More flood photos

Looking west across Mud Island and I-40 toward Arkansas.

Blowing up the levee in Missouri

And the 200 sq. mile lake that was created. They blew another hole and all that water drained back into the Mississippi and is headed our way.

The statue of Tom Lee in Tom Lee park.

South end of Mud Island.

And here is the end of Mud Island when it's not flooded... only the flagpoles are above water now.

Houses on Harbor Town

Park at Harbor Town

Harrah's casino in Tunica

Mud Island at Harbor Town

Harbor Town homes

Another view of Christian Brothers H.S. athletic field from last weekend.

From several days ago. The south end of Mud Island is now almost under water

Looking west on I-40 toward Arkansas

Harbor Town - see all the trees under water on the Mississippi side.

Wolf River emptying into the Mississippi, except it is not emptying because the Mississippi is too full so the Wolf is running backwards.

Tom Lee Park last weekend during the music festival. It's mostly under water now

Harbor Town

Christian Brothers H.S.

Spain DeWitt Airfield......

..... now under water

The levee that broke and flooded the airfield

From Arkansas looking toward Memphis on I-40

Tunica

Tunica

I-40 near Brinkley Arkansas, the White River out of it's banks

Flooding 2011

Here are some photos taken April 29 and 30 in the Memphis area. Except for Tom Lee Park and the photo looking toward Arkansas, all these photos are flooding from the Wolf River.  Near the Mississippi it is worse now and not expected to crest until a week from today. They have already evacuated hundreds of people into shelters who live closer to the Mississippi.  They are now predicting a crest of 48' - just 6" short of the all time record set in 1937. (Read the book "Rising Tide".)  All the casinos in Tunica are closed.  The Wolf and Loosahatchie Rivers and Nonnconnah, Fletcher and Big Creeks can't drain because the Mississippi is so high that the water is flowing into those rivers, not out of them.  Last night  the Corps of Engineers blew up a levee in Missouri, creating a 200 sq. mile lake, but that was to relieve pressure at Cairo, IL where the river was 60 feet. They blew another hole so the water in the lake just flows back into the Mississippi, so it's still coming this way. And in the last 36 hours we've had about 5 more inches of rain here - more up in the Ohio Valley.

This is the Shelby County shooting range at Shelby Farms.

The Putt-Putt golf, gocart and entertainment park on Summer Avenue.

  The sports complex at Christian Brothers High School - that is the baseball and football stadium under water.  Baptist Hospital is across the street and stayed mainly dry.  That's Walnut Grove going left to right.

This is looking east from Shelby Farms - Germantown Parkway is the road going left to right. See the dark blue sliver on the left about an inch down from the top - that's Walnut Grove Lake - my house is just east of there in the trees. Fortunately we're up on a hill so the river can't get to us but it made getting around town challenging.

Tom Lee Park downtown Memphis, setting up for the Music Festival last weekend. In two weeks for the Barbeque contest this will all be under water so they moved it to the tailgate parking lot at the Liberty Bowl. It won't be the same as hanging out at the river. The houses at the bottom of the photo are up on top of a high bluff so they are not in danger.  The weird rectangular house in the lower right was built by Cybil Sheppard.

I-40 looking toward Arkansas. The river usually ends where you can see the grass start.

Baseball fields near Thomas:

Dealer row on Covington Pike

 Summer drive-in

Spain-DeWitt airport at the north end of Mud Island

Stay tuned for more pictures.

Quilt Retreat

Last weekend we had our annual quilt retreat where we spend two days in lodges in the woods, eating, sewing, taking classes, eating, walking in the woods, eating...  you get the idea. I taught a class - Happy Villages - where you cut up stair step pieces of fabric, arrange them on some batting, and then add roofs, doors and windows. It's like kindergarten and lots of fun. No sewing, no worry about cutting off points, no worry about perfect quarter inch seams.  I had 11 students, and they created 11 very different villages.

Here are some of the

villages at show and tell

on Sunday morning.

 

 

 

  Last summer I tried to teach my Wisconsin Girlfriends this same technique. They were not very well-behaved students as you can see at the right. They actually finally settled down and made some neat villages, but since they don't quilt, I ended up quilting all of them for them. And they had so much fun they're making more! My Uncommon Thread Quilt Guild students were much better behaved!

Our guest teacher was Janet Jones Worley, who was just a delightful person and her Saturday night lecture was hysterical!

Here are most of the people who made challenge blocks.

Race for the Cure

Saturday was the Susan G.Komen Race for the Cure. It's been monsoon season in Memphis, but Saturday morning the rain went away and the sun came out just in time for it to be a beautiful fall day. Over 16,000 people participated! This year when they took the survivors photo, my neighbor and I stood next to some crazy ladies with big pink hair and mardi gras masks - we figured that way we could find ourselves in the photo. It worked! See the lady with the green jacket on the right side of the photo? If you go in about 6 people, I am there, with a pink bandana around my neck.


I'm about in the middle in the photo below, a pink haired lady is on my left, and my neighbor Lynn with a boa is on my right. Julie, who I met on the shuttle bus on the way there is next t Lynn.

Part of the St. Francis Ladies Auxiliary Team  -

Romy, Donna, me, Lori and Karen.