Training day

Oh, shoot - having trouble connecting my laptop to the hotel Wi-Fi. I can't imagine why as I doubt anyone else is up at this ridiculous hour. Well, it's not ridiculous for me - it's 5:14 AM. Perfect timing. I was all prepared to load some of the photos from yesterday using my phone as a hotspot but that's not happening.  I just tried again and I have pictures for you. YES - I know I edited pictures before I left, but it seems so out of place to be blogging about them while I'm here!

Let's just say that my new found information on my phone has been most helpful and I was hoping to test out transferring photos this morning. Alas the internet connection has thwarted my efforts, but only temporarily. I have to do some more work on the Wi-Fi transfer of the photos. My phone doesn't seem to want to find my laptop or I didn't give it enough time. No worries - e-mail works just fine.

Still, I'm super happy that I know how to do some of the cool things that I can do on my phone so reading this book has been a great exercise so far. I wonder how much more I could learn if I actually read more books like this or the instructions??

There is so much NEW going to be announced at this convention. NEW this, and NEW that. If I told you - well, I can't. Not yet!!!  That should all be announced on Monday. The only thing I can tell you because it's already out there is that there is a NEW Husqvarna Viking DESIGNER EPIC 2. And oh my - it's pretty spiffy.

I found out that there's a walking trail near the hotel. So I had time to kill before breakfast yesterday and I took myself and my camera (I mean my phone) for a walk. The trail starts just at the end of the hotel. The hotel is 3 or 4 stories high, but it's LONG. Ask me how I know as my room is 66 (out of 84) and it starts at 01 at the elevator! But I take the stairs - god forbid that I would wait for the elevator. Thank goodness I'm a fast walker. I think I've got the entire place nailed down - I know how to get from A to B.

Unfortunatly some of us have to switch hotels in a couple of days. Half of this hotel is under renovation and it didn't get completed on time. So the staff gets moved out and the dealers get moved in. A bit of a nuisance, but the other hotel is very close and is much closer to the geocache that I NEED to get while I'm in Arizona. That'll make Ronda and Laura jealous, although Ronda may have an Arizona geocache. Not sure about that.

The walk was amazing - the length was 2.5 miles which was a perfect walk in the morning. I walked all the way to the end and then back again. Less than 1 hour. And that was stopping for loads of photos. I don't need to take photos this morning. It's an interpretive trail so there was all kinds of information along the trail. I took pictures of all the plants and the info boards.

Start of the trail

There are two main Native American tribes that live in this area. The Pima and the Maricopa. Did you know that they grow cotton in this area. Now if you're a quilter - think about it - Pima and cotton. Yep - this is where PIMA cotton comes from. Who knew????   The things you laern when out on the trail.

PIMA cotton comes from this area

I was a little hesitant to strike out when I saw the sign alerting us to be on the lookout for wildlife - like rattlesnakes, bobcats, coyotes and scorpions. At one point, the sun was in my eyes and I couldn't see anything even with my sunglasses on. The only wildlife I saw was a jackrabbit! It was a beautiful walk.

Danger alert!!!

Sunrise in the desert

I should say that I started out with my fleece jacket on and pants. It's cool in the morning - OK - it was 18 C. I know compared to back home that that's HOT, but it was cool. Remember, I like to be toasty warm. Well, when that sun came up, the jacket came off. It doesn't take long for the temperature to rise when the sun is out. I had pants on as well. This morning, I'm going to tough the first part of the walk with no jacket and shorts. Then I'll be totally comfortable on the way back.

So what did we do all day yesterday? We learned all the amazing projects and topics that we're going to teach next year. Holy - some of these educators are so darned creative! I'll be making those up in December to get ready for the upcoming year. Yeah!!!!

We also helped stuff bags and assemble kits for the attendees that are coming on Sunday.

I'm not a picky eater, but holy - the portion sizes here are HUGE. One plate is enough for two people - easy. It's such a waste. I had soup and a small salad last night with shrimp. I'm not sure what it was, but it didn't sit well with me and I couldn't digest it very well. I'm feeling much better now, but holy. The one meal I eat fairly healthy and it doesn't like me! I didn't sleep as well as I would have liked because of that small detail, but I'll be just fine1!!!

The educators had to make a challenge for the convention. We had access to certain embroidery designs and a theme of organic, we had to make something. If you watched the video in the link for the DESIGNER EPIC 2 above, you understand the whole organic theme. Holy - that took a little bit of thought to come up with an idea, but I'm happy with the one that I made. We get to reveal them this morning to the other educators and then they will be whisked away to be put on display for the dealers to vote.

I needed a small piece of string to finish my project off and I had forgotten to pack one. So I went to the hotel check-in to see if they could find me some. Not in the bell closet. She was going to wait for this morning to ask the purchasing department. I doubt they would have some, but could she check the kitchen - they're bound to have some string. As I was waiting, I was looking at all the artwork - there is tons of it in the hotel. I saw some string balls but I thought it would be highly frowned upon if I scooped a piece of string for my project. Luckily, the kitchen had string!!!

String art

Here's a quilt with wild horses on it that I found on one of the walls. Apparently, there's still a huge herd of wild horses that roam not far from here. Well, in the Wild Horse Pass which is a ways away but still in the area.

Small quilt as part of the hotel artwork

Information on the horse quilt

It's going to be interesting to see how the others interpreted the challenge. That's one of the reasons why I love challenges. To me, the BEST way to learn something or to grow or to encourage your creative side to come out is to participate in a challenge. I've given you the links to several upcoming challenges for the Canadian Quilter's Association. One of them is a postcard, the other is the Trendtex challenge. Seriously - you should think about participating. If you want, I'd be happy to run a lecture on how to tackle a challenge. It's so much fun. Trust me - I've made some duds in my time and I've also been quite successful in my challenges. Each time I finish is a win for me as I'm bound to have learned something.

So think about that!!!!!  The postcard challenge should be super easy. It's really just making a postcard. Hey - I could have a post card class at my house. They used to be all the rage and they are so darn easy. I'm making up a list of classes that I'm holding at my house so if there's something that you want to learn - let me know.

I'm going to see if I can connect to the internet to bring over some pictures. Just hang tight!

Oh - here's a picture from my balcony last night. The quality of the S10 phone as a camera - well in some cases, it beats my full-fledged digital SLR. I know!!!!

View from the balcony

OK -- still have 20 minutes before sunrise, but I'm going to ready to go the minute it starts to get light. I figure the snakes and scorpions won't be out until it gets warm. Coyotes and bobcats?? well - I'll just yell a lot!!!

Have a super day!!!!!

Ciao!!!

Travel Day

While it might be 7:30 back home, it's only 4:30 where I am which is in Phoenix, Arizona. So that means that for the next week, the blog is going to be late!!!

I really tried to go to bed late last night so that I would wake up late. I was still awake at 3 AM. I've been luxuriating in the fact that I don't really have anything to do this morning (well - I have a bit of hand sewing) but I'm just taking it super easy. I don't have a roommate so I can do whatever I want.

As far as travel days go, yesterday was a pretty quiet day. I got to the airport with time to spare as I did NOT want to miss that flight. There's ONE direct flight per day to Phoenix. The bag tag and drop off process went smoothly with NO human intervention required from the airline staff. Isn't that just the weirdest??  Got into line for security which took slightly longer than normal - there seemed to be a jam up in the security machine, however, thank god for the Trusted Traveler line as it was significantly shorter than the regular line.

Then onto the customs area which again is pretty much automatic. The machine didn't even give a hoot that the photo of me taken by the camera was totally unclear - I swear it didn't even do the retina check. One of my fingerprints didn't really register and yet, I was able to walk right through. What the heck is that all about????  And why does the customs guy ask if I have checked luggage?? That's a common thing and I always wondered why? I don't think I've ever had checked luggage coming into the US and I was a tad worried, but he just wanted to confirm that I had luggage.

I met up with my colleagues and we had lunch near our gate. Here's my inexperience in travel. I didn't pay attention to the fact that we were flying Rouge which is one of the airlines run by Air Canada. The flight attendants had different uniforms than what I was used to. I asked - Oh - this is Rouge. OK - I didn't know that. There was NO inflight entertainment. Everyone else knew that because they all had movies on their laptops or phones. I didn't even have a novel with me. I did have my audiobook, but I find that there's so much noise on the plane (airplane noise) that I can't hear well without turning the volume up too high.

I did have the book on my Galaxy s10 so I read a couple more chapters on that. Holy - I'm learning so much about cell phones. I'm going to be able to compete with the younger generations when it comes to knowledge about cell phones. It's kind of exciting actually. OK - I've gone mad. I'm finding a manual exciting??? 

Doesn't matter. Oh - I remembered that I had downloaded some quilting magazines on my iPad so I dug that out. There just wasn't a lot of room to do anything in those seats. And my elbow kept turning on the overhead light. I slept a bit. Now, how is it that when I sleep on a plane, I find my mouth hanging open. Seriously??? That's quite attractive I'm sure. Yet the young woman sitting next to me appeared to be asleep for quite a while and she didn't have her mouth hanging open once.

I did have a little incident on the plane. I should know better and next time - DO NOT let me eat chocolate on the plane. I've said - I ate some chocolate on the plane. I do from time to time indulge in chocolate. I like it. At once point, I realized that a piece of that chocolate landed in my lap and oh dear - it's melted. There was chocolate everywhere. On the seat belt, on my phone and OH MY GOD - in my lap. Well, right in my crotch to be more specific.

It looked like I'd had an accident. HELP!!!!! So I discreetly got up and went to the washroom where I tried to clean it up the best I could. Now my pants were wet.

As we were getting ready to disembark, I noticed there was still some chocolate residue on my pants, but it looked way better than it had been.

Even though I travel with a checked bag, I'm still travelling light compared to my traveling companions who each had TWO checked bags. I couldn't possibly have enough stuff to fill two bags. I don't even want to carry that much stuff around. Let's just say that we filled the Super Shuttle quite nicely with our luggage.

Luggage for FOUR people for one week

Then onto the hotel. I should say RESORT. Of course, Arizona is partially desert and it's so cool to see the cacti. What a cool place. We're staying at the Sheraton Grand at Wild Horse Pass. Check out some of the photos on their web site.

The resort is HUGE and it's gorgeous. It's also isolated. Well, isolated in that the nearest sign of civilization is about 3 KM away. Or is that in miles??? I don't remember.

Plus it's HOT. I threw stuff in my room, changed into shorts and headed out for a quick walk around the property. I love this place. There's a small patch of green grass that is labelled the Wedding Photo Lawn. We met up for dinner at 4 PM Arizona time, but late for us.

Margaret and I walked around a bit more and then everyone retired to their rooms for the evening. I went for another walk. The one thing about this place is that it looks like we are in Disney land. Everything is PERFECT. There isn't a single piece of litter or weed out of place. Fake rocks in the hotel - yep - it looks like Disney. I've taken tons of photos already.

The ceiling in the lobby

Panoramic view from the hotel lobby

I had washed my pants before I went out and left them on the balcony so they could dry in the heat. I LOVE my balcony. Of course, I turned off the air conditioner when I entered the room and left the patio door open last night so I could hear the birds and well - some other animals making weird noises. Hey - I'm on the second floor - I'm OK with that. It's fabulous and before going to bed last night, I sat on the balcony and watched the stars and the moon and just relaxed. It was beautiful.

I read a wee bit about the history of this area. It used to be inhabited by the Pima people. I did a wee bit more research and it would appear that the hotel and the surrounding lands are owned by the Gila River Indian Community and Sheraton was hired to run the resort.  I need more time to finish reading that article.

Today is a day of education stuff for us. I'm so excited about the new products that are coming down the pipeline. Can't say anything yet - but there is lots of exciting stuff coming. Some, I know about, some I know a wee bit about and some I know nothing about!!

There's a "river" that you can rent a paddleboat and go down. It's about 2 1/2 miles long and was built to represent the mighty Gila river that used to run through this area before it was diverted to a damn. But that's kind of cool, however, that isn't going to be in our future as we're now going to be hands down (in the hotel) for the next 7 days.

On that note, I'm out of here. I still have HOURS before I need to make an appearance at our first meeting. What to do? What to do???  Too dark to go for a walk.......yet.

OK - you noticed that I added some pictures of the trip. I figured if I sent them to myself on the phone and resized them while doing so that would work. But where to save them. So I recreated the folder system that I have on my computer at home. I should have done that before, I didn't want too, but there are too many neat things here not to share with you.

Have a super day.

Ciao