First! Happy Birthday, Camille! 🎉🎂🍻

You are the sunshine in ALL our lives. I am so happy that you have found yourself living your best life in a caring and friendly home, even if it is nearly half a world (and 8 hours time difference) away. I can’t wait to hear more about the BIG BASH in 2026. I’m going to do my best to be there.

With the exception of a couple of weeks in the US visiting family (Franklin, Seattle, Port Townsend, Seattle, Franklin), a trip that deserves its own post, I have spent much of the summer focusing on three things:

  1. Working on my knitting and quilting projects
  2. Over seeing family projects and travel
  3. Getting my back issues sorted through physiotherapy to avoid surgery

The garden, usually my main summer activity, has been a half-hearted undertaking this year. It has run rampant because of the unusually wet year we’ve had (since last July). It’s not so much more rainfall, although it certainly feels like it because it’s a rare day that doesn’t have at least one shower. There’s just been less sun so damp gardens don’t get to really dry up enough for effective weeding and gardening. The growth has been in more “green” and less fruiting. Real rainforest conditions, in other words.

The second reason for a less than tidy garden is item #3 in my list. Last summer, I did something that caused my back issues to flare up… and it didn’t get better. Lots of visits to doctors, lots of massage and physio to just maintain some mobility ensued. I was given three options: 1) do nothing; 2) surgery; 3) noninvasive treatments. I went for #3. After a couple of cortisone injections that didn’t really help, I looked for a physiotherapist who specializes in scoliosis and back injuries using the Schroth method. I found only one—in Dublin. But as things often work out in Ireland, this therapist has treated a few of my husband’s cousins! So I went for an assessment, came home with some exercises (that I didn’t do correctly or often enough because I didn’t know what a “rep” was and confused it with “sets”—don’t laugh. I was never a gym person and never had the use of a personal trainer.) When I returned, I learned how to do them correctly and, in the course of two months doing my exercises RELIGIOUSLY every day, I am now seeing progress. My therapist has also found me a colleague in Cork so I’m hoping to be able to switch and shorten my travel for treatment to less than an hour each way. The trip from my house to the Dublin location took 4 1/2 hours each way using cars, trains and public transport.

In any event, I’ve kind of given up on this year’s garden and will be working in the spring (with help) to redesign some parts of the garden so that they take less maintenance… and room. The shrubs we planted four years ago have outgrown what we expected in terms of space.

The weather (damper and cooler than usual) and less gardening have meant more time for knitting and quilting. I completed two rather large projects from Stolen Stitches: The Galway Blanket and the Thea Blanket. These are not huge bed sized blankets, but at 40”x50”, fairly time consuming. The nice thing was that both were constructed of 10” squares so VERY portable and doable on trains and planes. I also worked on a couple of shawls for other people and finished the  Torc Cardigan which was the Mystery KAL. I think I made it one size too small, and a little too long. I’m going to send it to my sister Andrée who is both taller and skinnier than I am… and then knit another one for me. I do love how it feels. Her birthday is in October, so that would be perfect!

I’ve been quilting like crazy these past few weeks, hoping to get my granddaughter’s quilt done before the 14th of September but I don’t think that’s going to happen. Better to take my time and get the quilting done to my satisfaction than to rush and feel stressed out about it and put in less detail than I think fitting.  But I will keep tipping away, alternating with some of the other knitting projects I have in the pipeline: a cardigan for my sister-in-law, the last two Celtic Knit Club 2024 projects — a wrap and a sweater, the two fall Stolen Stitches KALs. I have promised to make my sister Camille a new quilt to replace the one that got lost in the move. To be honest, I had made that butterfly quilt for her 21st birthday and she turns 63 today. It was well loved and well used—the last time I saw it, it was pretty tattered. My quilting skills over 40 years ago were not what they are today. It was probably tied—not hand quilted. So I found some gorgeous butterfly fabric and will make this one so it will last. Something for her to cuddle up with on her couch in her new home in Port Townsend.

Coming up is the family trip this month to celebrate our 50th wedding anniversary. Five couples, 8 days, 6 hotels, 2 maybe 3 counties (Galway city is a rain day option, and we do pass through Limerick, but we’re mostly in Kerry and Clare), and who knows who we might run into on our way? This is Ireland. It’s smaller than you think.

The two blankets will be coming along for anyone needing a nap on the mini-coach (probably me), as well as any portable quilt/knitting projects. Robbie and I have been planning this all year. Mouse and our house will be cared for by dear friends who are coming here from Dublin for a week’s getaway. I’m hoping to do a post a day with a record of where we’ve been with story snippets and pictures (maybe video). Someone is bringing a drone and everyone will have phone cameras.

In other words, September posts will more than make up for the lack of posts all summer long—at least, that’s the plan. Eight sleeps and counting.

THE LAST WORD/PHOTO: A couple of things seen in Port Townsend that just cracked me up!