Visit to Sagamore and more boating safety.

Today we drove over to take a tour of the Great Adirondack camp Sagamore. It is really impressive. It's being maintained for access by the public. It boasts a tennis court and a bowling alley. Not bad for camp over 100 years old. There are oer 27 buildings on the property, though the State of New York owns most of the original property around the camp. I took a lot of pictures.

Birthday report

My daughter says she had a fun birthday. Blueberry peach pie for breakfast. A trip to town to see a movie. A really exciting(just kidding) boating safety course...installment one. What more could a girl want?
Here are the socks I hid and did remember to bring with us to New York. Though I say she has a unique way to wear them.

Shopping in Utica

My daughter's birthday is tomorrow so we are going to Utica to do a little shopping. My son loves the Price Chopper pepperoni so we have to stop there too. Maybe a side trip to Lowville to Miller's the Mennonite meat market. They have the best meats and seasonings and all the old fashioned candies and cooking ingredients you could want.
Lots of progress on the Crow's Nest bathroom. Pics soon.We came across about 70 Canadian geese in New Hartford near Utica.


Here is some of the scenery on the way.
A nice sunset at camp from our dock.

Building materials

The Crow's Nest is a one bedroom little cottage in the woods. It is on top of a garage and has a screened in sleeping porch. We are trying to get it habitable as something more than just an extra bedroom with no facilities.
Today and Robert headed to Utica for materials for the bathroom. The kids worked on emptying the garage while they were gone. They are now digging and jacking the building up to get a support moved into the right place to hold up the middle of the building. They have the materials for a sink, shower and toilet to be put in, along with some flooring and something to cover the walls. I forgot we probably need a light, but that is the least of our worries right now. I am waiting to hear from the excavator to get the engineering done for a well and septic system.

June 25 Work on camp begins...

Our friend Robert arrived today to start work on a bathroom for the Crow's Nest and some kitchen work in Innisfree. We have to get the Crow's nest rentable to help support the camp. It's never had a bathroom...
Here are the before pictures.This is the space that will become the bathroom. We have come up with some other issues, like emptying the garage underneath to be able to get to get the pipes up there and that the garage is missing a support...nothing too big. Ha! I wonder if I'll get to get anything started with my kitchen.

June 24 = at Innisfree and Cool-Shag-Na

We spent the day settling in and visiting with my cousins. I decided to add one more New York row to the afghan.
Innisfree is beautiful. I didn't think I liked the new siding from the pictures, but it is just terrific.

June 23 = Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania & New York

We arrived! More in a little while.
It was crazy getting to camp along this stretch. We had a 3 hour drive through Chicago, then a 4 1/2 hour stop on the Interstate 90 because of an 18 wheeler taking out a stretch of road. Then we attempted to drive through to New York. We stopped for a couple of hours at a service area for a nap, then onward we went. We traveled a lot at night and I did a fair amount of driving so I didn't stop in Ohio or Pennsylvania for yarn. I stopped in Ohio last year, does that count. I did pick out yarns that matched the colors of Ohio and Pennsylvania as I drove through and I did crochet a row for each state.
Here's the afghan in Chicago.
Here we are at the traffic stop in Indiana.

Here we are at a rest stop on the New York Thruway.

June 22 = Wisconsin, Illinois & Indiana

We got to Wisconsin in the wee hours of the morning. Stayed at the Ramada Inn(don't recommend it since their internet never worked and I couldn't catch up on my blogs).

The boys went on a tour of the Fairbanks-Morse facilities while my daughter and I hung out at the hotel. We went up to Janesville to the Dragonfly Yarn shop. Nice place! Then we headed back into Illinois. Stopped at Unique yarns. Also nice. Then we drove and drove...finally stopping in Indiana for a short nap in the car before starting out again.Here's the afghan progress through Illinois.
Here is Dragonfly Yarns in Wisconsin.I really enjoyed the elegant selection of yarns here. There were some cool silks and I got this great aqua colored mohair for a shawl or something.

Here is Unique Yarns in Illinois. Wow, what a diverse selection. There were lots of inspiring finished objects I had to take pictures of for future reference. Not to mention lots of hand dyed yarns and rovings.

June 21 = Oklahoma, Missouri and Illinois???

We're in Clsremore today as we wake up. We've got a 12 hour drive to Beloit, Wisconsin to be there tomorrow. Possible stops in St. Louis, Missouri and Springfield, Illinois yarn shops. We'd better fly!

June 21 = Justin's birthday!!!

Happy birthday! We'll see you in a couple of days.
One month and you are out of the army!!! Yippee!!! No more Afghanistan and no Iraq!!! You have had a hard 6 years. I am proud you are my son. Can't wait to give you a hug. Love you!
XOXOXO
Mom

June 20 = more Oklahoma

After high-tailing it to Oklahoma to get to the yarn store in Guthrie, Tom-tom our GPS unit gave us bad directions, not once but twice. After my husband finally hit the thing and got over it we made it to S.W.A.K. with 3 minutes to spare. Luckily for me Jane was nice enough to stay late so I could shop. It's a great shop. Lots of great yarns, project samples, books, needles, notions, even salt water taffy.I even found some of my favorite sock needles, 8.5" circulars. They have what Jane calls Oklahoma cashmere...it's buffalo and is it ever soft(it was a bit expensive so I passed this time, maybe I'll order some at a later date). There's a fairly large sale area with 30% off.
I bought several green yarns since it seems as though the rest of the countryside will have a variety of plants growing all along the way. The afghan is getting big. I may need to slow down so it isn't too big and heavy for a throw. It's ended up being 3 yarns carried along using a size M hook.
A couple of hours later we were at my aunt's house in Claremore for a visit. My cousin even sent two dozen fresh eggs with us to take to camp. I have pretty cool family. It's good to see them even for a short time. My cousin and her husband will be joining us at camp in about a month.

June 20 = Texas and on to Oklahoma

We are still at the Big Texan. Having breakfast. Paul is washing the mud off the truck from the dirt road he took storm chasing last night. It was a doozey of a storm. At about 1 am something blew off something. There was a horse hotel/barn right next to us. The horses were pretty frightened. At least the buildings held together. The building definitely creaked and moaned all night.
Off to the yarn store and then into Oklahoma from here...see ya
Here's my son with his Texas sized jelly beans.

I made it to the yarn store in Amarillo. It was small, but had a few interesting things. I bought a couple of yarns in colors for my afghan. Then we high tailed it for Oklahoma. Here's my progress near the Texas Oklahoma state line.

Texas weather

Can you say severe storm warning? Just look at this weather. We stopped here for our traditional once a year dinner on our way across country. A few miles before Amarillo we saw a small tornado sticking out of the side of a cloud. It was pointing up in the air not toward the ground. We decided to stay over night. Lucky for me since we missed my planned Texas yarn store by about an hour.
Oh yeah, they also expect severe storm conditions until after 2 am.
The boys are out storm chasing with the camera.

June 19 = New Mexico and Texas

Okay, right now we're in Gallup getting ready to head out. Plans are that we stop in Albuquerque to go to the Fiesta outlet....seconds they don't sell to their vendors. Can you say deal? I hope so. More later...

Here's my cross country afghan when we reached Albuquerque.

We made it to the Fiesta Outlet.
I wasn't all that impressed. I guess you can save a little, but there weren't many yarns. It is a small space in an industrial building.

Here's the haul! I am using the green Kokopelli on the cone and the balled multicolored Ballet in my afghan. The green is the color of the plants we've been driving by and the multicolor are all color of Albuquerque.

June 18 = Arizona

We left home at about 2 pm California time and reached Arizona around 6 pm. Then drove in to Kingman.

Here's my progress on my Cross Country Afghan. Unfortunately I wasn't able to buy any yarn in Arizona. We got to the store in Kingman just after 6pm and they were closed. Here's where I would have shopped. Maybe next time. There was one more chance to find a store in Flagstaff, but it was even later by the time we got there. No luck in Arizona at all. I did crochet some. We are now in Gallup getting a little shut eye. It's 2:45 am here so I'd better go to sleep while I can... see ya.

Still getting ready...

I took the kids shopping for hiking boots and clothes that fit. They just keep growing. Finally started packing.
Now the misters are fixed and it should be nice for my orchids while we're gone. We have a pool service. The car has been serviced. The luggage carrier for the top of the car is clean. We have yet to finish the rest of the details, like a back up waterer/cat sitter. Just keep saying "we're on vacation, we're on vacation, it doesn't really matter when we leave..."
I am so thrilled my friend Leigh Ann is coming to camp in July. We are going to have such a blast!!!

Pool never looked better

The pool is fixed and the kids have been swimming. The light is even fixed. I don't think it has looked better since we've lived here (9 years now).

This is one of the yarns I posted. It's silk I bought to try dyeing. I have an idea for a lacy tank I want to try. I think it will look best as it is. So no dyeing for this one.
In other fiber news, I was invited to join Ravelry! I have added a couple of projects and some yarn on my personal page. It's really cool! They just invited over 2000 people to join. It is still in beta stage but I guess they have worked out enough of the bugs to give it a go. You should definitely give it a look. It'll be great to get my stash organized and added so I can check on yarns for a project when I'm not home.

One step forward, one step back

Slowly organizing for the trip. I am deciding on projects and yarn to take along. I started my Cross Country Granny Square Throw in California colors. I hope it looks okay as I contiinue adding a different yarn for every state.
I tried to get a pair of socks I've been procraastinating on through the heel and gusset. Unfortunately I discovered that I have been knitting them on different sized needles so I have to go back to the crocheted cuff to make them match. I wanted the adjustments out of the way before getting in the car. Oh well, perhaps I won't be able to work on these until we get there.

Sock Knitting Machine day

In preparation for our trip to New York I thought I would make a couple more of the little felted bags I made before. They felted up too small to be of much use to carry my camera and cell phone. Here they are pre-felting. I just checked the wash and it looks as though I may have made three of them out of superwash. Can you believe it? A whole day wasted putting around with something that has turned out to be useless.

Pool filling...

Well the pool is finally fixed and being filled. Now there are only about a hundred more things that need doing before we leave for New York.
Thought I should get at least one picture of the culprit before everything looks back to normal...
Here's the Drop Stitch T's body. I haven't decided if it's going to stay this way or not. It'll be more useful in the summer without sleeves. My daughter thinks I should use the sleeves as leg warmers. Hmmmmmmm.That's a shadow on the T from my holding the camera over it.

Drop Stitch Sweater Progress

I am almost finished with the Drop Stitch "T-shirt" from the SNB calendar. Here is the back with dropping stitches in process. I have finished the body and sewn up the shoulder seams. The sleeves are going to be a little tricky though. I made them and the body in the round and the armhole openings are larger than the sleeves. Gotta go ask Sharon....good thing Yarn Deli is open til 6. Mean while I am wearing it as a sleeveless tank.

Flowers in the garden

Here are some of the flowers blooming in my Southern California patio garden today.