This has been a week spent in the car rather than my sewing room. Some months ago, I enrolled Julia in a class at our ‘local’ state university. They hold summer academy classes in a range of subjects for high school age kids. She wanted to take the Forensic Science class. This academy is very well done. She has a professor from the college and only 16 students are in each class. She has been working on extracting DNA from samples of blood and learning about how things are done at a crime scene. She loves the class. This girl loves her science.
The university is about 1 and 1/4 hours from our house. Her class lets out at 5:00 which is, naturally, prime traffic time so the commute home is long and tedious. It has been worth it though to hear the stories of what she is working on. Choosing to live in the rural area that we do means driving your kiddos all over kingdom come in order to expose them to all the experiences a child needs.
We spent one night in a hotel near the university to avoid a couple of the drives. I brought my small sewing machine and set up shop for a day and an evening.
I made a bit of progress on a new project I am just starting. I am using some of the blue fabrics from the vintage collection that I posted about here. I cut strips from the blue scraps and joined those in sets of three strips. Each stripset was then sub-cut into strips that are 1 and 3/4″ wide. Those strips were then joined to make tiny 3″ nine patch blocks. The little nine patch blocks are the cutest. I will be combining those blocks with solid 3″ blocks into a larger, double nine patch to end up with a 9″ block. I have made about 25 of the baby blocks and need 100 so I am just getting started.
Hopefully I will get caught up this weekend. It is supposed to be fairly warm so I don’t see that I will be outside very much. Spending the week in Sacramento with my daughter really made me appreciate living in the Sierra Foothills. Sacramento is so darn hot – it was 107 degrees today! In addition, the traffic is lousy. We are so lucky to have nice cool nights and no traffic. I am thankful for our little town in the mountains.
Hope everyone has a wonderful weekend!
Linking to Yvonne at Quilting Jetgirl and Let’s Bee Social.
It is nice to live in a rural setting and a great place for raising a family, I agree. Your devotion to your daughter and her interests is commendable, Bernie. And your nine patches look fabulous! Those are some pretty cute prints. Looking forward to seeing your progress!
I am sure you end up doing the same sorts of things with your daughters. It is just part of the deal. We live in a tiny area and there really aren’t a lot of extra academic-related activities so we end up driving for these things. It’s all worth it. Take care Lorna!
I’m glad, despite the rush hour traffic driving, you’ve got to see many advantages living out of the city. The overnight stay in the hotel with your daughter and sewing machine must have been a nice break too – I guess there was air con?! Have a good weekend too!
There are so many advantages to living in the country, at least in my opinion. I suppose it is really just whatever works for each of us. I did enjoy my one afternoon of sewing – it was worth staying the night. Otherwise I would have been a whole five days without any stitching! Horrors 🙂
I love your tiny nine-patches. The colors and prints are so vivid. I’m sure the bonding time with your daughter was the upside of those long commutes. There’s just something about car trips with a teenager to open up communication. Stay cool!
You are so right. With all of my kids, it seemed like the car was a great place for conversation. Either that or they just put their heads back and sleep (which is also good sometimes!) Today is the last day of class and then we get back to normal.
Have a great weekend Janine.
B.
What a cool experience for your daughter – I would have loved taking a class like that, too! And yay for portable sewing; a great way to pass some time! 🙂
I love the little 9-patches! You are quite dedicated–usually when I’m in a hotel I just lay on the bed and watch movies. Something about it saps all my strength. And bless you for driving so much for an opportunity for your daughter! Hope you have a great weekend with no driving!
It gave me something to do. We did lay around and watch movies in the evening. I am so glad to be done with all of that driving…. I don’t plan on doing much over the weekend. Just happy to be home!
Take care,
B.
107 degrees is a ridiculous temperature. I am of the opinion that it should never go over 72 degrees : )
I completely agree! I am not a hot weather person. Our summers are normally pretty warm tho. It is hard not to wish it away. Time goes by so fast that I try not to do that but in this kind of heat I start really looking forward to fall!!
I love the blues in the ninepatch. I’m glad Julia enjoyed the forensics class, sure sounded interesting. Drove an hour and a half to Pueblo for baseball up and back yesterday. Today we are making the drive once and staying over. Wish I had something to do in the hotel, will probably read and watch movies!
Love you! Juanita
Nothing wrong with reading and a couple of good movies. Hope it isn’t too hot in Pueblo. Are they winning?
I can’t wait for this heat wave to break. I am worthless when it is over 95. Yesterday in Sacramento I saw numerous people on campus sitting in the shade wearing jeans and long sleeved tshirts. It was incredibly hot. Long sleeved tshirts?? One guy was jogging at 5:00 pm at 107 degrees. Really?? To each his own. ? have fun with Sam.
I read this and thought about it all day, then forgot to come back and comment! You are such a good Mom. I’m so glad you encourage the scientific mind. I encouraged both my kids not to be afraid of math and science (I have a degree in mathematics, but I’ve forgotten everything – everything!). My son is a computer programmer, and my daughter now works in the geology side of oil & gas. She considered a degree in forensics for a long time and still is fascinated by it. Good for Julia!
Wow, what a nice comment! We do encourage her in all of the STEM fields because that is where her strengths lie. Plus I want her to be able to have a lucrative career and be able to fully support herself. Unfortunately, that is harder to do if you have a focus in liberal arts. She LOVED the class. Talked about collecting samples, and extracting and purifying DNA and seemed to really understand it. It will be interesting to see what path she chooses down the line. My degree was in child development and math was always a pain for me. Are your kids living anywhere near you? Two of my four live across the country from me so I hardly get to see them. Take care Linda.
That is so cool! Sounds like a class that I would love to take. So glad you can give her that experience.
This class was just a lucky find. She had such a great experience with it. There is so much available out there once you start looking.
Thanks for visiting Diana!