A GRAD, A WEDDING, AND SOME CELEBRATIONS!

River's elementary school held a 'leaving' ceremony day before yesterday -- it was adorable, but it's also hard to imagine that my middle grandson will be 'middle' school come September! It was dark in the gym so the pics didn't turn out very well...


The video is only slightly better (and short)!


I also got to spend some extra time with Gibson the same day -- we walked right out to the end of the breakwater and back!


We watched a huge sailboat being unloaded from that yacht freighter, but more importantly (because Gibson found it far more interesting!), we watched this great blue heron wrestle with a baby eel for several minutes .... before dropping it back into the water!


Yesterday I made it out to the spinning group and managed to knit about 4 rows on the never-ending blanket -- which has to end today because it's going up-Island tomorrow, gift-wrapped, for Dave and Vicky's wedding. I think I've told about three different people this week that I'll see them at Friday Knit'n'Cafe ... and I won't be there!

Today is Canada Day and although I'll mostly be knitting, I am intending to make it down to Ogden Point for the start of the Vic-Maui sailboat race (I'll be watching/cheering for 'Kinetic')... and of course we have 'front row seats' on the bridge of the Wind Walker, for tonight's fireworks!

In the next few days I'll be posting details for a contest -- in addition to putting another FibreFest to bed and finishing my 50th pair of socks, we also celebrated 12 years aboard the Wind Walker YESTERDAY ... AND my 6th 'blogiversary' is in a few days. Sounds like lots of good reasons to celebrate, doesn't it?

AAAAAAAHHHHHHHH....

After a weekend at Albert Head, I feel rejuvenated and ready to take on the world ... or at least the tasks at hand!

This is what my weekend looked like... first we drove down to Clover Point to see if the wind was bad.... it wasn't, and we saw this pretty little classic boat heading out:


Then on the way out to our favorite anchorage, we passed a tenant from our marina who was out for a 'day sail' with friends:

We 'tucked in' behind the point like we always do, and enjoyed the 'cast of characters' who joined us at various times:





We had two lovely days and nights, and we never even got off the boat (in the inflatable) to go to the beach, or off exploring or anything!

Yesterday morning we knew the wind would be coming up so we up-anchored and came back in to the harbour -- but we weren't ready to come home to our marina yet, so we tied up at the downtown dock for the day instead, and had this view for awhile:


On the way in, we passed one of those yacht transport freighters, at Ogden Point:

And we were variously entertained...

This couple was up the mast of their sailboat...

This little girl was literally swinging on the boom...

And, just so you know, much knitting took place ...

This blanket WILL be ready to give as a wedding present this coming Friday for sure!

Got home around supper time last night, and today will be a busy one -- Michael has his second cataract surgery this morning, and River 'graduates' from elementary school this afternoon!

IT'S KELP.... IT'S A ROCK... IT'S A ....

...gray whale!



And it has apparently been hanging around the Victoria harbour for several days now, coming in as far as Fisherman's Wharf!

I finally made it down to Clover Point night before last for the first time since the FibreFest, and there it was, about 100' off, in the kelp bed. We hear, every year, of one or two grays spotted around here, but that's the first time I've seen one.

We are hoping to get out to Albert Head this weekend -- we've been too tired to get ready to go rest!

FIBREFEST HIGHLIGHTS: A PICTORIAL

SURVIVED ANOTHER FIBREFEST!

And it was wonderful, again!

The Friday night dinner and fashion show was a bit smaller than it's been (we sold only 60 tickets -- last year it was at least 75) but the food was somewhat better, and the fashion show was amazing, as always. I have much better pictures coming, but here's Ursa from Gaia's Colours, who sponsored the evening ...

And a bit of the crowd...

The day at Saxe Point started out cold and a bit windy, but by about 2 pm the sun was out, the wind had died and it was glorious ... and I haven't got a single picture to show you! Other people do, though, so I'll post some as soon as I have them. I realized this morning that I don't even have a single photo of Cat Bordhi, so I sure hope someone took some and will share them with me!

Much more to come about FibreFest 2010 .... I did pretty much nothing yesterday, and hope to do about the same today. Oh... but I did manage, some time in the past two weeks, to finally finish my 50th pair of socks! Between that and surviving the FibreFest and the fact that it's my 6th blogiversary in 12 days, I intend to celebrate by launching a contest of some kind soon, so stay tuned!

VICTORIA FIBREFEST!!

Even though we had World Wide Knit in Public Day and Spin Around the Spindle last week, I still think of the 'real' Victoria FibreFest as the event that starts tonight with our dinner and fashion show. Of course, I still have 217 details to take care of today, but I'm getting excited now, too -- I've seen some of the pieces that will be in tonight's show, and they're stunning!

Meanwhile, I mentioned a few entries ago that we started a prayer shawl for Linda, a member of our little spinning circle who was in a serious car accident a few weeks ago. Wendy and Rosalie went to see her yesterday and gave her the finished shawl...

I think she liked it. :-) Linda has a long way to go to heal, though, so that smile is in spite of being in a lot of pain.

If you're local (or not too far away), I hope to see you this weekend at the Victoria FibreFest!

CONGRATULATIONS, GEORGIANNA

A week or two ago, I got an email that *wasn't* FibreFest-related from an old friend who lives in Whitehorse, Yukon. It simply said, "Care to come to my convocation?"

I've never attended anyone's convocation before, so I wasn't sure what to expect, but it was completely lovely!

Waiting for her name to be called...

Congratulating the Class of 2010:


Congratulations, Georgianna, I'm SO proud of you!