The weather dawned, bright, sunny and warm. OK, the morning didn't actually dawn, it was more that the clock showed 7:00, and it was snowing and then raining. So this weekend we picked an indoor activity!

We visited the Bellevue Art Museum, which is about 20 miles north of here. They had a special series of exhibits that appealed to all of us.

You can't take pictures in a museum, so I'll try and describe a little of what we saw. I assure you I won't do it justice, but you can use your mind's eye to fill in the details.

The first exhibit was on baskets - not your average baskets, mind you, but artwork inspired by baskets. Many weren't bowl-shaped at all - some were made in the shape of a shallow plate, others were square and completely enclosed, and still others were bowls inside of other bowls. There were tiny bowls, huge art pieces, and each were made of something different. I found weavings of thread, horsehair, porcupine quills, film negatives, tape, staples, branches, copper strips, silver wire, gold wire - even one made out of fish skins! There was one box made of silk weaving, and inside you could see a ball that was made of silk weaving as well, suspended in the box somehow. It was amazing.

The next exhibit was on quilts, all from the 1800's. There were the standard quilts you might find in any older home, but there were "crazy" quilts - ones where the scraps of fabric were used however they came, and quilted together. There were huge quilts made from 1-inch squares, and "charm" quilts, which have no repeating fabrics. One had over 1,000 squares of fabric, none of which were alike! And some of the "whitework" quilts, that are hand-stitched patterns in white thread on white fabric, were so intricate they took years to make. Awesome stuff.

And then there was my favorite exhibit, called the "Book Borrowers". This exhibit was art made from books, inspired by books. It's the hardest one to explain, so I'll tell you about a couple of examples that I found most extreme.

The first was a series of animal books, opened, joined and arranged where the pages faced you as you circled it. The artist had cut out parts of the  pages of the book, such that they showed a particular animal diagram, but in 3-Dimensions. The artist left certain words on various pages as he cut down to the picture to tell yet another story, all from within the book!

Another exhibit looked like a life-sized person laying on their side, sunk into the display table - but it was all made from different height books. Still another, one of my favorites, was a "canyon". The artist took a series of old encyclopedias, and pushed them together to make a row of books about 10 feet long. Then he did the same thing with another set, pushing them spine-out from each other. He glued all this together, and then took a sand-blaster to the top of the books and carved out what looked like the Grand Canyon out of the pages of the book, so you looked at it from the top!

Another one of my favorites was a clock, with all the parts of the clock made from books on - what else - clocks!

Most of our trips are rather lengthy affairs, taking a few hours to get to and back. We try to get out twice a month on Saturday, alternating between the country and the city. On the other Saturdays, we all have work, homework, projects and other things going on.

Every so often we're in danger of not being able to go out. Sometimes I'm out of town for work, or Marjorie is at a ladies' group or working, or Christina has a birthday party or some other thing to visit. When that happens, we'll skip a Saturday, but when it happens twice, those not involved in something else still go out.

And that's what happened this week. Marjorie had a commitment in the middle of the day, I had/have a ton of work to do, and Christina was busy with a project. We knew we couldn't spend the whole day doing something out, but Christina and I decided to head into Seattle for Coffee and Pastries, as well as a morning at our favorite location - the Seattle Public Library.

And the pastries - oh, man! We stopped by a Polish bakery on 1st Avenue and I had a chocolate caramel hazelnut twist. Christina ordered a fresh apple cinnamon Piroshky the size of her head. Then a quick stop at Seattle's Best Coffee (SBC) for a couple of Mochas and we were all set.

Thus refreshed, we padded off to the library, which is a huge "upside down pyramid" made of glass and steel. I took along my laptop and while Christina loaded up on books, I finished my article for the weekend that was due Saturday night.

With all that done, we had a little more time to explore the city further, and in the end, Marjorie joined us for a dinner of Smoked Salmon on the waterfront.

So it turned into a great day anyway, and convinced us of what we already knew: the good times aren't because of where we go, but because we go together.