No Excuses

It has been an interesting fall for us, with ups and downs. I cannot deny that the grueling, unrelenting specter of this pandemic has sapped my desire to add to my blog. But it is December 31 and I have promised myself to record our autumn events, since I have so much to be thankful for.

In September I came across this little Bernina 215 sewing machine. This is a basic model without decorative stitches but it sews so beautifully that I am happy to add it to my craft room. I immediately stitched up a padded pouch to hold accessories. And when my main machine is in for maintenance I will now have a way to sew. 

I found this fabric with phoenixes all over it and had to make a dress for granddaughter Jillian. She told me “Grandma, phoenixes are my favorite mythical creature!”

I also made up a couple of quilted wall hangings. Now, I love to quilt, but I have no wall space or bed space for a quilt. These are 6” wide and 12” or 18” long so I can find a spot for them. I do enjoy changing out decor seasonally.

This past year I have found Fabrics-store.com and their beautiful linen fabrics, so I sewed myself some kitchen towels, using decorative stitches on my Bernina 480 machine as accents. 

I showed Bob some photos of turned gnomes and he immediately started making me some. Here’s a tiny one that I keep in my kitchen… and here’s a Viking gnome for the living room. I just love these!

On the “Weaving in the Saori Way” group on Ravelry we were challenged to weave something for the home. I wove up some coasters using a warp I already had on my 9.5” 8S Leclerc Voyageur table loom. A quick and fun project.

Bob and I weren’t the only ones having fun in October. Auggie dressed as a taco and won second prize in the doggie Halloween contest. Yes, that is definitely a happy look on his face—he loves wearing costumes and enjoys the attention he gets from it.

The best time we had in October, though, was when two of my sisters flew out for a long weekend. Cher (from Florida) and Gail (from Texas) made the trip and stayed in our motorhome which we took out of storage for the occasion. We had so much fun shopping and hanging out (and of course enjoying homemade margaritas!) What a joy to see them.

In November Bob and I went to a couple of interesting places. One of my friends belongs to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints and she told us about the Mesa Arizona Temple, just up the road from us. Apparently few people ever get to see inside (not even people of that faith) yet it was opening for two weeks for tours so she urged us to go see it while we could. It was a pretty amazing place. Unfortunately we could not take any photos inside but we could photograph the outside. We brought some friends with us and we all enjoyed the tour.

For my birthday Bob took my to Taliesin West, a Frank Lloyd Wright home in Phoenix. This was our third FLW house and as always we were blown away by the genius of this architect. Afterwards we ate lunch at Giving Tree Cafe, a vegan restaurant in Phoenix, and had a yummy meal. We enjoyed a vegan Thanksgiving (“Thanks-living”) as well, purchasing a takeout feast from Green New American Restaurant in Tempe, as we had in 2020.

We aren’t getting any younger, though, and in October I had an episode of a-fib so my doctor sent me to a cardiologist. After six long weeks of testing (and then waiting for a report) I learned that I am fine. Whew! That was a scary couple of months. Then in December I experienced my first, and hopefully last, kidney stone. I am now drinking lots of water faithfully and will never allow myself to be dehydrated again.

Bob decorated our house again for Christmas, adding an angel to our star decoration on the side of our carport. The angel was made by a fellow woodworker who passed away a year or so ago.

Wishing all of my blog readers health, peace, and a very happy New Year.

All Settled In and Making Things

It took Bob and me pretty much all week to move our things into the motorhome, but it’s all done. Since that time we have remained busy. One of the ice plants in front of our house didn’t survive the summer heat when the little tube bringing water to it got clogged. We have a battery-powered watering system to water a couple of time a week that worked quite well otherwise. Bob dug up the dead plant and replaced it with another yellow-blossomed ice plant, and also added a pink one in the center. I’ll post photos when it starts to bloom. We also put out our little wooden pig that we bought in Mexico.

With all the improvements we’ve made on this place we hadn’t yet tackled the bedroom closet doors. They are old, rather ugly sliding doors that scrape across the bottom of the track each time we want to open the closet. We had resigned ourselves to losing the drawers under the base of the closet, too. But then Bob found doors from Home Depot that can be special-ordered to the exact size we need, so the drawers will be staying and there will be minimal work to install everything. The doors should be here in about three weeks.

The other big ticket item we have in the works is having the two chairs in the motorhome recovered. My reclining chair has taken quite a beating over the last few years and the faux leather upholstery has been flaking off. We found a local upholstery fellow that has 30 years of experience and next week we’ll drive the RV to his shop so he can re-cover them. It should only take a few days to do it, too.

On our last week of traveling I started a little pin loom weaving project using a Wunderwag 6” pin loom, and I finished it in just a few days. 

I’ve been sewing a lot. My nice Bernina 480 sewing machine has been in the shop for its annual Spa Day and I came across a simpler machine that will be a backup when I can’t use it. The new one is weighs less and will be handy if I take a sewing class. It’s a Bernina 215 and she’s a sweet little thing. She takes all of my 480’s feet, too, so that saves a lot of money. I sewed up this little bag to hold all of her parts.

I also made this little Happy Cat, which is a free online pattern by Ann Wood, found here. Oh, and see the black stand that raises up the TV so that our DVD player slides underneath? Bob made that, too.

Bob has his lathe set up and made me this beautiful pressing tool out of a piece of Osage orange wood he had. This is nice to do a quick press of seams without going over to an iron as I sew things up.

And lastly, I made this knitted hat and scarf set for Jillian out of some yarn I had in my stash. It was a very soft, squishy knit.

So you see we have been very busy, indeed!

Nevada to Mesa, AZ

I don’t know what I expected of Nevada. Actually, yes I do know. In 2016 we traveled from California to Las Vegas before moving on to Utah. So we expected the whole of Nevada to look like the area around Vegas. And there I was very wrong.

Except for Las Vegas, Nevada is beautiful. Highway 93 is smooth and well kept, and there are mountains everywhere. We were enchanted. We left Hollister, Idaho and traveled south to Ely, NV (pronounced “eelee.”) Our campsite that night was in a KOA and was surrounded by mountainous views. Our only issue with it was that the elevation of 6600 feet made us gasp for breath at times. From Ely we continued south to Las Vegas, and then on to Congress, AZ, spending one night each time. And this morning we left Congress to arrive at our park in Mesa where we will be for the next seven months or so. We’ve only been away for five months but it feels much longer than that to me. And now we have the task of moving everything from the motorhome to the house in the next seven days.

Here are photos of our journey as we moved south.

Approaching Ely, NV

South of Ely, NV

Approaching Las Vegas with smoke from wildfire clouding the view

We pass the Hoover Dam, with Lake Meade just barely visible on our left

Mountains south of Las Vegas

We enter Arizona and see our first saguaro cacti

Congress, AZ

The weather has cooled down a little, from temps in the 100s to the 90s. We are grateful for every degree dropped as we move our things in!

GrandCamp Idaho and Visiting with Family

Bob and I traveled the last leg of our trip to Idaho last Friday, passing the Snake River as it disappeared and reappeared alongside the highway.

We settled into our campground in Caldwell and welcomed daughter Emily, her husband Anthony, and their four beautiful children with a cookout. The children have gotten so big since I saw them in March, and the boys looked huge to us!

After a nice visit, the parents and two youngest returned home leaving us with Quinn and Eve for two days. They have already returned to school so we had to make the most of the weekend. It was so good to spend time with them! They played in the campground pool and game room, and we did lots of crafts…paper dolls, puzzles, rubber band bracelets, Shrinky  Dinks, and painting. And of course we had s’mores!

Later in the week Bob gussied up Emily’s mantle by adding an inner frame to surround the newly painted black wall. Even though it is shallow, the new trim gives a feeling of depth and looks so nice. 

The week went all too quickly, ending up with a meal at Casa Del Matador and a walk around the Village in Meridian. What a fun time we had!

Then we were off again, this time heading south. Originally we had made reservations in Oregon and Washington but the fires out there were causing real problems with air pollution and we decided to return to Mesa early. It has been hazy since we got to Idaho and the haze is worse the farther west you go.

We spent our first night at Buster’s Restaurant and Saloon in Hollister, Idaho, where they have an RV park out back. We had a pull-thru site just steps from the Saloon, and Bob spent quite a bit of time chatting with the owner who dreams of retiring to the road in a motorhome he is working on.

I’ve been working on these knitted fish wash cloths, and also and using my 6” pin loom to make squares for  baby blanket (pics of the blanket to come later.)

It will only take us a total of four nights to get back to Mesa, and I’m looking forward to getting back and settling in. We changed time zones again as we entered Nevada so we are now on Mountain Time, three hours behind our family and friends on the East Coast.

The road to Logan, UT

On Tuesday night we had strong winds until about midnight. Our RV was rocking and the slide-out covers were flapping. Fortunately the winds stopped for Wednesday but then it started to rain and we had light rain most of the day.

On Wednesday morning Bob and I left Rock Springs, WY for Logan, UT. It was about 180 miles but the trip took over four hours because of the mountain driving we had to do. Whenever we go over mountains I  prepare ahead of time by deflating the Sleep Number mattress so it doesn’t pop. This is a necessity. We also have to be aware when opening jars and plastic bottles the next day because air pressure builds up and we can get a little spray. Just one of those little things most people never have to deal with!

Bob and I noticed a lot of these little silo-shaped structures in the fields outside of Rock Springs but couldn’t figure out what they were.

Then I remembered that our friend Retha had shown me how to use Google Lens, a feature of Google Photos. So I snapped a picture and immediately Google Lens identified these structures as fracking equipment. And now we know. Thanks, Retha!

We passed through Bear Lake in Utah, which is an amazing turquoise color, caused by the calcium carbonate (lime) in the water. The wind had picked up and there were whitecaps in the water.

Once past Bear Lake the road took us on a winding pass through mountains. The canyons we drove through were beautiful and I briefly fantasized about living here in a cute little cabin on a mountain. Except I’m going to bet dollars to doughnuts the winters here are brutal.

We are only in Logan for one night before moving on. Only two more travel days until we see my daughter, son in law, and their four beautiful children!

Cheyenne, WY to Rock Springs, WY

I don’t have a lot to say about Cheyenne since it was only a one night stop. Cheyenne is a lot like Nebraska…flat lands. One issue we ran up against was that the park’s water pressure was higher than any park we’ve seen so far. It actually blew the valve off our hot water heater, so Bob had to go looking for a new one. It’s a good thing he’s handy! I don’t know how RVers manage if one of them isn’t a fixer.

I did finish knitting my washcloth, a pattern I found on Ravelry that’s called “Zinnia.” It’s very pretty but I wasn’t crazy about the process of making this one; a lot of yarn-overs and knit-two-togethers with very little plain stitch knitting. And constant counting. I guess I was just in the mood for something more mindless.

On Monday we left Cheyenne and travelled about 280 miles to Rock Springs, which is where we started seeing real topological changes.

We are staying at an event center in town, where we have the most wonderful views of the mountains.

This morning (Tuesday) Bob, Auggie, and I left the RV at 6:30 am to see some wildlife. The sun was just coming up as we drove.

Soon we turned off the highway to a dirt road that was well maintained, and started our 90 minute drive along Wild Horse Loop. We saw pronghorns, sage grouse, and finally, wild horses! It’s a beautiful drive and we did not see another car the whole way.

The scenery was lovely, too, with beautiful vistas.

On Wednesday we leave for Logan, Utah. We’ll be taking a route that avoids the fire just east of Salt Lake. City.