Off to San Francisco

We are off for vacation to San Francisco later this week for five days. We leave there and fly to Las Vegas for three more days where we'll meet up with some family. Then back home to Saratoga Springs in upstate New York.

Have already booked a number of trips for the visit to California. We're going to visit Alcatraz, Muir Woods, and the Winchester House in San Jose. Looking forward to seeing the Golden Gate Bridge in person!

One of the fun things we're going to do is a rent a Go-Car! This car is a small two-seater with a GPS guided tour built in. Hope it doesn't rain as there is no roof!!

When we get to Las Vegas, we are planning on visiting Red Rock Canyon and the Gold and Silver Pawn Shop were the History Channel's Pawn Stars is filmed.

Hope to post some great photos of this trip, when we return.

On the Needles

I'm presently knitting a sweater for my Prayer Shawl Ministry group. It's a pretty light bluish-gray, a Vanna yarn from Lion Brand Yarns. It's an interesting pattern that comes from the book Knitting for Peace: Make the World a Better Place One Stitch at a Time.

The pattern calls for you to knit the middle front panel followed by the middle back panel. You then lay the panels end to end, pick up stitches along each side (one side at a time). Once a side is finished, the arm will be knit. Should save some time in sewing up the seams. Here's where I'm at so far:

As you can see the front and back panel are laid end to end and have been joined by a continuous side panel. The rectangle that is being formed between the two panels will be the opening for the head. So far, so good!

Loopy Ladies

I have been lucky enough to be invited to join a group of hookers who meet on Wednesday at our local Senior Citizens Center. What a great group! They call themselves the Loopy Ladies, and I guess that now applies to me, too.

In addition to the camaraderie, I've also been asked to sell wool to those members who don't have a source for dyed wool. An added bonus!

It was a bit of a shock to think I had to join the Senior Citizens in order to attend. I just turned 54 and was surprised that I am eligible. 50 is their minimum age. Enough said about that!

Got to bring the rug I completed for Gene Shepard's blog challenge last year to be displayed for the center's open house next week. These gals are very active!

Anyway, so happy to be in a group again. I'm sure I'll get more hooking done, and will definitely be inspired by the others' work.

Knitting Group

My prayer shawl ministry group has been knitting up a storm this past winter. We have many projects that we work on and have all become quite close. Many of our members have things going on in their lives that need all the prayers we can muster. So when we get together, we laugh a bit, and sometimes even cry.

Here is a photo of one of our lighter moments. How many hands does it take to unravel one ball of yarn?!?!?