I am back from my long overdue vacation. It's been two years since my last true vacation and this one was worth the wait. I had to take a day just to rest up because I drove and my body and mind needed to regroup. You know, the needing a vacation after the vacation.
A girlfriend of mine and her family moved to West Virginia four years ago. She kept asking me when I was going to visit. Well, I finally did and boy did she make my trip memorable. It was like sipping fine wine as I enjoyed the fresh air and beauty of the mountains, farm country and sun sets. I felt as if I was on a yarn/animal tour. I hiked, tried some sky shooting - just two shots. That was enough for me, even though I liked it I didn't want my shoulder to be aching for the rest of the trip. But the next time I am there for sure I want to do that again.
We had the privilege of enjoying great food and we had fresh vegetables given to us from the farms we visited, met new friends to keep in touch with, went to yarn shops and farms that dealt with the needlearts, got to be around a lot of different animals and some other adventures. And one of the best things is having someone that lives there that knows where to go and will drive you around.
Each day was a new adventure and I loved every bit of it. I had a fantastic time. I put my pictures in flickr if you care to view them. Different ones were trying to talk me into moving there, but I would come back with the sentence, "I'm a city girl and I have got to get back to the city." Farming is hard work and I think you have to have a passion for it to stick it out. And finding a job there is not easy either. So I had a blast while I was there but home started to call out to me at the end.
The highlight of the trip was yarn places and farms, especially with sheep that were sheered and the wool was died and spun. One of the farms that we went to was friends of my friend and she took me through the whole dyeing process. Really interesting. She said that I could come back and help with the dyeing. Now I will be back next spring for that one.
The air smelt clean and fresh, well except for two mornings where that I was awoken by a smell I could easily identify as a skunk who happened to want to say hello in his stink kind of way. Other than that I could breathe so much better.
I know there are ones reading this and are saying that they already live in this surrounding. I don't. I feel that sometimes we take for granted things that we have in our every day life that makes life just a little more special. So if you are fortunate to live in this environment do as the saying goes; 'take the time to smell the coffee' because it is oh so sweet and delicious.
Robert Frost
I used my sight to enjoy all of what I saw, I gained insight in learning more in the world of needlearts and of the beauty that surrounded me, and I was constantly excited for the whole adventure that I experienced.
Just to give an update on my projects, I brought with me several projects and I finished the Panda Silk DK Fan Shawl that I talk about in my post from July 6, made a hat called 'love it, leaf it!' featured in the Knit 1 Magazine Spring/Summer 2009, made a teddy bear out of the book Cuddly Crochet by Stacey Trock called 'Timmy the Teddy Bear' and I still need to sew it together, and I am almost finished with a Turtle out of the book Knitted Toys by Fiona McTague. I brought a lot of papers that I needed to sort through and got through all of them since I was being chauffeured around, I took advantage of that. I just wanted to reconnect with you. I'll share more of my West Virginia adventures in another post.
Have a great day.
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