A Visit to Sisters

Every year, on the second Saturday in July, the little town of Sisters, Oregon pulls all the stops and devotes all its shops and streets to a gala show of art, specifically the art of quilting. U.S. 20, the prime connector over the Cascades between Oregon's capital and the booming cities of Central Oregon, becomes bottle-necked at Sisters.

On this day, beginning early in the morning, hardly a stitch goes unnoticed as thousands of excited visitors from everywhere savor the hues, shapes and imagination of quilters.   The hours, even months, spent in quiet solitude with needle and thread are now revealed in broad, warm daylight.

It matters not, a barber shop or a bakery, any shop can display quilts. What better way to illustrate the "Log Cabin Pattern" than with a log cabin picture? (above) An eye-teaser of "Tumbling Blocks." (Below) Sisters, with a population of nearly 1000, is located in a mature ponderosa forest on relatively flat land but with several mostly extinct volcanic mountains in the area.   It's in the eastern shadow of the Cascade Mountains and enjoys a spectacular, nearly 180 degree, panorama of snow capped peaks including the "Three Sisters" from whence the town gets its name. It is equidistant from Eugene and Salem (just under 100 miles) over the mountains to the west and only 22 miles from the burgeoning Central Oregon metropolis of Bend to the Southeast. The open quilt show on Saturday is indeed the climax of quilting activities.   But the entire previous week is chock full of fun and interesting things for that enthusiastic breed, quilters.   Classes on every facet of the craft bedazzled the best of them. But Mary stood out clearly among the other sewing-machine toting fabric addicts.   Shown here, she even drew cheers from other camping quilters at Tumalo State Park after her day in class. And now as we depart from Sisters, we stop for one last look at the mountains that named the town. This photo was taken four years ago. The field in the foreground has a new residental development. Sisters has been discovered!