Froggy Sailor's Delight

The socks are done! I love them and keep wearing them around the house even though it's quite warm here. I've already posted them in Ravelry, where my user name is happygirl.

The pattern is Sailor's Delight from 2-At-A-Time Socks by Melissa Morgan-Oakes. I have a rather loose gauge, so I ended up using a Size 0 needle with my Sophie's Toes yarn. Sophie's Toes is a great yarn, hand-dyed by Emily Parson from Chicago. You can take a look at what she has for sale on her etsy shop, which she updates about once per month.

Tomorrow is my birthday, and I plan to spend the day either quilting my log cabin challenge or piecing a new project. My friends are having a BBQ party in the evening to celebrate the July birthdays in the group - mine and Judy's are both in July. I'm looking forward to a great day!

The Baskets Have Arrived!

So the baskets arrived at my house yesterday, and I had a great time unwrapping them and putting together the liners, protectors, tie-ons and lids. Here is the basket Mom and I found at the little Amish shop in Plain City, Ohio (just outside of Columbus). It's the 2003 Caroling Basket. I got a great deal on this basket with the liner and protector, but had to find the lid at the Longaberger factory store.

This is the basket I bought at the Longaberger Homestead. It is only available there, and I had to choose from several colors of stain (this is a pretty dark green). I LOVE the sunflower fabric, so I had to choose that for my liner.
And this is the basket Mom gave me for my birthday. It's the Large Woven Memories basket, also available only at the Homestead. I chose the purple plaid liner and the pretty purple flower tie-on. So cute!Finally, this is the basket I bought at the Factory Store. It's the 2006 Woven Memories basket. There were no liners or protectors available there, so I'm doing a search online to track them down. I really like the shape of this basket.
So that's it! I love all of my baskets and I didn't go overboard as I had feared.

Back from Ohio!

Mom loved her quilt! She has it on her couch as a throw and it looks great in her home. We had a little birthday celebration as soon as we got to her house so she could spread it out and see it. Her cats have not noticed it yet, but I'm sure there will be some napping with the quilt as soon as they do.

Mom and I shopped, went to a concert in the park, and went to the Longaberger Homestead over in Frazeysburg, Ohio. I did a lousy job taking pictures of all of this, but I did manage to get a couple at Longaberger. Here's the corporate headquarters building:



And here's the giant basket at the Homestead:


I bought a basket or two (which I had to ship, so I'll post pictures when they arrive), and Mom gave me the Woven Memories basket for my birthday which is in just a few days. Thanks Mom!

As you can see, we had perfect weather. We stopped off at Miller's, a restaurant near the corporate headquarters which serves Amish food. It was delicious. Then we drove home, enjoying the lightning bugs which we do not have here in Colorado.

All in all, we had a great visit.

I won't speak of the plane ride, except to say it was most unpleasant.

Happy Birthday Mom!

Mom's Birthday Quilt
Originally uploaded by pfeifferini

Today is my Mom's 60th Birthday -Yay Mom! In a few hours, I am flying to Ohio to see her with this quilt in my carry-on.

The pattern is Squash Blossom by Fig Tree Quilts. It's a very sweet and easy pattern and the colors are just what Mom would like. For a close-up, click here.

See you next week when I get back!

Pass Creek Trail to Engineer Mountain

Engineer Mountain; 070908
Originally uploaded by pfeifferini

Yesterday, Linda, Kenna (Linda's dog), Robin, Biskit (Robin's dog), Magena and Ella (Robin's Granddaughters), and I hiked up the Pass Creek Trail to the base of Engineer Mountain. This trail has been improved over the last several years, and was an easy, smooth hike through a pine forest. We topped out above timber line in a large open meadow in the shadow of Engineer's impressive cone.

This photo is of Engineer Mountain from Highway 160, about 30 miles north of Durango. The top of our hike was to the right of the rocky summit.

I'm having trouble getting photos to load, so I'm going to stop with just the one for now. There's more on my flickr page, just click here.

Cascade Creek Trail

On June 2, 2008, Linda, Kenna (Linda's dog) and I hiked the Cascade Creek Trail. The trailhead is about 27.5 miles north of Durango on Hwy 550. It was a nice trail with lots of ups and downs following Cascade Creek. There were a few steep spots, and even some muddy areas of the trail, but overall it was a great hike.



This is looking back towards the trailhead to the east. Linda and I really like the meadows that open up on trails like this. Kenna is just out of sight sniffing around.


It was pretty loud along Cascade Creek, but most of the trail was high above in the piney forest. This is one of the rare crossings of the creek.










There were hundreds and hundreds of Blue Columbines before the trailhead. Here's just one example. If you want to see more, click here to go to my flickr set. They were really beautiful this week.

Playing Catch-Up - Part 2

The girls and I hiked the Vallecito Creek Trail on June 11.

From the left we have Marcia, Linda holding Kenna's collar, Lynn, Celia, Kim and Elaine. Behind them is the canyon containing Vallecito Creek, looking north.

The trailhead is on the far northeastern side of Vallecito Reservoir, about 25 miles east of Durango. This is a very rocky trail, and it follows the canyon carved by Vallecito Creek which was full of water from the spring runoff. In some places, the water was so loud we had to shout to be heard! We saw many wildflowers along the trail:

So now we're all caught up! The last hike of the month was Elbert Creek, and you can see that post here.

Playing Catch-Up

In the time I was contemplating doing this blog, I took lots of photos. So, today I thought I'd tell you about some of the things I've been doing for the last month or so.

On Memorial Day weekend, I woke up to this:

The photo is of my husband's barn, full of old bicycles and other manly things, and yes that is snow. On May 23. On one hand, it had been a very long winter for us and I was sick of snow. This was a much disappointing sight. On the other hand, I got to wear knitwear to the Pagosa Fiber Festival where I met some very funny alpacas and a scholarly sheep. I bought some gorgeous stuff from the vendors and had a lovely day over all. By the time I came home, most of the snow had melted and the sun was out again.

The girls and I went on our first hike of the season on May 28. We trekked up the Junction Creek trail which is also the southern terminus of the Colorado Trail. This is a short hike, less than 5 miles, along a well-maintained trail. We saw many mountain bikers and runners (!), and after many, many switchbacks, we came to the top:



From left to right, that's Robin holding Biskit, Beth, Celia trying to hold Kenna, Linda standing, Kim petting Splash, and Marcia the speed-demon. Behind them is the view from Gudy's rest, looking southeast towards Durango.

On June 1, we had our 9th Annual Small Quilt Benefit Auction. We have a live auction every year of quilts made and donated by La Plata Quilters Guild. This year we had 134 quilts and raised almost $12,000.00. It was a somewhat stressful day because the City of Durango double-booked our park with a wedding. As you know, people having a wedding have no sense of humor, so I spent a good portion of the day dodging the mother of the groom who kept trying to find someone with enough authority to kick us out of the park. Luckily, others in the guild were able to keep the situation calm and I was able to focus on the auction itself. I never get photos of the auction while it's going, but here are all the quilts hanging up before the auction.




Our next hike was Animas City Mountain on June 4. This trail starts right in town (Durango, that is), and climbs steeply up to a great overlook. The trail then continues along the northeastern edge of Animas City Mountain and down to make a loop . The entire hike is about 6 miles on a rocky trail. On the way down, I took photos of the Animas River out of its banks in the valley north of Durango.




On June 6, I hiked the Sale Barn trail south of Durango. It was a lovely, easy 8 mile hike on smooth trails. This trail is dry and had lots of cactus and other flowers to keep me occupied:



Hmmm, kinda blurry, but still pretty.























Later that weekend, I finished these pink socks!





The pattern is Sugar Maple from 2-at-a-Time Socks by Melissa Morgan-Oakes. The yarn is Emily Parson's Sophie's Toes. Knitting these socks was fast, interesting and fun and the socks are gorgeous. I love this technique and am using it for all of my socks now. I immediately cast on another pair of socks plus a scarf, both of which I will cover in a future post.