Whitnall Highway

A book we received for our anniversary.IMG_3991I am really enjoying the all the books that offer walking options in LA, each has it’s own spin.  We chose a walk close to home, from North Hollywood to Burbank and back. This is an area I drive through a lot, but of course walking is a whole new experience.

Have you heard of the Whitnall Highway?P1120843I had seen the signs, I had driven by this park, I even wondered why this large swatch of open space exists in a very dense part of the valley.  Now I have my answers.

George Gordon Whitnall was a pioneer in the field of city planning.  He designed this highway alongside the power lines.  The book describes this as a proposed Freeway, but the Whitnall Freeway was a different plan that never came to fruition either.

Starting at Cleon and Whitnall Highway in North Hollywood, the power towers dominate the skyline.P1120815Nothing permanent can be built underneath them. So here it is just a dirty wasteland. On either side are the residential streets, small homes and apartment buildings.
P1120817A business that flourishes under power lines are nurseries, they often lease this land for their plants, since they can be easily moved.P1120818Or can they?P1120821

Another use is a dog park.P1120820A very large area, rather two fenced in areas with a lot of people and dogs.

A receiving station, a very large functional power station stands here.  The building is of course Art Deco.P1120822

The design elements don’t refer to any particular historic period, they are simply decorative.P1120823I do love this urn, part classical, part whatever the designer wanted to do. A real mishmash. The banana leaves give it another lovely So Cal touch.P1120824Then we enter Burbank and things change.P1120828Burbank unlike North Hollywood spent money to make this median a real park.P1120831With grass, people playing soccer as well as a jogging trail and workout equipment. P1120832In the original plan for the highway, there was meant to be a two mile tunnel under Griffith Park. Here is the view up to Mt. Lee, on the other side of these Radio towers is the famous Hollywood Sign.  You notice how flat this is, man made flat. Mr. Lee planned to build a mega mansion in the 1930s and leveled out the rounded peak.  The home was never built but the towers uses this land.

While walking in the park we came across a fallen bird’s nest.P1120844The engineering is amazing, not sure this was ever uses since a bird will usually line the nest with softer material and this one is lacking that. So maybe it blew down before the bird finished the job.

The highway of course was never completed, even the sections between Burbank and North Hollywood weren’t graded. So today between many of the homes there are plots of empty land with towers right between the homes.

Next up, other sights on the walk.

Leah

Signs of the holidays

IMG_3966Driving Westley home from Daycare, I noticed this wonderful Art Deco apartment building. Or is it a house?  Maybe it’s just one house which is even cooler.  (this street is all apartments, so I assumed).  Aside from very interesting design, it’s blue and white – perfect for Chanukkah.IMG_3967Then we walked around the neighborhood and saw people putting up their decorations.  These large ornaments are inflatable.IMG_3969These aren’t, needless to say, I really love these.IMG_3971And this one especially, since it works for Chanukkah as well.P1120845Closer to home, in Burbank. Looks like they get their street decorations from the same source that the City of Orange did.P1120846I wonder if this is an LA thing, to have these large ornaments outside. Would they survive the snow?P1120847Or would all the sparkles just fall off in the weather.P1120833The owl made me do it! Take the picture that is.P1120827Pretty in the day time, probably even more so at night.IMG_3979I chose my polish carefully this week.IMG_3977And of course lit candles.

 

Leah

Close to home

I had heard about the Onion, the Church of the Sepulveda Unitarian Universalist Society in North Hill. Right here in the Valley.P1120668It is very clear why it is called the OnionP1120670I only took pictures from the outside, I’m sure it looks good from the inside as well. The time to visit is during a service, I’m not taking my camera into someone’s religious service, they are praying, not being a spectacle.P1120669I didn’t do a lot of research about who the architect was or exactly when this was built, my guess is sometime in the 60s. The building has actually aged well.P1120672Sometimes it takes looking, interesting buildings can be found everywhere.P1120741This is what December looks like in the Valley.  We do have a few trees that change color, it may not be New England but it is pretty. Of course right next to the deciduous tree we have a citrus tree full of fruit.P1120742Just like back east, the leaves cover the front yard.IMG_3951This a flowering tree one doesn’t see back east in December.P1120744People have interesting garden decor.P1120743And of course the Christmas decorations are out in force in peoples yards.P1120748Or apartment balconies. P1120745The angle of the sun these days creates wonderful effects on the most mundane items. P1120746Like the light fixtures on buildings.

Leah

New York beauty grows

P1120399This is a block I drafted myself!  That is a lot of very small pieces, yeah for paper piecing. I never could do it otherwise.P1120398The number of blocks are growing, at a snails pace.  I enjoy just laying them out.  I realize that my method of just having a pile of fabric means that some fabrics get overlooked. So I tried to create some order.P1120550It’s still messy but at least they are grouped in piles of color. P1120551And the number of blocks continues to grow. I foolishly thought I’d be making a king size quilt for my bed. No way, these are 8″ blocks and the paper piecing is very time consuming. Not to mention that all those small patches means a lot of unseen fabric in the seams – this is going to be one heavy baby – even before I get to the actual quilting. P1120749Lightbulb moment!  I have been enjoying the book Double Wedding Ring Quilts, where the author Victoria Findlay Woolf deconstructs the traditional pattern. Why not do the same here???  Make partial segments of the New York Beauty blocks.  It will cut down on my work, it will also allow for more negative space.P1120751Another ahh hah moment. Start sewing the blocks together. There is no perfect design that will emerge.  I can stare at this for hours and find faults, but it’s not like any other arrangement would be better.  At the moment I’m going with six blocks across, time will tell if it stays that way, or if I even add a border.    Many of the images I found on Pinterest use print fabric for everything, the overall effect is bright and colorful, but all those points and arcs get lost. I like how the details pop out on the dark background.P1120752It not just about color, it’s also about showing off my crazy paper piecing skills.IMG_3952And now to get back to sewing more blocks, so I will be able to randomly add them into the quilt.

Leah

Hat

Remember this?IMG_3937It is now thisP1120740Finished!!  Thank you Marne for the cute pattern Fairy Stones.P1120726Modeling it on a ‘chilly’ day.P1120731A slouchy comfy hat.  I like how it looks from the back.P1120719Enough room to really pull over the ears.P1120716Love the slouchness of this.

And now, to give it to it’s rightful owner.

 

Leah

Fire

Novembers challenge for the Valley Modern Quilt guild, otherwise knows as ValleyMQG was fire.  I wanted to do something very different from the needle turn appliqué that I did for the first challenge.

P1120431So I pulled out my Accuquilt  die for half square triangles and a whole lot of scrap fabric and got to work.  There are many ways to create half square triangles. I must say that using the die cutter is great when you want to just dive into scraps.  I also realized that to create the flame, I’d be best off setting them on point.P1120437I love building up a design as I go, center flame blue, some white around it, then yellow and red. I’ve seen different images of a flame, this is the color sequence I went with.  I also cut the bottom straight as soon as I could.  Made it easier on my eyes.P1120439I was working with what I have, finding black fabrics in my stash wasn’t  easy. I didn’t want to use solid fabric, those that look solid are simply cut where there wasn’t a print. Sure I could have gone and bought some grey on black prints – but part of the challenge I put on myself was only use what I have!P1120440Artistic draping over rock.  I have some better close ups of the quilting.P1120444

I tried to quilt flame shapes in the flame itself.P1120451And smoke in the dark background.  With busy prints it isn’t noticeable, but I know.
P1120441Finished quilt.IMG_3939And on display with others at the guild meeting.  I’m pleased with the quilt, I don’t love it like I do the water one, I have no idea what I’ll do with it. I think I’ll hang water somewhere in the house, this one isn’t getting hung anywhere.  As much as I enjoyed the challenge,  I don’t love it enough to hang anywhere.  Not everything I make needs to be used. Sometimes the journey is enough.

Leah

Orange, CA

After the Nixon Library it was time for lunch and what better place then Orange. This little town in unique in that it saved many of it’s old houses during the building boom that started in the 1950s. P1120660It is well known for it’s center that is built around a circle plaza.  P1120639I love the old time Christmas decorations. In the plaza and up above the streets.P1120637I also love how small town America puts up these signs honoring their sons and daughters who are serving in the military.P1120651Now this is a Christmas decoration!P1120642Many of the old buildings now house antique and vintage shops as well as good restaurants. This building has both a bank and a  Starbucks.P1120647Banks don’t need as much space as they did before, although the bank is still occupying a lot of this space.  Starbucks is open from 6am – 7pm,  I don’t think the bank shares those hours.P1120645Gorgeous painted wood ceiling.P1120646Plaster detail inside.P1120648Looking up where two building meet. P1120649The blade advertising is here, the building houses stores.P1120643Clocks are always important, for the many people who didn’t own watches.P1120654In 1929 The Orange Movie theater opens on Glassell Street. It was one of the many movie palaces build at the time.  Like many theaters it went into decline in the 1950s and by the 1970s someone wanted to turn it into a porno theater. Thank God the Son Light Christian Center bought the building. Many of the original features had already been removed, but Churches take very good care of old theaters and this is no exception. I’d rather see sermons than porn here any day.P1120655I’m taking a guess that the design elements outside are from Gladding McBean. No one else does their standard of glazed terra cotta designs.P1120653I love ghost advertising, I hate graffiti.P1120661Using the old building, probably from the 30s as it was intended – for car repairs.  I do like the signage they have added, both the flag and the cars.

Orange is a wonderful little town to wander through, on Thanksgiving weekend, it was full of people enjoying the sun, the shops and the restaurants.

Leah

Crafting for the holidays

IMG_3893It started with this picture in a magazine, Molly Makes. What a great centerpiece for the Thanksgiving table.IMG_3920My version wasn’t so austere, all gourds and flowers came from the supermarket.IMG_3919Even the cranberries.

Thats’ it for the holiday specific craft, now onto gifts.P1120555A cute pouch, using vinyl. I should have changed out the needle, the machine groaned sewing through this.P1120556The end result is a very nice holiday gift.P1120665ItMy friend calls these bags, loaf of bread. I made mine more like a kleenex box instead.P1120664It is lined with iron on batting, gives it body and shape.P1120666Fun lining fabric.P1120667And my label, not sure if I can put a label on the vinyl pouch – without it being visible.IMG_3928And finally, using my friend’s pattern Fairy Stones Hat I’m making a hat for a specific friend in mind. IMG_3937Fair Isle knitting is addictive, I always want to see what the next row will look like. This will be finished very soon.  I’m having fun using my colored yarn.

Leah

Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum

P1120610Thanksgiving weekend is a good time to go for a drive and visit local areas.  I’ve been to the Reagan Library too many times to count, but aside from one lecture, I hadn’t visited the other presidential Library in Yorba Linda. So off we went.P1120612Only to discover that the museum wing is being renovated and is closed to the public.  I was a kid living in Israel when he was president so for both those reasons, I didn’t know much about him. Of course I remember that when the Yom Kippur War broke out – America immediately sent military supplies to Israel and for that I am eternally grateful. P1120613A simple gravesite, right next to his beloved wife Pat.  A very interesting fact, he was born a few feet away in the home his father built and is buried here. Very few people are born and buried in the same place – while traveling and visiting more parts of the world in between.P1120615The home he was born in is still standing on the exact same spot. It was lifted at one point to reinforce the foundations,  his father Frank never imagined that his simple catalog home would one day need to be strong enough for thousands of visitors.  When originally built there was no fireplace, or a bathroom for that matter. P1120618Two sones commemorate Nixon, the home and farm were dedicated as a California historical site after Nixon served as vice president to Ike Eisenhower.  Later his daughter Julie would marry Eisenhower’s grandson David – small world.P1120620The home is tiny, hard to imagine today a family with 4 sons (the fifth son was born after they left this home and unfortunately one son died here) in such a small space. Life was very different in the early 20th century. I was so thrilled to see wonderful examples of handwork. The docent said that most of these items had been in the home originally and one of the daughter in laws gave them to the museum when the Presidential library was founded. I have no way of knowing if this quilt was from the Yorba Linda period or later, but either way – LOVE IT!P1120622How cool is this one lone blue and cream basket?  And then through the doorway I spied this. P1120629So maybe Hannah made the quilt herself, she certainly had a lot of sewing to do with her large family.  This one is not only a workhorse but is quite the beauty.P1120631As is this stove. Of course the house had no electricity or running water. This would have been a woodburning stove and for food storage, an icebox – where the iceman delivered a block of ice. P1120633You know the saying, don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater?  Here is the bathtub, Adults first, and by the time you get to the youngest – it’s not clear if the baby comes out dirtier than he went in, or if he simply gets tossed with the dirty water. P1120621More crafts, a braided rag rug.P1120623A crochet afghan,  done in a pattern that today we’d call modular squares. P1120624A closer look reveals that the moths are getting to the wool and there have been some repairs done.

P1120626I love old photographs, especially when they touched up or a composite like they are here. The five Nixon boys, Richard is second from the left.  By the time Edward was born (far left) Arthur had been dead for five years.  Another thing we don’t experience much anymore – the death of children.

I’ll have to go back next year to visit the actual museum when it reopens.  Historical figures are best viewed through the lens of history, not through the headlines of their own day.  Richard Milhous Nixon was a fascinating man.  HIs tombstone states accurately, The greatest honor history can bestow is the title of Peacemaker.

Leah

A lot to be thankful for

I love home tours,  sometimes it’s just going to open houses in the neighborhood and sometimes it’s a chance to see wonderful historic homes.  A friend gave me two tickets for the Pacific Palisades annual home tour. So I grabbed another friend and off we went.

P1120578I took this picture out on the street. Of course we weren’t allowed to take pictures of peoples private homes. What surprised me is that a few of the homes were at the top of a hill, with no view of the ocean.  Off in the distance is the Palo Verdes Peninsula, behind the tree on the right Catalina Island sparkled. P1120579Here you can see the tip of Catalina in the distance. It takes bright clear days for the island to be visible. Even though this isn’t my daily view – I am so grateful to leave so close to this.P1120581An amazing thing about Los Angeles, or in this case, Santa Monica, look at that large swath of white sandy beach. Many of our beaches look like this, not some skimpy 2″ of sand with massive high rises. Sure we are getting more tall buildings near the beaches, but our beaches are wide and spacious.  I don’t swim in the ocean here, way to cold for me, but I love a day with a walk along one of these beaches.

Thanksgiving is here. A uniquely American holiday – yes, we have all kinds of traditional food, but it’s wonderful as a nation, that we take a day to simply be thankful

 

IMG_3919I had seen an image in a magazine of using winter gourds as flower vases.  I hope to remember this next year so I can buy them before Halloween, very few remain in the stores by Thanksgiving. I found some! Bought some supermarket flowers, and even used some uncooked cranberries.IMG_3920These gorgeous gerbera daisies are from the local supermarket, what a find.IMG_3921In preparation for all the food, Aytan came over and helped me layer the pot with sweet potatoes, apples and brown sugar.  I didn’t light the stove until the pot was full, he did want to give a stir with his little stick.IMG_3922Then we found a You Tube video on how to make a turkey mask. I helped some but he did most of the work.IMG_3923As I mentioned, a lot to be thankful for.

Leah