Relaxing

On Monday Bob and I had visitors; our Las Cruces friends, Joan and John, drove up to see the Animal Refuge and to check out our motorhome. They have been curious about what it's like to live on the road, at least for short periods of time. We were happy to show our home to them! We went to lunch after a tour of the facilities here, to a cafe called Passion Pie. What a nice place for lunch. They serve simple fare, such as breakfasts (think homemade Belgian waffles heaped with fresh fruit) and lunches (quiches, soups, salads, and sandwiches) and we enjoyed it very much. It was good to find this place, because Truth or Consequences, NM does not have a lot of lunch options on a Monday. We hope to come back again before we leave the area.

The other day I started playing around with Adobe Capture, which is a free app that gives you special effects for photographs. My friend, April, sent me the link and suggested I check it out. After a few minutes I figured out how to make this image of my tape loom, and was pleased with the graphics.

It's a fun thing to play with.

One of my favorite things to do here is to spend some time giving the five little dogs at the refuge some love. Here is Jack in my arms giving me a kiss and Foxxy sitting on the back of my chair, waiting for his turn to be scratched. It's still a little cool in the mornings, but a few minutes later that jacket was OFF.

KC got a chance to be outside this afternoon. The sun was warm and the sky was blue, and Bob and I had outside projects go do; Bob was recharging the water softener and I was putting a third coat of Tung oil on my loom. Only one more and I'll call it done! So I came and brought out KC so he could be near us in the kennel near our rig. The first thing he did was to rub himself into the dust. Then he sat and watched us work until he fell asleep in the sun. He didn't want to come inside!

KC has enjoyed being in one place for three months, but two weeks from today we will be moving to our next spot. This is the longest we have remained in one place since we've been on the road!

Bosque del Apache with Friends

First off, I'd like to thank all who called and emailed to ask for an update about Auggie. I am happy to report that he is feeling much better, his e-collar is off, and he is just about back to his old self. He can still feel his stitches, which will dissolve on their own, but most of the time he ignores the sensation. I tell him that each day he will feel them less and less until they are gone. I'm not sure he believes me, though.

Today Bob and I drove up to Socorro, NM to visit with our friends, Kathy and Ron, whom we met last spring in Albuquerque. We had a great time catching up, and together we toured the Bosque Del Apache Wildlife Refuge. What a gem this place is! While we were unable to get a photo of the many Sandhills Cranes that winter here, we did see and hear them fly over us. Plus we saw an egret, a roadrunner, snow geese, and a bald eagle. And a lot of small birds, only some of which I could identify. We strongly recommend a visit to this lovely place. Next time I will bring my bird book!

By the way, Bosque Del Apache means "Woods of the Apache," and the term "Bosque" (pronounced 'boskay') has come to mean an ecological area with cottonwoods, which is typical of this region.

After we finished seeing the refuge we went into Socorro to have a bite to eat at Buckhorn, which proudly proclaims that it is #7 in America. According to the menu, "The Buckhorn Burger has been named in GQ Magazine one of the top 20 burgers in the US, rating it #7, mentioned in Travel + Leisure quoted "paraje numero uno" in The New York Times and the Buckhorn Burger beat Bobby Flay in  a Green Chili Cheeseburger Throwdown shown on the Food Network." Of course, we had to try it, and it was very good (despite a very long wait to be served.)

We then drove into town where we stopped at the Old San Miguel Mission, a lovely church that has recently been restored.

I loved the way the sun was just peeking over the church tower in this shot.

All in all, it was a really fun day and we will hopefully be able to see Kathy and Ron again this year when we travel back through the area.

OK, I know that the title of this blog is Weaving Down the Road, but today I was Warping Down the Road, putting a short warp on my tape loom so I could show a little woven tape to Kathy. It is, not surprisingly, rather difficult to actually warp a loom while riding down the highway. Not so easy to weave that way, either!

Here is the very first tape being woven on my new loom. I was surprised at how different it is to weave on a tape loom as opposed to an inkle loom or using one of my other looms to weave a band. There is a definite learning curve, but the loom performed very well and it was fun. I will have to work on my selvages, though!

Mesilla Valley Weavers Guild

On Thursday my friend, Joan, invited me to visit the weavers' study group of the Mesilla Valley Weavers Guild in Las Cruces. What a great group of women, and very talented weavers, too! The group was so welcoming to me and I felt right at home. Here are just some of the "show and tell" projects presented.

After the meeting, a half dozen of us went out to lunch at "A Bite of Belgium," a casual restaurant that served us some excellent lunches. I enjoyed my grilled lamb sandwich. Yum!

One of the guild members owns a yarn shop in Kansas and asked if we wanted to stop in, so Joan and I shopped at Sharon's garage to pick up some 8/2 cotton. Joan has promised to weave some towels for a challenge run by the Bucks County (PA) guild that she belongs to. She picked out some pretty colors and we headed back to her house to get some warp on a Schacht rigid heddle loom she has. It was a fun day!

Today, after a tiny bit more sanding, the tape loom was declared to be finished. I put the first coat of Tung oil on it and just stood back to admire the beautiful wood. I plan to reapply three more coats of Tung oil before warping it up. Here's what it looks like now:

The weather has turned quite spring-like, with high temperatures in the mid-70s and lows in the high 40s. I also love the fact that there is not a cloud in the sky. I could get used to this!

Handwoven Slippers are Finished

Well, today was finally the day to cut into my handwoven cloth that I had felted in the washer. I actually cut off the knotted fringe this morning in preparation, noticed that I could still see some yarn, and threw it back into the washer (quick wash, 15 minutes) and dryer (about 90 minutes.)  That did the trick; when I cut into it again the yarn strands had completely melded into each other and would not unravel. I cut out two sets of soles, for warmth against our cold floors, and one set each of the toes and the heels.

I used the same pattern I have been working with, from BeautifulPieShop on Etsy, but this time I left off the cuffs for a low heel version. The slippers went together easily, and I even found a narrow inkle band I had woven and tucked away for future use, several years ago. The stripes gave me a way to evenly space 1/4" slits in the felted fabric, and I like the effect of the band as a means to keep the slippers on my feet.

My daughter, Emily, sent me a picture of her girls coming down for breakfast in their new slippers. Such cuties!  I think they like their new footwear.  :) 

Temperatures rose to the 60s today and by Wednesday it will be in the 70s. At last, some nice warm weather.  I am loving it!

Cone of Shame

Bob and I spent 12 hours trying to keep Auggie from shoving his paws into his mouth and ripping out his stitches before we decided he was going to need an Elizabethan Collar, aka an e-collar. Fortunately there was one available for us to borrow from Desert Haven that fit him perfectly. Of course, he hates it.

We have tried to tell him that this is only temporary, but I think it is going to be a long week for him. To a dog, this is the "cone of shame." It's rather humiliating for him.  I was able to stay home yesterday while Bob worked on special projects for the Shelter, and I went in to price merchandise at Paws and Claws Thrift Shop today instead. That way one of us was with Auggie at all times. Hopefully by Tuesday we will be able to leave him alone while we work.

We have had so much fun with our friends, Mike and Retha. This photo is from October when we met at the Living The RV Dream Gathering in Bradenton, FL.

They came over last night with a yummy chicken dish, and I made some dinner rolls and oatmeal raisin cookies for dessert. It was hard to have the evening end! Sometime you meet people and form an instant connection, and it was like that with these friends. They headed off to Tucson this morning for two months and we will make sure we meet up again with them in March.

I finished weaving my slipper fabric for the felted slippers I plan to sew. No, I did not abandon this project, although it has taken me a while to weave off this warp. Some warps are more fun than others, and I had to make myself sit down and weave some days, but it's done, and I have felted it. I love this cloth.

Here you can see the two sections of it. The first part has stripes, before I ran out of one of the colors and I finished it off as a solid. And it feels thick and soft. Hopefully I will finish these slippers this weekend. 

We Get Company & Auugie Gets Teeth Pulled

Today was a very full day for us. Bob and I got up early and took Auggie over to the local veterinarian to get his teeth cleaned. Little did we know that he would need NINE teeth pulled as well. Poor guy. He has been pretty groggy from the dental surgery all evening.

Pretty much all of his upper teeth are gone except for his canines. It looks like he's going to have to be on a soft food diet.

K.C. the cat had a great day, however! Our manager, Joe, brought over some catnip toys for him and K.C. had a blast playing with them and batting them all over the coach. Sorry to say, our kitty did not miss Auggie at all! While they tolerate each other and even lie side by side at times, their relationship is not yet a close one. Perhaps given enough time...

Bob and I met some wonderful people in Bradenton, FL this past fall, and today we were excited to see them again. Mike and Retha, on their way to Tucson, have stopped to stay in our campground for a couple of nights, along with their twelve dogs that travel with them. Yes, I said twelve dogs! Mike and Retha used to breed and show Japanese Chins, a breed that is related to Pekingese dogs, and when they went on the road the dogs naturally came along. These little dogs are seasoned travelers, and several of them are senior citizens. It takes a lot of organization to care for twelve dogs and fortunately these folks are very organized! They tell us that rarely does anyone in a campground even realize that they have more than four. To an outsider, Japanese Chins all look the same, and since Mike and Retha walk four at a time (and the dogs are so quiet) people assume there are only four being walked over and over.

As I was straightening up today I came across this card that my Dad gave to me when I graduated from college in 1997. Dad had been diagnosed with Alzheimer's by that time but was still able to write (and to write well!) This card means so much to me and every time I come across it it's like getting a hug from him. Dad passed away twelve years ago and I miss him terribly.

I think about what Bob and I had to do to become full-time RVers, and his words are as fresh as if he wrote them yesterday.  I'll keep tucking this card in a different place each time I come across it, so I can continue to find it when I least expect it.

El Camino Real Museum

On Sunday Bob and I visited the El Camino Real Museum, about a half hour north of the town of Truth or Consequences, NM. The weather was warm but very windy, and we were feeling the cabin fever from being inside so much.

 The entrance to the museum was very dramatic, surrounded by desert landscapes.

Inside and downstairs was the entrance to the movie theater, where we viewed a brief film about El Camino Real de Terra Adentro, meaning "the royal road to the interior lands." Twenty two years before the Mayflower landed, this road was created by the Spanish Conquistadors to connect the city of Vera Cruz in Mexico to Santa Fe, NM.

Inside the museum is a courtyard in Spanish and Mexican style. 

 Beautiful art and sculptures are featured.

A typical mercado, or marketplace 

Clothing such as that which would have been worn four hundred years ago. 

Bob in front of vintage postcard posters. 

A two wheeled cart, of the type used by travelers along the historic road.

El Camino Real traversed scenes such as this.

We brought a box lunch and ate it while surrounded by beautiful desert vistas.  

After we returned home I spent the rest of the weekend sewing slippers for two more of our grandchildren. Jillian and Alex will receive these.