It's now Fall, and I wondered how many times this year I had hiked the Y.  Since I collected a rock every time I went hiking, dated it and put it in a jar, I could tell!

From counting my rocks I knew that I went to the Y 24 times, including today.  Went to other places 4 times.  Those included the "big hikes" we took on a couple of occasions that took many hours.  I collected 3 rocks each time we went on a big hike, taking a rock from each main trail. 

The first time I hiked the Y (not including the times decades ago!), it took me 45 minutes and my legs were shaking when I got back down to the car.  My knees always hurt coming back down, too, for many months.  Now I can make it to Turn 10 in less than 30 minutes (my record is 25 minutes 20 seconds) and my legs don't shake and my knees don't hurt anymore coming down!  Yeah!

My jar of hiking rocks.

All the rocks spread out, according to date.  January's rock is on the far left, September's rocks are on the right.

Riley's Christmas Stocking

I decided it was time to write a new post.  I haven't been very diligent in this matter!  We went on our Australian vacation in July, which was wonderful!  I only posted almost 600 pictures in Facebook!  I now can climb to turn 10 on the Y trail in 25 1/2 minutes!  I finished Riley's Christmas stocking!

The stocking was a true labor of love.  The kit supposedly included everything "needed" except a small amount of batting.  The white felt was unacceptable, and I had to double it to make it acceptable.  The white felt was supposed to be the backing, which would have been unacceptable even if it wasn't see through.  Who gives a child a white stocking?  It would never have looked nice after the first 5 minutes of him using it. Then I ran out of some of the sequins.  The company sent more sequins, I used the backing of the stocking to double up the white pieces, I used a red and green plaid (doubled and interfaced) for the back, used fuzzy felt for the stocking topper, and used a ribbon instead of felt for the hanger.  The back and the front were sewn right sides together, then flipped and machine top-stitched.  This stocking is made to last a long, long time!

Here's my village!  Isn't it adorable!

Boy, I'm a bad blogger!  Since I've written last, I spent 3 weeks in Eugene, hiked to the Y numerous times, crocheted lots of new Itty Bitty Baby clothes, hiked around Y mountain and down Rock Canyon with John on Memorial Day, almost finished my plastic canvas gingerbread village, filled in lots of spaces in my genealogy, and spent LOTS of time preparing for our upcoming vacation (cruise around Australia!!)  Whew!

I will post photos when I finish my little village.  It is adorable.

My best time of hiking to the Y (to turn 10) is now 26 minutes!  And my knees have stopped hurting on the way down.  THAT is quite a blessing!

Hiking the Y

I just made my 4th climb up to the Y.  Only 32 minutes to turn 10, and 25 back to the bottom.  I'm getting better at this!

Almost Spring!

I knew it was going to get stormy over the weekend, so I took advantage of the great weather and hiked up to the Y on Friday.  It was my quickest time yet, 35 minutes to Turn 10.  Then I actually went over the short trail to the bottom of the Y and had someone take my picture to prove I made it. :-)

Eugene

I spent most of last week up in Eugene visiting Thomas and Melissa.  It is VERY humid there!  Lotion?  Who needs that?!  I used very little while there.  Everything is green, including the bark on the trees, rocks and roofs.

I worked on a plastic canvas needlepoint project while there, too, and finished my 2nd dish cloth using the Knook.

Fun, huh?!  I can knit (though it's not great knitting) as long as it's with a crochet hook!