The Very Rich Hours in October 2012

Looking back now it is doesn’t look like much of a list, but as it was happening it felt like I couldn’t cram one more thing into this busy month.  Both Roger and I had a lot of projects coming to fruition this month--Things that we’d been working on all year.

 

It began gently enough, the weather unseasonably fine, no rain for many weeks, records being broken.  I joined the island’s walking group on a walk to Cattle Point Lighthouse.

 

 And of course, Roger was again involved in the second annual Farm Parade.  This year, I got to ride in the truck with him, pumpkin man riding with us in the back.

 

 

Midmonth, the weather turned to its normal, rainy conditions, and is still trying to make up for lost time.  But I managed to drive to Olympia and then Rockaway Beach, Oregon in beautiful weather, stopping to have lunch overlooking Canon Beach.

 The reason for this trip South by myself was my attendance at the Columbia Basin Basketry Guild’s Fall Retreat.  I’d been wanting to go for several years, conflicts had always arisen.  This year I was determined to go despite the fact that the Barreca’s were meeting the very weekend of the retreat in Olympia at my sister’s for our annual early Thanksgiving celebration (Thankstween)

 

So I decided to go for just two days and three nights and signed up for one giant two day basketry class—making my own cedar hat.  I would leave Saturday morning and be back in Olympia in time for the big dinner party with 28 other family members.  Unfortunately, the weather going back up to Washington was unruly, I passed through several squalls (or did they pass through me?)  The roads were dicey, but I made it to my sister’s and had a nice visit with the family.  My husband, however, had gotten sick in the meantime and was unable to join us. L

 

 

 As soon as I got back home, it was all about the all-Island Textile Guild Meeting, that I, as SJ Island rep, was in charge of hosting.  We had a new venue, and a great speaker from Whidbey Island.  Also, I had decided to run the first ever “bag raffle” which meant collecting articles to raffle from the members, sorting, and bringing in the infrastructure to show off the items.  Thanks to the hard work of a core group of guild members, the meeting worked out great.

 Having no time to rest, the very next day, Thornbush was spotlighted for a “Farm Tour” as part of the “Savor the San Juans” festival, the festival that had started so many weeks earlier with the Farm parade.  Roger had been working all month to get the place ready, but the big push to make everything beautiful came in this last week.  It rained and poured all week and we weren’t expecting much of a turnout, but on Sunday, it stopped raining and the sun even peaked out for a minute or two.  There wasn’t a big rush of people touring, but a steady little dribble all day long.

 

Of course, out in the real world, the Presidential debates are changing the course of history, the Giants sweep the Tigers in the World Series, and the biggest damn storm ever hits the east coast.  Meanwhile . . .

 Monday, good friends from Seattle visited and left yesterday and today I got into costume and was able to show off my newly-made cowboy hat.  And so October comes to a close.