Central Ave Hat: Local Yarn & Local Designer

Hats, Hats, Hats! Who could ask for a better summer knitting project than a HAT or in my case SIX hats! Hats are a great traveling summer project! You need to knit only one, no partner is needed. Hats are small, and not hot on your lap. You can challenge yourself and learn a new technique on a small project instead of a sweater.  Need to learn and explore cables there is no short supply of hats designs with cables.  Want to learn color work, twisted sts, texture work . . . the list goes on and what better way to explore a new design/technique while knitting up a hat for yourself or a gift for some knit worthy fan.

Earlier in the summer I knitted two Coming Home hats. I fell in love with this great pattern for several reason.

I have a niece with three young girls who are all very knit worthy gals! They wear everything I have knitted to the point of almost sleeping in what I have knitted.  Not only do they wear all the knitted items, I get great photos with them wearing everything and truly using hats, fingerless mitts, and sweaters.  I am always after a great design to knit for up for them.

My favorite local yarn shop in Montana is really 4.5 blocks from my front door.  LUCKY--right!  The owner and designer (Aimee) is a great gal and this spring and summer she has been on a creative roll which means all her customers have been having a blast knitting up all her new creations. To add to all the fun of knitting a PDS pattern is the Knitting 'N Needle has an in house dyer.  Jennifer, has a great talent for colors and matching up colors with the local surroundings which I LOVE!  You will find yarns with local names such as: Fireweed, Beargrass, Huckleberry, Lupine, Winter Raven, Iceberg, Juneberry, Jewel Basin and the list of colors goes on and on!

PDS Worsted Great Northern

PDS Worsted Depths

PDS Worsted Inspiration

PDS Worsted Lupine

I just completed the last Central Ave Hat.  I knitted four of these beauties this summer. They were a great project on our trip north as it is an easy as can be pattern to follow while being the passenger on our trip.  Great easy knitting around the campfire while enjoying the view with a nice hot or cold drink.

Knitting away on the drive
north in northern BC.

Yukon camp site

Sunrise in the Yukon w/coffee and knitting

Evening time to relax

Making progress on the plane as we head back to the village

The last hat on the needles home in Alaska.

Lucky recipient of the first hat off the needles.  She was the last to get a sweater so she earned the first hat!

Mornings on the Tundra

Good Morning 8-18-16 First light across the tundra and Johnson's Lake I call it Johnson's Pond.

August 17, 2016
If you have been following me for anytime you may have figured out I am a morning person.  I love getting up at 5:00 a.m., heading down stairs to set up the dog food, get the girls out for a short little business trip, back inside, feed the girls, sit down with my cup of coffee and the computer. This routine is mine and I own it!  I cherish the fact, I can do this and love that I can do this consistently.  Once I have checked that the world is still out there . . . since I live about 400 air miles north-west (this means you can only get here by air, dogsled or barge--NO ROADS) from Anchorage checking on my world has some meaning for me.  I check out the knitting world and rarely news at this point in the day.

For example this morning is the first morning that the dogs need their glow stick collars as I call them.  They are not glow sticks but they have that look to them.  The moon is just about full or is full, will need to look on a moon chart. Soon I will need a head lamp to walk the dogs.  I love the transitions of seasons in the far north . . . I feel more connected to the outside world up here as we move through the yearly seasonal fluxes.

Mornings . . . I love a nice morning walk.  We walk almost every day in the morning until full on winter arrives.  Our walk is 2.02 miles out to what is locally know as the tank farm.

The Tank Farm . . . where fuel is stored.

This is where the fuel for heating, and driving is held.  This fuel arrives on barges and whatever price it arrives at is the price for the year.  We walk east out of the village and then back. We cross the slough twice which is great for photos.

Time for a Change

Blogger

Every once and awhile I feel I need to change the old blog.  Possibly move to a different blog server, change everything, start over, oh the list goes on . . . I was going to move over to Word Press for a few reasons and then I said what for!? You know this format just change up the template go for a bit of a newer look and stay put!  Good, bad or indifferent here I am blogger to stay put for some time!  "If it ain't broke don't fix it" mentality is in full swing here!

Work is about to start up here full time once again and the summer holidays will draw to a close.  A new school year full of ups downs and a ton of work.  I am about to have a class this year get this 16 boys and 3 yes just 3 girls!  I am excited, they are a fun group full of energy going every direction!  My challenge is to heard that energy along a positive learning path.

Tundra & Beach Life 

We are back home on the tundra and beach.  This time of the year is when you wish the dang wind would blow!  The bugs are out in full force and I mean BUGS!  Yikes the other night was just brutal out there bugs, bugs, bugs!  I just love being in the wide open space of the tundra despite the dang mosquitoes!  I do wish the winds of winter would blow a bit more in the summer.  

Flying back home and the Unalakleet River from air.

If you look carefully you will see black lines across the slough.  That is the snow fence where we ski and hold most ski practices.  It is known now as the Dragon's Back.

The plane is above our place as we fly in to land.

We have a good variety of mushrooms and this variety can get HUGE!

Sadie keeping an eye just in case something moves so the Akbash in her can warn us! 

My companion . . . dogs just bring so much happiness into one's world!

The expanse of the tundra I love! 

The berries are HUGE and plentiful this season.

My morning walk along the slough.

Day Break

Now life on the beach is a rather stinky place.  Fish litter the beach!  The beach is just covered with salmon decomposing all over the place.  Then you can toss in the occasional seal or beaver carcass rotting from the spring and the smells are just NOT delightful!  Soon the salmon bodies will start to disappear and be replaced by moose carcusses.  We are just never short of dead bodies and body parts for the dogs to roll in, eat and barf up later again . . . 

Yesterday, I took Kuvi, a friends dog out for a beach run.  I get to use Robin's fat tire bike which is a riot to ride.  Kuvi gets a run as he is currently home alone.  He had the chance for all kinds of beach snacks: silvers, humpies, reds . . . seal jerky oh such tasty gross treats!

Fat tire riding in the rain.

Smile says it all: outside, rain, biking all fun!

This my readers is part of a house.  This house came on a barge and it will be put together up the road into a full house.  This is a normal way to get a house here in rural Alaska.  One can order a home to be shipped out to your village/location by a barge. As long as your location is accessible by barge service one can purchase home.

One of the little boys who will be in my class this year keeps bring me flowers.  Smart kid I would say!

Once again it is the that time of the year that we wait for our shipments to arrive.  Cardboard boxes we sent up from Montana.  The totes are from our shopping in Anchorage. We also order frozen meat which we will get next week and fresh produce every week.

Hardware Stores!

I love a good old fashioned hardware store!  I am not talking Home Depot or Lowe's I mean a hardware store a REAL one!  Along the Kootenay lake in British Columbia there is a classic good old hardware store!  Grey Creek Store is a treasure and I hope it never changes!  We always make a point of stopping if we are driving by this treasure!

Reverse Migration North

Highlights from our reverse migration north . . . I am on a bit of blog blitz here just wanting to get myself up to date!  This post is a photo essay of sorts. Photos are not in order at all!

Tally can never ever get enough swim time in . . . she just loves water!

Dos and life is all about the stick!

I would say we are the happiest outside.  We love camping--car camping, backpacking whatever we love sleeping in our tent!

Home on the road!

Life by a campfire . . . 

Our tent mates!

Look at Miss Sadie 8years old and as beautiful as ever.  My dear companion!

Little Miss tally is not a fan of bugs and loves to be snug as a bug.

More knitting along the drive

More swimming and stick action in the Yukon.

Cotton flowers as I call them remind me of punk rockers along hwy in the Yukon.

Our last camp in the Yukon.

Morning yoga in BC 1st morning on the road.

One of the ferry crossings which I just love in BC!

Morning road trip yoga! 

BC logging a huge operation!

Bear Lake morning yoga---I love this campground complete with loons!

One of those cultural events along the way!

Caribou

Are we close to being home yet?

Morning coffee on the road.

Haines Junction Bakery a great treat along the drive.

Yukon break

Yukon break

Yukon break

Our last camp

Our last camp

Our last camp

This greeted us at our last camping site.  I found it very fitting as so many folks can not believe in life itself and one must get up, get going and embrace life to its fullest!