How The West Was Spun

Changes in the Air

It's that time of year, I guess.  I'm not really a summer kinda person.  I like the changes of fall and spring, and the surprises of changeable weather that comes with those seasons.  Right now, in the valley, we couldn't ask for nicer weather.  After several cold and rainy days last week, we are looking at 10-14 days of sun with temperatures around 70 during the day and 50 overnight - just perfect for outdoorsy kind of stuff.

A couple of weeks ago, I made another big change - I left my job of almost 5 years in a middle management position.  I had been feeling really really (REALLY) burned out before we went on our vacation, and while I had a wonderfully relaxing time, by 7:30 a.m. the morning I went back to work, I could feel my blood pressure at the upper limits of what probably isn't so great for me.  Too much stress, consistently long days with cancellation of many things I've had planned with friends or the animals, or just myself, and well..... not enough compensation (is there ever enough compensation for a job which is driving you mad on a daily basis?  Not for me anyway).

I did some numbers, began doing some looking around and was able to find myself a nice, quiet, work-from-home (I don't think I'm equipped to go back to an actual office - virtual reality is SO much better) job with another national company, in which I am only responsible for the work on MY desk, and as long as I crank through my work during the day, I knew I could match my yearly salary (although improving upon the hourly, since I'm not working 12-15 hour days anymore).

Lots and lots of things I probably could say about my ex-job, but for right now, I'm just glad to be out of it.  This weekend, since I didn't have to check in and be on call, D and I took a lovely ride with the horses, I sat and knit for several hours (something mindless while I watched a movie, but sometimes you need mindless), and I got a warp wound for some Xmas present towels.  I'm hoping this will be a change for the better, will give me some discretionary time back in my schedule to do some things I want to do (rather than have to do), and markedly decrease my stress level (because really, who needs the stress?).

And the best part - all this gorgeous fall weather to actually have the time to get out and enjoy!

All for now.....

S is also for.....

Sydney. (Notice a trend here?)

I obviously have a thing for black-and-white, long-haired dogs, eh?

Syd, although she looks like she could be Sam-dog's love child, was a rescue dog from a group in New England.  She was found wandering along a road in central Tennessee, picked up by the animal control and was in a kill shelter on her last day of life when this herding-dog rescue group got her out and moved her to their safe house out on the Cape in Massachusetts.

She is the completely antithesis of Sam - she is quiet, very docile, an absolutely sweetheart, and extremely gentle. Her first winter in Vermont with me was a bit of a shock for her, I think, but she soon figured out she absolutely LOVED the snow.  She would spend hours outside in the snow, digging little bunkers to lay in, racing over the drifts, and just eating the white stuff.

 

She's also been a great babysitter for the puppy.  She is very patient with her and lets her pull on her tail and generally climb all over her.  She's taught Rowan everything she knows about napping, which is considerable.

All for now.....

S is for......

Sam.

Sam officially was D's dog - he got him as a puppy his last year in college - before I knew either of them.  Sam wasn't really happy when D and I started dating - he was very jealous and would spend hours sitting in front of whereever I was sitting, glaring at me.  He eventually came around tho, and became very very protective of me.  When I would walk him along the wide tree-filled Monument Avenue in Richmond (where we lived at the time), he kept an eye out for any "questionable"men and if he saw one he didn't like, he would interpose himself between me and the interloper and if the guy made any moves towards us, Sam would hit the end of his leash with teeth bared.  It was obvious he took his protectorship very seriously.

We think he was mostly border collie (originally a pound puppy), and although he didn't have the herding "eye", he was smart as a whip, and we'd often find at the end of a party or get-together at the house, he had managed to move everyone into a corner where we'd be huddled, talking, without even realizing he had moved us there. 

He was one of the best friends D ever had (although the two of them occasionally had discussions over who got to be the alpha male in the house), and he certainly was one of mine.  The year we lost him to old age and painful hip joints was bleak in our house.  We pretty much cancelled holiday celebrations because the house was so empty without him.  D and I still recall him with great fondness, and shake our heads and laugh at what a character he was.

All for now.....

Some Knitting Things

First off, I have an FO, which I haven't even blogged about being "in progress" - far different from the 2-1/2 years' worth of pictures I usually give you (the "Oh look, 1 more inch knit" ones - you know what I'm talking about).

I was a little bit worried about yardage of the handspun I purchased in Scotland, but with the short-person modifications I put into place, I have finished the "Red Vest" from Cheryl Oberle's Folk Vests from that handspun with an entire skein to spare. Here it is blocking....

A closeup of the front bands with the wee tiny (but perfect!) buttons I found for the closure.

Project Specs:

• Handspun wool blend (alpaca, I think) yarn from The Woolen Centre in Scotland (approximately 550 yards used)
• Knit on size 3 and 4 U.S. needles
• Modifications:  I shortened the overall body length by about an inch
• If I knit this again in the future (and I might, because I really like the fit, style, shape of this one), I would add a few more garter stitch rows to the armhole openings.  Just the 2 rows tend to roll to the inside.

And since the weather here in SLC changed dramatically from summer to late fall in 48 hours, I wore it this weekend and it's a great fall weather weight.

In other knitting news, my friend, Terry's, alpaca farm in Peacham, Vermont, will be featured in the next edition of Wild Fibers magazine.  There will also be a pattern in there for some socks I designed.  These were going to be my airline travel project (two pair's worth), but alas, no knitting needles in carry-on luggage, so instead, I feverishly knit in the hotel, in the car, and then still had 2 socks to finish when we arrived back from the UK.  I did, however, finish them and they went off in the mail over Labor Day for their big debut.  Terry's also got a hat pattern she designed, based on the socks, and she'll be offering kits with hand-dyed (natural dyes) alpaca yarn from her alpacas this fall at her web site: Snowshoe Farm Alpacas.  If you are interested, you can check out her farm store after the Fall edition hits your mailbox/newstand, or let me know via email and I'll forward that along to her.

All for now.....

R is for

Rowan.

She's technically D's dog, but when you are the person home all the time with said dog, well.....she sorta becomes yours by default.

Here's her highness looking like a very large and somewhat mottled baked potato at 6 weeks:

And at about 9 weeks.

3 months:

And now at 7 months, quite the young lady, already figuring out how to retrieve and sit/stay and generally how to be a huge nuisance to her big sister, Sydney.  We don't call her "the tornado" for nothing.  She is a wild child, to be sure.

Sydney is just grateful for the outdoors and other things to pounce on so she can get some quality nap-time in during the day.

All for now......

Q is for.....

Quilts. 

I learned to quilt while I was in college.  One of my friends there (who was slightly older and therefore had her own rental place off-campus and therefore also had a room bigger than a walk-in closet) had a quilting frame and cranked through several projects during her last year at school.  About the same time, my grandmother (Jane) decided that she would take quilting classes to learn.  The ironic part of that is that HER mother, my great-grandmother, quilted a lot and was a fine stitcher, but because my grandmother was the eldest child, she spent a lot of time outside with her dad on the farm, and not-so-much time inside learning how to quilt.  So, in typical GJ fashion, she took herself off to the community center and learned how to as a birthday gift (I think it was the year she turned 80?).

Anyway, two of my prized possessions are two quilts my great-grandmother, Albina Watson Johnson, made.  The first is a yellow and white cotton diamond-pieced quilt.  I think perhaps called a "Texas Star"?  The points and the piecing are expertly done and she has quilted several rope knots and star motifs in white-on-white in the empty muslin areas.  It has lost a lot of its original loft to the batting and is somewhat fragile, so I don't use it much, but I love the technical expertise of it.

The second quilt is the last one she finished.  It was a wedding gift to my mother (married in 1964, and my great-grandmother died in 1968).  She was already starting to fail in her health, and it although the colors in the scrap pieces are bright, my gram commented that this was the only quilt she could remember her mother making that ever had browns in it.  Maybe tastes change when you aren't feeling quite yourself? 

The final quilt is a small sample/wall-hanging one I made when I got into quilting.  I love everything about this little piece - particularly the fabrics, but also the cheerful pattern.  I worked very hard on the piecing, which at the time was a lot of intricacy for me, as well as the quilted motifs (the borders have quilted leaves in them, although they are hard to see because of the printed fabric). 

I forgot, in fact, how much I enjoyed making this piece. So much so, I may have to dig out my quilting supplies and see what I still have.......

All for now.........

Great Basin Fiber Festival

Saturday afternoon, after D and I had ridden the horses through Yellow Fork Canyon (our weekend "short ride" standby location), he went off to work on dog training with Rowan, and I headed off to Wheeler Farm for the first annual Great Basin Fiber Festival.

The weather was lovely - warm and sunny with a light breeze - and the parking lot at the farm was full, with people parking along the access road.  All good things!  I took a brief survey of the area and started down the first aisle, at the end of which, I ran into Laurie and Birdsong in Laurie's booth where she was selling her absolutely yummy-smelling soaps.  (If you missed the festival live, you can visit her website at http://www.blessed-juno.com/). 

After chatting here for a bit, I moved on to look for Margene and Susan who were attending a dyeing class.  I got a bit side-tracked though, at Lynn's Spinderella's booth, where I picked up two batches of her blended roving.  She has a great eye for color and I've been really pleased with the job she's done on my own blends.  I bought a dark brown wool/alpaca/silk/thrums mix (8 ounces of that) and a full pound of her "enchanted forest" colorway which has wool and silk and thrums throughout.

I found Margene and Susan busily soaking their roving in preparation for dyeing.  The class looked well attended and sounded like a lot of fun.  (You can see more pictures over at Margene's blog, as well as her description of the class).  I left them to their color fun, and wandered over to say "hi" to Judy Jackson, for Cathy (and myself), where I picked up a "spring violets" colorway of Judy's creation on BFL roving.

And finally, after watching the llama rides and petting a lot of very nice alpaca fiber, I stopped in at Carolina Homespun's large booth.  They carry one of my favorite fiber vendors, Crosspatch Creations.  I snagged one of their "Totally Tubular" spinning kits, which gets you 4 ounces of fibers in a whole riot of their colorways (the one I picked has a lot of dark teals and purples in it), plus a free pattern and some suggestions for spinning up the fibers. (Colors are a little washed out in my photo, I'm afraid, from the bright sun.....but having already started spinning this up, trust me - dark teals and purples.)

I also found two 2-ounce bags of an absolutely to-die-for-it-is-that-soft silk and cashmere blend roving in the "Forest" colorway. Not sure what I'm going to do with that, but I loved the colors and it is sooooooo soft.

I'm hoping all the vendors had a very successful weekend.  I'd love to see this be an annual event for years to come.  It's a great time of year, a great site for the festival, and the vendor selection was very nicely thought out.  Kudos to the organizers.  I've got it on my calendar for 2007.

All for now......

Yellow Pine Trail

Back to business as usual here in the States.  We did take a short ride to work out the kinks from the horse crew on Saturday and I happily went off to the Great Basin Fiber Festival (more on that in a later post) in the afternoon.  Sunday, however, found us back in the Uinta's which are rapidly becoming one of my favorite places to ride. 

The day was perfect - sunny, 80s, light breeze and a bright blue sky.  The trail we picked this time was the Yellow Pine Trail, which we understood was theoretically "easier" than the Shingle Creek Trail which is just a few miles to the east of Yellow Pine.  Both of these trails, however, are technically difficult and not something I would put a totally green horse or a very inexperienced rider on.  The trails run through what must be the rock graveyard of the world.  Trails here in Utah tend to be rocky, but Yellow Pine has a LOT of rocks.  There are also several steep grades (22% or so) and quite a few of these tend to be on narrow trails, some with drop-offs into the canyon.

The trail winds up through ponderosa pine forest and aspen groves along the creek.  We started about 7600 feet of elevation where just a few trees have the edges of their leaves turning, but by the time we reached the summit at approximately 9650 feet, fall is definitely gaining a firm grip on the trees.  Our goal here was an alpine lake and after a hard pull uphill, the crew (we rode again with Pam, John and Daniel and respective horses) reached the summit and then, after a short downhill, found ourselves on the shore of a lake with absolutely pristine, crystal clear waters.

The edge of the lake is a bit mucky, but it was fun to see the hoofprints of some very large elk around the water's edge.  There is an area where you could camp, I suppose, if you brought in supplies for yourself and the horses, as there is no grazing in this area.  There are, however, large boulders perfectly situated for a resting spot to have lunch.

The horses, after their hard climb uphill, were glad for a rest.  Digger hung out with me (that's Shahara supervising Daniel's lunch) and he got a nibble of my oatmeal raisin cookie after lunch.  Happy put her head down, cocked her back leg and took a nap.  Only when she realized we were getting ready to head back down the hill did she look around at all.

The ride down had some difficult negotiations around the loose rocks and the steep incline, but all the horses did very well.  Digger and I led on the way out and I have to say, I was really proud of him.  He negotiated creeks and bridges, and did a long flight of stone stairs all by himself.  He was a little worried about some of things we ran across on the trail (what looked like the tread of an old snowmobile - neither of us were sure what that was at first), but he took a closer look and kept going past the scary boogie monsters when I asked him too, so all in all, we had a great ride.  There are some other trails in that area we are going to try to explore before the snows come (which is not too far off at these higher elevations).

All for now...

Random Photos of the Trip

Carvings on Victorian buildings in Dublin:

The North Sea - looking towards Scotland and the outer islands:

A Rowan tree (and the puppy's namesake) complete with orange berries:

Sea roses:

The shores of Loch Lomond:

 

The heather

View of Ben Nevis and the Trossachs

All for now......

Castles

Where else are you going to find old castles except Europe?  Really - we have nothing to compare them to in the U.S.

While in Scotland, we toured two castles that are kind of at different ends of the spectrum, but both interesting and beautiful in their own way.

We visited Loch Leven (pronounced lee-ven) which is a small loch just along the highlands border.  There a few small islands in the loch and upon one of them a castle was built and appears in the history as early as the beginning of the fourteenth century. The castle was used by members of the Scottish royal family during the century, but afterwards was the island home of the Douglass family.  It was the Douglass's who hosted Mary, Queen of Scots, as an honored guest, but later the castle was used to imprison her for just under a year (late 1567- early 1568).  Mary eventually escaped from the island castle and tried to rally her supporters behind her, but ultimately was forced into exile in England within a month.

A view across the loch on approach to the castle.

The main tower walls.

 

And a view of the loch from the parapet outside the tower where Mary was held prisoner.

The walls are in a bit of a state of ruin, but you can still get a feel for the cold stones and how damp and dreary it would likely have been during the winters.  As you can see from the view of the loch shot, there isn't a whole lot of space between the castle and the water, and 400 years ago, there would have been a lot less.  The whole island at that time was only big enough for the castle, its outer walls and enough rocky shore to pull a small boat up.  The water level in the loch dropped dramatically in the 18th century due to a dam project designed to furnish water power for mills at the end of the river which runs through the loch and the island gained quite a bit of acreage because of that.

The other castle we visited, which is at the other end of the "kept up" spectrum is Stirling Castle in the town of Stirling.  This is a large, rambling set of building, walls and parapets which has been used over the years as defensive as well as royal housing.  It has a commanding view of the town of Stirling (and nearby site of the Braveheart/William Wallace Battle of Stirling Bridge site).

The castle has been kept up and added to over the years, and they are in the midst of a major renovation project on the buildings.  The oldest stone buildings have been restored back to close to their original "high use" timeframe.  The structures built by James V for his new queen, Mary of Guise, are in the process of being restored.

One of the original stone towers:

And one of the palace buildings built during James V's reign.

And one of the best parts of the tour was the tapestry weaver's exhibit/cottage.  The Historic Trust is having a set of Unicorn tapestries woven to hang in the great hall of the building shown above. This is a 12-year project to weave the set of seven tapestries (two are completed and cut off the looms already).  They have a small staff of weavers who work on them and you can go in and watch the weavers at work.  (Disclaimer:  This is a contraband photo.  There were signs up all over not to talk to the weavers, but I didn't see the one that said "no photos" until we walked out the door to leave - that was only posted on the exterior of the building....so.... oops - sorry.)

They are obviously spending a lot of time, money and effort on this restoration, and I think it will amazing when it's completed. 

Tomorrow - final photos.

All for now.....