Jan is Here!

What better way to celebrate National Crochet Month than having one of my best crochet buddies here visiting for 2 weeks! We are going to have such a great time. Jan’s flight got in Friday just before noon and we had some fun playing in Boulder before heading back to my mountain home.

We had lunch at Mad Greens and then our desert was some yummy french fries from 5 Guys, our favorite. We decided we’d better walk off those fries, so we headed across Boulder to visit Shuttles Spindles and Skeins yarn store. We did our walk while moseying around the store, petting yarn and drooling over buttons.

A few buttons decided that they needed to go home with Jan. There was also some Southwest Trading yarn she couldn’t resist.

I had to adopt some buttons too, and a lovely ball of Berocco Mixer.

Saturday I taught at the Longmont Yarn Shoppe and Jan joined me there as one of my students. She has been wanting to take my Perfect Fit Crocheted Hat class for ages, so the timing of her trip worked out perfectly for her to get to be one of my students this weekend.

Both of us are keeping track of our daily steps, so we decided to get a walk in at one of the Longmont parks beforehand. Since it is very muddy and slushy up here on the mountain, not to mention a tad colder than down in the plains. Our first choice of a park was busy with a special event so we headed across town and ended up at Lefthand Creek Park.

There is a nice paved path around the park, as we explored we discovered that there were art installations all along the way.

The first sculpture we met were these “interesting” ants, they sort of freaked us out.

We really liked this snake. The tile work was amazing and the sculpture is actually functional as the head of the snake is a drinking fountain. We didn’t try it to see if it worked though.

We turned around a headed back to the car after we reached these wonderful Dr. Seussian looking “trees”. We decided we would have to go down again and attempt to do the entire path to see all the other artwork.

After a quick stop at the grocery store for a few items, we headed on over to the yarn shop for some pre-class shopping and I set-up for my class.  Students get a discount at the shop the day of their class, so of course Jan needed more yarn.

She obtained two lovely hanks of Raven Ridge Hand-Painted Yarn’s “Alight” 50% Merino, 50% Silk. The color is outside her usual palette, but is really gorgeous.

Then she needed to adopt a ball of the luscious Berroco Boboli Lace.

During the class Jan and one other student finished their class project very quickly. I had the students practice measuring and making hats to fit “heads” which were whiffle balls. Jan and I decided the holes in the balls actually make these look like they are little faces. Next time I teach this though I think I need to use “egg” shapes. Fortunately with Easter right around the corner I should be able to find some that will be just the right size.

Next weekend is the Longmont Yarn Shoppe’s annual retreat. We are going to be hanging out with other yarn enthusiasts and eating great food at the Sunrise Ranch in Loveland, Colorado. It’s a long weekend, Friday thru Monday, a nice amount of time away from my boys and family responsibilities.  So I’ll likely be posting after we return on the following Tuesday.