A hot dry weekend is always better under the trees!
It was our very timely ladies’ camping weekend. We went to Panther Creek Campground in the Gifford Pinchot National Forest, just north of Carson, Washington.
Rocks in Panther Creek
The water in the creek is clear and cold, perfect for a bracing dip on a hot day. The rocks are such pretty colors, too.
Panther Creek Falls
Panther Creek Falls is a twisty drive of 4.7 miles up the road, and then a very short hike. You can go down to the bottom of the falls. Stunning!
Panther Creek Falls, from the bottom
What a gorgeous beetle.
Tai chi
The tent pad at the vacant site next to ours made a great tai chi space.
I played with beads (ankle bracelets)
and I almost finished this project. We’ll see if blocking makes the brioche patterning show up better in the green section. Super fun to knit.
We also played games and just had a great time hanging out. It was a perfect weekend with friends.
How was your weekend? Hot? Do you knit when it’s hot? I always knit!
Back from a weekend camping trip with the Gal Pals. We went over to central Oregon for clear dark skies, anticipating water fun by day, and the Perseid meteor showers by night.
Mt Hood, a bit bare
We live on the west side of the Cascade Range, so we drove over to the east side going around Mt. Hood. It’s pretty bare in the summer.
Random dust devil
It’s drier on the east side of the mountains. The views of the mountains in the Cascade Range are stunning from that side.
Sunset behind Mt Jefferson
The setting sun cast a shadow of the mountaintop against the slight haze in the air…
followed by an allover orange glow. That’s Haystack Reservoir in the foreground, where we were camping. Unfortunately, it had a toxic algae bloom going on, so we couldn’t play in the water. Pivot and adapt!
We went to Sisters (the town) on Saturday, shopped at a couple favorite stores (Bedouin and the Stitchin’ Post), had an impromptu visit with friends there (hi Becky & Lisa) and swam at their community pool, and then went for music and wine at Faith Hope and Charity Vineyards.
Three Sisters: South, Middle, and North, or Faith, Hope, and Charity
What a beautiful setting! It wasn’t quite the day we had planned, but it was lovely.
The next day we set up at Tumalo State Park to play in the water, either floating down a short stretch of the Deschutes River, or just wading. Delightful! No pictures; we were having too much fun.
Smith Rock State Park
We stopped at Smith Rock State Park on the way back to camp. I had always imagined that Smith Rock is a single monolith that rock climbers love, but I guess not!
It’s an austerely beautiful place in the summer.
Bev’s big tent houses three comfortably
We enjoyed the starry skies, the Milky Way, and the streaking meteors each night. On the last night we took off the tent’s rain fly so we could skywatch through the mesh roof. Perfect!
It’s was ridiculously hot here last week (90 to 100F), so a planned camping trip with the ladies was a welcome respite. We went to Cape Perpetua, near Yachats, on the central Oregon coast.
Looking south from Cape Perpetua
It was a cool and misty weekend, with highs in the mid-60s. The curtains of mist falling past the cape were ethereally lovely.
Banana slug
I brought my assigned pooling cowl, but didn’t do a lot of knitting. There was a whole world to explore.
Giant Spruce
This Sitka Spruce was here before Columbus arrived in the New World. Older than Henry VIII?!
View from the other side
The hollow underneath was formed as the tree grew out of a nurse log, which then rotted away, hundreds of years ago.
What’s going to grow from this nurse log? Who will see it hundreds of years from now?Stone shelter on Cape Perpetua
Stone shelter built by the CCC in the 1930s. Workers (young men) earned $30/month. They kept $5, and $25 went home to the family.
Note the temporarily blue sky!Fungus among usLooking at you, oxalis?
Cape Perpetua is on a pretty rocky part of the coast, but there are occasional sandy beaches. Tillicum Beach was wide and inviting.
Designer feathers on Tillicum BeachTide pools like moonscapes
Spouting Horn blow holeCape Perpetua overlookFarewell to our mascot, who stayed with us all weekend
Back in town, where it’s cooled off a bit. Time to work out my next design!
I’ve gone through two design ideas so far. One would require an extra skein of speckled yarn, so no go on that one. It’s risky to order another and expect that the speckles will be the same (ask me how I know). Both this idea and the next idea involve working from the large end to the small end, in order to make the motif right side up. It’s a lot more planning and math, but it will be worth it. I hope. Onward!
What kind of person brings white linen knitting on a camping trip? Yes, it’s me.
I had just finished the white linen top, and I didn’t love it. I wanted minimal shaping, so I designed it with two simple rectangles. It turned out boxier than I wanted it to be, which meant that I needed to rip it back down to the beginning of the armholes, and add armhole shaping. That meant re-knitting 1/3 of the FO, ouch!
This new design had an impending date with the tech editor, just a few days away. So white linen and camping? Game on!
I did get it finished, and I love it. The shoulder/armhole shaping made a big difference. Pattern coming soon.
I’m currently knitting one more sample at a slightly tighter gauge, but the pattern is done and tech edited already. It just needs final measurements from the second sample; I’m almost done with the second half of it. This is a really quick knit in Aran weight Kestrel from Quince & Co.
Camping was lovely, too. We were at Lost Lake in the Mt. Hood National Forest to celebrate a friend’s birthday.
It was great to get away for a few days. No cell service, but my iPhone camera was handy!
And my feet were toasty warm in my Concentric Bed Socks.
I don’t have any big vacation plans this summer, just little jaunts close to home. But that’s not a bad thing. I was over in Sisters a few weeks ago for another friend’s birthday. That trip included karaoke, an incredible hailstorm, and a sailboat’s maiden voyage.
I’m home, skeeter-bit, itchy, and happy. We were at Swift Forest Camp on the Lewis River in Washington. It was marvelous to look up and see this by day…
…and a million stars by night. Being away from city lights really changes the night sky. It’s too early for the Perseid meteor showers, but we saw several meteors streak across the sky each night, including a very bright one tracing the Milky Way. Gorgeous!
I brought my knitting, and I was completely engrossed in my ruffle tank. I ripped both front and back down to the neck shaping so I could adjust the depth of the neckline. I had a “duh!” epiphany: I needed to figure how far *down* from the shoulders I wanted the neckline before I could figure how far *up* to start it from the armhole shaping, since I was changing the depth of the armhole, too. That sounds like gibberish, but it makes perfect sense. I wish I’d thought that through the first time. I also decided to forego the keyhole neckline on the back, and give it the same shaping as the front. I finished front and back, and started adding the ruffles.
I love how this is turning out; the ruffles are fun to make and charming to look at.
I shopped for these beads for an ankle bracelet last month and hadn’t gotten around to making it. Carole designed and put this together for me since I was otherwise obsessed.
We had some bead stash sharing and swapping.
It’s a multi-family camp out, which makes it all the more fun. The teens woke up on Thursday and decided to try to make a sailboat with the inflatable raft. It’s amazing what they can do with sticks, duct tape, rope, and the rainfly from a tent.
And it worked! Mast, sail, working boom, and a paddle as a rudder.
We had a great time, even without our electronic toys. There was no cell service in the area, and sometimes it’s nice to be untethered. But I’m looking forward to my new iPhone4 on Tuesday!
Find my patterns on Ravelry: Michele Bernstein Designs
Here are some of my favorites, and the newest. Many of my designs are also available through my Payhip store.
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