This morning we awoke to brilliant sunlight, and a deep blue sky. It was a little chilly, but we had promised ourselves a field trip when the rain stopped. We had two possibilities: the Quilt National Exhibit at the Foundry in St. Charles, or the annual Calhoun County (Ill.) Country Quilt and Church Tour in Brussels and Hardin. Since Norm was still smarting a little bit from dental work on Friday, we opted for the shorter trip, to St. Charles.
As soon as we pulled into the parking lot, I could hear a mocking bird scolding. I soon spied him at the very tip top of a Bradford pear tree in front of the exhibit building. The area was filled with brilliant Bradfords, and with the sun shining through them, they glowed and glistened, leaves dancing in the light breeze. We hadn't even seen a quilt yet, but the play of color and light in Nature's palette had us entranced.
Our destination, The Foundry, is a venue that rents studio space to artists and has a huge exhibit space, just right for the 80 quilts in the Quilt National 2009 collection. After it leaves our area on Oct. 29, it will be split into three smaller exhibits, so we were privileged to see the entire collection. We remember when this building WAS a vacant foundry, sort of hulking at the north end of downtown. It has been transformed into something truly a local treasure. No photos were allowed in the exhibit, but you can read about Quilt National here and about the Foundry, here. Some images of quilts in the exhibit are online here. These are not traditional quilts, but fiber art. A local organization that combats domestic violence sponsored this exhibit, and all income from the show will benefit its programs. 
After two hours of looking at stimulating but often challenging art, most of it abstract, our eyeballs were ready to rest on something more definite. You can't get much more definite than the Missouri River as it flows past St. Charles. Today the river was as blue as the sky above, and moving fast. It is rather high for fall, but we have had a lot of rain upriver recently.
Although the photos look like summer, they really were taken just this afternoon, Oct. 24, 2009. St. Charles has a riverfront park that had many visitors, and this stretch of river also is bordered by the Katy Trail, a hiking and biking path that runs from east of St. Charles to central Missouri, and eventually will go all the way into Kansas City. It is so scenic, and it has improved the economies of several small river towns. We just wish our knees were young enough to make the trip on a bicycle. Days like today just underscore how rich our natural resources are, and how in need of protection from over development or pollution.
This is the Highway 370 bridge, north of St. Charles, as seen from Riverfront Park. It provides a shortcut between I-270 in north St. Louis County and I-70 west of St. Charles. It is much less heavily traveled than I-70, especially across the five-lane Blanchette Bridge, into St. Charles. The water looks calm and glassy here, but the ripples in the foreground tell a different story. The Missouri is shallow but very fast. Lewis and Clark found that out when they tried to pole their boats upstream over 200 years ago!We felt that we had a bonus day, and thoroughly enjoyed it. This evening we met up with our friends Mike and Sandy, and went to the annual spaghetti dinner at their church. The pasta is great, but the real draw at this dinner is the home made pie. We had to choose between four kinds of fruit pie or coconut cream, chocolate, pecan or lemon meringue. Norm got strawberry rhubarb. Sandy had cherry. Not sure what Mike had. Me, I opted for the last slice of lemon meringue, and I have no regrets!
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