A Quilt Week Walk -or three - Come on Along! (and a treasure)

First, look at this lovely painting that a dear, dear reader sent of Giacomino and Maria!

Thank you Sharon, I absolutely treasure it!

Today marks the end of Quilt Week in Paducah.

30,000 quilters come to our city of 27,000 (they outnumber us!) to experience all that is the Annual Quilt Show and Contest of the American Quilter's Society. People from Australia, Japan, Wisconsin, Colorado, Sweden, France, Brazil, and all over this good world.

The Quilters love Paducah. And, dear readers, it is reciprocal. Paducah loves the quilters. We are the home of The Museum of the American Quilter's Society, and because of all of this, Paducah is known as Quilt City, USA.

These quilters aren't ho-hum, no, no, no. They are fiber artists. Take a look HERE. If you're new to quilting, check out Mountain Chapel, My Home Town, and Feather Story. HOLY SCHMOLY!!! Can you believe they do that with fabric!!!! Zounds.

But walks must go on, Quilt Week or no, they simply take on a new and exciting flavor. The first walk is Mama Pajama, Spice and Easy. We go collect Tracey and Francie and meet sweet neighbor Stefanie, who joins us. (Tracey said, "Don't you put me in this picture on your blog. Don't you do that!" So I didn't.)

L to R - Spice, Easy, Mama Pajama, Francie in the foreground, Stef holding the leads


Then we said hey to our sweet neighbor Kate, who was out working on her beautiful gardens.

Francie wondered what the heck all of these cars were doing in our little neighborhood. Hmmm?

The first walk completed, we headed off on the second walk.

L to R - Fat Charlie who really had to poop bad, Francie, Delia, and Luciano. Legs? Whose legs? What legs? Those are not Tracey's gorgeous long legs. They are not. I said "No your legs aren't in the photo. Don't worry about it. Nowhere near."

The third and final walk is the longest. We go all the way to the river with the young'uns, which takes us through downtown. There we can take pictures of ourselves, reflected in the store windows.

L to R - Francie, Tracey who appeared to be getting in this photo on purpose, uh-huh, sure looks to me, Swede William, Lindy Loo, your writer, Sam I Am.

Oh, yeah, now she's even posing!

Paducah's charming Renaissance District (downtown, and our adjoining neighborhood of Lowertown) was teeming with fun people. And so many of them were missing their dogs at home.

"Look! Greyhounds!"

Oh, dear readers, I would be one wealthy person if I had a ha'penny for every time I heard those words. And each time, ("Are they all rescued?") I have to decide whether to smile and walk on, or explain that these look like greyhounds, only they're smaller and they're actually their own whole breed. Whippets.

People don't like to be wrong.

Sometimes they try to convince me. "No, them are greyhounds."

Sigh.

But during Quilt Week, particularly the Brits and the Aussies chorus, "Lovely whippets! Lovely dogs!" Smilin' words.

After all that walking, Tracey and I had worked up a powerful hunger and it was lunch time and we noticed, lo and behold, that we had arrived back in our neighborhood at our favorite coffee house, Et Cetera.

The dogs checked the pretty flowers for huntable bumble bees, and we...

... PIGGED OUT! Homemade spinache quiche right out of the oven, fresh strawberries with yogurt and granola and a peach Izzie for me. YUMMMMMMM. Tracey started out with quiche and just strawberries, but she went back later and got the yogurt and granola too.

(Did I mention yumm? I think I did. In case I didn't: YUMMMMM.)

Et Cetera owner Allan is painting a labyrinth. It is way beyond cool, and another example of the magic of this place.

When we got home, we wallered on the porch. After all that pigging out, wallerin' was about all I was good for.

Easy is learning that folks who walk by our sidewalk are okay. Last evening, instead of barking at a group of home tour-ers, he ran and got the giant moose toy and brought it to them. He set to pulling Mr. Moose's mane off, which lodged in Easy's teeth, giving him the silliest beard!

Neighbor Auntie Karen had her iPhone and got these precious shots (you can click to enlarge, use your back button to return):

hug your hounds