Tag: Gillette

In Gillette Wyoming at the FMCA Convention

Not much to post because we have been attending a rally of the Diesel RV Club (I am VP of Membership). The rally was fun and informative as usual. It was held at the same campground as the FMCA convention, so we are basically set up with full hookups for over 2 weeks. Very unusual for us. It feels odd to use as much water as I want without any conservation LOL!

I did get a bit of sewing done though. These are 130 4” Drunkard’s Path blocks. I really need only 120, but on a scrappy version it never hurts to have a few extra to get a better color balance. It will eventually be 10 blocks x 12 blocks (40”x48”) before borders, but I haven’t decided on the border size yet. I am going to wait until I get home to lay it out so I can manage the layout better.

From a fat quarter bundle

Since Kevin is volunteering with the parking crew for the convention, I am now at loose ends! I have made everything I brought with me [note to self:bring more next time!], so I went to a small quilt shop in town, Blue Bike Quilt Studio, to see what I could find. They had this kitted up for a lap sized quilt, 59”x79”, a nice size. I have a strong preference for modern quilts, so I like this one.

Here are the fabrics. It included the background fabric (cream) and the fat quarters shown. It even included binding. I arranged them in the color pairs I intend on using.

The fabric kit

Happily for me, the quilt is made with 2.25” strips, and I just happen to have a 2.25” strip cutter with me! I wouldn’t have bought it if I couldn’t cut it with my Accuquilt cutter. It looks like I will only need 4-5 strips of each fabric, so I will have quite a bit left over. Just what I need – more scraps! I will wait until tomorrow to cut the strips, making sure I like the color arrangement.

I also packaged up all the kits for the microwave bowl cozy class I am doing at the convention. I have a max of 12-15 students (I have forgotten which!), but I made 20 kits so people can hopefully find one they like.) I need to make one while taking photographs as I go to finish up the instructions, but I can do that Monday or Tuesday.

Might not be more posts until the convention is over and we are settled in the Black Hills, about a week from now.

Gillette and the FMCA rally

I just found out all the iPhone pictures I posted in the blog were turned sideways on non-Apple products! How embarrassing. I discovered a fix finally, but it needed better internet than I was able to get in Gillette, so I just got around to fixing them. So far everything looks good since December 2016, and I will get the older pictures fixed when I get home to a high speed Internet.

I ended the last post with us getting parked at the FMCA rally. We actually had a pretty nice time. We met up with a few friends from RVForum.net, bought a new flagpole that attaches with suction cups plus a convection oven cook book and gear in addition to the SeeLevel. Kevin tried to buy a new TV antenna that mounted on the roof, but they were all sold out. I don’t know if that was a good thing or a bad thing! Our current movable DISH antenna works great, but it is a bit of a pain to set up each time. Because it is portable, it works in more locations than a roof top antenna ever would. The rooftop is just push a few buttons, and it works. The portable requires putting together a tripod, mounting the antenna, chaining it down, etc. We will keep talking about it and see later. It is the kind of thing we can easily get installed at Quartzsite in January.

The main reason to attend a big rally like this, in addition to seeing friends, is to go to seminars. They run seminars in 14 rooms, 6 time slots a day. Many are very product specific, but some are good for general interest. As an example of product specific seminars, Cummins puts on seminars about their engines and generators (the Onan brand). Kevin got some really good laminated handouts about maintenance and such. Examples of general interest seminars were ones about boondocking and planning long trips. Both of those were excellent. We did take one entire day off and did some sightseeing in the area. We went to a little museum in Wright, about 40-50 milesfrom Gillette. It exceeded my expectations. Fun fact: Wright is a company town for the local Black Thunder coal mine, but it is a public entity. It was incorporated only in 1985. That explains the modern city buildings and school. The guy the town was named after was a real character too.

We left on Sunday morning, and we went to a lovely little campground outside of Custer, SD called Beaver Lake. It was a private campground with lots of trees and a variety of activities. It was mostly full of people obviously in for a week vacation with kids and bikes. The site wasn’t very level, but we made it work. Have I mentioned how much I love the automatic leveling on the motorhome? I will,post more about the Black Hills later, and I will include pictures!