Ferns and Foliage – possibly for the yard?

These would definitely add color and texture to our yard. I am hopeful some of these species may be friendly to shade? Since our yard is pretty high on shade and low on sun.

These three seem to be three varieties of the same plant. A plant which I think I used to have but may have finally killed after three years. I have faith that if I had this plant again I could help it survive.

Flowers – inside or outside? Sun or Shade?

Everyone is aware of how much I love this shade of orange, right?

I kind of love everything about this flower. The round petals and the color.

A sweet looking flower that may choose to grow wild in my yard?

I love how this guy looks like he could be right out of a Dr Seuss book!

For the unidentified flowers and ferns (which is basically all of these) does anyone know the variety?

We had a great time hanging out at the winery in the village after touring the house. We toured the production area which was very interesting. Then we headed over to talk to the Smithy. On the way we may have taken a short detour to check out some of the mohair fleece they have for processing demonstrations. We spent a good while talking to the apprentice blacksmith who actually happened to be from Ohio. So many cool tools to check out that have barely changed since they were invented. You know what they say, “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”

The next morning there was a break in the weather so we headed back to the Biltmore to get some pictures outside of the house and a few more in the gardens in the daylight.

I found several flowers that I would love to see if I can grow somewhere in my house or yard. I do however need to get some better gardening skills before I can invest in a ton of flowers. Heh.

After we left the Biltmore we drove over to Tennessee to take a drive on the infamous Tail of the Dragon. It’s an 11-mile stretch of highway with 318 curves in the road. It’s quite popular with the motorcycle crowd and the touring crowd. The locals aren’t always too thrilled to have to drive up and down the road though when they’re in a hurry.

We had a good time and did three passes before heading up to Maryville, where we stayed on a mountaintop. Driving up and down the mountain was an adventure in itself and the boy definitely got his fill of driving super windy roads. It was a bit nice to finally get onto straight roads when we drove back to Ohio the next day. This place is a new bed & breakfast and the owners are wonderful hosts. We had a great time relaxing up there and are hoping to get back again some time.

One of the best parts about finally getting home after a long and very rainy drive was a phone call telling us to go out and get the big stick off our shed. After some prompting the boy went to check it out and we found that his parents had left us a super comfortable swing for our lanai. (I had to wait until the next day to get pictures.)

All in all it was a great anniversary trip. I think we’ll try to do something each year for our anniversary from here on out.

As proof of my exploits I give you one of my favorite pictures from our sneak peek photos.

Enjoying our hobbies in our finery.

These are the photos our photographers put into a slideshow during our reception. The rest of the pictures won’t be available for another 1-3 weeks.

The boy purchased a fancy Nikon D5000 as my wedding gift so in theory you should see a lot more pictures around here. Lord knows I took enough on the honeymoon. It may just depend on whether I get too hung up on processing and sorting to get around to posting.

The jet travel also lent some great knitting time. I am on row 6 of Chart D of my Ishbel shawl. 3 more rows and then the bind off. Maybe if I got off this silly computer I could get it finished during this trip. Once I landed in Denver I hung out for a bit waiting on my colleagues to arrive then we were off to work. I am looking forward to working on this project again and it’s always nice to get out of the house periodically and see my colleagues in person. Alright off to work on Ishbel a bit before I fall asleep. G’night.

After hanging with his cousins we drove closer in to DC to visit my friend who is working up there on a TDY from her TDY. Ahh government jobs, they always keep ya on your toes. We had a good visit and she took us out to eat to celebrate our engagement. The boy spent a lot of time playing with her cat by getting the cat to chase a laser around the hotel room. It was rather fun to watch. Sunday we moseyed into town and I finally got to go see the wonder that is G Street Fabrics. For those of you local to the c-bus, it’s a fabric shop that is probably bigger than the old Lazarus basement. I was a bit stunned at all the selection. I wish we had such a shop closer to home. Alas, the only project I knew the exact quantities of fabric I needed, they did not have the fabric I needed so I left without buying anything. But I did take a picture.

G Street Fabrics - View down 2/3 of the store

Then we headed into Alexandria where I went to Knit Happens and snatched up some Yarn Love – Charlotte Bronte Worsted. I have been wanting to try their yarns for awhile and I finally had a chance to see them in person before buying. I also snatched up a lovely little shawl pin to use with the shawl I was working on during the road trip. (More on the shawl later) All in all it was a good visit and I was happy to make it home and fold myself into bed.

I headed over to the Tilli Tomas booth to find yarn to make Sahara as well as the pattern. They didn’t have the worsted weight silk there but they did have the DK Plie. Unfortunately they were out of Atmosphere which is the colorway of the worsted sequined silk that I got last year. Fortunately Tracy is awesome and shipped some to my house. That would be the yarn that showed up while I was in Germany. Now that I have all the pieces I s’pose I should get around to knitting it eh? Oh and I also bought some Beaded Plie because I felt like it and it was pretty. Any ideas what to make with 120 yds of DK beaded silk?

Beaded Plie by Tilli Tomas

Plie by Tilli Tomas

Highland Heathers

STR Lightweight Mill Ends

one pound of Alpaca roving

Wollmeise in Fratello

I may even be a little sad to go home tom’w. I really have had such a splendid time on this trip!

Oh and here’s a shot of the pub.

Oftentimes I order in a pidgin German/English hand gesture manner and get something that tastes good but isn’t always what I was expecting.

The bit that surprised me the most though was the California roll. It was no where near the kind of hard and flavorless California rolls we get over here. Soo yummy! Too bad I didn’t get a picture of that. We were all stuffed by the end although I probably could have eaten more. Oh and here’s a pic of my colleague’s Pils.