29 years, but you know they don't make them like they used to." The pretty Costco Samsung appliance packages were tempting.

 I finally called some repairmen. "I'm looking at a Samsung..." I said. The answers were surprising.  "STAY AWAY FROM IT!!! We service them, but they have sooooo many sensors." And another said, "I wouldn't touch a Samsung with a ten-foot-poll. Buy American." Just as the Lowe's salesman had told me, getting parts for foreign brands was troublesome. This was the smartest bit of research I have ever done on an appliance: Call a Repairman first!

After three weeks, the fun of shopping had gone away. We just wanted something that would cook our dinner. My husband tried Craigslist one more time, and found a used 2013 GE stove in Washington State for $300. It looked to be in pretty good shape. He spent a day and some gas to go and see it, but it was worth it! 

Cleaning my new kitchen companion

Adjusting the slide-in-stove

Yes, it was a glass top. Compromises must be made. It must have been a stove from a vacation home because the top was nearly pristine. It was missing one part (an oven "sensor" for meat), and something had obviously exploded in the oven, but once that was cleaned up it was obvious this was a hardly used appliance.

The Carpenter built out a section to match the kitchen sink area

As you can imagine, despite being in the middle of construction, we started to use that big, wonderful appliance right away. It had even more perks than I thought it would.  I don't know how I got along all these years without a convection oven with three racks. I frequently use the "proof" function for dough.  It has a bonus high-power burner for boiling, and a warming burner.  Although I still forget to "lift" pans on the glass top and not pull them across, I have followed the advice to not rinse the cleaner off, and my stovetop has stayed quite nice. I never use the "self-clean" function and rarely put the oven past 450 degrees (to keep from "frying the mother board") so I think it will last a long time ;) 

It was just in time for a birthday "pizza party."

Kitchen Cabinets Part 2

 

Having retained our in-house carpenter, the kitchen cabinet building continued. Once all those boxes were built and in place, they were joined together and faced over with a lovely hardwood strip of wood to hide the join (we built the house of mostly fir, so I learned to appreciate those skinny strips of expensive hardwood!).

All this time we were taking any available surface we could for food prep. Here you see the top of the freezer being used for cinnamon-roll making. Note the sign: "All items must be cleared from this surface and surface cleaned after each use. Violaters will be prosecuted to the full extent of the law."  Unloading tools from the freezer access could delay dinner, and this was prime real estate so it had to be highly protected. It was hard keeping a surface clear anywhere in the house, as rare as they were! 

Once the sub-counter-top was installed, the surface was instantly useful as a tool-bench. 

Since we had a hiccup with the depth of the cabinets, some adjustments had to be made. Out came the sawz-all, and we once again proved that Good Design can solve problems. In order to accommodate the large sink, a bump-out was installed. I love it! The sink is a heavily used area, and I like that it isn't just in a line with the rest of the cabinets. Without having to do this bit of design work, we may have never thought of this idea. 

The Carpenter was then in charge of figuring out how to install the foot pedals and make them work with a regular sink faucet. 

I liked the idea of foot pedals (the idea was borrowed from medical facilities) because if you have dough, meat juice, or any other kitchen work on your hands you don't have to touch your faucet handle. We like to say that we were germaphobes before it was popular.

The bigger reason for the foot pedals was water conservation. From rinsing dishes off for the dishwasher to soaping up your hands, there is no reason to leave the water running. For some reason it is easier to remember to let up on the foot pedal than it is to remember to reach your hand over and stop the faucet temporarily. 

We could have gotten one of those "motion sensor" faucets, which would have been less of a headache to install. There were a couple counts against them: often the batteries were placed in an awkward spot, (and the idea of having to replace batteries in general was not favored), and we had heard reviews about the faucets malfunctioning (turning on when someone walks by, etc). 

Of course we chose the one option that took MOUNTAINS of work and research and phone calls and hardware store visits. And the one option that hardly anyone else was doing. Actually, it may have only been us and the guy on the Amazon review (thank you, Guy on the Amazon review, for putting in the details of your installation!).