DSC00817.JPGIt was 48 degrees at 6 am on Saturday morning when we left Colorado (although it was going to be in the 70’s that day). It’s going to be in the upper 90’s here in St. Louis today. What is wrong with this picture? Yes indeed, we need to move to Colorado. (We had serious discussions about this. Probably when the kids are out of college. Yay!) I’ve been vacationing in the mountains for 30+ years and I must be a mountain girl at heart. I just love it out there. But I missed all of you! The online capabilities where we were were spotty at best, so I was disconnected. I know - it was probably a good thing. You all kept Susan and the girls extremely busy here while I was gone. They did a great job in filling all of those orders! (I’m thinking that Susan probably needs a vacation now.)

So what did I do while I was gone? I had 3 days in MN, and then flew out to Colorado (Keystone) to vacation with family and friends for a week and a half. I did much knitting. I have 5 new pairs (PAIRS) of socks! Four of them are previous “single socks” that now have partners - whoot! And one pair I knit all at once because I was so in love with the yarn. (Anyone want to hazard a guess as to which yarn I was knitting up?) Pictures of socks on Wednesday’s blog. I need to wash and block them all. It was so fun to get so much knitting done. :-)

DSC00767.JPGWe had fun doing other things as well. We went horseback riding in the mountains. Here, Knitting Daughter, Iowa Girl, and College Guy await their assigned horses. DSC00773.JPGIt was a 90 minute ride up and down the mountain and that seemed to be just about right. I was near the end of the line, so this was my view most of the time. (I was sore after horseback riding, for pete’s sake. How can that be? I don’t ever remember being sore after riding horses as a kid. Jeesh.) I’m thinking if I was sore, it must be good exercise, right? Maybe when we move to Colorado, we’ll have to buy horses. For exercise, you know. Here’s something I learned - if the horse is going to the bathroom, you need to stand up in the stirrups. It takes the pressure off of their kidneys. That’s probably information that you did not need to know. Me, either.

DSC00774.JPGThere was shopping, of course. I had to take Loopy to two of my favorite stores in Breckenridge. The first - Joy of Sox - is almost as fun as knitting your own. Almost. I didn’t buy regular socks there, but I did find some fun footies that have aloe in them and felt like silk. Great to wear to bed. DSC00776.JPGMy other favorite place is Milagros. They have wonderful loaves of all kinds of soaps and I think I went back there on three different occasions this time. :-) My favorite scents there are Glacier and Rain, but my favorite loaf for the design has to be the coffee one. Do you see Loopy perched there in the middle of a few loaves? He liked it there. This is just the entrance to the store. There are tables and tables of these wonderful soap loaves! You can see all of the soaps and order them online here. DSC00824.JPGThey make great gifts. I also caught this sign on one of the shops in Breck. I can’t remember which store it was, but it cracked me up. (There are several great pizza places there. No doubt there are a lot of pizza leftovers being carried about.)

DSC00806.JPGWe took the ski lift to the top of the mountain one day. It’s so beautiful up there. Here is a photo of College Guy and Iowa Girl on the rocks. What a view behind them! These rocks are stuck into the side of the mountain and perfect for climbing. My friend Janice and I did a bit of knitting at the top of the mountain, because there were chairs there that were clearly meant for knitters. We knew as soon as we saw them that they were marked for us. While we were knitting, the kids were sliding down snow hills, so we soon had to abandon the knitting and get the cameras out.

DSC00822.JPGAll of the flowers in Colorado look wonderful. I might even be into gardening if I could do it in cool weather and have such wonderful results. DSC00821.JPGHere, my flowers just seem to …. die. Maybe I ought to water them more often. Yet another reason to move to Colorado asap. We’re going to have to investigate locations more completely.

Ok - now I’m off to get all of your weekend orders out and then answer the eleventy-billion emails that are sitting in my in-box. It’s a good thing Susan and Knitting Daughter are helping again today. Knitting photos on Wednesday, next week’s Sneak Up info on Friday. (Remember - no Sneak Up this week - WH has a LOT of photos to take. Boxes and boxes of stuff came in while we were gone. I’m hoping by Friday we will have a better idea of what will be up next week. For sure, the Wollmeise, because THAT is the yarn that kept me so captivated that I made the second sock immediately after the first. The colors and yarn are amazing.)

Sheri sowhatalldidyoudowhileIwasgonefortwoweeks??