Hi Ruby, I just viewed your blog and I love your work. The photo of the bison is wonderful. I cannot wait to see what you do with it. Great work!!! Toni

Hi Ruby! Many thanks for your great note! And, IF we ever head N. again (and, Please God, we will and...soon!), I would love to visit you at your ranch!! 40 BELOW!! Eeek! Reminds me of sooooooo much of my life when I lived in "snowbelts" (Ontario, PEI, New Brunswick, Boston, etc.) I raised my family in dear, wee Ottawa, Ontario - the Capital of Canada and a city that has even colder winters than...are you ready? MOSCOW!! Seriously!! Around about the 2nd week or so of each Feb., the local newspaper invariably reports this news to shivering Ottawans and also invariably lets us all know that it could be worse - that we could be living in Ulan Bator, the coldest city on earth. It's not unusual for Ottawa to have temps. of -40 and -50 for days/weeks on end!! Add to that the windchill dealie and you have to be super watchful re: frostbite - ie. which can occur within...minutes on such days!! So fast that you may not even be aware of it!! I know you know alllllll about cold, but maybe you didn't know just how cold cetain cities in Canada really are?? Cheers! Charlotte

Hi again, Ruby!! I am such a dunce!! What I was leading up to was this: Next time we go North, we plan to ferry straight up to Fairbanks and then...REALLY DISCOVER ALASKA!! Cheers again! Charlotte

Hi Ruby! My enormous thanks for getting my day started with such JOY!! ie. I just treated myself to your photos...3x!! I've been partic. struck by the fact that you live in...ta da! AAAAAAAAAlaska!!!! In 2004, my husband and I fulfilled a lifelong dream and...DROVE NORTH TO ALASKA!!!! We LOVED the drive and the North sooooo much that, the very next year, we did it again!! We only got to the most Southern spots of Alaska (Fairbanks, Juno, etc.)because we spent so much of our time wandering around Northern B.C. and Yukon ( which reminds me, I want to live and die in Dawson aka my idea of Heaven on Earth!!), BUT next visit, we hope to "ferry" our way straight up to Fairbanks (we ferried our way S. to Vancouver both trips which allowed us to visit such wonderful places as Wrangel (sp?), Alaska!! Have you been there?? the town's children were granted full rights to the garnet find of what must be the world's most big-hearted miner!! The children - and ONLY the children - mine and sell the garnets and are then free to use the $ any way they wish. Don't panic!! To mine these garnets is not to go underground in dangerous mine shafts - the garnets are in surface stones and the kids just get their pickaxes or whatever you'd call them and hack off chunks of surface rock containing garnets. The kids then make a point of running down to the docks to greet each and every ferry and sell their wares. I've got several man's-fist-sized chunks of rock with these gorgeous stones peering out of them here and there!! Imagine!! Unfortunately, garnets are not my birthstone, but I know several January Babies and each of them now has a "rock from Wrangel". Enough! Plse. forgive my babble - just wanted to say how much I ENVY you where you live! Cheers! Charlotte

Thank you Ruby for nice words about my pillows. Yes, you can check out my little online store www.lenkart.com to see other designs. Hopefully soon I will have more time to add new decorative pillows and design a few more too.

Have a good day,
Elena

Your mosaic skulls pictured on your website are incredible! Thanks for the friends request!

You know I really can't do nature pieces. So see we balance out :) I've tried to really push myself to do abstract work unfortunately in my quilts I haven't quite reached it yet.

Thanks for adding me as a friend.