What Have I Been Doing Since June?

Holy smokes. I've been neglecting my once beloved blog. What on earth have I been up to since June? Well, I did the holy terror ride known as "The Triple Bypass". Unfortunately for me I did it with the beginning of an injury and ended up with a complete injury which sidelined me for 6 weeks. "The Triple" as it's lovingly referred to, is 120 miles over 3 mountain passes. My riding buddy Arnie and I started so early that the first descent down Squaw Mountain felt like a polar ride. The sun was up but not high enough to hit the road. It was a little chilly and hard to keep a grip on the handlebars and brakes because even my full finger gloves weren't enough to keep my digits from freezing into a painful position. But I've done it, and don't ever have to do it again. The ride serves as a sort of Rite of Passage for the riders around here and now I've got the bragging rights. yeehaw

In August we had the 1st Annual Guthrie Ride to honor our friend Bob Guthrie and raise money for his pet project, the Swan Mountain Rec Path. We had over 400 riders register and almost everyone showed up despite the horrendous weather. So many people worked really hard to make this ride a reality and they should be really proud of a job well done. Hopefully next year we can get twice as many people and some warm sunshine.

In October we went on a bike trip to Japan. We spent the majority of our time in the northeast corner on the island of Hokaido, which is where this photo was taken. The riding was great most of the time. One or two of the roads were a little to trucky for my taste but all in all it was a great ride. After Hokaido we went to Nara and Kyoto. These locations were amazing. Lots of old temples, gardens, etc. I loved the food. Not just because it tastes so good but it's so low fat that no matter how much we ate, we didn't gain any weight. yeah. So bottom line is that biking in Japan, even on the island of Honshu which is heavily populated, is really a wonderful experience. There a lots of narrow back roads with very little traffic and some great climbs. One or two of which I couldn't get all the way up. Serious incline on some of their roads.

Since returning home I've made a evening gown, which I draped myself. I had two weeks to get it done as we were going to the Respite Care Ball in Fort Collins. This dress was a pretty big challenge for me as I was copying, as best I could, a dress designed by Diane Von Furstenberg. I had only seen the dress in an American Express commercial and on her website. The print she used is pretty graphic so it's hard to see where the seams are so it took me quite a while to come up with what I thought was the pattern. I think she may have used a knit of some kind, but I used silk and did the entire dress on the bias. Sewing on the bias takes a special kind of dedication and stubbornness. So here's the final product. I'm a better seamstress than I am a photographer. The red trim on the hem was my own artistic license. The necklace and matching earrings were made by galpal Penny. Thanks Pen. One niggly little issue with this dress was undergarments. As it's quite wide over the shoulders and dips down pretty good in the back, hiding bras and spanks was tricky. Things were patched together under there. One of these days I'll think to put the undergarments on the dress form before I start draping!

By the way, I'd like to nominate the inventor of Spanks for the Nobel Peace Prize. Hey, if Al Gore can win it for making a movie, the inventor of Spanks should be no brainer. I think I'll start a letter writing campaign to the folks who make these decisions.

So what am I doing now? Well, I'm a grammy in waiting so I'm knitting my first ever baby sweater. Knitting for babies is liking working on tiny models. Everything is miniaturized. The yarn, the needles, the size of the pieces. I'm not really loving this. As soon as I get this little number finished, I'm going to work on something life sized. I'm trying to figure out how to adjust a regular pattern to to a maternity pattern. I'm not really sure what I'm doing but I did find an article on www.knitty.com so hopefully that will help. And I'm also making a coat for the incubator otherwise known as Jill. She has barely managed to get a little bump going so there is no dire need for the coat yet. My goal is to have it under the tree. I'm also working on converting a pair of regular jeans to maternity jeans and I want to knock out a couple t-shirts based on the ones we saw at Gap Maternity. I'm busy busy busy.

And to make time management (never my strong suit to begin with) more challenging, it hasn't stopped snowing for more than 24 hrs at a stretch since the day after Thanksgiving and so I'm trying to get in some skiing, skate skiing, skinning and hopefully snowboarding. AND I still have to get in 3 days of volunteering for the Nordic Center to earn my free pass. Of course, it may take until closing day as they seem a tad disorganized with the right hand keeping secrets from the left hand. I may just have to break down and pay for the dang pass.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BIG BROTHER DENIS. I hope the day is wonderful. Yikes, it's son-in-law Dillon's birthday in two days. I wonder if any of the gifts I ordered online will be here by then. Doubt it, as I did it all yesterday. I'm having a cyber Christmas this year. If I can't order it online you probably aren't going to get it. And it better be on sale or have free shipping. Damned economy!

So, that's what I'm doing and I better get back to doing it.