FoxwoodLane

Baby, Ballet and a Quilting Workshop

2011-05-31T07:55:00.000-07:00

Brooklyn Kate born May 5th, 2011, 3 weeks early, but doing very well! - a new baby grand doughter.

Ballet has finished for the season.

Two friends and I went to an Art Quilting Workshop with Liz Faminoff for 3 days in Armstrong. This is Liz'z sample

This is my quilt ready to be stitched. Everyone choose their own backgrounds. The fabric for the flowers was in a kit and was mostly shaded fabric. The flowers were cut out using the lighter part for the top of the poppy and the darker parts for the bottom. There was 2.5 hours of homework the first night, cutiing out endless leaves. It was an intense workshop, but we all had a great time!

Deep Lake Hike April

2011-05-31T07:42:00.000-07:00

Signs of Spring

2011-04-26T14:30:00.000-07:00

goldfinch near our feeder

Spences Bridge Geo Trip April 8

2011-04-26T14:26:00.000-07:00

Pictures from a recent day-trip to Spences Bridge

The pelicans are back at the marsh on the Old Merritt Highway. They don't live here, but pass through for feeding.

bridge on the old KVR line

tunnel on the KVR

Weaving Projects

2011-04-05T08:34:00.000-07:00

I finished 3 coral chenille scarves with supplementary warp accents. I kept one for myself. 18epi 2/8 and 4/8 cotton with some tencel and orlec threads. Woven with a single strand of chenille. The coral chenille was from Cotton Clouds.

2 sets of 8 place mats and a runner in Summer and Winter, cotton and orlec

getting ready to do tea towels from 100% boucle in 5 colours.

Dewdrop, Tranquille

2011-04-05T08:08:00.000-07:00

The other day we went for a hike in the Dewdrop, Tranquille are. The ground was still soft after winter and the grass was just starting to grow.

view of the Thompson river from the Red Lake Road

big horn sheep near Tranquille

view of Kamloops lake from the top of the bluff near the train tunnel while doing Mollie's Reach cache

Mollie's Reach

As seen in our backyard

2011-04-04T18:52:00.000-07:00

A red tailed hawk has been trying to make a home in the gully behind our house. Today I got it perusing our (empty) pond. It doesn't get much peace before the neighbourhood crows start harassing it, but it has been hanging around for about 3 weeks.

WIPs Landscape Quilts

2011-04-04T13:50:00.000-07:00

I have 5 landscapes of Rocky Mountain scenes underway at the moment.

I finished 10 landscape cards that I made mostly to try out my new sewing machine.

new Bernina especially for free motion

Sunday Hike

2011-03-23T08:07:00.000-07:00

view of Tranquille on the way

Sunday was a warm spring day finally and we enjoyed getting out for a hike up Cinnamon Ridge to the hoodoos. There were 2 caches in the area, lots of cactus and the ticks were out. The grass is just starting to turn green and the snow is receding on the hills. We ran out of time to do the other caches further up. We'll come back another day for them!

Fiber's West, Abbotsford , March 18

2011-03-22T08:30:00.000-07:00

Three friends and I drove to Abbostford on Friday to go to the annual Fibre's West in Abbotsford. We stayed overnight in Abbotsford and drove home the next day. It was lots of fun and everyone found goodies to buy. The event is quite small although it is growing every yera, it still barely filled half of the space. there were vendors from as far away as Vancouver Island and Alberta. I bought a little bit of knitting yarn but I couldn't find the specific yarns I was looking for. The Silk Tree had a booth but she did not hae the 12/2 silk that I was looking for. She said she will send it to me with no charge for mailing, so I just have to wait and see. The fun part for me was that I won the first door prize which included a Namaste knitting bag from Jane Staffford.

Laura Fry's booth.

my Namaste bag filled with goodies and then filled with my knitting.

Hamel's Quilting store in Chilliwak on the way home

Penticton Trip March 11

2011-03-21T08:38:00.000-07:00

We made our third trip of 2011 to Penticton to take my dad to get hearing aids and to do some of his business now that his house has been sold.

We drove home through Keremeos and Princeton. There was still a lot of snow on the hills and Princeton had about 4 inchs of snow on the ground. We saw some mountain goats just outside Princeton and lots of deer in the fields.

ice on the Similkameen river

This is the time of year to see lots of eagles in the fields and on the frozen lakes

Wednesday is for Ballet

2011-03-10T18:33:00.000-08:00

Works in Progress and Some Finished Objects

2011-03-08T18:25:00.000-08:00

I finished the quilting on a landscape I started last year. This is the view of McGillivary hills from the Pritchard area.

mug rugs underway on my little loom

3 chenille, supplementary warp scarves waiting to be tagged

another warp ready to go

Geocaching Birthday

2011-03-07T10:12:00.000-08:00

We were surprised by a late season snowfall, but we still had fun geocaching on Rick's birthday.

Papa found the cache! - cupcakes!

February

2011-03-03T18:58:00.000-08:00

February was cold, gray and snowy but we managed to have some fun. It included a trip to Regina, Sask , a trip to Penticton , a birthday, some geo-caching and a flu bug. Hope spring comes soon!

Backyard Visitor

2011-02-07T17:02:00.000-08:00

Sunday Storm Feb 6

2011-02-07T08:28:00.000-08:00

It snowed almost all day Sunday and in the end we had about 8"

Random Studio Photos

2011-01-31T12:45:00.000-08:00

Last Sunday of January

2011-01-31T08:30:00.000-08:00

We had a fun weekend of caching. Rick had Friday off, so we went to the western part of town out by the airport to do some fun puzzle caching. There was not much snow at that time, but the day was too gray for pictures. We were pleased with our selves to figure out the Head's Up Cache Head's Up . It involved figuring out a hidden code to find the coordinates.

It snowed about 6" on Saturday night and then turned cold and clear. Sunday the temperature didn't get above -10C. We spent Sunday afternoon driving through the grassland taking pictures and finding caches.
We are now up to 601.

Edith Lake Road

Blackwell Trails

2011-01-27T14:02:00.000-08:00

On Sunday we went out to the Blackwell trails so that miorrieave and Taylor could do the Mama Mia caches. It was a beautiful day with a mixture of sun and fog and frost on the grass.

Mamma Mia
Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head
I Talk to the Trees

Since then MaliBooBoo , a local cacher, had added to the series:

Trailer Park View

Skiing and Caching

2011-01-27T12:50:00.000-08:00

On Saturday we drove out to the Goose Lake/Lac la Jeune area and went cross country skiing. We followed an old road with snow mobile tracks on it and found 6 caches along our rounte. The snow was warm and not in very good condition and it was very much a challenge, but we had fun anyway.

Fun in the Snow

2011-01-16T12:41:00.000-08:00

We finally had enough snow to spend an afternoon playing. This was up by Lac du Bois where the snow was well over 12" and the temp. was about -2C.

2011

2011-01-12T19:15:00.000-08:00

Well ,the first week of January 2011 was rather surreal.

We had the stomach flu that we caught from Dave and Corrie and the girls when we had a late Christmas celebration on Jan 1st.

We had a final acceptance on the sale of my Dad's house in Penticton, after dealing with some home inspection issues and a late deposit cheque. I'm the Power of Attorney who was making the sale happen, so having it finalized is wonderful! the closing date is Feb 28th.

On Thursday, my Dad had the fourth fall in two weeks , two of which involved paramedics. A spot became vacant in Complex Care at the Hamlets in Penticton and Rick and I dropped everything and went to Penticton and got him moved on Friday and Saturday. It was tremendously emotional, because my Dad knew enough to know he didn't want to move, but his dementia had gotten sooo bad that he didn't even remember the last fall a day later. The staff at the Hamlets were glad that he could move back on the same floor he was on this summer, but Dad does not remember any of the care-aids or the friend that he made from before. He has 3 ladies in the same little group with him and he did seem to be enjoying their company. Even if he starts to complain now, we all know that this is the right place for him and he will have to stay.

We came home on Sunday to collapse and hope everything is smooth sailing for the rest of 2011!

Christmas day walk by the airport

2010-12-29T20:50:00.000-08:00

We took advantage an unusually mild, sunny Christmas day to go for a long walk on the dike by the airport. The sand flats were beautiful and one place had numerous bear tracks preserved in the mud. The dogs had a great time and we found about 4 interesting caches. Katie went to dinner with her boy-friends family and Mike didn't feel like coming on the walk.

Tree series of caches

2010-12-29T20:40:00.000-08:00

On Dec 23rd we went for a beautiful, snowy winter walk on the horse and hiker trails ,to place a series of 6 caches. These caches will be published for the Pink Mug event on Jan 11th. This is an area where our family has traditionally gone on a Christmas eve walk. It's alwaysa special place in the winter.

December birthday

2010-12-29T20:33:00.000-08:00

Turning 3

Dec fun

2010-12-29T20:27:00.000-08:00

December pictures from our house and a trip to Wildlights on my birthday.

Lorax series of caches

2010-12-13T17:22:00.000-08:00

To celebrate our year of geocaching and 500 finds, we decided to put some caches out in Barnhartvale. The first series we did was 2 kid caches and a micro in a series based on the Lorax book. We hid them in an area that was devastated by the pine beetle and then by overly aggressive slavage logging, so the story of the Lorax seemed to really fit. Even though we put them out in the mist of very cold (-20C) weather and even though they were aimed at children we've had a lot of response from the geocaching community. We've had 16 people find them already and a local cacher, Couloir has added to the series. He also did a write up about them on the Interior Geocaching Blog

.Lorax Caches

Interior Geocaching blog

Katie at " at the far end of town"

Katie and Muffy looking for Couloir's cache.

We took Katie out to do our caches and we all found Couloir's

Caching in Nov.

2010-12-13T16:40:00.000-08:00

Near the end of November, we went on a beautiful winter walk above Rosehill to finish off a puzzle cache that we had started. It was snowy, but sunny and it turned out to be a great walk. The puzzle cache was amazing and our favourite of all that we have done this year. It turned out to be almost our 500th find.

Rick at the final stage of "4 Elements"

Road trip

2010-11-17T09:50:00.000-08:00

Yesterday some friends and I took a road trip to Salmon Arm and Armstrong. We were mostly shopping at the quilt stores, but I wanted to check out Denise's new gallery in downtown Salmon Arm. It's called the Osprey gallery and it's on Alexander, which is the one-way street heading down from the highway towards the lake. Denise wants some of my weaving in her gallery and I needed to have a look at it before I bring her some scarves. The gallery is beautiful and elegant and has three of Denise's art quilts and several of John Burrows fantastic paintings.

We drove home through Falkland and found a great little yarn store that we didn't know was there. We stopped for a break at a charming little 50's style diner in Westwold and got home just before dark.

Cache Creek, Ashcroft Trip

2010-11-17T09:44:00.000-08:00

Ashcroft manor -not open this time of year

On Monday we took another holiday geocaching trip to Cache Creek, Ashcroft and Logan Lake. The weather got worse as the day progressed and we had to do some of the walks in a cold rain. It was still a fun get- away -day and we found over 20 caches. We ended up having dinner in a charming little pub in Logan Lake and trying for a few more caches in the dark on the way home.

Ashcroft heritage fire hall

a gold country cache at a heritage church in Ashcroft

a beautiful cemetary in Ashcroft

the view from the cemetary

Barnes and Willard lake near Ashcroft. The fog lifted just long enought to get a glimpse of the lake

Highland Valley Copper mine near Logan Lake in the dusk

the wind was howling and the temp was below freezing up here

Turtle Valley Drive

2010-11-17T08:07:00.000-08:00

turtle valley near Chase

On Saturday Rick and Katie and I set off on an all day geocaching trip through Turtle Valley, Skimikin Valley, Sunnybrae on the Shuswap and Sorrento. We ended up doing 38 caches for the day and had lots of fun. The weather was damp and foggy, but not raining. Some of the caches ended up involving a walk up through the forest on the Fly hills near Skimikin lake. We also hit Herald Provincial Park near Sunnybrae and even did a few caches by flashlight in Sorrento. One especially was memorable because it ended up being up a tree and in the dark I thought something was going to fall on my head! It was a great day to spend as a mini-vacation and a stress relief.

trutle valley ball field

donkey refuge off the turtle valley road

welcoming committee at the donkey farm

Tappen and Sunnybrae

Herald Prov. Park in the Shuswap

2010-11-16T18:23:00.000-08:00

I've been taking a small 5 day holiday from Nov 11th until the 16th. One of the days I did some extra babysitting and had Mia for an afternoon on Friday. Katie came over and helped play with orange , pumpkin spiced paly dough that I made.

Falkland Pillar

2010-11-16T18:20:00.000-08:00

Last sunday after the guild sale we went on a small geo caching trip with Katie through the Chase/ Falkland Road . We stopped and hiked up to the pillar at Joyce lake. We've seen the pillar from the distance before, but had never hiked up to look at it up close.

View of Falkland from a cache up the hill. The weather was great and was actually the last warm. sunny day of the fall.

Thompson Valley Potters & Weavers

2010-11-10T08:58:00.000-08:00

Last Saturday was the Thompson Valley Potters and Weavers Guild sale downtown.

The show was very well attended and people were coming in and shopping all day. I did well and was excited because I sold lots of big items ( as well as other items), including my long "Tranquille Spring" fabric landscape. I also sold the expensive puff chenille poncho like the one I gave to Corrie. I only made 3 and now they are all gone.

The people that bought the big landscape, also bought a smaller Kamloops Lake landscape and were sneaking around buying the Tranquille one as a Christmas gift for a woman from Vernon who fell in love with it. It's the biggest peice of art I've ever sold. I just tried making the bigger peices last winter to see if I could do it and managed to get 3 out of 4 peices finished . Two have now sold. It's nice when people appreciate your work especially art.

I always sell lots of weaving but the landscapes are more fun!

Now I just have to weave more scarves for a few galleries that want my work before Christmas and then I'll have time to play again!

Sunrise Mountain hike

2010-11-10T08:35:00.000-08:00

A few weeks ago we took an afternoon and hiked part way up Sunrise Mountain near our home.

looking east

looking west towards town along the Thompson river

Weaving Pictures from October

2010-11-10T08:28:00.000-08:00

Here are some pictures of what I was working on in Oct.

Playing with Fire

2010-11-10T08:25:00.000-08:00

A few pictures from The Oct 30 craft show.

More October Weaving

2010-11-10T08:22:00.000-08:00

Colours of Oct.

2010-11-09T19:56:00.000-08:00

I'm really late getting my photos for Oct. up, but we have had such a beautiful Oct. that I didn't want to miss posting. It's been really fun sharing photos from around the world with Life Looms Large blog http://lifeloomslarge.blogspot.com/ . This is the last month for this project and I will miss it.

Here are some pictures from our yard in Kamloops in Oct.

Beautiful golden grasslands in the Nicola Valley in October.

Playing with Fire , Oct 30

2010-10-21T21:09:00.000-07:00

This is the next craft show I will be participating in. I've been busy trying to get ready for this sale in the middle of my busy, busy fall. I will have some pictures to post of work I've been doing in a couple of days.

It's a great sale, lots of new vendors every year. Some of them come from different parts of the province which is always exciting I think. All the artisans are asked by invitation only and we try to keep the quality high.

Playing with Fire

Penticton trip

2010-10-21T19:00:00.000-07:00

the Nicola valley grasslands on the way to Penticton

We made a quick trip to Penticton on the Friday and Saturday before Thansgiving. We arrived home from Victoria and 8:30 pm and got up at 6:30 the next morning to leave. We had to go meet with the real estate agent and finalize putting my Dad's house on the market. We have spent all summer getting him moved into first complex care and then assissted living and coming to terms with his dementia. We are all hopeful that the house will sell quickly and that things will settle down soon.

a fruit stand in Keremeos on our way home

Victoria Trip

2010-10-21T18:35:00.000-07:00

On the Wednesday and Thursday before Thanksgiving, we had to take a quick trip to Victoria for Rick's job. He was celebrating 30 yrs of service with a free trip and dinner at government house. It was a fun, but very quick trip. It took us 8 hours to get there , with the ferry trip included, and we found it quite a lot of driving to turn around and drive home the next day. We had family commitments in Penticton on Friday and couldn't extend our Victoria trip by another day. The weather was beautiful for the trip over and we had a great time.

Coquihalla highway, driving through the mountains

BC Ferry slip at Tsawwassen. The city of Vancouver is in the distance.

Mt. Baker, Washington from the ferry.

the hotel in Victoria

BC's parliament buildings from our hotel balcony

foggy day on the way home

Happy Birthday Auntie Katie

2010-10-18T08:18:00.000-07:00

Katie's birthday was on the 13th of Oct.

Thanksgiving Geocaching

2010-10-15T10:21:00.000-07:00

We had a fun afternoon on Monday doing some kid friendly caches in the local parks while the turkey cooked!

Oct. Fun

2010-10-15T10:15:00.000-07:00

We are having a busy, busy month including some babywitting days. This was a sunny Saturday at the local wildlife park with the girls. Katie came along to help and have fun!

Week 2 of our Holidays, Lac la Biche

2010-10-03T09:25:00.000-07:00

After spending about 3 days slowly driving to Jasper and another few days there, we headed out to Lac la Biche, to visit our oldest son, Mike. Lac la Biche is 2 hrs northeast of Edmonton, Alberta on the way to Fort McMurray. It's almost past the agriculture part of the prairies and is in the boreal forest with miles and miles of aspen trees. The land is very flat to our eyes . It took Mike a long time to get used to the landscape. There are hundreds of lakes nearby in the county that he lives in and fishing and ice-fishing are big-time activities.

The town of Lac la Biche from the provincial park across the lake. Lac la Biche is right on the lake and was settled by french Canadian fur traders and missionaries.

the beach at the campsite

cormorants lined up on a little island in Lac la Biche lake

pelicans on the lake

The weather had been cool and rainy almost the whole summer and a lot of the birds had already migrated. Usually there are hundreds of pelicans and cormorants around. We did manage to find some though.

Rick on the viewing platform at the park

a pelican in the sunset

spectacular sunsets when the weather co-operated

Mike had a new fishing boat this year and we enjoyed our days out on the local lakes. The fishing was not quite as good as some years, again because of the rainy weather.

Muffy waiting for a fish!

Touchwood Lake

After spending nearly a week, we headed back towards the Rockies through rolling foothills and prairie scenery.

Vernon Quilt Show

2010-10-01T19:48:00.000-07:00

Here are some pictures from a great quilt show in Vernon. Some of my friends and I did a road trip today to Vernon today and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. There were so many quilts that it almost became overwhelming!

quilt blocks decorating the walkway to the entrance

On the way home we drove around through Salmon Arm and Sorrento. The Sorrento Centre was hosting the display of African themed quilts by the Glacier Grannies from the Comox Valley on Vancouver Island.

This is the description from the Sorrento Centre web site.

Art Quilt Exhibit: "Turning the Tide... one ripple at a time"

Friday, October 1 (2-7 pm) - October 2, 3 (11 am- 4 pm) - Quilts created by members of the North Island Quilters for Community Awareness on display. The theme - "Turning the Tide...one ripple at a time" - stresses the changes that are occuring in sub-Saharan Africa as a result of the generosity of Canadians. For more information on these beautiful works of art please go to glaciergrannies.org. The Glacier Grannies are a group of dedicated women from the Comox Valley who raise funds for the Stephen Lewis Foundation's Grandmother to Grandmother Campaign.

Here's the link to the Glacier Grannies http://www.glaciergrannies.org/

My camera batteries died, so I couldn't take pictures. The display was incredible and really worth seeing. They are travelling across Canada through the winter and I would really recommend seeing them if at all possible.

Alberta Trip Week one

2010-10-01T19:32:00.000-07:00

Here are some pictures from our recent trip to Alberta. We were heading to Lac la Biche , which is 2 hours north-east of Edmonton , Alberta, to visit our oldest son. If we had driven straight through, it would have taken about 14 hrs. It's about 1000 km from here. We love camping and hiking in the Rockies , so we always plan to take our time and enjoy the mountains coming and going. This time we left Kamloops about 3 in the afternoon and spent the first night at Clearwater in a provincial park on the North Thompson river. From there we went to Mt. Robson provincial park. Then we spent 2 nights in Jasper doing some exploring and then 1 night in Edmonton before arriving in Lac la Biche.

the Fraser River at Mt. Robson

rafters on the Fraser at Rearguard falls

Maligne canyon northeast of Jasper

Medicine Lake on the way to Maligne Lake. This lake is a special "disappearing lake that has underground springs that drain the water at differnt times of the year. This was the fullest we've ever seen it.

me on the way to do some painting at Medicine lake

a pika in the rocks

fresh snow in Aug. at Medicine lake

mountains in the evening light at Pryamid Lake outside of Jasper

Mt Edith Calvell with new snow from Pryamid Lake.

We had a lot of rainy weather for the 3 and half weeks we were gone ,so I didn't get as many pictures of the mountains as I usually do.

Colours of Sept.

2010-09-28T15:19:00.000-07:00

We just got home from a rainy, rainy trip to Alberta and the Rocky Mountains. We had a few nice days with new snow on the mountains when the sun came out. I'll post pictures of our trip in up coming posts, but I wanted to squeak in with my colours of Sept.

These three pictures are from Yoho National Park which is in BC and were taken on our way home. Thye aren't really from where I live but they are from my province so I hope they count.

Takkakaw falls

a natural bridge on the kicking horse river

the view from our campsite in Yoho

lake revelstoke

This is what the scenery looked like for a lot of our trip. After the hot summer of forest fires, really the rain is welcome.

Since we've come home, the sun and warm temperatures have come back and I managed to get a few fall pictures from our yard.

Go to Life Looms Large http://lifeloomslarge.blogspot.com/ to see more colours of Sept.

Colours of August

2010-08-23T13:56:00.000-07:00

peaches,gala apples, tomatoes, flowers from our garden

We are finally having a beautiful, sunny day with no smoke in the valley. The forest fires in the Cariboo have been so bad this month, that we've had very smoky days and a lot of air quality advisories.

Our garden and fruit trees have been doing super well with out much attention from us.

We've been driving back and forth to Penticton a lot this summer, trying to get my 85 yr old father settled in a care home and then an assisted living facility. So far this week things are going well in Penticton and we are at home getting ready to go on vacation for 3 weeks.

The Kamloops area has had enough moisture this summer to keep the grasslands a bit green and to keep us from having bad forest fires in the immediate area. The grass is starting to turn golden now at the end of Aug. and the river level is starting to drop.

hills from Barnhartvale, looking north

Thompson river at dusk

golden grass on an evening walk

moon, sunset Aug 22

Go to lifeloomslarge to see more colours of August from around the world.

Smoke in Aug.

2010-08-06T10:23:00.000-07:00

This is what the Nicola valley looked like at 8:30 in the morning on Tuesday when I was driving to Penticton. Our province has 400 wildfires burning this year and the smoke from the largest fires is filling up the valleys even a long distance away.

Pelicans come to fish on Stump lake in the summer but they don't breed here. There is only one lake in the province where they breed and it is currently surrounded by a forest fire.

High Counrty Pottery Sale

2010-08-02T16:40:00.000-07:00

I'm a permanent invited guest each summer at the High Country Pottery Sale in Sorrento, BC. It's always a busy and fun sale to do. I didn't get any shots of the hall or the crowds because it was super busy all day. I sold lots of weaving, including my new puff poncho like the one I made Corrie and lots of cards and landscapes. Everyone always does really well and has a good time.

High Country Pottery

Sorrento

Work from July

2010-08-02T11:52:00.000-07:00

These are some purses I made last week from rag fabric that I had previously woven. These were getting ready for the sale at Sorrento that I participated in on July 31 and Aug 1. I didn't have time to get postings done last week as I was scrambling to be ready. The sale at Sorrento is fantastic. Not only are there lots of tourists and cottage owners staying at the Shuswap, the hall is right on the Trans-Canada Highway and we get a lot of people travelling through who decide to stop and shop.

Colours of July

2010-07-28T17:02:00.000-07:00

July has been very hot and much dryer than normal. The grasslands around Kamloops have quickly become golden.

Thompson River looking west towards Kamloops

Our yard is a little oasis in the desert.

Unfortunately, we are getting into wildfire season around here with the dry conditions.

This was the view from the top of our driveway this morning looking towards Kamloops. A 55 hectare fire broke out in the sagebrush covered hills near the area that we live in.

There are a lot of dead pine trees in the area. The air tankers were on the job first thing this morning and the fire was 80% controlled by afternoon.

visit Sue's blog at Life Looms Large to see more Colours of July from around the world.

Sunday Swimming

2010-07-27T12:47:00.000-07:00

It's been really hot here the last few weeks ( 30-35 C.). We decided to go to Chase beach on Sunday evening for a picnic and swim. Mia discovered floating and had a wonderful time.

Great Shuswap Pottery Sale (with guests )

2010-07-20T11:12:00.000-07:00

Here are a few pictures from the sale at the Shuswap this past weekend. It's always a great sale for me and this year was no different . I was so busy that I didn't have a chance to take pictures of the crowds. I sold one of my new bigger landscapes, as well as lots of weaving and smaller landscapes.

the setting and the hall.

the drive out to Celista

Fishing on Father's Day

2010-07-15T15:01:00.000-07:00

backyard visitor

2010-07-15T15:00:00.000-07:00

We had a visitor in our backyard yesterday. We know they are around but rarely see them in the daytime.

picture taken through screen window

silk scarves

2010-07-15T14:17:00.000-07:00

Here are the cousins modelling some of my finished silk scarves.

I have 10 warp painted silk scarves ready for my sale.

Finished weaving

2010-07-13T09:52:00.000-07:00

While I had models around I took some pictures of weaving that I recently finished.

I made Corrie a twisted poncho from the chenille fabric I was weaving this spring. The fabric turned out beautifully. I'm really happy with it and will do it again. I've made one more poncho for my sale this weekend and I have one piece left. I may twist the fringe and turn it into a shawl or I may use it for another poncho.

Here are the directions for the fabric.

Warp is all chenille from Webs, sett at 16 epi. I put on 13 yds ( which was too much) and it was 33" in the reed. I used navy, red purple, bright blue, and teal shaded across the warp with my sectional beam.

The weaving alternated blocks of chenille in plain weave with bands of black merino wool. I used different colours of chenille for the blocks. Each chenille block had 36 shots, followed by 12 shots of merino. The beat was quite firm. The piece for the poncho was 32" wide and 86" long when it came off the loom. I washed the peice gently in the machine without letting it spin very much. Then it was dried in the dryer until almost dry and hung up to finish drying. The dryer felts the bands of merino and creates the puffy texture. After weaving the piece measured 19" by 78". For twisted ponchos , I like to use 19" by 70" for a medium size. The chenille in the warp and weft makes a very velvety fabric.

Cousins

2010-07-13T09:34:00.000-07:00

Second cousins are lots of fun!

Rick's sister Mary and her three grand daughters came for a visit the other day.

Finally Finished

2010-07-12T13:11:00.000-07:00

I finally finished three out of four of my landscape projects from this spring. They are stretched around artist canvases and stapled at the back. I work on a muslin background and use steam- a- seam to fuse fabric pieces down. I mostly work free -form from photos and don't cut pattern pieces. The sky is hand painted with Seta colour fabric paint. I find it easier to find skies in the colours that I want if I paint them myself. The pieces are free-motion stitched with invisible and decorative threads. I used angelina for the mist on the mountain and added beads and embellishments.

These two are from a picture from the Dallas- Barnhartvale nature park looking towards town.

This one is 36 x 12 and is a from a picture that I took last February of Kamloops Lake looking toward Mt. Peter and Paul. There was skim of snow on the hills.

Summer Craft Sale

2010-07-12T11:31:00.000-07:00

I've been busy getting ready for one of my most busy sales of the season. If anyone is in the Shuswap area next weekend, it's a beautiful drive to Celista and the show has a lot of great artisans. This is my fourth year to be invited to this show and it's one of my favourites. Even though it's in a local communtiy hall , it's a very busy sale with a lot of eager shoppers who plan their summer around being able to attend.

More Colours of June

2010-06-25T08:10:00.000-07:00

Here are 2 more pictures of the beautiful green grasslands with mountains in the background. With this unusual spring the mountains still have snow at the end of June. We drove and hiked on Stoyoma on the 1st of July a couple of years ago. There's beautiful alpine scenery up there and a recreation site on a little lake. This year we wouldn't be able to get there.

a beautiful green valley near Hat Creek, BC

Stoyoma Mountain near Merritt

Colours of June

2010-06-24T16:28:00.000-07:00

Here are some pictures of a rainy June day in our yard. We've had a lot of rain all month, the river and creeks are filled up and the drought fears have eased around our area.

raindrops on our pond

the peonies have been beautiful

The rainy June has meant that the grasslands are still a bright green and the wild flowers are putting on a show this year.

chocolate lilies

Here is a link to Life Looms Large with some more pictures of the Colours of June from around the world.

Life Looms Large

Allenby

2010-06-15T14:08:00.000-07:00

map of our route

One day we drove over to Princeton and after looking around the museum we found a few more caches at an old mining town called Allenby. It was a few km outside of Princeton towards the south.

"Constructed in 1916, Allenby was the site of the 2,000 ton concentrator and mill plant used to process ore from Copper Mountain. Many concrete foundations remain in Allenby today, along with ruins of what once was a busy company town that had 68 homes and all the comforts required by a community."

from a web site

Now, very little remains of the town and mine. It's another place we never would have found without geocaching.

The Mine that used to be ..... Allenby Rick at the cache site

old photo of Allenby

link to photos of Allenby Allenby, Ghost Town

fossils on the walk down to another cache

part of the mine down by the Smilkameen River

This cache was at a very strange geological formation. No one seems to know why it's there. It looks man made, but it's not.

Standing Wall, Shrinking Shaft cache

Hiking along the KVR

2010-06-14T15:58:00.000-07:00

The old KVR (Kettle Valley Railroad line runs along the Tulameen River between Coalmont and Princeton. It has been fixed up as part of the trans Canada Trail and a lot of bikers and quadders use it in the summer. It goes through very rugged country and there is limited access to the trail from the road. There are a few caches placed along the KVR with direction to 4x4 roads to access points. We never would have experienced the trail or the river if it wasn't for the caches. We really enjoyed the trip and we saw no other people the whole day that we were down there.

views of the Tulameen River along the KVR at Summer Sand cache

views from TCT Princeton "Twin as the Bridges"

on the way to Roaneys Station a baby Harlequin duck walked down the trail in front of us

Coalmont, Blakeburn

2010-06-12T16:16:00.000-07:00

old Coalmont hotel

We had a lot of fun geocaching and touring around Coalmont, Granite City and Blakeburn. Coalmont still has some buildings in use, but Granite City and Blakeburn are old ghost towns. There aren't many structures left, but the caches took us to some interesting spots we never would have know about otherwise.

some scenes from Coalmont

Coalmont web site

this is one of the only cabins remaining at Granite City, just up the road from Coalmont

"WELCOME TO GRANITE CITY

In 1885 a cowboy named Johnny CHANCE struck it rich!

He started a boom town that grew to a population of over two

thousand! Granite had two main streets, 'Government and Granite',

with two hundred buildings, thirteen of which were saloons!

But it was not to last, and by 1915 it was left to the deer and grass . . ."

this is a picture of a dredge on the Tulameen river in 1930. When Rick's mom was a little girl her family worked a dredge like this out of Princeton in around 1925.

an old cabin along the tram line near Blakeburn

one of the towers for the tram line almost gone now

the new strip mine above the old town of Blakeburn

all that's left of the Shaughnessy division of Blakeburn

Meet Miss Mary McKay – of Shaughnessy Division

what we had to walk through to get to the old cabins!

old coal chute at Blakeburn Blakeburn

a street in downtown Blakeburn today

Blakeburn 1926

http://www.michaelkluckner.com/bciw2coalmont.html

old Blakeburn coal pit Mullin Coal Mine by the Tulameen Turtles

view from the old town of Blakeburn

Muffy at the end of a long day

We found 9 caches , did a lot of walking and exploring and bushwhacking.

Tulameen River Forest Service Road

2010-06-10T19:48:00.000-07:00

On Monday the clouds were low , but it looked like the rain would hold off. We decided to explore the Tulameen FSR towards the Coquihalla and Cascade Mountains. There were some geocaches up the road, as well as some trails and lots of raging rivers and scenic mountains. People from the coast actually use these back roads to get to Tulameen in the summer.

an old cabin and mining operation at Days gone By cache

the start of a trail down to 2 caches

The trail was really steep and impossible to cross this time of year, so we didn't see the falls but found the first cache Onroute to the Falls

I Love Bridges cache

clearcuts and snow

moss campion on a hillside

our route

Camping trip to the Tulameen Area

2010-06-09T19:41:00.000-07:00

campsite at Otter Lake, Tulameen, BC

We went on a camping trip to Tulameen and the Merritt grasslands area at the end of May and beginning of June. We had a later start than we had planned ,but once we got going we had a great time. I was glad to be away from cell phone coverage for awhile! The weather was much better than it was at home.We had some rain , mostly at night , and it was cold. I was in my winter coat and tuque a lot of the time. Strange for Kamloops to have been more rainy!

Root cellar at A Trestle is but a Memory - Tulameen Turtles . The road was almost flooded at this spot

Gotta Go #1 - Tulameen Turtles

These pictures are from 2 caches on the Otter Valley Road.

We did a lot of exploring and geocaching and took lots of pictures. We chose the Tulameen area because of all the history in the old mining camps and towns and becasue the Tulameen Turtles and the Mozey-on-Inn had put out a lot of great geocaches for an event last year.

downtown Tulameen

beautiful penstemon on the cliffs

view from Dead Horse Bluff - cache by Mozey - on - Inn , looking toward Coalmont

Weaving on Wednesday

2010-05-26T15:43:00.000-07:00

Some pictures of weaving in progress.

A warp of 2/8 cotton in huck lace for tea towels. The warp came out a little bit narrower than I had planned, so the towels will be small, but I like the colours. I was just trying to use up green cotton that I had left over from an order for a lime green runner.

The last silk warp on my baby wolf. This warp is off now and I will take more photos when all the fringes have been twisted.

A chenille warp on my Nilus loom. I put on 13 yds of chenille , shading colours across my sectional warp beam. This is an experiment to try using chenille warp and weft and to use merino for differential shrinkage. The sett is 16 epi. I cut one piece off after weaving 86", to check shrinkage. I washed it by soaking it in the machine with little or no agitation and carefully spinning some water out and drying it in the dryer until it had shrunk to the size and look that I wanted. It came out beautiful and velvety and just the right size. I'm really pleased with it. I plan to make a poncho for Corrie plus 1 other poncho and a shawl.

Lac du Bois on a holiday Monday

2010-05-26T08:55:00.000-07:00

The weather was sunny and cool on Monday, after a rainy weekend. We spent the whole day geocaching in the Lac du Bois grasslands. They were pretty this time of year, but didn't have nearly as much growth as other areas to the east. Still, it was nice to see them while they are still green.

It wasn't in the tree!

Lac du Bois itself. The Ballsam Root is still in bloom.

Chocolate Lily

The dogs are helping.

This is an old cabin at Griffin Lake

We drove to Pass Lake and then over to Isobel Lake where we walked all the way around on the interpretive trail. We drove home on the long Lake Road through the Eastern side of the grasslands.

Hike up Sunrise Mountain

2010-05-25T19:46:00.000-07:00

On Sunday afternoon we hiked up part of Sunrise Mountain, from the Uplands trails , to do 2 geo caches. It was a very, long steep climb. The first cache we came to was Zilch, and from there we found a beautiful hidden valley with lots of tall grass and wild flowers. This led us to the Citius cache which was on a bluff over looking the valley. The views were spectacular. We chose a difficult , steep way to come down and would have been better backtracking a bit. We left our house at 3pm and made it home by 6:45 to watch the Lost finale. It was a great hile and we plan to go back sometime.

Looking east along the South Thompson River.

Kamloops lake is in the distance looking west.

Georgie-Porgie Geo cache trip to McGlashen Lake

2010-05-18T11:53:00.000-07:00

On Sunday afternoon we drove up to the Campbell Lake - Monte hills area to do the Georgie Porgie series of caches and explore some new roads. We found all the caches and found some roads that we had never been on before.

This is the large mudhole near the top that we drove through and came out on the George main road. The silver nano in the tree is the first Georgie-Porgie cache.

This old cabin was down a road that was blocked off because of the swift moving creek.

These are some of the caches along a really pretty ridge overlooking the creek. The grass was really high in this area and the trees were very large and old.

Georgie-Porgie caches.

After we found the caches we carried on and found the road to McGlashen Lake. We had never been there before because we thought the road would be too rough, and we weren't sure where the road was. The lake is beautifu,l with lots of granite cliffs and shoreline. We'll be coming back a lot I'm sure. It turned out to be only 40 min. from our house.

Our route with the roads that we found.

WIP Wednesday

2010-05-12T18:33:00.000-07:00

Here are some pictures of works in progress in my studio.

The last painted silk warp on the baby wolf.

Some silk scarves waiting to have the fringe twisted.

The last of 6 placemats in the Kamloops Gold colourway/kaki on my big loom. I still have to weave gold and ivory. There is enough warp for 14 more mats and 2 runners.

The chenille warp for puckered shawls and poncho on my 45" loom.

A 2/8 cotton warp ready to go on Shelley for tea towels in huck lace.

Sunday trip to Chase area

2010-05-10T13:59:00.000-07:00

On Sunday we drove out towards Chase, on the other side of the river, to do some Geo caching and to find some rocks for our pond. The day was lovely, one of the first warm, almost summer like days we've had this year.

These pictures are from a cache in the hills above Pritchard on the north side of the river. Martin Mountain is still snow covered in the background. The grasslands are really green right now and a lot of the flowers are over. The Balsam Root that normally covers these hills didn't do very well this year and is a lot smaller than normal.

The South Thompson river from the bridge at Pritchard. The river has come up a lot in the last few weeks, but still has a long way to go.

A view of Niskonlith lake near Chase, looking east. Some of the dead trees from the fire in 2003 can be seen in this picture.

My 20 minute sketch of the same view while Rick was looking at plants

An early bunch of Paintbrush flowers blooming in the shade and a single late Arnica flower. We also saw Penstemon, Lupine and Larkspur blooming.

Last day of April

2010-05-01T20:51:00.000-07:00

Some random pictures from our yard yesterday on the last day of April. I love the light in April and the evening skies have been so pretty.
We've had a lot of birds in our yard this spring, more than usual it seems. We've had one pair of Goldfinches at the feeder all week.

Colours of April

2010-04-27T19:01:00.000-07:00

April has been mostly a beautiful month with lots of warm days and a few cold, almost snowy days thrown in.

Early in the month the mountains had new snow and the trees had new spring green leaves

Our yard has beautiful flowers and bright green grass.

flowering almond apricot tree

The hills in the main valley around Kamloops are starting to turn green, but higher up there is still not much growth and there is still snow around.

April showers have meant lots of golden light against dark skies. These pictures are looking at the trees behind our house from our sundeck at 8 pm one night.

Sue at lifeloomslarge.blogspot.com/ has more pictures of the colours of the month from around the world. It's fun to look at all the flowers blooming.

Tuesday Studio Pictures

2010-04-20T20:17:00.000-07:00

She arrives in my studio to supervise like clockwork everyday at 3:30.

I'm afraid I'm going to cut her tail with the rotary cutter.

The last of the silk scarf on the loom. I finished this warp today and will put another on tomorrow.

Geocaching on Sunday April 18

2010-04-20T12:41:00.000-07:00

We were supposed to be replacing windows in our house this weekend , but they did not get delivered in time. Instead we did a short geocaching trip in the hills behind Barnhatvale on Sunday. There were a lot of campers at Scuitto lake, which was open of ice. The hills higher up still looked like early spring, with out much growth.

Katie at Scuitto falls. The cache is in this picture.

The view from the Old Campbell Range school cache.

Gus's Rat Barn cache --- a very pretty meadow and old homestead that we had never been to before.

View from Buse Hill. There were 2 caches up here.

This was probably the last caching trip for awhile because we are going to be busy with household chores and gardening.

Our yard in April

2010-04-20T10:54:00.000-07:00

Our apricot tree has never had so many blossoms!

We spent all weekend working on our pond/waterfall project. It's almost finished. We just need a few more plants and rocks.

A pair of mallard ducks were checking out our yard yesterday. They walked up and down the driveway and then went over to the neighbour's yard.

More pictures of April work

2010-04-20T10:25:00.000-07:00

I finished my first knitted scarf. It's the Brooklyn Tweed Noro scarf in 1x1 rib.

I wove 3 plain weave scarves with soft knitting sock yarn and fleece artist mohair for weft. I had one skein of la Boheme Fiesta yarn ( rayon boucle, brushed kid mohair) in sapphire from Art of Yarn in Kelowna, that I used in the warp. One is for me for next winter and the other 2 will be for winter sales.

I also finshed 2 sets of 6 summer and winter placemats in blue plus a 32" runner. This warp was for orders and I wove some more for sales after the order was done.

April Weaving, Silk Scaves

2010-04-20T09:38:00.000-07:00

I finished a warp of 3 silk scarves . These are from a warp I painted last August. They are 2/8 silk from the Silk Tree, sett at 24 epi, 5" wide. I put on 10 yds for 3 scarves plus samples. They are woven in 2 block twill on my 8 harness Baby Wolf loom. The weft is hand dyed 2/20 silk from Treenway. I dyed the silk in a crock pot outside on my sundeck in February. Silk has a strange smell when it is dyeing, so I like to do it outside. I use Lanaset/Telena dyes for my silk. I use the 2/20 doubled on a bobbin for the block scarves and singly for the collapse weave.

collapse weave with single 2/20 weft

I am twisting the fringe on 2 more scaves at the moment and weaving another two in 12/2 silk. I should have this warp off today and plan to put another warp on tomorrow. That will leave one more painted warp to finish up this spring.

Fossils and Geo -caches

2010-04-20T09:10:00.000-07:00

April 11

We went fossiling for a couple of hours at Split Rock. The fossil bed is on a very steep slope at the top of a hillside.

There are very interesting rock formations along this valley. The grass and sagebrush are starting to turn green but the wind was still very cold.

We carried on and did a few geo caches in the area as well.

On the way home Rick investigated some rocks and discovered a new fossil bed. He found 3 ginkgo leaves.

view from the new fossil site

Easter egg hunt

2010-04-05T15:02:00.000-07:00

Here are a few pictures from hunting Easter eggs in our yard on Sunday.