Monday, May 30, 2011

To the Glaciers and Back...

Just finished a 7 day cruise to Alaska…lots of amazing colors, especially the blues in the glaciers. We travel north with friends, eating way too much the whole time. DH has a theory that the cruise ships feed us extra carbs to keep us in calm while we cruise between each excursion location. We left Seattle about 4 pm, cruised north all night, all the next day (a little bumpy) and the next morning, arriving in Juneau about noon. Our excursion there was to the Mendenhall Glacier. What Amazing Colors! Lots of blues in the ice and rich greens in the landscape. It was a gray day, but not cold. I think the gray sky helped make the blues pop out. After the glacier, we toured around Juneau and back to the ship.




The next day was Skagway. We went on the (very) narrow gauge train to the top of White Pass. And since we were the first train of the day, we went on to Fraser, BC to turn around. We spend the afternoon with our friends, shopping.



The next day was Glacier Bay National Park…really an amazing place…worth the calorie intake on the ship to get there. We saw several ice calvings (big chunks of ice breaking off the glaciers). I’m still working through my photos. But here’s a peek -- if you look closely you will see a calving.



We spent a lot of time cruising around looking at the different glaciers with Park Service naturalists on board giving us lots of info. Early afternoon the naturalists left and we headed for Ketchikan, arriving there early the next morning. We left the ship at 7am and took a cruise (on a much, much smaller boat) to the Misty Fjords – which were really misty (think rain). This was the only day we had rain…just lots of gray days. Once again, amazing scenery.

We left Ketchikan at noon, cruising toward Victoria, BC and arriving there about 6 pm the following day. The next morning we were back in Seattle, waddling off the ship about 9am.

Now why am I writing about a cruise to Alaska in a weaving blog – because the colors were so inspiring! I’m really looking forward to see where all the color combination ideas take me. Stay tuned!

Tuesday, May 17, 2011

It's Back! The P2P2 Challenge

Thanks to Meg at Unravelling we are doing another Pics to Picks Challenge.  A total of 19 weavers signed up this year.  We are each randomly assigned to send pictures that inspire us to another weaver.  This year mine are going to a weaver in California and last year they went to a weaver down under.  So I'm looking forward to getting my pics from a weaver in Australia.

It's been months since I blogged about my weaving but, yes I have been weaving.  When I last posted I promised to post a photo of the satin scarf using the leftover weft from Daisey's snacking.  So here it is:


I've been on a laprug weaving binge.  I've woven 4-5 (lost count) since Christmas, using a Lisa Souza's BFL yarn in the warp and her Silky boucle in the weft.  Take a look at three of them.  The one on the left hasn't been washed yet.


And now for a couple of scarves, woven on my table loom using Lisa Souza's Big Wool.


And finally a scarf made with some of Lisa Souza's yarn in the warp and Just Our Yarn 5/2 tencel in the weft. I'm really excited about how this scarf turned out.  When I was winding the warp, I listened in my headto the words of Randy Darwall - "why use 5 colors when you can use 50 colors."



I have several other completed projects, but they will have to wait until next time.  However, I would like to share that our beloved Crazey Dasiey (see my avatar photo) went on to the Rainbow Bridge in December.  We know she is in doggie heaven, chasing bugs and butterflies and dreaming of cashmere yarn to snack on!  We miss her everyday.