Thought I would close out my series of posts about my visit to the Oregon Coast at the end of July 2023 with a couple favorite photos from the ca-zillion (an even higher number than “zillion”) photos I took during the trip.
(If you are just joining us you can catch the rest of the story in this series of posts (scroll down when you click the link to get to the 4 earlier stories from this trip) – Oregon Coast Adventures.)
Our Oregon based friends MJ and J who know the Oregon Coast very well, took us on road trips from Newport to Florence, Oregon along Highway 101. Many of the photos below are from those stops and apologies I do not remember all the names of the places so I just omitted them – ha!
It was so wonderful to be back in Pacific NW and walk among the old growth forests/trees – oh how I missed them and their dense foliage! I remember many a wonderful solitary or group hike in these types of forests during the 22 years I lived in the Pacific NW (8 years in Seattle, Washington and 14 years in Bend, Oregon).
I’ll close out this post with what might be my favorite photo from the trip:
Continuing my series of posts about our trip to the Oregon Coast in late July to visit with our dear friends MJ and J.
(If you are just joining us you can catch the rest of the story in this series of posts (scroll down when you click the link to get to the 3 earlier stories from this trip) – Oregon Coast Adventures.)
On our way to meet up with our friends I had John stop at a “boutique” Goodwill Thrift Store. I’ve never been to one before. I chatted with the staff member who greeted me when I entered and she said they sold donated “luxury” and “upscale” items there.
It was unlike any Goodwill I’d been to before (if you are familiar with Goodwill thrift/charity shops then you know many of them are very cluttered and kind of run down looking).
Friends of our friends let us stay at their amazing vacation home in Newport. One of the owners is a quilter and the gorgeous vacation home was filled with quilts! (My kind of place to stay at!)
They even had a quilt in the master suite bathroom!
The house had a wonderful view out the back of the Newport Bridge and a lovely piece of stained glass in the entry way window:
It was nice to stay in a cozy home for a couple days on vacation with our friends as we were able to make delicious meals and have a movie night one evening. John of course made his famous “sausage and gravy” for breakfast one morning to the delight of our friends.
While in Newport we wandered around the Nye Beach area and I could not wait to get my toes in the sand and then the ocean!
The town next to the beach is charming (they have flowers everywhere!) and we had fun wandering about and of course I had to stop at the local independent bookstore!
John and my friends were very patient while I got my bookstore browsing on. They had a lovely new and used book collection.
I’ll close out this post with a couple more photos from our wandering around Newport to include some cool art made from recycled rubber tires in downtown Newport.
Before July’s trip to the Oregon Coast gets to be too much of a blur in the place, I should probably continue my story about the trip. I am going to jump the end of our trip and the road trip to return from Newport/Oregon Coast to Portland, Oregon to fly home back to Denver. Also I want to share a little quilt shop tour of the “out of the way, down the road, in the back of the woods” quilt shop we came across in Tillmook, Oregonon our way back to Portland.
If you are just joining us you can catch the rest of the story in this series of posts (scroll down when you click the link to get to the 3 earlier stories from this trip) – Oregon Coast Adventures.
Here was our route from Newport, Oregon (on the coast) to Portland, Oregon (inland). We took a different route back to Portland than the one we took to the Oregon Coast (where we went through McMinnville) in the post Oregon Coast Adventures: First Stop -McMinnville, Oregon:
Let’s talk Tillmook first, as it was the one quilt shop stop I made while visiting the Oregon Coast area. Technically it is not on the coast as it is a little bit inland but we’ll pretend like it is the coast.
I asked John if we could stop in Tillmook on our way to Portland as it’s been many years since I’ve been to the Tillmook Factory/Tillmook Dairy Co-opwhere the dairy products I love (seriously yummy ice cream and cheese, etc.) come from.
On our way there I saw a sign for a quilt shop –Sew Little Timeand I asked John to pull off the main highway and follow it. This took us into some back roads and I was beginning to get suspicious if there was actually a quilt shop there…
(Can you see the news headlines: DENVER COUPLE DISAPPEARS LOOKING FOR A QUILT SHOP IN RURAL TILLAMOOK)
But finally there was after driving deeper and deeper into the rural area – at someone’s house!
Once I convinced myself to walk in, I discovered a lovely little shop with wonderful and very helpful staff.
This is the shop where I found the fabric to make the bag from our friends K & M who just got the new lab puppy (see post Bag to Celebrate a New Lab!):
The had older fabric lines and a lot of “country/rural life” themed fabrics but they are a small shop in a neighborhood and likely gear their fabric selections to what people in the rural community wanted (Tillamook has a large farming community and we saw some gorgeous farms as we drove around). The staff was so warm and friendly I would stop there again even if I am not sure what I would buy there (unless I had a friend who just got a new tractor and I was making a gift with tractor fabric…). The shop does not appear to have a website but here is an article about them from the Cannon Beach Gazette – With ‘Sew Little Time’, go quilt shopping.
After the quilt shop we headed to the Tillmook Factory/Tillmook Dairy Co-opand wandered around a bit and shopped in their giant “gift shop” of dairy delights!
Not for the lactose-intolerant!
Before we got to Tillamook, we stopped in Pacific City at the Pelican Brewing Company and had snack and a craft beer, then wandered along to beach.
Our flight back to Denver was in the early evening, and before we dropped our rental car back off at the Portland airport, we stopped in downtown Portland for an early dinner at Deschutes Brewery and a wander around Powell’s Books.
It was fun to take John to two places I love (Deschutes Brewery and Powell’s) for the first time!
I likely have another story or two in me about this trip so stay tuned for more Oregon Coast adventures in the future.
Toward the end of July 2023 we met up with dear friends on the Oregon Coast. I am doing a series of blog posts about our adventures on the Oregon Coast – check out the blog category – Oregon Coast Adventures– for the other posts (note when you click the link this current post will be the first one that shows but keep scrolling).
After flying into Portland, Oregon, renting a car, and stopping in McMinnville, Oregon (see post Oregon Coast Adventures: First Stop -McMinnville, Oregon) we drove to Depoe Bay, Oregon and spent the night at a little motel right on the bay. We came in a day before our friends we to arrive so we could do a little sightseeing on our own and leisurely make our way toNewport, Oregon to meet up with them.
The motel itself was nothing to “write home about” but it had a tasty free breakfast included and some amazing views.
This was the view from our motel room window:
And here are photos of the beach area a little bit down from the motel where we did a little exploring before heading to a delicious fresh seafood dinner.
And of course I had to take a photo in B&W:
I love this photo! Looks kind of mysterious and moody!
Next post in this series I’ll share our adventures when we got to Newport, Oregon to meet up with our friends.
Toward the end of July we met up with dear friends (the kind of friends that you’d also consider family) on the Oregon Coast.
These are friends I met in Bend, Oregon where I lived for 14 years until my husband Terry suddenly died in 2018. I haven’t been able in the 4.5+ years since moving to Colorado to bring myself to return to Bend, Oregon for a visit (such an awesome life…nearly perfect… was lost there and I still have some trauma from coming home and finding my life partner on the floor dead in the house I’d plan to live in with him the rest of my life…too painful to return yet…) and I didn’t want try to ask my friends to come all the way to Denver again to visit us, so the “compromise” was to meet up the Oregon Coast (via Portland, Oregon).
It wasn’t much of a “compromise” as I love the Oregon Coast; and John (my new life partner) hasn’t been to the Oregon Coast, one of my favorite places in the world (or the places I’ve been in the world), and I was so excited to share it with him.
Central Oregon Coast map from aaroads.com/guides/us-101-or/
The plan was meet up with our friends in Newport, Oregonon the Oregon Coast the next day after flying into Portland, Oregon. We rented a car and here was our travel route (with lots of beauty along the way to see on the Pacific Coast Highway/Highway 101):
Image from Google Maps
But along the way we decided to stop in McMinnville, Oregon for lunch and to visit a quilt shop I had visited many years ago (I think before blogging as I could not find a blog post about it, ha!) – Boersma’s Sewing Center.
John sat in “the husband area” (ha!) with the vacuums (they sell sewing and vacuum related items) while I browsed.
After the quilt shop we headed to a lovely brewery (Two Dogs Taphouse) nearby for a delicious lunch:
We loved that they had a cozy sitting area, actually like a living room, that you could relax in with your beer and your food and watch TV:
After lunch we stopped at Third Street Books (how can I pass up an independent bookstore?) on our way to our car:
And then off to Depoe Bay (the town before Newport as you head south down the Oregon Coast) where we would be spending the night until we met up with our friends the next day in Newport, Oregon.
It’s been a long time since I’ve added a post to my blog categoryLife in B&W where I let my inner Ansel Adams run free (smile). So it was time to share some of the Black & White photos I took while recently visiting the Oregon Coast. I’ll tell you more about the trip in a future post, but for now here are photos from our visit to Yaquina Bay State Park in Newport, Oregon and the Yaquina Head Lighthouse:
While at the state park beach area we enjoyed looking for life in the tide pools (the tide was low), a visiting with a park ranger who gave us a great overview, looking at large rocks covered with endless mussels, and trying to carefully walk on the rocks on the beach near the tide pools (the beach is entirely made of black basaltic rocks) without wiping out on Cobble Beach!
If you’d like to see more and see some of what we saw but in actual color, here is a video I found on YouTube:
The Black Pioneers: Legacy in the American Westexhibit opened at the California Museum in Sacramento, CA on June 10, 2023 however the official exhibit opening event occurred on July 15, 2023 and I attended.
I was so surprised to discover my quilt Langston Hughes: Pioneer Poet was used as their show poster! The museum staff told me how much they loved my quilt.
Here are some of the photos I took (including the poster and my piece, see videos below to see the other quilts in the show):
This quilt has gotten a lot of mileage! I also found it posted on other online advertisement for the show:
GoodDay Sacramento morning show had a segment on the exhibit (you will see my piece toward the end of the segment):
GoodDay Sacramento
CBS News Sacramento also had a segment on the exhibit:
CBS News Sacramento
And here is the walk-through video I took while at the exhibit:
I recently returned from a long weekend in California. John and I visited family and friends in Oakland and Sacramento California. I’ll share some photos/stories from those visits in a future post.
A month ago John and I decided to visit Fort Collins, CO for an overnight visit. We love Fort Collins and are entertaining the idea of moving there someday…perhaps.
On our way to Fort Collins, we stopped in the neighboring town Loveland, CO to visit John’s sister and her husband and go on a boat ride with her and her husband.
We had a lovely boat ride around the reservoir/lake area they live in (Colorado is far from the ocean but we do have rivers, reservoirs and lakes to sail on). Their adorable little dog Lacey came on the boat ride with us and had her own little bed on the boat:
After visiting with John’s sister and her husband we stopped at the Loveland Visitor Center to get John a sticker (he collects stickers to put on his toolbox) and took some photos of the awesome “Love” sign outside the visitor center:
(Did you spot John in the photo?)
Behind the “O” of LOVE, which is shaped into a heart, are “love locks” where people promising their love to each other have left locks:
You can see the theme of Loveland is “Love” and inside the visitor center they also had this sign that you could use as a background for photos:
Postscript
A Visit to Pink Door Fabrics
Before we got to Loveland, we first stopped in Frederick, CO to visit the retail store of Pink Door Fabrics, which is only open to the public 2 days a month.
Here are some photos from my wander around the retail store of Pink Door Fabrics, which is primarily an online shop specializing in Tula Pink fabrics.
I was well behaved until I got to this section of the shop:
I filled my bag really full and they did not mind!
One of Ireland’s favourite visitor experiences & tourist attractions, the Cliffs of Moher tower over the rugged West County Clare coast.
Visually spectacular, the Cliffs of Moher sit astride the striking landscape of the Burren on one side and the Wild Atlantic Ocean on the other. Rising out of the Atlantic waters to a height of over 700ft at O’Brien’s Tower and running along the coast of Clare for almost 14 kilometres, or 8 miles, the Cliffs of Moher were formed over 320 million years ago, and today form part of the Burren and Cliffs of Moher UNESCO Global Geopark. The Cliffs of Moher is in a Special Protection Area for Birds and Wildlife. The magnificent Cliffs on the Wild Atlantic Way host major colonies of nesting sea birds and are one of the country’s most important bird-breeding sites. Borrow some binoculars from our information desk and do some bird watching. Enjoy the captivating spectacle of the vast array of sea birds, a delightful way to pass the hours.
It was very very very windy on the cliffs and here are John and I braving the wind:
And here are our friends K and M. that we went to Ireland with, battling the wind at the cliffs:
K’s mother was from Ireland and she still has plenty of family there (some of which we met up with in Galway while we were visiting); and her husband M goes to Ireland all the time so they were awesome tour guides.
I took over 100 photos at the cliffs and I am certainly not going to torture you to them all (or clog up my image allotment on WordPress); so I made myself select a couple of my favorites to share with you the beauty of the Cliffs of Moher:
The photos of course do not do the beauty of the Cliffs of Moher justice – I felt like I was on the set of a movie and fully understood why the call Ireland the “Emerald Isle“.
Here is a little video I took:
There were a lot of cattle grazing in the grasslands area of the Cliffs of Moher and one particularly friendly bovine caught my attention and we took a photo together.
Now I am considering becoming vegetarian again, ha!
Oh I left out something from our visit to the Pearl Street shopping district thrift/vintage shop –Heady Bauer from the previous post. The shop had a really cool used instrument section where the staff encouraged you to pick up an instrument and play whether you knew how or not:
There was a father and son in the section enjoying the instruments.
John decided to pick up a used guitar and start strumming:
John used to play a lot of instruments when he was younger (the guitar, the piano, and even the saxophone) and at one point was even in a band. I encouraged him to think about getting a used guitar in the future and start playing again.
After an afternoon of wandering around the downtown Boulder shopping areaPearl Street, we headed over to the Boulder Dushanbe Teahouse for dinner. This tea house was a gift from Boulder’s sister city in the Soviet Union, Dushanbe. Here is a snippet of the history from the teahouse’s website:
In 1987, during his first visit to Boulder, Mayor Maksud Ikramov announced that Dushanbe planned to present our city with a Teahouse to celebrate the establishment of sister city ties. From 1987 -1990, more than 40 artisans in several cities of Tajikistan created the decorative elements our Teahouse, including its hand-carved and hand-painted ceiling, tables, stools, columns, and exterior ceramic panels. Often these skills are handed down from generation to generation within families. Lado Shanidze served as chief architect. In Central Asia, teahouses serve as gathering places where friends meet to talk or play chess over a cup of tea. Many teahouses are traditionally decorated with Persian art, characterized by the use of motifs from nature – stellar, solar, and floral, by the repetition of patterns, by form over representation and pattern over detail, and by lavish decoration and color. Our Teahouse accurately reflects this artistic tradition that dates back nearly 2,000 years. The master woodcarvers, including Manon Khaidarov and Mirpulat Mirakhmatov who helped reassemble the Teahouse here, have carved their names in the ceiling. The artisans who have painted it have written their names on a green painted area above the entry to the kitchen. A message carved in the ceiling reads “artisans of ancient Khojand whose works are magical”.
Here are some photos I took while we visited the teahouse, but there are much better photos on the teahouse’s website.
They have an extensive tea menu, hundreds of teas are available. As an obsessive tea drinker, I enjoyed browsing their menu book of teas!
I ended up gong with one of the “teas of the day” which was a rose and lavender infusion. I had a lovely pot of tea along with our lovely meal. (And my pot of tea came with an little hourglass so that I would know when to put the infuser basket out of my tea pot!)
This teahouse reminded us of how many hidden gems (well at least hidden to us) there are in Colorado. We plan to spend the Spring and Summer exploring more of Colorado and finding more of those “hidden gems”.
After the teahouse we continued on our thrifting/thrift store adventures and stopped at the awesome Goodwill in Boulder. There John found an amazing deal – a metal craft beer sign to join his collection of craft beer signs in our basement bar area, for 75% off the retail price!
The sign was in pristine/brand new condition and still had a plastic protective sheet over it (which was removed for the photo above).
I found some amazing used books – several of which were recent publication hardbacks – for only $2 each!
This particular Goodwill was recommended to me by someone I’ve followed for a while on Instagram – @boulderthrifter. She was kind enough to give me thrift shop recommendations for our trip to Boulder.
BEFORE HEADING HOME
The next day we had another Independent Bookstore adventure, this time at The Bookworm – Boulder’s largest used books bookstore (after a delicious breakfast at The Buff, a Boulder breakfast top spot).
I knew The Bookworm was my kind of place because when you first walk in you are greeted by the bookstore dog!
After petting the dog for a while, I went on to browse their HUGE used book selection.
John and I had a wonderful browse in this bookstore.
Right before we headed back to the Denver Metro area, we stopped at a cool used art supply shop, Art Parts: Creative Reuse Center. I love art supply reuse centers! I’ve written about them in the past in posts such as Who Gives a Scrap?.
I had a fun browsing at this shop and left with some free art quilting magazines.
John and I decided to play tourist in our own state and spend a couple days last week in Boulder, Colorado (if you click on the linked “Boulder, Colorado” you’ll see a lovely little video giving you a feel for Boulder, Colorado from the bouldercoloradousa.com website).
I couldn’t help myself, it is early Spring and the landscape is still pretty stark around Colorado so I just had to take the photos in Black & White!
The Lodge has a cool two-level lounging area and they also serve craft beers and have a daily “Happy Hour”. The accommodations were decent although sparse, but you couldn’t beat the $70 a night price.
Excellent value for the money; and if you are really looking to save money, they also have like a $22 a night hostel (you share a room with others). There were lots of young outdoorsy adventure seeking type dudes staying there, I am sure they were enjoying the low rates for the hostel area.
John and I spent some time in the lower level of the Lodge, sipping craft beers and reading (John) and crocheting (me with my travel granny squares making project).
I loved this cool piece of art in the Lodge:
THE ADVENTURE BEGINS
So Boulder has a lot of independent bookstores and a lot of cool thrift shops, and visiting them was part of our plan while in Boulder!
We started our adventure with a trip to the downtown Boulder shopping areaPearl Streetand spent time wandering about the Boulder Book Store.
The bookstore was pretty amazing; and I could have spent a day there (but there was so much more to see in Boulder). The original building that houses the bookstore was built in 1899 and you can see the historical architecture throughout the building.
Here are a couple photos to give you a flavor of what it was like to wander about the bookstore:
I had my favorite (and now well worn) tote bag in tow; but I was well behaved and only filled it with one new book from the Boulder Book Store.
I also filled it with some new stickers for my water bottle, laptop and John’s tool chest (which he covers with stickers) as they had an amazing and reasonably priced sticker collection:
After the bookstore, we wandered around the Pearl Street shopping district and stumbled upon this very fun thrift/vintage shop –Heady Bauer. I was already having an awesome day so I appreciated the sign in front of their door: “Best Day Ever”:
When first entering the shop you see a huge wall display of crocheted blankets, including granny square blankets, mounted on the wall!
Seriously creative art and recycling!
I bought a used book there (I didn’t want the book from our first stop to be lonely!) – an original edition (complete with 1970s cover art) of one of my favorite science fiction books of all time: Rendezvous with Rama by Arthur C. Clarke.
It will be fun to re-read it in the version that it was originally published.
Oh we had a laugh when we stopped at the clothing store Free People to look around (I do like some of their clothes). Do you remember when I was endlessly working on drawstring bags? Well we came across a line of pants that to us looked like “drawstring bag pants”!
I feel like I could definitely learn to make those pants!
I’ll continue the rest of our Boulder adventures in my next post, and I want to close this post with some really cool embroidery art they had in the Free People store above their clothing displays: embroidered coffee and tea burlap sacks:
When I was writing the post 2022 in Review: A Year in Travel I realized there are a couple adventures in 2022 I did not blog about that I meant to but time got away from me and I forgot.
One of those adventures was a trip to Fort Collins, Colorado with my sister in July 2022.
After wandering around downtown Denver for a day, we headed out on a road trip to Fort Collins. I love traveling with my sister, we always have a grand time! The road trip was only around 1.5 hours but provided plenty of time to chat and listen to good music.
I offered to pay for our accommodations in Fort Collins, since she had paid to fly from her home in Virginia to Denver, Colorado and instead of a traditional hotel experience I decided to try out an Airbnb experience. I am going to assume that everyone has heard of Airbnb but if you haven’t it is where you stay at someone’s private home which may be occupied also by the owner or unoccupied and you have the property to yourself.
I usually prefer unoccupied because I always sort of feel like I am intruding in someone’s life but I’ve had some fun experiences staying at occupied properties.
Well I found the coolest Airbnb rental in Fort Collins, occupied, that came with a dog on the premises and a really peaceful and zen environment. It turned out the owners were just as awesome as the accomodations.
Here are some photos of the property we stayed it (my sister and I shared their guest room):
Except for the owner’s bedroom and their home office, the entire home was open to us to enjoy. There were so many awesome places to sit and relax (and meditate if you like). I got up early each morning and sat on their enclosed porch with a book.
They also had a couple bikes that guest could use for free (the home is not too far from downtown Fort Collins) and my sister and I had fun one morning biking to breakfast. I don’t remember where we ate breakfast but it was really delicious!
It was my sister’s first time to Fort Collins and we had so much fun sightseeing in Old Town/downtown Fort Collins. There are endless little boutique shops, places to eat, etc. in a less than a mile radius. We also visited my favorite thrift shop in Fort Collins – Brand Spanking Used, as my sister also loves thrifting (she is the one who got me into thrifting).
John and I have talked about maybe moving to Fort Collins, CO someday. We really love that town and it’s a great quick weekend getaway place. The only thing is they get more snow and intense weather than Denver as Fort Collins is located right near the Estes Park and Rocky Mountain National Park area. But I do love Rocky Mountain National Park – I can’t wait to return there again (see my post on my first amazing visit to this national park Rocky Mountain National Park).
Wherever we move, if we move, it will have to be a one story house (okay if it has a basement), as this broken ankle has made me acutely away of how challenging stairs can be when your mobility is impaired! Our house it too big for two people (and a small dog) and perhaps someday we’ll put it up for sale and let a family enjoy it!
Okay so back to the trip (got sidetracked there for a minute), in addition to fun wanderings around Fort Collins and a beautiful Airbnb, what made the trip really special were our awesome Airbnb hosts. It didn’t feel like we were staying at an Airbnb, it felt like we were staying at a friends’ house!
We had some many amazing conversations with the hosts, some of them late into the night. They were such an awesome couple and we had deep conversations about life as well as lots of laughs! Here we are on the last day of our visit (they did not want us to leave):
The joy on our faces was real – we had such a fun selfie photoshoot and could’t stop laughing when they tried to work the dog into to the selfie!
My sister and I always have cool and unique Airbnb experiences when we travel together. I remember staying at an awesome Airbnb during our sister’s trip to Glenwood Springs (see post Train Ride to Glenwood Springs, CO and More – Part III) that was a “bed and breakfast”, and each morning at breakfast we’d chat with other guests who were visiting from different countries. Breakfast each morning was such a treat!
John doesn’t care for the Airbnb experience and he would not have enjoyed that while in Fort Collins we shared a bathroom with our hosts. He likes to stay at a nice hotel. I do also but when I am traveling with my sister Airbnb seems to be the way to have the most unique travel experience!
As promised, here is a blog post about all my travel in 2022. But before I dive into that, let me share why travel in 2023 will likely not be the same volume as 2022.
A nasty slip on the ice on January 11, 2023 led to an ankle dislocation and a tibial fracture. I was just taking Mike out for his morning walk and SURPRISE! It looked pretty bad when I first did it but the surgeon I met with today said it was a common ankle fracture.
I have surgery on Thursday January 19 to get some delightful plates and screws inserted into my ankle area and rebuild me. It will be a 6 month recovery. He said a couple weeks post-op if I really wanted I could travel but I likely won’t be feeling it for a while!
I had a dental appointment yesterday and my dentist did share that he had the same type of injury a couple of years ago, recovered fine and is now running again and snowboarding. He is near my age and really active. Right now all I am thinking about it how much I will miss my morning walks with Mike the Miniature Schnauzer while listening to audiobooks. Also a couple fun trips 2023 got cancelled – we were headed next week to Atlanta, GA for a conference John needed to attend; we had a trip to Cabo planned; we had a New Mexico roadtrip with my sister planned; we had a family trip to Barcelona Spain (with a side trip to Lisbon Portugal to meet up with some friends of John’s there); and a little weekend trip to Las Vegas. Maybe the Universe was telling us to slow down as we’ve gone a little crazy traveling post pandemic!
Well enough on my new found reality. let’s talk about all the travel I did in 2022, good memories (queue Barbara Streisand singing…)
2022 A Year of Travel
John and I went a little crazy with travel in 2022 in a post pandemic explosion of saying yes to most travel opportunities presented our way. For domestic (U.S.) travel we had the SW Airlines Companion Pass (that we had earned in 2021 for 2022) and so I could fly for basically free ($11 fee each way) whenever John flew.
We had a busy combination of personal and business travel within the U.S. and a trip to Ireland. Here’s where we went:
Chicago, Illinois (three visits)
If you count our short trip to Chicago at the beginning of January 2023, we visited Chicago three times in less than 3 months. Our trips included two business trips for John and one trip to meet up with my brother and his family in Chicago as my brother was there for a business trip. Here’s a blog post link about one of the 2022 trips to Chicago – Chicago in Black and White
In 2022 we went to Austin, Texas twice on business trips for John. It is a very cool city and I had an amazing time at the downtown Austin library (a magical place!). Here is one blog posts related to some of our Austin, Texas travel in 2022 –Peaceful Oasis at the Austin Central Library .
Las Vegas, Nevada (three visits)
We visited Las Vegas three times in 2022 for fun – twice on our own and once with friends. On one of the trips I took a bunch of black and white photos on “old downtown Las Vegas” – the Fremont Street Experience area, and shared them in this post –Downtown L as Vegas in Black and White
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Atlanta, Georgia (one visit)
I probably should have written a post about our visit to Atlanta, Georgia in November 2022 as I took a lot of cool photos, but I’ll share some of them here. The airport, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, is really cool and we loved the art to include a simulated rainforest at night experience in one of the main moving walkway areas; and a wonderful tribute to the late U.S. Representative John Lewis:
We spent time wandering about the Krog Districta really cool shopping and arts district. They had another tribute to John Lewis as graffiti on a building (they had lots of awesome graffiti art in the district); as well as a display of some amazing recycled metal parts (including automotive parts) sculptures:
Portland, Oregon (one visit)
I blogged about my awesome trip to rainy Portland Oregon in December 2022 in the post A Little Reunion in Portland Oregon. Although it was cold and rainy it was fun to visit Powell’s Book and other cool places in the Pearl District of downtown Portland.
We spent a day in NYC before heading overnight to Dublin, Ireland. Perhaps I am cheating but I will go ahead and call this a visit to NYC!
Omaha, Nebraska (one visit)
We had a brief trip to Omaha, Nebraska for John’s business meeting in October. I was bummed to learn after the trip that we were not to far from one of my knitting goddess blogging buddies @mildly granola who lives in Iowa, and we could have met up for an adult beverage!
I could have done a post on the Omaha visit but I was distracted from travel and then too much time passed and I forgot about blogging about the trip. So here are some photos of the fun we had one afternoon in Omaha’s Old Market:
Fun shops we visited in Old Market included the Christmas store Tannenbaum(which had the most unusual and perhaps disturbing Nativity Scene I’ve ever seen); Raygun(which had a hysterical sign on the front window); the Imaginarium ;as well as the Monster Grub Pub (a horror themed pub!):
St. Petersburg, Florida (via Tampa, FL) (one visit)
We had to travel to Wilmington, NC for a work conference John needed to attend. We flew into Raleigh, NC, rented a car and drove to Wilmington. Here is a blog post about time in Raleigh –Trip to North Carolina: Fun Evening in Downtown Raleigh.
So currently all my 2023 travel plans have been cancelled and I am adjusting to my new limited mobility reality. But my ankle will heal and I’ll be back traveling later in 2023.
Before we boarded the plane to Richmond, Virginia, we suddenly had so many logistics to handle like cancelling our Amtrak train tickets from Washington, DC to Richmond for the next day and cancelling the hotel for that evening in D.C. We also needed to rearrange our hotel accommodations in Richmond at the Linden Row Inn to start a day earlier. It was a made rush on the phone and online before getting on the plane but we were so happy to be going directly to Richmond, VA to start our Christmas holiday with my family!
While in Richmond we had fun exploring downtown Richmond and Carytown with my sister and then a wonderful Christmas Eve and Christmas Day with my brother, his wife, their son and of course my sister and her husband and son.
Christmas Eve we stopped by my sister’s favorite distillery Trial & Errorand did some whiskey and infused vodka tasting which was fun!
My brother’s son, my 10 year old nephew, brought some of his stuffed animals for me to repair (I had my trusty traveling needle and thread) while we were together, so I did a couple “surgical” procedures on his “well loved” stuffed friends while we visited:
On the 26th of December it was time for John and I to say goodbye and take Amtrak train to Washington D.C. to catch our flight back to Denver on Wednesday the 27th. We were staying overnight in D.C. and in the morning going to sightsee a tiny bit before heading to the airport.
We were feeling so grateful that Christmas with my family was a success as we sat on the train headed to D.C. when a couple things suddenly happened…
First the train ahead of us hit a parked car on the track (luckily no one was inside the car) and our train was stopped for a hour or so while the crash was resolved.
Then we got a message from Southwest Airlines that our flight to Denver from D.C. on December 27th was CANCELED. Just cancelled with no rescheduling. We had a message to see an airline agent to re-book.
So once we got into D.C. instead of heading to our hotel, we took an Uber to Ronald Reagan Airport to see what was up. Boy were we in for a surprise! We didn’t have all the details at the time but SW Airlines had completed melted down. They cancelled all flights across the country for Wednesday to Friday, halting their operations until they regrouped. It made the national news and the U.S. Department of Transportation said they were going to put the airlines under investigation as they stranded thousands of people after the Christmas holiday.
We got to the SW Airlines ticket counter and we were told there were no flights until Saturday December 31st! So we were stranded in D.C. from Tuesday Dec 27 until Saturday Dec 31!!!!!
Here are links to a couple of the news stories that summarizes what happened with SW Airlines:
And one of the many videos of news stories of the travel nightmare that hit the U.S. courtesy of SW Airlines:
There are numerous sad stories of families missing major holiday vacations and missing luggage. The airport was filled with people who had been basically camping at the airport and long lines of people trying to find their luggage or speak with a gate agent.
John and I were upset as we were missing our dog Mike and looking forward to returning home to him, we had parked our car the airport and had to incur 4 – 5 more days of daily charges; and we now had to incur the cost of a hotel for 4 additional nights as well as food. Plus we had packed light and our clothes really needed a laundering (and we had run out of clean underwear!). Also we had planned to be home way before New Years Eve and enjoy a couple days at home, and New Years Eve, etc. before the New Year began.
So now you might be wondering – why didn’t we just book a flight home on another airline as the other airlines had not melted down and were operating as normal? Well we checked every airline that could get us to Denver and flights up through Friday ranged for a one way flight from $2100 to $4300 per person (only last minute first class flights were available on other airlines). It was much less expensive to stay in the D.C. area until Saturday and fly home at no additional cost via SW Airlines.
But we decided to make the best of it and see it as a forced vacation in Washington D.C.
We decided to only stay one night at the hotel we booked near the White House area in D.C. and move to stay in Alexandria, Virginia, which is sort of suburb of D.C. for the rest of our stay. It is a safer area, has the wonderful Old Town Alexandria to wander about, is right on the Metro line (DC area transit system), and is only two stops from Ronald Reagan Airport which we would eventually fly home from.
Wednesday the 28th we wandered around Old Town Alexandria and had a fun time despite our situation. I’ll do a separate blog post on that as this wandering involved an absolutely awesome yarn shop as well as fabric shop!
Thursday we decided to spend 1 – 2 days in Washington D.C. playing tourist. We both wanted to see the Library of Congress and although I’ve been to D.C. many times since I grew up on the East Coast, I’d never been to the Supreme Court and wanted to see that. We figured we could also fit in some Smithsonian Museums too!
Here we are at the King Street Metro Station in Alexandria about to head back into Washington D.C. for our first day of sightseeing at our nation’s capital on Thursday December 29th:
In addition to that separate post on our adventures in Old Town Alexandria, I’ll have a separate post on our adventures in D.C.
But we only spent one day in D.C….why? Because another miracle happened, one I like to call THE NEW YEARS MIRACLE.
The afternoon of Thursday December 29th, we had just finished visiting the Supreme Court building and went to wait on line at the Library of Congress for a tour. While on line we discovered we could only get into the building with “timed entry tickets” which we had to buy online, and they were sold out for the day. John got online and got us timed entry tickets for Friday so we could try again during are planned day 2 of touring D.C.
As we were exiting the line, a large family group was confused as to where they needed to wait on line to get into the Library of Congress. We stopped to help them and pointed them to the line. They asked us how was the Library of Congress and we explained we couldn’t get in because the timed entry tickets were sold out. Well they said they had TWO EXTRA tickets and we could join their group and get in!
We were so happy as this left more time the next day to see other things in D.C. and we were really looking forward to touring the Library of Congress, one of the few venues in D.C. neither of us had seen.
Little did we know this was part one of a two part miracle, as while we were touring the Library of Congress we got a text that SW Airlines was restoring regular operations.
We looked at their flights online and saw there were flights on FRIDAY from D.C. to Denver AND one flight that evening back to Denver!
We quickly ended our day in D.C. and took the Metro to Ronald Reagan Airport to see a SW Airlines ticket agent! We convinced them to put us on the Thursday evening flight and not to charge us the $700+ dollars the flight cost.
The we rushed back to our hotel, which was 2 Metro stops away, packed as fast as we could and headed back to the airport! Amazingly our hotel, Embassy Suites heard our saga and kindly refunded us our hotel room charges for Thursday and Friday night (another part of the miracle, like perhaps a part three)!
And late Thursday December 29th we returned to Denver! Two days earlier than Saturday (huge smile)!
In addition to being able to return home earlier than planned, we were so grateful to the people we randomly met who shared their tickets to the Library of Congress with us as (little did we know at the time) we would not be in town the next day to see it!
So that’s the shorter version of our holiday travel saga, I’d put you to sleep if I provided all the details, ha!
I’ll close out with a couple of humorous airplane travel memes courtesy of demilked.com:
Happy New Years to all of you, I hope 2023 is spectacular for you!
I spent Christmas on the “East Coast” of the U.S. with my family this year, and I have a bit of a travel saga to share. John and I met up with my sister and her family; and my brother and his family in Richmond, Virginia to celebrate the holiday. But this trip involved a “bomb cyclone” in Denver, below zero degree Fahrenheit temperatures, numerous flight delays and a major airline meltdown.
It was the first time in many years spending the actual Christmas holiday with my siblings and their families. When I lived in Oregon (West Coast of the U.S.) we avoided cross country travel during the holidays as it is always a “hot mess” at the airports. We always visited before or after the holidays. After I moved to Denver in 2019, the plan was in 2020 spend Christmas on the East Coast with my family as now I lived 1/2 way across the country.
But we all know what happened in 2020 (hint it involves the word “pandemic”).
Then we were going to make it happen in 2021 and there was a national situation involving the word “variant”, and we decided to wait another year.
So this was the year it was going to happen and “come h*ll or high water” John and I were going to make it to the East Coast for Christmas with my family! Our plan, which we thought was fool-proof (but only fools think that, ha!) was to first fly into Washington, D.C. where there are always numerous flights and options, stay the night there, and then take Amtrak train from Washington D.C. to Richmond, Virginia (which has very few flights from Denver).
Before I tell your the story of our travel saga, let me first share some photos with the darling resident kitty Annabelle (who liked to take “selfies”) at the Linden Row Innin Richmond, Virginia where John and I stayed during our family holiday:
More on our visit to Richmond and eventually Alexandria Virginia and Washington, D.C. in a future post. But when our travel adventure began at the Denver International Airport (DIA) we thought we were not going to make it.
A couple days before Christmas a bomb cyclone was due to hit Denver, Colorado. We found out our original flight on SW Airlines was cancelled and they would not allow us to schedule a new flight over the phone or on line – we were informed we had to do it in person at the airport! John went to the airport and was able to get us another flight, very early in the morning (5:05 am).
The only problem was the night before our early morning flight the bomb cyclone it and Denver got a MAJOR snowstorm and temperatures dropped to 15 degrees BELOW ZERO Fahrenheit (-15 F)…and that is -26 degrees Celsius for my blogging buddies outside the U.S. John’s son was originally going to drive us to the airport but the weather was treacherous and his car was not up to it. We looked at getting an Uber or a Lyft ride share ride but they were limited with the terrible weather.
So we decided to drive it ourselves and leave our car at the airport. It was a long “sphincter-puckering” drive on snow and ice to the airport. Luckily John has lived in Colorado most his life and is an experienced snowstorm driver.
The roads were not the scariest part of the drive, the other drivers that were either whizzing by or driving 10 miles an hour on the highway were the scariest part!
But we got to the airport 2 hours early for our flight! We were overjoyed (and we able to un-pucker our sphincters!)
But then the plane could not board passengers as the airline could not get it de-iced. They could only keep crews out for 10 minutes at a time in the sub-zero temperatures for safety reasons (like frostbite!). Plus they have 17 airline crew members that needed to “deadhead” and since they had to get the flight crew members to their next location (pilots and flight attendants), they had to BUMP 17 passengers from the flight.
The gate attendant of course asked for 17 volunteers to give up their seats (with an offer of $1200 in flight credits) but warned us that if there were not enough volunteers, they were going to have to give some of us bad news.
3 hours later we lined up to board the plane (John and I were lucky enough not to be selected to be bumped from the flight) and discovered that those passengers who were bumped we not able to get their luggage that had been loaded on the plane back! They had to wait to hopefully get another flight during a horrendous storm while their luggage flew on to the destination.
Lots of stressed out holiday travelers and tension and then the SW Airlines airport gate attendant had a meltdown and tearfully announced over the loudspeaker that if customers continued to be hostile towards her she was not going to help them. I felt bad for the passengers but I also felt bad for the overworked and stressed out SW Airlines staff who were trying their best to handle a stress holiday travel weather disaster that was not their fault.
We were so happy when we boarded the plane to the first leg of our journey – Chicago, Illinois (Chicago Midway Airport).
Little did we know that when we landed, our next flight (to Washington, D.C.) would be canceled...
So we were stuck at the Chicago Midway Airport with no way to get to Washington, D.C. that day as the weather was growing worse (Chicago of course was being hit with a blizzard). We even heard that the airport was being closed! This turned out to only be a rumor by one of the airport food service workers who talked to who’d been told the airport eateries were all closing/they were sending staff home.
John and I were able to find a flight late that evening to Washington, D.C. but there was a strong potential it would be canceled, and then the CHRISTMAS MIRACLE HAPPENED.
John and I were in a daze wandering the halls of the airport wondering how to fill the time, when John noticed all flights were cancelled on the large screen listing of arriving and departing flight board he passed by…except for a 5:00 pm flight to RICHMOND, VIRGINIA!
Richmond, VA was where we wanted to eventually end up! We walked as fast as we could to a SW Airline gate counter, pleaded our case and got two of the last available seats on the flights! After my very happy sister (who I’d kept apprised of our evolving travel saga) picked us up from the airport we were able to check into the Linden Row Inn and meet our new friend for several days, Annabelle the resident kitty.
More on the next post about our travel saga, the SW Airlines meltdown and then the New Years Miracle, but here is a photo of the wonderful couple dressed as Santa Claus and Mrs. Claus (or was it really them?!?!) that were wandering the halls of Chicago Midway Airport trying to bring cheer to travelers during a stressful holiday travel time:
I thanked them for the joyous distraction they provided!
December is a difficult month for me as it is the anniversary of my husband’s passing 4 years ago in 2018. But I am getting better at finding ways to distract myself. Sort of spur of the moment, I decided to meet up with my friend Laurie in Portland, Oregon for a day when my partner John was headed to a 1 day business trip to Oklahoma City.
Laurie was with me on the 2nd worse day of my life, when I had to go to the funeral home and make arrangements the day after my husband died. She works with horses trained for therapy for children with special needs, and before she drove me to the funeral home, we stopped at a ranch with some of the therapy horses she works with. She had me spend a little time with the horses and I had an amazing and kind of spiritual experience with one of the therapy horses. It was a very compassionate thing for her to do before I had to face the unfaceable.
Laurie lives in Central Oregon where I used to live before I moved to Denver to try and find a new life in 2019. She would love for me to come visit her in Central Oregon but although it’s been 4 years I still cannot bring myself to visit Central Oregon. I had quite the beautiful life there and it was gone in an instant.
Portland is about a 3 hour drive for Laurie, she used to live there and she knows it well. So a compromise was to meet up in a different part of Oregon. I could handle Portland, even if my late husband and I used to go there all the time and I had many fond memories of many trips Portland (here is a random memory from a blog post from May 2017 – The Beauty of Moss and Fungi).
So we had a wonderful 24+ hours in Portland together – I flew into Portland on Thursday late morning and Laurie took me back to the airport on Friday late morning. We stayed on Thursday night at the oldest and historic hotel in Portland – The Benson Hotel.
The Benson Hotel was beautiful decorated for the holiday season:
The architecture inside the hotel built in the early 20th century was amazing and we spent some time checking out the ornate ceilings:
Laurie and I also did the “historic stairwell tour” at the Benson where each level’s stair landing of 12 flights of stairs had a collection of historic photos and photos of famous people who stayed at the Benson, including many 20th and 21st century U.S. Presidents, here’s a section of one of the stairway gallery walls:
The Benson Hotel is in downtown Portland in an area known as the Pearl District. We spent Thursday wandering around the Pearl District and spent a couple hours at my favorite bookstore – Powell’s Books.
According to a web search, Powell’s is the largest used and new bookstore in the world, occupying an entire city block and housing approximately one million books.
If you love books and independent bookstores I highly recommend a visit to Powell’s. You would easily spend an entire day there wandering the shelves.
And wander I did…and of course I found the craft book section…
It was fun to find one of the books that one of my art quilts are in:
We also had a wonderful lunch at the Portland location of Deschutes Brewery my beloved brewery that started in Bend, Oregon where I used to live. It was amazing to have one of their wonderful beers on tap again as well as one of their delicious burgers:
I didn’t stab my burger, ha, it came with a steak knife in the middle to cut it in half!
In addition to the bookstore and a delicious time at the brewery, we visited lots of fun shops in the Pearl. Then in the evening we went and visited the Columbia employee outlet store (Laurie has connections) and I got these wonderful slippers at quite the discount:
Then we went back to our hotel and watched movies and ate snacks! It was the perfect day with a friend!
The next day it was back to the airport for me but I had a nice time at PDX before my flight, stopping at the Tillamook Market in the airport for some yummy Tillamook cheese macaroni and cheese!
PDX has some amazing art on display and I was captivated by an exhibit “Open Entanglement” by the artist Jo Hamilton of her crochet art:
The trip was a wonderful distraction and I so appreciate that my friend Laurie could meet up with me in Portland!
Postscript
To give you a little taste of the Powell’s Books experience, here is a clip I found on YouTube from CBS Saturday Morning:
November and December are always challenging months for me and John and I work to make these months as fun as possible, adding distractions here and there. In November we added a very awesome distractions – a couple days staying at my favorite hotel in Colorado – The Broadmoor. (here are a couple previous posts on our visits to The Broadmoor – Weekend at The Broadmoor, Breakfast Buffet and Confused Deer)
The image above is how it looks in summer and it from the resort’s website. Here is how it looked in November when we visited:
It was still beautiful, just icy on the lake (and pretty chilly outside especially in the evening).
One of my first stops when I arrive at the hotel (after settling in our room) is a visit to the hotel’s library to borrow a book to read during my stay:
I like to spend at least an hour (or more) in that library each visit, sitting near the fireplace and browsing through books. This time I selected a book I also had in my library at home so I could start the book while at The Broadmoor and then pick up my book when I got home.
Armed with a book, I was able to drag John to one of the many cozy nesting/seating areas in the resort next to a fireplace and settle in. First with a gelato and the book and then getting starting on knitting a new hat (this time a gray hat):
It’s very difficult to leave these cozy nesting areas but eventually John and I put on our bathing suits and then our robes provided by the hotel and headed to the hot tub:
John has been very busy at work so it was nice for him to just sit around and relax in the hot tub. Plus we had it all to ourselves on a beautiful day. It overlooks the golf course and if you ignore the scattered snow on the ground it was quite idyllic. (I had to spare you me in a bathing suit so you only get my toes, ha!)
My second favorite part of going to the hot tub at The Broadmoor (sitting in the hot tub is my favorite), is the refreshing walk back to your hotel room in your bathrobe! It is so fun to walk around the resort grounds in your bathrobe! It was chilly but a dry and refreshing chilling. I like to pretend I am at a spa/resort in the Swiss Alps!
I know I read somewhere that it is good for your metabolism to be in radically different temperatures every so often.
The Broadmoor has discounted rates for “off season” (which I think is October to March) and you can golf for free on a modified version (10 holes) of their world class golf course. We tried but it had recently snowed and the golf course was closed. Oh well, we’ll try again next time we visit in the off season. The regular green fees for their golf course is outrageous, so we like free better – ha!
It was a lovely getaway and I am looking forward to my next visit. They are “the Longest-Running Forbes Five-Star, AAA Five-Diamond Resort in the World” and their impeccable service definitely supports this status. The staff is so wonderful and everything is so gorgeous and well appointed there!
While we were there, they had started decorating the hotel for the holidays and I close this post with photos of their decorations in progress:
Knitter blogging friends: Prepare to be underwhelmed.
Non-knitter blogging friends: Oh wow look I knitted another hat 😉
I follow several amazing knitters who are busy making complex colorwork knitted hats, socks in their sleep, shawls with fancy lace designs, and tiny Aran cabled sweaters. And I have made ANOTHER simple knitted hat with the same pattern I’ve been using since the early 2010s.
But it’s another hat (option to wear) and its DONE!
Before my trip to Ireland I wanted to have a knitted hat to work on during the trip (a very portable travel project). Here is the hat early in its creation during my train ride from Dublin to Galway:
Since returning from Ireland in October, on subsequent my recent travels (to Omaha, Nebraska, to Fayetteville, Arkansas, and to Atlanta, Georgia) I’ve been working on the hat, especially when on planes:
And last night I finally finished that hat!
Here I am wearing my new hat (which is the same as all my other hats, ha!):
Oh and here is a follow up from my post earlier in the week Cute and Curious Kitty Quilt Trunk Show – I got the quilt that my friend J gave me while I will in Fayetteville, AR, on the wall yesterday.
I am so honored to have one of her mother’s quilts hanging in my home, I put it in the downstairs guest room:
It goes with the beach-y/nautical theme in the rest of the guest room as when you think of Colorado (hint: landlocked state), you definitely think of the ocean – ha!
Her mother hand quilted the quilt and I am amazed at all the work that went into that quilt!
The tierneycreates Beastie has already, in those posts, introduced you to J’s cat Oscar, quite the adorable kitty. Oscar wanted to be part of everything we were doing with unpacking and organizing J’s studio. He also wanted to be part of when J was trying to do a “quilt trunk show” for MJ and I.
J is a quilter but also does many other creative crafts. She is also a former architect and professional photographer. She is infused with creativity and I am fairly sure she got some of her creativity from her Mom who was a prolific quilter.
Here is J’s favorite quilt of her Mom’s which hangs in one of her guest bedrooms:
One evening J treated us to a trunk show of a collection of her late mother’s quilts and Oscar was all about being part of the show!
The quilts were wonderful but I was definitely distracted by Oscar’s mischievous cuteness!
J gifted me one of her mother’s quilts and I plan to hang it in my basement guest bedroom which has a nautical/beach theme (don’t laugh at me – I know I live in Colorado a “land locked” state, ha!):
tierneycreates Beastie back again continuing my series of posts of our trip to Fayetteville, AR to help our friend J unpack and organize her studio and hang out with our friend MJ who joined us.
If you are just joining us here are links to the previous 2 posts:
In the previous post I mentioned my run in with the cat Oscar while I was taking my dog Mikelet for a walk in the backyard. Tierney moved Mikelet and I to a safe location, the porch swing, just in case Oscar decided we were cat toys.
Mikelet got pretty cozy on the porch swing and was ready for belly rubs:
Mikelet was a very good dog during our trip and mainly laid about and slept while we worked on the studio unpacking and organization project.
Here is what J’s studio looked like by day 3 of the project. Tierney had made it her mission to get J’s sewing machine area cleaned up so J could sit and it and sew!
I even found a clean spot on the cutting/worktable in the center of the room:
On Day, Tierney, Mikelet and I had to head back to Denver but our friend MJ sent us this photo of a completely cleaned off worktable!!!
Amazing!
By the time we left every box was unpacked and nearly all the boxes were broken down and moved to the garage for future recycling.
Early in our project, Tierney came across this plaque in one of J’s boxes and hung it on the wall of the studio for motivation:
I guess it worked! But what really worked was the untiring and persistent efforts of J, MJ, and Tierney (and me cheering them on) “kicking #ss and taking names” on those boxes! They were quite the RELENTLESS team!
They didn’t just unpack boxes and organize the studio, they also did some fun stuff, but Tierney forgot to bring me along so I’ll let her tell you about it in another post.
J’s new home was really beautiful. So I will just close my series of posts with some photos of her lovely home and her amazing collection of art from J’s world travels (for example the ancient Egyptian themed framed quilt is from her trip to Egypt) . Also Tierney made J a little hostess gift, one of her drawstring bags, and that is in the photos below:
Here I am in my observation tissue box taking notes for this blog post:
So after a day of unpacking boxes, J’s studio looked like this:
It might not look like it, but we were making great progress! Especially when we got the closet organized and set up for J’s WIPs (works in progress) to be stored out of the way (plus she could see all the projects she has to get done by the end of the year – ha, ha!):
Unpacking all those boxes we made a bit of mess between the boxes themselves (which we broke down) and the wrapping papers.
But we had a curious kitty Oscar who was fascinated with all our unpacking activities, especially the wrapping paper:
Oscar even tried to help us break down some of the boxes:
I’ll admit Oscar was cute, but I am not too sure of my comfort level around Oscar. When I tried to take my dog Mikelet for a walk around J’s backyard, Oscar came a little to close for comfort:
Tierney had to intervene and move Mikelet and me to another area as we weren’t sure if Oscar would think I was a cat toy!
After a long day of unpacking, J who is an accomplished pianist, treated us to an impromptu concert on her beautifulEstonia piano (which Tierney thought also looked beautiful in B&W):
Wow all those symbols on the page look complicated, not sure how J understood them all!
Well more progress to come in Part III of this series of posts…
Hello this is tierneycreates Beastie, filling in for Tierney who has just returned from a couple days in Fayetteville, Arkansas. Mikelet my miniature Miniature Schnauzer and I went with her, and we consulted/helped with the unpacking and organization of her friend J’s studio in Fayetteville.
(if you are new to this blog, my story is on this post – I’m A Monster!!! and you can see all my posts at this link: Beastie Adventures).
Tierney and J’s Central Oregon based friend MJ also met up with us there (and Tierney and I got to fly on the same flight from Denver to Bentonville, AR as MJ had a connecting flight from Central Oregon).
J had moved from Central Oregon (where Tierney and I used to live) to Fayetteville, AR and then had a major life changes and did not have the time and chance to unpack and organize her quilting/art studio. She invited MJ and Tierney to visit her and MJ came up with the idea that we could also work on getting J’s studio to the point where she could do her art again.
Here I am on my way to Arkansas – Mikelet and I traveled in Tierney’s backpack:
After visiting with J and MJ a while when we first arrived in Arkansas, we headed upstairs to J’s studio to see what we were getting ourselves into…
Oh dear.
Looking around, I realized we’ve got a bit of work to do.
Well I went ahead and set up a temporary desk in the tissue box so I could blog about our project!
Next guest post I will show our progress, but for now I will close out this post with a funny sign J had in her studio:
Hello this is tierneycreates Beastie finishing up my Beastie Travelogue of our visit to Ireland.
Human Tierney at some point will share her Ireland adventures from her human perspective (boring) but I am not sure when that will be. She is making stuff for her Etsy shop for the upcoming holiday season and has had more intermittent travel with Human John on business trips. Perhaps she’ll blog about all those things someday…we’ll see…
Here I am getting ready to write the Part II of my previous post – Guest Blog Post: The Beasties’ Ireland Travelogue (Part I). However, my dog Mikelet continues to be a bit naughty, seeking attention (he’s still mad he did not get to go to Ireland we John Beastie and myself) and is standing on Tierney’s favorite miniature tape measure (which is the perfect size for him), distracting me from writing!
Okay so back to my travelogue…
So after a couple days in Galway we took our rented car onto to Doolin, Ireland. On the way to Doolin we stopped at Dunguaire Castle, the Cliffs of Moher and Lisdoonvarna.
Here are a couple photos of John Beastie and I outside of Dunguaire Castle before we went inside:
Tierney didn’t let us take too many photos as it was very windy and she was afraid we would blow into the ravine!
After the castle we headed to the Cliffs of Moher. Tierney will likely share a post about the allegedly amazing Cliffs of Moher. I say “allegedly” because as she left John Beastie and I in the car! All I know is she was really hyped up when she got back in the car after visiting those cliffs!
She did let us out of the car in Lisdoonvarna, a small town which is home to the annual Matchmaking Festivalthat happens every September. Here is a little from the website linked on the name
Europe’s biggest singles festival takes place every September in the small village of Lisdoonvarna on Ireland’s Wild Atlantic Way.The month long Irish festival attracts people from all over the world looking for Love, fun and a bit of ‘craic’. The festival is over 160 years old and couldn’t be more different from online dating services. There’s music and dancing in every bar from 11am in the morning to the wee hours of the night and those looking for love can meet Ireland’s only traditional matchmaker Willie Daly in his ‘office in the Matchmaker Bar. Legend has it if you touch his ‘lucky book’ with both hand’s, you’ll be married in six months!
– matchmakerireland.com
In the Lisdoonvarna town center there were statues commemorating their famous Matchmaking Festival. I just had to climb up and get my photo taken:
My partner John Beastie reminded me that the statue was about “matchmaking” and since he was my “match” we should probably be photographed together:
I probably should have stood up for the photo but I’d gotten pretty comfortable in the arms of the statue!
Finally we arrived in Doolin where we were to spend a couple more days before heading back to Galway, dropping off the rental car, and taking the train back to Dublin where we would fly back to the U.S.
Doolin is known as the home of traditional Irish music and it is filled with Irish pubs with live performances each evening of traditional/folk Irish music.
Matty Beastie (who I introduced in the post Guest Blog Post: Beasties Return to Ireland!), like Human Matt, loves traditional Irish music, so human Matt brought Matty Beastie to the pubs in Doolin:
Matty Beastie traveled in Matt’s jacket pocket (I think Tierney and John should take a lesson from Matt and start carrying John Beastie and myself in their pockets).
Sorry there aren’t anymore photos of John Beastie and I to share from our trip to Ireland. Tierney was busy photographing less important things I guess…sigh.
I’ll close this post (and my travelogue) with a little video of Matty Beastie enjoying traditional Irish music while we were in Doolin:
Hello there – this is tierneycreates Beastie returning to guest blog post and continue the story of John Beastie and my trip to Ireland which I began in my previous post – Guest Blog Post: Beasties Return to Ireland! . (If you are new to this blog, my story is on this post – I’m A Monster!!! and you can see all my posts at this link: Beastie Adventures).
My dog Mikelet has calmed down now that I’ve been back a couple weeks. If you remember from the previous post, he was standing on my desk trying to get attention while I was writing you a blog post. Now he only peers over my desk trying to get attention…
I am ignoring him for now (but will take him out of a walk in the chilly morning – Autumn temperatures have hit in my part of Colorado – when I am done writing) so I can share a photo travelogue of some of the highlights of our trip to Ireland.
I’m only going to focus on what John Beastie and I did, as human Tierney can write her own posts about her adventures!
DUBLIN, IRELAND
Before we got to Dublin, Ireland the four of us (humans and Beasties) flew from Denver, CO to LaGuardia airport in New York. While at the LaGuardia airport, John Beastie and I couldn’t help ourselves and had to go and hang out where it said “Do Not Climb“. I think they meant “Humans Do Not Climb”, I don’t think this sign applied to Monsters!
John Beastie and I were so excited to go on our first holiday together we had difficulty minding the humans! (and Tierney grew up in NY and was getting a little too sentimental about the “I love NY” sign so we had to do something to calm her down…)
Our first day in Dublin, Ireland was spent with John and Tierney the humans as their friends Matt and Kathy were not arriving until the evening as they were flying in from Scotland where they had spent a couple weeks.
So Tierney and John shared with us their first Fish & Chips in Ireland:
No worries we were careful not get to get any grease on our clothes (especially since they were the only outfits we had for 1 week in Ireland!)
After the Fish & Chips we had a wander about and visited places such as the Christ Church Cathedral and St. Audoen’s Churchand the beautiful adjoining park. Here are a couple photos from those wanderings:
We also wandering about the streets of downtown Dublin taking random photos:
When we met up later that evening with Matt and Kathy, we got to enjoy our first fresh Guinness pint in Ireland! (Okay it was Tierney’s pint, she had a lot of hesitancy of letting Beasties near alcohol…):
The next day we first visited St. Patrick’s Cathedraland John Beastie and I entertained ourselves by finding places we probably shouldn’t pose for photos at:
Then went to the Guinness Storehouse (brewery tour)with Matt and Kathy and John Beastie and I took some photos there (this one is my favorite):
After the Guinness tour, we met up with Helen of CrawCraft Beasties who made me and I’ve already shared the stories from that reunion (for me) and first time meeting (for Kathy and Tierney) in my post Guest Blog Post: Beasties Return to Ireland!.
The next day we took the train from Dublin to Galway to spend a couple days in Galway.
There was so much to see looking out the train window, every if it was overcast and raining.
Here we are in the lobby of the lovely hotel we stayed in Galway – the Galway Bay Hotel – which was right across from the beach/water:
It was so windy in Galway along the water, John Beastie and I tried to take some photos but my hair was blowing everywhere:
Human Tierney had the same problem (but she pulled it out of her face for her selfie):
Of course John Beastie and human John did not have this problem, as they have not hair (on their heads)!
We finally had to settle for a photo away from the wind among some flowers in the garden at the hotel:
I’ll continue our Beastie Travelogue in my next guest post, but I’ll close this post with a really stupid photo Tierney took of us while she was waiting for human John to check out from the hotel (so they could head via the car the four humans had rented to the next part of the Ireland adventure!)
She had us stand in a tray on the coffee table of the hotel lobby (my eyes are rolling):
This is tierneycreates Beastie guest blog posting (if you are new to this blog, my story is on this post – I’m A Monster!!! and you can see all my posts at this link: Beastie Adventures).
You haven’t heard from Tierney or myself in a while as we’ve been in Ireland!
Tierney, John, John Beastie and I recently returned from Ireland and I got to see my maker Helen of Crawcraft Beasties & Knit with Helen; and Tierney got to meet Helen in person for the first time!
We had lots of adventures in Ireland visiting cities such as Dublin, Galway, Doolin, etc. I told Tierney I would get the blog posts on our trip started as she is still rather jet lagged.
Here I am trying to write this blog post (sitting at my desk that John built me, see post Guest Blogger: A Desk for Me!) while my dog Mikelet is trying to get attention from me as he missed me on my long trip (we did not take him for fear he might get misplaced during the trip).
We visited Ireland with Tierney and John’s friends Kathy and Matt who visit Ireland a couple times a year. Kathy’s family is from Ireland and she still has family there and Matt who is part Irish, is well versed in Irish culture and history.
Kathy also knows Helen as she has been working with Helen to get her husband Matt his very own Beastie!
John Beastie, Tierney, Kathy and I met up with Helen and visited a pub for a Beastie reunion with Helen. Here are a couple photos of our initial reunion, I could not decide which one I like best of my awesome maker so I included them all!
She was pretty pleased to see us again as she sends her Beasties out all over the world and rarely gets to see them in person again once they’ve traveled across the ocean!
After the pub, we all headed to Helen’s studio for a little tour of her studio, to meet the new Beastie for Kathy’s husband Matt, and to take a little knitting class (Helen is a professional knitting instructor) to learn how to knit cables (which scare Kathy and Tierney).
This is Helen’s new studio and although John Beastie and I were not “born” here but it was awesome to be in a place where our fellow Beasties are now “born”:
Here is a little photo tour of Helen’s bright and cheery studio:
After a little studio tour, it was time to meet “Matty Beastie” (and his dog Riley) the new Beastie Helen made for Kathy’s husband:
Matty Beastie comes with his dog Riley the Chocolate Lab (to see the Canine Riley check out the post Loved (or mugged) by a Lab, Tierney is Riley’s “Dog Godmother”), a pint of Guinness, as well as his PJs (if he gets tired of wearing his jeans) and his famous slippers.
Helen brilliantly added a magnet to Matty Beastie’s chest so he could hold up his pint of Guinness:
John Beastie and I took a group photo with our new friend Matty Beastie who we would now be touring Ireland with:
As you can see I was not sure where to look during the photo as Helen was also taking a photo of our group at the same time.
We got distracted during the photoshoot and Riley ended up sampling some of Matty Beastie’s Guinness!
I did take Matty Beastie aside and give him some tips on managing humans and how to get away with things right under their noses…
While John Beastie and I visited with our new friend, the humans Helen, Kathy and Tierney) had a cable knitting class. Below is a photo of the class sample and a photo of Tierney clumsily trying to knit her first cable (she won’t be whipping out a new Aran sweater for me anytime soon…).
I am sure Tierney will do a post about it whenever she finishes that headband.
After the knitting class, we headed back out to a pub (the humans visited a lot of pubs while in Ireland) to meet up with human John and human Matt so he could be surprised with his new Beastie!
John Beastie and I watched with anticipation while Matt excitedly unboxed his new Beastie:
Matty Beastie was a hit with Matt and John Beastie had raise a pint to toast the newest member of our US based Beastie family!
Sláinte!
More stories to come on our Ireland adventures. Tierney asked me to include this photo as proof that she and human John really did come on the trip:
I am also including this photo – Tierney captured in a moment of pure joy hanging out with my maker Helen in person for the first time:
A nasty slip on the ice on January 11, 2023 led to an ankle dislocation and a tibial fracture. I was just taking Mike out for his morning walk and SURPRISE! It looked pretty bad when I first did it but the surgeon I met with today said it was a common ankle fracture.
tierneycreates 