*playiing cards with the neighbors

Always so enjoyable to read about your quilt retreat. And always helpful to see how others adjust and deal with their food.

Chloe
Healing is grand

: *4 Sandhill Cranes in our field
: *hearing many flocks of cranes
: calling as they flew north for the
: night, lots of sparrows chirping
: from the hedge, and a Great Horned
: Owl calling at twilight
: *a single red Christmas ornament on
: an evergreen tree outside the
: window at the dentist office
: *snow-covered mountains
: *watching cranes land in a field
: *a cute, colorful rug with an animal
: alphabet for my office

: On Saturday, I helped to make a
: quilt. One of the organizations I
: volunteer with, Hawks Aloft, makes
: a fundraising quilt every year.
: The director is a well-known
: quilter who teaches quilting
: classes, and she designs the
: quilt. Then a team of volunteers
: makes the quilt top. About half
: the people who help make the quilt
: are quilters, and the other half
: of us are not. I am not. So those
: of us who are not quilters make
: the simpler parts of the quilt,
: making the same blocks over and
: over, usually the ones that go
: around the border. We usually all
: go up to the director's cabin in
: the mountains to make the quilt,
: so there are about 12 of us there
: from Friday night until Sunday
: morning, sleeping 4 to a bedroom
: and taking turns cooking for the
: group. This year, there was too
: much snow in the mountains, so we
: worked at someone's house instead.
: The cabin is fun, but having the
: one-day event at someone's house
: was better in some ways, because I
: got a good night's sleep before
: the work began, I got to eat my
: regular breakfast, and I only had
: to worry about 2 meals.

: I have always taken food with me to
: the retreat. Before I stopped
: eating gluten, all I really
: worried about was adequate
: protein. I would take almond milk
: and Restore to drink when I got
: up, because breakfast was never
: within an hour. I'd also take some
: protein, like grilled chicken, in
: case a meal was low on protein.
: Id' eat whatever was served and
: supplement the protein. But now
: that I don't eat gluten, I have to
: take a lot more backup food. This
: year, we only ate two meals at the
: retreat, and I took alternative
: foods for both meals. I was able
: to eat the lunch that was served,
: but the dinner had gluten in it,
: so I ate the salad and my own
: chicken and brown rice. If I were
: still eating gluten, all the food
: would have worked well enough for
: me.

: The quilt is beautiful. It took
: longer than usual this time. It's
: really big and there were a lot of
: blocks to make for the border. It
: seemed like billions, so we
: started calling it the Sagan
: quilt. You can see the quilt if
: you go to the Hawks Aloft facebook
: page. I made a lot of the pieces
: that have little turquoise
: triangles on them. They had
: alternating small tan and
: turquoise triangles, and then a
: big tan triangle. It's so
: wonderful to be able to take part
: in making something so beautiful.
: We sell raffle tickets all year,
: and it's cool to be able to tell
: people that I helped make it when
: I'm selling tickets at an event.

: Allison