I am a gal who likes lists, much like my father and maternal grandfather. I have lists for everything.  There are lists of what to do at work and what to do at home.  I have packing lists.  I have lists for my infusions and a longterm project list.  I kept my farm list from 2008, and there are still projects not done on it. Some are never ending like mending fencing.

And then there’s the Magic List in the kitchen.  It is an old chalkboard that Tom got from in front of a church in Acme, being given away for free.  It is magic because you write what you want from the store with colored chalk, and it magically appears (because one of us goes to the store and buys the stuff).  It is nice though because we take a photo of it with our phones and shop off of that.

But I also have bucket lists.  I used to have just one, but now I have several.  There is a generalized one which includes the U.S. and some of the rest of the world.  I have a Pacific Northwest one and a Seattle one.  But today I developed my Skagit one.  I have had some Skagit sites long term on my original bucket list like the arcade in Mount Vernon.  But I have added more over time.  This is partially contributed to by the Tales of the Magic Skagit podcast and the recent Explore Skagit newspaper insert (yes, I still get the newspaper).  Here is my Skagit bucket list:

So today I thought we should knock off some La Conner sites before the Daffodil and Tulips Festivals get busy.  We started off at the Skagit County Historical Museum.  We have been there before but it has been a while.  And they have a Lost Cities exhibit now that I wanted to see.  Here are some photos from that exhibit.

Hoodgal is particularly interesting to me as it was settled by Swedes.

Then we checked out the rest of the museum which we have seen before but noticed some interesting items still.

On that last map, we live in section 32 and part of section 5.

We then headed to the Pacific Northwest Quilt & Fiber Arts Museum which is located in the historic Gaches Mansion.  We had never been here before and they recently added the “Fiber Arts” to their name so that piqued my interest.

The mansion is gorgeous.  There had been a significant fire with extensive damage to the 2nd and third floors in 1973.

The city of La Conner purchased the building and finished restoration in 1978.  The museum moved in in 1997 and purchased the building in 2005.  They then undertook a major restoration to return the exterior, first and second floors to its original historic state.  This was completed in 2013.

Currently on the second floor there is the exhibit Liminal Lines by Maria Shell.  This is an example of these quilts.

This is the view of a portion of La Conner from the third floor.

The third floor exhibit was Bedtime Stitches by Salley Mavor.  They were amazingly intricate felted 3D framed images.  It was quite incredible.

On the first floor was 170 Years of Flowers Pieces from the Permanent Collection.  This was my favorite quilt

Then I went to the Museum of Northwest Art.  There they had an exhibit of art pieces by Italo Scanga from the Dale and Leslie Chihuly Collection. Here’s his story:

Apparently Italo and Dale would scavenge around Skagit county for pieces to include in their art.  You can see this in these art pieces.

On the second floor was other art pieces from the Pilchuck Glass School graduates that were contemporaries of Italo and Dale.

There was also an exhibit of art done by local school children that I loved.

Finally there was a WPA era mural of Skagit County as well.

Tom had chosen to skip this museum and walked Ryeleigh around the streets of La Conner instead.  She is having a great time.

We then headed to Beaver Tales coffee for some hot drinks.  I will look into getting a fresh roasted coffee subscription from them.  They deliver any where in Skagit County for free.

Then we headed over the rainbow bridge and drove through the reservation before heading back home.

It was a nice afternoon of seeing local museums and businesses that we otherwise wouldn’t have.  Plus it is providing them some support with the pandemic waning.  So I would encourage you all to create your own local list and take some time to explore. Who knows what you will find?