Around the Circle This Week: September 18, 2015

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Row, Row, Row Your Quilt Gently ’Round the Lake

When avid Ely, Minnesota, quilter Debbie Erzar heard about the theme of this year’s “Row by Row Experience,” she knew what quilt she’d be working on this summer.

With “Row by Row H2O” as the 2015 theme and with Debbie and her husband, Bill, about to head out around Lake Superior, it seemed only natural that she would create a Lake Superior Circle Tour quilt.

The Row by Row Experience is an annual challenge to quilters around the U.S and Canada. The competing quilts need to have at least eight rows using patterns given away or kits sold at participating quilt shops. Debbie’s quilt – which she and Bill brought into our Duluth office September 16, just one day after she finished it – has nine patterned rows plus three extra panels she created. Debbie gathered the patterns at quilt shops all along their tour earlier this summer and then finished the quilt in seven weeks, despite recovering from back surgery. “Quilting is a passion for me, and a healing when times are tough,” says Debbie.

The summer challenge, which began with 20 shops in New York state in 2011, has grown to more than 2,200 participating quilt shops in all 50 states and several Canadian provinces. Joanne Moros, from Portage Quilt House in Portage Township near Houghton, Michigan, participated again this year. The shops pay a fee to join in and then must create a row pattern that has not previously been published, Joanne explains. “We have to come up with it ourselves.”

The challenge does generate interest. Joanne says about 500 people came into her shop this summer looking for the free pattern or to buy the kit. “That’s higher than we’d normally get.”

The first person to bring a finished quilt into a participating shop gets “25 fat quarters,” which equals about 6 ¼ yards of fabric. Debbie earned the prize at the Creations Quilt Shop in Duluth.

Debbie and Bill started their 13-day Circle Tour in late June and camped along the way in their RV. “We really enjoyed the provincial parks, Agawa Bay being the favorite,” Debbie says.

They found ties between Ely and Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. “The U.P. was incredible. In some ways, it was very much like home. We would love to go back to visit in the fall. Calumet was so interesting; lots of Ely people came from the Calumet area, lots of Ely names in the cemetery and downtown. The Catholic church in Calumet also had some connection to Ely people, a beautiful church. I could go on and on.”

We appreciated her tip-of-the-hat to Lake Superior Magazine’s publications as aide, too. “Our trip around Lake Superior was wonderful.  The material that we used to plan our trip and where we wanted to visit was based on the top picks from your magazine and the guidebook, Lake Superior: The Ultimate Guide to the Region. You provide valuable resources to plan our trip.”

We’re glad we helped to inspire the Erzars’ trip, and thrill to the quilted “guide” to the Circle Tour that Debbie created from it.

On the Quilt

On Debbie’s quilt, the horizontal “rows,” from top and with each shop indicated are:

  • “Sleeping Giant Awakes” from the Circle of Friends Quilt Shoppe, Thunder Bay
  • “Traffic Jam” showing the International Bridge between Michigan and Ontario from Life’s a Stitch in Saul Ste. Marie, Ontario
  • a beach panel from Sew Irresistible in Houghton, Michigan
  • “The Falls” showing Tahquamenon Falls from Village Fabric & Crafts in Paradise, Michigan
  • “Sew North Shore” from Quilt Corner in Beaver Bay, Minnesota
  • “Big Mac on a Summer’s Eve” showing the Mackinac Bridge from Alley Kat’s Quilt Shop in Marquette
  • “Northbound Freighter” from Gloria’s Happy Hooker in Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan
  • “Shine On” of the Duluth pier light from Kelly J’s in Duluth

The vertical row includes:

  • Lake Superior Circle Tour logo
  • a panel showing lakes and mining from North Country Quilts in Tower, Minnesota
  • Lake Superior and an abstract panel representing waterfalls

– Konnie LeMay

Towers for Lutsen’s new gondola installed by helicopter

Look! Up in the sky! It’s a ... gondola tower? Construction on Lutsen Mountains’ new gondola went aerial this week. A helicopter carried the steel towers over the rough terrain and placed them into their foundations, which were built over the summer.

When completed in November, the $7 million eight-passenger gondola will be able to transport 1,000 people per hour, triple the capacity of the four-seat “little red apple” gondola that has been in use since 1989. It can later be upgraded to handle up to 2,400 passengers per hour.

The old gondola cars, iconic on Minnesota’s North Shore, will be sold during a charity auction, starting at $500 apiece. A date has not yet been chosen.

Wisconsin DNR evaluates lake trout rule

An emergency rule to boost lake trout numbers in the Apostle Islands region expires at the end of September, and the Wisconsin DNR is collecting feedback from anglers.

The rule was enacted after a decade-long decline in lake trout abundance, caused by unsustainably high harvest totals, the DNR says. It reduced recreational anglers' daily limit from three to two. One could be 20 to 25 inches long, the other a trophy-sized 35 inches or longer. Only Wisconsin waters east of Bark Point were affected.

"The quota has been dropped over the last 10 years, but just for commercial fishermen," says Terry Margenau, the DNR's Lake Superior fisheries supervisor. "Last year was the first time the quota also dropped for sport anglers. We don't have all of our numbers in yet, but the numbers through July suggest it made a difference."

The DNR will host two public meetings about lake trout recovery: September 29 at the Northern Great Lakes Visitor Center in Ashland and October 1 at the Saxon Community Center. Both will be 7 to 9 p.m. If you can't make the meetings, email comments to Terry at terry.margenau@wisconsin.gov by October 15. An updated rule will take effect on December 1.

"We want to keep the harvest low, but still have people able to fish," says Terry. "Initially there was some frustration among sport anglers, but at the same time, they understood. The difficult part of this process is that lake trout are a slow-growing, long-living species, so change takes time."

Lake trout were devastated by invasive sea lamprey and overfishing in the mid-20th century, but had made a strong recovery until recently.

+ Video: Watch the Hon. James L. Oberstar arrive in Duluth just before sunrise this morning.

+ U.S. Coast Guard Marine Safety Office responders estimated five gallons of fuel oil spilled into the bay at Two Harbors, perhaps from a backup in a vent pipe while fueling a freighter. One neighbor reported a strong fuel smell, which may have been due to additional fuel on the freighter that did not enter the Lake, according to Lt. Patrick Lammersen. The Duluth News Tribune reports the fuel was quickly contained.

+ A website about the St. Louis River estuary earned the Minnesota and Wisconsin Sea Grant programs an Outstanding Programming Award from the Great Lakes Sea Grant Network. They built the site to “explore the science of the Estuary through the eyes of people that live and work here, and delve into the Science of the interplay between humans and ecosystems.”

+ Our pal Hannah Stonehouse Hudson, photographer extraordinaire, was featured in the Bayfield County Journal.

+ Sam Cook, Duluth News Tribune: “Dave and Amy Freeman prepare for their year in the Boundary Waters.”

+ A grocery chain's plans to bottle water from the Lake Superior basin and ship it elsewhere were abandoned when the company learned it would violate the Great Lakes Water Compact, according to a Journal Sentinel story. The compact prevents communities and businesses from moving water out of the watershed.

+ Hope McLeod, Bayfield County Journal: “Seven students and six adult liaisons have been working all summer growing mostly tomatoes, but also a few other crops, inside the new high tunnels on five campuses in Bayfield and Ashland Counties. Agripreneur students were paid a stipend and also earned school credit for tending the tunnels.”

+ Molly Hoeg, a Lake Superior Magazine contributor, decided to pull herself from a rut by biking the entirety of Duluth’s Skyline Drive and more, taking photos along the way.

+ More than 350 Wisconsin sixth graders paddled the St. Louis River in 24-foot voyageur canoes on a field trip hosted by Wilderness Inquiry.

+ CBC News: “Nipigon construction boom gives boost to town’s economy.”