A Dull Roar

Things should get back to normal today. At least I am hoping so.

It has been a week of non-stop running around. The Blueberry was one thing but when I got home there were several days with plans made and activities to complete. Yesterday was swim day.  As I said I had been invited to join the seniors swim day... and even though I am not a senior, I decided to take them up on it. The Community Events Coordinator for several years has been trying to get a group of people interested in twice a month (every second Tuesday) taking the Lion's Club van (which is a 15 seat passenger van) and heading off to an indoor swimming pool in Chetwynd, which is about a 45 minute drive away from our town. We have a pool here in our town but it is an outdoor pool and shuts down  during the winter. So most people in the winter time head off to the Chetwynd pool which has a really great indoor pool. So there is a lot of interest from seniors around here but none serious enough to take the Events coordinator up on her proposal. Some times she get three or four people but some times she gets none and it is hard to justify this program if there is no one to swim.  So she has been looking around the community to find extras who will join in this program. Insert me. I am a stay at home mom and while I am not a senior,... I am creeping up there and the Events Coordinator is a good friend of mine. It seemed like the right thing. So yesterday we headed off for a day of two hours of swimming. It was great. 30 lengths I did which turns out to be almost a kilometre of swimming. It was a beautiful day and the roads were awesome and once again I forgot to take pictures.... I know I am pathetic. I felt great.... until last evening.... but that is another story. Before I get to that I have a few photos to post of the Blueberry retreat.

In hind sight I'm kicking myself because I really didn't bring along my camera... I thought that the camera on my iPhone would be good enough.... it wasn't... It sucked. So here are a few pictures of what was going on at the Blueberry and to those who had their picture taken but didn't get it posted it probably is because the image was just too blurred to keep.

Now this picture needs some explaining. It is an image of Noah's Ark... but it it not just that... It is the coolest image ever because the whole image is made with 234 smaller images. The whole image is made up of small four inch square images done in colour schemes so that when they are put together they colouration makes it look like Noah's Ark.  This mural was hanging on the wall of the Blueberry's big room. The Blueberry in actuality is a summer Christian Bible camp... in winter they rent the main building which is a huge log building, to anyone who wants to use it for retreats. The Scrapbookers use it quite frequently and so do the quilters and then there's us spinners and weavers. It has a huge dining area that we set up tables in to work at. But there is another room off the main room that has a mic and amps and guitars and drums and it is where they have their church type services. That's where this image was hanging and I liked it so much I thought I should take a picture of it.  For my level 5 homework I have to design a skein of yarn based on a photograph or image of some kind and when I saw this image it gave me something to think about.... I think I will base my skein on this image.

This is two of the spinner and weavers that I have such a good time with. They are a laugh a minute but they would say that so am I... Norma is on the left and she was a Home Ec teacher for years and years then Marjorie is on the right and she feeds the five thousand. She works with street people because her church puts off once a week a free lunch for street people.... so she literally feeds the five thousand... only with more than just a few bread and fishes.  Now while I organize the food for the Blueberry.... these two ladies keep the kitchen running and keeps us all in order. They are awesome. Always they are working to make sure we are not poisoned with food that has been left out too long and also they take food out and get it ready for eating... they are wow and amazing.

 Marjorie was finishing several scarves and hats... this is one of her scarves.

 Now here are Linda who's the money lady.... we pay her for our retreat.... and in the background is Mary.... she likes balls... and to be exact, she likes the balls of Arne and Carlos!

And here are the balls of Arne and Carlos....

Don't Arne and Carlos have nice balls.... (you can see why we laugh so much while we are at the Blueberry! We do tend to be a little like a bunch of 14 year olds giggling over anything to do with sex.) By the way Mary had a go at knitting Arne's and Carlos' balls and I think they are really awesome.

 Linda had finished the purple scarf and then she was working on some spinning too.

Cheryl was working on her tapestry and she also was working on a pair of knitted gloves which only had the fingers left to be knitted. The tapestry is awesome... but very time consuming.

This is a sample sized picture of one of my level five homework skeins. This is my garnetted yarn. It is a very pretty black merino with colourful silk noils blended in. I was very happy with it.

One of our members from FSJ while we were at Blueberry was going through a life altering and dreadful experience.  She was in hospital having surgery for Breast Cancer.  So our minds were very much on her.... and we missed her dreadfully at the retreat. She is not the first of our group to go through Breast cancer and cancer in general. In the last year or two our group has been hit over and over again with cancer if not in our members then in their husbands. So two years ago we decided that we would start making comfort blankets for those in distress... whether it be in the form of cancer or just distress of illness or loss of a loved one. The idea was that 15 inch squares would be knit by various members of the group and then donated to a stash held by one of the members till such time as it would be needed for one of our members. But we have not been able to get ahead of the people we love finding themselves in a stressful health situation. I have begun knitting one on my own... I am determined to try to get something done so that maybe we can get ahead of the game.

It is dreadful to watch your friends dropping like flies... sometimes they get up again but sometimes they don't.

So last night I was working on my comfort blanket which is a dark green only... later I will add another colour but I have no idea what colour I'll use. That's when the swimming of yesterday morning began to make itself known. By the time bed rolled around last night I was so sore that I'm sure my neck and shoulders even looked red. It was terrible. I went to bed early hoping that that would help... but eventually I had to get up and open the bottle of Tylenol. This morning things are feeling pretty good.

I'm sure today will finally be a time of settling down... and getting back into the swing of things. You know that dull roar I'm hoping for.

I'll let you know if today was a dull roar....see ya tomorrow.