I took the long way home

on Wednesday after leaving The Villages, FL after being there for two days teaching and doing a trunk show for The Quilt Guild of The Villages.  How or why did I do that... my GPS somehow got reprogrammed and when I selected the home button it directed me south, instead of southeast to who knows where, but after an hour and 1/2 of driving and nothing that was coming up looked familiar, I put my home address in manually and discovered I was near Tampa and further away from home than I was when I got in the car and started home in The Villages.  Of course getting home on I-4  through Orlando at the tail end of rush hour traffic was no joy, but finally 3 hours later, 1-1/2 hours longer than it should have taken me, I arrived home safe, sound and just a little more tired than I would have been had I took the right roads in the first place.

The Villages.  What a neat concept for a community. The Quilt Guild of The Villages has over 800 members and is a collective made up of 18 smaller guilds (or bees)  that meet at different locations in The Villages. 
Everyone, well not every one was zipping about in golf carts.  In this community he carts  are not reserved for the golf course.  The carts have their own paved path with underground tunnels to cross from one side of the auto roadways to the other. and they are everywhere.  They were parked in front of shops in the market squares as well as bars,  restaurants and coffee shops.  Most looked like what you'd imagine a  typical cart  on a golf course would look like while a great many others were full of personality, like little VW's or Smart cars.  They were soooooo cute.  I wanted one.  I was told that some of the gasoline powered ones can zip along at speeds up to 35 miles an hour and are considered street legal.   The other thing I found neat about the community; I wished I'd taken a picture was a lot of the homes had garages with small door separate from the regular sized ones just for the carts to enter.

The guild put me up at the Water Front Inn which was a very nice place with a tropical theme.  Think Hemmingway.

No one in my class admitted to be in witness protection so here is a look at the some ladies who were in my Wednesday class.

 

Several of my students arrived at the class site via their cart.  This is one of them.

 

I am home for a 11 days and I plan to get back to the painting I left on the easel and try to get it quilted before I am off to Boca Raton on the 19th.