Rooster Rock Trail #3399

Wow.  Rooster Rock was a brutal hike!  We went Sunday morning and yeah, it was brutal.  It is a 4.2 round-trip hike with 2,267 feet in elevation gain.  The first 0.9 miles is a "gradual" rise, but the last 1.2 is up, up, up.  This is a photo-heavy post, the hike was brutal and beautiful.  See?



Annie headed up Roster Rock Trail #3399



"Flat land" - the gradual 0.9 miles

Dry streambed near the trailhead

Trail looking back towards the flat land.

Trail looking up away from the flat land.  Can you see Josh?

Huckleberries were everywhere!!! Not quite ripe though.

Trees, trees, trees.  View looking down the side of the trail.

Trees and ferns - view looking up the side of the trail.

Small viewpoint - can you see the Santiam River wayyyy down there?

The Rooster Rock.

View from top of trail.  Rooster Rock is off the picture to the right.

Annie at the top, trying not to trip over her tongue and tumble down the hill.

Josh and the girls - the tongues!!!

Me and the Annie Bug.

Another view from the top.

Trail headed back down - steeper than it looks!

Another view of the trail headed back down.  So much variety in scenery!

We spotted 3-4 of these old telegraph line insulators along the trail up in the trees.

At the intersection of Trout Creek Trail #3405 on the way down.  Annie laid down every time we stopped.

Back in the flat land.  Like a fairy land!

Small meadow on the side of the trail in the flat land.

  So cool huh?  Yeah, felt like someone kicked me all 4.2 miles the next couple of days, but I am very proud of myself and happy to have made it to the top!

Leafs Me Happy and Giveaway!

Its Friday!!  And I am so glad :o)  Josh is home and my birthday is Monday so I plan on some fun stuff this weekend - Farmer's Market, hiking, dinner out, motorcycle ride...the list goes on.  Hopefully I can fit some sewing in there since I have a Tetris block burning a hole on my sketchpad right now!  But for now, I have a few things to tell you about, a blog hop and a giveaway!

Cherry at Cherry Blossoms and Mdm Samm at Sew We Quilt have announced a Fall themed Blog Hop in October:

I have a ton of fun following the blog hops so I joined this one too.  I think it is a great way to keep myself sewing and the inspiration is awesome!  So, check it out and maybe join yourself? 

All you gotta do on your day is:

1. Make an unfinished block 10.5 or 12.5

2. USE any Fall fabric in any colour as long as it's FALL colours

3. Give your project a name...suggestions:

Fall escape

Turning a new Leaf

SAD summer is Leafed...lol

4. Take nice photos

5. Do a giveaway or don't ( optional)

6. Place your creations on your scheduled day by midnight E.S.T.

7. BE a cheerleader for all those who participate!

If you want to sign up, email Cherry with your "I'm IN!..." in the subject line.  Yay!

The second thing I wanted to tell you about is a giveaway over at Maureen Cracknell Handmade.  I discovered Maureen while I was on Jackie's blog and have been intrigued ever since.  She makes all kinds of projects: quilty and crafty!  One of her sponsors, Canton Village Quilt Works, is offering a 6 fat quarter bundle of the new Art Gallery Fabric's Oval Elements. 

A couple of my favorites: Peacock and Tangerine

Simple to enter and fun too!  Head on over to Maureen's and check it out.

I hope you all have a great weekend - supposed to be great weather here, I hope it is for you too!

9-Patches and Lily & Will II

Look what came today!!!

I ordered this Lily & Will II layer cake from Christa Quilts! after I saw this tutorial at Moda Bake Shop: Snuggly Squares II Baby Quilt by Melissa Corry of Happy Quilting.  With Grant and Katie having another baby - a boy this time, this seemed to be a great project, quick and easy.  I'll get to that when I finish a few other projects up - but it will be soon for sure!!!

One of those other projects is my 9-Patches that I am doing for the 9-Patch Summer Quilt-Along with Kristen over at Meadowbrook.  I finished up another 20 blocks, I am almost half-way to my goal for a lap quilt. 

Love the paisley, wish I hadn't opened my mouth and mentioned it to someone who has their heart set on it now.  Oh well, I can always make another one that I like!

WillaMutt Strut, Hexies and Tetris

This weekend was a hot one!  We got over 100 at the house on Saturday and that was in the shade on the front porch.  Early Saturday I loaded up the girls and we headed up the Riverside Park in Salem for the WillaMutt Strut 5K, a benefit for the Willamette Humane Society.  I usually try to two or three things a year for an animal shelter with the girls.  An annual must is the Santa Paws photos in December and I wanted to run with the girls at least once this summer, so we added this to our 5K.  No photos - I had my hands full.  I did finish with a sprained ankle (my first experience with trail running probably shouldn't have been with the dogs too), but the three of us met another GSP that spends time in Sweet Home training and another dog from Lebanon.  Off we went home, I propped up the leg on the couch and got to work on my second block for our Row Robin.

I finished one last weekend.

This month's theme is hexagons.  I love paper piecing, however...English Paper Piecing is a little more than I like - hand stitching is ucky.  The theme of the quilt is an asian fabric, so I decided to do a little bit of hexies and fill the rest with some foundation paper pieced paper cranes.

I pieced five of the cranes in coordinating colors and sashed them in the asian fabric.

Then to add some length since I was just a bit off, I added some stripes of the coordinating fabric.

I finished the second hexie block Sunday around noon.  This is what the finished row looks like (the white cloth is wrinkled - been under a cat!).

Then the power went out Sunday afternoon.  Great.  Just sat down to cut the pieces for my tetris blocks #2 and #3 (I missed week 2 with Mom and Josh here and just got 3 done).  The Tetris blocks are part of a quilt along over at Happy Quilting.  I got all the squares cut, then the heat chased me out the door and downstairs.  I crashed on the couch with the girls for an hour, then the power came back on.  Here's week #2 Tetris Block:

 

Here's week #3 Tetris Block:

Week #4 starts Tuesday!  I'll have some 9-patches up tomorrow.

Pets On Quilts!!!

Yay!  It is August :o)  It is time for the Pets On Quilts Parade!!!  Snoodles and Padsworth over at Lily Pad Quilting are hosting the 2012 Pets On Quilts and it is awesome!  Who knew so many pets all did the same thing, yet were all different too!? 

So, here's my entry to the parade (and a bunshof other pics that I couldn't resist when I dug them up):

This is how I, er I mean, WE bind quilts. 

Since all three are on the quilt (and two more under Annie) - I can't decide if it's a cat on quilt or dog on quilt category...any suggestions?  There are two dogs and one cat...

And here are the rest:

A wall hanging I made for the breeder we got Oakleigh from.  This is a Silver Linings Originals paper piecing pattern and I modified the spots to match the ones on her beloved Harley.

A close-up.

O looking at the camera - she's still a baby!

O and Annie looking at me, what the heck Mom?  Still a baby....

All three of them on the sofa with me, O is curled up, Molly is wondering why she's lost her spot to a small annoyance and Annie chillin at my feet.

I wouldn't let O on my lap when I was binding this one, I think Molly is under it in my lap.

Molly cat on a kitty quilt her Aunt Nancy made for her.  The only way I can get her to use it on a regular basis (she isn't a normal quilty kitty) is to put it on a chair in a quiet room, so it's in my sewing room.

Annie found a warm spot under a quilt that just came out of the dryer.  I think O may be under it on the other end of the couch. 

That's the girls and Molly!  Our furchildren.  Just thinking of them makes my heart happy (and I start to worry about my cucumbers in the garden disappearing too).  Make sure  you check out everyone else on the parade - they're all awesome and totally fun :o)

Oregon Coast and Glass Blowing

Yay!  I am back :o)  Mom and Josh were both here for almost two weeks so I kept myself busy capitalizing on time with them and away from the blog. 

The big thing we did while Mom

was here was spend a day at the coast.  Due to the shop being closed, Josh being in Denver and Liz being on her cross country trip it was just the two of us this year.  We made an appointment for three items at Jennifer Sears Glass Studio for 1030 so we had some time before we had to be in Lincoln City.  We hit the Cranky Weiner Man's for breakfast burritos, then Starbucks for a cold caffine fix and headed over.  It was pretty overcast, but warm and the roads were clear all the way over.

Since our photographer was off making awesome cross-country wall paper, we don't have any photos of the process (both of us had our hands full), but if you click here you can watch a few slide shows of the process.  Mom was with Andrew (in two of the videos) and made two items:

a star fish paper weight

 

and a small vase/votive. 

I was with Otto and since I already have a star fish (and one of everything else you can make) so I made a votive which is a new offering this summer. 

After we made our pieces we headed over to Mo's for some chowda and shrimp cocktail.

 

 Then, on our way back down the coast to Newport we decided to head down to Agate Beach and check out the Japanese Dock that was knocked loose during last year's tsunami and floated all the way over to our little piece of the coast.  I didn't think it would be so far away from the parking lot!  Don't know why I thought it would be close.  But, it was a little bit of a walk. 

On our way I looked down and spotted a lady bug that had taken the day off work to spend some time at the beach too. 

We didn't walk all the way up to it, it was crawling with folks and we could get the photos we wanted from a distance.  You can see how big the dock is in relation to the people around it.  Off in the distance is Yaquina Head where one of the Oregon Coast Lighthouses is located. 

On our way back I had to take a photo, you can see our parking lot over my Mom's shoulder and we are only half-way back to the car! 

When we got home, we relaxed on the front porch and looked back on a great day!

Tomorrow I will have my Pets On Quilts post up!  I've got'em on them and in them!