Hiking While on Vacation

I promised pictures from our vacation in the Smoky Mountains and here are a few....

This is G and I at Grotto Falls.

I just can't remember the name of this trail as we actually were on pieces of 3 trails on this particular hike. Even though the fall color is past it's peak this is stunning fall color to me. We literally had a blizzard of leaves falling from the sky. Gorgeous.

One day I really hope to be able to hike quite a distance on the Appalachian Trail. This was our first day in the park. It's inconceivable to me that people hike 2000+ miles. Some all at once!

Stunning views everywhere!

Me....on the Appalachian Trail! So much fun!

I had previously posted that I was hoping to be a lot stronger in my hiking abilities this trip. I'm pleased to say that I was! We only repeated one trail that we hiked last year but I was able to shave 1 hour and 10 minutes off my time! I felt fabulous!!! Being 55 pounds lighter than last year has helped so much. Next year will be even better and I'm really looking forward to it! So far, 2 vacations are tentatively planned for 2009 where we'll be able to do some hiking!

I just wrote a big long paragraph about my weight loss that I decided to delete from this post. Let's just say that looking at pictures of oneself objectively can be a huge reality check and that I still have some work to do mentally. This trip totally rocked and I can really see improvement in my physical ability. That is what I'm going to focus on!

We're Back

We're back!!! We had a great time even though it was very cold! Here are a couple of pictures of where we stayed. More to come later!

This is a mini sock that I knit on the trip up. This picture was actually taken in the bathtub of the cabin where we stayed. It had stacked stone walls.

Is this a cute front door? A local artist made this. He actually had a shop about 5 miles from where we stayed that we passed several times. He was generally outside working on his doors.

More later!

Heading for the Mountains!

Tomorrow we're leaving for a vacation in the Smoky Mountains! We're staying in a sweet little cabin with a hot tub on the deck and 2 fireplaces. We'll spend every second our bodies can handle hiking in the Smoky Mountain National Park. We did this same trip last year during November and hope to do it each year. It's nice to see the fall color and experience the park when it's cool and not so crowded.

It's been fun to do something I never thought I'd do and I have hopes to one day spend a week or 2 hiking on the AT. I've been on Weight Watchers since January 2007 and I'm exactly 55 pounds smaller than I was for last years trip. I am hoping that the weight loss will result in my stamina being improved. Those elevation changes can be a killer for a Florida girl!

So I'll see you in a week with some pictures of G and I on the trails!

Class on How to Dye Yarn - Part 1

A month ago I took a class at Sugarbee Studios on how to dye yarn. So far, I have no interest in spinning. But dying yarn for my own purposes absolutely fascinates me! Sugarbee is a local Fiber Artist who has recently received recognition on Lime & Violet. It is a true honor to be able to take this class from her. One thing I learned is that you can make dying yarn very scientific....or not. I have enough math in my life as it is; so we chose to go with the "or not" method. After all, my interest in the fiber arts has been sparked not because I need more analytic stuff in my life but that I needed to get in touch with the creativity that I wasn't sure that I had.

Here is Sugarbee herself with some of her dyes. When the class was over, she gave me generous samples of 8 dyes so I can play around at home. She gave me everything I needed to get started except the yarn blanks and the crockpot.
For the lesson, we dyed yarn using several methods of applying the dye. For one, we put the yarn in the crockpot and then poured on dye that we had premixed with water and placed in bottles. The yarn above reminds me of an Easter Egg!

Here's the bottles ready to go!

Another method is to put the yarn in the water and then put the powdered dye into the crockpot and distribute the color gently. I actually preferred this method. The yarn above was sticking out on purpose. Later we gently pushed the white part down into the dye as we were going for a tone on tone blue color.

To me, I'd thought that getting a deeply saturated black would be difficult. Not so! This came out very black. The grey was nice and grey and the Hot Fuschia (love that name!) was also very vibrant. Later I realized that I already had a Sugarbee yarn very close to these colors so Sugarbee showed me how you can overdye yarn.

All of my yarn came out beautiful! You're going to have to wait for a 2nd post though to see the results! If you ever get a chance to take a class I would highly suggest it. It really is very forgiving, very fun, and very satisfying.

Make sure you check out Sugarbee's blog which also has a link to her Etsy shop. If you're a spinner, she also sells the most amazing batts. Like nothing I've ever seen before!

Check back soon for part 2 where I'll show the results of my class to include the yarn that we overdyed!

Finally!

It's FINALLY cool enough here in Florida for me to wear a pair of socks! Yipppeee! I started knitting in Janaury. By the time I got around to finishing a pair of socks it was just too darn hot to wear them! This morning was super cold (in the high 30's I think) and I got to wear these:

These are the first pair of socks I ever attempted to make. Just plain janes knit on DPNs. Nothing fancy at all. But warm. Soft. I didn't anticipate how good it would feel to wear them!

Everyone should have a pair of hand knit socks!