2010-12-10T14:19:00.000-08:00

I have made Raidan a purse for Christmas.

It was pretty fast to work up and hadf it done in 2 days.

Then I decided to make a cell phone cover for me. I think I want to make more of these for my etsy shop. cell purse

At St joes in tacoma

2010-11-11T20:28:00.000-08:00

Dave is in remission and so they are giving him higher dosage of chemo to kill anything thats left floating around. He is tired mainly so he has been sleeping a lot. Hope to see him back home this week end.

we have wonderful friends

2010-10-24T21:53:00.000-07:00

Our kayak community has done it again. They had a play day that was a benefit for us. We feel so loved by them as they wanted to help us out as we go through this difficult time in our life.

I miss my sweetie

2010-10-10T09:17:00.000-07:00

Its been 2 days and I miss him. Again they are saying he can come home on Monday or Tuesday. Its raining so that does not help my mood either. Amy went out to see him last night and they had a good visit. Will be going to see Julie and Rai today. We miss our little girl now that they don't live with us and she had been sick for a while so I had to stay away from her because of that. She made pictures for her Papa to have while he is in the hospital. He also got a card from Tailer that she made.

Thats all for now, happy sunday everyone!

Update: Dave makes life interesting (not) I got to bring him home but he had too much fun and had to go back to Seattle after 2 hours. Seriously his platelets were too low to clot so he had bleeding. They just keep the blood going in him to get his levels up now. He is my sweetie and I love him so much. He does keep me on my toes at times though!

Up too early

2010-10-05T06:09:00.000-07:00

Been up since 5:30 so thought I should do an update. They changed the diagnois from Myeloid sarcoma to Acute myeloid lukemia. The staff here has been great with taking care of him. He is almost done with his round of chemo, so I think in the next week he will have another bone marrow biopsy to see how well the chemo worked. I will be going back to Olalla as I have to go to work tonight.

Wow

2010-10-02T00:14:00.000-07:00

Thanks to everyone who is helping us out. Bernie Swanson was out tonight. Dave and I were sleeping when he showed up. It was nice to see a smiling face when we woke up. I have drawings of Raidan and Keegan's on the bulletin board for Dave. He had his chemo tonight and I think they will be doing blood some time tonight also.

This is Raidan riding a horse all by herself!

She is our little sweetie!

Off to Seattle for 2 days

2010-10-01T09:06:00.000-07:00

I am going to see my Hunny today in Seattle. We miss each other and he also needs stuff since they admitted him the day of his appt with the new Dr. More later when I get there.

Thanks to Phil Philben,Ayu, Rhonda and Chris for their donations!

Email for Dave

2010-09-30T14:06:00.001-07:00

I set this up so it could be a place for everyone to talk to him.

bigwavedave920@yahoo.com

Once I get there tomorrow he will have his lap top.

Shit hits the fan

2010-09-30T11:03:00.000-07:00

This is the start of our journey with Dave's Cancer. He had been sick for 4 months and nothing the Dr. tried worked. So 5 Doctors later he is now getting chemo for acute myeloid leukemia.

We have heard from so many of our friends since he went in the hospital for his treatment. We love all you guys and you know who you are! I am sad that my sweetie is so sick and that I have to go to work when I would rather be with him but thats what days off are for. So thats all for right now.

Belle the blue beveren and her kits

2010-04-26T11:50:00.000-07:00

On March 21st Belle had her 1st litter of kits. They have been growing like weeds since then. She has been a good mom to them and they will be ready to sell May 21st.

If your intersted I have 4 does for sale, I do have 2 bucks and a doe that I am takeing to Ellensburg for the Wa state convention June 25th. I am planning to just keep one buck after that show.

My email is herbandteas@yahoo.com

Tully's knitting group

2010-01-04T23:36:00.000-08:00

I went to meet up with the girls at the Port Orchard Tully's and I wished I had my camera with me. Everyone had something beautiful on their needles. We also had laura with her spindle,since I found out she is in Olalla too it looks like I might have someone to hang out with that loves fiber like I do. One of the ladies there also had made a knitted Pooh bear and also told me there is a pooh bear group on Ravelry. Once there I found another site that had rug hooked stuffed pooh bears so I just might buy the kit for my daughter Dawn for her birthday in Febuary.

Happy New Years

2010-01-01T00:03:00.001-08:00

I am hoping that this year will be a much better year than last year. I will be having surgery soon to replace my damaged cochlear implant and during the time I will have off I plan to work on my different ideas I have for the new year.

More later when I am on my own computer so I can add pictures to this post also.

rooster tea pot

2009-12-02T15:57:00.000-08:00

I am posting this so anyone that likes to collect tea pots and chickens can see. Dave's Mom bought him for me.

Also here is a picture of the ginger bread tea loaf I made today. You will notice it is just about gone too.

Goat cheese

2009-11-02T22:29:00.000-08:00

Last week end I went out to see Vicky in Hansville. She now has a creamery that she sells her goats milk from. I have been wanting to make cheese for a while so I bought some of her goats milk. Once I got all the stuff together to make it, I thought it would be easy. Well I had to email Vicky a few times. My 1st problem was this morning there was no curds just milk. Vicky suggested that I add more rennet. Which worked. So after dinner I wrapped up my curds so they can drain for a few hours. Once that is done then I can put the cheese in a container and tomorrow morning I want to add some chives and garlic. I also hope to get pictures of the finished product and have some comments on how it tastes. So stay tuned as the cheese turns :D

my newest bunny

2009-10-11T19:31:00.000-07:00

This is Bella, she is a sweet blue beveren. She is a new addition to my rabbitry. Thanks to Jennifer Clark for letting her go home with me.

Korbins hat

2009-10-07T13:58:00.000-07:00

Here is Julie's cabbage patch doll modeling Korbin's hat. Actually now it is Rai's cabbage patch doll so it is a 2nd generation that is playing with this doll. I hope that Jeanna likes the hat and Korbin will actually wear a hat.

Misshelaineous stuff

2009-10-05T19:14:00.001-07:00

Rai and I went to my friend Jeannie's grandson Korbin's 1st birthday party on Saturday. As you can see she was very tired afterwards.

Here is a couple pictures of Dave and I when we went camping on the Elwah river for 3 days. It was suppose to rain the whole time but it only did it when we were hiking out to go home.

This is a fountain that my father in law made, it is pretty cool looking and I love the sound the water makes.

This is my white rock hen who has gone broody....she has 4 rhode island red eggs under her, I am hoping they will hatch.

Here is updates on how my silkies looking. I think that the black one may be a rooster so his name stays Fred and the white one is a hen so she is staying Ethel.

Lavern and shirley

2009-08-25T21:01:00.000-07:00

Lavern is in the 1st picture and Shirley is in the 2nd picture. They are birchen blue cochens and are about 5 months old . They are a very chatty couple of hens so thats why I named them Lavern and Shirley !

Our chickens

2009-08-21T10:22:00.000-07:00

The white rocks have started laying. In one weeks time their eggs doubled in size from Pullet to huge brown eggs and soon the rhode island red bantam hen will be also.

Here is a few pictures of our chickens and my little helper Rai. She is just the right size to fit in the bantam coop.

buttons

2009-07-19T20:48:00.001-07:00

I love special buttons and these are just so cute! Anyone else love buttons? I have white rock hens so this was about as close to the breed as I could get in buttons.

Holland lop kits for sale

2009-07-16T13:49:00.000-07:00

They were born April 30th so they are about 10 weeks old now. All 5 of them are Blue tort bucks. The parents are a smoke pearl doe and a blue tort buck, He won 2nd place at the Yelm, Wa spring show this year. They are a very smart and sweet breed of rabbit and good with kids.

I am selling them for $25 each

Silkie chicks

2009-07-07T22:06:00.000-07:00

I picked up these cuties in Bremerton yesterday. I thought I was bringing home 2-4 week old buff's but ended up with 3-buffs and 1 white and black 6 week old chicks. They are funny looking right now but when the feather out they should be beautiful birds.

Thanks Jason for giving me the silkies!

rhode island red bantams

2009-06-16T21:09:00.000-07:00

Here is pictures of my little rhode island red bantams. They are about 2 months old. Since I had some issues with cats in our yard. I keep them in a huge cage where they have plenty of room and during the day I have them in a pen so they get to get bugs and weeds.

2009-06-10T22:27:00.000-07:00

Here is some things we have in our garden this year. Along with my bantam chicken lucky, she is lucky because she survived an attack on her cage mate 2 times. So she is going to be my only small chicken.

New Chicken coop

2009-05-25T20:56:00.000-07:00

Dave had been putting up siding on our house and a new window this week end and we had enough to build
a new chicken coop that is now in the back yard. The old window is now the door to the coop and there is a back door to reach in to gather the eggs each day. It is in a very shady spot where there is plenty for them to eat besides their feed. I have 4 hens now and I am looking for a broody bantam hen so I can buy fertile eggs to hatch. So now all my pests oh I mean pets are in the back yard in their own homes.

Thank you hunny for making them a nice place to live!

2009-05-17T14:43:00.000-07:00

Sweet pea with one of her kits and

all 5 kits in a box.

2 month old white rock chicks.

Raidan's bunny nest box

2009-05-08T08:35:00.000-07:00

This is my grand daughter's bunny nest. She seen that sweet pea had bunnies so she put her bunny in a nest too. She will be 3 in August and just loves our bunnies!

Sweet Pea and Peter's kits

2009-05-05T13:55:00.000-07:00

Our holland lop kits, they are 1 week old and will be opening their eyes real soon.

It looks like one is already taking after Peter as he had tried to jump from my hand into Julie's lap.

They look like they will be torts but not sure if the color will be blue like Peter is. Sweet Pea is a smoke pearl.

The rabbits have a home

2009-04-28T16:39:00.001-07:00

This is my new rabbit home. It is under our cedar tree so there is shade and sun when the door is open. Plenty of ventalation during the summer and can be closed up more if needed in the winter.

what is on my spindle

2009-04-14T16:33:00.001-07:00

This is my spindle I had made for me a couple years ago. The design is the symbol for OM. Which is my mantra when I am meditating. The wool on it is a hand dyed Corriedale.

Breakfast for bunnies

2009-03-27T10:45:00.002-07:00

Here is my view of them in the morning all clustered together waiting to eat. Once I put food in one bowl all 5 of them try to get in to eat!
They are now 7 weeks old.

Alpaca and silk fiber

2009-03-25T21:36:00.000-07:00

Can you see the shine in this fiber. I can't wait to spin this up.

Chloe babie's

2009-03-10T13:37:00.000-07:00

They are now in their own cage eatting pellets and hay. They will be 5 weeks old tomorrow the 11th

Barney

2009-03-09T14:13:00.000-07:00

I picked him up on Saturday from Larry at the Yelm rabbit show. He is such a laid back little guy. He is my new breeder buck.

Bunny in my pocket

2009-02-27T14:42:00.001-08:00

All I can say is I am having fun with these little cuties.

To be felted

2009-02-27T13:57:00.000-08:00

I got this yarn from Dulie to make something for our rabbit clubs demo table at the show next week end. I thought that I would try felting it to see how it does since it is an angora blend. It if works out they way I hope it will become a coffee cozy.

bunny's a hoppin

2009-02-21T17:54:00.001-08:00

They will be 3 weeks old on the 25th. They have grown so much and they are pretty fun to watch. They were stretching and hip hoppin around. Somewhere during the time since I had surgery on the 17th till today I lost 2 white bunnies. So we just have one white bun now. It seems to like having me hold it the most too.

1 week old kits

2009-02-12T18:17:00.001-08:00

Their little eyes are starting to open and they are moving around quite a bit now.

I have 4 dark chinchilla kits and 3 white ones. I think they are all cute!

Chloe' s kits

2009-02-05T17:47:00.001-08:00

Here is the 1st picture of Chloe's kits. Some of them were hiding. She was a very good mom so she got a few treats after she was all done having them.

Rabbit agility training

2009-02-01T22:56:00.000-08:00

Today I took Peter for his 1st agility training. At 1st he was just interested in eatting grass. Then Kim set him up with his own set up and he finally got the idea that he was suppose to jump over the sticks not go under them. It was fun so I hope to bring Sweet pea with us next time.

To learn more about Rabbit agility training check out this link:
http://tinyurl.com/c6ldgw

Alpaca tam in ebony

2009-01-31T22:41:00.000-08:00

I am making this tam for me in bernat alpaca blend yarn. The color is ebony. It is soooo soft and I am abuot 3/4 of the way done when my lovely grand daughter Raidan got a hold of it. She wanted to crochet like her Nonnie. There will be more pictures when I finish it.

My latest cuties.......

2009-01-27T18:57:00.001-08:00

This is Sweet pea and Peter cotton tail. They are Holland lop's the smallest of lop rabbits. They are so much fun to have around. They let Raidan play with them. I am going to take them for agility training. Here is a link so you know what I am talking about.

http://tinyurl.com/c6ldgw

Dave says I finally lost it when he seen me with Peter in a harness and leash. Hehehee, thats why I am the crazy bunny lady right???

Snow day

2008-12-17T12:42:00.000-08:00

Here are my chickens having a snow day. I tossed out their scratch and out they came one by one out of the coop.

Yelm rabbit show

2008-11-09T13:10:00.000-08:00

Chloe, has been with me for a bit over 2 weeks now.

I took her to the Yelm, Wa rabbit show yesterday to show her.

You can't really tell from the picture because of the flash but she is darker in person than in this picture.

She got 1st place in her class yesterday and so now I have to brag as I am a proud bunny Mom.

She also got bred by her new friend Malachi while we were there so it may work out that we will have more rabbits next month.

American Chinchilla Blessed Chloe

2008-10-31T11:23:00.000-07:00

This is Blessed Chloe, she is an American Chinchilla doe. She is a little shy, but a very sweet girl. She is a rare breed rabbit that is on the critical list as there is not as many of her breed left. I got her from my friend Kim Smith of Blessed Farm.

Kitchen set

2008-09-27T13:14:00.000-07:00

This is what I have been working on lately. I have been buying dish towels then knitting up dish cloths and scrunchy's for gifts. I have been thinking of listing them for sale on Craigslist.

Our 24th anniversary

2008-09-20T22:03:00.001-07:00

He is still my sweetie after all these years. We have just about raised our kids and we have 2 cute grand kids. We have many friends in the kayak community that have been there for us when we needed them.

I hope we have many more years together.

Raidan turns 2

2008-09-20T18:56:00.001-07:00

Here is a picture of Raidan on her 2nd birthday August 16th

She is growing up to be a pretty and sweet little girl.

She loves Dora the explorer. She loves spending time with us. She likes to help me feed the chickens, ducks and our bunny Lily.

Here she is sitting in the back of our Toyota tacoma with Lainey & Tailar

Rooster tea pot

2008-09-15T12:26:00.000-07:00

About 8 yrs ago my Mother in law Vi bought me this rooster tea pot for Christmas. I think he is unique and was happy to add him to my small collection of tea pots I have. It is funny that now I have chickens but no roosters.

How my garden grows

2008-07-27T21:10:00.001-07:00

My 1st picture is of my black hollyhock flowers, below them I have some black violets which will fill out the area under them. 2nd picture is of my giant pumpkin plant. At this time there is 20 blooms with a few starts of pumpkins. 3rd picture is of my zuccini plant......we are going to be having some zuccini bread this fall. The last picture is of my chamomile plant. I grow them this way each year for my tea blend of peppermint, chamomile and lemon balm.

My favorite chickens

2008-07-27T21:02:00.001-07:00

Today I interduced my birds to scratch and they all went after it then I went to the back yard and gathered some of my never ending supply of weeds for them to eat.

These are my favorite chickens out of the 6 that I got from Del's. They are really growing fast! The other 3 chickens kind of look scruffy looking so I am not sure if this 3 is the hens and the other 3 are the roosters. I guess I could post their pictures on back yard chickens to find out what the experts think.

They look like chickens

2008-07-14T22:35:00.001-07:00

They are 7 weeks old now and they have all their feathers in. The chicken you see by my shadow is the boss chicken which I suspect is a rooster. They share the coop with the ducks now, the ducks have the lower part and they all fly up to the upper level to sleep at night. All day long they peck and scratch around in the pen we made for them to stay in.

Dalia's

2008-06-25T13:30:00.000-07:00

I work in a garden shop and today we got these beautiful dinner plate dalia's. I bought them for Dave as his birthday is coming up and we use to have a raised bed full of different colors of this variety. Now we are trying to grow veggies there.

There is lots of blooms waiting to open on this plant so I know it will be beautiful when it is in full bloom.

Happy Birthday Sweetie!

Here duck ducks

2008-06-23T17:54:00.000-07:00

I now have a pair of Pekin ducks. They are 10 weeks old and will be laying eggs in the next couple weeks. We built a fence around the the coop so they can get bugs and weeds. They still have not gotten in the pool but I am sure they will soon and then I can take a video of them splashing around.

They are much more mellow than the chicks which almost have all their feathers. The chicks are now spending the day time out in a cage and inside the rabbit tent at night with a blanket over their cage to keep them warm.

outside in the big cage

2008-06-14T20:25:00.001-07:00

Today I put them in this big cage I got from craigslist. Like anything else they huddle together then once they see it is ok then they set about to check out the sights. The close up is to see how the feathers are growing in now and she is sitting on the roost Dave made. They were also able to get dandelions that were peeking thru the wire. I think they will be able to stay in this for a while and we are going to put it in a box so it will be like a coop. This is a video of them flying.

17 days old

2008-06-10T19:20:00.000-07:00

They are starting to look more like chickens. They have back feathers and wings. They also fly around a bit. I am really enjoying having these little peeps around. Today Dave gave them some dandelion leaves. At first they acted like it was some thing evil till they noticed it didn't move unless they picked it up. Then they went to town on eatting it.

11 days old

2008-06-06T18:56:00.001-07:00

Here they are at 11 days old. I have named 3 of them so far. There is penquin, blondie and ginger. I have made a short video on youtube.com

This is the link

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EIrTdx_rDEI

chicken coop design

2008-06-05T16:49:00.000-07:00

This is a picture from the chicken coop book I got from the library.

Our coop looks simular to this one here. We just have to make the roof slant, put plywood over the run, add a roost and nests to ours. Right now it is the coop is taken apart so we can clean it and put the roost and the nests in.

More pictures later when we get it done and the chicks inside :D

5 days old

2008-06-02T16:20:00.000-07:00

Here is a picture of them sleeping in the corner at 5 days old they are getting their wing feathers in pretty good now. Today I put some food in my hand and after a bit I had 4 or more in my hand pecking food out. I thought it was neat that they were eatting out of my hand.

Here a chick, chick..... there a chick, chick

2008-05-31T14:13:00.000-07:00

We got chicks yesterday from Del's farm supply in Port Orchard. We got a half dozen of Amercuana chicks.

Our chicks at 3 days old.

Here is a link of what they will look like http://www.mypetchicken.com/Ameraucana-B5.aspx

Baby blanket beginings

2007-02-27T18:59:00.000-08:00

This is the start of a continuous granny square baby blanket. I have been working on it off and on for a week. The yarn is a red heart yarn called ocean. I think it is a pretty color for a baby boy.

I have to have it ready for the Mom by the end of March.

Camping at Ike Kinswa

2007-02-11T14:53:00.000-08:00

We left on Friday afternoon loaded up with our kayaks and trailer to Ike Kinswa state park. This is our 1st trip camping in our fifth wheel trailer. We had to go to Seattle the day before to pick up the racks at SRK so we could take our kayaks as we were going to meet up with some of the South Sound Area Kayakers on Saturday to paddle around Mayfield lake. According to Terry West the POC we went a total of 11 miles. It was really beautiful as there were waterfalls along the way. We had a camp site on the lake so all we had to do was put our boats in the water and meet up with them across the lake at the boat ramp. As you can see above there was a beautiful scenes from our camp site and the way we had to put our kayaks on our truck.

New paddles

2007-02-11T14:44:00.000-08:00

Dave made my grandson Keegan and I greenland paddles.

We went out to test drive mine and once I got use to it I really enjoyed paddling with it.

We went to the boat ramp in Port Orchard to paddle and once we got near Gorst there were tons of jelly fish and I felt like I was flipping pancakes instead of paddling!

Febuary sock of the month

2007-02-04T21:03:00.000-08:00

I have joined the Knit and Chat on delphi forums sock of the month. This is the 1st sock for the month of Febuary. Actually it is my 1st completed adult sock. It is a tube sock done in a rib stitch pattern. I am going to give the completed set to my daughter Dawn for her birthday later this month.

Amy is my lovely model for this picture :)

Baby gift set

2007-01-30T15:37:00.000-08:00

I made this cute set for a friend's daughter. The hat and socks are the easiest I have made to date. I am sure I will be making more of these during the year because I know of at least 2 more babies that have yet to be born.

The background is a table runner I crocheted for use on our kitchen island.

Here she is.............

2007-01-30T15:32:00.000-08:00

Raidan Lily, she is almost 6 months old and a bundle of fun. She is wearing a hat I made for her using red heart yarn.

My felting adventure

2007-01-11T17:01:00.000-08:00

Now that the holidays are over I decided to dig into felting. I have been inspired by Cat Bordhi's Treasury of magical knitting so much so I got her 2nd treasury of magical knitting. I seen a pattern for a coffee cup cozy on Knit and chat at Delphi forums. Being as I have a hard time holding on to those esspresso cups as the burn my fingers, even with the card board ring around them I thought that this is what I wanted to make for me.

Something quick and easy right???? This is a crochet pattern so I had to look up the stitch so I could make it then I was on my way.
Once it was done it was huge but I just figured it would shrink down to the right size once it was washed. If you look to the right and see that curly fuzzy round thing you will see what it looked like once it was felted. So I decided I liked it though cuz it reminded me of myself. I have been having some memory issues lately and so I named this my Fuzzy brain. Later I plan on adding some beads to it to make it sparkle.

I then bought some more yarn and tried it again but this time I did my own pattern that worked out just fine for me. I made mine with the ruffle and Dave's is just a round as I really don't think he would wanted a ruffle on his.

I used a j hook
ch st 28 joined it together
ch st 2 then hdc in the next st
join then repeat till you have 8 rows.
rows 9 to 11
you ch st 2 then 2 hdc in each stitch.
(If you don't want a ruffle stop at row 8)
This makes your ruffle then bind off.

Toss it in washer add a little bit of detergent
Set on lowwatter /hot water setting.
with tennis balls to help aggitate your cozies.

Memory book for my Mom

2006-07-30T23:21:00.000-07:00

Last summer about this time Amy and I went to see my Mom and Richard in Northern Calif. for a week. While we were there my Mom gave me some lovely photos of her family. I decided since then I wanted to make my Mom a fabric memory book with some of these old photos.

The 1st photo is of my Grandma and she is holding me. I find this a special photo because she rarely smiled in any of the photos that have been taken of her. The 2nd photo is of her Mother who was my Great Grandma, I never met her but it is really nice to have such a lovely photo of her.

Spring break, the week away!

2006-04-17T07:30:00.000-07:00

Here is a few photos from our spring break!

Amy and I at Illaya's in Sequim
Dave and Amy practicing at Crescent beach
Dave at La Push

We took the week off and spent the week up in the Port Angeles area. For the beginning of the week we had our daughter Amy with us. We spent each day at Crescent beach. Dave had just bought a new sit on top surf kayak. Amy and Dave went out her in his sea kayak with him in the surf kayak. She got around the island and splash with lots of laughing as she went over too far and fell out. So it took a few minutes but she got back in. Then they went over by the rocks he went into the surf to see how his kayak was on the waves. Then they came back in to the shore so he could help her practice different ways to get back in the boat.

Monday, Amy and I went to Sequim to see my friend Illaya. We spent some time visiting at her home and then she took us to lunch. We had a great time with Illaya but it ended too soon.

On the next day we were all out in the water with Dave getting Amy in the white water boat and the surf kayak. I was out there playing in the sea kayak. Tiny waves are fun to practice bracing on.

We took Amy back on Tuesday as she had other things she wanted to do on her break. We then went camping for 3 days at Salt Creek.

On Wednesday we went out to La Push! The waves there were great and Dave got to surf his new kayak there to see how it worked in bigger waves. He had a great time out there while I read or slept on the beach....ahhhh how nice it is to relax on the beach!!!

Thursday we spent hiking around on the beach and the trails at Salt Creek. Its a really nice camp ground even with the teenagers who were camping next to us LOL

Friday its back in town again for the Port Angeles kayak symposium! We helped out again in the morning. Then we spent time talking to Sarah and Gerry at the Washington water trails tent. We later in the day had the wild harvest class with Jennifer Hahn and Mac Smith. This was a great learning experience on how to harvest sea weeds and small shell fish.

Saturday I had the wild cookery class with Jennifer and Mac this was so much fun watching them cook up stuff from the harvesting we did the night before! Dave had some classes in the afternoon and our friend Bob came out so we were hanging out with him till the slide show that Jennifer had that night about her solo paddle through the inside passage! It was a wonderful slide show and she is a gifted story teller that I bought the book just so I could read it for myself.

Sunday we both had volunteer duty and on the water classes which we both enjoyed. We had a great week and I can't wait to do it again.

Pretty knitting needles

2006-02-27T20:41:00.000-08:00

I finally got around to making up the needles for knitting
multidirectional scarf.

I had borrowed the book, Modular knits by Iris Schreier from my local library. In the book it says to take dpn's and add something at the top to keep the stitches from falling off the needle's. So I found some polymer clay bead's that I got in a swap, then I glued them on.

I think they look pretty nice if I do say so myself.

Circle of friends

2006-02-20T13:23:00.000-08:00

Circle of friend's

I finished my project for this month for the Bead Art Exploration. It is a bracelet that I have called "Circle of friends". The beads in it remind me of a song that my daughter's camp fire group use to sing at the end of the meeting.
If I remember it correctly it goes something like this.

Make new friends but keep the old one is silver and the other is gold.

That's about all I can remember but I was thinking about the lesson for this month and this song came to mind.

So once I finished this bracelet that I was just making for myself it all came together for me in my mind. It is made with magnet beads that I had bought at Ellen's lbs while I was there with her a couple week ends ago and turquoise cathedral beads. I have some friends who have very magnetic personalities and some that real gems in my life and they are my "circle of friends."

Edited to add:
The magnetic beads are suppose to help with arthritis pain which I have problems with my right wrist so that is where it is going to be worn.

Have a happy week, Helaine

Learning to spindle

2006-02-16T13:13:00.000-08:00

I now have a spindle but I did not know how to use it. This lead me to looking for ways to learn how to use it before I get my shetland wool back.
So I joined the "Spindler's" yahoogroup, on there I met Heidi from The Artful Ewe. She told me of the local spinning guilds and the fact that she will have people over on Wednesday to try out spinning wheels at her place. There was going to be someone there who could help me learn how to use my spindle!!!
This was pretty cool as there was wool, books, wheels, looms and spindles everywhere I turned. I got to watch people on spinning wheels and see some different wheels in action. I got the help I needed plus some yummy wool to turn into yarn and a spindle to try out at home. So much fun and so little time to do it in.

Unusual pin from Ellen

2006-02-07T21:48:00.000-08:00

On the Bead Art Exploration for January, we had to do an unusual project. It had to be made with something unusal. So Ellen made hers with lichen and beads. Here is the one she made for me at the retreat this last week end. She is so sweet to suprise me like that. I was sitting next to her the whole time she was making it LOL Then she gives it to me!

Woman's PJ retreat week end with Ellen

2006-02-06T22:48:00.000-08:00

This is what I made this last week end while I was at the woman's pj retreat week end with my friend Ellen. This year was a bit different as there was a huge storm heading our way early Saturday. We woke up to no power with huge winds that had gusts up to 60 mph. From where we were sitting in the craft area we could see huge waves and the trees were swirling around.
We worked on our projects and mine was a felted cap by the time I got done with it. I had started it at home by wet felting around a tennis ball. Once I had finished tossing it around in the dryer I cut it in half to get the ball out. I used seeds from a necklace I have had for a very long time and an assortment of beads. On the top is a felted ball that I beaded before I had attached it to the cap. On another note there has been mention that it would look cool as a "boobie cup" instead of a cap for a doll. Hehehee

close encounters

2006-01-28T18:47:00.000-08:00

I finished my alien cloth that I am making for my daughter Dawn's birthday next month. I had fun making this as it is the 1st time I have knitted something that had a design in it. I have to make a 2nd one. I was thinking it would be cool to make it into a table runner or something like that. After I finish the 2nd alien cloth I am going to try the dragonfly cloth pattern in some really nice cotton yarn I got at Sweet Stitch www.sweetstitch.com in Bremerton.

Sunday at the pool

2006-01-23T08:53:00.000-08:00

This Sunday, Dave and I met up with the South Sound Area Kayakers at the Shelton, Wa pool. We all spent 2 hours practicing rolls, wet exits and to re enter our boats. I wish I had pictures of this but I was busy trying to learn how to get back into my kayak by myself as well as getting on the back of the boat to enter it that way too. I am proud to say that I managed to do these things so now I feel a bit better that I might be able to do this on my own if I went out paddling with others when Dave was not with us to help me in my boat.
Afterwards we went out to eat with a few of them and we had a great time just sharing paddling stories.
While we were driving there I did see a couple yarn shops I would like to check out when I go back to that area again.

My 1st ramble

2006-01-20T15:42:00.000-08:00

Welcome to my blog

I hope to share my thoughts and some of my creative work.
I just started knitting this fall. I love working with fiber and fabric. It has actually taken over for now my bead work. The scarf is the 1st project I have finished as well as a fisherman's scarf I made for my step dad but I did not have time to take a picture of it because I needed to send it to them for Christmas 5 days later .

Then after that I finished a crochet bracelet that ended up going to my daughter Julie. I finished this for the bead art expoloration project for the month of December. Actually I finished it at the beginning of January.

This last week end I went to Port Angeles to meet my hubby and some friends of ours to go paddling. I stopped 1st to meet my friend Illaya at the Mingled yarn in Sequim. This is a lovely yarn shop next door to a country store and garden shop right off the hwy. We spent at least 1 hour drooling over the yarn . Illaya bought some lovely fiber to keep her busy for a while. I bought some 2nd time cotton yarn that is really beautiful in maroon with some dark purple running thru it. I also bought some brittany needles. I spent the time I was not in my kayak that week end knitting up a wash cloth. I plan on buying more of this yarn as I really liked working with it. I think there is enough to make another wash cloth too.

MissHelaineous musings