Paducah KY Sept 2025

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I live in Cincinnati, so left here on a Friday afternoon, dined in Louisville KY and then headed on to Paducah and just stayed in a cheap motel on the outskirts of town, so I could get to the National Quilt Museum after breakfast Saturday morning.

The breakfast spot we tried downtown was great: quirky and charming with good food, reasonably priced.

I spent a lot longer at this National Quilt Museum than I thought I would. There were 3 exhibits that day: one was a 1-woman show. Another was an international exhibit with the theme of FIRE. Previous years themes were air and water. Finally, the permanent collection on display is historic and very comprehensive. I learned a lot by looking at this artwork!

One lesson I took from the quilters is that these pieces all read really well from far away AND close up. This face from one of the large portrait quilts is an example: look at all that stitching in the face and hair! The texture of these works of art is just amazing.

This was the whole quilt...

And, of course, the artist whose 1-woman show was featured as one of the 3 exhibits used my kind of colors, so I loved it.

She did beautiful abstract quilts but also wonderful representational work and just about everything in between. She'd been quilting for almost 50 years. Here's one of her representational quilts that told a story: very interesting.

I like art that is colorful and that looks abstract but is actually something real, like this close-up of a cactus.

This photo shows the scale of how large some of these works are. And then when you get close to one, the detail in it is just incredible.

These works were 3-dimensional with raised panels, kind of like relief sculpture. I don't think there were many things this artist hadn't tried to do during her fifty years of quilt artistry.

Here's a different one...

And another, from farther away, so you get the effect.

Here's a closeup of a peacock quilt ... this is the photograph I used for my painting.

If a diptych is two panels and a triptych is 3, I guess this was a quad-tych. I liked the scale and the peacock blue colors of this work.

Hopefully this photo gives you an idea of the detail you see when you get up close to it.

]This portrait quilt was part of the permanent collection.

Here's a close up of the border across the bottom.

And even closer up to it...

Okay, now I think we're going on to the FIRE themed exhibit in the third gallery.

This one was about the fire in a diamond ... cool, huh?

And this, done on an actual firehose.

Now we are walking along the flood wall above the Paducah riverfront. Look up mural artist Robert Dafford. He and his team did a lot of work along the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers, particularly for towns that needed them to boost tourism. I love the ones we have under the Roebling Bridge in Covington KY but these go on and on and on. We drove past them and then we walked by. Great way to get steps on a nice sunny day.

Here is the Paducah riverfront, behind the murals on the flood walls.

They have a serpentine wall like we do in Cincinnati.

Paducah once had 3 different railroads coming in there; it was a good place to transfer and this museum was worth the visit.

My friend who specializes in steamboat artwork and models told me that the school for training pilots is still here and operating in Paducah. At the museum just north of this school, we got to feel what it what like to pilot a steamboat -- scary! That was a very interesting museum too and the bonus was a Smithsonian Institution traveling exhibit on Native Americans that I found fascinating.

Back to the hotel to rest and change for dinner. And here we are at Sara Bradley's restaurant, Freight House. 

I had my eyes peeled for a guy who drank "Country Boy Cougar Bait" ha ha

There Sara was, working with her staff. What a thrill! The hours were conducive to people raising families -- Tuesdays through Saturdays from 5-9p  We got there at five and stayed until almost 9 enjoying the tasting menu.

I'm watching right now on Food Network's Tournament of Champions. First became aware of her when Bravo's Top Chef took place in Kentucky. She's stayed true to her root and hometown and that has really helped Paducah. Worth the drive to meet her and eat at her restaurant. The quilt museum, murals, riverfront, and the other good museums and restaurants were all a bonus!

Lots of things are closed on Sunday so we went and visited the TVA and walked around watching boats going through the lock before driving back to Louisville for a late lunch/early dinner.

Because It's Rained Every Tuesday

My plein air painting group usually paints outdoors every Tuesday starting in April. But this year it seems like it has rained every Tuesday. And because I still feel like I'm recovering from a health issue experienced last November, I just don't want to paint outside in the rain.

Luckily our group has an alternative place to meet and paint on Tuesdays in April and May. So I've been working on some watercolors indoors. This one's in progress right now. It's of the Harmon Museum in Lebanon, Ohio. I had a one-woman show there 2 years ago and our Mason-Deerfield Arts Alliance Painters will have a show there Oct 18 through Nov 22, 2025.

So I thought I'd use one of the photos I took to create a watercolor -- it's not finished yet but I made progress this week.

 

Lloyd Library

I've walked past the Lloyd Library at 917 Plum Street in Cincinnati so many times and always wanted to take my book club (the Book Babes) there. Becky Shundich, who paints with us every Thursday, told me she'd taken hers to the Lloyd, Mercantile and other libraries in Cincinnati. So I called to schedule a tour and I think everyone was delighted by this "hidden jewel" in our city.

The current show in the museum was Flora Mania and the botanical illustrations and typography in the books being displayed were breathtakingly beautiful to me. Christine Jankowski's stories of the local Lloyd Brothers and their forays into botanical medicine, mycology, and their pharmaceuticals business come alive for us.

I was thrilled to see a copy of a medical journal published in the 16th century. Intrigued to learn about the inventor of Benadryl, George Rieveschl. And having just read Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer, the story about the cancer drug made from the bark of yew trees really resonated with me. They had to find a way to make it without destroying hundreds of thousands of trees in the Pacific Northwest.

Gardening is not my gift but several of those with me are avid gardeners and there were lots of books we could peruse on subjects they were interested in. If the program "Building Your Herbal Library" were not already sold out, we'd all have wanted to go to learn what herbal remedies we could be growing or stocking up on at home.

The next exhibit is "Pick Your Poison" opening May 31. I started laughing about how Rhoda and I thought the "yellow wisteria" at Blarney Castle was so pretty: we kept standing under it and taking pictures. Later we found out the flowers gave off spores in the air that were poison and people kept their children away from these flowers for that reason. The garden we were in at Blarney was clearly marked "Poison Garden" but we were oblivious. Typical! ha ha

 

Oglebay, Wheeling WV

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The Mansion: worth the tour!

The Guest House

All the nutcracker decorations reminded me of my nephew, Grant, who collects them

First room of the mansion - dining room

I loved this old French hand-painted wallpaper

Mouse kings by the fireplace “Say Cheese”

The crystal chandeliers in every room were beautiful

More beautiful old wallpaper

I want a wallpapered ceiling.

The Pioneer Room

Forgot that WV seceded from VA to be Union instead of Confederate 

Several rooms had wallpapered ceilings which I liked. This was the sewing room

Thought this ceiling medallion was beautiful 

More beautiful wallpaper scenes of the Middle East, Egypt, India?

View of the nutcracker decorations from the front door of the mansion

This Mother Ginger looked like she came from New Orleans Mardi Gras!

Before driving around Wheeling and touring The Mansion at Oglebay, we had Rhoda’s cousins “best pizza in North America” for lunch

I’ll never forget Dennys heartfelt testimonial about a successful business depending on hiring great employees and treating/paying them well.

Colleen’s Christmas cactus was blooming so profusely then I noticed them everywhere around Wilson Lodge after we checked in

The Thanksgiving and Christmas decorations were so pretty and gift shops the kind that made you happy to look around in even if you didn’t buy anything

Loved our table in the window for the Holiday Buffet Dinner before taking Trolley through the Festival of Lights

Photos don’t do justice to the light show

Played cards by the indoor pool and had a hot chocolate while enjoying live music. Ray Stevens’ Guitar-zan, a melange of the Judds’ Love Will Find a Way with Bridge Over Troubled Water and Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah (Christmas version)

Glenda’s Christmas card photo taken here last year so Rhoda and I took each other’s pictures in the Santa chair

I look forward to returning in warmer weather to see a concert, play golf, and enjoy walking around this beautiful land. There’s a gentility and graciousness here that I appreciate.

Very interesting glass museum and glass blowing demonstration.

Worlds largest glass punch bowl sat outdoors in a cemetery under its makers monument for almost 75 years before this! The horizontal piece in front is just one of the prisms that used to hang around its rim: amazing!