Before we headed south, we took a day to visit boating friends in West Seattle, enjoying their great neighborhood and views of downtown Seattle. They also took us on a little driving tour of some hidden gems in town – I loved the Troll under the Fremont bridge…

…and yes, that’s a real VW Bug in his hand! A perfect day.

We started driving south and I remembered that Petersburg friends were also out and about in their RV, so I sent a text to say hello and to let them know where we were… and it turns out that they were heading to the same campground that evening to meet up with their son and his wife (also Petersburg people). We celebrated Jim’s birthday in style! A couple of nights later we ran into our friends again at another campground – we’ve seen more of them outside town than back at home!

Our general destination for this RV trip is Arizona. We stopped for a short visit to see friends in Yuma, and I had to laugh at how many Canadians were there for the winter. We saw the 60s pop band Herman’s Hermits in concert there – what a blast! Peter Noone is the only one of the original Hermits still in the group, but his voice was strong, he had a ton of energy, and he definitely had the moves. We capped off the visit with a trip to nearby date farm for a little date ice cream.

From Yuma we headed to the small town of Gila Bend, AZ – about 75 miles west of Phoenix. The campground there was terrific – very friendly people, and lots of hummingbirds.

They even had a little private nook where you could enjoy a nice view and no interruptions, complete with comfy chair, wind chime and a hummingbird feeder – a perfect place to enjoy my book.

But the reason we came here was to explore some of the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) part of the Sonoran Desert National Monument.

This part of the Sonoran is pretty remote – we bounced along a 4WD road for a few miles to get to a trail area – we didn’t want to get lost! I’ll post more about the Sonoran Desert tomorrow – it’s a terrific wilderness.

It’s that time of the year when we head “down south” (which is Alaskan for “anywhere in the Lower 48”) for a knitting retreat (for me) and to do some exploring with the RV (for both of us). It’s a good time of the year to escape winter for a bit because this is what it looks like at home…

…but when we got to Seattle, it was worse!

Seattle was in the midst of “snowmageddon” – it’s rare to get snow in this very hilly town, and the city has very little equipment to deal with it. Flights were cancelled left and right, and neighborhoods were snowed in for days.

Regardless, the knitting must go on… and the knitters (and spinners) gathered one last time for Madrona – a knitting and spinning retreat that has been going on for 20 years. This is my fourth year attending “graduate school for knitters”, as Jim calls it. Classes, demonstrations, the Teacher Talent Show to raise money (serious money) for charities, lectures, and knitting or spinning by the fireplace are all great ways to experience Madrona. Sadly, this is the last year in its current incarnation, but two new people are taking over the same date and location starting next year for a similar event – Red Alder – and I can’t wait!

Spinning in the bar…

…demonstrations of antique sock knitting machines…

…asking a lady to pose with her knitted sheep doll (Dolores – a real character – in a custom designed mermaid outfit (just one of a growing collection)…

Now, you may think we knitters and spinners are all nut-cases, but really we just love fiber and making things and being creative. And being kind to one another. It’s a Big Thing with crafty people, which is what makes being around so many of them at one time pretty awesome.

Everyone admires everyone else’s knitted things. It may not be the colors or style you’d choose for yourself, but you can see the workmanship and pride in every shawl, sweater or hat and appreciate it. And the most fun is to take a class from one of the outstanding teachers and come back a year later wearing something you made based on that class. I’ve never been a “fan girl” about anything, until I met knitting teachers. I have a few favorites… Beth Brown-Reinsel, who wrote the book about Ganseys and is a traditional knitting maven, posing with Jim in his custom Gansey…

…and Fair Isle color wizard Janine Bajus, posing with me wearing two of her designs – the Helsinki sweater and the Cordova hat.

I took a day-long Knitted Tessellations class with another very favorite teacher – Franklin Habit – and as much as I detest to be in photographs, I just had to get a fan girl picture with him (and my tessellated swatch). (A tessellation is an arrangement of shapes closely fitted together in a repeated pattern without gaps or overlapping. It involves math and rules, but it’s really cool!)

I wrapped up my glorious long weekend of knitting with a class about Danish star motifs and the history of their traditional damask garments from a knitter/historian – Vivian Hoxbro. She told us that the Danes think of the stars as holes in the sky that give you a little view of Paradise, hence the significance of the many star motifs on their garments. Suffice it to say that I’ve already ordered her book!

So here ends my annual Blog About Knitting, and now I promise to return to our normal kinds of adventures.