Day 2 Estes Park Oddessy

It started out as a beautiful day .. sun shining and all that. I picked up breaky at Mickey D's and headed off to the fairgrounds to check out the Wool Market. I had forgetton that classes were on Thursday and Friday but the actual Wool Market didn't start until Saturday. That's OK I had to drive down the hill to take care of some business.
The Drive down the mountain was absolutley gorgeous!! I WANNA FISH THE BIG THOMPSON! I don't have a font big enough to express that. There were fly fisherman everywhere!! They all looked like they were having a blast. And me here without my rod! =Sigh= oh well... next time!

On the way back up the mountain I stopped by a local rock shop and looked at the goodies. I got into a conversation with the owner who had some tourmaline from Pala. We traded some rock stories and some Tucson Gem Show storied and I left with a few pieces of stone. Two nice moonstone cabashons, two tourmaline cabs and a string of tiny faceted garnets (very nice). When I got up here I sat down with full intention of going down to the creek and knitting for a while... but of course as things go fell dead asleep. I woke up hungry and fretted over dinner. Nothing like an agorophopic with social anxiety disorder traveling alone. We don't go out much! I found a local Mexican restaurant that had take out and fretted some more over trafic and parking... but I got the courage to drive my ass down there and was pleasantly surprised at the lack of trafic and loads of parking!! I made my order and took it back to the timeshare and pigged out while watching Man vs Food (Man won both episodes) and was quite full.
I finally got the knitting out and finished the first in the next of a series of baby socks for the boss's progeny. Very cute! I figured that instead of just starting the second of the set I would knit another in the pattern as the correct series of colors had not come around again. I dropped a stitch on a purl and it ran down to the cast on.. I'll have to frog that and start over ... no biggie they are tiny little things - it was less than a hundred stitches into the sock anyway. So I have been poking away at my grey wool socks. A lesson in sanity or patience. It's a solid color sock so no pattern to keep me awake and occupied. I am just hanging on with the pattern as my push. Although I am still in the 2X2 ribbing I am enjoying it. It's very soft and cushy... and is as fun as bubble wrap to play with .. just a little quieter.

Well tomorrow starts the Wool Market. I have cash in hand as well as my resale permit (saves on taxes now is a pain later) so I have a buget. I had a bigger buget until I went to the rock shop ... but I was good ...I didn't spend the bank. My sister will show up sometime ...that should be fun! We both enjoy the wooley arts.

The weather has been interesting. It started raining this afternoon. It was really pouring a short while ago. They had tornado warnings from the Wyoming border all the way to Trinidad Colorado. I am glad I am up in the hills... tornados don't form in the mountains. Russ and I have a deal that if either of us sees rotation in the clouds and a wall cloud and large hail you have to grab the camera. You probably though I was going to say head for safety... but this is from the woman who when Russ put the nail from the nailgun thru his hand the first words out of my mouth were "Where's the camera" I knew he was fine.... but how often are we gonna have the chance to get another kodak moment like that???

Well I'm beat and I need to jet off some directions to my sister so she can find me tomorrow. I will be back here in the evening maybe with a few more stories and if I get coordinated some pictures.. The difficult part is the only internet is in the lobby of the timeshare... and I have no cell phone reception here. Where I do have cell phone reception I have no internet so getting 2 and 2 together to make 4 has been difficult. Maybe I'll talk Juti into eating a the brewery ... generally those places have good grub and this one boasts of high speed internet. And I think I can get cell reception ...

It's time for the Estes Park Wool Festival and Market

Ok everytime I go to one of these cool events I promise to try to live blog.. this time I won't... I can't - no cell phone reception. I will try to nightly blog - how is that? The trip up here to Estes Park was a trip! I had really cool thunderstorms with finger lightening (haven't seen any of that since Wisconsin) And of course everything was lush and green. There wasn't any wind between Chugwater and Ft. Collins which was very unusual. I usually hit 50mph with higher gusts going through that route...it was nice today-probably because of the storms. I saw a double rainbow! Very cool and while enjoying the rainbow I listened to the National Weather Service Tornado Warning... oh joy! I even got to use my rusty California driving skills in traffic. Since I left work 4 hours plus late [ugly story of the past two days are omited from this blog] I got to drive the last two hours in the dark... and the last hour of it was a thrill ride! New Moon... no stars... no lights... and because of the terrain it was like driving through a pitch black tunnel with the only light the reflection of my headlights on the double yellow line on the road in switch back mountain roads. I can't wait to see it in the day! I want to know what I missed. Part way up the mountain I passed what looked like mountain/rock climbers - not sure if they were going up or coming down. From what I hear (sounds like home) the river is raging out here... I got glimpses of it on my way up.

Tomorrow I'll check out the wool market. I need to find Susan (Susan's Fiber Shop in Bristol, Wisconsin) and give her the sample of cleaned, carded and spun Teeswater from the bag of fleece she handed me when I visited her shop back in March. It's really nice stuff... it's just like Yearling mohair only softer and easier to work with and has a beautiful luster! I hope she likes what I did to it!!

Ok well off to bed.. I have wool to drool over tomorrow...