Art and Alexandria

Come on in and sit awhile... I have a few pictures to show you of our travels the last couple of days. DH is required to take the week off between Christmas and New Years, so we catch up on museums, shopping, and movies during this week. On this Dark and Stormy night, we visited the National Gallery of Art in DC.

The lights shining against the cloudy sky made for a spectacular "movie set" kind of feel to the place.

I took many pictures to play with later in composition as one of my goals this year artistically is to learn more about manipulating the digital image, printing and making altered art. I'm interested  in developing a personal use of the technique so it's going to be a learning curve. I've got ideas....

 Again, the lights bouncing off the clouds made for dramatic lighting. This is the view outside between the two Gallery buildings. If you peer down into the glass structures you'll see inside one of their gift shops.

DH dropped me off to shop and parked the car.
Of course the first thing I did, after going through security digging through my bag, was check out exhibits of interest that were closing soon. Then I might as well shop while waiting for Drew, and since I was given a 20% off coupon, the game was afoot.

isn't this a wonderful pattern?? paving stones outside the building

I found some treasures for the studio, including a dry erase board, and a magnetic figure of an artist to move around it for fun, a necklace of glowing colored crystals and Drew found an artistic bow tie for our NYE dance. Another learning curve, how-to-tie-a-bow-tie.
On our long walk to the first exhibit, of Charles Marville, click here photographs of Paris in 1850's before the ancient buildings were demolished to make the large streets of today, we walked through the antique furniture exhibit where I took the photo of the yellow divan. Oh, to have the space to live with this furniture!
The photography exhibit was fabulous, and we met interesting people looking at the photos. One couple had been to Paris, and told us all about their trip. Another woman just had to correct my pronunciation of the name Eugenie, as apparently it MUST be spoken only in French, ooh lala. She then told us more about the history of the period than we thought we needed to know. The Nat. Gallery of A is the only place I've been corrected numerous times, unasked, on name pronunciation. Thanks, y'all.
We then visited the exhibit of Yes,No, Maybe where a group of print artists discover what quilters know, that you can add elements til it's too much, then take some away, and decide if it's enough, needs more or is too too much already!

 The next day we went to Alexandria VA to walk-with-poodle and enjoy the decorations. We visited the dog treat store, and along the way saw
This wonderful place!

 I coveted nearly all I saw in this shop, Decorium.
These feather duster pink trees were awesome!
Not exactly panetone's color of the year, but a cousin.

Then there was this enormous round shelf. If it hadn't cost so much cost more than we have to spend right now, I'd still be downtown Alexandria wrestling it into the car!!
I saw many large banquets, and even more really large hanging light fixtures and chandeliers that I could imagine glowing in our little cluttered house-that-needs-too-much. I HAVE good taste people, just not the wherewithall to use it. 

And then there was this chair with a wee little drawer  apparently just right for a remote control, heehee.
Or a pin cushion...

When you are already this close, and you have a 25% off coupon good for one more day, one absolutely must go visit Jenny Beyer's studio to seek some more fabric. She has moved from mainly traditional patterns to the most yummy modern blenders and I covet all of them. Yep, I'd make room in the stash for lots more.

After a lot of deliberation I decided the three shades of concrete on the left here, would be perfect to build a border on my tumbling blocks hand piecing project that is almost done. There has been some movie watching time, and some car riding time to sew, and although I haven't shared this quilt with you yet, it's soooooo cool to me, and about ready for borders of "concrete"
The other fabrics are for the petting stash, oh go ahead click on the image and see them close up, so nice... And I got a sale pattern, bwaahaahaa, LeeAnna following a pattern! I think I can do it, and it's got paper piecing as well as circles... whee!
Tomorrow I plan to share my New Year's quilt and a few goals with you all. Hope you had fun with us this season. There's a contra dance tonight so we can start the new year doing what started our marriage, dancing. Want to see more about contra?? check out this post
LeeAnna