Craft Camp (Retreating) - Part 1

It's been quite a week. Lovely, relaxing, and almost enough crafting...

I got to have a retreat from work-work, housework, the scary economy, the constant rain of bad news (and creepy, negative movie ads - what is with that of late?!?!?), kitty maintenance, hubby support, yada, yada, yada...and I got to craft, pretty much to my heart's content.
I'm home today doing laundry, pestering the husband and kitties and trying to pull together many thoughts and pictures from the weekend.

Some of the folks from my crafting group and I enjoyed a retreat at Bear Cabin Inn. It's in Show Low, Arizona, run by a lovely lady by the name of Carol Webb with her husband Bob.
She has a variety of helpers that come in to help cook and keep us in Crafter's heaven.
This was the first time I got to meet "TC", their elderly Siamese-colored kitty who took a short nap on my chest. (No, I didn't get a picture, but I had a bunch of fawn-colored fur shed on my person that would stand as proof of the encounter.) I did need the kitty-fix, I was missing my own furry monsters.


And there's Maggie, their black Labrador, who...







loves to fetch, announces all visitors, sleeps in a wing-chair in the living room, and she dances in the snow.

Technically, it's supposed to be a "Quilter's Retreat" - but our group is eclectic and we had quilters, knitters (me), needle-pointers, hookers (Rug hooking crafters), cross-stitchers (Debe and I), a sewing maven making spiffy little bags, and a silver clay artist complete with kiln on our retreat.
(I didn't get my quilting stuff pulled together in time else I'd have been in the quilting category too.)

So our retreat started on Thursday with a drive to the White Mountains!


And I took my first out-the-car-window pictures with the digital camera:





















Windshield shot:










There was a detour from I77 on the way up and then there were pauses on the detour (I177) for blasting.
My roomie and I got through pretty easily, but others had to pause for quite a while and even got to feel the bounce of the explosion (I believe the State was moving rocks the "quick" way to widen the road).




Salt River Canyon Pictures!
(This is the one that wasn't blurry...):



Confession - I did a poor job of documenting my trip and the camp pictorially.
There were concerns about battery life, base ignorance on how to document my trip for a blog, and...I just forgot to on occasion.

So we arrived as the first campers in Show Low Thursday afternoon (all others being slowed down by later starts, detours, blasting, and the lure of previously un-visited quilt stores along the way...)

We claimed one of the bedrooms and setup crafting nests in the big work room at Bear Cabin.
This is the view from my chair of the work room. It is from later in the weekend when Martha and Jan had nearly completed the quilt-tops on which they were working (beauteous, aren't they!?!)
Martha was recovering quilt squares she made 10 years ago (when she didn't know much about quilting). I think she did a grand job then AND now!!














The view from my craft table - through the french doors and past the balcony, there's lots of trees and a meadow. Jan's lovely and nearly complete quilt top is on the left.

















Kitty-corner from me.
(Yep, it's a big room!)








The camp includes meals on Friday evening, Saturday breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and brunch on Sunday.
So we explore meal-options Thursday night and Friday morning. We went out to a yummy Barbecue place for dinner Thursday night.

There was more crafting on Friday - I finished the knitting part of my Knit Dr. Bag homework.


3 pockets and 142 inches of I-cord for the handles - Done!






(I have to have this felted before our next class.)

There was also a trip to Amazing quilts. Ok, several trips, but I only made purchases during one.
I fell in love with this Laurel Birch X-mas Fabric (planned for a Tree Skirt) and the "Chocolate" fabric was too much for this chocoholic to resist (and I got a spiffy bag):
















From my seat in the work room at Bear Cabin, I also had a grand view of one of two bird feeders. There were a variety of little finches and what I'm told was a "Tit Mouse" (small, gray, looked like a finch with a cardinal mohawk) but I didn't get any good photos of the little bird stuff.
These Woodpeckers were less wary of me:
























































Next Blog...the Alpaca Farm Field Trip!!